[ Some eternal peace this is. Not even a minute to get cold and cozy in his grave and he's being unceremoniously dragged up and out again, sputtering and naked as a newborn. The people who have dragged him out seem surprised that he's bleeding all over the nice ceremonial floors, but they get their wits together faster than he does. He's carted off to be bandaged and dressed, and a woman in robes answers all of his less than cheerful questions with an unruffled patience that would impress Harpocrates. He thinks about asking after Clive and Jill, but he figures when he finds his way out he can just yell until Clive shows up.

They tell him that this is The Free Cities — The Free Cities on some other world, at least. Must be hard to get a stolas about the name being taken if that's to be believed. Cid doesn't comment either way. He's only just gone back to having mostly the right number of holes in his body, and he's not eager to introduce new ones. He wanders off as soon as he's dressed, and no one seems particularly concerned with it. There's some kind of storm coming, and they're busily in the midst of preparations.

Cid spends some time in the barracks just getting his bearings. It's been a long time since he was in a place like this, uniform and all, but looking at him you wouldn't know it — he seems to interact with the soldiers with familiar ease, pitching in with the fortifications and making dry comments that draw out the occasional laugh or hearty groan. Even if he could think of a reason for the higher ups to lie to him in this particularly baffling way, the soldiers' accounts are much the same. He finds it hard to imagine even dead-eyed Ultima going to the trouble of playing such elaborate mind games with a used up Dominant.

Either at the Barracks or somewhere in the city proper, the moment he spots anyone else who bears an arcana symbol in place of their rank, he'll saunter over. He's already tugging the collar of his uniform open like it's been trying to strangle him. ]

Summoned, is it? How was your swim? [ Cid's tone is wry and easy, but there's a faint furrow between his brows. Nice that he isn't all that special around here, but that gives him more questions than answers.

Or maybe you're the one who approached him first. Cid can just as easily be found brooding on his own somewhere, or sitting on one of the beds, changing out the bandages around his midsection sometime that evening. The wound he's covering is well on its way to healing — or would be, if Cid was resting instead of gallivanting about building fortifications and interrogating his fellow Summoned. If you run into him here, you might notice that patches of his right arm and torso are made of stone instead of flesh.

Regardless of the storm, he will be making the trip into Cadens, so carriage buddies for the ride are welcome. ]

[ In many ways, Cadens is almost like a dream fully realized. The vibrant interest in scientific progress and what people can do for themselves without using magic as a crutch — it isn't something he thought he'd see in his lifetime, even if he'd managed to live. But just like any dream, the reality of it isn't so neat. It seems like any system has the people it values and the people it deems expendable. Not everyone is like him, lucky enough to be both at once.

While the streets are nearly deserted, nearly isn't the same as entirely. Cid doesn't want to be out on the city streets any more than anyone else, but in the course of playing nice with his new hosts and handing out masks he runs into a couple of vagrants with nowhere else to go.

He doesn't bother trying to ask the city guard if anything can be done — he knows full well the sort of apathy he would expect to be greeted with. Instead, he waves down one of his fellow Summoned. He gestures toward the alley where an elderly gentleman is huddled with his granddaughter, the two of them doing their best to shield themselves from the blowing sand. ]

Do you know of anywhere they can go to wait out the storm?

[ As the days pass, Cid thinks he's beginning to feel the dregs of levin in his blood start to stir again; whatever is left of Ramuh is still there, though not easily or eagerly reached. Then again, there's plenty of electricity in the air, so maybe it's just that.

He spends most of his time in Cadens proper, eager to be free of the barracks. He still doesn't have a gil to his name, but he can enter the Fortune Arena (hah) for free. He means to look around and carry on searching for actual work, but he ends up talking his way into a lively discussion with one of the drivers; a young woman who could give Midadol a run for her money when it comes to talking fast. A part of her wagon's engine was damaged during travel, and there isn't time to find a replacement. ]

If you did something like — [ Cid looks around for something to write with, and after a moment he crouches down — gods, did his knees make that cracking sound? — to scratch out a diagram in the dirt, to better illustrate his point. It's clear to anyone who might be paying attention that he has a fair amount of engineering knowledge; New Magic is new to him, but otherwise he knows what he's talking about. ] Would that be enough to compensate, do you think?

[ If he notices anyone lingering nearby, he'll push himself to his feet and dust off his knees. He gestures for them to join the discussion. ] If you want to tag in, be my guest. She's got no use for the likes of me.

[ The woman laughs, not unkindly, but she doesn't disagree. Well, shows him for thinking he could just waltz in and figure it all out. ]