187
Read to everyone:
Jineko gets quieter, the longer you search. You see her excitement curdle into wordless anger, escalating with each new discovery. Arcing a broken hover disc across the room, she stands up and beckons for everyone to follow.
“We need to get back before my mother finds my empty bed. And she’s going to have a full day of work for you.”
If anyone asks Jineko why she’s angry:
“In one day, I’ve gone from struggling to maintain my balance on crutches to floating weightless above the earth. But our fears kept me down. This place has been below us the entire time. I’ve worked through so much … and for what?”
If asked whether or how she will tell her parents, or the others at Mother’s Watch:
“I don’t know! Look at me! Look at what these things can do! What if the Matriarchs decide these devices are sacrilege, or cannot be trusted, or worse: will corrupt and change me, like the Shadow Carja? Will someone else choose how I live the rest of my life? Or will they simply exile me from everyone and everything I know and love?”
“Or do I hide? Pretend to be the Jineko of yesterday to keep those around me comfortable, unchanging forever, like some inert boulder in the sun? What kind of life is that? Who does that make me?”
Jineko can eventually be talked out of her anger, but her anxiety will remain. She pauses as you approach the exit, looking between you and the ruins.
“There are many artifacts here which can help people in All-Mother Mountain. People who are hurting right now. Devices to seal their open wounds, or to ensure their broken bones heal correctly, or to ease the challenges they will face.”
“We are not Oseram, who study and use every thing they find beneath the earth. We are not Banuk, who would weave these devices into their flesh and lives, and treat them with reverence. We are Nora. We know what is good and right comes from nature and from each other, and all else cannot be trusted.”
“Do we bring these devices to All-Mother Mountain and try to help who we can? Do we risk destroying Nora culture to save Nora people? Do we risk the wrath of the righteous, who will attempt to destroy these devices out of fear? What do you think?”
Discuss your options as a party.