#eikonsiren

❣️ Check Marcel's Pulse || Accepting. @eikonsiren || Marcel

Marcel has never feared death. In fact, he has always wholly welcomed it, knowing full and well that his job all but asks him to do just that - to die. The only idea of death that is remotely unsettling is the pain, should he be alive long enough to feel any.

He thinks, as his mind floats in and out of consciousness, that he's very lucky he hasn't felt any up until this point.

Various sounds swirl around him - snippets of gentle voices and the clanging of bottles - sometimes he can even make out the call of his own name. Whatever will he still possesses inside of him pushes his consciousness towards the voice, towards his name --

And his eyes open painfully slowly.

With his newfound sight, albeit blurry, comes a wave of pain that his unconsciousness must have been fighting off. He winces, breathing in a shuddering breath as his hand involuntarily grabs the arm nearest to his. A few blinks clear his vision enough and it's Amelia he sees, carefully hovering over him with one hand by his wrist. Her fingers are pressed into his pulse, and he can't help feeling overwhelmingly blessed to still be alive.

"Am - Amelia?" He asks in a whispered tone, unable to speak at full volume just yet. "You're here."

Zemian didn't like the idea of being so far from Waloed, especially on his own. Sure, his time serving Rosaria did allow him to hold his own relatively well, but he was unsettled by the combination of distance and being out on his own.

However, with the collapse of the Intelligencers following Benedikta's death, Barnabas had explicitly dictated his refusal to send out any of their troops unless it was a part of their lord's plan.

When word arrived that the lost Eikon had resurfaced with a Dominant, it required someone that was a significantly less conspicuous to extract them and deliver them back to Waloed safely.

While there might be troops stationed along the northwestern coast of Sanbreque, far from the majority of prying eyes with the collapse of the mothercrystals in that corner of Storm, it allowed a safe harbor for a smaller ship. To keep from drawing suspicion and his knowledge of the area from his prior service, Zemian was instructed to seek out the Dominant on his own.

The information itself quickly became widespread, and the Ironblood were cause for concern, even without their mothercrystal.

All he had to do was find someone matching the description, but that was easier said than done as there wasn't any idea of their destination.