etraya | UN: ScielCandide

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UN: ScielCandide | Video

[The camera is fixed on a table, upon which sits a neat stack of cards –– black with gold foil in the shape of a sun and moon bisecting each other. The user’s hands pass over the deck and spreads it wide into an arc. Her hands are tanned, with two rings on her ring finger and one on her index finger, and she has so many colourful braided bracelets that some wind around her palm.

Her voice is pleasant, playful, French, a little theatrical:]

Bonsoir, mes amies!

Tonight and tonight only, I will tell your fortune with a single card. Tell me your name, and if you would like to hear about love, money, health or the soul.

If it moves you, you must repay me with an amusing anecdote about yourself.

Ready to play?

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[ He winces, thinking of Lucien, but Sciel sails onward and he follows along, albeit with a little more effort. ]

Drunk, no. Maybe with one or two more glasses of wine in her than usual, but never more than that.

[ He laughs, recalling that night. The pinch of grief at recalling those friends now long gone is an old and familiar one. ]

Not with me, either! I tried to get her to have a drink and she just told me to go away.

[She bumps her knee against the side of his.]

Never? Too bad! I occasionally secretly imagined you two shared a moment in an office or the lab or something.

[Not a secret anymore, but still a fond wish –– that both of them could overcome their foibles and have some pleasant little tryst, something to break up the monotony of work and an ever-approaching doom.]

Either way, we’ll make it right. When she gets here, we’ll drink again, and we’ll make the Festival look like a council meeting by comparison.

Mm.

[ A non-committal hum into his glass, the same response he'd given Sophie when she started down the same path, talking about him and Lune together. He hadn't wanted to think about it at the time, and after... well.

In the end, it's just as well. He seriously doubts Lune ever harbored any thoughts of that nature towards him.

Another swallow down, he adds: ]

Not unless you count us arguing over the best ways to calibrate the Lumina converter.

[ He leans on the bartop, regarding Sciel with affection. Whatever doubts he's been harboring about Lune joining them, she seems blessedly free of anything similar. ]

You really are sure she'll get here, aren't you?

[Your avoidance has been noted, sir. Sciel shakes her head, smiling into her glass.

For a few weeks, she'd been so absolutely sure about being the last one standing. To see them all alive again had been a wonderful twist, but getting to cross paths with Gustave once more had been nothing short of exhilarating. Anyone could live. Why not believe in it?

Wherever Lune is right now, it's not far.

She grins.]

I've been saying it since we got here. The deal has been sealed since we saw her in San Fran, we're just waiting for her to be couriered over.

Besides, we're a team.

She'll be annoyed to be so late, [ is Gustave's prediction. ]

But the sooner she gets here, the better. I'm trying to figure out if it's possible to adjust the Lumina converter to work with other kinds of energy than chroma alone, and I'm sure she'd have plenty of insight.

[ And what else would Lune want to do on her arrival aside from dive into a thorny research question? ]

[Probably a good one.]

Maybe Aurora thought she needed a bit of relaxation. She thought wrong, obviously, but being late isn't the worst thing in the world.

[She drums her fingers on the bartop, wondering.]

It'd be handy if you could. We've all been neglecting our training, but it's hard without chroma anyway. I give you and Lune about a week to get it sorted out.

If we don't sleep, it might only be a few days.

[ Lightly joking as he turns his attention momentarily back to his drink, which is better now that some of the ice has melted into it. The Lumina converter has been on his mind for a while, and not just as a way to give the team their edge. He's behind — he's known it since Maelle and Sciel and Verso first arrived, bearing new, stronger pictos and lumina. That was the whole point, to get stronger the closer they came to the Monolith, but—

There's a weak point in the team now: him. If they're on a mission, or even just attacked here on Etraya, he'll be a liability to them, a vulnerability. Unless he can find a way to catch up. ]

Strange to be in a world without chroma, isn't it? I felt a lot better when it came back to me.

I'll start a timer.

[She notices this little dance with Gustave, the way he moves around subjects like he's drawing a box around it that he can't himself cross. He's always done it, to some degree, but it feels more obvious now that the thing they're avoiding is right between them, rather than some uncomfortable other. Are you thinking of dating her, sorry that made your day so frustrating, wasn't it annoying the way Alan said that––

Talking about themselves is so different now.]

Incredibly. I only have my cards back so far, and I feel like I have all this extra energy and nothing to spend it on. The minute it's back, I'm dragging you and Maelle down to spar.

I'm sure she'll appreciate that. You know she's always up for a duel.

[ Although most of Maelle's comments in that direction have felt a little like they were said more for form's sake than anything else. He doesn't think she's all that interested in fighting him, right now; not really.

Sciel might be another story entirely, depending. ]

And who wouldn't appreciate a training session with the reigning Gestral champion?

Oh, she loves it when I put my back into it. Gets her real competitive.

[Maelle’s been having too many mid-afternoon naps to claim she isn’t bored. More adrenaline would do her good.

Sciel takes another swig, this one feeling like liquid courage, even if it comes out a little gentle:]

Would you want to?

It could only help. I've hardly picked up my sword since I came here.

[ His memories of that arrival are foggy, and that's probably for the best: dropped immediately from battling Renoir — and losing — directly into another arena. He'd acted on instinct, reflexes that had been trained into him almost down to the bone, but since then...?

His right hand flexes, empty of a sword hilt. Someone further along the bar taps their bottle on the wood, and it rings in his head like the sound of a cane on stone. ]

But I doubt you'll find me much of a challenge anymore. Maybe you'll be able to teach me some new moves.

[She turns her head to him completely, a pinch to her brow, her tone lighthearted.]

Oh, come on. You can outsmart me just as quickly now as you ever could. I was always a heavier hitter than you.

[Her weapon alone outweighs the rest of the team's put together, Monoco's staff aside, and it is a thing to be reckoned with. She cuts a wide path and does not stop moving once she's started, and the blade goes wherever it happens to connect mid-swing. But it isn't the same as his tactical genius, his prowess at finding the exact right place to strike, the most efficient way to end a fight. He can still win, even if it'd be a war of attrition. She's sure of it.]

I think it'll make you feel good.

[ She looks at him head on, and he ducks his head a little, acquiescing. ]

You're probably right. It'd be good to get some exercise in. Besides, who knows what the next mission might bring? There's likely to be fighting ahead in some capacity.

["Probably."

The mission is what being able to fight is for, ultimately, but she knows it's more complicated than that for him. Does he worry he can't keep up? That they've changed so radically in so few months that he doesn't fit into their formations, or that learning what Verso's taught them would amount to hand-me-downs?

There isn't really a point in trying to guess when the man is right there, but the evening is so nice that she'd rather not take his hand and lead him right down a path fraught with danger. She wants to drink. She wants to enjoy him.

She smiles, nods.]

... Right. We should be prepared. I'll be upset if it's a fun fight and we miss out.

[She slides the menu over to him.]

Your pick next, by the way.

Well, we certainly can't have that. Miss the chance to show everyone here what they could be doing with a scythe?

[ He takes the menu and flips it open, scanning down the columns of text. Most of these cocktails are utterly unknown to him; he may have to just pick at random. ]

Besides, it's strange, isn't it? Going from a fight every time we turn a corner to civilian life again.

Mm. It's underestimated.

[Scary but too impractical for most, the learning curve tremendously steep. She leans her elbow on the bar, cheek in her hand, considering how atrocious it is on the mind to change directions on a dime like they have.]

But we never had this much free time as civilians, either, even as children. It feels like Etraya wants us to enjoy ourselves, and the time we have, instead of living so frantically. Otherwise wouldn't we be sent off on another mission the moment one ended?

And even the missions themselves haven't been the same sort of thing we trained for. No Nevrons, no Continent to cross, no Monolith to try and get to...

[ His drink is almost finished, and he can feel it already starting to work on him, lazy tendrils of warmth slipping into his limbs.

He slides the menu back to Sciel and taps at one of the drink names. ]

I say this one... whatever whiskey is. But blackberries are nice.

Good choice! Guaranteed we’ll like at least part of it.

[As for missions…]

We didn’t even help with the end of the last one. All Etraya’s superheroes did the heavy lifting there! Maybe the next one will involve weeks of marching, camping and life or death fights with Cultists.

We can hope!

[ Bracingly, as though he ever wants to see one of those damned Cultists again. ]

We're about as expert on those things as they come. Toss in a Bourgeon or two and I'll really feel like we're managing to pull our weight.

I wouldn’t mind a Bourgeon. I’d take a Mime, too, just to laugh about it after.

[The bot comes by; Sciel orders for them in advance. No interruptions here. It’s a bit that gives her a moment too long to think, and she remarks:]

I wish we saw more of the Continent together. I shouldn’t have run so far. Might’ve met up with you all sooner.

[ He grimaces at the thought of a Mime and tips his drink up — look at that, just enough for a last slightly-too-big swallow, perfect for this topic of conversation. ]

Yeah, me too. But maybe it's better it happened the way it did, you know? We might have missed each other, since I made Lune keep going past the Indigo Tree without waiting to see if anyone else might show up.

[ Not one of his finer moments, but he'd do the same thing again, if he had to. Maelle had been the only thing he cared about then; he hadn't wanted to rest until he found her. ]

[Bottoms up. The sooner it settles in her belly, the better, she thinks.]

No, you're right, it's better that part went the way it did.

[She'll never say it wouldn't be worth the risk of things turning out differently. There is so much she'd love to change! But changing the past isn't possible, and they didn't get more time together, so the less said the better.

What else to say?]

[ Almost as soon as he's finished his first drink, the second one arrives, waiting. Another dark color, but he's not sure how much of that comes from the smashed blackberries and how much from the liquor itself. ]

Besides, I'll never forget seeing you showered in adoration at the Gestral arena! Have you ever been out of your element for more than a single moment?

[She snorts, attention moving to the drinks for a beat, sliding the emptied glass out of the way and taking the new one between her hands. Best to wait a moment for the Fireball to fade off her tongue, lest the first sip of this one be tainted. She smiles at it, then at him.]

Is there a place on any world that does not have fighting and carousing in some form? I suppose if I found a place that lifeless, I could just bring those things with me.

I'd love to see the effect you might have on a world that's filled to the brim with quiet, taciturn librarians.

[ The bot rolls by again and politely leaves them both a glass filled with water; Gustave takes his to take a sip and wash away the lingering too-sweet warmth of the Fireball on his tongue. ]

Or perhaps a world where no one knows what dancing is?

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