Summary:A discussion of the Circle's status degenerates into something slightly more juvenile.
XP:I4, L4, P4, S4, V4, Z4
Tags:< Dreams of Ash and Cinnamon | Sol Invictus Logs | Traces of Moonshine >
It is blossoming season in Chaya.
The red blossoms, once a symbol of a crusade aimed at tearing the world limb from limb and building a cruel fortress of its remains, now are once again only a reminder of revelry and joyous emotional catharsis; the Sunlands Summer Palace, once a clever feint in an elaborate military maneuver, now only a proper den of excess and debauchery.
And so, of course, it is here that Zahara has travelled, along with some of her companions, for a moment of reflection and consideration of what has come to pass.
Imrama reclines with lazy comfort on the air itself, floating at waist-height. He holds a caramel-creme pastry in his left hand and the stem of a ten-foot tall hookah in his right. He seems pleased.
Spring "Are these the only cookies you brought?" Spring rummages through the collection of pastries strewn in the bottom of Unfolding Petal's cage.
zahara glances over at Spring, shaking her head a little. Her red-gold filigreed dress matches the intricate swirls in the cage holding the dethroned god. Within the bars, a thin chain twists down from the center ring, to a matching collar, which rests lightly around his neck. "I had brought several dozen but SOMEONE ate them along the way."
Spring "Mm."
Spring chooses a lemon cookie and eats it, then walks to the window and looks out at the dimming sun.
Spring "It gets dark so early nowadays."
The Chayan landscape is indeed quite beautiful, and now has even begun to recover from the great harms inflicted upon it in the Red Lily War.
Imrama completes a long drag and breathes forcefully up into the air. The grey smoke has hints of electric purple in it, and as it arcs upwards, it fills with sparks, like a firecracker. "One more thing for the fix-it list, Spring."
Spring "It never ends."
zahara "No. And we will take up the list again in our next lives."
Spring "How fortunate we are, to be Repairmen of Creation."
Imrama "It is a beautiful day though, in a bright and delightful season. Time enough for chores tomorrow. Today should be for play. Now that we are all accounted for again - what better time to celebrate?"
zahara smiles tiredly. "You are right, Imrama. Have you any more of that herb of yours? It seems to complement the air here."
Imrama gladly passes the stem to the Empress. "Of course, Dreambreaker. I always bring enough to share."
zahara closes her eyes as she takes a long drag on the hookah, forcibly pushing away her seemingly permanent sour mood. "A gentleman as always," she smiles, the smoke swirling around her as she exhales.
Varanim Varanim, who slouched down on a couch immediately upon arrival and hasn't said a word sense, rouses from her apparent doze though her eyes are still unfocused. "Anyone who brings a pipe that large and doesn't have enough to share is either doing it wrong or very, very right."
Imrama leans in and whispers in Zahara's ear. "Not always, Empress."
zahara chokes a little, "I don't want to hear about what you do in your spare time with my great great, Captain."
Spring snickers.
Imrama "Fair point. A practiced raconteur prefers to show, rather than tell."
zahara takes another drag. Two.
Phoenix` makes a muffled giggle. Apparently she's been sprawled under a rumpled, gauzy heap of sheets for some time now. "Oh do show us, Immy."
Phoenix` "It's so wonderful to let our hair down now and then." It looks like she actually purchased a terrycloth bathrobe for the occasion.
Imrama "Well," Imrama begins, climbing down from his invisible, non-existent liter. He approaches Phoenix with a gleam in his eye. "I will need a few volunteers from the audience. Perhaps you, Phoenix, and Varanim. And rather a lot of chocolate syrup..."
Spring "Is there chocolate syrup?"
Spring looks around.
zahara scoops up a rock and chucks it at Imrama
Varanim "That's sweet, but I'm saving myself for marriage." She looks a little alarmed, in an unfocused way.
Phoenix` speaks to the butler vine. "Fetch chocolate syrup. And...cakes. Several cakes." She turns to Imrama. "I think the herbs are making you a little suggestible."
Spring "You are?"
Spring "Wait, that was an obvious lie."
zahara snickers
Varanim "No, I was making a tasteless jo... like that, yes."
Imrama "An obvious, obvious lie. You wound me to the quick, madam." Imrama laughs and falls backward onto a cushion of air.
zahara runs her fingers over the silver silk of the Bonds and smiles to herself. "You're lucky your pride is all she wounded," she grins
Imrama "Quite to the contrary. I can think of several other places I would prefer to have her land her blows."
Varanim "Zee, cut him off, he's had too much."
zahara "He's barely had anything"
Imrama raises his hands in a pose of concilliation and mock surrender. "I concede that, in light of certain recent events, group sex does not seem to be the best way to strengthen the bonds of our Circle. But does anyone have any better ideas?"
zahara "Is this a thing we're trying to accomplish?"
Imrama "Lucent pointed out to me some time ago that we are not so tightly knit as we might be. I think he had a good point."
Phoenix` "We could play Truth or Dare."
Phoenix` thinks a moment.
Phoenix` "Um, maybe just Truth."
zahara "Truth sounds like an unpleasant game."
Phoenix` "Usually."
Lucent walks in, a lecturing little jupiter on his shoulder! "Dares can do wonders when Exalts do them, actually."
Spring "I think that is the concern."
Lucent "Point. What do we spin?"
Varanim "At the risk of being obvious, I'm with Zahara. Is closer better?"
Phoenix` "Oh my goodness a baby Jupiter!!!" Phoenix lunges at Lunent and pats chibiJupiter's head. "Where did you get this? Do they have other baby things???"
Lucent "Six!" A tiny little Luna pops out of his armor and unto Phoenix's shoulder, eliciting a glare from chibiJupiter!
Lucent "I figured it would not be rampant heresy to reconfigure the coronal into baby Incarna."
Lucent "At least, I have yet to be smoten."
Spring "Smitten."
Spring "Smote."
Spring "Hm."
Spring considers this.
Phoenix` "Smit. Smat. Smut."
Phoenix` giggles.
Lucent "That is Venus." She appears on Lucent's other shoulder, smug!
zahara takes this opportunity to get more of whatever's in the hookah
Lucent smiles bright at Phoenix. She's nice!
Phoenix` "Well, I don't know about closer and feelings, but it seems like most Essence systems benefit from being interconnected with other systems. We might do well to profit from this observation."
Phoenix` "On the other hand, ... ... ..."
Phoenix` looks around.
Phoenix` "You guys are kinda scary."
Spring "At least most of us have not died."
Spring "Wait."
zahara "uh huh."
Spring looks perturbed.
Lucent "Are we counting our templates?"
Varanim "I haven't," Varanim beams. "How's that for irony?"
Lucent counts on fingers
Imrama peers over Lucent's shoulder. "Are you counting me or not?"
Lucent "Of course I am! The Herald killed you DEAD that time."
Lucent "Trumpet or no trumpet."
Imrama "Well, good. I'm affraid that all of this talking has put me in the mood for some doing. I'm in favor of anything that makes us better friends and compatriots, if there's a vote while I'm out. Especially anything fun or dangerous."
zahara "Aren't they both the same thing?"
Phoenix` makes a quick mental list of substances. "Yes."
Lucent looks at Varanim. "Yes."
Imrama With that, Imrama wanders off to find some nubile youths, and head off the servant bringing the chocolate syrup and cake.
Lucent sits down upon some pillows, and considers. "Nim, can we use your staff to spin it?"
Varanim "Huh? Sure," she says, not really paying attention to where the conversation is meandering back to.
Lucent "So make a flower, and..." Lucent takes Varanim's staff, and has the five baby goddesses of fate spin it!
zahara "Wait, what are you doing now?"
Lucent "Spinning the bottle! Or, well, hallowed sun-staff, no phallic conotations whatsoever."
Varanim "S'not actually hallowed, it's just a stick." For the first time since arriving, Varanim's eyes actually briefly focus on the staff, pointing between her and Phoenix. "Wait, what's going on?"
Lucent "Truth or dare. You. Asking her."
Varanim "Uh, truth or... dare?" she says a little uncertainly to Phoenix, still looking slightly out of the proceedings.
Phoenix` gazes across the floor at Varanim, running the tip of her tongue over her lips the way she does when thinking about very serious matters. "Dare."
Varanim looks speculatively at the ceiling for a minute before raising a triumphant finger. "Write me some naughty fiction. About, hmm, Spring and Lucent. No, wait, Thirteen."
zahara blinks at Varanim in horrified fascination, then turns the same look, mixed with speculation, at Phoenix
Lucent gets a nervous eye-twitch. "... what?"
Varanim "Oh, am I playing the game wrong? Pass me that pipe, I'll think of something better for next time."
zahara passes the stem over
Spring doesn't say anything, but seems to have developed an odd twitch.
Phoenix` nods. "Thirteen and Lucent?"
Phoenix` "All right, I'll have that on your desk by morning."
Lucent fumes. "Pass the pipe."
zahara "You have to SHARE."
Lucent "I need something strong in my system right now!"
zahara "Thirteen was pretty strong. ... 'm just sayin'"
Lucent facepalms
Lucent "Just spin it again..."
Varanim tokes, then passes it on to Lucent. "This is more fun than I expected. Who's next?"
Varanim feels around with her foot for a few seconds until she finds the end of the staff, then kicks it...
Phoenix` picks up the stick and waves it musingly. "Okay, Zee, truth or dare?"
zahara twirls a red blossom between her fingers, and inhales the intoxicating scent from it. "I'm not fond of Truth. So Dare."
Lucent "Truth shall set you free!"
zahara "I've used that line on prisoners before, you know."
Lucent shivers
Phoenix` thinks. "Okay. There are some cream pies over there. The next time a servant comes in, throw a pie in his face. Do not explain."
Spring "What? No. Do not waste pies."
zahara snorts. "Alright then."
Phoenix` "Spring's right. Just pants him instead."
zahara "You can lick it off him afterwards
zahara "Make up your mind, quick!"
Phoenix` pokes the butler flower. "Send us a fresh hookah, please."
zahara walks over to the door, leaning casually against the doorframe. "Pants him huh.."
A servant struts in, unaware of the intense drama that is soon to befall him.
He is dressed in one of the elaborate, four-strapped serving kilts of the Chayan servitor class.
Spring "Something went wrong."
zahara contemplates for a second whether or not one can "pants" a kilt-wearer, as he passes her, flicking her fingers out between one stride and the next. Her Essence-imbued fingernails slice through all four straps, and she proceeds to jerk the kilt down.
zahara takes said kilt, reconfigures it expertly, and then hands it back to him. "Put these on." Yes - pants.
Looking at Zahara with a seriously raised eyebrow, the servant expertly dons the pants.
zahara "Ah, wonderful!" she claps. Then she yanks the pants down.
zahara "Carry on." She waves airily.
The servant picks up the panks and stalks back out of the room.
Lucent laughs!
zahara giggles.
zahara struts over, her walk mimicking the servant's initial air, and takes the staff. She gives it a good spin
zahara "Huh. I get to dare Varanim now?" She leans back thoughtfully
Varanim "Truth."
zahara "Oh right, I'm supposed to ask that." She frowns a little, thinking.
Lucent fidgets
zahara "Would you ever sleep with Larquen Quen?"
Lucent "... what."
zahara "He's got all that fancy necromancy lying around and all."
zahara "Plus, you both know what eachother likes... and the whole paradoxy aspect."
zahara "What's not to love?"
Varanim Varanim, who has gone back to apparent fascinated contemplation of the ceiling, blinks. "His joints are kind of bendy wrong."
Varanim "Also, dead people? Not sexy, it turns out. So no, but I had to think about it."
Lucent sighs in relief, filling the room with coruscant, felicitious smoke
zahara "Fair enough, I suppose." She winks.
Varanim "Wait, you said ''Quen/, not Mask of Winters. My mistake, I'd totally hit that."
Lucent coughs, the smoke vanishes. "Spin it!"
Varanim kicks the staff, which comes to rest aligned between her and Lucent this time.
Varanim "Truth or dare, your Zenithness?"
Lucent spreads his arms, defenseless! "Truth shall set me free!"
Varanim "Do you really think being a Circle will help us all, or do you just want a contract saying the band will stay together so you can feel better about your little suicide pact with destiny?"
Lucent "Both."
Varanim "Hm." She reaches out and kicks the staff again.
Lucent sees that the staff goes to... him. And Zahara. He has a little Mars point to her. "Truth or Dare?" said in the magnanimous voice of a little sprite. Enacting Confrontation Kata.
zahara "I'm free enough. Dare."
Lucent "I dare you... on your prowess as a Sorceress... to use all your mystical might to make us more of a CIRCLE!"
zahara "You.... what?"
Lucent "You heard me! I'm daring to make us... you know. Circlish."
zahara "No power in this world could possibly do that!" she throws up her hands.
Varanim "It might be funny."
zahara grumbles. "I can cast the Unity again I suppose."
Lucent "That is all you got?" He grins michievously.
Spring "How well did that work last time?"
zahara "You know, it would have worked JUST FINE if people hadn't gone and gotten possessed and died and things."
Spring "But that happens all the time."
Spring "It will probably happen tonight."
Spring "Phoenix? Are you still alive?"
zahara rolls her eyes. "So why bother?"
Lucent turns to Phoenix and sees a burning pile of fire and ashes and phoenix feathers where she once stood. "Huh."
Lucent "You planned for that, right?"
zahara throws up her hands again
Spring "What I was trying to say is...maybe you could do something even better than the Unity. Why settle for something you did not create yourself?"
zahara "I'll... think about it."
Lucent "You cannot. It is your dare. You MUST DO IT!" Lucent and seven incarna pointed. Very officious.
zahara "I hate you."
Varanim "S'what you get for picking dare," Varanim says smugly, blowing a stream of smoke ceilingward.
zahara "I hate YOU too."
< Dreams of Ash and Cinnamon | Sol Invictus Logs | Traces of Moonshine >