warforged | sometimes you can't make it

Who: Alexstrasza, Krasus/Korialstrasz, and the Redsworn
What: Successful retreat into the Ruby Sanctum
Where: Ruby Sanctum
When: After a long, grueling battle near the borders of Suramar
Warnings: Please PM the mods if any warnings are needed

[The Ruby Sanctum is a flurry of activity. This becomes clear within two seconds of stepping through the portal. The wounded are guided over to a grassy clearing surrounded by saplings and adolescent trees, bade to lay down and receive healing from other dragonkin. Some of the trees are years old, while a few look to have shot up recently. If you watch, vines engulf one fallen warrior; the body sinks into the ground, and a tiny sapling appears in its place.

Despite the war going on outside, the sanctum is less of a cavern and more like a self-contained dimension. Ample sunlight drifts down through scarlet leaves, which are occasionally home to the crimson scales of a whelpling. There is life everywhere: insects on twigs, birds chirping overhead, flowers at your feet. Dragon eggs lay nestled in the nooks and crannies offered by the tranquil forest. There is a decently-sized spring filled with fresh, pure water, as well as some small rocky outcroppings to sleep in. It's warm and comfortable enough to rest out in the open, too.

The cloaked and ever-mysterious Krasus stands watching the dispersing redsworn, his back against the massive oak in the center of the sanctum.

Occasionally, one may glimpse a beautiful red-haired woman with copper skin winding through the copse.]

[ooc: Mingle log for redsworn!]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

She didn't remember him.

That didn't surprise Mar... nor did it particularly bother him. The Legion rampaging around were of a power and ferocity he'd only seen once, thanks to the intervention of the Bronze Dragonflight and a merry trip back to the Well of Eternity's final moments; that and the incredibly strange assortment of companions he'd found himself surrounded by spoke volumes. Perhaps this was an alternate timeline, or some weird past or future. Whatever the case...

Eh, he'd been through worse. So he swept the Dragon Queen a great bow.

"This would be the... Outland, Howling Fjord, Vashj'ir, Pandaria -- fifth time I've deployed to a new land only to find myself immediately wrapped up in a conflict of large-to-colossal size. They do all start to look the same after a while, although this was the first time I had to drag dragons around instead of slaying forty of whatever opposed me. And if I'm being entirely honest, I've visited the Ruby Dragonshrine before."

"Fifth time?"

Easily impressed and shocked at the same time, she looks him over intently. Five times he's been deployed to foreign lands and this isn't the first he's been to her sanctum?

"Have we met before?" It's becoming something of a habit to ask this, but after speaking with Krasus in private? There's no telling anymore. "Please forgive me for not remembering... The timelines are a tricky matter that are beyond my understanding."

She was still an Aspect, here. Of course she didn't remember him -- she no longer was one in the Azeroth he knew. Remembering that made everything much clearer.

"There's nothing to remember. Our meetings were in my past but your future, I'm sure of it. Looks like someone broke time again..." He sighed, glancing around as if he expected some of the random people standing around to suddenly cast aside their concealing illusions and reveal themselves to be members of the Infinite. "If you tell me what is going on, I can perhaps at least figure out when I am."

"My future..." She pauses and considers pointing him in the direction of Krasus.

"You would have better luck speaking about current events with my adviser." She explains calmly. "For now, I wish to spend the limited time I have in getting to know everyone. Do you understand?"

After everything he had been through, the dismissal stung a little -- but honestly, he was very disappointed in himself for letting it. Outwardly, he saluted smartly, slapping a hand to his chest. "My blade is yours, Dragon Queen."

"You have my thanks."

She eyes him, wondering what she can say or do next to get him to open up. "Have you fought these fiends before?"

"I've fought the Burning Legion a few times... but I'm not entirely certain how much I should tell you. If this is the past, knowledge of the future might drastically change it. Although." He looked down at himself, very clearly a blood elf here where blood elves shouldn't even exist were this any time before the Third War. "That may already be too late."

"I cannot claim if your words ring true or not as that is not my domain. However, if you wish to keep your secrets from me, then I ask you share your experiences with your new allies."

Shaking her head, "The last thing we all want is for blood to be shed when it could be prevented."

"Don't worry." Reflexively, Mar glanced over his shoulder at the rim of the Dragonshrine, in a direction he knew as bone-deep as his own name. If this were the Azeroth he knew at the time he knew it, he would be looking in the exact direction of Icecrown Citadel. "I'll spare no words in explaining just why they should fear the Legion, why they should hate it, and why they should oppose it."

He wanted to explain everything he could, but -- just to pick an example at random -- how could he possibly tell her that in his past, she had been captured by the orcish war machine and subjugated to provide mounts for Horde dragonriders? That's not just the kind of thing one ought to just come out and say...

"Oh! I should say that there's a corrupted Dragonflight called the Infinite which is constantly trying to meddle in time to weaken Azeroth's resistance to the Burning Legion. This might have something to do with them!"

Another Dragonflight? The Infinite? It's enough to cause alarm within her, but none of it shows as her gaze remains steady as ever. Whatever she may be thinking won't come to mind, but this is something she'll bring up to Krasus later.

"Good to know." A flight that is akin to the Bronze Dragonflight when it came to their powers? Then again, Krasus was here as well and that was just as confusing as the rest. "Who is their leader?"

"That... hell with it, I'm sure Nozdormu knows." And no one else would believe him. "The leader of the Infinite is Murozond, who rules it from a distant possible future in which Azeroth has fallen to the whoa shouldn't tell you that one!" He held up his hands like a barrier between them. He had no doubt that Alexstraza could do basic anagrams, but was Neltharion even Deathwing at this point?

"Uh, anyway! Usually the Bronze Dragonflight would send people back in time in period-appropriate disguises to put right what they were trying to screw up, but now here are a bunch of us looking blatantly out of place, so I wonder..."

He was, but not to her. He won't be Deathwing to her for a very, very, very long time. As problematic as her thoughts are when it comes to Neltharion himself, he does raise a more valid concern.

"We will need to outfit you properly." Disguises aren't really going to work out so well, but giving them proper armor can be of some use. "I will speak to Krasus and make it happen."

"I hope not too properly. I'm rather fond of what I'm wearing. But some of the allies we've got here are definitely short in the armor-and-weapons department." To put it mildly...

sometimes you can't make it

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