Red beckoned Moody, motioning for him to get him and he jumped off of Ruiner right away.
"And this is?" Ruiner asked while placing Mjölnir on his back and squeezing the arm Moody was grappling.
Red rolled his eyes, "This is Moody and he's the reason I was able to come back to this place. He's mute, so don't expect to have any engaging conversations with him."
"So that airship, that was you? Where did you -"
Red cut him off, "Look can we save the questioning for later?"
Ruiner looked at the large wooden ship parked haphazardly in the middle of the open field, "Fine, but I hope you know that ship is going to get scavenged before the day is out."
Red looked back at the ship then back to Ruiner, "I don't really care about that. Tell me, where is the rest of my squad? Where are Day and Yasuke?"
Ruiner began walking back toward the kingdom and Red and Moody followed behind.
"Your friend Day was knighted a while ago and she's been serving as one of Princess Emere's attendants."
Red grabbed his chest and breathed a silent sigh of relief, "Wait what about my squad? Did they discontinue while I was gone?"
Ruiner stopped walking for a second causing Red and Moody to stop as well. He made a noise with his mouth, then continued walking, "You've been gone for quite a while Red. After Princess Emere took a shine to Day and made her an attendant, that little group was disbanded."
"And where is Yasuke now?" Red asked, getting slightly annoyed.
Ruiner looked back at him then back towards the kingdom, "He's in the darkest depths of the dungeon. He's been there ever since the two of them came back from that mission."
"They've kept him locked up in that dungeon by himself for weeks?" Red thought to himself.
"Why did they lock him up in the first place?" Red questioned.
Ruiner shrugged, "A dispute, or maybe a disagreement. I don't know every detail, I was on a mission that day. All I know is he said something about the king, and then he said something about Olo. There was a scuffle, Olo won and they threw him down there and destroyed the key."
Red fumed, "I hope you mean that figuratively. Anyway, we got rid of a few knights from Socotra, that should have given him some serious clout, no? What does he have to argue with the king about?"
Ruiner seemed to get more frustrated, "I don't know! And before you get any bright ideas about visiting Yasuke and asking him yourself, the king isn't allowing anyone down to that portion of the dungeon to visit him."
Red smacked his teeth, "Yeah, we'll see about that."
The three of them approached the front gate. The several guards standing there all stared and gawked at Red but didn't utter a single word. Two guards standing off to the side pulled on a long rope and lowered the small drawbridge and the three of them walked through. As they entered the front gate Moody stared at every towering building and glistening monument with wide eyes.
Ruiner became more serious,"Well I don't care much about what you plan to do next, but you cannot miss the town forum tomorrow under any circumstances. Do you understand?"
Red looked at him puzzled, "Town forum?"
Ruiner shook his head, "You don't have town forum meetings in that back water place you call a home country? Town forum meetings are where the state of affairs of all aspects of the country are discussed. Military, political, social even entertainment, everything gets its space. Since that many sectors are being addressed, it's always an all day event, and it isn't unusual for it to go on several days."
The three of them passed by a giant gold statue as they passed through the modern buildings of the shopping district.
Ruiner continued, "It's a once a year event. Since you disappeared so soon after you first got here back then, it's no wonder you didn't get a chance to go."
Red became agitated, "Why do you keep talking like that? Like I'm some long last legend. You just saw me not too long ago! I've been gone - what, two or three weeks?"
Ruiner stumbled back and his eyes became wide, "Is that what you think? That you've been gone a few weeks?"
Red only stared at him as Ruiner circled him and looked him up and down, "That is what you think isn't it? I don't know if I should be the one to tell you this Red."
He paused for a moment and averted his eyes, "Red, you've been gone for eleven months."
Red mouth swung open and he looked at Moody, "Eleven months? You've gotta be…eleven months? But wait, back up, I've been gone eleven months, does that mean Yasuke…"
Ruiner put a hand on Red's shoulder, "Come to the town forum meeting tomorrow. King Esa and Commander Olo will be expecting you. Be there at high noon." He walked off into the sea of people in the bustling city.
Red looked around at their surroundings. They stood right below a decrepit and nearly broken down building. The buildings bricks contained a messy mix of reds and browns that coalesced into a garish composition.
Red thought to himself, "The special operations headquarters. Still standing huh, although it looks like no one has been here for a while."
Red jiggled the handle and it opened without any resistance. Red stepped one foot in and motioned for Moody to come in. As they both stepped in, Red examined the condition of the headquarters. It was in significantly worse shape then the last time he saw it. It had been completely furnished in the time he was gone, but all the furniture was slashed and destroyed save a few small pieces. Red walked around the first floor slowly. There was smoke residue on every surface. A slimy liquid dripped from the ceiling in certain spots. A trunk with dry ice billowing from it sat in a corner. Red opened it slightly and a rancid smell punctured his nose. Backing away from it, Red took a seat on one of the undamaged chairs and Moody continued to walk around and look at everything closely.
Resting his arm on a nearby counter, Red continued to look around. There were burns and slash marks everywhere. Chains connected from the ground to the ceiling in several places.
Moody walked back over to Red, and in the thick layer of dust that settled on top of the counter, Moody wrote, "What happened here?"
"I don't know." Red shrugged, "But I bet this has something to do with the reason Yasuke was imprisoned."
Moody scrawled out, "Who is Yasuke?"
Red sighed, "One of the other members of our Order. You're a little stronger than him physically, but his potential is boundless. His power is truly something else, it might be more versatile than my hemokinesis. But what truly makes him special is his spirit. I can tell he wants to do good, more than anyone else."
Under his second message, Moody wrote, "You going to town forum?"
Red thought for a second, then nodded his head slowly.
Moody used his fist to clean some of the dust, and then scribbled, " Am I going to town forum?"
Red shook his head, "Not only have you not been knighted, but nobody even knows who you are. Under normal circumstances, I'm sure me vouching for you would be more than enough but what I'm going to be doing to be doing is bound to make me extremely unpopular. It might even make us enemies of the state."
Moody began to write, "What do you-"
Red grabbed his finger, "Don't worry about it. Just know if I'm successful, you'll get to meet the other two members of the Order of Iconoclasm very soon. If not, we'll have to…well we can cross that bridge if we have to get there."
Moody moved to a different area and wrote, "What do you want me to do?"
Red grabbed his chin, "I'll guess we'll act under the assumption what I plan is going to go well. I want you to go the shopping district and get a tome for a spell called "Collective Conscious". It's basically telepathy, we'll be able to hear your thoughts so we don't have to always scramble for paper and pen for you to write on."
Moody looked at Red and mouthed a word, before going back to the counter and writing, "Where is the money?"
Red laughed and reached into his trouser and tossing a small brown bag of coins across the counter and in front of Moody.
"This should be more than enough. I didn't grab the two sacks of coins off of the ship, I want to minimize the questions as much as possible."
Moody looked in the bag and frowned, turning to Red and shaking his head.
Red stared back at him, "What, is that not enough for you? You should be able to find a way to make that stretch. Find a fence and buy a fake soldier's badge, intimidate the shopkeep with that. Or maybe just haggle him down to the amount in the bag. Or just steal it. Do I have to hold your hand through the whole process?"
Moody quickly wrote, "I didn't say--"
Red slammed his hand on the counter, "Damn it! If you need me to tell you every little step you should take and move you should make, maybe I should be rethinking letting you in the Order!"
Moody furiously scribbled, "Going to sleep." He stomped off into the pitch black of the second floor.
Red scratched his head and pinched the bridge of his nose.
"I'm going to get you out Yasuke. We'll get Day and bring together our Order."