Conversation · Visual Calculus

Ruination has come. The broken arches betray the once grand history of this building. It towered over the harbour, until it happened.

[Discard thought.]

Form a guess about what happened.

A great force from the northeast fired into the city. Heavy artillery shelled the coastline, fired from the water -- a straight shot into Revachol.

The tenement acted as a defensive wall against the worst of the shelling. Until it was destroyed, and they had a direct firing line.

The wind blows through your hair. The sea breeze cuts around you, high on the balcony, as you stare over the edge at the sea.

I wonder what I look like up on this edge.

From the eyes of a seagull: a nest of brown hair not worth the fifty foot dive. From a pedestrian on the dock: a rugged man staring out to sea, mere feet from fatality. From a guest on the balcony of the Whirling-in-Rags: a silhouette imposing enough to be seen at a distance.

The chill is bracing. The salt hangs in the air. The wind from the ocean pushes at you, smoothing your moustache.

"Hey Kim. Do you know who shelled our city?"

"The Coalition," says the lieutenant. "But that was a long time ago. I think we should move on. It's chilly up here."

He does not like talking politics of this kind.

He fears the discussion might lead to disagreements. As it often does.

Take in the ocean.

The waves of the Martinaise inlet roll over the fallen remains of the building. The dark waters obscure the better part of the remains.

This is where the damage came from. From somewhere in the inlet. The cannons.

What didn't fall into the ocean was used as scrap; what wasn't used as scrap was thrown into the ocean.

Look at the ruins in the water.

Those arches acted as support for something greater than what you see now.

Only three storeys stand where nine to twelve once did. Restoration has failed. What the shelling took out was never re-built.

Underwater, iron helmets have sunk deep into the sand and the mud. Helmets of soldiers. And their fingerbones, too. And clavicles. Littering the ocean floor...

Time to go. [Finish thought.]

Who did this? This damage?

A fleet -- the combined armies of Occident and Graad, with Mesque volunteers. A five-nation army. Hundreds of vessels.

They massed airships further down, in the bay of Revachol. The artillery was so powerful, the ships not only required gyroscopic stabilization -- they were anchored into the ocean floor as well.

Many are still there to this day. If you squint, you can just barely see the shadow on the water, far in the northeast. Cannons still ready to placate Revachol.

Coalition Warship Archer can shoot fifty shells a minute, on twenty co-aligned arches. They will reach the city in 58 seconds.