Gerrard

The heavy flapping of uncoordinated wings filled the air as a black feathered flyer slowly came into view. Upon closer inspection, any vigilant individuals would notice a white furred griffon with with black stripes across her form trying to spot a decent place to land. The immense open field nearby was apparently was not big enough though, the sloppy flier coming in too fast as she crashes into the ground, tearing up part of the field as she flops over on her back and slides to a stop. Her red eyes peer up into the sky as she watches the clouds meander about slowly in the sky. The odd griffoness lets out a sigh and spreads her wings wide across the ground, resting peacefully. After a moment of silence, she yawns and retracts her wings, rolling over to her claws as she shakes off the dirt from her form. A few green grass stains pepper her black and white form as she recovers from her gnarly crash and stretches out her body. After a moment of awkward silence, the griffon lets out a surprised squawk as she remembers why she came to this city at all! "Cider," she declares excitedly to nobody in particular, looking around and not spotting any immediately. After a moment of fruitless searching, she spots two other griffons playing around with some tools, and narrows her eyes as she tries to prowl over to their location. Assuming they were not completely asleep as she landed, her goofy hopping into bushes would be completely ineffective as burst out of one and landed between the pair, puffing her chest out as she tried to look over the two griffons as confidently as she could, her talons shaking with excitement as she struggled to keep her overwhelming excitement from bubbling over!

Gerry nodded as his emperor spoke. "Yes. I agree about the trenches and such, but I believe we should establish our baseline water in the area. You might be surprised how much is in the area, especially if the area has been abandoned. Lets check this area for water and see if the situation is better or worse than your maps indicate," Gerrard explains as he pulls out a shovel and heads over to the well in question. "I was hoping it would say how long this city was abandoned or be old enough to have historical value. Unlucky I suppose," he adds with a sigh, reaching into the well and heaving rocks out of it. He scraped dirt off the stone wall of the well and pulled out a reference sheet, "hmm, not the worst," he mentioned vaguely to nobody in particular.

Gerrard kept a steady pace, not particularly fast, but didn't show any signs of fatigue. He didn't know exactly what to think of Norton, but he was at least more agreeable than the average person he worked for on a daily basis. "Emperor, I usually actually have to carry a ridiculous amount of piping so some pony living alone in the middle of a jungle can have water. This is an interesting change of pace, a focus on digging instead of hauling," he explains, glad that most of the weight he was hauling was actually just water. He soon spots the well noted on the map and leads the crew down to the ground level. He could already feel the heat starting to bare down on himself, the younger architect making a mental note about avoiding this area in the future if possible. He took a large drink from his canteen and surveyed the area. The well itself looked relatively old, some of the bricks already collapsed to the side. It wasn't the most reassuring sight to the untrained eye, but another sight stuck out to him, the ruins of a long abandoned city peppered the landscape, stone foundations poking out above the seemingly dry earth. "This could be a good or bad sign your majesty," he explains, taking a brief stroll through the long abandoned town. He spots a collapsed wreckage of a long abandoned home and hustles over to it. His keen eyes spot a tin can in the rubble and he pries it free of the rocky prison. With a quick shake of the metal container, a lone coin rolls out it and makes its way over to Norton before eventually falling over onto its side. "Can you identify that coin your highness. It could tell us how old this settlement was and how long this well might have been abandoned," he explains, Gerrard wondering how much of a historical buff the odd Norton actually was.

"Understandable. We griffons have more important tasks than picture taking, like rebuilding our country," Gerrard adds with a grin, not taking the oddness of Norton as the most serious issue as he hopped off the area near his 'throne' and helped gather up some of the materials needed to get back to work. He pointed out the various 'clawtools' needed to work on the project, guiding Clawson through what all would be required. As the architect helped collect their supplies, a warm smile spread across his face as he realized the strange monarch intended to work alongside everyone else. The misguided griffon just assumed that pony rulers were too uppity to do any real work, and didn't understand ruler morale boosts. When asked if the monarch's presence would be a distraction, Gerrard shook his head, clearly not worried about it. "With the amount of wells we will be checking, every talon helps. Our process will be rather thorough. We will be digging down each well a few feet, remove any blockages, catalogue the water available, and note the type of rock presence and their rough permeability," he explained, most of his words being decently simple enough for his companions aside from his last one. As the monarch suggested Gerrard lead the way, he nodded, taking one last moment to search through his numerous supplies, finding everything in order as he stretched out his body and glanced at the map one last time. "Our first stop will be a mine about half an hour flight from our location. Assuming of course we fly at a modest pace with all of this equipment. And make sure we all have water, can't have anyone getting heatstroke," he explains calmly for everyone around him. The flight didn't seem very far at all, but the architect didn't seem keen on flying there at a particularly fast rate for reasons unknown.

Gerrard took his job in Equestria to explicitly avoid doing military service, but had enough general knowledge to understand the analogy. He nodded in agreement with the emperor and pointed a black talon at the map, circling one of the wells with chalk. "Yes, you are correct. Think of the survey as a search for enemy supplies to pillage to add to our war chest. We will leave no stone unturned," he explained excitedly, his long black tail swaying as he spoke. The architect wasn't one one to gloat to other griffons, but the idea of getting a statue of himself was appealing, even if it came from a crazy griffon. He put on as much a smile as any beaked predator could and nodded for the emperor. He looked over to one of the nearby griffons and puffed his chest and spread his wings wide as he struck a fantastic pose! "You can take a picture now if you need a reference, but as a humble griffon, I can wait," he explained with a grin, patting Norton back. "I'll just collect the paperwork and get the ball rolling. The griffon folk have endured thirst for long enough. By my honor as a griffon, I will save your people emperor," he loudly declares, snatching the paperwork and pointing a talon up in the air to seem even more dramatic. After holding the pose for a dramatic five seconds, he lowered his talon back to the ground. "Lets get some drills and shovels, and find some water," the architect cheers, looking around to see who his assistants were in this noble quest!

The griffon nodded when he was thanked, but quickly realized that it wasn't the most positive of replies, gulping internally as he realized he had done a pony salute. He was glad that the commander-in-chief used the salute for him, Gerrard probably being the least patriotic griffon around and not actually knowing any salutes of his people. "O-oh, apologies, its a bad muscle reflex my time in the pony lands," he explains, standing at the emperor's side as he looked over the paperwork, starting to feel a bit embarrassed about his questionable griffon-hood! His golden eyes scanned over the paperwork as he pulled out a piece of chalk from his saddlebags. "Without unicorn magic to scry for specific locations of water, we will need to do this the hard way. Assuming that these wells are still operational, we can use their locations to predict other locations of water in the nearby area. This is by no means a perfect method, but it is a good start," he explains, connecting the dots of the well locations with his chalk to somewhat graph out a reasonable location another well might be able to be formed. "We would check the stone in said wells and determine if the area was likely to support underground reserves of water, and by cross referencing my previous marks with the stone surveys, we can narrow down likely water locations. That being said, if some of these wells can not be reclaimed, it will also greatly limit our data in finding new well locations," he explains calmly erasing his chalk marks and avoiding three marked wells to show how a water outage could drastically reduce the available water in the area! A lot of his work was noticing patterns in water locations and finding rocks that could safely store water within them. He was starting to regret this assignment and thought back to his time in Equestria. When ponies wanted water somewhere, they usually just controlled the weather to get the rainfall they desired. His work often was relegated to getting water out into the middle of nowhere, or just setting up plumbing for the fancy folk he was often employed by!

As his gesture was not met with immediate or at least obvious anger, the architect retracted his wings and returned to a normal posture, glad that the citizenry of Canterlot had finally taught him something useful in his business life! The golden eyed griffon peered across to the leader, sensing something a bit off about him. He seemed more agreeable than pony royalty and appreciated that, wondering if griffons were less annoying about that or if this individual was just clueless about his alleged station. Gerrard had never been called a Sir except by his odd friend Asteria, so he assumed the latter, but approached regardless, quickly making his way to the side of the emperor. He nodded as the noble explained the situation. The architect wanted to keep his conversation as griffon-centric as possible, but decided to test the waters a bit as he searched for a proper way to respond to his comments on the desert around him. "Yeah. It is looking drier than Appleloosa in the middle of summer out here. Are we looking for drinking water, or are we also trying to get farmlands set up. This isn't the most fertile looking of lands, but I can find you water out here. I can't promise you a massive underwater reservoir here, but I can quench the thirst of your people. That is a Grayfeather guarantee your highness," he explains playfully for the royal, accidentally giving him an Equestrian salute, but forgetting in the moment. After lowering his salute, as his eyes drifted down at the paperwork. "Do we have any information on the area? Am I going to need to perform a water survey or is that listed here in all this paperwork," he asks with a grin, reaching for the paperwork.

Golden eyes peered out across the the barren wasteland that surrounded the nearby area. A griffon of dark fur and feather looked over his often neglected homeland with the casual attention often attributed to his species by outsiders. It felt like it had been years since he had returned to his homeland, the engineer, usually getting called over to pony lands to deal with situations that went beyond simple pegasus weather manipulation. He had to wonder why they needed his services, agriculture being of substantially less interest to his species. Perhaps they were finally deciding to be more omnivorous than they had in the past, but he found that hard to believe knowing the stubborn nature of his species. Regardless, his internal dialogue was interrupted as an attendant broke him out of his thoughtful stupor and lead him into the building with the strange, and regally dressed griffon 'emperor'. In contrast to the emperor, Gerrard wore a substantial saddle bag that rest tightly on his chest, clearly in a position to not interfere with his flying ability. His dark welding goggles dangled slightly above his bag, both items partially hiding his form that was by no means gaunt like the regular citizens of his land. A keen eye might even notice that he lacked the substantial musculature of a warrior, either from a life of ease or from the plant based pony diet. The light clicking of talons filled the air as the grey feathered head of the architect poked his head into the presence of the illustrious leader. His keen eyes didn't recognize this particular griffon at all even with such distinct regalia and almost garish looking clothing. Gerrard was clearly not keen on visiting his homeland in his free time. Still, years of time spent in Canterlot had trained him in how to deal with these types of people, and he was eager to test his abilities! After approaching the emperor, Gerrard paused and did a polite bow approximately five body lengths away from the leader. He had lowered his head to the ground and spread out his large black wingspan in a display of submission and respect, showing that he had no weapons hidden in his large wings. "It is an honor to be in your presence your magnificence. How can I be of service to such an illustrious leader of our people," he politely remarked, fishing through his memory as he tried to remember which particular honorifics worked the best and how to also distance himself from his normal pony employers.

After finally noticing that Twitch messages were a thing, an ooooooold friend messaged me and convinced me to pop back into the community. That being said, I'm looking for anyone who might want to give this catbird another chance to RP. My situation has left me with a lot of free time, and I struggle to find positive ways to spend it. And if you are a new person who has never met me, I welcome an opportunity to meet you as well!