LBG: Lazy Battle Goddess [Ordo]

[Fabula Caromed]

Okyaab VI orbit, coming in for landing in the middle of nowhere
As Fabula slowly orbited yet another new planet (insert adventurous purr here) in the Bloody Pilgrim, she attempted to brainstorm a proper way to introduce herself to this "be Arklim" man. Theoretically she could just walk up and say "Hi, you spoke to my wife, wanna arm wrestle?" The more she thought about it, though, the worse that idea sounded. It was just polite to at least let a person know before you wandered in. She pulled her datapad out and looked up the man's contact information.

<Hello. My name is Fabula Caromed. I believe you spoke to my wife recently.> A short text message, nothing extravagant. <I'll be landing nearby soon. If you don't mind, I'd like to meet with you and discuss something, myself.> Hopefully Lynn hadn't decided to surprise her and have her fitted for armor of her own volition, because if so, this was going to be a very quick visit now or a retroactively awkward one later.

But she couldn't leave it to someone else to get herself outfitted and ready to represent her wife's clan on the fields. A bunch of doctors might make for decent field medics, and Lynn herself was a wonderful scout, but none of them were really cut out for frontline combat. Someone in that clan had best step up to the call of Mand'alor when the blaster bolts started flying, and if it was going to be Fabula, she needed something to keep those blaster bolts from hitting her.

Plus, that whole "Resol'nare" thing sort of required her to have legitimate armor, rather than just a disgustingly awesome jacket.
[member="Ordo"]

 

[Ordo]

[member="Fabula Caromed"]

His hands pulled lightly on the straps that connected the heavy beskar plow and the big bull nerf that pulled it. There were few people that would bother with such primitive methods but those people couldn't lift the plow and hit the nerf with it when they felt inclined...go figure. The dark metal blade dug a furrow in the ground as the nerf pulled. The sounds of rocks and soil grinding out of the way of the pitched mandalorian iron was one he knew well and reminded him that when the rest of him was stripped away this was what he was, a simple man.

Sweat clung to his bare chest as he righted the blade and held it straight. His occasional "ho bull" the only conversation to be had. His plain blue work pants were militarily bloused at the tops of his armored boots. Black soil clung to his thick hands and forearms as he slowly finished a row and prepared for another.

The sharp chirp of his datapad drew his thoughts away from his work and back to the galaxy for a moment as he loked to see what crisis or news he would be getting to deal with today.

"Caromed. hmph." He said as he looked up for the sparkle of a ship's hull reflecting light from the local star but nothing yet.

<<This is Ordo.>> he typed calmly, <<Land next to mine should be room unless you fly a frigate.>>

With that he sent the message and stepped around the plow to unlatch the nerf. It seemed the work would have to wait until tomorrow. Today just got booked.

 

[Fabula Caromed]

Landing as specified, Fabula struggled her way out of her cockpit seat and, once again, found her crutches. The blasted things were becoming more of a nuisance than a reminder of her own damned weakness, which could have been seen as a kind of progress. After all, it was just a few more days, maybe a week until she might be able to walk on her foot full-time once again. Had she her romantic, religious notions of the Force as she used to, she might have taken a moment to thank it for its assistance.

But this wasn't the Force. This was her.

Struggling down the boarding ramp to her ship, Fabula looked out across farmland and gave a quiet sigh, allowing a subtle smile to find its way across her face. Rural planets were easier to stomach than big, metropolitan ones like Taris. She might spend some time here bench pressing a cow, if she had time. It had been so long since she'd done anything ridiculous just for the sake of saying she had.

Fabula might have allowed herself to zone out while looking out and around the farmland she stood on if she'd come without a purpose. This time, however, she had a reason to be here. Her yellowed eyes scanned about for this be Arklim man that her wife had been so eager to talk about...and for anything vaguely resembling a smithy to indicate he'd be able to humor her request in the least, rather than just turning her away.
[member="Ordo"]

 

[Ordo]

[member="Fabula Caromed"]

He locked the nerf in the pen as the ship settled on its struts like a strill on its haunches. A rag pulled from his back pocket to wipe his hands and brow as he walked tiward the descending boarding ramp. His short brown hair felt cool in the small breeze. It wasn't the first visitor he had had of late but he hadn't expected another so soon. He figured either a tragedy happened or someone wanted something, people rarely bothered to look for him otherwise.

His eyes narrowed as the woman began to hobble down on a pair of crutches. It was a small thing but he had a tendency to over analyze. Crutches were almost as primitive as his plow and that told him the woman either hated not moving under her own power or was a technophobic.

The pad on which her ship landed was directly across from his round bastion-like yaim, his smithy off to his right was easily recognizable from the heavy besskar anvil and many crated implements that sat in front. A one man machine shop was inside the buildings behind the anvil for his work. To his left were several pens with various livestock he had collected over time. The pet strill was not about at the moment but the Aak dog rested near the pens, along with a bantha, ronto, and Dewback. A bull rancor from Dathomir that acted like his child more than a mount or friend roamed the mountains nearby when it chose to but otherwise it was a typical colonist farm. Not much to look at unless you liked that sort of thing.

He raised a hand in greeting and walked closer, his meager senses tingling as if he could smell power from her. He gave a glance behind her just in case then looked her in the eyes.

"What can I do for ya , Vod Caromed?" He said finally placing the name.

 

[Fabula Caromed]

Right. Beskar sighted. This was definitely the place to be. Now all she had to do was convince a complete stranger to make some of the most expensive and rare armor in the galaxy for a cripple he'd never met. Make a good first impression, stupid girl. Despite the pathetic sight that was a curvy but sickly-looking woman struggling to move forward of her own power, she offered the closest thing to a smile she could manage.

"Su cuy'gar. I'm sorry for the unannounced arrival." One of her hands came off of the walking aid she'd been hauling around for about two weeks, extending forward in something akin to a greeting. This was as much for her own proto-ego as anything, to reinforce that there was indeed a warrior beneath this pitiful shell; given the chance for a hand shake, she fully intended to put considerable strength behind it. "My life recently underwent a somewhat drastic change, and I was reminded that I needed to do something with it."

Her back straightened as much as it could while favoring her left ankle. "I've decided to fully join Lynn's clan, and that means I need proper armor." And now she had gone from serving no one and fighting because it was fun to serving her new family and fighting because she was the only one of them who reliably could. "Judging from that forge, I came to the right place."
[member="Ordo"]

 

[Ordo]

[member="Fabula Caromed"]

The sun was already just passed it's zenith as he looked at the woman. Her pale clamy complexion, the favored ankle, the determined tension in her eyes all told a story and it was really none of his business.

"You at least called." he said his voice like stones in a dryer, "Most folks just show up at the door, expecting not to turn up dead." He reached forward and took her forearm with the intent of seeing what kind of person she was. Most aruetiise would be off put by the Mandalorian greeting but that was the idea in a way. Mandalorians weren't Jedi bowing like servants and they weren't Sith peacocking to see who could be the biggest "Lord", no, Mandalorians got in close and looked you in the eyes so you and they knew damn well who you were dealing with.

Her grip felt like a beskar vise and her eyes like molten fields of Mustafar. He held the shake for a few seconds his big hand touching fingers around her arm. He nodded once and pursed his lips in an expression that said 'well, damn girl' without a word needed. "You look like the backside of hell, but if your Lynn Caromed's riduur then I'll do what I can."

He pointed to the forge and the machine shop behind it. A slight twinkle in his eye as if he was pointing at a favorite child. Thick black tattoos on his forearm still framed with beat red from the small woman's grip. "That's where the work is done, but your a guest so you're welcome to eat drink and rest as much as you need while I do the smelting." he looked her up and down breifly measuring in his mind how much alloy he would require, "even if you don't need it," and she looked like she did, "Ner yaim, Gar yaim."

 

[Fabula Caromed]

Oh now that was a load off her mind. Fabula's expression softened into a smile, and she bowed her head momentarily in acknowledgement. "I understand that you're not obligated to do this. Vor entye." And so she'd have proper armor. The Wanderer's memories distinctly showed her body being much more durable than it currently was; she'd probably sort through her jumbled up skull at some point and find a secret to being extremely tough. At the moment, though, that seemed unlikely, and impractical to top it off. She needed an immediate and reliable source of protection if she was going to contribute to Clan Caromed.

Plus, again. Resol'nare thingie.

The idea of standing around doing nothing did not sit well with Fabula, so she shook her head and started limping her way towards the man's forge. "But there's no need to let hospitality get in the way of efficiency. My leg may be out, but you likely don't need me to run a mile." Also her...measurements would be an issue if he was just eyeballing it. And if she could help in designing or creating the damn thing, she would gladly do so. "I'd like to have as active a hand in this as I can without getting in your way or affecting the quality of the finished product."

Hopefully that would allow her some manner of input that she could use to shape a set of armor that she wouldn't abhor wearing. That, in itself, was going to be an interesting test, since Fabula hadn't bothered with physical armor in...ever. Her jacket was protective, but not weighty and rigid like proper armor. This was going to be a new experience for her, if she couldn't turn it into bulletproof robes.
[member="Ordo"]

 

[Ordo]

[member="Fabula Caromed"]

He pressed his lips into a thin line as he made a show of thinking.

'Yup, stubborn' he thought as he nodded to the woman. He started to turn and walk to the forge waving a heavy hand as his invitation for her to follow. She wanted to help and work for her own armor and he wouldn't dream of denying any vod that privilege.

"You'll only need to run if the osik hits the fan." he said seriously, "but that hasn't happened at the forge in years." He reached for his gauntlets and a bandana to tie around his head to keep the sweat that would soon come from his eyes. A quick burst of flame from his gauntlet began the fire and he took up a shovel for loading the forge coals. "Take the bellows handles and press them slow and steady so we can get the fire hot enough to melt the impurities out of the beskar."

He shoveled coal into the forge and then moved to a pile of beskar chips and drew lightly on the force as he filled the shovel with beskar and thrust it into the smelting forge. The process would be a long one from here, for to melt beskar which could withstand a plasma blade was not an easy task.

 

[Fabula Caromed]

Struggling along behind him, Fabula limped her way towards Ordo's old-fashioned smithy. None of the electronic blast furnaces with perfectly controlled smelting temperatures, or chemical scales for perfectly mixing compounds. This was as archaic as Fabula's crutches...and likely had the exact same reasoning behind it. Artisans were notoriously sentimental when it came to having a personal touch. Chefs with their insatiable need for "wood smoked" flavors and artists who insisted on hand-mixing paints were far too common for their unique quirks not to be present in other industries...which seemed to include smiths.

Regardless, she had her instructions, and she wasn't the master of the craft around here. Fabula took her position by the bellows, bracing her body up on her left side as she used her right hand to move the machine to life. There was an incredible amount of resistance to it, but Fabula had a burning determination to get this done...and with that came the Force. Something in the neighborhood of twenty times average human strength at her fingertips made smith work hardly an issue for the pale lass. Doing standing chin-ups at four hundred-esque pounds with one hand wasn't even straining her.

And she would have been happy to do it in silence the entire time. Quiet voice and terseness be damned, Fabula was the loud one in her family until Fable came along. Small talk wasn't her forte. Still, she was working with someone, and there was no guarantee he'd be quite so inclined to work without speaking, so she figured she'd take the initiative (what? Is this Fabula we're talking about? Jeezus...) and find a direction the conversation might go in.

"Truth be told, I don't think I've ever worn armor in my life," she eventually broke the silence in her standard mousy tone. "I tend to move around a bit when I fight, and it's always seemed like it would do more harm than good." She didn't include the part where, up until very recently, she could render her skin blasterproof at will.
[member="Ordo"]

 

[Ordo]

[member="Fabula Caromed"]

Ordo watched the precious metals begin to glow and melt into a glowing pool under the steady heat of the bellows and forge. With a quick hand he grabbed his tool that rested by the forge and skimmed the scummy dross from the surface of the molten beskar and dropped the rapidly cooling dross into a bin for the byproducts of his craft.

"I have worn armor most of my life and I have been known to move pretty quickly from time to time." he looked at the woman before adding more beskar and repeating the process. "You just have to learn how to move in it same as learning to move without it.....but....not all armor has to be heavy armor. A Beskar mesh is just as tough as a plate in a lot of cases beskar in the right hands can take nearly any form."

He scrapped out more of the dross and then began pulling the beakar out to pour into standard molds to cool.

"We'll need to go over to the "drawing board and sound out just what you do and don't want for your kit." he looked at her from crown to foot, "and solid measurements would be good before we machine the joints."

He walked to a large computer station inside and activated it. It was state of the art, a benefit of owning a interstellar tech company, and he leaned back in his seat as it fired up.