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Post by Barnabas Tharmr on Jul 25, 2023 20:27:15 GMT -6
“Mother…”
For the first time in decades, Barnabas found himself bested. Mythos—nay, Clive Rosfield—was a force to be reckoned with. He was every bit the strong vessel that his master deserved, and he was perfect for him now that Barnabas had forced his own power onto the man. The king himself felt strangely empty with his dark magic so diminished. He could feel the coldness of the aether that had run through his veins for decades finally take over now that the protection of his eikon had left him, and yet he could only turn his head towards the sky and laugh. He had played his part to its ultimate conclusion, and now the lord had a path forward with which to remake the world in his own image. Everything was as it should be. True paradise awaited.
As his vision faded to black, Barnabas stretched out a hand towards the statue of Ultima that towered above him as he welcomed his own death. Still, he couldn’t recall lowering his hand or even really losing consciousness. His return to awareness was anything but gradual. It was a violent rush of air in his lungs as he sat bolt upright, gripping the scar over his heart and breathing heavily as the sun beat down on him from above.
That was…unexpected.
Barnabas couldn’t delude himself for a single moment that this was paradise. His will was still fully his own, and as he raised one hand to shield his eyes, he observed that it was blazingly hot and that a sea of sand stretched out in front of him. Some forsaken corner of Dhalmekia most likely, though the Republic was an entire continent away from the tower in Waloed where he had meant to meet his end. The king’s fists dug into the sand in frustration. “Why, my lord?” He beseeched the heavens, feeling desperation enter his voice, though he’d always tried to keep himself composed around Ultima. “Am I so unworthy of your paradise? Or…is it that my work in your name remains incomplete? Do you perhaps still have need of me?” His prayers went unanswered, though that wasn’t terribly unexpected in this corner of the world. Ultima’s full attention was likely on Mythos and the final mothercrystal, but the silence still grated on his nerves.
Steeling himself, Barnabas rose to his feet and dusted the sand off his trousers as he took stock of his own injuries. Surprisingly, he seemed none the worse for wear though Clive Rosfield had beaten him nearly to death. It only served to strengthen his theory that his master had a hand in his sudden resurrection. He hadn’t known Ultima to have this kind of power, but surely a god didn’t need to reveal everything to one of his servants. Barnabas also took the time to take stock of his own magic, noting that aether seemed to come to him far more sluggishly than before. Perhaps that was an expected side effect of Mythos absorbing his power. Most disappointingly, when he reached for Sleipnir, he felt…nothing. So creating an egi was beyond him now.
“On foot then,” he murmured, feeling a brush of disappointment that had nothing to do with having to cross the sand on his own two legs. The horse had been his companion for decades, and his loss felt…strange. It would be difficult to replace a companion as loyal as Sleipnir. Still, if this was as God desired then Barnabas had no ability to question it. In the end, that was what surrendering his will meant.
Surveying the desert again, the king observed that he wasn’t quite in the middle of nowhere. Far in the distance, there appeared to be movement along a winding trail that snaked its way across the sand dunes. Perhaps a trade caravan. The Dhalmekian Republic was known for those, though Barnabas was surprised there were enough citizens left to form one after Kanver had been completely taken over by the akashic. Still, it was the most promising thing in sight, and so Barnabas set off for it.
It was a short walk made more miserable by the heat, but once he was within range, the king slowed to consider the road. For it was a road of sorts. While not crowded by any means, people passed by in twos or threes on the backs of chocobos. Some even rode past in caravans that seemed to carry various supplies. A trade route indeed.
Three men rode past him on their chocobos, and Barnabas sighed as he summoned his dark blade to own hand. A necessary evil, but they were only human. There was little to grieve. “Forgive me. I seem to be in need of transportation.” He slashed across the air with his sword, unleashing a wave of dark energy that swept outwards. It caught two of them in the neck and their heads rolled before they seemed to realize what had happened. The third man looked around in shock on top of his chocobo, and then he let out a scream as he tried to escape down the road. Ah, but men were ever the same.
Barnabas teleported in front of his path, rising up from a portal of dark magic. The chocobo reared up with a screech of surprise and nearly threw the man, and the king held up a sword to his throat as that forced them to a standstill. “Tell me. What city is it you ride for?” He wanted to know what to expect ahead of him after all.
The man’s eyes bulged as he stared down at the sword in the king’s grasp. “I-...Aljana! It’s Aljana!”
Not even a real place. If he were going to lie, he could at least make it believable. Barnabas sighed from between clenched teeth, touching his forehead as if he had a headache. He could never understand why Sleipnir and Benedikta had enjoyed dealing with people.
“Remember this. That Barnabas Tharmr offered you mercy, and you were too foolish to take it.” He slashed downward and the man fell from his saddle with a choking sound. The Waloedian banished his blade and carefully stepped over the body before he climbed up onto the back of the chocobo himself. Before he rode off though, he clicked his tongue to try to attract the remaining two chocobos to follow him. It would be a shame to leave them in the desert. He rather liked animals.
Final Fantasy IX
27
YEARS
Agendered
Open
Pansexual
333 POSTS
Fin
Peace is but a shadow of death, desperate to forget its painful past.
[attr=class,bulk] The desert wind was pleasant as it whipped around him, tussling his hair and both cooling and heating him at once. Kuja thought he might never tire of it, this exhilarating sensation of a living planet’s natural graces. It was particularly refreshing after his time in the ever dismal, ever icy Sonora and his many months picking through the ruins of the Valley, feeling as though he may drown in its oppressive humidity. The desert, on the other hand, offered him nothing but heat, wind, and solitude, and as he sat nestled upon his dragon’s back, watching the sands drift by below him, he was grateful for it.
He had no real business of note today. It was a time of rest, mostly, though he also found himself short on gil given his current priorities. His scavenging through the jungle paid less than nothing. His purchases in Sonora cost even more. Given all of this, he had neglected his usual business in Aljana and so hadn’t had a choice but to return to his desert hideaway to continue it. He had stored his wares in the modified saddlebags strapped to Ava’s waist. Though his dragon had snorted her displeasure, his magical trinkets, talismans, and other oddities of note weighed far less than what she generally carried for him, and so there had been no real resistance.
He would enjoy this flight, this moment, then sell his wares, spend a few nights in the city with all its amenities and eccentricities, and then return to his work restoring the Lost City’s magitechnology. It was a simple matter. Or at least, it should have been.
It was not out of place to see traders and caravans out upon the desert roads. Those of Aljana knew him well enough not to panic at the sight of his dragon flying over them. Those not native to the region did not, and he found it ever amusing. He liked to watch as he passed them by in those brief few livable hours at dawn and dusk when travel was made possible in the Sands. Three approached on the horizon, saddled on the backs of desert-bred chocobos. Down the road, a figure stood, facing them expectantly.
Hm. Now wasn’t that interesting…
The man seemed to have no means of transportation for himself and looked entirely unlike the usual residents and nomads of the desert. Kuja would have thought him to be a bandit if he’d been at all prepared for the climate and its challenges. However, as the chocobo riders approached, Kuja watched as the man seemed to summon an overlong and quite deadly looking blade from thin air.
He swung it expertly at his moving targets. There was a squawk of terror from the chocobos as the heads of their riders were instantly severed and sent toppling into the sands. Their bodies followed shortly after. The singular survivor gave a delayed shout, more out of surprise than terror as blood soaked the ground around him and the mysterious swordsman appeared suddenly before him as though by magic.
Kuja leaned forward, marveling at the carnage which took place below. Such power…
Could he perhaps take it for himself?
Kuja stroked his dragon’s feathers. ”Circle the skies,” he told her he called upon his magic and willed himself to the ground. Teleportation was not, as it happened, an effortless skill. It was one that he often kept at the back of his mind – a last resort as it were for the concentration and magic it took to complete. Indeed, he felt quite drained as that familiar blue light engulfed him and he felt the sands rise beneath his feet until he was, finally, grounded once more. Teleportation was a skill best saved for the most perfect of times, and this, he thought, was one of them.
The mysterious swordsman could be deranged. He could have a hatred of dragons. He could simply disappear again, instantly out of his grasp. So long as Ava kept to the skies, she would be safe to ferry him away once more.
The desert was not nearly so pleasant from the ground.
He stood, his metal boots sinking deep into the heated dune on which he’d found himself as he watched the scene play out at a slight distance, arms crossed, hand curiously at his cheek. The swordsman put his blade to the neck of the surviving rider and demanded to know his destination. When the shocked traveler responded, the man merely sighed, rubbed at his head, and then felled his victim in a single strike.
Kuja’s heart was pounding. Was that anticipation? Curiosity? Longing? Fear? He couldn’t tell, but he ached for an ally of that strength. Here, he lacked such things, his reputation having been quite thoroughly tarnished by his enemies. If he could give the swordsman's wrath a more proper direction…
”He was telling the truth, you know,” he called as the swordsman took the chocobo’s saddle for himself and began down the road. ”If it’s information you seek then I would be more than happy to oblige.”
[attr=class,bulk] Barnabas managed to collect and soothe the other two chocobos, but he had just started down the road when someone else was suddenly in their path. The bird that he was riding reared up in surprise, and the king had to quickly calm it with a hand on its neck. The poor creature was having a trying day. He would have to pick up some gysahl greens for his new mount when he had a chance.
The stranger announced that whoever he had just killed had been telling the truth, but Barnabas was currently more interested in looking him over to see what information he could glean. There had been no one else close by when the three men had approached, he was positive of that. Which meant that unlike the others, this man warranted caution. His silver hair would have been foreign enough, but the way he was dressed demanded attention. Truthfully he resembled Sleipnir enough that it was a little uncanny, but Barnabas quickly waved that theory aside. Even if he had accidentally changed his egi’s form, he still would have felt something upon his creation, and there had been nothing. No, the king was quite alone here. Wherever here happened to be, considering the man’s words. Less of what he said, and more of how he said it. He spoke with neither the lilting accent of Ash or the smoother tones of Storm. Now that was interesting.
A sudden movement from above attracted Barnabas’ attention, and he raised a brow at the sight of a silver dragon circling the pair of them overhead. Ah. That explained the man’s sudden appearance.
“It’s a strange dragoon who has no need of a spear,” he commented slowly. “And that wretch? I assure you that I’m quite familiar with the layout of Dhalmekia ever since our alliance was struck a decade ago. I’ve yet to hear of an Aljana.” It had been an alliance of pure convenience of course. It hadn’t saved them when the time had come. Not that many even deserved salvation with the way humans turned their backs on the lord. Barnabas had worked tirelessly to change that, and still his time to rest had not come. But perhaps this stranger was Ultima’s way of steering him towards his next task. God sometimes worked indirectly when he was indisposed, and he must have had his hands full with Mythos right now.
The man was offering information, and Barnabas thought for a moment before he gripped the reins and climbed off the chocobo’s back again. His boots sank down into the sand, reminding him that it was blindingly hot. It was only by the grace of god that he hadn’t woken up here in his full armor at least.
“And what would the price be for such information?” Perhaps seventy years ago he wouldn’t have looked a gift horse in the mouth, but he was too weary with humans and their machinations to think that the man was offering out of charity.
[attr=class,bulk] ”A dragoon?” Kuja echoed. Wasn’t that what the Burmecian knights called themselves? Kuja’s eyes flicked from the swordsman to his dragon circling above and then back again. Did the man…believe he’d jumped from that height? Without so much as disturbing the sand? Kuja put a hand to his mouth to stifle his silent laughter, his shoulders shaking with the effort. The dragoons of the swordsman’s homeland must have been a sight more graceful than the clumsy fumbling of Burmecia’s rats if he could ever think such a thing unironically.
Still, Kuja had the man’s attention. That much was clear. Enough so that the swordsman dismounted, landing heavily in the sand to face him. Ah! But there was that bolt of adrenaline once more! It was the thrill of a life or death game with the odds stacked against him. Kuja’s eyes gleamed with the challenge.
His opponent’s first move was a defensive one, cautiously asking the cost of his information. Kuja responded with a smile. ”Your favor,” he said simply. ”Or at least enough to not share the same fate as these unfortunate travelers.” He waved a hand towards the discarded corpses, his violet lacquered nails glinting in the harsh sunlight.
The match had begun in earnest. It was time for Kuja to make his opening move.
”Though I will give you this much free of charge. This desert is the largest land mass on the continent, spanning from its southern shores to its northern reaches, and it is sparsely populated. Without proper direction, one might travel for weeks without ever reaching its end. Nature is an impossible foe for even the greatest of swordsmen, wouldn’t you agree?”
Perhaps the man would claim him a liar and impose the same punishment as the riders before him. He seemed as familiar with the deserts of his world as Kuja was of Gaia’s, but this kind of game required its risks, and Kuja placed a fair amount of weight on the power of mystique.
”Ah. But this heat is simply unbearable. Would you care for a reprieve?” Kuja gathered sparks of magic to his fingertips and directed it upwards, swirling it about until above their heads he’d gathered a perfect sphere of clear blue water. He clenched his fist and the sphere broke, showering them both with a pleasant drizzle like rain. It gathered in puddles at their feet and slid in rivulets down the dunes.
Watera may not have been the best use of his magic when he was already exhausted from teleportation, but this was not a battle of strength but of wits, and Kuja thought he had made his point perfectly clear. ’I have power. I could use it to your advantage. I am worthy of your interest.’
[attr=class,bulk] The man seemed amused at Barnabas’ assumption that he was a dragoon. So much that he was almost shaking with silent laughter. The king quirked an eyebrow at the display, feeling that he was missing a joke the man was having with himself. There wasn’t anything funny about his guess that he could see, and he was quick to try to clear that up. “You’ve tamed a dragon and conquered the skies. What would you call yourself if not a dragoon?”
When Barnabas asked what the cost would be for his information, the man gave him a smile that spelled danger. It reminded him a little of the one that Sleipnir wore whenever they hosted a delegation at Stonehyr. A bit too playful for his liking. When he responded though, it was to answer that he simply wished to gain the king’s favor.
“Ah.” It was Barnabas’ turn to chuckle as he reevaluated the comparisons he’d been making in his head. It wasn’t Sleipnir that the man resembled so much as Benedikta. They had used each other up until her death, so he couldn’t say that he wasn’t familiar with such arrangements. “A small price to pay.” His favor meant nothing in the grand scheme of things. Unlike the affections of the lord.
“And you needn’t worry,” he commented as the silver-haired man directed his attention towards the men he’d killed. “They merely had what I needed.” He idly stroked the plumage of the chocobo he’d taken as he spoke. Of course, no one would be spared once god cleansed the lands, but Barnabas had been patient for this long. He could wait longer. Especially since he hadn’t yet been given leave to rest.
The man offered him insight on the desert that they were currently in, making Barnabas frown as he mulled that over. Something that large surely outstripped Dhalmekia. Not to mention that the republic had small settlements all over the place. They gathered near water like moths to a flame. It was the description of the desert reaching the northern shores that troubled him the most though. The man could have been lying in order to force Barnabas to pause, but somehow he didn’t think so.
“We aren’t on Valisthea,” he finally broached slowly. It wasn’t a completely foreign possibility. Barnabas himself had been born on the shores of a southern land, though the memories of his childhood there were cloudy at best. “What is this place then?” Clearly the lord had wanted him to be here, but why? What use did Ultima have for him outside of the twins?
Before he could dwell on that thought for too long, the man showed off his magical ability in a display that was clearly built to impress. Water droplets rained down on the pair of them, and Barnabas held out a hand in surprise as water pooled in the center of his palm. The man didn’t have any visible signs of the curse on him, and he was exposing quite a bit of skin. That didn’t necessarily mean anything when he was so young, and yet his choice of spell was curious...
“Is magic common here so far from the crystals?” Barnabas lowered his hand and offered the man a faint upturn of his lips. “Or do I have the honor of addressing Leviathan the Lost?”
[attr=class,bulk] Oh, how Kuja loved withholding information! It was one of his life’s greatest pleasures, he’d found, whenever he had the opportunity to stand above another, resplendent in his knowledge and the dramatic ironies only he had the chance to appreciate! It was a feeling of power, held secretly in the palm of one’s hand. He would hate to part with it now, particularly when he held it over someone so strong and self-assured, but such was the nature of their transaction.
And perhaps he could learn a little in return.
His eyes gleamed with hunger as the man spoke, so cryptic and nonsensical that it would have seemed like madness had Kuja not known better. What were these crystals he spoke of? And how, exactly, could he mistake Kuja for an eidolon that, last he knew, had most resembled a sea serpent? It was the same hunger he felt at the sight of ancient ruins, their secrets long lost. Knowledge was power, and he wished to claim it all.
”You will have to tell me more of where you came from. Valisthea, did you call it? How curious.” He had never heard that one before, and he had heard tales of many worlds and many planets here on their strange little land that drifted in between. He wished to chronicle every detail so that he knew better how to handle any future travelers. But that could wait, assuming he kept the man’s attention once they reached civilization.
All the more reason to prove himself useful, he supposed.
Kuja waved a hand at the horizon of endless sand. ”You will find these lands to be a nexus of sorts. It was populated long before your arrival with a history dating back centuries at least. Now some power calls to those of strength across the span of dimensions. Why, I could not say, though I have spent years studying the phenomena.”
Almost as an afterthought, Kuja added, ”They call this place Zephon. We are currently in the Reikinto Sands to the far east of the continent.”
Would the man believe him? Perhaps. Perhaps not. But Kuja would be proven right in time, and he hoped that his show of strength had bought him time if nothing else.
”The laws of the universe as you know them do not apply here. And no. I’m afraid I am not Leviathan.”
[attr=class,bulk] The man had apparently never heard of Valisthea before, though his eyes gleamed with interest at the name. A scholar perhaps, but Barnabas was far more distracted by the implication that the twins were unheard of here. “I see I’ve traveled further than intended if it isn’t on your maps,” he said slowly, but the man finally deigned to provide him with some answers as he swept a hand out at the desert that surrounded them.
Barnabas listened closely, his brow furrowing as he made sure to take in every detail. Eventually he let out a chuckle, pressing one hand to his forehead as he wondered how it had come to this. Was this his punishment for taking the fight with Mythos too far against the lord’s wishes? Ultima had tried to reign him in, and for the first time he had ignored the order. Maybe that was why he had been denied paradise.
“You’re either telling the truth or completely mad, and I can’t discount either,” he said finally, dropping his hand to consider the feminine man again. “I have to assume the first for now.” It wasn’t a pleasant thing to be stuck in a new land yet again. He had conquered a continent before, but he’d had the double advantage of loyal armies and his full prime state. Here on this “Zephon.” he was alone without so much as Sleipnir, and it was hard to say if he would still be able to transform into Odin or not when he’d willingly given his magic to Clive. Evidently he still had enough to call on his sword and some amount of darkness, but it would take time and experimentation to see how much else he could still do.
“Then you were brought from a different place as well?” Barnabas was ready to ask questions now that he’d taken a moment to reflect. “You say you don’t know what makes people converge in this place, but why is it that it seems to have revived me? Scarcely a moment ago I was on the brink of death.” If this stranger didn’t have a satisfactory answer, then Barnabas would have to assume it was Ultima, but he wanted to see what he could provide first.
The man denied that he was Leviathan by saying that the laws of the universe as Barnabas understood them did not in fact apply here. That…was actually fascinating. The king felt his eyes alight with more curiosity than he’d felt in a long time. Especially when he wasn’t in battle. Whether or not he was stuck in a strange land, this was something new. Something he could explore again. It was far from paradise, but perhaps it also wasn’t the punishment that he’d first thought. Thirty years of apathy were starting to flake off, one question at a time.
“Then you can use magic without being bound to an eikon.” He looked the man over with more interest, once again seeing no evidence of the curse. “And you suffer no ill effects?”
[attr=class,bulk] The man reacted in a way that even Kuja could not have anticipated. At hearing the news that he had, in fact, been swept away from everything he had ever known, he stared at him for only a moment and then reached up a hand to his forehead and began to laugh.
Kuja raised an eyebrow. How curious indeed.
Whatever had given him cause for such dry, raucous laughter, the man kept to himself. He spoke only when he had finished with his humors, lowering his hand to appraise Kuja again. Was he mad or telling the truth? Kuja only smiled in return as the mysterious swordsman came to the proper conclusion. The man was distrustful of strangers, that much was obvious. He was a skeptic by nature, but he was no fool. Such conditions would make Kuja’s own ambitions a challenge, but Kuja had never been one to shy away from a challenge.
He would stay and continue the game. For now.
Once again, the swordsman came to a logical conclusion, addressing Kuja directly with a question of his origin. ”I was,” Kuja answered simply. ”I, too, was stolen away from the clutches of death and thrust upon these very same sands. It took some time to discover what had become of me, but here I stand. Ready to share all that I know.”
Kuja knew that there were some in this place who made it their life’s mission to find those lost travelers of the interdimensional corners of the universe and explain to them their new circumstances. Kuja couldn’t understand it. The reactions were always the same. ’But how am I here? Was I not already dead? I don’t remember a thing. How do I return?’ It was dull work. Predictable work. Kuja generally avoided it, but he had done far worse work in the name of power, and he couldn’t deny that a traveler freshly lost to time and space was left in a vulnerable state – one that made them an easy target for any wishing to use such vulnerability to their advantage.
Though this man, strange in his mannerisms, did not seem to fall to despair. Far from it, his eyes lit with the same hunger that drove Kuja’s own questioning. He was curious.
”Then you can use magic without being bound to an eikon? And you suffer no ill effects?” the man asked. His eyes swept over Kuja’s body in a way that he was not unused to. Beauty was both a blessing and a curse, after all.
Kuja tilted his head, touching his bottom lip thoughtfully. His smile did not waver. ”My magic is my own,” he answered. ”It stems from my very soul, and I have honed it much in the way that you have honed your blade. Such magic was unusual in the world from which I was taken, but it is not so foreign here. You will find cities built upon the arcane arts though I find their spellcraft lacking and their range dreadfully limited.”
Kuja laughed quietly behind the back of his hand. He held little affection for the city of sea and sky, oft besieged by villains and disaster alike. He had been that villain once, long ago. It had won him the very dragon which now circled the skies. A fair trade, if he might say so himself.
”We can speak more once we have reached civilization, if you would wish it of me. I am well known in the desert city of Aljana. Once I have finished my business there, I would not mind your company should you call upon it.” He looked to the sky, cloudless and a blaring, blazing blue. ”I will travel by dragon along the usual trade paths, and you can follow behind. It should be only half a day’s travel by chocobo if you know the way.”
Kuja could have made the trip in half the time if he took Ava at her usual speed and ignored the ground routes for a straight path as the crow flies. But he supposed the extra hours would be worth his while so long as he had truly won the swordsman’s favor.
”Ah, but we’ve forgotten our introductions. I’m Kuja. Sorcerer, inventor, arms dealer, and archaeologist.” He slipped into a well practiced bow, the kind he had perfected in the noble courts of Treno and Alexandria before he straightened and regarded the man before him. ”A pleasure. Might I ask as to your name?”
[attr=class,bulk] The silver-haired man acknowledged that he too had been on the verge of death when he’d been brought to Zephon. He also reiterated that it had taken him lots of time to discover what was happening, but now here he stood. A convenient fountain of knowledge. That was laying it on a bit thick in the king’s opinion, but the man wasn’t wrong that Barnabas didn’t have many other options. Regardless, the stranger didn’t seem like a bad choice to rely upon at first. He almost certainly wanted something from Barnabas, but the king had put up with plenty of people trying to curry his favor before, ranging from Benedikta to Dhalmekia’s council. One more on the pile when he badly needed direction couldn’t hurt. Besides, the man hadn’t appeared to bat an eye at the murdered traders behind them. It could be hard to find human allies so willing to overlook atrocities. Perhaps he could prove to be useful in return.
The stranger went on to explain that his magic was his own and that it originated from his soul. That was such an impossible answer that Barnabas was rendered a little speechless. He wished Sleipnir were here to interpret his questions before he even had to ask them, but as it was, he was left to struggle with human interaction on his own. “Such a thing is possible without a hand from the divine?” All magic stemmed from Ultima, even if it was indirectly through the crystals. To hear that other places operated differently was…troubling. Magic couldn’t truly originate from humanity itself, could it? The possibility scratched at a corner of his mind uncomfortably until he did his best to compartmentalize that off. He could examine that thought more and why it bothered him later.
The man offered to lead him directly to the city of Aljana where they could talk more. It sounded like a long journey even by chocobo—far enough away that Barnabas certainly needed the help, so he didn’t waste any time in agreeing. “I assume you aren’t difficult to find unless dragons frequent the city.” Not impossible considering the empire of Sanbreque, but he couldn’t make any assumptions about this place being similar to Valisthea. “Thank you. I wouldn’t relish being lost in the desert.”
The man finally introduced himself as Kuja, and what a collection of professions came with the name. “You’re very well-traveled for someone your age,” he commented with a small chuckle before giving his own introduction. “Barnabas Tharmr. Dominant of Odin and King of Waloed. Though it appears I’ll be starting from scratch on that front.” The idea was more of a relief than it perhaps should have been.
