THE SKY WENT BLACK,

[agogemod]

WHO? Everybody!
WHAT? Agoge's inaugural TDM.
WHEN? The Battle of Hattin, 1187.
ANYTHING ELSE? Violence, as always. Please warn in subject lines for anything beyond physical violence, and move to a personal journal if things go beyond PG-13.

FROM JERUSALEM WITH LOVE;

the horns of hattin, 1187: the holy land

read the jerusalem setting infopage

Your eyes open, and above you is the roof of a tent, a heavy woven material that blocks you from what must be an otherwise glaring heat that is beating down. Near you stands a man - you understand him, but you aren’t sure you are supposed to. Aware as you are that he is speaking Arabic, a trickle of words as he dabs water on your brow, that as you go to reply, you realise, you are speaking Arabic too. Urging you to sit up slowly, and now that you are awake -

“Good, slowly does it. You are meant to have heat stroke. Nothing sudden now. The Commander will explain it to you soon - in here it’s safe, no outsiders can come in. Check your BCE, it will tell you what has happened - ”

As he indicates to the small pack that seems to hold your belongings, he explains: you are in the encampment of Saladin, the greatest commander in all of Islam. He has been fighting the crusading invaders since the death of the Crusader King Baldwin VII. But one of the most important was about to start: you are here, at Hattin, though the enemy hasn’t arrived yet. Not that it means it’s time to rest: this is a war camp. There is much to do. Saladin runs a impressive army, and it wins by its discipline, no idle hands here, and for you, newly awakened to it, there is just as much to do. So enjoy the first few moments of reprieve, there won’t be much of it in the coming days.

MISSION OBJECTIVE

The forces of COST-- allied, today, with the armies of Saladin, though they will never know-- aim to win the day.

This is imperative, because Saladin's victory at Hattin makes his next victory possible: he intends to march on Jerusalem, long held by invading Crusaders, and take his city back. Historically, he wins a Hattin and at Jerusalem. But, the Regency supposes, if they could weaken Saladin in Hattin, perhaps even completely defeat him, he would not be so able to take the city.

Preserve the flow of history. Aid Saladin's army. Defeat the Crusader army at Hattin.

A MESSAGE FROM GROTHIA

>>@CMDR

@ALL I don't have time to explain right now, but the transporters have played havoc on the way in and we think that the - nevermind, the techdacts don't make any sense at the best of times. Your memory has been tampered with, one of the Regency's tricks, no doubt. Price for late intelligence, we didn't know until we made the transfer.

Short of it is, I put you all down as having a bout of heat stroke that knocked you out and that’s the story you need to stick to. Even if you don't want to trust me, you're going to have to follow my instructions if you want to live through the next week. We can do our reintroductions later.

Follow our instructions and we’ll all make it through this with minimal casualties.

Welcome back, soldiers. Good to have you with us again.

WIN THE DAY

MEDICAL

Help build up the army after the Siege of Tiberias.

After this battle, Saladin's forces turn toward Jerusalem, and eventually take it from Crusader control. It's imperative, then, that Saladin's forces are strong, healthy, and most importantly, alive. This is war: there are a larger number of soldiers who are wounded and require medical care to maintain the numbers. Saladin's forces are lucky: their medics are some of the best in the medieval world. But there is constant need for more hands on deck to assist. Whether that’s holding down a soldier to cut off his leg - or dress a wound. Maybe it’s just as simple as a soldier that wakes up from his fever wanting water, there is always something that needs doing.

STEALTH

Sabotage the water supply of the crusaders.

All armies march on their stomach, and in the desert, access to water means life or death. Saladin knows this, and the Crusaders are heading for the largest oasis between Jerusalem and Hattin to replenish their stores. Saladin has placed a line of defense at the oasis to stop the Crusaders. Some truly desperate Crusaders are risking death, attempting to break through the defenses in an attempt to get some water. Your orders are simple: no Crusader should be getting to that water.

STEALTH

You know what else armies need? Sleep. For those brave enough, its been encouraged to try and exhaust those Crusaders. Your orders are vague, leaving plenty of room for creativity: psychologically mess with them, mimic loud animals to wake them up, forcibly introduce these 12th century men to Cyndi Lauper at the top of your lungs. Whatever takes your fancy, just try not wake Saladin’s forces, they still need their beauty sleep. And most importantly: don't get caught.

COMBAT

The Crusaders are here: fight them. Crusaders will in heavy chain mail into battle, often with a padded gambeson underneath them. Aim your weapons for the chinks in the points that quickly immobilize: the throat, armpit, inner elbow, inner thigh, inner knee. You will always want to aim for the veins and joints. This isn't about clean, this is about hard and fast. Battles in the desert are made worse for every hour spent in the gruelly heat.

They fight with heavy sword and shield, and the metal they wear makes them more strongly defended, but also slower; they cannot mount their horses without some help, so if you manage to unhorse a Crusader, they must survive the remainder of the battle on foot. Often if you wounded a horse, it can kill the man riding it.

Medieval warhorses are huge animals that can do serious damage with a single kick; however, by Crusader tradition, many are stallions, which are famously willful difficult to control. Being thrown from one of these horses, especially in armor, is no small thing. This is where by contrast Saladin's army comes into its own. They ride a lighter horse more suited to this kind of warfare, and the cavalry works by spiking in quickly, reigning down an attack, then retreating. The Turks are famous for riding by, and shooting down arrows into foot soldiers before retreating out of range again.

Aside from the knights on their horses, keep an eye on hired mercenaries and others of all classes storming into battle. Watch out for crossbows: a single bolt can punch through thick metal, much less whatever you might be wearing. However, the shots take a great deal of time and strength to load, requiring the user to pull the bolt back while standing on the bow. The weapons are not stealthy, and striking an opponent while they load them is the surest route to victory. More traditional archers are far more difficult to defeat; though their arrows can't cut through metal, they can shoot from much farther away and draw another arrow ten times as fast. Other fighters charge in with cudgels, maces, spears, axes, polearms, and the fervent determination fanaticism brings. Do your fellow soldier on the battlefield a favor: try and take out an archer whenever you can. But for those fielding the arrows, don't stay put, they'll always try and take you out first.

The battle of Hattin is one of the most bloody in the history of the Crusades; famously, it is said that its outcome left the sky black for all the birds hungrily circling the carnage. Your job in this battle is twofold: fight to win, and survive.

COMBAT / STEALTH

Capture Guy D'Lusignan.

History dictates Guy D'Lusignan, current King of Frankish-ruled Jerusalem, is captured by Saracen forces, which later leads to Muslims recapturing Jersusalem from Frankish hands. Help the Saracen war parties ride out, make sure they aren't sabotaged, and attack King Guy's war party. Along with them, you'll find Reynard de Chatillion, another nobleman whose capture will herald a collapse of the Crusader forces. Medieval battle isn't like modern warfare, where soldiers fight on in spite of their leader's capture or death.

A medieval battle ends when one side gives up, or when a leader has been killed or captured. Capturing the heads of an army leads to the immediate death of the battle's morale and will to fight. To win the Battle of Hattin, it is imperative that Guy D'Lusignan and Raynard de Chatillion are captured, as they were in history.

read the jerusalem setting infopage

NAV. NETWORK LOGS OOC PLURK DISCORD

Comments

angela ziegler ( overwatch )

[heilt]

( medical )

( from one battlefield to the next. angela had been in a tent like this before arriving here, and though it was difficult to shake off the words of the man that had been attending to her when she'd arrived she couldn't let herself get distracted now.

she's attending to a patient, quietly reassuring them when the footsteps around her catch her attention. angela needs assistance, an extra hand so that she can stitch and bandage.

stepping away from her patient for a moment she turns to pick something up, grabbing your attention as she goes back to her patient )

Put your hand here.

( it's war. there's blood. lots of it )

( network )

un: @mercy
@all: How many people have experience in these situations, whether it is combat or medical? Perhaps I should enquire as to whether anyone knows anything of time travel. It seems appropriate, even if I don't expect anyone to answer affirmatively.

A.

[disorderdisgust]

[And it is because of the blood that Overhaul is utterly disgusted by it. Surrounded by people in their most disgusting, natural state. Not that he hadn't seen worse things. He had reduced humans to bleeding pairs of legs missing their entire upper half of their body, he had torn their forms to shreds and reassembled it, taking what he needed. He had seen blood and guts so many times and yet every single time they thoroughly disgusted him, through and through.

[As he is called over by Angela, he didn't know why he complies. He had too much pride to simply obey orders but also he is here and he has nothing better to do. He's playing Doctor because it is something his Quirk is well suited to, just as well suited to it as it is to ridding himself of disgusting people, and he might as well do something he is good at rather than something even more disgusting. He removed his glove from his right hand, placed his hand on the patient, activating his Quirk as he did so. He only needed minimal concentration to be able to reassemble the person, wounds perfectly healed, and he completely disassembled the blood on his hands to remove himself from being stained by it, and he slipped his glove back on.]

"I think you'll owe me a favor for this later."

[heilt]

( with his hand in place angela turns to gather some more cloth, starting to unravel it as she moves back. though where she'd expected to see blood instead she simply sees no wound, his hand no longer over her patient.

he'd healed it. it's not entirely surprising, not with what angela can do herself with her own tools, but those capabilities didn't arrive with her )

Thank you. ( she places the cloth by the man, checking now the vitals of her patient ) Though I don't work in favours.

( she helped, she healed. saving lives didn't grant favours )

[disorderdisgust]

"Then I suppose we work in different currency, then."

[Not that he had anything in mind. It was simply the natural order of things, keeping people indebted to him. Still, his usage of his Quirk hadn't taken her by surprise, as he would have thought it would. The people here, from his own assessment, seemed to lack the quirk factor. So, she wasn't unfamiliar with such abilities.

[Perhaps her world was as unclean as his own.

[But it didn't matter. He had his own world to worry about, and neither of those worlds were relevant to the matter at hand. He made sure to put his distance between himself and the doctor, as he smiled a little bit under his mask. For the sake of keeping things covert he had been forced to switch out of his usual mask, but that didn't also mean he couldn't cut off a piece of his vest and fashion it around his head to protect himself from breathing the same air as these people nonetheless.]

[heilt]

My help comes without a price.

( it was what she did, what she'd trained to do. her profession, her life. healing people healed the world in a way, and she hated to see people suffer. her gaze is still down on her patient, fingers measuring their pulse as she silently counts. things are starting to look better )

They're improving already.

A

[orsinope]

[ He does. There's a time and place to question, to bristle; the wounded aren't it.

(It seems as much a shame as ever to own no skill at this. How many will die today? A question that leads too naturally into and for what .)

The momentum of the short hours before them have meant little time for observation, but it didn't take long to realize how few women field battle or tents. It's as good a guess as any that Angela's involved in,

In whatever madness this is. ]

I suppose it's foolish to ask whether this is your first battle.

[ A comment in two parts. She's at the work more than ably; and if there's any sense to be found in this place —

Then neither of them would remember it anyway. ]

[heilt]

It's not.

( and fortunately for this situation angela knows just what to do, even if the tools that she has with her are far more limited than what she is used to.

angela doesn't wonder if she would be quite so able if this were her first time in war, though perhaps her past experience (that first time many years ago) would answer that question. she knew medicine, and that was all she needed, even if acting was more difficult. battlefields and hospitals didn't provide the same sights )

I was caring for patients in the aftermath of a similar situation before I woke up here.

( she wishes she could remember the interaction in between, and the reason or things that lead to angela being here, but for now getting through this is most important )

[orsinope]

[ He watches the blood spread out from under his palm, a slow seep awaiting seal. The loss isn't so extreme as to leap to cauterization — he thinks — not when she's already stitching in hand, best to let those with experience lead in these matters.

How frustrating it is, to only hold pieces together. ]

I'm sorry to hear it, [ There's danger in so many places, a relentless state; at least it confirms her place here. Not one of those they must blend among. In public as they are, caution begs. ] But I doubt you'll hear complaint.

[ Maybe not. The man beneath his hands tries to shift, slumps keening back into place: the low sounds of fright mingling with rasped breath, with an obvious pain. His eyes are unfocused, distant, as he murmurs —]

You don't belong here.

[ A gasp, they roll back in his head. The words unspool into nonsense sounds. Not a true observation, still, the line of Orsino's mouth draws sharp as his grip adjusts. He's certain they've all had the same message of that supposed Commander,

What a thing that would be, to doom this man by coming to his aid. ]

b

[rappels]

un: @aloy
Time travel? Is that what this is supposed to be?

[heilt]

From what this appears to be we're not anywhere that resembles where I was from. Everything I've seen looks as if it came from centuries ago.

[rappels]

But it does look familiar to you?

[ That's more than Aloy can say herself, save for the people being, well, definitely human. Everything else is harder to place, since it's a history that's been lost to humanity at her point in time. ]

This is a weird question to have to ask. When are you from?

medical

[pointedlook]

[ He's been in enough fights (dream-side or otherwise) to know that there's always damage. Physically, mentally, emotionally. The battlefield medics can patch up skin, muscle, and bone– the rest doesn't take as much precedence and oft goes unchecked.

Still, stabilizing is the first priority.

Arthur is no longer squeamish; he can watch someone reset a bone with the same reaction as someone sipping coffee. So he goes to make himself useful in the aftermath, ducking into the medical tent and scanning for a physician. A blond woman snags his attention and he doesn't hesitate to place his hand over the compress, adding pressure to stave off more bleeding. ]

Tell me when to move.

[heilt]

( there's a few moments that angela leaves him there whilst she gathers the necessary supplies, giving him a nod to lift his hand so that she can begin to clean the wound )

I'm glad that you came through when you did.

( it would make the difference between saving this man and losing him )

[pointedlook]

[ He waits patiently, applying even pressure until the blonde turns around, giving him the signal to move his hand. Arthur sticks by to thread a stitching needle while she cleans the wound up and is ready to hand her a fresh cloth when the one she had inevitably became too blood soaked. ]

I have uncanny timing, it seems. [ He flashes her a small smile, friendly. ] Or maybe you do.

slams in here

[totallytrustworthy]

Nnnnope.

[No, Chloe is not touching that wounded patient— isn't this when the world was stricken with the plague and all sorts of other hygiene-related medical problems? Even dressed as a soldier, playing the part of a dedicated, unremarkable asset, there's not enough pay in the world to encourage a little hands-on medieval medical training.

Gloved hands lift, solidifying a refusal to assist.]

You are out of your bloody mind, trying to patch him up like this.

good darling!!

[heilt]

( there's a soft sigh and angela presses her hand a little firmer over the wound, gesturing with her other hand to the supplies that are just a little out of her reach )

I'm a doctor and this man is someone I can save.

( the injury wasn't too grave, even in this century with the more limited resources. that and angela was determined )

You can at least pass me those supplies.

medical

[lonelywar]

[He was facing a similar situation. The time between was a ragged wound, something he could not piece together regardless of his best efforts - though the fact that he should be presently afflicted with a mortal wound and was not might be a contributing factor. The land, which seemed arid enough to be scorned by any and all gods which might have lived here, as well as the strange visions he saw before him, bristling with text and sound, were all elements impossible to understand. But he could not remain still. Clad in clothing and armor alien to him, equipped with weapons similar yet somewhat exotic, he started to rove through the camp - though not even ten minutes into his aimless explorations when he noticed the woman looking directly at him, motioning.

Ashitaka approached, having a feeling of what he would find even before he found the torn body of the patient. Despite his apparent youth, he looks unfazed, instead looking to the woman for guidance. She gives it, and he responds quickly and without comment. He applies pressure with his left hand as instructed, a twinge of something crossing his expression as he did so - not disgust at the blood or injury, but as a reaction to the pulse of pain he felt burn under the skin of his right arm.

He watches her a moment longer, mien still and silent. Then he says,] You are accustomed to things like this. [It was a statement, not a question. Lately, he had become very familiar with the delineation between those who were and were not familiar with the face of war, though he had also realized it was far blurrier than once assumed.]

[heilt]

( there's a nod, and angela gives a small hum as she moves aside to grab the supplies that had been out of her reach. returning she gestures for him to lift his hand, angela beginning to clean the wound and wipe away the excess blood )

I'm a doctor.

( a doctor that had also worked in situations like this before, if in a different time period. she'd been in situations where she had few supplies before, though whether that 'helped'... it wasn't the right expression )

Put your hand back.

( there's a clean bandage under her fingers now, angela waiting for his hand to reappear before moving hers away, starting to wrap a cord higher on the man's leg to staunch the blood flow )

[lonelywar]

[As she moves away to fetch what she had needed, he looks at the patient. He was familiar with wounds, and he knew of the most basic of first aid (some of which wasn't even entirely medically accurate), but anything beyond that was thoroughly outside his ken. He dutifully moves out of the way when she returns, watching her carefully, taking mental notes.

He nods at her reply; her level of comfort at working with this made such a thing apparent. What perhaps spoke even more than her sure-handedness was the complete calm he sensed from her. Not even being in a foreign land, surrounded by war and death, inhibited her with any hesitation. He respected that.

He puts pressure on the now-bandaged wound when she asks, and he watches with curiosity as she begins to wrap a cord around the man's leg. Why would she do something like that?]

You are no common doctor. [Another observation.]

Medical

[horsepowered]

(Chiron has no problem being drafted into assisting with another patient. The approach that the doctors in the tent have has been instructive so far, and there is litle doubt in his mind that the woman who has asked for a very literal hand will be equally instructive.)

How much pressure do you require?

[heilt]

Firmly, and don't lift the bandage.

( angela waits until his hand is over hers before she takes her hand away, stepping away from the patient. she needed to make a tourniquet, to prevent even more blood loss. if she could control the circulation she could slow its exit, and hopefully save this man and his leg )

[horsepowered]

[Chiron's hands are firm, and there's an air of calm to him that makes it clear that this is not the first time he's had to provide support in a setting like this. His eyes remain downward, focusing on the flow of blood onto the clean cloth.]

The bandage is nearly soaking. I may need a second bandage before your additional preparations are ready.

network

[chariotry]

UN: aristosachaion

@mercy
I have experience in everything you've mentioned, including time travel.
I'll admit that my medical knowledge is lacking, but I'm an invaluable asset in terms of combat.

[heilt]

I'm a doctor, though my combat skills are lacking.

( that's possibly also exaggerating it. she's not a fighter, and refused as much training as she could get away with )

Is time travel common to you? I know very little about it.

[chariotry]

A doctor? Then you're on the sidelines rather than the battlefield. There won't be many times we run into each other, so we might as well get acquainted now.

In my case, I've time travelled by magic.