3rd adventure: Rebirth

"You think?" Fedler replies with a pensive look on her face.

"I agree," the fairy says with a big smile. "You should make me your hairdresser from now on!"

"Uh huh."

Just as Breeze is starting to make a new braid, the door that leads to the conference room opens and Sonlake Dermold steps through it.

"Hello everyone," he says. "I hope you didn't wait too long."

"Standard fare." - Mihai replies to Sonlake, in a posture that seems ready to get up from the chair and down to business.

Steve smiles at his commanding officer. "It wasn't bad. Are they ready then?"

Konrad looks up at Sonlake and nods. "It's good to see you, Sonlake."

Sonlake nods back at Konrad and then answers to Steve, "They are. Please, follow me."

Mihai gets up from his chair. Following Sonlake will ensue.

Konrad picks up his rings and pockets them, and follows Sonlake into the conference room.

"Yeah, let's go!" Breeze deploys her wings and follows Fedler into the conference room.

In there, you see two familiar faces; Meneo Nori, the Councilman of the Highwind region, and Aaren Shaw, the General who debriefed you a few days ago. The third man however is someone you haven't spoken to before. He is a middle-aged man with greying hair and a perfect white smile who's dressed in a simple but clean-cut mage uniform. The armband he wears indicates that he is a white mage.

The three men are standing in the middle of the room and they all turn at the same time to face their "visitors". You can see on the table behind them five pouches and metal boxes. "Ah!" The mage greets you with a smile. "There you are."

He approaches you and extends his hand to shake yours, one person at a time.

Steve only:

Mihai complies with the handshake thing. He decides against asking the only question on his mind just yet.

As Konrad is a little surprised by the white mage's informal greeting, but nevertheless reciprocates the warm reception.

Steve is surprised to see Jace Knight at this meeting but does his best not to let it show. "A pleasure to meet you, Councilor Knight."

Mihai's demeanor becomes sharper, as he eyes the White Mage once more after hearing his last name.

Another councilor. Displeased at what we did, like his friend? Konrad gauges the attitudes of the two men towards the five of them, and of Nori toward Knight, who has his back turned to the former.

Deception 20
See above

"A pleasure to meet you too," the councilor replies. "But please, call me Jace."

"Uh, yes, mister... Knight." Fedler can't bring herself to use his first name.

The prime councilor then reaches Breeze and presents his index finger to her. She happily shakes it.

"You've already met Meneo and General Shaw," Jace Knight says as he gestures to his colleagues. "so I think we can skip the introductions. Let me first thank all of you for the terrific job you've done. The people of Highwind, and the Free Feathers as a whole, owe you a great debt." His smile slowly vanishes, and he now seems almost dejected. "It is a shame that they might never learn about your exploits. I'm sure you've already guessed as much, but the details of this whole incident will have to be kept secret."

Sonlake takes his place behind the group, and makes himself unnoticeable while the other Councilor and the General straighten their posture.

Konrad only:

Unconcerned with the news, Mihai gets to the point - "What about Saemon Olyr?"

High praise indeed from a man on the council of the Free Feathers government. Konrad swells up, quite confidently as well that any hard feelings that might have arose in the political body of the island from their actions in the asylum were well behind them, or soon would be.

"Oh, he's already been sent home," he says with a smile. "I signed the papers myself. He won't be allowed to talk about the exact circumstances regarding his release, but he won't have to live in the asylum anymore. Actually..." he looks at his watch, "he and his escort should arrive at the inn located between here and Waterglass in no more than four hours."

Mihai is relieved, though slightly disappointed - "...I see."

"Really? That's wonderful news." Konrad can't hide his disappointment at the job they were originally hired to do was handed over to someone else. That should be us right now.

"I hope he's still able to recover after that horror."

"Oh, that's good. I'm happy for him and his sister." He clearly shares the disappointment the rest of the team is feeling about not being the ones to see him there.

"Yeah! Saemon is going home!" Breeze is now dancing in the air, throwing her hands around like a kid. Fedler shares her joy, but like the other human-sized members of the group, she is also slightly disappointed.

Jace Knight quickly catches on to that. "I had assumed you would be relieved to learn this news, but you also appear saddened by it. May I ask why?"

"We were hoping to take him back ourselves." - he explains, but regains his composure in short order - "Anyway, he's going home."

Konrad however is not so quick to let it go. "Excuse us, Jace. While we are happy for Saemon's return home, and hopeful for a swift recovery, escorting him home was originally our job. Did we do anything wrong?"

Steve shrugs. "He's an old friend of ours. He probably doesn't remember it but we do. We were looking forward to seeing him back home."

"Oh I see. Well, I simply didn't expect you all to feel so... attached to this idea. Had I known beforehand, things would have been different. However, I suspect you will have other things on your mind in the coming days."

"Uh?" Breeze scratches the back of her head. "Like what?"

"Let's not get ahead of ourselves." The Prime Councilor smirks, and then turns towards his colleagues. "I believe we have a few medals to give out first, no?"

Councilor Nori nods and picks up one of the metal boxes and then hands it over to the General. The military officer then walks over to Fedler since she's the one who's standing the most on the left, and then opens up the box.

Breeze gasps, and exclaims, "That's a Medal of Honor!"