an enigma wrapped in a shyness burrito (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
bumbles) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
exsiliumlogs2013-08-13 04:22 pm
bumbles) wrote in exsiliumlogs2013-08-13 04:22 pm
Entry tags:
head after head, and never heads enough
Date & Time: The Reign of Terror: 23rd March, 1794 – 6th April, 1794
(forward dated to: 15th-22nd August, Exsilium time.)
Location: Paris, France
Characters: Margaery “awww yisss” Tyrell (shrewdly ) & Adonis “why me” Casey ( bumbles )
Summary: Secret messages hidden in paintings! Fancy stuff! Impractical clothing! Art theft! Pearl clutching! Le fromage! Abuse of exclamation points! Or you can look here!
Warnings: really bad puns, A Song of Ice & Fire factor, possibly painful historical inaccuracies and the occasional beheading.
But let's not get distracted; that's a few months before this fine tale of adventure and silk stockings.
Translation technology, fake names and profiles, a base of operations that is actually just a room in an inn, and extra equipment for staging an art heist. There's no way this could possibly go wrong.
Adonis Casey wasn't quite sure what he'd done to deserve this; he wasn't quite sure what Margaery had done, either. It wasn't quite what he'd imagined, when he'd thought about missions being given out based on your qualifications. To be honest, he wasn't quite sure what he had imagined, because it didn't seem all that likely. Blood saturated wood, cartwheels rattling over uneven streets, and rats scurrying underfoot were definitely not what he'd ever thought about when he imagined Paris, at least.
Now, he's not exactly good with history, but art history he can handle. There was all manner of awful things to piece together about the Reign of Terror, even if he tended to think of Delacroix, Liberty Leading the People - never mind if it was some forty years after the fact, or David's Death of Marat-- that had to have been painted this year, he'd realized after they arrived, though it hardly mattered.
War with Europe, desperation and fear rippling through Paris with the British capturing of Toulon. Whispers of the counter-Revolution tearing apart the struggle of the past four years, and of promises never being realised escalated. Desperate measures: dangerous ones, including the suspension of the hard-won new French constitution. The Committee of Public Safety was to protect France in her time of need, from the corruption of those who would undermine the revolution, though it didn't do much to protect France's population. People are careful: madame and monsieur are not to be used, only Citizen. A slip of the tongue is enough to warrant the slide of the guillotine into your neck, and it's safer to turn in someone else than risk being named disloyal.
None of his classes on oils and canvas had been sufficient, as it turned out. None of it had done anything to really brace him for the way viscera and filth invaded each breath. Sticky heat makes the stench cling to his skin, along with lace and fine embroidery.
It'll be fine. They just need to be steady, just keep from getting ahead of themselves.
(forward dated to: 15th-22nd August, Exsilium time.)
Location: Paris, France
Characters: Margaery “awww yisss” Tyrell (
shrewdly ) & Adonis “why me” Casey ( bumbles )Summary: Secret messages hidden in paintings! Fancy stuff! Impractical clothing! Art theft! Pearl clutching! Le fromage! Abuse of exclamation points! Or you can look here!
Warnings: really bad puns, A Song of Ice & Fire factor, possibly painful historical inaccuracies and the occasional beheading.
“The goal of the constitutional government is to conserve the Republic; the aim of the revolutionary government is to found it... The revolutionary government owes to the good citizen all the protection of the nation; it owes nothing to the Enemies of the People but death.”
- Robespierre, 25th December, 1793.
“Terror is nothing other than prompt, severe, inflexible justice.”
- Robespierre, 5th February 1794.
But let's not get distracted; that's a few months before this fine tale of adventure and silk stockings.
Translation technology, fake names and profiles, a base of operations that is actually just a room in an inn, and extra equipment for staging an art heist. There's no way this could possibly go wrong.
Adonis Casey wasn't quite sure what he'd done to deserve this; he wasn't quite sure what Margaery had done, either. It wasn't quite what he'd imagined, when he'd thought about missions being given out based on your qualifications. To be honest, he wasn't quite sure what he had imagined, because it didn't seem all that likely. Blood saturated wood, cartwheels rattling over uneven streets, and rats scurrying underfoot were definitely not what he'd ever thought about when he imagined Paris, at least.
Now, he's not exactly good with history, but art history he can handle. There was all manner of awful things to piece together about the Reign of Terror, even if he tended to think of Delacroix, Liberty Leading the People - never mind if it was some forty years after the fact, or David's Death of Marat-- that had to have been painted this year, he'd realized after they arrived, though it hardly mattered.
War with Europe, desperation and fear rippling through Paris with the British capturing of Toulon. Whispers of the counter-Revolution tearing apart the struggle of the past four years, and of promises never being realised escalated. Desperate measures: dangerous ones, including the suspension of the hard-won new French constitution. The Committee of Public Safety was to protect France in her time of need, from the corruption of those who would undermine the revolution, though it didn't do much to protect France's population. People are careful: madame and monsieur are not to be used, only Citizen. A slip of the tongue is enough to warrant the slide of the guillotine into your neck, and it's safer to turn in someone else than risk being named disloyal.
None of his classes on oils and canvas had been sufficient, as it turned out. None of it had done anything to really brace him for the way viscera and filth invaded each breath. Sticky heat makes the stench cling to his skin, along with lace and fine embroidery.
It'll be fine. They just need to be steady, just keep from getting ahead of themselves.
no subject
( Quiet, in the way that Donny is so frequently quiet, over-serious and earnest and all the things he's been mocked for over the years. There's a moment, overlong, before he takes a step back, kneeling and digging through the bag for some of the documents the Initiative gave them. ) We'll, um-- w-we'll all uh, g-get home.
( He's sure of it, has to be. There has to be some positive, here, something for them to grasp onto. It was what he had to do to, what Atlas had to represent, though he couldn't exactly turn into Atlas here.
He sort of wished he could; it might be more reassuring for Margaery to be working with someone so much steadier, but he could hardly have his mask, here. ) Just, uh. A d-day at a t-time, right?
( Another cliche, hardly helpful, and he shakes his head at himself as he straightens up with their mission directive. )
no subject
Even in Westeros, I would not be allowed to return home.
[ But it is duty, a sense of obligation to House Tyrell, that prevents the melancholy from lingering. She rolls her shoulders into what might be a faint shrug, a clear sign of dismissal as he rifles through his bag and emerges with the mission directive. She gestures to the documents, head tilted. ]
What favors do they ask of us?
no subject
( Less timid than usual, more purpose. Atlas creeping into Adonis, concern and not being able to go home if she wants to (and it seemed like she did), that's not okay.
A glance to the papers, and he flips open the folder, paging through to the relevant point. ) Art um, art r-requisition and uh, d-diplomacy.
( But he's paying more attention to Margaery than the documents. ) The United Earth has um, b-been-- been c-communicating secret m-messages in p-paintings, so um. I find the p-paintings, I g-guess. B-but uh, you're-- you're the b-brains of the operation.
( Basically. )