expiationlogs | (OPEN MINGLE) Ain't no party like an Aldrip party

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(OPEN MINGLE) Ain't no party like an Aldrip party

Who: The Chosen
Where: Aldrip inn
What: Open mingle log (with mod approval)!
Warnings: Nothing major anticipated, other than light (underaged) drinking and comic mischief, but PM me if any warn-worthy things happen and I can update this space.

Feel free to use this log as a completely open mingle for all characters new and old! There will be a few prompts below the cut, but you're free mess around with them or come up with your own ideas for toplevels, and tag around as you please.

Nestled in the heart of the quaint town of Aldrip, the inn, formally known as The Inn, has housed the Chosen of Expiation since their initial arrival. In spite of the occasional influx of new Chosen, they've dedicatedly provided rooms, food and drink, and basic amenities without buckling—even during the food shortages and other issues that have plagued the town. Of course, the Chosen have been no slouches themselves, repaying the hospitality with mercenary work, hunting and fishing, cooking, completing odd jobs, and much more to help bolster the economy. Even those, er, less magnanimous sorts have benefitted from this give-and-take, although there are those that prefer their living space to be a bit more solitary (or perhaps cave-ier) that might not have noticed as much.

In the days to follow, most won't be able to recount exactly how The Party started. The true story is that one particular new arrival, after having spent a day or two scouting the area out and, deciding it's chill enough, opted to do what he does best: be a public menace. What is known is that rounds of drinks start getting ordered and handed out, and soon platters of cheese, fresh bread, and other victuals make the rounds as well, appearing on tables that quickly begin filling with people. Somehow, someway, local musicians are pulled in to play and given a striking, energetic setlist to set the tone. The word gets out—party at the inn!

And boom: just like that, it's a party, and everyone's invited.

Early on, the offerings are relatively meager. The inn's food stores aren't completely bottomless after the shortages, to say the least, and there are a sight more Chosen (and local residents who also join in on the fun) than there is free food to toss at them. The drinks range from milk, water and juice to scuzzy, pisswater beer, which is a bit more plentiful. As the tavern portion of the inn fills with people, the music relatively ambient so that you can still hear the people at the table next to you talking, others bring their own food and drink, adding to the options on offer.

Others bring things like cards to play with, or dice and coins to gamble with, and set up spaces at tables toward the back. There's even an amateur fortune teller, heavy emphasis on amateur. Maybe you've got some party games of your own in mind, or you're a natural-born performer and want to hit the stage. Maybe you'd rather just grab a pint and lurk in the corner doing some people-watching. Or maybe you're just hungry and want to stuff a bunch of cheese in your pockets for later. Either way, there's something here for everyone.

As evening wears on, the peaceful inn party blossoms into a proper block bash. Even if you're not the partygoing sort, it'd be a little difficult to ignore the sheer ruckus going on downstairs while you attempt to read quietly in your room. The music, chatter and laughter carries on down the street, attracting even more people. By this point, it seems as if the food and drinks have multiplied, thanks mostly in part to others showing up with their own offerings, Chosen and local alike. It's getting rowdy in a few places—the music's louder and livelier, people are dancing and singing, and the gambling/party games' stakes seem to just keep climbing higher and higher. It's a good time all around. If you're not the quiet, loner type, anyway.

Thinking of sitting this one out? Think again: somebody starts going around to all the rooms and knocking on the doors, calling out to come join the fun. By the time you get to the door, though, whoever's up here disturbing the peace is gone, but maybe you can track them down by their voice at some point and wring their neck later.

In addition to the escalating merriment, all this imbibing also has the added benefit of loosening a few lips. Now's your chance to pick up the latest Aldrip gossip! You might even hear tell of a few pesky monsters that need slaying, so if you want to jump on that bounty before anyone else gets to it, you better act quickly. (But maybe don't run out into the woods in the middle of the night to fight monsters while inebriated... or do, nobody's stopping you.)

Late into the night, the festivities are still going, and they're... messy. Fortunately the drinks and provisions seem to have run to the bottom of the barrel, so those that've been partying hard for hours are getting cut off whether they like it or not. The band's getting tired, the tempo of the music fluctuating. Some people might like to go to bed sometime soon, so maybe now it's time for the voices of reason to tell those still dancing on top of the tables to get down. And why is there a chicken in here? ...And oh no, somebody tell those guys to take that swordfight outside!! Yeeaaahh, maybe it's about time to shut this production down.

Or maybe not. Let the good times roll until the sun comes up! That's up to you.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[He's the same.

They fight Shadows, and... use code names and weird costumes, okay, sure, whatever, she isn't sure if she's supposed to be jealous or not without seeing what the costumes are, but -- she almost feels dizzy at the realization, tempered only slightly by the knowledge that Strega had Personas, too. More than anything, he doesn't strike her as being like Strega. Call it a hunch, but she doesn't think Kurusu is a bad person. It's not the sense she gets from Messiah, deep inside her heart. It's the sense that she can trust him. She wants to trust him.]

I've never heard of the Metaverse, [she admits finally, some of the tension in her shoulders easing as she makes a conscious choice to trust him.] I'd use it during the Dark Hour. It's not a gun; it's a summoning tool called an Evoker.

[She raises two fingers to her temple, miming the use of a gun. He gets it, right?]

[His eyes trail to her thigh, and surprisingly, it's not a thirsty teenage boy thing. He's just looking at the Evoker, strapped there, and then back to her gesture. She has to shoot herself in the head to summon...?]

Whoa, metal. We just rip off our faces. [A beat, and his eyebrows crease together.] ...that sounds worse, actually! Goes with the Phantom Thief thing-- [He swipes his hand in front of his eyes.] Masks.

[She can't help it -- she laughs when he calls it "metal." She'd been expecting horror, revulsion, disgust, but no. He thinks it's cool. All at once, it's like she's remembered how to smile again.]

Masks, huh...? [And she finally puts the name to the thing they'd been dancing around, watching his face.] Literally a Persona?

[Capital-P Persona. It's the literal translation, sure, but if he knows, he knows.]

[He stands up a little straighter, grinning with all of his teeth again. It makes him look younger, without his glasses. He nods, making an affirmative hum of sound, letting his shoulders bunch up a little near his ears. He shifts, then, sliding his (sheathed) dagger out from-- actually, where the fuck was he hiding that?? --and crosses the room, glancing at the space next to her before dropping to sit on the floor near her feet.]

I used a dagger, in-- I don't know if they're the same with different names, but. The other world. It looked kind of like this one. [He turns it so the handle is toward her. It's an implicit display of trust.]

[She takes the dagger in one hand and hefts it, gazing at it in a new light. She doesn't try flipping it around or moving it from hand to hand, not like when he'd first showed it to her -- she doesn't want to risk dropping it on him -- but she doesn't miss the implicit gesture of trust. Maybe under all that confidence, he'd been scared, too?

She taps his shoulder lightly with her foot, offering the hilt of the dagger back to him. She's not willing to just hand over her Evoker in exchange, but she appreciates the gesture for what it was.]

I didn't think there were other Persona-users here. [Her hand falls to her heart, clutching it softly. Messiah might be the Judgement arcana, but mentally, she brings him to the forefront of her mind.] Who's yours?

[Akira isn't sure he remembers what fear feels like, he's been covering it up with bravado and confidence shaped like a domino mask for so long.]

[He's sat on the floor with the world's worst posture, hunched over like a shrimp, but his head is angled up to smile at her in a startlingly adoring way. He takes the dagger back and spins it easily between his fingers, sliding it back into the sheath without looking at it.]

[He's still drunk, but it's literally an extension of his fucking hand, even actually forged and not a toy made cognitively impressive.]

Arsène, like Arsène Lupin, inherently. I kinda... collect them? But that's a weird me thing. [He reaches up and twists the centermost lock of his curls between his thumb and forefinger, suddenly self-conscious, and focuses on the hair rather than looking at Kotone.]

[Now that brings another jolt of surprise to her face, dropping her jaw slightly as she stares at him. It's not that she thinks it's weird, but--]

You have more than one? [At once? Her friends had been able to reawaken their Personas into more powerful forms, but that's not collecting them.

Impulsively, she shifts off the bed to sit next to him, wanting to be closer to his level.] You can switch between them?

[A startled, embarrassed flush creeps up his neck, and he twists his hair a little more.]

Oh-- yeah. Uh. Kinda like a rolodex of brain-demons.

Did you meet Igor? No, wait-- did you meet Theo?

[She presses closer, eyes wide and maybe a little -- she doesn't know. Anxious, maybe? Not about Igor; the cryptic, long-nosed man had given her advice and helped with fusion, but Theo was the one who'd really helped her. Given her tasks, asked for her help, asked her to take him around the city, wanted to get to know her as a person, not just a contract.]

[His eyebrows raise, and he taps the end of his nose, extending his finger out about six inches.] I am thou, thou art I, and my nose is as long as a city block. Didn't know a Theo, though.

[...You know, there's a part of her that's kind of selfishly glad that Kurusu didn't meet Theo. Theo was her attendant. Her friend.

But she just giggles at his description and nods, draping her arms comfortably over her knee and leaning in to press against his shoulder.]

I thought I was the only one. Who... "collected" Personas, I mean. Who met Igor in the Velvet Room. None of my friends knew what I was talking about when I tried to tell them about the door.

[He doesn't know what to make of it.]

[He's never felt misunderstood by the Thieves, exactly-- sure, they didn't see glowing blue doors and didn't take a pair of twin ten year old girls around Tokyo only for them to merge into one slightly older girl later on. They all had one solid, resolute depiction of their rebellion. Arsène was his tried and true, the first and foremost, but he still felt strangely fractured just picking them up almost willy-nilly. Like he didn't quite have enough of a solid depiction of himself, so he had to fill in the gaps with other things.]

[Kotone got it, though. And for a minute, that suffocates him, and the world closes in on him just a little bit, and he has to close his eyes to not look harrowed.] Mine would just say I was standing around looking spaced out.

Yeah, same here.

[It's so strange. She'd thought she was special, unique and different. The only one who'd had that experience, the only one who could understand. She'd asked Dazai once if he'd thought that was wrong of her, to be able to change her face, change her "true self" whenever she wanted.

She glances up at him and gives him another smile, reaching to gently pat his knee at that look of his. Maybe it was the same for him, maybe it wasn't. But either way, it's nice not to be alone, she decides.]

Theo was my... he called himself my attendant. He called me his "honored guest." [Her voice reflects a little of her amusement at that, tinged with a nostalgic bittersweetness.] He was my friend, though. Igor did all of the fusions, but Theo cared about me.

[The laugh that leaves him is sharp, because it's sudden and breaks its way out of him in the same way it breaks through his brief melancholic brooding, and he lays his hand over hers.]

Mine started out as a pair of vicious twins who liked to smack me with police batons and kick me into the Velvet Room. Justine and Caroline. They later merged into Lavenza. ...that part's kind of a long story.

[She can't help but laugh a little herself, more in disbelief than any real amusement. Theo would never. If a pair of twins with police batons had tried to kick her in, she probably just wouldn't go at all. Or try to walk in before they could hit her, one of the two.]

Theo could tell me the exact temperature of anything around us. He was really proud of that.

[She misses him, plain and simple. She knows she'll never see him again -- her contract with him is over, he'd intimated as much during their last meeting together in her room, but... she can still miss him. A little huff of a sigh escapes through her nose as her fingertips lightly tighten against his knee.]

Was it hard...? Being a leader?

[His mouth forms a little "o" at the mention of Theo's thermostat abilities, but it's the question that makes him curl inward just slightly. His hand drops from his hair, but he folds his knee a little closer to himself, rubbing his thumb over the back of Kotone's knuckles.]

[Was it hard? Was it hard? He almost wants to laugh at it. He was sixteen, discarded by his parents and thrown into a city he'd only ever heard of but never seen, lost and thrown into a parallel world his first day of school. Scolded for being late, never once bothering to try and explain that he and Ryuji could have died. He made friends he wouldn't trade for the world, but they saw him as this infallible pillar of strength and ability that he felt so disconnected from sometimes he laid awake at night staring at the ceiling trying to figure out how he'd gotten here. The plan for the interrogation room had been cumulative, and he'd agreed, but...]

[He closes his eyes and sees empty syringes, over-shined shoes under too-pressed slacks, felt the bruising all over again. He flinches, opening his eyes to clear the sight, and draws in a startled gasp of breath, squeezing her hand. His voice is very small.]

Every day.

[She can't begin to guess what he's been through, but she watches his face quietly and without judgement, searching for any of those minute shifts that might indicate what he's thinking about; what he's going through. She can recognize the way he curls in as something defensive, recognize the way he closes his eyes as being lost in a memory. It hurts her hand a little when he squeezes it, but she doesn't make a sound or do anything other than apply equal pressure to his knee in something she hopes is stabilizing.

His voice is so soft and so small that her heart twists painfully in her chest. She isn't sure if it's sobering or heartening to know that whatever he's been through, it was probably just as difficult as what she'd gone through. Beneath his confidence which she's almost certain must be, at least in part, bravado, he's just a boy.]

Hey. [Her voice is soft, matching his in volume if not in tone. She wiggles her fingers a little, trying to turn her hand over to interlace their fingers, give him something better to hold onto. Contrary to the way he's curled in on himself, her posture is open, her ankles tucked in close to her body and free hand resting in her lap; her expression is as soft as her voice as her eyes flit across his face.] You don't have to talk about it if you don't want to. But I'm here to listen if you do.

[It's reflexive, then, the way he sits more upright and flashes a smile, shaking his head.] Oh-- nah, it. It's fine. I mean, I appreciate it.

[His free hand goes to the back of his neck, but the one attached to Kotone's curls their fingers together in a way that suggests it was Not Fine, but she probably got it. Maybe? He didn't know if he wanted to hope she understood-- it's hard being a kid and no one understands. He rubs at the base of his neck, fidgeting with his hair, and laughs softly.] Wow, my hair's getting kinda long. Um-- it. Talking about any of why it's hard for me to be a leader while still-kinda-drunk is a really bad idea, but. Rain check, maybe. [He will not rain check. She will have to drag it out of him, honestly.]

[Yeah bud, she gets it. This time, she's the one rubbing her thumb along the backs of his knuckles, even as her smile turns a little wry. It's something she'd say if Shinji asked if something were wrong, honestly.]

If you say so. Just remember that I'm not part of your team, so you don't have to... you know.

[She bounces their joined hands together against his knee, hoping he gets it. He doesn't have to put on a brave face for her, because it isn't like she's expecting him to see her through a difficult situation. Maybe it hadn't felt like that for him, but then again, maybe it did.]

Is anyone from your team here? I'll keep an eye out for them.

[Kotone one of these days you're going to be presented with a very distraught teenage boy who can no longer keep a brave meme face with all the shit he's put up with, and what then. He just chuckles again, nodding as he self-consciously rubs at the back of his neck some more. It's not that he doesn't want to confide in anyone, certainly not that he doesn't trust, that he thinks no one will care. It's that he's walked them backward into Hell so many times with a confident flick of his tailcoat that he doesn't know what it would do to them to see him less than perfect. He can't do it to them.]

[Maybe it's why Akechi and Sumire are so important to him. He can unpack that another day. Speaking of them, though--]

Goro Akechi-- grouchy old man in an eighteen year old's body, kinda..., mousy-brown hair and red eyes, and Sumire Yoshizawa, a tiny angel with red hair and red eyes who can and will beat anyone in a dance-off. They're both-- [His expression twists, and he curls his knees a little closer to himself, suddenly overwhelmed with fondness.] They're so important to me.

Edited 2023-04-26 22:04 (UTC)

[Ah, the need to be the infallible leader, solver of all problems. She watches his face, that little awkward gesture, and decides: yeah. It must have been tough.

So the easier topic will probably be a welcome relief instead of trying to push about what being a leader had been like. Her eyebrows quirk, a little suspicion that she'd had falling neatly into place. Ah, of course Akechi had known so much about Jung and coached it in such language. She files that information away, nodding and smiling.]

We've met. She introduced herself to me as Violet -- I guess that's one of the code names you talked about, right? She shared some of the food she cooked with me. And I've hung out with Akechi-san a couple of times. I helped him make some beef stew, and I brought him lunch a couple days ago.

[He moves his hand, settling it atop his other knee and drumming his fingers over the fabric of his jeans.]

Oh-- yeah. She's Violet, I'm Joker. Akechi's Crow. [His face wrinkles up with a grin.] You got him to cook? He sucks at it, I'm surprised he let you. Sumire..., she can be a little shy, at first, I hope she won't mind I gave you her name.

She said she preferred Violet. There's some kind of history there, huh?

[It's starting to hurt her shoulder to keep their joined hands on his knee, so she shifts, not letting go of his hand, but letting it fall to her lap instead where it's more comfortable.]

I won't ask you to tell me what it is, don't worry. If she wants to, she can tell me herself.

[But Akechi... eh. He can handle it. Her nose wrinkles a little with her mischievous giggle.]

His attempt burned black. I was able to walk him through my process and had him help me chop the vegetables. He was pretty good at that part, at least! He's been here about as long as I have, so I consider him one of my friends.

[That feeling almost certainly isn't mutual, but she has a sense that it would take a lot for him to see someone as a friend. She'll keep chipping away at that barrier of his until he lets her in.]

[He startles a little when she shifts, realizing that it must be a weird angle and giving her an apologetic grimace. He shakes his head, just briefly, but it's a sharp enough gesture that his curls bounce.] No, definitely-- it's her story to tell. She's been through a lot, I really admire her energy.

[And then he-- tries. To not laugh, but he snorts and then barks, dissolving into brief peals of boyish laughter directed at his knees.] Ohh..., oh, Kotone, bless your patience. He's good with knives, definitely. [He leans sideways a little, bumping into her shoulder.] ...thank you, for being around him. He's fucking awful about letting people befriend him.

Mmhm.

[Something to be aware of, but not something to even hint that she knows anything about to Violet herself. It's about trust.

His laughter is infectious, and she laughs a little herself at the use of her first name. Oh, is that the basis they're on, now?] I've noticed, but don't worry. Someday, he'll figure out that those cold glares of his won't work on me.

[She forms her face into a rather good impression of one of Akechi's dead-eyed stares, the one that screams you're such a waste of time, leave me alone -- and then breaks it with an even louder laugh.]

(OPEN MINGLE) Ain't no party like an Aldrip party

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