expiationlogs | {Mini Event} Day of Devotion

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{Mini Event} Day of Devotion

DAY OF DEVOTION

This is an entirely opt-in very casual event that has nothing to do with overarching storyline and is just an additional introductory log, and a means for characters to meet. We hope you've all had a very happy Valentine's Day week however you've chosen to spend it!

SCARVES OF LOVE

The season of affection and love of all kinds falls upon Aldrip in the wake of their festivities for Those Who Were There. As part of the celebration, what's referred to as the 'Day of Devotion,' local merchants carry a variety of wares, but none so coveted as their multicoloured scarves available in a variety of prints, designs, and fabrics. Perhaps consider picking one up and giving it to someone who's important to you. No money? No problem! Whilst Aldrip doesn't exactly work on a layaway system or akin to, you'll find the mercantile business owners are quite open to trades and other means of bartering. Maybe they'll give out a scarf or two in agreement for running some errands...

Lucky recipients of these very fashionable scarves will find themselves suspiciously open to sharing positive, warm and fuzzy, or perhaps downright amorous feelings toward the person who gifted them the scarf to begin with, regardless of whether you've known them for years or even just a couple of weeks. But don't worry—the feelings are temporary! Once the Day of Devotion comes to a natural conclusion, your feelings will return to something like normalcy and you'll still wind up with a new fashion accessory. Of course, if you've always been amorous with that special someone, you likely won't notice any sort of change.

Take the opportunity to embrace the celebration, maybe embrace one another a little bit, too, and begin forming some potentially everlasting bonds with others.

BRING PROTECTION

Not everyone is choosing to celebrate the Day of Devotion in the same way. Due to the heightened popularity of the pretty scarves, some of Aldrip's jewellers have been bitten by the green bug of jealousy. In an attempt to compete with the sales of scarves, jewellers are advertising pendants, brooches, and other assorted charms that are meant to serve as warding and protective trinkets. What are they protecting one from? It's difficult to say and the merchants aren't inclined to give a straight answer. But whether you need protection from love, personal feelings, or perhaps something more physical, they've got you covered!

If you choose to give these amulets to others, recipients of them and their related will be compelled to share their true feelings with those around them in addition to the person who gave them the protective charms. This sounds like it could be a good thing, however, that means it covers the array of positive, negative, and every shade in between, without a filter in place. Consider these accessories a potential test of friendships, familial relationships, and more.

Like the scarves, this need and desire to be truthful with your feelings will be temporary, lasting until the Day of Devotion celebration is over. But at least you'll be protected. From something. Maybe. Probably. Or not!

FLOWERS FOR ALDRIP

By now, you may be well familiar with Aldrip's variety of fields that are filled with vegetables and fruits that grace the dinner tables of the town and local cuisine. During the Day of Devotion and weeks leading up to it, you'll find that they're clearing another field and preparing the soil. What for, you won't find out until the actual day of the celebration. Once it arrives, there's a collection of simple carts filled with flowering plants. Locals and newly-arrived alike are welcome to lend a hand in planting them along the neatly tilled rows.

You may find plants that resemble or are identical to plants from your home world. You may find plants that you've never seen in your life. They come in a variety of colours and are accompanied by a lightly pleasing scent that shouldn't be too overpowering, though may still disturb those with allergies.

All who help out with the planting, watering, and other tending, will be rewarded with a bouquet of flowers that can be passed onto others to show your appreciation and other forms of affection. You may even find yourself making a good and lasting impression on the locals by offering some assistance.

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[ It isn't something Nanami enjoys or approves of: weaving, dodging, flipping back in response to questions. Though he'd always been the kind of person to keep to himself, rejoining the "world" of sorcery had built with it another boundary. Because by law sorcerers could not divulge even the generalities of cursed spirits and shamanism, exorcism, to civilians, it was best to avoid any prolonged contact entirely. Pragmatic to prevent extended communication, attachment.

He's an intentional enough person that it remains choice, rather than habit, to resist disclosure in a place where such must be pointless.

At his current position, turned toward Cloud, Nanami, too, observes the return to the fields. His attention remains on his drinking companion, the questions asked with what he identifies, immediately, as careful tailoring.

To the extent Nanami would ever own to a sense of humor, it probably doesn't extend to a black quip as to fired, because in a matter of speaking... ]

It's something different. Sorry, Cloud-kun, but I don't want to explain it.

[ An unpleasant story.

After having another sip, ]

With that sword, what kind of combatant were you?

[ And, after a beat, mouth slanted and voice tinged wry, ]

I don't mind if your answer is, "I don't want to explain it."

[ The petty part of him, easily affronted, wants to do just that. I don't want to explain it--leave the whole thing there, non-answer for non-answer, and fall into an uncomfortable silence. He can feel the urge on his tongue, as he looks down into his cup, a vague sense of displeasure over his features; it isn't at the taste of the beer, which seems fine, as far as beers go. There's something a little jarring about not being able to force information out of someone solely because he cares enough not to be a jerk about it: and he doesn't like that feeling.

He isn't really sure that he should be making friends in this place. He's never been good at it, always the kid in the back, sitting things out, quiet and strange: what good would it do now? He should be focused on getting Aerith and himself back to Midgar.

A swallow, shrugging up a shoulder. He finds some weak part of himself compelled to answer, like it might make Nanami like him a little better. ]

I was SOLDIER. I'm not anymore. No one here seems to know what that is, which means we're far away from the place I come from, but.

[ Another swallow. ] Left the company I worked for. Now I'm just for hire.

[ And maybe there's a small hint of a smile: ] I wasn't fired, or anything. I'm good at what I do.

[ For future reference, if helpful: Nanami would either not be at all uncomfortable in such a silence, or, do an excellent job at not showing it, instead suppressing it. Silence in and of itself he generally welcomes. Cloud should feel entirely at his own liberty to respond in kind.

Though — resisting the feeling of discomfort brought on by his own terse reserve isn't equivalent to enjoying it. It's never his intention to cause another person that experience, that awkwardness. Far from obliviousness or deliberate insensibility, he tends to be conscious of it, but it's a matter of principle. To speak for the sake of speaking, of filling silence; to compromise and share something difficult after a handful of conversations — ultimately, it would be a disservice to the both of them.

Or, that's just some self-serving bullshit in conscientious tissue paper, already torn from the wrapping alone.

Returning to the short of it: Cloud obviously didn't have to answer. Nanami had given him a painless out, the permission slip already written and signed. He'd reserved any expectation, still unwilling to make any firm conclusions about his character — but, after watching the younger man stare the bottom of his cup (or the beer sloshing within), expression almost sulky, he is a little surprised when he gets an answer.

Not unpleasantly. ]

Yeah, I also don't recognize it. [ Needless to say. ] Since you've tied our ignorance to place, I assume SOLDIER was reknown worldwide.

[ It sounded military, and even with his own profession that sourced de facto soldiers at a high school, his thoughts leaned national until "the company" gave it a corporate tinge. If corporate, a private organization that was itself for hire, and Cloud had gone into business for himself?

A number of assumptions in that. Right now, he doesn't need that much detail. That smile's enough, shaped by simple pride. ]

Might as well keep doing what you have more aptitude for. Just for hire for tasks that need someone armed?

Sort of.

[ It's hard to say, and for the first time since being here, he feels himself stall--feels his own thoughts stall, not jerked out of place by misplaced memory, or forced delusion. In the end, what does leaving Shinra, and SOLDIER, put him with? What should he be doing? Perhaps now, roped into Avalanche and the trouble of the Planet, there's an obvious directive, but even that doesn't necessarily feel like something that he's got the aptitude for. If anything, he's still just the hired help that's come along to muscle through.

Swallowing down the last of his beer, he finds he actually doesn't mind the taste so much when he's at the end of it. He might even endeavor to get another glass all the same. ]

I thought I'd be...a mercenary, but then that...kinda meant doing all kinds of things. [ A soft breath of half-amusement, through his nose. ] Rescuing lost kittens and collecting flowers and getting payment for water filters...

[ There's a wry flattening of his mouth: why is he saying all this? Stubbornly, he moves slightly, brushed past Nanami to go for that next glass. ]

Anyway, I got hired to help a friend and her group with something pretty serious. It's a long, boring story. You aren't looking to hire me, are you? [ There's another little smile, hidden by his new glass as he brings it up to his lips. ] If you are, I'll try a little harder to be appealing.

[ Having been steadily partaking of his own beer as they spoke, Nanami had finished it while Cloud smiled for his own capability, perhaps for being able to say it and know it true. His cup left on the table, pushed aside. Only notable, and he only tracks that Cloud seems to have finished his, because it cues up the question as to whether they'll keep it at one and return to the fields or laze a little longer.

A question quickly enough answered when Cloud gets himself another, movement in his periphery as Nanami reflects on kittens, flowers and water filters.

Doesn't sound so bad. He'd have said as much if Cloud hadn't moved — that if he enjoys fighting, if he's good at it and there's need, the value of that doesn't need saying. But, if there's a time where there's so little conflict that the only work a combat-specialized mercenary could get was recovering lost kittens, that sounds like a good thing. Or, sounds like it could be a good thing.

Maybe Cloud's too young.

Irrelevant, anyway, because when he gets back with his drink, turns out there'd been something more demanding after all. And since Nanami rarely feels compelled to ask to hear even short, riveting stories, he lets Cloud cut it there. Nanami may not be able to see that smile, but thinks he may be beginnig to recognize other tells: the inflection of his voice, slight dip of his chin, face, toward the glass even as he raises it.

Not a bad joke. Nanami doesn't smirk or smile, but when he crosses his arms and leans, it's forward, more to brace an elbow on the table as he looks up, features not blank, bland, or stoic — but relaxed. ]

Sure. Since you're the one standing, I'll hire you to get me another drink.

[ Ridiculously matter-of-fact — and maybe his tell's in his eyes, exposed as they are with his sunglasses on the table. Less matter-of-fact: ]

I'm not sure I want to know, but what does "more appealing" mean to you in this context?

[ One slender curve of a brow, but it isn't in question--rather, there's a hint of interest there, filtered across his face, but he does as he's told. Presented with a job, any sort of job, he's going to try to do his best at it: even the most annoying tasks that Tifa gave him, he still completed them for the sake of his budding reputation.

He almost wants to smile, but rather than reach along the table to snag Nanami another glass, he moves closer, firmly setting down the new one he'd gotten for himself there: he's only had one sip from it, and besides, what's a little swapped spit between practical strangers?

He finds himself absurdly pleased, as he steps back again to collect a brand new glass; and then, rather than stay standing, he pulls himself down into a seat next to Nanami, rather than across from him. ]

Guess it would depend on the job. [ His gaze is still cast peacefully out in front of the both of them, towards the fields. ] If you wanted me to cut down some monsters, for example, I'd show you my strength to appeal to you. But you're forgetting one important thing.

[ And there, a flicker of a blue-green gaze, glow tempered with amusement, at Nanami's profile. ]

You haven't paid me for this job, yet. I'm waiting.

[ Whatever the circumstances, generally, Nanami's face is about as animated as a stone. When Cloud puts his own glass down in front of him, the one he'd just taken a sip from, Nanami's features don't only shift — his eyebrows raise a solid half-inch and hold. At least he manages himself well enough that it's only once Cloud's turned to get himself a fresh glass that his mouth twitches.

First perplexed, then indignation (not for himself so much as basic etiquette and the integrity of the drink) vies with plain, unmistakable amusement. Nanami's too particular with his own speech not to take responsibility. He'd said another drink not another new drink. Though they both knew what he meant, Cloud had done the job in a manner Nanami knows well — more form, less substance.

When Cloud finally sits, it's next to him, leaving Nanami to shake his head rather than give him a look, one that might've cracked enough stoicism to expose a sentiment along the lines of, you shit. Recognition, not ire. Because he's not about to turn just for that, he settles for taking an indifferent sip of the secondhand beer, also looking straightahead. ]

Too bad. Since I won't be needing you to cut down monsters on my behalf, your strength wouldn't be too appealing.

[ Then, it's too quick for Nanami to feel it, that glance. There's just enough inflection in that reminder for Nanami to take another drink, brim over upper lip. ]

Isn't it you who forgot? A mercenary should agree on payment before doing the job. I've already got the drink. Used, too. How about a discount for that?

[ It’s a little interesting, that response. He hadn’t really thought that Nanami would need that kind of protection; then again, it’s not like even people like Aerith, who ask for it, need that kind of protection. He might be the person that has to come in and take down the egregiously strong things, in the end, but even he couldn’t full rid them all of Sephiroth—-

A slight pinch of his brow, like a prickle of pain, threatens his vision, but the view in front of them stays the same. A slow breath through his lips. He can smell the beer from his new glass. Slowly, he brings it up for a swallow. ]

That’s true. I guess a discount is in order. Should’ve confirmed the price beforehand.

[ At least he still sounds amused. ]

I’m guessing if I asked what you’d be needing of me instead, you’d say nothing, right?

[ He’s not offended by it, if it helps. Just mildly disappointed. ]

[ The timing happens to overlap — that Nanami does glance at Cloud when his expression changes, barely, the subtle dip in his brow. Had they not spend the entirety of this break gauging the relative stoicism of one another's faces, even Nanami might have missed it. The long breath that follows seems to have helped.

It doesn't seem to have been irritation over the discount, since when Cloud agrees, his tone remains light.

Unsurprisingly, Nanami doesn't comment. Instead, he's reaching into a trouser pocket to wriggle out his wallet, unzip a small compartment, and pull out one coin, which he slides on the table between them. ]

There.

[ A single coin seems fair, since all Cloud did was hand him the glass he'd gotten for himself and already drank from.

But — does he sound disappointed? Nothing for it. ]

That's right. I'll let you know if that changes.

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{Mini Event} Day of Devotion

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