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tabletopjourneys · 4 years ago

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Session 29 Notes

Completing fae deals and sailing out to sea with magic whales and a fortune in ambergris. Tags: @aradow @gher-bear @telurin @epimetal

On this day we successfully trick our way into completing Ixayl’anu’s bargain with Diem’s patron without having to fight anything. Said patron then immediately turns around to have Diem hold on to the item retrieved for awhile - the chaotic deck of many things. Diem and Ixayl’anu then deliver the fungus sample and make arrangements for possibly more samples and by-journal communications with the fungus expert, Professor Whitskey. Afterwards, we all set sail the next day for Anesh to continue our main quest. On the voyage, we encounter weirdness that includes a vanishing crew member and a group of whales doing ancient singing magics alongside and under the ship for a part of the voyage. It doesn’t seem to have anything to do with the meteors though. Ixayl’anu helps us discover and haul in some ambergris that’s gonna be worth tons of $$$$. *Details below the “Keep Reading” break*

(Additional details noted before we knock on Dima’s door.) We agree that at some point while we’re all in the room, Phi found a good time to tell us about Averni being run by vampires. This will possibly get threaded into a previous notes session if I find a good place. Either way, it happened.

Phi would have also told us during fae deal planning that Dima is a follower of Selune the moon goddess and that he’s pretty much not very tolerant/caring about other religions/gods/goddesses

Together we all figure out what Selune’s about, slightly a trickster (but not really the aspect Dima follows), for sailors, the moon and the night, etc.

(The visit with Dima - ‘Waiting Room’)

Ixayl’anu walks up to the door, Alfred the butler opens the door and looks at our ragtag bunch, spotting Phi in the back. “Yes, can I help you?”

Phi: We were wanting to talk to Dima, something’s come up.

Butler: Mr. Lenkov is in a meeting with Aristin Pilwickin (cousin 2nd removed) currently, but you can certainly come in and wait until they are done.

Phi: Yes it’s that important, we can wait.

Rest of us: Yeah we’re okay with waiting.

Phi: How’s it going Alfred?

Al: *steps back opens door, responds*

Phi continues making small talk.

As we walk past the doors down the long hallway, past the doubledoors Phi gets whispered what’s going on because she’s the only one with perception for it and on high alert.

The exterior walls are def stone, but interior walls are plastered wood slats (a note for Rana)

As we reach the room we’re ushered to we see a scholarly blue and white dragonborn and fucked up gnome chick, not related to Phi, def looks like she had a hard life, low London rough and tumble accent.

Phi parses this as odd because she doesn’t really ever see these two together and they were both doing whispery voiced arguing that clams up when we enter.

Gnome lady stays quiet

Payton (scholarly dragonborn): Ah, leaf pick, haven’t seen you in awhile.

Rana gives Phi a confused look because this is like name #15

He’s one of the more stable potion makers of the group (Payton) soooome minor enchantments

Phi: Hey! How ya doin, Payton?

Rana and Diem hug the wall together not feeling great about the group’s chances in this situation.

Phi and Payton have awkward chitchat.

Phi gives Bamfina Lockley (the rough and tumble London gnome) a nod: Hey.

Lockley gives her a cool look in response, something of a glare.

Payton glazes over that about how great it’s going, lots of shipments and good time for working on my projects.

Phi: Have you heard anything about the weird meteors we’ve been having, lots of sciencey people talking about that?

Payton: I have seen them but I’ve been really busy this past week so I haven’t been...why have you heard anything?

Phi: We were talking to some people at the university and it just sounded pretty crazy, right?

Payton: *quetioning look* I didn’t realize you were so interested in astronomy

Phi: New hobby of mine, been spending a lot of time outdoors looking up at the sky and it’s just become fascinating to me.

Neither Payton nor Bamfina look like they know what to do with that.

Payton takes interest in Phi’s friends, we briefly greet back.

Phi asks if they’re waiting to see Dima

Oh we’re just gonna go in then

Lockley stroms off

Rana: Bye!

Phi’s cousin walks out from a door in the side hall on the east wall. “Oh, Selphina! I haven’t seen you in forever!”

Phi: Oh, hey *nickname for level 2 familiarity* Small chitchat in the hall about wishing their loved ones well follows.

He gives the rest of us a wtf are these people doing here look as he goes by but Diem doesn’t even notice him until he’s already past them while Rana tries to start obviously awkward conversation with Payton after Phi dropped him like a hot potato. (The meeting with Dima)

Phi knocks on door where Dima is waiting.

Dima: Enter

Phi peeks in “I brought my friends with me this time, is it okay if they come in?”

Dima gives her a look: It’s better than having them in the hall.

It’s a cozy little office with french doors leading into a garden/well area. 20x30 office

Diem comes all the way in and crosses with Phi to the french door area to allow room for Rana and Ixayl’anu, then sits in the chair on that side of the office.

Dima thinks this is unusual that Phi’s brought people in, but she’s not in trouble for it. He casually closes his books and sets them aside as we come in.

Dima: Phi what is this about, I thought we’d spoken earlier?

Phi: Yeeeeah, but it turns out my friends realized they have something to talk to *you* about and so I brought them here to talk about it.

Dima: Interesting *makes go on hand gesture*

Ixayl’anu: (rolls a 10 on persuasion) and she says something to the effect of “I’m on a mission from Selune, and you have something she requires to complete my quest.” Dima is intrigued

Diem doesn’t think he looks intrigued enough and decides to use phantasmal force to convince Ixayl’anu Selune is now talking through her to tell this story, and hopefully Dima that it’s true/help really sell the story. Sleight of hand casting succeeds/Nobody notices Diem cast it, but Ixayl’anu makes her save enough to know what’s going on and let it happen.

Ixayl’anu then rolls a nat 20 on persuasion with the rest of the story, letting herself believe she’s possessed by Selune. Diem adds a little moonlight prestidigitation to Ixayl’anu’s eyes to really sell it. Both trickstery deities involved probably fully approved and thought this was great fun (Dima’s and Ixayl’anu’s)

Dima: Yes, Ixayl’anu, whatever you need, name it.

“Selune”: Ixayl’anu will know it when I see it through her eyes.

He leads us to the basement where there’s a sleeping black dragon it looks up and snorts.

Peace Antimony, (words I missed).

It hisses some toxic green gas and lays back down.

Dima leads us around. “This is just general storage, but I’ve got a vault down here.”

Rana and Phi have been flabbergasted. We all stand back and just act like we’re not interested in snooping.

1st item: metal globe with protection runes “thaumaturge’s orb.”

2nd item: A staff with a golden hand at the end with one finger extended “Staff of Midas”

3rd item: Multi-faced star-shaped cut glass/shimmery crystal reflecting light in prismy way “The sky crystal focus” about the size of a basketball.

4th item: Beautiful finely made silver circlet with a large multi-faceted, mostly purple gemstone in the middle with 3 little motes of light that float around it in diff shifting colors “Arcanist’s Circlet”

5th item: A tiny hummingbird out of enamel or jade, in flight “Valonte’s vitalium”

6th item: Another orb, jet black with 2 copper bands runes carved into the orb. “Orb of passage”

7th item: A sword longsword with kind of twisted metal and hilt is standard wrapped hilt that merges into the base of the blade like grasping vines, cross blade is thorny “constrictor blade”

8th item: Just looks like a deck of fine playing cards, kinda plain. “The Deck of Many Things”

9th item: Amulet on a jeweler’s bust, inside is a beautiful topaz (yellow), large cut to shine brilliant, around it 2 sphinx’s and a four winged angel on top with sunrays behind it. It looks very ornate. “The Sunheart medallion.”

If Rana was looking she might be able to say more about it, but she isn’t.

Dima: I did just acquire this as well.

*shows wine decanter sized crystal vial with a metallic, shimmering in all the colors kaleidoscopic liquid, I’m not exactly sure what this does yet, I haven’t had it identified, but it may also be what you seek.

Arcana check of 22 to see if I know any stories about the item names: Enough to Cross off staff of midas, volantes vitaleum, and constrictor blade.

Diem manages to sleight of hand cast message to share not these 3, but my patron said you would know it when you see it, so maybe...communicate with your god in front of each one or something? “You can respond to this message”

Ixie: Maaaybe.

Rolling a d6 at a 5 (for where she’s drawn): Ixie narrows it down to the skycrystal focus, the arcanist circlet, and the deck of many things.

Ixayl’anu tries to use divine sense in front of the 3. It doesn’t tell her any more.

She’s doing the slow loop around the room kinda thing, holding a hand out, dowsing rod kinda passing each one. Loops back around to the deck, decisively points at the deck “That one.”

Dima: Yeah, that completely makes sense, let me unlock that for you.

Phi rolls investigation to see if there’s a magic component to these keys or anything. As he puts in the key and turns it there’s a faint puff of coloured magic smoke that comes out, and she knows it’s just like a simple alarm spell - it would make a noise to alert something or someone elsewhere. Takes out the deck and hands it to Ixayl’anu.

Phi notices the back of these cards is an exact match to the card she’s been carrying. Dima’s deck is complete, Phi got it within a year, but not from Dima. Meta info none of us realize: Vizier: At any time you choose within one year of drawing this card, you can ask a question in meditation and mentally receive a truthful answer to that question. Besides information, the answer helps you solve a puzzling problem or other dilemma. In other words, the knowledge comes with Wisdom on how to apply it.

Ixayl’anu tries to give him a good faith I know it’s not enough token of 100gold

Dima: No, this is between us and the deities. (but he appreciates the gesture)

Ixayl’anu: May her light shine on you.

Dima: And you as well.

We don’t linger and follow Phi out.

He invites us to a drink after with some chitchat. With as little detail as possible and as much truth as possible (not sure what I meant by this statement lol). We get very good bourbon.

Charisma check for how Dima views each of us moving forward: Rana 15, Ixayl’anu 15, Diem: 10, Phi: nat 20 (22 total).

Level up!

We go back to the inn and Rana buys us dinner.

We talk about when we’re doing the professor meeting and will they meet us at night.

We both are like as soon as possible, but we’ll say it’s an emergency.

Rana exchanges a look with Phi.

Diem: What? Wait did you guys get message while I wasn’t paying attention?

Rana: Yes. Phi tells Diem the truth though (no, we didn’t)

Diem talks about maybe appearing on the boat after it’s already set sail - they don’t know how these things work.

Rana: Won’t the captain have questions?

Diem: Well we’re already paid for so it’s not like we’d be stowaways.

Rana and Phi talk about how mad her mentor might be, they talk about not knowing it wasn’t an actual message from Selune and what if Dima finds out. Rana doesn’t for a moment believe Selune was involved.

Phi: That won’t be explained until the future either and if a catastrophe was averted by then it could make him less mad.

Rana: Let’s hope it was worth it.

Phi: Yeah, let’s take it one day at a time. Cross that bridge when we come to it.

Rana: Let’s just hope we don’t burn that bridge.

*cut to Diem and Ixayl’anu for a deal’s a deal scenes*

Diem does as last time, with the sense Ahrune heard.

Ahrune pops in “That was fast, what have you brought for me?”

Diem: We may have convinced him it was ordained by his goddess.

Ahrune: More interesting than what I had in mind.

Ixayl’anu *huffy*: It wasn’t exactly clear, but I brought you these.

Ahrune: *examines them* Yes, these will do quite nicely *hands them over to Diem* Why don’t you hold on to these for me.

Diem: *thanks in shock*

Ahrune makes us a door directly to the guy, and hands Diem a return portal orb to the inn when we’re done. “Forgive me if I don’t want to stick around for this part.” *disappears*

*Diem tucks the cards into their inner suit pocket before following Ixayl’anu through the door.*

As soon as we walk in he looks up: Oh! Hello I didn’t...office hours are closed!

Ixayl’anu: Forgive the intrusion but I need to talk to you.

Whitskey: You don’t look like one of my students…?

Ixayl’anu: No we haven’t met before, I have an unusual question...well...maybe *looks at all the vials of fungus and thinking maybe not* Wondering if maybe you can identify something for me.

I’m given to understand you’re professor Whitskey?

Whitskey: Yep that’s me.

Ixayl’anu: Do you...I think this question is self evident but do you happen to study lichen and fungus and things?

Whitskey: That is my specialty

Ixayl’anu: I have a substance that I - well a group of us found recently and I was hoping you’d know more about it.

Magical lichen - you understand magical lichen very well?

Whitskey: Yes do you have one you want me to identify?

Ixayl’anu digs in her pack and pulls out the vial to hand over

Diem: before you open this you should know *tells about it briefly and where it was sampled from*

Whitskey: Yeah I recognized it so I wasn’t going to throw magic at it but thanks for the warning.

You said you found this in the shadowood? You’re quite far from home.

One of us: We spoke to professor Leonis he wasn’t sure if it was native here or if they came with the meteors, he kind of led us to think it was native

Whitskey: Professor Leonis, I can’t say that I’m too familiar with him but I don’t get out much. I have heard all this hullabaloo about these meteors but I didn’t realize it would have anything to do with my work.

We talk about it growing directly on the meteor.

Diem illustrates it for him.

Whitskey: Hmmm *adjusts glasses* (has very large eyes behind the glasses)

Ixayl’anu brings up the dwarf too.

Whitskey: There was a dwarf? Tell me more about this.

Diem does a 22 on telling the story again and all the details they can remember.

Whitskey looks at the lichen in the jar and studies it. His excitement continues to grow as he looks up things in books and compares, etc.

He keeps it in the jar and he brings the mage light closer to the vial. *Diem steps back*

The lichen grows toward the source of the magic with quite a speed, spindly bits and deeper colored. Whitskey quickly separates it out again.

Whitskey: This is quite a find! This is a very...I haven’t actually seen this before!

Diem would let him know what officials in Miova know, what little they don’t, or even the local Miovan professors about this fungus and that he might want to put a team together to stress the importance of this to his local magistrates/officials/etc, asks whether it might be wise to take a protected sample back there as well.

Whitskey: If I’m correct this line is very aggressive. Transporting it could be quite problematic, we’d have to set up a containment field, quite frankly I’m surprised it stayed in this method of containment.

Diem agrees on the point of transporting it back through another, different magical door and that it’s probably best to leave the whole sample with Whitskey after all.

Diem and Ixayl’anu talk about her mission and what they can do if they encounter more of it. Whitskey gets excited about the possibility of more samples then and happily gives us containers of his own.

Tips for future encounters: Bring someone who can create a null field, anti-magic area to contain it, and it is best you get the samples when they’re small, when they’re large they have a self-fulfilling mist about them and they become quite difficult to contain. At that point it can do certain things, take over other living organisms.

Diem: Like that dwarf - oh and maybe those gnolls.

*tells him about the gnolls now too*

Whitskey: Oh yeah some cults do use them to infect themselves with various forms of these lichens to become part of their deities. Usually those cults get found and irradicated. Some small discussion about that. We find out it’s common though with known species and not necessarily tied to this new one.

Diem asks about the care of the vessels

The containers are inert until you open them and put something inside, and once you shut them they become their magical versions and he wouldn’t recommend putting them in magic holding things like bags of holding or anything like that, but near those bags is fine.

(Rana:This guy is totally going to turn out to be evil

Leonis: "I can't just hand out University materials, I'd have to get permission."

This guy: "Take my personal vials.")

We get 3 containment units.

He goes around to the other side of his table and give us a small book of sending so we can keep in touch and we can coordinate how to get samples and such back and forth.

We verify we can send warnings through and not just notes, and he will contact us too about things he learns.

How durable are the contaminants?

More durable than glass, they can break, handle them with care, don’t smash them on the floor or throw them at things. They’re made of magical pyrex. Thick enough to drop from waist height and they’ll be fine.

Whitskey: You’ve made my whole night, my whole year, I have so many things to do!

Ixayl’anu has something else she wanted to ask but can’t think of it right now.

Diem makes sure it’s okay to ask him a question in the book later if she thinks of it.

Whitskey: Oh yes, so long as it pertains to all of this.

Diem: Can this book be stored in a bag of holding?

Whitskey: Yes absolutely.

Ixayl’anu: Anything else you can think of?

Diem: Nope I think we did a pretty good job.

Ixayl’anu smashes the portal and we go back to the room we were in, taking 45 minutes total.

Rana and Ixayl’anu played with their rats. *rewind a little (to prevent potential disaster lol)*

Before we left, Phi brought up that she had a similar card to the deck we got and she tells us it’s a deck of many things that have wildly varying effects that could be really good or really bad and she knows you have to declare how many cards you want to draw and select them. She has an enchanted card to be whatever card she needs and now that she knows this it’s revealed its true nature to her so now it probably doesn’t work as intended.

Phi asks if she can see the deck and Ixayl’anu hands it over (in the velvet bag Dima had tucked them in).

She puts them face down on the table “I have one of these cards that I thought was just a trick card. I use this to turn into a different card *she tells it to change by illustration* the fact my boss had cards like this tucked in his treasure room tells me this is more than just a simple trick.”

It’s def a trickster element to it. Diem realizes they know stories about these cards (21 arcana check), gives some examples of people dying, being lost, become more powerful or rich, getting wishes granted.

Rana makes a face when the wish spell is mentioned.

Phi: Sounds super dangerous but also kind of fun

Diem: Yeah, but also the epitome of fey fun, so it makes sense why you picked that one, Ixayl’anu.

Phi: *tucks her card away and talks about getting it identified*

*Phi and Rana time while Ixayl’anu and Diem are at Whitskey’s*

Rana: So how do you and Dima know each other?

Phi: He’s the head of an organization I used to be a part of.

My family is very involved still so I kinda don’t talk about being involved with it anymore so I kinda just go off and do my own thing but Dima is one of the people who knows I don’t wanna be a part of it anymore. He makes sure I don’t get any heat from not wanting to be part of it now.

Rana: Well your sister seems nice and he seems nice

Phi: He’s NOT nice, but my sister doesn’t know much about it, she’s just a family person, focuses on that. Her job’s not so intense (I have a lot of sisters though).

Rana: What do your other siblings do? *confused*

Phi: You know

Rana: No, I don’t.

Phi: Just stuff that isn’t necessarily on the up and up, you know, like...below the law things that you may not wanna do if you have kids you gotta feed. I don’t know, she’s just a different person.

Rana: Is that why she had so many kids?

Phi: Oh no that’s just normal and they’re not all hers.

Rana: Dima did help us. Well, we tricked him into it but he really did help us.

Phi: Yeah I was actually a little surprised by that. I think he’s just very devout so I don’t think he saw an option to not help if that makes any sense?

Rana: Either way if he’s been supporting you and he’s willing to help us out, he can’t be that bad right?

Phi: Sure. I mean he’s not supporting me out of the niceness of his heart, we made a deal.

*I missed Rana’s response, sorry*

Phi: It wasn’t like a favor it was a trade

Rana: At least we’re not making deals with the fae

Phi: That’s some crazy shit right? I’d never do something like that.

*Back to the present*

Diem stores coffee can sized containers in their bag with a tight fit and takes the sending book downstairs to meet the others after we decide to tell them about the deck in addition to the meeting with the prof.

They are cuddling very fat very happy rats right now when we find them.

Diem: Good news and...interesting news.

*we tell them*

*we go over our primary goal*

We decide to let the local lawmaster know our statement too and told the front desk lady. Rana didn’t come along, she went to bed.

Diem mentioned meeting them again for breakfast because they have last night of potential company.

Phi asks about that on the way and Diem dishes about the sexy librarian with his dark teal skin.

Ixayl’anu got a 13 on her insight check to the first story she overheard.

Contested against 23, she believed it all, but it was definitely just singing the praises of Teagan and nothing revealing at all about Diem themselves. (Insight checks were arranged after, Phi’s is yet to be determined)

(Getting on the boat)

Next day Diem doesn’t make it to breakfast but they do make it just in time.

Rana on stone: I have your stuff and bringing it with me to the boat, be there.

Diem: I’m already on my way I promise, I’ll be there soon *flying clothes on totally not already on the way* Diem also manages to get a pearl on the way for their new identify spell.

Rana is a bit grumpy as she eats her breakfast taco

Ixayl’anu tells Rana she has something that might help, even though she seems to have a handle on water forms now *hands over water walking ring*

Rana: If you don’t mind I would like to hold on to this for the journey.

Ixayl’anu: Sure

*brusquely nods*

Diem: Oh my pack is making up, you guys <3

Rana spent all night preparing all the water spells.

Ixayl’anu dumps 4 shark teeth

Phi: What’s with that?

Ixayl’anu: It’s so we have a safe trip?

Diem: What? What’s what about?

Ixayl’anu: Don’t you have anything to give too?

Phi and Diem: No, do we need to?

Ixayl’anu looks worried and gives us shark teeth and tells us to throw them in too.

We do so and I’m totally interested in the story behind it. Tell me Ixayl’anu, pretty please!

Ixayl’anu: You just do it for safe passage from the spirits.

Clearly the guardian spirits of the ocean are the sharks. This just insures nothing that’s beyond the sailors skills will happen on this journey.

Diem talks about that being fair - no shark teeth is probably why they ended up overboard in a barrel their last trip to sea.

*Ixayl’anu hands Diem a small bag of shark teeth just in case.*

Diem: Do I dump all these in now or for later?

Ixayl’anu: Later, you shipwrecked seems you’ll need them. Diem gives a fair point shrug and happily holds on to them.

During all this talk, Rana has tossed in one of the prettier stones from her pocket and while stressing out, is looking to spot it in the water. Rana manages to spot her offering.

Phi tries to distract by asking Rana about her homeland.

Diem internally pouts over not hearing Ixayl’anu’s story about how she lost her body guards the first time around that didn’t go so well, but is also interested in stories about Rana’s homeland (and distracting her). (I think I missed some of the initial talk)

Rana: Don’t wanna be caught out in the desert without protection either from the sun, cold at night, etc.

Phi: Well you just have to trust the experts that know about the place we’re in, like we trust these experts in the ship we’re in.

Rana looks over like “I know what you’re doing” Yes we do don’t we, let’s get on this boat before I change my mind. *Throws in all her shark teeth too*

When we get on, we mostly get ignored by the crew.

(Aboard the ship, talking about Anesh, Rana sees a new animal form!)

Phi does 14 perception, few new faces, mostly the same crew. “Hey how many shark teeth did you throw in the water today?” to the one she knows to be the nicest/most tolerant.

Person looks at her with sheer incredulity “what are you talking about?” and walks away.

Phi 11 retro-active perception checks superstitious stuff among this crew, but hasn’t noticed any.

When shown their rooms, Diem asks Rana if she wants to share a room since there are only 3.

Ixayl’anu attempts to bring her elk aboard and gets a few looks from the crew, but they don’t deny her. The captain is nowhere to be seen. It can roam around 9 or put it in 12 (the actual hold). She bought elk supplies bedding/food for the trip.

On their rush to the boat, I did manage to buy a pearl because my patron tipped me off to check my spell book.

We all hang out on deck, Diem tries and fails to come up with positive ship stories to distract Rana.

Ixayl’anu asks Rana about where they’re going.

Rana rolls 14 history check: She knows it’s a port town (Farford), they do a lot of the trade that comes in from Petarus rather than overland - specialty seeds, various animals (not the metals which come from Bouldergap). She didn’t stick around too much. Before she met us she didn’t stick around anywhere very much, sold her goods and moved on.

Ixayl’anu: What’s it like in Anesh?

Rana: It’s pretty dry, it’s a desert - most of it, near the mountains you have more brushy cover. You don’t wanna go to Lake Nitron.

Phi: Why not?

Diem: What’s wrong with Lake Nitron?

Rana: It’s pretty deadly, only a few birds can survive out there it’s not really a place that you’d want to live. Sunhame is right in the middle of it all but most of the towns are either on the coastline or nearer the mountains where there’s cover.

Ixayl’anu: And that’s where your home is, up in the mountains?

Rana: Yeah, that’s where I learned all my druid craft at too

Ixayl’anu: What do your parents do?

Rana: It’s just my mom, she’s a tailor. My dad died before I was born so I can’t really tell you much about him. My brother is a blacksmith.

Sunhame is not as large as Miova but the rest of the towns are about the size of Budelia.

I’ve been to Sunhame a few times, it’s heavily religious. I spent a lot of time traveling between them all between my mom’s business and my brother’s blacksmithing. We don’t have anything like the shadowood where we’re from though, that’s a you guys thing.

Ixayl’anu: Do you have trees?

Rana: Some, a few up in the mountains scattered near them, but not a lot of them. It’s not as green, you guys have a very green country

Diem: Do you prefer it that way?

Rana: I like both places, nature exists (I missed the rest of this) yeah it’s not as green as Rethwellian but I think you guys will like it, it’s a nice place.

Ixayl’anu: I get the impression it’s really hot though

Rana: Yeah, it’s warm. It’s a desert.

(Established that Rana’s staff is made of hazel, found in the mountains.)

(I may have missed some more things. You’ve probably guessed but even when I don’t note this, it’s probably true even for conversations that seem whole.)

Rana talks until someone stops her, but we’re all on team distract Rana, so we encourage it.

We have occasionally seen the captain if we notice.

Calm sailing so far.

Ixayl’anu rolls a d20 for us for mysterious reasons.

About 3 hours into the day, noonish, we see a pod of killer whales hanging out with the boat.

Rana ventures closer to the rail by then and adds it to her animals seen list.

Diem asks how her animal form hunting went.

Rana: I found a loud seal.

Diem: Did you try swimming?

Rana: No I just transformed into one so I know I can do it and watched them swimming so I’m sure they can. It’ll be fine.

Diem: Yeah, I’m sure it’ll be just fine. (As text this sounds like sarcasm but it wasn’t lol)

Rana: Yeah we’ll be okay.

Diem: We will absolutely be okay. (Also not sarcasm, but let’s not point out she didn’t try swimming in that form)

(Aboard the ship, Diem has identify now!)

Before the end of the day, Diem picks a time when everyone’s near enough to hear them to tell Phi “guess what I learned how to do?”

Phi: What?

Diem: *brandishes pearl* I can identify things now!

Phi: And what’s that?

Diem: Oh the pearl I need to cast it.

Phi: So does that mean you could find out what this card can do?

Diem: Maybe, wanna try?

Phi: Yeah *hands it over*

Diem starts trying

Phi: Oh but I also wanted to ask you how your night went.

Diem: *tries to concentrate on ritual but gives up to just answer the question* do you want to know that now or after I cast the ritual?

Phi: Oh later is fine.

Phi leaves so they can concentrate.

Diem finds it out after 15 minutes instead of just 10 and tells Phi it is the vizier and what it does.

Phi looks disappointed (I think because the card also lost its ability to be any card she wanted at a thought but all I literally wrote here is “Phi looks disappointed scene” and then failed to remember details I was so sure I could fill in later :P) (Aboard the ship: Keeping company with spiderwalking elks, Phi and Diem have a talk)

Ixyal’anu goes to keep her elk company after awhile.

Before the end of the night, Diem and Phi go to Phi’s room to dish the details on Diem’s last night with Teagan. By the time they get there, however, Diem has a more serious, related topic on their mind that alters this discussion (Sorry at the time I was stuck in the “no live awkward rated R details” mode and forgot something happened that would give Diem pause over the “after hours” story time).

Rana casts spider climb on the elk again to make herself feel better.

Ixayl’anu, confused, asks it “did you do this? How do you do this?”

Elk: I’m on the ceiling, it’s great!

Unfortunately realizes he can’t swallow upside down so comes down to swallow his food.

Ixayl’anu: You need to teach me this trick

Elk: I don’t know how I do it, it just happens.

Ixayl’anu insight checks 18 *stares down the elk*

Elk: Sometimes when your friend comes around I can do this.

Ixayl’anu: Which One?

Elk: The copper one

(Aboard the ship - next day shenanigans, I think? Day 3 shenanigans? I didn’t make the timeline very clear in these notes) At some point during the day, Diem snuck in Phi’s room to take back the doll from her packs, then tried to sneak it into her arms that night 20 stealth vs 25 perception, Phi wakes to see Diem looming over her, reaching out.

Diem quickly hides doll behind their back and is very awkward about this. Rana doesn’t cuddle and I wanted to see if you would.

Phi wants to know what they were doing, why they were reaching out for her face though.

They awkwardly try to explain that there was something on her face.

Phi tells them they’re being creepy. Diem: Oh, and who snuck into my room in Budelia just sitting on the end of my bed watching me? That wasn’t creepy? Deflection fails so Diem shows her the doll and pretends they were trying to get rid of it for her before she woke up and freaked out. This backfires as Phi gets really really freaked out and Diem decides they can’t go through with that either and admits that they did it, they were actually trying to *leave the doll in her arms* to find later and it’s just one of those normal dolls of the queen they were handing out at the festival.

Phi: I changed my mind, you’re not getting cuddles tonight.

Diem *crushed to lose cuddles*: I’m sorry, I didn’t realize you were that scared of it - What if I throw it overboard right now - an offering to the sharks?

Phi agrees to cuddle after all if Diem throws the doll overboard. We do so and then go sleep in the same room with Rana. Note: I think I forgot to note the passage of some uneventful days mixed up in this trip somewhere because otherwise we’d have only 2 full days out to sea, arriving in the morning of day 3. As such, I went back through the notes to note when an (the?) uneventful day(s?) might’ve occurred. (Ocean Voyage Day ?: What happened to Kelly?)

By the time the rest of us wake up, Rana is probably already on deck sitting miserably.

Diem tries to cheer her up but it’s mostly cause she’s not feeling well.

Ixayl’anu begins to notice how weird it is that this crew is quiet and antisocial

Diem doesn’t really notice but tries to encourage sea shanties. A few look my way (19 persuasion) and catch themselves humming before quickly cutting off and going silent again.

Ixayl’anu starts talking to phi about how strange this is

Diem agrees, noting how the ships they’ve been on always sing shanties and clearly some of this crew knows them…

Ixayl’anu: and they’re usually shouting back and forth about things they’re doing/seeing.

Phi: Maybe they don’t need to communicate like that?

Diem: Yeah maybe they all follow old ones...? Wait that sounded way more ominous out loud than in my head.

Rana is glaring at us.

Ixayl’anu: *Grumbling* it’s usually more lively than this, I just don’t like it.

Phi realizes something about something Tel whispered her: Wait a second guys, I wanna go ask somebody something *goes to find the guy who thought the whole shark teeth thing was weird*

Phi makes a 17 investigation roll, she does not see the person she was looking for, but she had seen him since launch.

Phi returns and tells us she can’t find the guy she spoke to yesterday when we set out.

Diem: Are all the little boats still here?

Ixayl’anu casts divine sense but doesn’t sense any celestial, fiends, or undead: Do you know his name? Maybe you could ask about him?

Phi doesn’t know why we’re worried, but she knows his name (Sean something I missed) and could go asking even though she’s not worried.

Diem messages: Are you really not worried or are you saying that for Rana’s benefit, you can respond to this message.

Phi: Well I’m not worried but I’m getting worried that you’re worried. You can respond to this message.

Phi goes off to ask the captain and knocks, hears sigh.

Cpn: What can I do for you Selphina?

Phi: I was gonna ask Kelly a question but I can’t find him, do you know where he is?

Peter gets quiet and then says “Oh no, Mr Kelly had other engagements and didn’t join us this go around.”

Phi: But I saw him yesterday…?

Cpn: You must’ve been mistaken.

Insight check 10. She knows he’s lying but doesn’t know anything else about it, only that something about this is not right. It’s also suddenly degrees colder in this room.

Phi: I guess I was mistaken.

Cpn: No worries it happens to everyone

Phi: How’s the trip going, are we on schedule?

Cpn: Oh we’re making excellent time, we should be there by morning.

Phi: Excellent

Upon returning to us, Phi: Guys I don’t think we should be talking near the captain’s door in the future, but I was clearly mistaken

Phi actively tries to get out of the conversation and drop it.

Diem suggests maybe it’s this crew’s own superstitions like “quiet passage for quiet passage.”

Ixayl’anu says maybe she’ll be be less worried about it then. (Aboard the ship: Ambergris!)

At some point during the day we see a lump of grey goo overboard about the size of 2 milk crates. Definitely smaller than a chair.

Ixayl’anu notices it first, rolls a 12 on nature check, it’s not something her culture uses but it’s whale vomit and worth its weight in gold.

She points it out, gives fancy ambergris name to us and looks for a bucket, Phi tries to help.

We found a bucket, it’s probably not big enough for this. Ixayl’anu hits the thing, but realizes the bucket is too small.

Rana casts control water to keep it with the ship. Diem runs to get their special rope.

When they return with rope, it ties off successfully and Ixayl’anu manages to get it up to the boat, with all four of us pulling we successfully get it on board (mostly Rana’s 21 and no thanks to my 2 lol).

It smells not great.

Diem: Oh that’s awful *prestidigitations it to smell like flowers* (Except it’s old enough to be hard and not smell too awful anymore)

We talk about getting it in the black of holding and breaking it in pieces so we don’t rip our bag.

Rana asks about what it’s for, is it part of the meteor?

Ixie: No, it’s...well it’s whale vomit.

Diem: Oh, gross... *looks at their hands and casts prestidigitation*

Rana goes back over to sit where she was before like oh my god as the rest of us talk about it being valuable. She leaves the bag of holding with us to break it and stick it in the bag.

Phi: This is awesome, the best day ever, I’m going to throw shark teeth in the water every time!

Ixayl’anu: *excited* yeah the teeth just show up on the beach it’s so easy to find them. (not knowing if that’s true everywhere).

Diem: Or maybe the whale just saw that doll (as an aside to Phi)?

Phi laughs.

We have a pleasant evening, no plans.

Ixayl’anu gives a heads up to the elk: Watch listen tonight so you can stay up. Keep your ears open.

Evening perception checks: me (literal 0), Ixayl’anu: (nat 20), Rana: 21, Selphina: 10. (Ancient Whalesong Magic!)

Rana can’t sleep tonight. She hears a low wailing that goes into a series of clicks. She hears it all night long.

Rana goes to Ixayl’anu’s room and asks “What is that?” It sounds like they’re following the boat or just all around us. A lot of them and very close.

Ixayl’anu: It’s whale song

Rana: Why are they so loud?

Ixayl’anu: Well it’s...I don’t know what they use it for, but it’s communication

Rana: But why are they so loud?

Ixayl’anu: I don’t know *both go above deck to check it out*

Rana makes 7 perception, Ixayl’anu a 14. She knows what to look for - occasionally she sees a spout but they’re not hanging out at the surface, only coming up to breathe and going back down, unlike what she’s used to.

Looking out over the water for a little bit they speak with animals at about the same time. About 10-14 whales.

Rana or Ixayl’anu: What are you singing about?

A whale: We’re working

Another whale: We’re busy

Now that they can hear what they’re saying, it doesn’t make sense at first, it has a weird strange poetic cadence to it, it kinda sounds like chanting or a ritual spell.

Ixayl’anu makes an 8 on arcana check

Rana wants to see if this is natural and rolls an 18 nature check. It seems like a natural thing, these are natural whales.

Ixayl’anu: What’s the song about?

There are words they can recognize, but she didn’t pre-arrange the song (Bless you if you know what I meant at the end of this statement).

19 perception from Ixayl’anu to get the meaning through the overlapping song. It’s about wrapping something around things and tying things together and binding something, repetitive in the round song way (row row row your boat lol) about keeping something together, apart from everything else.

Rana is leaning over the railing intrigued by all this.

Ixayl’anu is looking for any visual signs, 14, little waves, but not enough to disturb the pretty view of moonlight on the water. She doesn’t hear any birds or any other splashing. Very quiet other than the whale song.

Rana excitedly runs below deck to wake Phi and Diem up to experience the whales too! Diem actually does manage to perceive whales. It is very cool.

Rana (to whales): Are you coming with us?

A Whale: No we have our own business to attend to

Rana: Where are you going?

Whale: Here

Ixayl’anu: Are you hunting?

Whale: No, we are not hunting. We are very busy.

Rana: Do you need help?

One of the whales spy hops, large whale between humpback and blue whale (fin whale).

Diem: Wow that is so cool.

Rana gets the sense it’s looking at her and comes back down with a snort: I don’t think you could.

Rana: You’d be surprised. I might be able to help if you need help, but what’re you doing?

Whale: It is old magic for our kind.

Ixayl’anu and Rana ask them more about it, find out they’re doing some kind of binding ritual.

Rana casts locate object looking for pieces of the meteor.

She does not sense anything within a thousand feet of her.

Rana: Is it about a rock?

Whale: It is about the project

Rana looks at Ixayl’anu with an unspoken question.

Ixayl’anu shrugs.

Whale clarifies: The Great Project

Rana: Good luck!

One whale acknowledges with a little fin wave

Rana: They clarified it wasn’t about a rock

Diem knows of sailors telling a few tales of whales helping shipwrecked people and other species and some people say the whales seem to be very benevolent forces, not really heard of magic, just weird sailor tales.

Diem suggests maybe the great project has to do with the sharks teeth thing.

Eventually over the next half hour we get out of immediate range, but we hear them for the rest of the night.

Phi dozed off leaning against something.

We go back to bed and the whole thing puts us at a later rising time. (Farford on the horizon!)

When we wake up we see Farford in the distance.

We’re gonna get 30k platinum for the amber gris (7500 each)

Next session: Jan 14th 5pm. (But really...tomorrow, it’s tomorrow!)

We don’t need to rp out selling whale vomit.

Phi kept a little jar of amber gris for future trade options.

Ixayl’anu tries to find more shark teeth.

(Omitted notes to self with note of omission so I remember to reference them for establishing some previous details)

Diem promises when they receive their cut of the amber gris, to name their firstborn after Ixayl’anu lol.

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hehron · 4 years ago

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39 Quaffles: Part 2

Star Chaser Ginny Weasley gave up Quidditch years ago and has never looked back. On her thirty-ninth birthday, she gets a surprise gift. Coach Ginny!

"That was- that was something." Ginny sighed, letting out a half laugh as she sat next to Gwenog in the changing room. James was asking out every player who would look at him while Rose kept pestering them for advice on how to get in. Lily and Hugo were admiring the top model racing brooms with the Captain of the team and Hermione was discussing the game's political impact with the PR agent.

"You were good today." Gwenog said in strange sort of voice and Ginny turned to find her old coach watching her with a sad smile.

"What do you mean?"

"You were good with them. You taught them some valuable moves."

"It wasn't that special."

"They admire you."

"They admire you too."

"You got them to listen to you without even raising your voice." She continued as if Ginny hadn't spoken.

"Gwenog, what's going on?" Ginny finally asked.

"I didn't just call you back to meet the new trainees." Gwenog chuckled. "I want to offer you a job."

"I have a job."

"You call writing drivel a job? Be a woman and get back on the field."

"I'm thirty-nine, Gwen, and not in any form to play."

"But you're in the perfect position to teach."

"What?" Her eyes widened.

"I'm stepping down." Gwenog said with a faraway look in her eyes.

"But-But Quidditch is your life!"

"Exactly. My life has been just Quidditch for so long. I think I need to see what else is out there." She said gruffly.

"Is this the same Gwenog Jones who told me that all you need in life is Quidditch? The same person who was offended when I got married and had kids?"

Gwenog chuckled. "I stand by all that. And I was offended by you taking time off."

"I chose to do that and it didn't affect the team in any way."

"And I hated Potter for knocking you up. I lost one of my best players!"

"I chose that too!" Ginny laughed.

"Well now then, choose this." Gwenog insisted.

"I-"

"No more excuses, Weasley. Your children are all grown up and you have a pathetic job."

"But I don't know how to be a Coach. I know nothing about organising schedules and-"

Hermione who had been in the middle of dragging James away from getting hexed by the seeker, called over her shoulder.

"If that's your only concern, you've got nothing to worry about because you're amazing at it."

"But I'm not good at organising!" Ginny protested.

"You are, when it's something you care about. You proved that at Harry's birthday. It was so much better than anything I would have done."

"Seems like we have a deal." Gwenog smiled.

"Wait a minute-"

"Damn, Weasley. Where's your fire? Look out there at that group of girls and tell me you don't see yourself."

Ginny stared at the laughing witches and felt excitement bubble inside her again. Yes, she had given it all up, and she had done it willingly, never once regretting it. But perhaps the only reason you let go of something is so that you could find it again.

"I guess I'm the new Coach."

"What?" Gales, who had been passing by, stopped midstep, her mouth open in shock. Before they could make a move, she had screamed at the top of her lungs.

"Hear that, Harpies? Ginny Weasley is our new Coach!"

She and Hermione shared an alarmed glance before following the children, who had raced off the moment they read the sign.

They could hear loud music blaring from the house and there was a thin line of smoke coming from the window. As they entered, they were hit with a torrent of bright orange. Blinking back spots, Ginny took in what was once their living room. People were laughing and dancing and the teenagers were sliding down a romp on the stairs, above which hung a trapeze. The wall separating the dining room from the sitting room had been blown off and George, Fred and Lee were selling WWW products to the guests' children, while Neville and Hannah moaned about the trouble they'll have back at Hogwarts. Angelina, Roxy and Dom had somehow turned the porch into a haunted house and Charlie was performing a sort of dance with two baby dragons, with Molly and Percy screaming at him to stop while Luna cheered him on.

"What's happening?" Ginny asked, reading the sign that read 'ENTER THROUGH THE BACK'.

Molly Jr and Louis had set up a kissing booth where all her old teammates and much to Louis's annoyance, Bill and Fleur, seemed to be having a jolly good time.

Arthur, Lucy and Al were gathered around Rolf, who was showing off a new muggle gadget, with Audrey frequently interrupting his lecture on it. Lastly Vic and Ron were doing a weird jig on their brooms and screaming at the top of their lungs with Harry and Teddy providing them lights and puffs of smoke and occasionally joining in their off-key singing.

"What's going on?" Hermione asked panicked. "This wasn't how your party was supposed to be!"

"Yeah, things got out of control." A flushed Al said.

"Are you drunk?" Ginny asked with narrowed eyes.

"No." He shook his head quickly but the effect was spoiled when he let out a loud giggle.

"You're only fourtee- Oh Merlin! James, do not get on that trapeze!"

It was too late though, for he had already started to swing. Unfortunately, he clashed right into an unsuspecting Hugo, who was marvelling the jelly punch.

"My turn." Lily said.

"Now Lily. I know from my muggle studies class that you have to angle your body-"

"Oh no." Hermione said heading towards them.

"I need a drink." Ginny said aloud.

"Right this way, ma'am." Katie winked as she dragged her away towards a corner where Alicia was handing out drinks.

"Better be careful just in case Mcgonagall decides to show up." Ginny's eyes widened. There was something about your old teachers that made you feel like a teenager all over again.

"I've got to find Harry."

"Looks like he's done with the stage." Katie snorted, staring at Oliver and Charlie doing headstands on their brooms in the same place Ron and Vic had been a couple of minutes ago.

Ginny made her way through the crowd searching for her husband. It was her birthday! Where was he?

"Hey." The man in question grabbed her arm and pulled her behind the curtains.

"There's a whole band of people outside." Ginny said with raised eyebrows.

"I'm hiding from Hermione. Poor Ron, there was nothing I could do for him." Harry said with an exaggerated shake of his head.

Ginny snorted. "You did ruin the house."

"Easily fixed with magic." He shrugged.

"Of course. But I have to ask. How on earth did this happen?!"

"George."

"Say no more." She said, grinning.

"Do you like it?" He asked softly, resting his chin on her shoulder and pulling her close as she peeked between the curtains.

"I will if this makes James swear off alcohol." She said, watching him have a drinking contest with Teddy.

"Angelina spiked soda with a bit of alcohol and told them they were muggle drinks."

"Clever. Should've spiked it with Hannah's Pepper up. They'll never think of drinking again."

Harry chuckled. "Really though, do you like it?"

"I do." She smiled, turning around and looping her arms around his neck to stare up at him.

"Something happened at the pitch today." She started.

"Oh yeah, I've been meaning to ask you. What's all this about you being the new Harpy's coach?"

She groaned burying her face into his shirt. "News travels fast."

"So it's true?"

"Yeah, it just felt so good to be up there, with them. Gwenog offered me the job and I accepted." She said slowly.

"Gin, that's fantastic!"

"Really? We said we'd take time off now that you're up for the promotion to Law Enforcement, and I was really looking forward to that. It's been so long since we've had some time to focus on us again. What if we grow apart?"

"Ginny," He said, with a serious look. "We will never grow apart, okay? It doesn't matter if we see each other every hour or once a week. We'll always love each other. And you once put Quidditch on hold for our family, and I know you don't regret it, but I know you will if you give this up. You're amazing and you deserve this."

"Thanks, love." She said, pulling him in for a brief kiss.

"Will you be okay, though? Based on experiences, you do not do well with boredom."

"I'll be fine. Maybe I'll take up that training job. That way, I'll still get to work with the Aurors." Harry smiled. "Now let's go out there and watch Oliver have a heart attack when he finds out you're the opposing coach."

Ginny smirked. "After that, I'll give him a little preview of the game he's about to lose."

"Don't be so sure of that. You may be the Star Chaser but my team will completely destroy yours tonight."

"Ha! Bring in on, Potter!"

#Ginny #Quidditch #Ginny's birthday #Gwenog Jones #Holyhead Harpies #39 Quaffles: Part 2

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courage-a-word-of-justice · 5 years ago

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Iruma-kun 10

That mascot is still around to annoy poor Kalego, huh? (LOL) I also noticed the demonstration demons have horns like oni.

Oh no! This means Azz-Azz is a prime target for Iruma!

(I was going to write something. Then I got so engrossed in the action, I forgot to…)

LOL, Sabro’s too heavy for Team A to lift!

Oh, Iruma’s hair isn’t tied anymore…

“…pruning this cactus.” – Does Eggie-sensei like plants?

Ooh, the first double-parter ever for this show, I think it is.

Shinchou Yuusha 9

Apparently ep 10 got delayed…*sigh*

LOL, thre’s product placement for a certain ice cream brand in this episode, huh?

Can we not with the boob grope???

*Rista takes care of Mash and Elulu* - Rista’s such a mom sometimes…

Stars Align 9

This one scene with Nao looks really blue…it’s almost unsettling.

Oh dear…I understand the sentiment of an inferiority complex all too well.

Dr Stone 22

Now we’re back to good ol’ science vs. survival of the fittest philosophy clash. Now, see, that’s the Dr Stone I like best!

Torricelli’s law.

Why is mica like baumkuchen? Probably because it has a lot of layers…

Wow, for WSJ – which encouraged fangirls all over the world to make yaoi/shonen ai ships – they sure tossed out the yaoi/shonen ai option real fast…

Skarn. I’ve never heard of it until now.

Magma, staring at the product of magma…LOL.

I…don’t get it. Even after watching the bit again, I don’t understand why Magma was trying to save Senku.

So…as is said for most WSJ series, the treasure was the friends we made along the way…LOL, what a way to acknowledge a trope.

Lemme guess…surprise birthday party? (Sorry, when I was reading up on Magma earlier, I saw that Magma helps with a birthday surprise for Senku and I found out what it was.)

I wonder if Rei is still up there at this point…? (Who’s Rei? You’ll find out if you read the Byakuya reboot…)

Well, “Rock Day” only works in Japanese. The language would’ve drifted over thousands of years so it shouldn’t work in the year 5731 (or whatever year Dr Stone is set).

Dr Stone 23

One episode until the end…but I’m away over Christmas, so I’ll have quite a bit to catch up on when I’m back. Update: I never did end up going away over Christmas.

Senku is much more of a trickster hero than an action hero. That’s been pretty obvious all the way through, but here it’s at its most obvious.

Oh, so Kaseki made the village bridge? Is that a correct assumption…? Update: I think the answer was yes from the manga.

How much chemistry does Gen know, anyway? Assuming he’s a humanities person because of psychology and his tricks, it must only be basic, right?

Thse intense stares…I’ve been reading JJBA: DiU lately, so I’m expecting an 80s-style “!!” to appear over someone’s head at this point, LOL.

Ooh, hardware. In fact, it looks like the inside of a computer…or, more relevant to this case, a phone.

So it’s not “rules are rules” anymore? Now Kinro’s changed his words to reflect his faith in Senku…hmm! Interesting! (Update: A quick google says Kinro is 18. Senku is about 18 (+ 3700 years). Plus, after they start dragging Ginro away, Kinro says his trademark line.)

Wouldn’t the coal smoke alert Tsukasa of the village’s location, though…? Then again, thanks to Homura and Hyouga, Tsukasa already knows their location…oops.

Rochelle salt.

I saw that one shot of the world from the 1st OP and I thought there was meant to be a post-credits segment…LOL, nope.

Dr Stone 24 (FINAL)

The “acquisition message” basically said “We didn’t (just) need one cell phone, (so) it was useless!” Notably, it uses the counter for large items (like computers) for the phone.

Having finished the Byakuya reboot now, I wanna cry every time I hear about the guy…

Oh! The eyecatch is a record!

Basically, what records do is that they recreate sounds by using vibrations created by the grooves of the disc. Sound is a set of vibrations.

“Astronauts are science elites…” – Except maybe Lillian Weinberg…

I like Shamil out of the guys from the Soyuz the most. He’s a cross between Tsukasa and Senku. Stoic yet skeptical, a voice of reason for Byakuya’s sillier outbursts.

I wouldn’t be surprised if the shield was made with CGI, tbh.

Byakuya’s humour here is betraying the emotional capacity of the scene…it’s gone from “100% tear-inducing” to “confusing”.

Please sing Tsubasa wo Kudasai, Lillian…*crosses fingers*

I didn’t get what I wanted, but oh well. This song is good too. (I wouldn’t be surprised if most of the record player was CGI too. It’s good CGI for sure.)

LOL, Puyo Puyo! Even Sherlock Holmes! Dragon Ball, Nintendo Switch, VR, Saiyuki! It’s like a treasure trove of references!

Normally the s2 announcement comes after the credits, so I was thrown for a loop when it was announced before the ED…anyways, this is the end of the s1 coverage. See you for s2!

BnHA 72

[no notes, sorry!]

Iruma-kun 11

Robin looks like Iruma…(this vaguely annoys me.)

I noticed Keroli (sp?) is in the back left, alone…that’s kinda sad.

Sabro is hella tall…even taller than Azz-kun, and that says something.

Ah…I love Eggie-sensei. He’s so funny!

Really? I thought Sullivan wrote them (the rules).

I wanna see an episode where Eggie-sensei can’t turn into his fuzzy form and has to do familiar activities with Iruma. That, or an episode where Eggie-sensei has some human parts and some familiar ones (although that would scare some little kids, I think…)

What a Machiavellian mindset Eggie-sensei has!

Iruma’s got wine, people! Underage drinking is a no-no! (partially joking)

Good on ya, Clara! Go kick those girls to the kerb!

The butterflies are so beautiful in this show!

So basically school clubs.

Hmm…it’s almost a Fordist approach. I mean, “freeing yourself up to do other things” is basically the entire ethos of that.

NGL 10

I was reading JJBA: DiU today and Colt seriously looks like a Jojo’s character…

“Your face is just like…”

N-No way! You mean, the Victor Mary’s wanted to see all along…is the other gunhead…?! Geesh, what a plot twist!

Stars Align 10

“We all play to win.” – That’s very Maki of you, Maki.

Shinjo/Oshimi???? That must be Ryoma…! By the way, what’s up with these Itsuse twins…?

Who’s Hatanooka? Update: That’s the team with Joy in it…and those fangirls who busted Mitsue up.

F*** it…Arashi, I wanna pummel you someday.

LOL, you can sell your temmates out with chanpuru, huh, Arashi?

Did Maki suggest something subliminally…?

*Maki and Toma run around* - LOL, this play is completely unorthodox, haha. I can tell even if I’m no expert.

Shinchou Yuusha 10

We’re back after another week’s break…

Come to think of it, how do fantasy worlds have concepts of “hours”?

LOL, how convenient it was that there just happened to be a dude needing healing walking past! (partially sarcastic, partially meaning it since the circumstances foreshadowed it)

“Talent”, eh? *stares at the camera, which is showing Rista’s boobs, with disapproval*

The Demon Spirit Orb is basically a monster cell from OPM 2, isn’t it…?

If Seiya came from our world…then I’m sorry, Wolks, but whoever told you is completely and utterly wrong. *gestures at all the conflicts around the world, including political turmoil*

“Are you calling…”

No Guns Life 11

Second-last ep!

Oh great…another yandere?(I read JJBA: DiU hardcover vol. 2 yesterday, so I’m still thinking about Yukako Yamagishi…)

There’s a convertible in the OP, though…I wonder if that will come into play later. Update: Even if it does come into play in the future, it doesn’t happen in ths cour.

Stars Align 11

It was like Joy was showing off to the camera…LOL.

Apparently, Joy’s name is a weird reading for yorokobi (happiness).

This feels like a final episode…

Hmm. I thought Yonex sponsored this. Turns out that’s a parody logo after all (or at least, here it’s a parody).

One of the Itsuse bros looks exactly like Maki, so it’s confusing…

I’m still confused as to why Shijo Minami’s shirts say nantei on them. The minami might be nan in another way of reading it, but…the shi can only be read kokorozashi otherwise and while the jou can be read many, many ways, tei isn’t one of them.

Ume = plum blossom, so that purple-pink colour really suits them.

BnHA 73

Eri’s name means, literally, “to break reason”.

This scene with the stars and the dancefloor…that’s new.

Iruma-kun 12

Sometims you forget this dork *points at Azz* is more powerful than Iruma and Clara…

You can see Clara and Iruma in the shot of Azz-kun.

The reason why I like calling Kalego “Eggie-sensei” is because he doesn’t like it!

I love how the narrator is even aware it’s been mentioned several times Iruma can’t decline requests.

New Magic is basically science…?

Oh, it would be hilarious if this character Iruma just bumped into and he (Iruma) would be in a Battler together…but I’ve read spoilers, so I know what Iruma will join…

Is this some kind of allegory for technology…?! *eyes sparkle* Yes, I want in! Iruma! Join this club!

Even this demon’s clip is a book! Amazing!

Clara! She dab! In a pot!

Come to think of it, in the basic premise, Iruma-kun (the show) is Kenja no Mago, right? The Wise Man’s Grandson…sort of.

Shinchou Yuusha 11

Almost at the end…I’ll sorely miss this show.

Is Tiana some former version of Rista…?

How old is Seiya again…? Update: Apparently he’s 17…and if he’s the same age as he used to be in this flashback, then…kinda squicky, no?

Stars Align 12 (FINAL)

I heard this show dropped the ball and that Nao’s mother got a rant, but otherwise I don’t quite know what happens here…so let’s finish what we started. Update: Nao’s mother’s rant was in a previous episode.

Oh hey! It’s that running thing Nao and Taiyo were doing…I think. (I don’t think I’ve grasped everyone’s names, even over 12 eps, so I had to check Taiyo’s name up.)

Oh, these gremlins…*sighs happily but also exasperatedly* No wonder this show took out a top 10 position for my 2019 list.

I’m worried now…there’s always a last minute thing to ruin an episode on this show.

I always thought Ryoma’s hair was pretty nice…(small LOL). That’s just my bias for bishonen showing though.

I’m…scared now…Maki’s dad must’ve come back and the red in the sky really sold that moment…

Maki…no!!!!!!!! Aw, f***, that’s the final seconds…geesh, way to end the series. If this were a 2 cour, I’d definitely watch the next one, but since I heard through ANN that this is all we have so far, really, the only thing I can do for a passion project is hope another cour gets funded and (maybe) purchase what I can to help out. Well, that’s it, folks, skedaddle out of here until next time.

No Guns Life 12 (FINAL)

This pendant reminds me of the mana compass I saw in Fate/Zero yesterday.

I bet Danny planted those footprints…or something like that. Update: Yup, he did.

Come to think of it, is Juzo still missing his arm from last time…?

“You weren’t my client, little lady.” – There’s one of two possible options here, I think: 1) the hands guy was or 2) Danny was.

I wonder, will the hand Extended ever become his (Juzo’s) left hand? Or will he get an Extension for it?

Wow, second huge end-of-season cliffhanger! Juzo got a new buddy, it seems…anyway, see you in spring!

Cautious Hero 12 (FINAL)

If the Valkyryja (sp?) isn’t magic…what is it???

That one guy lying on the side of the fountain, looking all drunk…LOL.

Geez, you make me wanna cry, show!!!

Even the alarm clock is dejected…geez…

This is…the best conclusion of the fall season in that Seiya defeated the Demon King and the story wrapped up properly, but the worst in that Seiya died. No one died in Stars Align, even if they failed a tonne! So…I dunno. I guess it should be happy it ended optimistically…anyways, enough of my moping. See you next time.

BnHA 74

Shin Nemoto = “the truth of the origin of the sound”, if you stuck the particle no between each character.

Tintin got scary, LOL.

Lemillion, making “no capes” go out of fashion again (LOL).

Wow, talk about a clip show…! This is really one.

Check the end of the episode, don’t forget to watch the post-credits segments, people.

#simulcast commentary #boku no hero academia #my hero academia #shinchou yuusha #kono yuusha ga ore tueee kuse ni shinchou sugiru #no guns life #Stars Align #hoshiai no sora #Dr Stone #mairimashita! iruma-kun #welcome to demon school iruma kun #Chesarka watches MI-k #Chesarka watches BnHA #Chesarka watches Stars Align #Chesarka watches Shinchou Yuusha #Chesarka watches NGL #Chesarka watches Dr Stone #this hero is invincible but too cautious #the hero is overpowered but overly cautious

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lickstynine · 6 years ago

Text

Misadventures of Kit: Chapter Eleven

written with @ocsickficsideblog

Kit didn't sleep too well that night; he'd dozed off fine at first, but the encounter with his father had left a deep dent of anxiety in his already-soiled psyche. He tossed and turned throughout the night, asleep but hardly resting. When the doctor came in the next morning, just the slight creak of the door jolted Kit awake.

Alistair groaned, pulling the floppy pillow over his face. He never was too good with mornings. The doctor scrutinised him expressionlessly, then turned to Kit. “Will you be staying at his residence? I need him awake if he’ll be your primary carer.”

Kit nodded, still a little shaky even as he recognized the doctor. He prodded at Alistair briskly until he seemed reasonably awake, sitting up with Kit still on his lap.

“Al, we… we get to leave now.” Kit mumbled. He was trembling faintly, staring down at the sheets rather than facing the doctor.

Alistair brightened at once. “Oh, that’s great!” He nodded impatiently as the doctor handed him dietary plans and rattled off information, wanting to get him out the room for Kit’s sake. The doctor made him repeat stuff back, trying to insure that Alistair was actually listening. It clearly annoyed Alistair, but he managed to parrot everything, and the doctor finally left, saying he’d take care of the discharge paperwork.

When the doctor walked away, Kit wrapped his skinny arms around Alistair in a tight hug. “Thanks.”

Alistair hugged him hard. “Don’t you worry, I’ll take care of you.”

Kit let out a small squeak when his cousin squeezed him, but he nodded. “Is Julie coming to pick us up?”

“Yep. I sent him a message. You staying in your pyjamas?”

“Do I have a change of clothes?” Kit asked, looking around.

“Probably. I didn’t pack your bag, Jules did it,” Alistair said, going to rifle through it. “You have the very crumpled ones from that night…”

Kit shook his head. “I'd been wearing those for like a day and a half already.”

“Pyjamas it is then. It’s alright, I’m leaving in mine.”

Kit sighed dramatically. “How low have I sunken?”

“Oh, there’s way lower than this, trust me. Here, swing your legs over, you need your shoes on. Unless I’m carrying you.”

“You’re not.” Kit replied firmly. “It’s bad enough to walk out in my pyjamas.”

“Nobody cares in a hospital. I haven’t walked anywhere dressed ever since you were admitted, and nobody said a thing. I even got chips from the cafe and nobody even stared.”

“I care.” Kit muttered, feeling like some shitty Cinderella as he held out a foot to be shoe-d.

“I’m putting them on for you then?” Alistair grinned, carefully slipping Kit’s feet into his shoes and tying the laces in messy bunny-ears bows.

“Yes.” Kit replied. He tried to make his tone snobby and serious, but he was grinning back.

“Shall I comb master’s hair too? And of course, someone so wealthy and with such noble blood couldn’t be expected to wipe their own arse…”

“That’s what your favourite drinking fountains are for.” Kit smirked.

“Oh, you bitch,” Alistair laughed, slipping out of character.

Kit cackled as well, his eyes sparkling. “Let’s just go before the doctors come up with another reason to keep me here.” He hopped off the edge of the bed, wobbling and grabbing onto Alistair. “Shit…” After spending 95% of the last week lying down, his legs weren’t feeling very sturdy.

“Sure you don’t want to be carried?” Alistair said, wrapping his arm around Kit’s skinny waist.

“Please don’t. I’d like to keep a shred of my dignity.”

“Put your arm around my shoulders then. We’ll go slow.”

Kit nodded, latching onto his cousin. “Thanks.”

Alistair supported Kit down the long hospital corridors, their bag swinging from his free arm. He let Kit set the pace and hauled him back up whenever he wobbled. They had to pause a few times when Kit got tired, but they eventually made it out the front entrance, where Julius was patiently waiting.

He ran forward to help with the bag, hugging both boys in turn. “It’s so good to have you coming back home!”

“Thanks for coming to get us.” Kit forced a smile, but he was winded just from the walk through the hospital. Alistair bundled him into the back of the car, making him sit and sip water. Kit leaned on his cousin, sleepy and spacey but relatively cooperative. By the time they got back to the flat, he was halfway asleep on Alistair’s shoulder.

Alistair didn’t bother to ask permission this time, simply scooping Kit into his arms and carrying him upstairs. The older boy didn’t complain, looping his arms around Alistair’s neck. Alistair sat with him on the sofa, letting Kit stay on his lap. He’d got so used to his cousin’s warm weight on top of him the past few days. Kit didn’t object, so drowsy he didn’t notice or care when Star jumped onto his lap with a meow. Alistair carefully eased the cat onto the arm of the sofa, where she settled happily enough, starting to purr when Alistair scratched between her ears.

Kit smiled sleepily at the Star, but his expression shifted when he noticed the brown leather she was sitting on. The gears of his brain took a second to start turning, but then he sat up. “I never gave that poor girl her jacket back…”

Alistair nodded. “Call her.”

“Now?” Kit looked nervous. He also had no idea where his phone was.

“Well, you don’t have to. But you were in hospital a while, she probably thinks you’re not getting in touch.”

Kit sighed. “Oh, god, you’re right… Where is my phone? I haven’t seen it all week.”

“I put it in your bag,” Julius said, going through it. “I’ll have to put it on charge, but it’ll still reach.”

“Oh, thank you.” Kit smiled at Julius. “You've already been such a darling, but can I ask you one more favor?”

“Of course you can! You can ask me anything.” Julius smiled warmly - he liked being called a darling. Alistair wasn’t very big on pet names unless Julius was particularly sad or sick, and even then it was usually just “love.”

“Could you make me some tea? Please?”

“Of course! That’s no trouble,” Julius said cheerily, trotting off to the kitchen.

“Earl grey, if you have it!” Kit called after him.

“I know!” Julius called back.

“Thank you!” Kit looked down at his phone, nervously chewing his lip.

“Just text her,” Alistair said.

“But I'm not good at texting!” Kit cried. “What do I even say?”

“Just something like “hey, sorry I’ve been busy and didn’t get back to you sooner, you free to pick up your jacket?” It’s not hard,” Alistair said.

Kit sighed, muttering something to himself as he started to type.

Hi, it's Kit. We met at the bar about a week ago. Sorry I didn't get back to you sooner. I have your jacket. You can come pick it up, or I can have my driver bring it to you.

He sent it before he could overthink it, then showed the message to Alistair. “Is that okay?”

Alistair nodded. “Yeah, perfect.”

Julius came back in with Kit’s tea. “What’s perfect?”

“I'm messaging the girl whose jacket I have.”

“Oh, yes! The girl with the lovely red hair.”

“She had red hair?” Kit looked up from his phone, surprised.

“You don’t remember?” Alistair laughed.

Kit shook his head. “I drank half my body weight in whiskey that night. I could’ve left the planet and I wouldn’t remember.”

“So you don’t remember a single thing about this girl?”

Kit deflated, staring shamefully down at his tea. “No.”

“It’s okay,” Julius said gently. “You’d had a rough day.”

“What do you remember about her?” Kit asked, looking up at Julius.

“Irish accent. Looked very strong, and tall, but everyone seems tall to me. Older than you, but pretty. Lovely smile.”

Kit nodded thoughtfully. “Mum was Irish…” He mused, sipping his tea.

“You haven’t got some weird Oedipus complex going, have you?” Alistair asked.

“Obviously not.” Kit scoffed, “I was just thinking, it’d be interesting. I never knew much of mum’s family, so I don’t know that culture.”

“You can learn from her then. Your pretty little Galway Girl.”

Kit rolled his eyes. “Is that the extent of your knowledge of Irish culture?”

“I know about some of the folk lore. And a lot about the Troubles. But that’s it.”

“All I really know are some of the songs Mum used to sing.” Kit admitted.

Alistair sighed, nodding. “I can play them on my violin,” he said quietly. He’d never told Kit that before; it had been a private thing, something he was almost embarrassed about. He didn’t want to butcher the songs he still couldn’t listen to without hearing Fox’s voice. “I can the words too. It took bloody ages to master Gaelic Irish.”

Kit suddenly lit up, looking at his cousin with wide eyes. “Really?”

Alistair blinked, though he was delighted to see that expression on Kit’s face. “Yeah. I know all the ones she’d sing. Some others too, but hers are special.” He paused. “I can play them if you want. But I can’t sing like auntie did. And don’t watch me. That freaks me out. I’ll turn my back to you.”

Kit nodded eagerly. “I won’t stare. I just want to hear.”

Alistair nodded, grabbing his violin and slinking back awkwardly. Julius sat by Kit on the sofa, eager to hear too - Alistair rarely played even for him.

“Don’t laugh,” Alistair mumbled, convinced he’d sound awful, though he had a nice enough voice and he knew the songs backwards.

Kit rolled his eyes. “I wasn’t planning to.” He sipped his tea, staring off down the hall as he waited for his cousin to start playing.

Alistair took a deep breath, starting to play and sing. His pronunciation was perfect after practising so much at the songs, and he always became swept up in the music when he played. There was such soft love to the melody and in his voice as he sang, remembering being rocked to sleep as Fox sang to him.

The first few notes were lovely but unremarkable; however, when Alistair started to sing, Kit went still where he sat. While the music was vaguely familiar, the lyrics had burst through a dam of old memories. He sat, holding his tea but not drinking it, totally transfixed as he gazed off into the middle distance. He wasn't even aware of the tears welling in his eyes. Julius shuffled over and held Kit’s hand tight. Kit leaned on him at once, his lower lip quivering as he smiled.

Alistair played on, singing songs that were mostly about lost loves, the tunes soft and melodious enough to soothe small children - they hadn’t asked what the words meant back when Fox sang them. They were just sweet songs that lulled them to sleep in her arms. Kit barely even processed what they mean, so overwhelmed by the memories that it almost hurt.

It took more than an hour for Alistair to get through all the songs he remembered. His voice was growing husky by then, his own eyes damp. When he stopped playing, Kit's arms latched around his waist, pulling him close. Alistair turned around to hug him properly, putting down his violin. Kit leaned into him at once, finally breaking down in proper tears.

Alistair winced, holding him closer. “Oh Kit, don’t…”

“It's not… I don't… you… you played really well… I just… I miss her, Al…” Kit sniffled, clinging tightly to his cousin.

Alistair nodded, letting his chin rest on Kit’s head. “I know,” he whispered.

Kit nestled against him, continuing to sniffle for a while. He slowly settled down, and was quite content when his phone dinged, the sound making him jump.

Alistair nudged Kit eagerly. “Answer it! It’ll be Galway Girl.”

“Please don't call her that if she comes over.” Kit begged, picking up his phone. It was, of course, the girl.

I'm out. I can come pick it up, long as you don't mind me bringing my dog.

Kit furrowed his brows, showing the message to Alistair since it wasn't his house.

Alistair’s eyes brightened at once. “Yeah! Tell her to bring her dog!”

Kit nodded, turning his phone back so he could type. That's fine, go ahead. The address is Kit paused, looking up at his cousin. “What's your address?”

“You don’t know?”

Kit went red. “No! I know how to walk here, but I don’t know the street number.”

Alistair rolled his eyes, grabbing Kit’s phone and typing the address. Kit just shamefully took the phone back to finish sending the message. This time he got a prompt reply.

Be there in 30. That alright?

Yeah, that’s fine. See you then. Kit tucked his phone in his pocket, nervously chewing his lip. “She’s coming in half an hour…”

“Okay,” Alistair said, shrugging. “Why’d you look so nervous?”

“I don’t know! I’m not sure what to say when I see her, and I’m not really in a state to be having visitors, but I didn’t want to keep hoarding her jacket, and oh lord, I need to change…” Kit fussed, scrambling to his feet in search of his duffel bag.

Alistair rolled his eyes. “Just say you were in hospital. She’ll understand. And you still look pretty anyway.”

“I still want to be dressed.” Kit grumbled. “It was bad enough the people at the hospital saw me like this. Where did my bag end up?”

“I saved it,” Julius said, going to fetch it. He handed it to Kit. “I didn’t want to mess with your things, I just took the bottle away.”

Kit nodded. “Thank you.” He thumbed through the bag until he found a cohesive outfit: dark charcoal slacks and a warm burgundy jumper. “This will do. I’ll be back.” He shuffled off to the bathroom, clothes in hand.

“Don’t faint,” Alistair called, half-serious.

“No promises.” Kit was clearly teasing, and he came back a few minutes later, still running a brush through his hair. “It’s not ideal, but I look better than I did at least.”

“You look lovely,” Julius said.

“You're too kind, Julie.” Kit nudged Star off of the jacket so he could dust it off and smooth it. She made a small, indignant noise, leaping onto Kit’s shoulders. He yelped, giving Alistair a desperate help me look. Alistair giggled, carefully lifting Star onto his lap instead.

Kit sighed in relief. “Thank you.” He set the jacket carefully on the back of a kitchen chair, pacing nervously.

Alistair didn’t bother getting dressed, sighing at Kit. “She’s not going to eat you.”

“I didn't think she would. I just want to make a good impression.”

“She remembers the real first time you met.”

Kit paused, his face falling. “Oh… she does, doesn't she?”

“Hey, don’t worry,” Alistair said immediately. He was such a pushover with Kit. “She can’t think you’re a tit if she’s coming over.”

“She probably just wants her jacket back.” Kit plunked onto the couch with a sigh. “I don't know what I was getting in my head about.”

“She’d have got it back on the night if she didn’t want to see you. Trust me, she wants to pork you.” Alistair grinned.

“That's a bit presumptuous… maybe she's just nice. She could be a lesbian for all we know.” Kit mumbled unsurely, but he got back up and started pacing again.

“Did she look like a lesbian, Jules?”

“How does one look like a lesbian?” Julius giggled. “We’re not all rainbow coloured.”

“Don’t you have gaydar?”

“I spoke to the girl for two minutes. She had no reason to tell me that. But I do think she wants to see you if she left you her number, Kit.”

Kit nodded thoughtfully. “Maybe. But I'm not getting my hopes up.”

“Well, we’ll see how it goes.”

Kit nodded again, checking his phone for the time. “She should be here in about ten minutes.”

“Are you gonna sit down, Kit? You’re not strong enough to keep pacing,” Alistair fussed.

“I'm not that frail.” Despite his words, Kit was starting to wear himself out.

“It’s normal! You just came out of hospital!”

Kit sighed, but he dropped onto the couch again. “Yeah, for like the thousandth time.”

Alistair smiled. “We should have kept count. Could have got in the records.”

“I'd rather not be known for that.” Kit rolled his eyes.

“You’ll be known for something special one day, Kit,” Alistair said, without a hint of doubt.

The older boy scoffed. “Only if my father kills me and gets caught.”

“No,” Alistair said firmly. “That’s not happening. But I mean it.”

“Since when are you the resident optimist?”

“I’m not. I’m just extremely biased.” He grinned at Kit.

“You’re an extreme idiot is what you are.” Kit mumbled, leaning against his cousin.

“You are,” Alistair said lovingly, playing with Kit’s hair. Julius smiled at them fondly. Kit settled against his cousin, quiet and cozy for about fifteen minutes. He was startled out of his state of content by a knocking at the door, and he sat upright, looking at the younger boys in a panic.

“She’s here.”

#nanowrimo #misadventures of Kit #chapter eleven #collab #ocsickficsideblog #alistair #julius #kit #raycraft #drama of the big gay

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bluerosesburnblue · 7 years ago

Text

Liz Liveblogs Bravely Second: Chapter One

Bravely Second Chapter 1: When Duty Calls, Who Will Answer, GO!

Oh hey Kamiizumi. What the heck are you doing on a canoe in the middle of the ocean? Also, how is the boat moving but you are not?

WHO BRINGS THEIR CAT TO THE MIDDLE OF THE OCEAN???

Yew is blaming himself for the very existence of the traitors like??? Buddy. I don’t think that betrayal had anything to do with you

THEY’RE ALREADY A FAMILY IT’S SO CUTE

Tiz is tracking Agnès’s location based on the birds she can see from her window. What is this boy?

Team went back to Gathelatio for a boat and ended up discussing childhoods. Yew is a sweet little bookworm after my own heart and Edea’s answer is SWORDFIGHTING (”Didn’t you play tea parties?” “No, SWORDFIGHTING.”)

Edea is so excited to see Kamiizumi! He won’t explain HOW he’s alive, but hey! Free boat!

Yew gave a rousing speech to the remnants of the Crystalguard and big bro Tiz is just gushing about how Yew sounded like Agnès. And big sis Agnès agrees! (this family kills me)

“And everyone knows there are no squid on the Moon... only octopuses.” Tiz what... how do you know that? Is the moon colony a well known thing? Did we all just forget to mention that people live there in the first game?

And Magnolia doesn’t even know what an octopus is!

Everyone spies on Yew while he narrates his diary entries to himself and... ah, this must be where the “party members write comments in the bestiary” thing from the demo comes from

“Tiz please stop them.” “EVERYONE PICK A COLOR. I CALL GREEN.” Tiz...

They really are just a group of dysfunctional siblings already. It’s adorable

No one is impressed by Kamiizumi’s rowboat. Also he just... has a cat now. Okay.

Villains are talking about “an experienced assassin” and my jobs list is telling me that catmancer is in this chapter... so is this “assassin” the catmancer?

...those were cat noises in the background so I’m gonna say maybe

Oh god they flipped the perspective on the map so Eternia/Eisenberg are on the right and Harena/Florem are on the left. Oh god I’m gonna get so lost

That boat did NOT last long

Ughhhhhhh catmancer girl is making cat puns ughhhhhh at least Kamiizumi likes her because cats

And whoops now Kami’s cat is under her control and attempting to murder us

Hey! It’s Al-Khampis from the demo! And... Pudgius Bismol. Who was most certainly NOT in the demo

Okay I was worried about Yew being Tiz 2.0 at first but now he’s my precious nerd child

Cute Al-Khampis girl from the demo has a name and it’s Rifa! Yew knows her

I still can’t use the Al-Khampis inn, just let me heal please

“The five star gentleman I used to know” ...were Yew and Rifa dating?

Magnolia sure seems to think so because she’s getting jealous

Oh, so Rifa studies Ba’als! I suppose that’ll be our next target, then, along with tracking Agnès

Someone who looks like the owl guys that gave you summons in the first game is watching the party. It’s... ominous. He isn’t even speaking English, but Magnolia can hear him and understand him (no one else noticed because Edea’s throwing a fit over food)

Oh no he’s a Chomp cultist. He gave us chompcrafts. Time to become excellent plush toy makers

Just leave the game running and the team will auto-make plushies to sell. That’s neat

Oh christ I did it again I spent too long on minigames

Edea just introduced Tiz to someone as Agnès’s boyfriend and his response was to shove his hand on her mouth and basically go “HAHA what no” Tiznes is the best ship

Ughhhh who let Fiore “I kidnap women and wanted to destroy Florem” deRosa teach at a college? At least he bought the team lunch I guess

And they’re studying “somnial energy” to put an end to wars (as if people won’t just fight over the new energy source but whatever)

I can already see where this new “choice-based sidequest” is gonna go. Jackal wants more water for the people of Harena, deRosa wants more water to develop his wonder energy, and we’re gonna have to choose who to give water to

(Btw, Yew took everyone to a folklore lecture and Tiz was really into it. I love that the game makes sure you know that Tiz, despite being a farm boy, really loves learning. Also just furthers my belief that Tiz and Yew would be cute brothers)

T-t-teleport... pig??? There’s pigs that teleport you between towns??? That’s convenient but huh???

I like Jackal, he’s actually a nice guy, but I want the Thief job more, so sorry buddy (and like everyone in Harena)

It’s making me sick to side with deRosa, especially since I don’t trust a single thing he says about somnial energy and his “let’s have everyone move to Florem if they want water” plan is stupid as hell

AND IT COULD BLOW UP A TOWN my god deRosa is the WORST

His contingency for “what if someone uses it as a weapon” is I’LL TELL EVERYONE SO EVERYONE IS EQUAL AND NO ONE WANTS TO USE IT (buddy that’s just how you start Cold Wars, your plan guarantees nothing)

Ah well, I’ve already been spoiled on the fact that this game has time loops, so I can side with Jackal in the “canon run” I suppose (second loop?) I still hate this

God and now Edea’s preaching about how ideals are good but to never forget what people have sacrificed, forgetting that there isn’t even a guarantee that deRosa’s dumbass plan is even going to work! We screwed these people over for potentially nothing! So a little rich boy could feel better about his thesis work!

And the game presents it like it was a difficult moral choice, in a way that assumes that deRosa’s plan was anything short of poorly thought out and horrendously terrible. Also like the previous game didn’t do everything in its power to let you know that Jackal only ever did bad jobs in order to provide for all of the orphans he was taking care of and deRosa did a LOT of REALLY SHITTY things to women just because he felt like it. What I’m saying is, if you’re gonna write something to seem “morally grey” you have to be very careful, and basically not. Do. This. Especially if the choice is between a jackass who takes care of orphans through crime (morally grey on its own!) and a serial molester

The Ba’al is not in its crater. Edea thinks it doesn’t exist. Magnolia and I can see this for the omen it truly is

Magnolia has a communicator bracelet and called up VP Appleberry, who I am assuming is also a moon man given that he speaks fluent French. The Ba’al is on its way

So Ba’al v: Urchin. I think this is the one from the demo? Wasn’t that bad once I started chaining everyone’s specials (save accidentally healing it with Magnolia)

Magnolia’s explaining how she’s from the moon and fights Ba’als which... I thought we already covered, but okay (Rifa’s concerned that A. people live on the moon and B. the moon people have been fighting Ba’als for generations)

Insert *touching but cliche friendship speech by the team in response to Magnolia declaring that she’ll defeat the Ba’als even if she has to do it alone* here

Yew no joke made everyone umbrellas out of the Ba’al (and Tiz is the only one to genuinely compliment him on the resourcefulness, as opposed to being disgusted)

Yew and Magnolia are sharing an umbrella and he’s BLUSHING LIKE CRAZY that’s so cute (and Edea had to explain the Japanese “couple sharing an umbrella” thing)

CHRIST Edea. Tiz was just trying to help by sharing his umbrella. You didn’t have to drop kick him and smash his umbrella. God they’re all so MEAN right now

Agnès is in Anchiem! Move out!

Ah geez, the sandstorm from the demo is back. Let’s see how this gets resolved

Oh good. I’ve been waiting for the moment where Yew tells Pudgius to get lost because he outranks him (the noise Pudgy makes when Yew tells him he had a special sixth star is beautiful)

The Seven Horrors of Al-Khampis sound up there with the Seven Wonders of Twilight Town on the list of “things that are probably not what you think they are.” Wonder if the world is gonna glitch out

Mister Bones: the skeleton in the biology lab that comes to life at night oh my god these are already great

Professor Norzen is making some... weird noises at his star predictions (he’s also the astrologist from the beginning. Time to take his asterisk!)

Norzen set up the sandstorm to take down the Skyhold. Totally willing to sacrifice the people of Ancheim and Agnès. Yeah, no. Glad he’s crazy so I’m less conflicted about this than the Jackal fight

“I didn’t do anything during the events of the first game, so this time I will bring justice!!!” glad that Edea and Tiz chime in with the fact that their attempt to bring justice got a lot of innocents killed last game

I’d heard that fight was supposed to be hard, but I was overleveled as hell soooooo

“It was all a test!” Y’know, I saw that coming yet I’m still disappointed

Go find the compass, he says. What do you mean the cat that was suspiciously on the scene was being controlled by the catmancer. I never coulda guessed

Oh god she’s singing a song about cats and called herself a “meowsassin” can I give her an award for most obnoxious new character?

Wow. One scratch from that cat just straight up murdered Norzen. What the heck buddy

...the kaiser just said “Who’s a good kitty now? Who’s a good widdle kitty?” to Minette and I’m just ???

Mephilia vs. Kamiizumi sidequest. Gho Gettar has two choices: follow his dream and study with Mephilia to summon Amaterasu or follow Kamiizumi’s advice and go give his awful job another try. Not gonna lie here, I’m with Mephilia. While I agree with Kamiizumi wanting him to work hard, I feel like it would be better for him to work hard pursuing something he loves, rather than an awful job he hates just because that job is the right thing to do. And I’m with Mephilia: the break someone down so that you can build them up again mentality is fucked up and honestly more likely to cause someone to give up forever than actually help them

So naturally in the interest of making this the worst timeline and my own love of the summoner job, I’m gonna attack Mephilia. Sorry Gho, go back to your dead end minimum wage job for now

Well, at least Gho got promoted and is happy with his job. Still not super okay with condoning the “break them to make them” mentality

At the Harena Sea Caves for the compass. I think this was a demo location? It’s very familiar

Cats are here. I think we may be late

Goddamn my game hates the Harena Sea Caves. It’s crashed twice since I’ve been here. Thank god for autosaves

...does that compass just have a giant sword attached to the center?

Ah, but of course. Minette is here. (Just let me kill her already)

“Mewtralize” JUST STOP

Oh god Minette is calling herself a cat, and also the queen of all cats. She’s too far gone

Oh and the Kaiser loaned her a lion. Where did he...? Why...?

“Yew Mewnimeowgia” alright she’s dead I can’t take this anymore

Ultimately not a hard fight, but Minette can put the whole party to sleep which is annoying

Well she’s dead, but also handed off the compass to Janne. Annoying until her dying breath

Wait. According to the Journal she’s seventeen?!?! What?!?!?

Oh and it just flat out gives you a list of all the abilities and what creatures give them and the items needed. That’s WAY better than the Vampire blood magic from the last game

The Skyhold is still in Ancheim so the team is gonna see if they can get on it before it leaves. Through the Mill Works!

Ah, okay. So Catmancy skills are learned when ANYONE in the party is hit by a learnable attack, which the catmancer can then cast by using items. Interesting

Addendum: a catmancer/someone with Learning equipped must be in the party when the move is used

Magnolia is very impressed by the Ancheim windmills. Given that I assume the moon lacks an atmosphere that would make air power viable, I suppose that’s expected

Heyyy Private Piddler’s back

“I was hoping for someone more... competent” damn Janne is brutal

Janne is explaining why he hates the Crystalguard. Way back during the wars mentioned in the first game the Orthodoxy’s Crystalguard made a peaceful surrender when the Anticrystalists showed up BUT they also destroyed anyone who opposed the surrender... violently. Which included Janne’s parents. Yeah, I guess having your family murdered and erased from all historical records would screw you up pretty bad

Yeah Janne’s House Balestra was specifically killed by houses Geneolgia and Camlann. So Yew and Othar’s families killed Janne’s

Yew isn’t taking it well, but he’s also not buying it as an excuse. Sad backstory or not, Janne killed Yew’s friends and kidnapped Agnès. Basically, “cool motive, still murder.” And another reason to love Yew for the list

Aaaaand here’s Amphisbaena, which I’m gonna assume is the boss of the chapter. It’s uh... a two headed worm thing? Ugly as hell? One head is weak to magic and the other physical attacks. They also swap positions

A poor showing on my part: I forgot that using the Rejuvenation special attack would make all of my attacks heal so I ended up healing the damn thing back to full for a few rounds

Oh dear god according to the Journal that thing was PEOPLE, specifically one of a set of twins that ate its twin after being mutated. And since the twins were trying to protect Tiz they placed the monster in charge of defending his pod. Holy SHIT the Empire is messed up

Yeah any sympathy for the Empire gained from Janne is lost IMMEDIATELY after reading that

Yeah of course we’re not getting on the Skyhold. They sent their sniper after us

Wait... she’s shooting from EISENBERG? That’s across the ocean! How?

Foiled by a cowgirl and a bored baker. Typical

Also they’re probably dating? At least flirting really hard with each other

I wonder who the person doing the end-of -chapter narrations is supposed to be. She’s talking about love and figuring out if feelings will be true, which I’m not sure relates to what just happened, but alright

Wait the intro video is playing. Didn’t that already happen? Is that gonna happen every chapter? Like anime opening/ending credits? That’s neat, I guess, and it’s very pretty so I’m not complaining

And that ends Chapter 1! What a... strange series of events. I can already see where it’s improving on Bravely Default, and the story is already wackier, so I guess I’ll just have to wait and see if that’s a good thing or not. Until next time!

#bravely default #bravely second #liz liveblogs bravely second

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sarsaparillia · 8 years ago

Text

title: into the endless night summary: Alex and Jonas, stumbling through the aftermath. --- Alex/Jonas.

rating: t-ish word count: 6500+ genre: roadtrip fic! + smooching and ghosts notes: hey look, it’s the sequel to once more with feeling

AO3 | FFN

—

Evening is pale lilac.

It's one of those nights where nothing feels real, where everything is just the right side of off-kilter to set her teeth on edge. Golden light spills out of the windows like expensive champagne and Alex draws her nails along the skin of her wrist. Ren's babble winds through Clarissa's snarking beneath Michael's alcohol-smooth laugh, the clash and clang sharp as a looped feedback squeal. All the stars have gone out and it's too loud inside, too warm, too close, so she sits outside on the front stoop with her knees up to her chest and her face to her thighs while she tries to figure out how to breathe again.

(It's not a haunted house, but some days it feels like it.)

You should be used to this by now, something in the back of her head says.

And yeah, maybe she should be. Maybe she should be used to feeling like darkness coats her skin, maybe she should be used to feeling like she's outside of reality, maybe she should be used to not being okay. The ghosts used to sit on her shoulders and whisper soft sweet nothings to her, dripping venom and vitriol into her system, a slow-acting poison, and even though they're gone now they're not really gone, because—

She is sitting out here alone.

Ghosts, one. Alex, zero.

It's always like that, though. You win once, and then you're playing Hangman on a chalkboard without chalk, running blind through the rain. There's no winning that game, and Alex should really have learned her lesson by now.

But she hasn't, not really, so instead she sits out on the porch alone while her friends laugh from inside. And it's good, it's okay, Alex is only a line of noise out of static, anyway. She can count on one hand the number of times she hasn't disappeared from a party in the last six months. People would worry, if they knew there was anything to worry about.

Jonas usually finds her before she gets into any trouble. It's not a terrible thing.

The porch creaks beneath her, splintery old wood just in the beginning stages of rotting away groaning beneath the weight of a second person. For a minute the noise roars, sound pouring out of the open door. Alex gets halfway through a flinch, and then it stops. Quiet, again.

"I figured you'd be out here," comes Jonas's voice. "You want company?"

Alex shrugs.

She hasn't decided, yet.

Jonas waits by the door, doesn't move at all. He's always been good about that, about waiting for verbal confirmation of whether she wants something to happen or not. Sometimes, Alex thinks she might like it if he sat down beside her without asking, but the fact that he always makes a point to ask makes him one of the most stable people she knows.

And making out on the dock under the sun and the mist is one thing, but things change after the sun goes down. Right now, Alex isn't the same person she was yesterday morning, and she's not sure if she wants to inflict herself on people right now, even if those people are just Jonas in ratty jeans.

She weighs it for a while.

And all that while, Jonas waits.

A breeze shivers its way down her collar. For a summer night, it's pretty cold; gooseflesh breaks out all over her arms. Alex tips her head and like, that's as good as it's gonna get.

The porch creaks beneath his weight, because yeah, he gets it.

He stays standing, though. Alex thinks that sometimes, Jonas knows her better than she knows herself.

"Let's go somewhere," he says.

"What?" Alex squints up at him. He's in silhouette, standing in the warped backglow of the glass doorway with his hands stuffed in his jacket pockets. His face is swallowed in shadow, only shifting lights for eyes. That's not ominous or anything. "Go where?"

"I dunno. Somewhere," he shrugs, jerks his head at his truck, parked on the side of the road. The headlights flick on and off, the quiet click of locks unlocking made visual.

"Why?"

"I don't wanna be here right now."

He doesn't say you look like you're about to tear your skin off to get away from yourself, but that's what he means. Alex can hear it in the hanging in the air around his shoulders, in the space between seconds. There and not. Ghosts of themselves. Always ghosts.

Aw, crap.

Alex unfolds from the porch, all of her bones creaking. She feels so old. This place is in her bones, sunk inside of her. She carries it like she carries the empty plot of land where Michael's grave used to be, and not even a hundred parties can take that away. She carries it like she carries Edwards Islands, like she carries Maggie and Anna, like she carries the blank space between resets. She carries it like she carries the ghosts.

"What if I don't want to come back?" she asks him. The night colours up around them black and rotted, and it's not the only one. She hasn't slept in days. Steady, Alex, steady. "What if I want to keep going?"

"Okay," Jonas says. "We keep going. You're gonna have to learn to drive, though, I've gotta sleep sometimes."

"I know how to drive," Alex says, which is a lie, she is a lying liar who lies, she has no idea how to drive whatsoever. It's not that she's scared of flying metallic vehicular death, but yeah, okay, she's sort of scared of flying metallic vehicular death. She's been close to the end enough times to not want to go there.

(Four people drowned at Cape Meares. The red pulsing light from the headlamps in a locked car. And Jason sounds a lot like Jonas. Jason sounds way too much like Jonas. God, there's just no leaving the ghosts behind, is there.)

"Stick," clarifies Jonas, grinning. He's not privy to the wheels Alex's mind are turning. "You have to learn to drive stick."

"You're the worst," Alex manages, and she's unsteady as she stands but she's always unsteady, so what the fuck ever, right. The night slips further into itself, turned the colour of a bruise blooming violet-dark above them and Alex wraps her arms around herself like a shield. "I mean—yeah, okay. I can drive stick. I can totally drive stick!"

"Yeah, you can," Jonas says. He drapes an arm over her shoulders, and Alex goes kind of grudging until the seams of their jeans brush. Gathered close like this, it only takes a minute for all of her muscles to begin to unknot. His thumb draws a line along her collarbone.

Alex doesn't have the heart to push him away. He's warm. "I'm not twenty yet."

"Yeah," Jonas says. "But I am."

She squints up at him again. "I will push you off the dock, do not test me."

"Already tried that, Als, it didn't go over awesome," and they both remember the weathered-silver wood, the sun-shot fading mist, the island in the distance lurking like a hungry thing. A distant chill runs over them, a ripple of time and loss and forgiveness. It's so quiet these days.

"Yeah, well," Alex says. The crook of his body is an okay place to be, and yeah, things are still—they're still delicate, sometimes, still difficult and too big and she should be over it! She knows she should be over it, okay, she knows. But that's not the way things work, that's not the way Alex works, that's not the way the ghosts work. Worked. Past-tense. They don't work at all, anymore, do they.

Alex takes a shuddery breath in. Alex lets a shuddery breath out.

"You gonna be okay?" Jonas asks the top of her head.

"I dunno. You really wanna run away with me?" Alex shoots right back at him.

"Yeah," Jonas says, like it's easy. For him, maybe it is. All of his muscles go lax, this weird little smile crooking up the corner of his mouth. "So. Wanna go?"

"God," Alex sighs. "More than anything."

And so they do.

They go.

— — — — —

Jonas drives too fast, flying down the highway towards the state line like the ghosts have come back grasping from the gates of hell (but they don't and they haven't, please god say they haven't), until there's nothing but the motion-blur outside the window, the summer-new leaves reduced to dark impressions along the side of the road. Alex dozes with her head against the window.

Michael's jacket is a shitty pillow but Alex couldn't bear to leave home without it. The radio is left untouched in the back of her underwear drawer wrapped in Maggie's stories and Anna's letters, and she very carefully didn't look at them before they booked it out of town. Her parents had been watching TV. They didn't hear her leave.

(There are some things that she can't let go of, and maybe that's okay. Healthy? That's a different question, but no one's here here to tell her that her coping methods are going to get her killed, so whatever. She's only running away for a little while. It'll be fine. It always is.)

The highways are deserted, this late at night. The occasional passing vehicle's headlamps are the only light, washing passively over their faces, bright then not. They're far enough away from the city already that the light pollution's faded, and the galaxy sprawls out above them, a diamond-covered blanket soaked in ink.

Inside, the truck is very quiet.

Alex doesn't sing anymore, but that's alright. No one else does, either.

And she doesn't reach for the knob of the radio, because that's still impossible. It feels like it's always going to be impossible, because sound is waves and waves are drowning and drowning is the ghosts underneath a hundred million tonnes of water.

It's dumb, Alex knows that.

But associations are hard to shake off, especially when you've played the game so many times that you don't freak at the jumpscares anymore. She doesn't have enough fingers to count out all the ways that's fucked up.

So instead she draws on the window and thinks about Jonas, about the toothpaste cowlick on the back of his head, the weird difficult way he looks at the world with his jaw up and out like he's daring it to come at him. They're all problem kids, really, but Jonas is quiet about it; it's the cigarette and the leather and the beanie, the wide shoulders and the habitual background lurking thing he does.

It's like this: Ren has his drugs and Clarissa has venom glands and Nona visits the graveyard like she can't stop. Michael dreams about running after Clarissa, and Alex dreams about running until she can't run anymore. Jonas stands in the background, a break in the river, a stone in the storm, ready to go whichever direction Alex picks.

That's pretty fucked up, too, now that she thinks about it.

"I'm sorry," Alex says.

"What? Why?"

"I just am," she tells him. A car goes whooshing by, and his face is lit up for a split-second. His eyes are very green. Alex's stomach twists, pain or pleasure or both or maybe neither, maybe something else entirely like want or regret or self-loathing. It's a lot of things, maybe. Emotions are like that. Sometimes, they're too big for names.

"Don't be," Jonas says. The road curves, a ribbon of grey silk disappearing into the gloom, and the steering wheel curves with it. "Nothing to be sorry for."

There is, though.

There are always things to be sorry for. Alex turns back to the window, and wonders if she'll ever be able to listen to the radio ever again.

Lonely hours slip by in the silence, and they drive and drive and drive. They drive and Alex counts the lines in the corduroy, the dust motes in the passenger cup holder, the cigarette butts in the ash tray. They drive until Alex is nearly asleep, or maybe is asleep, until—

it's raining. your hair sticks to your face, to your lips tinged blue. there's water dripping down your neck, down his neck, your starboy laughing into the force of the storm with his jacket up against the wind to try to keep you dry. edwards island's main street is drowning, rain a whole symphony in the gutters, and you duck down between two close-spaced buildings with your palms wound into his shirt to drag him somewhere a little more dry. alex he says, alex we're already soaked what are you doing, and you turn and his collarbone is right there. against his skin you say shhh don't make a sound and it's so close, so warm, he's laughing again and

—moonlight limes the horizon, and then Jonas flicks his blinker on.

"I'm hungry," he says into the silence between them. Alex blinks into wakefulness. Weird dreams. There's salt on her lips.

She doesn't question it.

But she does question his choice in rest stops.

"Are you serious right now," Alex says when they pull off onto the tarmac of a little roadside turnout diner, and it's not a question. The Last Dance proclaims itself in bright neon red-violet, bulbous incandescents flickering sepia gold, a cheerful pink sign in the window glowing OPEN. It's one of those disappearing heart-of-the-Americana-drain places, liminal simply because it's already halfway gone. Everything smells like just-baked apple pie and that peculiar not-quite-smell-not-quite-taste of diesel and dreams that infuses all roadside diners. The lights are on inside.

But the shadows stretch long, and Alex thinks that if she had her radio, it would be singing all kinds of death songs.

Wet pavement shines, but it hasn't rained in days except inside of Alex's head. Come play with us, soldier, she hears, all soup-can jingles on the breeze. There are ghostlights blinking in the distance. If there was a piano, it would be playing itself.

Holy man, this place is haunted as shit.

"Coffee," says Jonas. The smeary lines beneath his eyes are enough to have her reaching across the console for the keys. He can't drive like that, it's not safe, and she doesn't want to die tonight.

"Why didn't you say anything?" Alex asks over the clink of metal, even though it's a stupid question. She knows why, and when he looks at her in the dark with eyes like holes in the world, she wishes she'd never asked. It's easy to ignore the puddles in the cracks in the ashphalt. "You're exhausted, Jonas, jesus."

"You wanted to go," he tells her.

And that's just—that's just Jonas, isn't it. Of course, he hadn't stopped because he thought she wouldn't want to; she'd said as much before they left, hadn't she? Alex hates herself. She runs a hand through her hair, catching on tangles in straw.

(She still needs a dye job. She always needs a dye job.)

"Yeah," Alex says. It punches out of her, such a hurting thing. "I guess I did."

"So," Jonas says, like he doesn't blame her for it, like he could never blame her for it. It twists all of her insides into knots. "Coffee?"

"Coffee," she says, because, man, why not?

Fifteen minutes later, Alex is rethinking that assessment. Jonas orders pancakes, and when the waitress brings them over, he pushes them right across the linoleum table without a word. A white plate, the pancakes are golden and beautiful, soaked in whipped cream, dripping buttery syrup. There is a strawberry.

"Are you serious right now," she says again.

"Eat your pancakes," Jonas advises, slouching back against the booth's wall-corner, eyes closed. Leather squeaks against leather as he shifts. The mug of coffee sitting between them steams thinly, little pale tendril like ghost hands reaching up towards the ceiling. Alex watches it for a minute without saying anything, chewing on broken glass words, shatter-shard and metal red in her mouth. She can still hear the Morse beeping through the static: still here, cannot move, very cold, love—.

"We are going to get murdered," she mutters at last, which, probably. Across the diner, the tired-eyed waitress raises an eyebrow like she heard it, which, also probably. It's not a big place, this diner, and the shadows are very hungry.

"Pancakes," Jonas says again. His eyes are still closed, the jerk. Who even looks like that after a night of driving? Who sits like the whole universe is an opportunity? It's not fair, and even more so because of the perspiration running down the side of Alex's glass. Rain, salt, oceans. Grief in all its forms. "Eat them."

"Death first," Alex stabs viciously at her plate.

"Been there, done that," Jonas kind of grins out of the corner of his mouth. It makes his lip pull up right where he normally sticks his cigarette, and the worst thing is that he's not wrong. It would be so much easier if he was. It would be so much easier if she had no idea what he looks like when he laughs.

Because dying isn't permanent when time is just a construct.

Alex eats the pancakes.

(The dream lingers for a long time. Hours later, she can still taste the rain.)

— — — — —

"So is this Tour de Haunted America, or are you punking me?" Alex asks, after Jonas has paid and they're strapped back into the truck. The tips of her fingers feel like ice; it's not a nice feeling, all the worse for being one that she knows. The Kanaloa ghosts were always cold, too—every time they gave Jonas or Clarissa or anyone else back, the body would spend fifteen minutes shivering the frost in their souls away—so it stands to reason that every other ghost would be, too.

"What makes you think it was haunted?" Jonas asks levelly. The truck hums beneath them, roadsong murmuring up through the faded corduroy seats and into Alex's bones. It's a warming thing. She tucks her freezing fingers underneath her thighs.

"Really?" Alex raises a skeptical brow. God, he's the worst, she can't believe she likes him. If he was wearing his beanie, she would pull it down over his eyes. Then they'd crash and die and become ghosts themselves, so maybe not. "We're gonna go there right now?"

"We're always going there, Als," says Jonas.

Well, they're always going somewhere.

Alex turns her face back to the window, inhales deeply and holds the air in her lungs until the beat of her heart slows to something a little more manageable. Her reflection looks back, all big dark eyes, brown skin, bleached-out bangs.

She's had other reflections, but this is the one that she knows the best.

Ang god knows, she owes him this much.

"I could feel it," Alex says, low. "It was like, shadows? I dunno, I can't even explain it."

"Try," says Jonas.

Alex sighs. Her breath fogs the window, and yeah, it was kind of like that, kind of not. All she has is impressions: merry red lanterns to lead the way, devoured suns inside the great gaping maw of the universe, the sharp jut of a collarbone in the rain, Clarissa's red curl of a smirk falling backwards out of a window. Hauntings feel like that, she thinks, that same edge of unreality.

Like peeling back flesh from bones.

"Do you remember when Clarissa died?" she asks the dashboard.

"Which time?" he asks, so casual.

Well, that's dark. "All of them."

"Yeah, I remember."

"It's like that," Alex says, takes a breath. This is still difficult to talk about, but at least he sort of gets it. At least he won't look at her like she's something unfixable. "Like—layers. We watched her fall, what? A hundred times? A thousand times? It always turned out the same, and then they stacked—"

"Memories on top of memories," Jonas nods. "Déjà vu."

"That's French for already seen, you know that, right?"

"Alex," Jonas stresses her name. He doesn't really need to say anything else.

"Okay, okay, be grumpy," she says airily, and when Jonas's mouth twitches like he's going to protest, Alex reaches over to poke him in the side just to watch him squirm. That it keeps him from interrupting her is secondary, but also appreciated. "Anyway, it's that. Feels kinda… heavy. Like there's too many people, but not enough space."

Jonas catches her wrist. With his thumb against her pulse, for a minute they both just sit there and count the beating of her heart. One-two, one-two. He tethers her to the real world, does Jonas, anchors Alex back in her body when she can't figure out how to do it for herself. His hands are just on the other side of too-warm, callused all over and nearly uncomfortably rough. His dad had him mowing lawns all summer, and the mower is an old one, made of splintery wood. She doesn't know why she thinks of it, because it's something so mundane.

But for the first time in a long time, Alex doesn't feel like she wants to climb outside of her skin, so she just goes with it.

"Jesus, you're freezing," Jonas says, shaking his head. "Put your jacket on."

Michael's jacket, she wants to say. Michael's jacket.

But there's no way to say that without making it weird, even though Jonas probably won't be too judgy about it. It's not like he's the pinnacle of stable mental health, either; his mom's still dead.

(Sometimes Alex wonders if he begrudges her this: she brought Michael back because she couldn't stand not to bring him back, because broken dishes and broken hearts aren't the same thing, because she had the opportunity to erase the cataclysm that destroyed her whole life and he didn't. Sometimes she wonders if Jonas would do the same, if he had the choice. Sometimes she wonders why he didn't get the chance, but that never gets very far because it always ends up making her grit her teeth. God, she wishes so many things.)

Alex puts the jacket on.

Jonas turns the key in the ignition.

Into the endless night, they go.

— — — — —

They're four hours outside Camena's limits, far past where the city meets the sea, on a long empty stretch of stretch of road that hasn't seen another soul in probably a hundred years. It's a forgotten space, time-out-of-time, and that's exactly what Alex wants. There are some things that shouldn't be said in daylight places.

(Or when operating flying vehicular death traps, but that is another story entirely.)

"Hey," Alex says, "can we stop here?"

Jonas looks at her out of the corner of his eye like he's been doing all night, half measure and half respect and all exasperated, cracked-out affection. But it's not even a question. She can feel his foot heavy on the brake as the truck shudders, slows. Stops.

The night air is cold and wet with saltspray, the crash of the ocean against the rocks. But it's quiet, it's so quiet, there might be no one alive for a hundred miles. Civilization could end and neither of them would ever know, and it wouldn't be a terrible thing.

Alex climbs out of the truck without a word.

(Jonas follows her because Jonas always follows her. What else is there?)

After the island, they'd done this a lot—snuck out during one of Michael's parties to go driving out into the middle of nowhere, where no one knew their names. Not this far away from home, but something like it. In the back of the truck bed there are blankets in a box, half a bed already made just waiting to be laid out.

"Naptime?" Jonas blinks at her. "Seriously?"

"Naptime is great, don't front," Alex says. She yanks the blankets out of their coffin, thick handspun wool that she'd stolen out of her parents' house six months ago and hadn't ever given back. Her mom had looked at her, once, with ancient eyes.

But she hadn't asked about it, and Alex had no answers for her. Has no answers, for anyone.

Alex looks over her shoulder, out through the tangle of her hair around her face. "Are you coming?"

"Yeah, okay," says Jonas.

The truckbed dips beneath his weight, and they arrange themselves in the messy nest that she'd made. It's not elegant. It's not pretty. It's two kids trying to figure to figure out who they are, even though they have no idea who they are, not really. A boy and a girl. A girl and a ghost. A ghost and a shadow. the aftermath of a supernova, like nothing left. Like rain on lips from forgotten dreams, or forgotten lives. Alex feels scraped raw, but Jonas is a garbage snowman and she's a hole in the universe, and it's—it's okay. Maybe. A little bit.

Because then they're just laying there, and it's quiet, and it's good. Comfortable. Warm. And safe, and maybe that's the most important part. There's a screaming two inches of space between his shoulders and hers, and it's still too much.

Alex can feel the words welling up in her throat, tight and hot and laden with heartache.

"I can't swim," she whispers into the empty black dome of the sky.

"…Huh?" says Jonas.

"It's why—I mean, Michael wanted to teach me, you know? The lake, that's why we were—" and she stops, breaks, washes ashore. It heaves in her chest, wretched, such a howling grief. She can still see his hand reaching for her through the water, shimmering sun-speckled blue-gold. It's been a hundred days, or maybe a hundred years, and it still gives her nightmares. "That's why. The whole thing. 'Cause I can't freakin' swim."

"Huh," he says again. "Hey, move your head."

"What?"

"Just do it," Jonas says.

Alex moves her head.

When they settle again, he's somehow managed to get his bicep beneath her neck, arranged her close enough that they're touching from hip to shoulder. Alex blinks upwards, thinks about putting her cheek against his arm where his shirt's ridden up, skin to skin. His body is right here, and she could. She could.

"Shouldn't you be mad or something?" Alex asks the sky, instead.

"Shit happens," Jonas says. His muscles ripple like he wants to shrug but he also doesn't want to dislodge her head from his arm, so there's that.

"Okay, I'm sorry, but that's like, the worst excuse ever, man. And that's including the ghosts' whole let us have your bodies so we can pretend to be alive again thing," Alex says. "Shit happens. Seriously?"

"Shit does happen," Jonas says mildly, but she can hear the grin in his voice.

"Even when your brother drowns and it's your fault?"

"It wasn't your fault," he tells her, painfully gentle. "You came down after me, remember? If it was anyone's fuck-up, it was mine."

"You didn't fuck up," Alex murmurs, shaking her head back and forth like a crazy person. There's winding panic in her throat like there always is when she thinks of the lake; lake, water, rain in the gutters, drowned and drowning, a collarbone and a kiss. "If Mike hadn't—if I hadn't—if he'd just listened—"

"Woulda, coulda, shoulda," Jonas says into her hair. He's kind of mashed his face against her skull, speaking low and soft to calm them both down. "Als, breathe."

Right, breathing. That's like, a thing.

Alex gulps down air, gulps air, gulps.

"In to the count of seven, out to the count of eleven," Jonas says placidly. "C'mon, breathe with me."

It starts in the fingers, the uncontrollable tremble. Then it's the shrinking of the world, the black around the edges of the vision, the sudden saltwater sloshing behind the eyes, the breathe alex breathe breathe breathe you gotta breathe shit will you please breathe—

(She never used to be like this.)

"Crap," Alex says, a long time later. She sounds like she's been gargling soda and salt. "Sorry."

"Not something to apologize about," Jonas says, and his eyes go hard when Alex opens her mouth to protest. There's a line of pale pink on the horizon; it's an hour to sunrise, maybe two, and it's getting easier to see. "Als, don't apologize. Not for this. Not ever."

"I got snot on your shirt."

"Yeah well," he shrugs. "I've had worse things than snot on my shirt."

"Like what."

"Ghost goop?"

And it's that phrase, ghost goop, that breaks whatever was left of Alex's composure. She's exhausted, anxiety draining away, and Jonas is a dumb idiot who says things like ghost goop. Who even says that?

Alex hides her face in his side, and she laughs until she can't breathe. It's catching, too, because then Jonas is laughing, and then they're both laughing, like a pair of power-mad maniac supervillans. Two kids here at the end of the world before it's eaten into the sea, laughing and laughing and laughing.

"God," Alex says, the last bubbles of mirth easing the words. "Ghost goop."

"Ghost goop," Jonas grins. "Feeling better?"

"A little," slips out of her, not quite a murmur but close. The exhaustion leaks out of her, a loose-faucet of tiredness. "Let's never do that again, okay, that sucked."

"You wanna sleep? We can," he tells her.

The truck-bed blanket nest is perfect for curling up and sleeping off an anxiety attack, but Alex mostly just wants to stay where she is. If she sleeps, she'll dream. There's no telling where that will go, especially not after the night they've had. Edwards Island plus a panic attack plus a haunted diner multiplied by the heady attraction of Jonas' skin equals nightmares, probably. "The sun's almost up. Is there even, like, a point?"

"There's always a point to sleep, Als."

"Pfft, whatever man, says you."

"Says every bad decision I haven't made, because I get enough sleep, unlike some people," Jonas says, and actually has the gall to stick his nose in the air like he's not also rocking the insomniac eye-luggage.

"Oh my god, there is not one single bad decision you haven't made," she says.

"Is, too!"

"Name it," Alex grins at him with all her teeth. She has the emotional range of a teaspoon. "I dare you."

"Well, I mean. There's this," he says, waves a hand to indicate the… everything around them. The night sky turning light along the edges of the world, the moon's pale face a luminous disc beginning to wither in the coming dawn; this dark and quiet place they've found themselves in, safe and warm, is far away from the ghosts they carry.

"Okay, no, this was a terrible decision, Jonas. Like, no thought went into this decision. I said I wanted to run away, and you just, like, went with it so don't even front," says Alex, but then she's kind of smiling, so soft it's almost not there. "Thanks, though."

"For what?"

"Getting me outta there," she murmurs, turns her face into the crook of his shoulder. Something hot and tight had throbbed in Alex's chest all day, an ugly red beat that abated only with miles passing beneath them. Trapped in her parents' house, trapped in her own head, Alex hadn't been able to escape the cyclical nature of the thought patterns but, well—

Jonas gets it, which doesn't surprise Alex at all.

I'd do it again, he doesn't say, just shifts enough that he can press his chin to the top her head, and they stay like that for a long time because it's easy, it's so easy to just lay here and breathe together. There are no obligations, just silence and stardust the glow of far-off silvershot nebulae.

"What's a bad decision, then?" Alex asks, very quietly, what feels like an aeon later.

For a whole endless breath, Jonas is perfectly still.

It's a blur of movement, shadow-dark skittering smearing into her head going thud against the truck bed, into knees and elbows digging in, into the rush of blood beneath skin and heat and then—

Jonas hovers above her, looking down.

"What are you doing," Alex says, the echoes of a long-dead conversation soft like new leaves in her mouth. His chest is solid beneath her hands, beneath his shirt, the bones of him all elegant lines straining around her. He keeps her safe like that, legs tangled, arms a cage. She could leave if she wanted to but she doesn't want to. Alex wants—she just wants.

"Making a bad decision," Jonas says. He brushes her washed-out hair out of her face, and she catches a flash of his white fingers. Alex tilts her chin just enough that his knuckles graze her cheekbone. "Hey, we're not dead yet."

"I know we're not," she says. "How is this a bad decision?"

"You just had a freak out, Als, I wouldn't say it's great."

"I dunno, it could be worse. We could totally be possessed," she pauses to stare him up and down. There's a challenge hidden in the corner of Jonas' mouth like a drift of cigarette smoke on a cloudy day, and she raises her eyebrows at him. He doesn't get to be the only one that dares the world to come at him, does he; Alex is just as bad. "Are you going to kiss me, or what?"

(They're both going to eat it someday. Probably they already have.)

"If you want me to," Jonas says.

"I do," Alex says, raw and honest with it. Sink-spill, ghost-riders, starboys with their empty eyes and their canvas skin, she wants. She just wants. "I do."

"Cool," he says, voice hoarse, and he's close enough now to count the flecks of hazel-grey in his eyes, close enough now that their noses bump. There's nothing sexy about it. She doesn't know why it's endearing. "Cool."

When Jonas kisses her, Alex keeps her eyes open.

They both deserve to remember this, after all.

— — — — —

"D'you think Maggie and Anna are… you know, together?"

"They're okay, Als."

"Okay isn't the same as together," Alex murmurs. They've migrated inside, the chill of the pre-dawn air sending them skittering back into the truck. She pulls her knees up to her chest, Michael's jacket tucked between her shoulder and the window. It's a bright spot of colour in the grey morning light, a bloom of crimson, satin-soft.

"Better than not okay, though," Jonas yawns. There are little purple violets of exhaustion pressed underneath his eyes, blossoming night flowers that can't be smeared away, no matter how much Alex would like to.

They're going to crash, pretty soon, the both of them.

"Mm, I guess," she says, dropping her head back against the window. "But I mean—they're dead."

(Dead like his mom, dead like her brother, dead like the ghosts.)

Jonas looks at her. His eyes are soft. "I know what you mean, Als."

And Alex thinks about Michael and Clarissa, and the future, about time's strange and arbitrary rules on how she lives through it. She thinks about Ren and Nona, off-again this month, and about school and leaving and all the things that come after graduation. College, or travel, or… whatever the heck it is that teenagers do to become adults, whatever a person does to figure themselves out.

She thinks about the fact that in graveyards, she can feel the press of the dead like butterfly wings, whispering softly in her ears. She thinks about the fact that she knows what a final goodbye sounds like, that she knows the taste of time, that she knows the feel of sand slipping through fingers. People look at her like she's crazy, sometimes. Even Michael does it, and that hurts the worst.

Alex thinks about the fact that she still keeps that stupid radio.

"I don't think I'm ever gonna be normal," she says. Her hair falls into her eyes, and she shrinks behind it 'til all she sees is teal-turning-blonde, nothing but a sunlit sea. Alex thinks of rainwater down a window, streams converging, one thing becoming another becoming another becoming another, and doesn't know how to explain.

"The hell is normal, anyway," Jonas says. He rolls down the window and there's a spark, a tiny flame alive then dead; he exhales opaque smoke.

"That's going to kill you," Alex says, but this is an old argument, and nearly fond for it.

"Everything's killing me. Might as well enjoy it," Jonas grins at her around the cigarette, startlingly white, startlingly charming. He turns sober and quiet when he looks at her, though, eyes going soft. "Normal's overrated, Als."

"No, I mean—" and Alex breaks off, chewing on the words, trying to pick the right ones for what she feels. "It's like, Clarissa's going to Boston, right? And Nona got that scholarship to Juilliard, and Ren's aiming for UCLA, and it's like, it's like everyone's doing the whole real life thing. But I can hardly sleep, because I can still—"

"Still what?"

"I can still hear them. Not the Kanaloa them, they're gone, that's why I asked, but like… dead things in general. Graveyards suck for real, man."

"Is that how…?"

"The diner?" Alex thinks about it. There were other things, too, of course—the conspicuous lack of other patrons with solid food, for one, and the way that even the waitress was a paper-thin imitation—but mostly it was that cold trickle down her spine. "Yeah, that's how."

"…Why didn't you tell me?" Jonas asks. Exhales smoke, again, and drops the cigarette into the ash tray. It's the only one there.

"I did tell you, like, six hours ago."

"Why didn't you tell me before this?"

"What would I have said? Hey, by the way, I see dead people? Yeah, no thanks," Alex shakes her head. As it is, her parents have been quietly taking her aside and asking if things are alright—she doesn't need them worrying that their daughter's gone off the deep end and sending her to some correctional facility up in Alaska, which is totally not nightmare fuel or anything. As though she doesn't have enough nightmare fuel as it is. Jesus.

"I mean, you could've."

"Oh, shut up," Alex says, lips twitching as she reaches over to shove him.

Jonas catches her hands. He's always doing that. It would be annoying if Alex didn't know that he has a thing about touch: who's allowed to touch him, who he's allowed to touch. "I'm gonna have bruises, stop your violence."

"You like my violence!"

Jonas doesn't deny that, which, um, okay. He looks at her and says, "I like you."

Alex turns red to the tips of her ears.

"Are you blushing?" Jonas stares at her. "Christ, you're blushing, that's adorable—"

"Shush, I'm tryna be serious here! We made a deal, okay," Alex blows all the breath out of her lungs, forcing the flush away. Now is not really the time to turn into some eighteenth-century maid, swooning over a compliment from a stableboy. That's ridiculous. Alex is an adult or something. "Me and the ghosts. I promised that I wouldn't forget, no matter what. I can't—it's not a promise I can break."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"I dunno," she shrugs. "Maybe I'll go chase ghost stories. Maybe they'll think it's funny."

"I thought we established that annoying dead people is a quick way to get killed," Jonas says flatly.

"Yeah, well," Alex says. A slow, creeping smile splits her face, bloodied in the wash of the rising sun. "We also established that I don't get on super-awesome with staying dead, right? I'm basically the perfect person that way."

"You're going to die," he says, dropping his head back against the headrest to stare at the ceiling, wonder-eyed and dazed like he can't believe the words coming out of his mouth. "I'm coming with you, or you're going to die."

"I'm not going to die. You don't have to come."

"Kinda do, though."

"No, you actually don't—"

"Alex," Jonas says. Her name passes his lips simple and low and honest. It sends a shiver down her spine. "I want to."

"Oh," she says. "Really?"

"I'm here right now," Jonas says, staring straight ahead. He puts the keys in the ignition, and the truck thrums to life. "Aren't I?"

Alex looks at his profile for a long, long time. The broken ridge of his nose, the dark bruises beneath his eyes, the line of his jaw. She knows his face, and she knows when it's lying.

It's not lying, right now.

"Yeah," she says. "I guess you are."

Along the edge of the universe, the sun is coming up gold, glinting diamonds across the ocean. There's an island out there, dotted with the leftover remains from a different ghost camp, a different girl who broke the world, different travelers, different stories. Jonas lets the truck sit idle beneath them, palm loose around the gear shift. His knuckles are a curvature, bone and tissue, marrow and blood.

Alex links their fingers like a prayer.

In the sunrise over the water, she can see for miles, miles, miles.

—

fin.

#oxenfree #oxenfree fanfiction #alex x jonas #i'm a garbage trashcan on fire whaddup #sara makes shit

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heartillian · 6 years ago

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where did the whole rinoa has purple eyes thing even come from...i know in certain merch she has purple eyes & in opera omnia too but?? in the official art & the original cutscenes and even dff, her eyes are dark brown? idk but, just to be clear, my rinoa definitely has dark brown eyes and her highlights are the result of hair dye. i always liked the mostly very realistic colouring of ffviii bc i feel it works for that setting but i especially feel it’s important for rinoa since, until later in the plot, she’s supposed to be this normal girl in the sense that she isn’t like...a garden student or a soldier or anything like that? this isn’t really a headcanon or anything, just something that was in my head asdfghjhgf!!

#☆彡 sʜᴏᴏᴛɪɴɢ sᴛᴀʀ ⌇ (OUT.)#i mean...i think MOST ppl think the same way i do so this isnt a revolutionary thought at all lmao #but i HAVE noticed some ppl draw her with purple eyes or prefer her that way or whatever #which is obviously FINE but im just getting my opinion out #also im hoping making stupid posts like this will help me feel more comfy abt posting eheadcanons asdfghjhg #im very bad at posting my personal takes on canon muses bc im worried abt disagreement but i feel like rinoa is the canon muse who is finall #finally going to stick for me and i really do have a bunch of very personal takes i want to write up for her! >:^)#im the opposite of a lot of ppl on tumblr in that i find ocs super easy to write but canons make me nervous asdfgfd #im a lot more at ease abt creating my own character from scratch than trying to handle somebody else's character bc of #other ppl's expectations but i really want to make my portrayal of her my own11 #* !! weird al singing all star on loop.

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raksesrot-m · 6 years ago

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yever just look at some of the ppl followin you & then look at ur blog & just wonder ,, how & why

#fdgfdghdfgh i have some mutuals that i like admire a Lot & just i look at them & then look at myself & just ????? ur still here ????????????#& every time i wanna even think abt makin a move to interact i literally have to check my followers list to tripplecheck if we're mutuals #bc i just somehow cant believe it no matter how long it's been since they followed/--back #esp w all the mess that's been going down on my blog lately fdghfhj #somehow i just find it rlly difficult to wrap it around my head that there are people that would stick around no matter what #idk if it's patience or enjoyment but im just :o either way #* !! weird al singing all star on loop.

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dnldvy · 6 years ago

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* !! i have,, a new psd , new icons , changin up how i do shit , feelin Fresh , feelin like this might be just what i needed

#so it's like a reboot w/o actually rebooting the Whole thing but just the key shit dsfgdfg #which includes tags dsfgdsf #* !! weird al singing all star on loop.#feels good #feels organic #i was well due for a change up

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howaminotinthestrokesyet · 5 years ago

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Dark Prince of Awesome (Hey, That’s Me!) Live Review

I am going to do something a bit different so bear with me. This is a review of my own performance. For years, I have been doing Weird Al Yankovic parodies for what I call shits and giggles. I have even sold them on Amazon.com to almost anonymous acclaim. You can read in more detail in the feature articles section of this book about my catalog. Last summer and last week, I did live performances of my comedy. I do so through a company called Afton, which is pretty much a scam. You pay to play almost, but that is my love of music live, if you can call what I do music.

In July of 2018, I played the Heartland Cafe in Rogers Park, Illinois, which was the old Red Line Tap. This was a fun show on a Saturday night with a good group of other artists performing too. I wore a gold jacket and got a great response to my funny songs. I even attempted to sing Miguel’s “Skywalker” wearing a Star Wars flight helmet. I bet the sound guy a shot that I would actually do it as my final song. This was amateur to say the least and most of the people in the crowd were the artists themselves. That is the problem with these shows. You have to provide the people and receive zero assistance from the venue. You cannot count on people walking in the door because they charge an outrageous $12 per person. Nobody in their right mind is going to pay that unless they are friends or family. Yet, the redeeming quality for all this is the fact that you get to experience a real authentic live show experience. I can begin to understand how difficult this music thing as a profession can really be from getting people to see you, preparation, anxiety, and a whole host of other things. Like Tom Hanks said in A League of Our Own if it were easy, then everyone would do it. The hard is what makes it great. At the show in 2018, I even sold copies of my earlier volumes of this book. A guitarist in another band asked me to sign a copy of it. The other bands had a few friends in the audience, so it was nice to actually play for some fans.

In contrast, last week’s show was the exact opposite at a club in the South Loop of Chicago called Bassline. I was not sure about this show as it seemed like a bad idea to perform the same week of the Taste of Chicago. I was right. Only half the bands actually showed up, while nobody else sold any tickets. This was a glorified rehearsal session offering me zero desire to actually be there. I tried to leave at one so I could go to the Taste of Chicago down the street. Yet, the show manager would not allow such a thing. The sound guy was some sort of Neil Young clone wearing a fedora and sunglasses even though the club was so dimly lit. The club was nice meant for rock and roll, but it reminded me of a place designed by that lameass douchebag from Bar Rescue. If this were true, I would not be surprised one bit. There is a certain depression that sets in when you perform for nobody, which even happens for me when I do karaoke. I don’t even do karaoke in bars that are empty. You do not get that adrenaline rush when you know that as a performer I can provide someone there with something they have never seen before. The show itself was absolutely bananas in a way because there was a rap group, acoustic guitarist, rock duo, and me the man from Mars. The other issue was in the stage setup and the sound. I needed a headphone jack to plug in my iPad, but of course the venue had the shortest cord in the history of electricity. I remember having to sing from the back of the stage and being unable to move around due to restrictions on the mic. I kept putting my hands behind my back feeling a bit like Liam Gallagher of Oasis fame. The other issue was the fact that it was way too loud for an empty venue. I think Neil Young was doing it on purpose to piss me off actually. I had to scream my lyrics, which did not allow for the wry, subtle punchlines to the songs. These songs were not meant to be sung like that. Finally, in an act of desperation, I sang “Crash Into Me” using a death metal voice. This was probably the best received song, but I was not about to sing an entire song that way. By the end of my set, I had a gigantic migraine from all the screaming. My voice cracked a few times making for quite a sloppy set, on top of the fact that these were all new songs. I realized that the one thing to come out of all of this that I now know what songs work well live and what songs do not. The learning experience aspect of it made the whole night worth it I guess. And so it goes, until next time.

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teachanarchy · 7 years ago

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Quiet as it’s kept, the music we call jazz began life as an experimental remix of dance grooves from Africa and Europe that got chopped and screwed by high-stepping bluesicians of New Orleans over a century ago. From the git-go, the jazz thing has been as much about alchemy as flashy chops.

Everything we love about modern song, noise, and dance sprang from swing and bebop roots: R&B, rock, Motown, funk, disco, hip-hop, Detroit techno, Chicago house, drum & bass, et al are all extensions of a movement-inciting continuum that started in antebellum New Orleans’ Congo Square—breakbeat culture’s ground zero. It was the explosive site where enslaved Africans were permitted to get their ya-yas out to the beat of the drum—well, at least until the human traffickers of that time figured out rebellion was also being plotted in the Square under the cover of a funky good time. Same as it ever was.

Early New Orleans jazz connected those rebel riddims to funereal and carnivalesque marching band stomps; Jelly Roll Morton decided ragtime piano was needed to further excite the cipher of tubas, trumpets, clarinets, bass drums, and tambourines. Duke Ellington brought a rich palette of colors to big band swing that was adopted from the spirituals, Debussy, and Stravinsky. Louis Armstrong made a trumpet emulate a man laughing to keep from crying his eyes out and transformed his singing voice into a sardonic freestyle horn. What did I do to be so black and blue? Armstrong inquired in 1925, and his existential query has yet to stop worrying the minds, bodies, and souls of African-Americans to this day.

Collage, cut-and-paste, sampling, remixing, and genre contamination has been a preferred mode in African-American music since the 1800s.

The flavors that Armstrong’s triumphant horn shot out so perplexed the French manufacturers of his instrument that they sent engineers to his first Paris concerts to find out what modifications he’d made to his trumpet. Sacre bleu could have been the only response when the builders realized Satchmo’s ancestral African lips and tongue were the only technological innovations at play.

By the 1970s, Sun Ra had already pioneered the introduction of electric pianos and Moog synths into serious freedom jazz: Miles Davis had strapped a wah-wah pedal to his horn and was in the studio making vicious breakbeats with tape loops, tabla players, and live handclaps on electronic jazz masterpieces like On the Corner and Get Up With It. Students of Miles—like Herbie Hancock, Chick Corea, and Weather Report—soon followed, with sublime composition, improv chops, and grooves steady enough to yank in hardcore disciples of James Brown, Sly Stone, and Funkadelic. Meanwhile, Maurice White’s Earth, Wind & Fire so wickedly blurred the line between avant-garde soul and electronic jazz as to render distinctions between the genres patently absurd.

In a nutshell, the pioneers of ’80s and ’90s breakbeat dance culture were following precedents set by jazz musicians of the 1920s, ’40s, ’60s, and ’70s—even if some didn’t know it. Not entirely their fault: serious jazz got a lot less concerned with the dance floor from the mid-’40s on, thanks to Charlie Parker and Thelonious Monk, who were more concerned if their virtuosic flights made them happy than if they did everyday people; all the serious hoofers, toe-tappers, and lindy-hoppers got the message and moved on. Where they moved to was a hot, newfangled conflagration of gospel beats and vocalizing gone blasphemously secular, jazz harmonies and gutbucket blues forms—all that mess being pioneered by one Ray Charles. This kitchen-sink template set the stage for everything that’s come down the pike since, from mojo-handed talents as diverse as Little Richard, Nina Simone, Jimi Hendrix, The Isley Brothers, Larry Levan, Ron Hardy, A Tribe Called Quest, and Lauryn Hill. Collage, cut-and-paste, sampling, remixing, and genre contamination has been a preferred mode in African-American music since the 1800s.

Guru and DJ Premier of Gang Starr did much to assert the common humanity and creative urges of rappers and beboppers in their collaborations with Donald Byrd and others on their epochal Jazzmatazz series of albums of the late ’90s and aughts. They sparked a breakbeat-jazz hybrid scene on both sides of the Atlantic that yielded much musical fruit for a brief time but never cracked the blinged-out materialist hip-hop mainstream of the late Clinton and early Bush years. The Soulquarian Movement rallied by The Roots to assemble D’Angelo, OutKast, Jill Scott, Common, Bilal, Black Star, and Erykah Badu under one roof, and all threw hints and flashes of their own jazz genes into the conversation for those who knew the codes.

On the contemporary set, cats like Christian Scott, Jason Moran, Flying Lotus, Thundercat, Marc Cary, Vijay Iyer, and Robert Glasper are reuniting the urge to cunningly improvize with the urge to move the crowd. So of late we’re seeing a revival within the jazz world of electro-acoustic forays that refuse any opposition between software-driven sonic modernity and a good old-fashioned bebop-infested blowing session—both in the studio or on the stage. Ironically enough, as DJing has evolved into a standalone art form, it’s become much akin to ’60s freedom jazz, drawing crowds who don’t feel weird about gathering to hear turntablists experiment in public with their craft.

As frequently happens when the gems of our parents’ eras undergo rediscovery, old rhetorical baggage fades and the glorious innocence of crate-digging for soul gold remains.

The ever-ambitious Flying Lotus—grand-nephew of Alice Coltrane and her husband John, a far-flung composer of dream-dusted cosmic music in his own right—has done much to surgically conjoin the beatmeisters and jazzers of now through his Brainfeeder label. It’s an enterprise which in a relatively short while has normalized the curious drift of instrumental improvisers to the dark side of hiss-and-glitch clouded boom-bap, and vice-versa.

Political upheaval and jazz revivals tend to go hand in hand for African-Americans, and this Black Lives Matter-defined moment is no different in that regard. The jazz-damaged hip-hop artist of now who has made the convergence of ambient sonics, beats, and sexy improv seem inevitable, a seamless fait accompli, has been Kendrick Lamar—especially given how fluidly and fluently he deployed Glasper, Thundercat, and other bi-coastal jazz pros in the composing process that produced To Pimp a Butterfly. Because critics were so quick to label the album a black protest psalm, Butterfly hasn’t yet been fully recognized as the Bitches Brew of our time—an artist’s nuclear meltdown of this era’s dominant musical tropes into a definitive abstract-expressionist statement—one that We The People can feel, call and respond, rally around, freely quote, space out, get our wiggle on to, etc., etc.

Butterfly is a bedazzling combo of beats, rhymes, and live in-the-studio experimentation. Jazz heads have no choice but to flip over “For Free,” a straight-up freedom swing where Kendrick turns rapping into scatting and what author Jack Kerouac called bebop prosody, while string and drum breaks pop like bomb bursts around his head. It’s a ballsy declaration of jazz-funk allegiance from an MC not afraid to play a game of virtuoso chicken with players who routinely eat knotty changes for brunch. There’s as much Isley Brothers and P-Funk influence as Coltrane and Mingus, but in the ’70s it was never unusual to hear funk bands sharing stages and tours with Miles acolytes like Hancock and Corea. A musical rapport and mutual language was shared, one bonded by the warm-blooded tones of the Fender Rhodes piano—the universal solvent of ’70s black music across the rhythmic spectrum. Ya gotta love that Kendrick recognized having Glasper on Butterfly—with his sumptuous touch on the Rhodes—gives more life to the sonic beds his rhymes flowed over. Ditto Terrace Martin’s yearning-burning alto sax on “Alright,” which establishes a stellar emotional plateau for jazz and hip-hop hybrids.

That Lamar is a multidirectional rapper—able to supershift his cadences, character-acting, and melodic caches on a dime—is what unveils him as a jazzer in hip-hop guise. He’s not alone in these mutant abilities: the members of Freestyle Fellowship, The Pharcyde, Snoop Dogg, and Del Tha Funky Homosapien all inject that gene into a loosey-goosey California rap skill set. Lamar’s just the first artist to make it so fearlessly explicit at breakneck tempos when many of his generational peers are still drawling lockstep to gothic trap beats. It’s hard to imagine Drake, Young Thug, or even Chance The Rapper so viciously and fluently going toe-to-toe with a stomp in 9/8 like Kendrick does at the midway point on “Momma.” Fortunately, the race toward the dreamy side of the jazz-ecstatic aesthetic continued on K-Dot’s surprise March release, untitled unmastered—a spooky revisitation of the trans-dimensional realm of loops and live-riffing in modern rap that he and his cohorts have made their privileged wheelhouse.

The most immediate beneficiary of this perfect storm, though, has been Kamasi Washington and his comrades in the West Coast Get Down crew. Washington’s May 2015 release, The Epic, signals how modern acoustic jazz could go down to the breakbeat and improv, harvesting a global flow of heads ready once again to embrace 15-minute tenor saxophone solos with as much ardor and attention as they’ll bestow on their favorite MC’s next 64 bars.

Washington’s rapid ascent to world-stage prominence has been linked to both exceptional good fortune and family ties within jazz, but the striking thing about The Epic is that there’s nothing overtly hip-hop-friendly about it. It’s as pure a sonic throwback to the ’70s freedom-cum-cosmic swing of his dad’s youth as has been heard in acoustic jazz since that era, when Alice Coltrane, Pharoah Sanders, and McCoy Tyner extended the range of Sun Ra’s intergalactic inventions into forms that found traction among a post-Black Power generation of listeners on historically black college campuses. Also woven in are nods to the smoother funk-jazz of the ear, purveyed by Grover Washington Jr. and The Crusaders. The twain rarely met up and played nice back then due to political divisions in jazz over spiritual purity and pop ambitions. But as frequently happens when the gems of our parents’ eras undergo rediscovery, old rhetorical baggage fades and the glorious innocence of crate-digging for soul gold remains. Even more remarkable, though, is how Washington has made those open-ended modal jazz forms relevant, rabidly followed by the musically intrepid and curious collegiate crowds of now—the Black Power flower children of the Black Lives Matter era. Many of us jazz lifers got lifted seeing more twentysomethings at Washington’s February coming-out gig in New York City than we’d witnessed at a Gotham jazz club since The Marsalis brothers and Steve Coleman’s confederates stormed their youth movement onto the scene in the 1980s.

As always, jazz never went away; it just kept vibrating in its batcave, laying in stealthy wait for a shaken-and-stirred world to get hip and revolutionary-minded again, between wars and between the ears.

#jazz #music #culture #us history

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docacappella · 8 years ago

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A Swingles Moment

My very first experience with a cappella music came when I was in 9th grade. My choir teacher, Kevin Badanes (the very same Kevin Badanes in the brilliant vocal jazz group Avante) played a recording of the Swingle Singers singing “The Theme From Superman.” That was when my life changed.

I’ve mentioned this story in a previous blog, but chances are you didn’t read that one, so I’m reiterating the point. It was The Swingle Singers who started me on the path I’m on today. Before that moment, all I listened to was Weird Al and Jimi Hendrix. After that moment, it was Weird Al and A cappella (sorry Jimi).

A cappella CD’s were hard to find in 1996. You had to order them from magazines (which seemed sketchy…though I later found out they were just run by Deke and friends of Deke). CD stores (you may not know what those are…) did not have a “contemporary a cappella” section.

Perhaps if CD stores still existed today…they still wouldn’t have a "contemporary a cappella section."

Anyway, back to the story. So I tried to devour as much a cappella as I could, which was difficult since I didn’t know where to begin or how to find the music. I was able to find “Chameleon” by Vox One and a CD by The Nylons, but not much else. Thanks to the Internet, this problem is now solved…but it’s been eclipsed by a new problem: Now there’s just too much a cappella out there and if you’re new to the a cappella scene, you could be as lost as I was in 1996.

I’ve mentioned that point in a previous blog as well, but chances are you didn’t read that one either. So far, you’re 0 for 2.

I swear, I’m getting to the point.

In 1996, life-changing a cappella music was hard to find. You had to stumble across it accidentally. The same goes for 2017, but now you have too many sources to check and too many opinions to sift through.

In the expanding world of contemporary a cappella, an a cappella nerd like me can be overwhelmed by the amount of new content. When all a cappella starts to sound the same, it can be hard to love the style as much as you once did.

But that’s when I turn to my Swingle Moments.

What is a Swingle moment? Simple. It’s a term I invented just now (yay me!) to describe a personal, life-changing a cappella moment (not necessarily from the Swingle Singers). Hearing or seeing a Swingle moment is like having a nerdy divine intervention where you suddenly know the next step of your a cappella journey. The build-up of fatigue from hearing too much a cappella is released in a glorious puff of smoke, like a big satisfying aca-fart.

Here are my Swingle Moments. (Sorry/Not Sorry for the fart joke):

The moment I realized any song could be arranged a cappella: “Steven’s Last Night In Town” by Pandemonium.

My collegiate a cappella group, Vocal Point, had dug in their heels and refused to sing any music later than 1990. This meant our repertoire consisted of *gasp* “Lion Sleeps Tonight, ” “Day-O,” and “Eleanor Rigby.” And no, we did not sing it well.

For one of our concerts, we invited a group from the University of Maryland, Pandemonium, to sing with us. At the time, I had expanded my listening tastes to Weird Al, Monty Python records, A cappella, and Ben Folds Five. When I heard Pandemonium sing my favorite Ben Folds Five song “Steven’s Last Night In Town,” I suddenly knew that anything was possible. It was at that moment that I realized our tired arrangements of burnt-out oldies were not going to satisfy me as a musician anymore. I wanted to expand our repertoire to include the off-beat songs that no one would think of and original songs that no one would dare to write.

The arrangement that taught me how to write an a cappella original song: “What’s It All About” by Five O’Clock Shadow on Wonders of the World

This song remains my favorite a cappella original of all time, mainly because how it uses so little to rock so hard. When I wrote my first a cappella original “Power A cappella,” I copied the form and style of “What’s It All About,” because I knew if I used the same mechanics that made that song successful, mine would also be successful.

Fun fact: “Power A cappella” was terrible.

The arrangement that taught me how to compose polyphonic a cappella textures: “Everlong” by The Amalgamates on BOCA 2005

That arrangement is still one of the gold standards of polyphonic a cappella arranging (in my opinion). Just listen and try to pick out the numerous intersecting lines within the overall groove. I wish more a cappella groups would create dense, driving textures like this one.

The arrangement that changed my mind about medleys: “Super Mario” by Vocal Point on BOCA 2009

Normally, I hate medleys. The medleys I’ve heard are usually clumsily-arranged song cycles that give you the “greatest hits” without any substance. Plus, they’re sooooooooooooooo long.

My attitude about medleys changed after hearing “Super Mario.” Besides the fact that I was thrilled Vocal Point (different Vocal Point) had dedicated an entire medley to a video game, I loved the concept (moving from level to level), the inclusion of sound effects, the adaptations that added new lyrics, and the seamless change from the “invincibility star” song to “Shining Star” by Earth, Wind, and Fire. If you ever write a medley, please listen to this one first and follow their lead.

The album that shaped my current arranging style: Hold That Thought by Fermata Town.

For a brief few years, a cappella music didn’t thrill me. I felt like the BOCA compilations were churning out the same types of arrangements, and I hadn’t heard anything that I truly “loved.” By complete accident, I found Hold That Thought on iTunes. And then the light bulb turned on.

The group’s merging of radio hits with extremely complicated (and often surprising) jazz harmonies threw me for a loop. And let’s be clear…this is not a jazz album. They can rock as hard as Pentatonix, but with harmonies that are much more complex. Ever since hearing this album, I’ve been trying to model their style and substance. I’ve rekindled my interest in learning jazz theory and I’m constantly trying to shock the audience with interesting chords and dense harmonies.

The performance that set my career in motion: Mister Tim at the Amplify A cappella Festival, 2012

No live a cappella performance has ever had a greater impact on me than seeing Mister Tim perform in 2012. In that performance, I learned how to operate a live looper, I learned that you can be silly in a cappella, and I learned that there was now a way for me to make the a cappella music I had always wanted to make, without interference.

I’m not a professional live looper yet (nor will I probably ever be), but I owe much of my silly Docacappella persona to Mister Tim.

The arrangement that expanded my concept of harmony: “Poor Wayfaring Stranger” performed by The Swingle Singers with Peter Hollens, written by Tom Anderson.

There’s a reason I believe Tom Anderson is the greatest a cappella arranger living today: he sees music, writes music, and hears music in a “Beautiful Mind” like way. Despite his endless portfolio of arrangements, the immediate proof is in “Poor Wayfaring Stranger” where he utilizes chord combinations I haven’t even heard of (and I’m getting a doctorate!) and creates a rich tapestry of sound I didn’t even know was possible.

It’s been 3 years since I bought the arrangement from him, and I’m still combing through it, trying to decipher what the hell he was thinking when he wrote it.

The performances that changed the way I visualize live a cappella: “Titanium” by Voices In Your Head, 2013 and “Mad Hatter” by LARK, 2016

Both of these groups demonstrated what I feared I would never see again in a live a cappella performance: innovation.

Personally, I’m tired of watching the “hey-we’re-trying-to-be-really-cool-and-hip-by-standing-in-a-double-arc-or-adding-sexy-dance-moves-to-our-set” kind of choreography that plagues many inexperienced groups at ICCA and ICHSA competitions. When I wanted someone to show me something new, both of these performances did just that: Voices in Your Head manipulated the position of the microphones to create a sonic pulse and LARK added costumes, makeup, and staging to their performance, enhancing what could have been a tired power ballad into a spectacle.

This is one of the goals of my group, Satellite Lane: To create a show out of a cappella, not a set of songs with individual choreography. We’ve achieved this by writing 10-minute short plays, making “faux a cappella commercials,” or adding thematic dance moves that re-appear throughout all three songs.

For the theatre geek inside of me, I will always prefer “innovative and wacky” over “cool.”

The album that blew my mind: Bioluminescence by ARORA.

Sure, Pentatonix is credited with bringing a cappella to a current mainstream audience (as they should be). But within the a cappella bubble, the album that essentially "changed the game" was ARORA's masterpiece, Bioluminescence. What makes this album great isn't necessarily the songs themselves (all originals, all incredible), but the way ARORA uses so little to create so much. A group of only five singers, ARORA layers harmonies over harmonies to produce a "wall of sound" set to a tight, rhythmic groove.

My very first thought after listening to this album was that I need to work harder so that I could one day create an album like this one.

Those are my Swingle Moments. What are yours?

Marc Silverberg

Follow The Quest For The A cappella Major: twitter.com/docacappella facebook.com/docacappella docacappella.tumblr.com docacappella.com

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