Subject: Staring away from each other.
Author:
Posted on: 2011-12-11 02:00:00 UTC
Maria looked desperately around the room for a friendly face. "Soo... we pretend we never went under the mistletoe, and Luxury never caught us?"
Mark cleared his throat and ran his hands through his scarf. "Agreed. I am going to find something to do over there now..."
"Yeah, you do that." Maria shivered a bit. "I'm just going to go... ALLLL the way in the other direction."
(( Hello! Before we start, just a few ground rules to keep things running smoothly:
1) When you join in, post your response to the end of whatever the most recent post is, to keep just one string of sequential posts. That way it should be easier to keep track of what's going on, and thus easier to include everyone. When the string gets too long, we'll come back to the top and start a new one off this post.
1.5) Don't worry about your characters being "late" if you can't get here until this has been going on a little while. It gets old fast, and this is an open party: people are welcome to come and go as they please. You can even write in yours as having been there the whole time if you want to.
2) Keep posts in past tense. It's easier to read if everything is in one style, and it will make it easier for me when I put the whole thing up in a log.
3) No controlling other people's characters. Some may be okay with it, but I'm not (unless you have explicit permission).
And of course, OOC stuff gets marked somehow, but you all know that. {= ) So, here we go! ))
As near as Ilraen could figure, someone almost always threw a big party in the Headquarters Lounge around the month of December. It was linked to some kind of seasonal festival in World One, and elsewhere, though he had never quite worked out the specifics; everyone he asked seemed to have a different answer. They agreed on a few things, though: there had to be decorations involving lights and shiny objects, there had to be presents, and there had to be special music and food.
The latter had been the deciding factor for his attendance at this year's party. He wanted more chances to socialize with his friends and fellow agents, which was difficult without either leaving Nume alone or spending the time to convince him to come along. Nume was adamantly anti-party, and no amount of persuasion had moved him this time. Ilraen had considered staying in, too, for his partner's sake, but finally the thought of missing out on all the rare and wondrous holiday food items overcame him. He promised at least five times to behave himself in human morph, and to bring back some for Nume, and now he was here.
As a human, he was a willowy and youthful-looking man with messy ginger hair and green eyes. He had finally gotten himself a pair of bluejeans to wear around when he needed them, and Jenni had given him a traditional knitted Christmas sweater two years ago: it was pine-green with bounding white reindeer across the breast. He liked it. It made him feel less naked without his fur. Nothing could make up for being half-blind and liable to fall over, but he had enough practice with disguises that he managed, even with his bag over one shoulder. He had gifts for his friends, in case they happened to be around.
In the Lounge, the party was already in swing. People milled about, cheery music blared over the sound system, and whoever was organizing the thing had found one of the big pine trees favored for their long-lasting needles, and strung all manner of shiny things on it. It was probably the second one in its place—someone always tried to use real candles for the lights until something burned down. Ilraen wasn't sure whether he was imagining it, but he thought he could smell a hint of burning. That could just have been the Lounge, though. It had a history of being set on fire. Ilraen couldn't pick out a single piece of furniture he recognized from his first visits here.
He did pick out the spread of snacks on the bar top to his left, though. Unable to restrain an eerie, unpracticed grin at the prospects ahead, he shifted his way through the crowd. He did want to socialize, but a little bite first couldn't hurt.
At first, Nume didn't realize that Sylvia was talking to him. There were lots of people in the room; she could have been addressing anyone in the general area, and anyway, he wasn't finished with the Yeerk. As Orken walked away, he curled his lip—it might almost have been a smile, sort of—and was about to remark to Ilraen how much the Yeerk seemed to like the sound of his own voice, but Ilraen shook his head and pointed over Nume's shoulder, anxiety writ large in his green eyes (not literally, thank goodness).
Nume turned around. "What?" he said before taking in the woman's appearance. "Oh, that. Well, I warned people to get out of the way. If you didn't, it's your own fault." He folded his arms again.
Ilraen shook his head. He wanted no part of this. "Excuse me, I think I saw someone else I know. Good-bye!" He went to look for Maeryn/Kaliel.
(Kali figured he must have been too busy with his food to respond), the Tok'ra turned away from the Wraith and went over to see just how badly the tree had been burnt. It didn't look too bad, though a few branches towards the top had been singed heavily. She shrugged; the tree didn't mean much to her, though she was glad that it hadn't caught fire. That would have been too much to handle, to be honest.
"We're back and we got food!" said Philip as he and Gaspard pushed his way through the crowd, laden with several aluminium foil-covered trays. The two boys placed the trays onto a table and started to uncover the food.
"We've got... fried chicken!"
"Here's some BBQ pork!"
"Apple pie!"
Gaspard looked over to Philip. "Since when has the Cafeteria ever made something digestible? This is too good to be true."
Philip stared back at his friend. "You just HAD to invoke the Ironic Overpower, didn't you. Now what?"
"Hey, you did it just now," retorted Gaspard. "All right let's try this... WHAT COULD POSSIBLY GO RIGHT?" he intoned, speaking in a loud and clear voice.
Philip backed away. "No way, man. Not even an inversion can save you now."
One of the trays rattled as a grey matter oozed out of it. "Your friend's right, you know. Nothing can go right!" the sentient sludge said as it threw itself on Gaspard, bringing the intern to the ground.
... as an interesting gray sludge crawled out of a covered tray. She then shrugged and grabbed a piece of pie.
Unfortunately, she did not see that next part, where the sludge jumped on an agent.
Well, she did when she turned around and more sludge was crawling towards her.
Lisa slowly reacher for her manual and the box of Christmas crackers. If she couldn't find a spell that worked, she was sure she put an actual exploding cracker in there...
Evie said as she wandered into the Lounge. "Fish? Wrong way again."
"This is HQ, there's no right way either... ooh, what's this?" the Fisherman replied as he absent mindedly walked in.
"Christmas party by the look of it."
"Of course, Christmas! I'd almost forgotten about it."
Evie had become distracted by a small blob of grey sludge that was inching its way across the floor toward her. "Er... what did you do with that scenery-custard-stuff?" she asked.
"Gave it to the Canteen," the Fisherman replied. "Why?"
"Did it look anything like that?"
"Er... not really. It was a lighter more brownish-grey. And it didn't move either."
"Just checking."
...Gaspard decided to call out for help.
Now, there are quite a few dialogue choices when it comes to asking people to help you get rid of a murderous, sentient blob that came from a cafeteria tray. For example, "Help me!" is a classic, while "Get it off!" conveys a more urgent tone. "Kill it with fire!" would be valid if the thing was not gripping onto your shirt while scrabbling at your neck. In the end, Gaspard settled with the ever-popular "AUUUUGH!".
"Your wallet or your life!" yelled the blob, trying to strangle Gaspard. "Your wallet or your- OOF!" The terrified intern punched the blob in its side. He expected the thing have the consistency of Jell-O but to his surprise, it felt more like solidified chili. The chili monster recoiled from the blow, falling off Gaspard. It tried to slither away, but the edible abomination didn't manage to avoid a mighty kick from a bystander that sent it into the closest wall with a wet SPLAT!
Gaspard stood up and walked over to the chili monster, looking at it carefully. "I have a question for you," he said.
"What?" answered the blob, slowly sliding to the ground.
"Where the heck are your vocal cords? I mean, come on. You are a blob for crying out loud! How do you do it?"
The chili monster thought about it for a few seconds. "Does it matter?" it said as it suddenly detached itself from the wall and launched itself onto a cyborg-like woman with bright white hair.
... Lisa was assaulted by another blob of grey jelly-stuff.
"GET IT THE HELL OFF ME PLEASE OH GOD!!!" Lisa fell off the chair she was standing on and tried to do the "Stop, Drop, and Roll" thing.
"Give me that cupcake!" the blob shrieked back.
"I DON'T HAVE ANY!" Lisa was at this point trying to beat it off her leg with a loaf of French bread.
----
The Scribe looked up and blanched.
She swore in three different languages and wished (not for the last time) that her sonic pen hadn't been ruined by that Dalek last week... or a year from now, depending...
The Scribe eventually decided to pack up and get the heck out of there. Unfortunately, her path was blocked by even more gray, jiggly foodstuffs.
"Mommy..." she squeaked.
As many mages from Lee's home continuum had found, when a large amount of magic was used for an extended amount of time, there was often an adverse effect on the mage who was acting as the conduit for said magic. In Lee's case, for example, it brought out her more paranoid and protective instincts; when they were combined with her battle skills that had been sharpened by two years of fighting badfic abominations of various kinds, the total effect left the elemental mage on edge quicker than if someone had shouted "Sue!" at the top of their lungs in the Cafeteria during rush hour. When she heard the ruckus begin thanks to the sentient grey jellies attacking people, she immediately located Ian and Sammy, both of whom were thankfully nearby. One muttered spell later and the two were neatly shielded from any kind of attack.
"Who the hell thought it would be smart to bring sentient food in here?" Lee growled, Roshaun baring his sharp teeth in an unconscious echo.
said Gaspard to the magician as he was backing away from a newly spawned ball of sludge. "Blame it on the Cafeteria. Last I heard, they were breeding things in their pots and pans."
closing her eyes for a moment to try and collect herself. She had to remind herself that Ian and Sammy were safe, and that was all that mattered. There was no need to act on the immediate impulse of blasting a path through the crowd and hauling them bodily out of here.
"Sorry," she said to Gaspard, opening her eyes and letting her breath out slowly. "I apologize; I'm sure you had nothing to do with this." She turned her attention to the grey balls of sludge. What to do with these little menaces, then?
Evie shouted as she tried to pry the sentient sludge from her chest.
"Gimme the cash!" the ball replied.
"Huh?" the Fisherman said, bending down and examining the creature. "It speaks?"
"Yeah, great, now get the thing off me!" Evie replied.
Together they were able to remove the sludge and throw it to the floor. Evie tried to trap it with her foot but it simply slithered away. The Fisherman emptied a bowl of strange looking sweets onto the buffet table next to him and used it to trap the creature. "I got it!" he declared, sitting on the bowl.
"Okay... now what do we do?"
... squish the thing with a large plate, but it just reformed. And then jumped on her. And then demanded her credit card.
Lisa decided that the only approach she hadn't tried would have to be effective, since nothing else was.
So she grabbed her manual, thumbed through it, and managed to choke out the first few words. As the grey sludge slowly crawled up her face, she said the release word.
The sludge exploded.
"Eww..." the young girl winced before running off.
----
The Scribe was not having fun. She was being accosted by three different sludge-food-things and even worse was the fact that her tea she had left on the table was mostly likely stone-cold. And full of grey, jiggly, slug-y stuff.
She caught sight of Lisa running off. "OK... break the spacetime continuum a little more-ow! getitoff!-or die of slug attacks..." she muttered to herself. The woman shrugged. "Lisa! Little help here!"
Lisa wordlessly tossed her a Christmas cracker and ran in the other direction, presumably to hand out more cracker.
The Scribe looked doubtfully at the small cardboard tube in her hand. A piece of gray stuff attack her pockets, yelling about money, and she finally gave up.
She somehow managed to get the grey things off her, and then she pulled the cracker open.
Out fell a pack of cherry bombs.
The Scribe smiled evily.
I was in a rush.))
Ilraen could only stare, wide-eyed, as his partner—his partner—charged into the room and doused the fairy (and anyone unlucky enough to be standing in the same trajectory) with punch.
"Excuse me, Orken," he said weakly. "I need to . . . " he trailed off as he approached his partner.
Nume, for his part, watched the fairy flee the room with satisfaction, though not pleasure. There were still flames, though the smoke was rising into the rafters for the most part, and no one seemed to be suffering from it. He looked around and spotted Ilraen coming toward him.
"There you are," Nume said.
"Here I am," Ilraen agreed. "What are you doing here? You told me you would not come."
The black-haired man shrugged. "Came to keep an eye on things. Some fishy messages were going around, and Maintenance hinted the power might go out somewhere. I figured a mass panic would ruin my evening more than the Lounge, though given it was on fire when I got here . . . " he shook his head with a grimace.
"Most of them are out now," Ilraen observed, watching the largest blaze above mysteriously die down as, unbeknownst to him, all the oxygen was sucked away. "Since you are here, you can meet Agent Orken." Seizing Nume's arm cheerfully, despite the man's resistance, Ilraen dragged him back toward the food table.
"Orken, this is my partner, Nume. I do not believe you've met."
"Agent Supernumerary," Nume added for the sake of completeness, pulling his arm free and eying Orken dubiously. "So, you're the Yeerk?"
(( I apologize for Nume's complete lack of tact. ~Neshomeh ))
Orken was leery of Agent Supernumerary’s question. He hoped that it was no the start of some anti-Yeerk tirade, or questions about flushing. He shuddered slightly, remembering the question Cadmar had asked when they first met, about giant space toilets.
“I am indeed a Yeerk, Agent Supernumerary.” A hint of a smirk passed over his face, briefly. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, too. I’ve heard good things from your partner. I trust them to be true. Ilraen has proven himself to be more than adequate at his job. His knowledge of the Harry Potter canon proved-“ He was interrupted by a tap on the shoulder.
Thomas gestured to the presents Orken was carrying. “Cadmar’s being all huggy with this other dude, and I figured now was a good time to grab the presents.”
“It would be, if you had not interrupted my-“ Orken stopped, realizing that Thomas was offering to take the two annoying boxes that he had had been lugging around since the party began. “I mean…you may have them, Agent Thomas. I was just introducing myself to Agent Supernumerary.”
Thomas gave Ilraen’s partner a quick appraising glance before snatching the presents from Orken. “Sorry dude. I’d love to stay and get all introducutiony, but I have to get back to Cadmar. I asked a question, and they should stop hugging any second now and realize I asked it.” He ran off, back towards where Cadmar and Cali where wrapped in each other’s arms.
Lisa lay back on the couch and closed her eyes, hoping for a short nap. Possibly a nice cookie.
Of course, this is a holidy party in the PPC HQ. Peace is not an option.
Within five minutes, Lisa was sat on, she had angrily attached the sitter to the ceiling, she was then accosted by a chaperone for the party (who, unsurprisingly, was drunk himself), she was forced to take the sitter down from the ceiling, and then the Scribe demanded that Lisa give her all her cookies.
"Why?" Lisa snapped exasperatedly.
"So that next time you see me... Well... next time I see you, which will be in... hmm... two years for you? Yes, because you're... fourteen... so you'll meet me in about a year and a half... Anyway, so that then, you don't owe me anymore."
Lisa silently handed her cookies over and stomped to the snack table. Unfortunately, her foot got caught in the tablecloth, and the entirety of the snack table (including the inedible stuffed hedgehogs in motor oil sauce) came crashing down.
Lisa swore again and felt like kicking a puppy.
With a resounding crash, the table fell down, drenching the already-disgusting foodstuffs in... motor oil? Gaspard edged away from the slowly expanding puddle of flammable material and bumped into a redheaded girl who was silently fuming beside the downed table.
"Oh, sorry. Didn't see you there," apologized Gaspard. He took a good look at the girl again: she couldn't be over 14 years old. "Um, if you don't mind me asking, are you in the PPC or a are you a Nursery kid? You seem awfully young to be an Agent."
Skills Percy managed to miss the whole roof on fire incident, right up until he was showered in glass. This shook him out of his conversation long enough for him to glance around.
"Whoa, whoever did this must have been a ninja." He said, "I didn't hear a thing."
His previous conversation forgotten, Percy turned to the nearest person.
"Hey random person! I'm Percy and I have no idea where I am, How are you?"
-------
On the other side of the lounge a certain rabbit-eared individual was cursing his luck.
"Damnit Vorce, You've been wandering for ages and now you've managed to get yourself stuck in a pyromaniac's paradise."
Turning he spoke to the nearest two people, one of them holding a rather familiar weapon. "No way. Is that a Dracon beam? Hey you two, Have you two seen an idiot by some chance? Green skin, pink eyes, stupid. Ring a bell?"
... while covered in stuffed hedgehogs and orange slices. "For your information, I'm fourteen, a wizard, and yes, I am an agent. Well... in training. But still."
She got up, dusted herself off, and looked regretfully at the remains of the snack table. "... Sorry about that. I'm notoriously clumsy. Erm. There aren't anymore snacks, then?"
Kelok was disappointed by the fall of the hedgehog and motor oil table, but said, "Don't worry, the chocolate table is fine."
He chose a small handful of chocolate covered slugs, and poured a cupful of chocolate covered eggnog. He checked to be sure that Unger was not actively encouraging the flames in anyway, and went back to his alcove in case the fire suppressant suddenly decided to work. He never wanted to be in the middle of a flood of that stuff that managed to be both slick and sticky at the same time again.
(OOC--sorry I didn't reply yesterday)
Cali pulled back from Cadmar as he finally processed that Thomas had asked him something.
"Hey, where'd he go?" he asked Cadmar.
Miah wiped her face, and looked around for Maria. When she spotted Maria hiding behind her, she said, "I always forget about you being a cat."
Cadmar blinked and looked around. "Oh, looks like we kind of ignored him... I guess getting lost in someone isn't complete bullcrap after all." Cadmar spotted Thomas approaching with a couple of packages in his arms. "oh, there he is, sorry about that Thomas!"
*With Maria and Miah*
"You need to stop in more then," Maria said while glarign after the kids, who were harassing Mark. "C'mon, let's get you to Cadmar, he missed you too. oh, and I can smell Cali with her!"
Thomas cleared his throat. “I can see that… there is no need for either of you two dudes to answer my question. Uh. Well. This is kind of awkward. Well… I’ll leave you two be, but first, I wanted to give you this present. I guess it’s a combination Christmas and saving my life gift. Whatever you do, don’t pull off a red bead. It will explode instantly.” Thomas thought that the Sue necklace he had picked up a few missions back would look good on Cadmar. Of course, he didn’t know what the rule on giving jewelry to girls in a relationship already was, but he hoped that it wouldn’t make the situation even more awkward than it already was. Thomas handed the package to Cadmar.
...from the surviving snacks table, Kaliel left Orion talking with someone she didn't recognize and surveyed the party around her. Now that the fire had come under control-- a few of the rafters were still smoldering, but other than that, the majority of the flames had been quenched --it seemed like everything was going back to normal. Kali caught sight of Kelok lurking in a nearby corner and figured that she may as well go say hello. She walked over to the Wraith, idly itching at the scratchy wool of her left sleeve with her free hand as she moved.
"Hello, Kelok," she said, giving her fellow Stargate native a smile. "Enjoying the party so far?"
replied Gaspard. "Unless you can conjure up food outta nowhere with your magic. By the way, which Department are you applying for? No, wait, let me guess... Floaters, right?"
At that moment, Gaspard's father came up to him and tapped him on the shoulder. "I gotta go now, my shift is going to start soon. Your mother is pulling an all-nighter: she's currently purging Phazon from some character named James Raynor so she won't be coming here after all. Don't stay up too late and stay away from the chocolate onions," said the nurse as he left the Lounge.
*With Miah and Maria*
Miah looked a bit guilty. "It has been a while since we've had a team building exercise."
*Cali, Cadmar, and Thomas*
"What'd you get, Cadmar?" Cali asked excitedly.
"Let's see..." Cadmar pulled the lid off and looked inside. "Hmm? A necklace? Oooh, that's what you meant by beads!"
... over his black sweater-vest and waited for Thomas to leave without replying. The younger man was in such a hurry, a response hardly seemed necessary, especially not with Ilraen on smile-and-wave duty already.
"Well, I'm glad he didn't cause any trouble," he replied to Orken. He didn't have much height on the other man, if any, but he used every nanometer to peer down over his glasses. "I can't say I get this kooky friendship thing, though. If you mess with his head, I don't mind telling you that you and I will have a serious problem. Whatever he told you about me was probably nicer than I deserve. He's like that; you might've noticed."
The subject under discussion stared at Nume with a flat expression, not quite sure whether he was being complimented or insulted in his partner's misguided attempt to protect him. He wanted to say something to clarify the matter.
"The chocolate-covered ham is very good," he said. "Have you tried it?"
On reflection, that probably wasn't the optimal approach.
Thomas grinned. “I’m glad you like it. Uh, if you pull the green beads, it releases sleeping gas. That might be useful at some point in the future.” He felt awkward in front of the couple. “Uh. Nice meeting you, dude. I have to go give Maria her present, and then I want to see if those dudes who were on the mission with us when Orken got the goa’uld in his head are around here.”
____
Orken did not know whether to take Nume’s statements as an attempt at intimidation, or simply an attempt to protect his partner. Perhaps it was both. Either way, intimidation was not something that worked well on the former Yeerk.
“Whatever you may think of our friendship, Agent Supernumerary, I can tell you that I have no intention of doing anything to harm your partner. Despite rumors to the contrary, Yeerk’s do care about more than messing with the heads of others. Besides, Ilraen has proven himself to be willful. I doubt I could really mess with him very badly.” He decided not to elaborate on the argument they had had about Thomas’ behavior. Now was not the time to open that particular can of worms. He continued.
“Maybe I could undermine his self confidence a little if I really tried, but even if you do not trust that I actually like this Andalite, remember that doing anything to hurt him would be detrimental to this organization. If you can’t trust my motivations, at least know you can trust my loyalty to the PPC, and in doing so know that I would never do anything to negatively impact the performance of one of its members. We will not have any problems,” he said, not thinking about anyone ever daring to question his loyalty.
... chocolate-covered pineapple slice from the other table, looked at it doubtfully, and then shrugged and bit in. "Well, chocolate table isn't so bad. But yeah, I'm applying for Floaters. Might transfer to Bad Slash if I feel the need to destroy my brain."
Lisa glanced over the table and blanched. "Oh, crap. I've gotta go, there's a time-traveling maniac who I'm supposed to meet next year coming after me."
With that, she ducked under the table.
... looked around, and set her tray of pumpkin bread on the corner of the chocolate table. "It's not chocolate-covered, but this looks like the only surviving snack table. So much for sorting the food."
She glanced over the tray. It looked like most of the bread had survived the PPC-style firefighting. Gillies took two slices with glass fragments off the tray, and dropped them in the trash. She smiled at the others gathered at the snacks. "Anyone want a Christmas cracker? My partner brought a box full, straight from World One London."
... streaked over to the Christmas crackers, almost jumping for joy. "Normal foo..." she trailed off as she looked in the box. "Those... are not crackers. Those... are not even edible. Or food. Are you trying to poison me?"
... looked at the young woman. "No, they're not food, they're crackers. Haven't you ever seen Christmas crackers before?"
Gillies grabbed a plate, and put several slices of pumpkin bread on it. "If you're looking for food, try these."
((OOC: Briggs speaks with a definite British accent, but there wasn't a good spot to note that. Christmas crackers: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christmas_cracker ))
... "heard about them. I thought they were some sort of English Christmas treat. I suppose I really should have read Harry Potter more carefully... So... what do you do with these things?" Lisa finished her mini-monolouge, staring curiously at the crackers.
Derwin smiled widely. "Ooh! Caddy and Maria are here! Yay!" He politely excused himself from the conversation he was having with Natasha,and bounded over to the two Floaters. "Merry Christmas! Happy Hanukkah! Crazy Kwanza, and other cliche holiday related well-wishes!"
... in which Ilraen waited for an explosion, but it didn't come. Nume simply went "Huh" before going on:
"I guess he wasn't exaggerating when he said you take the whole professionalism thing seriously. All right. As long as you don't undo all my hard work training him up and don't bother me, who you spend your time on is none of my damn business." Relaxing his posture, he unfolded one arm enough to stick out a long, pale hand.
Ilraen breathed again. Nume and other people was always dicey, but that had gone pretty well. For a given definition of "well," anyway.
(( Sorry I'm so slow in replying. I've got the day off tomorrow, so I'll try to make the most of it. {= ) ))
to the party. After being given that switchblade from Derwin, she had been left speechless. The problem with her and holiday presents was that if someone gave one to her, Natasha would feel guilty about it until she gave something in return. Which is why after Derwin had excused himself to go say hi to some of his friends, Natasha had raced back to her and Sylvia's RC to find something that would work as a gift. There being a fire might have had something to do with the speed that she had left the lounge.
Running back in (After checking to make sure that the fire had stopped)Natasha scanned the room for Derwin, gift clutched in hand. Seeing, him, Natasha ran up to the ghoul, breathing hard.
"Um, I uh- I didn't say thank you for the Switchblade, so, um, yeah. Thanks! And I um, I realized that um- well..."
Natasha trailed off, holding up her hand to give Derwin the present. It was a cluster of purple crystals, each pointing straight up from a grey stone below them.
"It's amethyst. I got it from this store in World One during summer once. I brought it from home because, well, it's pretty. I figure that you can use it to smash a Sue's face in for a bit of ironic justice."
_____
Meanwhile, Sylvia had been watching all of the commotion unfold, wondering if setting things on fire was part of the holiday, when she suddenly found herself wet, sticky, and smelling very sweet.
After a moment of shock, came a moment of anxiety about the condition of her trench coat. And then came the predictable moment of rage. Whoever was responsible was going to pay.
Sylvia grabbed a nearby party-goer.
"Tell me who's responsible for this." she demanded, motioning at her soaked clothing. The agent pointed at a black haired man wearing glasses. "Thanks."
Striding up to the man, Sylvia gave her best attempt at a death glare.
"Explain." she snarled, once again motioning to her wet coat, "Now."
...said Gaspard as the girl he was talking to dived under a table. "She's going to meet somebody she's already seen... next year?" he wondered aloud. Deciding to give logic a rest, he shrugged his shoulders and quickly stepped out of the way as a disgruntled woman wearing a trench coat stormed past him. After giving her a second glance, the intern returned to his table where his fellow interns were seated.
"The main snack table is down," Gaspard said. "So I'm headed to the Cafeteria to go and get some more food. Can I convince some of you to come with me?"
"I'll go," said Philip, rising from his seat. "Besides, those choco-snails were staring to get gross after a while. Maybe we can find some REAL food in there."
"You're talking about the Cafeteria, Philip," replied Gaspard as they walked to the doors. "Knowing them, they've probably got some nasty stuff waiting for us in there."
"Like... chocolate-covered anchovies."
"Choco-steak."
"Friday's lasagna."
"Stu of the day."
"Let's not go there," said Philip hastily as he pushed open the doors. "Last time I ordered that there was strange lumps in my food."
"Right," said Gaspard as the two boys stepped out into the hallway. "Which way is the Cafeteria again?"
"Oh, hey Derwin!" Cadmar said with a smile.
Maria waved at the ghoul. "Merry holiday thing to you too!"
Orken did not know how to react. He could have sworn that the older agent had been challenging him. Maybe he had misread the situation. It certainly wouldn’t be the first time. It was around this point that he realized Nume was offering his hand. Ah, this again. This, he knew.
Shaking Nume’s hand, he said, “Ah. Well, don’t worry, Agent Supernumerary, the last thing I would want to do is undo any of the work you’ve put into training Ilraen. It has been… not unpleasant to finally meet you. I wish you a happy religious or non religious festival of your choosing. Or, if you so choose, of course, no celebration at all.”
Orken had never understood the term “happy holidays,” since, it had always implied to him that those who choose not to celebrate were somehow being left out of any well wishes. He had viewed it as one more example of humans irrationally separating each other into groups. His former host had called him “paranoid” and Thomas had told him he was way over thinking things.
He shoved his irrelevant musings into a far corner of his head, and gave one of his rare genuine smiles. “Well, if you two will excuse me, I think I’m going to try some of that chocolate covered ham Ilraen seems to love so much. While I know taking food recommendations from an Andalite can result in the consumption of some non-food items, I think I’ll take his suggestion this time. Hopefully I’ll be seeing you two around.”
... Lisa grabbed a cracker and examined it. "Oh, these are the things with the little paper hats inside? I've always wondered what the point of these was... I mean, it's a paper hat. Ooh!" Lisa suddenly had what would later be classified as either the worst or the best idea ever. "You don't mind if I take these, right? 'K, thanks, bye!" She grabbed the box and scuttled off, using the much-loved beam-me-up-Scotty spell to go to her RC for a while.
She spent the next twenty minutes doing things you probably don't want to know about.
When Lisa got back to the party, she sought out out the Scribe, in the hopes that the woman would not be averse to trying out her new invention.
"Oh God, your famous Christmas crackers?" The Scribe groaned when Lisa pulled her aside. "I really shouldn't spend a whole lot of time with you, you know... Time travel?"
Lisa blinked. "Famous?"
The Scribe facepalmed mentally. "So this is your first time making them... ugh... now I have to try one..." The woman gingerly took hold of the end of the cracker and pulled.
There was a loud BANG and the immediate area, including the party guests, was covered with red paint. The Scribe groaned again. "How in the world do you do that..."
Lisa immediately launched into lecture mode. "While it is impossible to store a large object inside of a small object, this can be worked around by storing said large object inside of an otherspace pocket, the opening of which is inside of said smaller object, and which will be opened upon a pre"programmed" signal..."
The Scribe wandered off to wash her hands.
Lisa ran off to try her new toys out on some guests.
Derwin cheered. He grabbed Natasha in a hug. Turning to Cadmar and Maria, he gave another big grin. "This is Natasha! She gave me chrystals!"
(( Since it's starting to look a bit cramped down there on my screen. ))
Ilraen flinched at the shout from the red-haired girl with the radio and watched for a moment, until she left and everything settled down again. He shook his head, then took the brown-wrapped package from the top of Orken's stack and replaced it with his, which had the unmistakeable heft of two middle-sized paperbacks. He watched Orken tear into it with his characteristic precision. Inside were copies of A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess and Brave New World by Aldous Huxley.
"I'm not certain if you have read these before," Ilraen said, "but since you are in a science fiction division, I thought you might like to have them anyway. If you don't, that is. They're considered classics in World One. I read them both during the quarantine in 2008 and found them fascinating." He watched for Orken's reaction, unconsciously hunching his shoulders and turning over the package in his hands.
Gaspard stood up and headed towards the snack bar. That choco-tuna has horrendous: why on earth would anyone make that, let alone eat it?
"Curse my curiosity. I really shouldn't have eaten that," muttered the intern as he wove through the crowd.
Lee turned around to see if she could find her way back to Ian and Sammy. The crowd had shifted enough that the subjects of Lee's search were blocked from sight, however, and given the density of said crowd, Lee figured that it'd probably be best for her to just wait until she spotted her partner and surrogate daughter. She spotted a nearby empty chair and quickly claimed it, the fabric of her silk robes-- in the traditional blue-with-white-fur-trim of her home 'Verse --rustling a bit as she moved. Lee sank down into the chair, content in watching the crowd around her.
She saw Ilraen and Orken nearby, though she only really recognized Orken from the mission they had gone on together.
At this point, the doors opened and a small group of people entered the room. The most distinctive one was a tall man with pale purple skin and green hair, who was practically bouncing with glee. "Come on, you lot!" he exclaimed, on noticing two of his companions were hanging back a bit. "If I can get excited about something that doesn't even exist where I come from, you've no excuse."
"You get excited about any reason to have a party, Dayn," was Andrew's only response, while Alyssa and her daemon Kian - still a bit nervous around big groups, after nearly four years in the PPC - just smiled a bit sheepishly.
Dayn shrugged slightly and grinned. "I'd have dragged Faith along, too, but she said something about preferring to spend time with Parjai."
"To be fair, he doesn't generally do parties," pointed out Russell, who was looking a bit more enthusiastic. "And we know what she's like about him." They all chuckled at his understatement; Faith was head-over-heels in love with the clone commando, and took any opportunity to just spend time alone with him.
"Anyway, that ain't the issue," said Kayla, the older of the two women in the group. "Go on, all o' you - party time. Looks like it's been pretty lively as it is already."
Russell and Dayn didn't need any further encouragement, and set off in different directions - Russell headed for the snack table, hoping to get a drink, while Dayn bounced off towards the music and conversation. Andrew hung back a bit more until Kayla gently shoved him at the nearest group of people. "Go. Socialise. At least say hi to people. It's Christmas, even you can relax a bit."
He rolled his eyes, but decided not to argue and approached the people nearby. Kayla, shadowed by Alyssa and Kian, strolled off in another direction, hoping to say hello to a few others.
Hopping through the doors at that moment was a deep one, with a fairy flying not far behind. The deep one had long forelimbs and a long head, while any details about the fairy were hidden due to her being on fire.
"Now Kasaiko, we are trying make a good impression on these people," the deep one stated. "Please make at least some attempt to control your impulses. Fire is NOT to be considered a method of conversation."
"Don't be so boring, Yanri, fire is ALWAYS good!" Kasaiko retorted, as she set an unused chair on fire. "And besides, everyone is really happy to see it! Just look how shiny it is!" the fairy continued. As she was flying off to set something else ablaze, she died from the heat, only to respawn at the chair she had just lit.
"My name is Yn'hrai, and fire is most distinctly not good. Notice how it just killed you?" the deep one asked, as Kasaiko managed to ignite herself again.
"Fire totally harmless. See, this chair's just fine!" Kasaiko stated over a pile of ashes that used to be a chair. "And look at the people with fire on their patches! I'm going to go talk to them!" she said sticking her tongue out at Yn'hrai.
"That fool, when will she ever learn..." said Yn'hrai disdainfully.
Then at the wooden furniture. Then at the wooden floors. Then at the manic fairy randomly setting stuff on fire.
According to the chatter he overheard while grabbing some snacks, the Lounge had gone up in a blaze several times in the past. Just how much of this room is flammable anyways? How fast would the flames spread? Were there any fire extinguishers in the room? Probably not, he reasoned. That's why the place burnt down several times.
Gaspard started to drift towards the exit. Just in case.
It was the same ghoul he had met earlier that day, not the angry one with the weird advice but the cool one with the metal teeth.
"Derwin! That's his name." Percy said to himself before taking off in his direction, his lanky frame slipping between people at an as high speed as he could manage.
Sadly he didn't achieve this without stepping on a few people's feet, drawing cries and indignant looks in his direction.
"Derwin my buddy, my pal, my chum! You gotta help me, everybody keeps looking at me and I don't know anyone and I was wondering If you could hide me or something!" Percy cried out as he reached the ghoul.
"Hey, watch it!" he said. "Oh, it's you, Percy. Hullo there."
Running after the green-skinned man, he, too, stepped on a few feet. "Of course they'll look at you, Percy," he said, "Your skin is green. But, then again, there are so many weird things here..." he said.
Logan, Aegis and Kern wandered into the lounge. Logan's hair looked even more dishevelled than usual.
The sounds of an ongoing argument wafted in from the corridor.
"... look, I was tired, ok?" said Logan, looking at Kern irritably.
"If you're expecting any sympathy from me, think again," said Kern. "No one forced you to go to Rudi's last night, let alone drink that many beers. And now we're late for the party, thanks to you."
Logan didn't reply - his partner's nagging only making his hangover worse - and made a beeline for the drinks table. Hair of the dog, and all that...
Aegis and Kern looked around for any Agents they knew, soon after joined by Logan, who had appropriated several drinks. Logan thought he recognised the Andalite - Nume's partner, right? - but he didn't recall meeting most of the other agents present.
The trio of ESAS agents tried to catch the attention of some nearby agents and strike up a conversation.
he said "Oh hey Caliban! How are ya? Yeah I didn't always look like this."
Putting his hands in his pockets Percy continued, "Anyway this place is pretty damn weird, walls appearing out of nowhere and stuff. I still can't figure out how I got back here! And I still have no clue what I'm doing, Maybe you could help?"
Yn'hrai, glad his Touhou-verse companion was with someone else for now, hopped over to the snack bar. All he saw that was edible was some tuna, but it was a strange brownish color. "All the food here is rotten, how do they ..."
"HI YINRA!" shouted Kasaiko, despite being right next to the deep one. As he turned around, he noticed several burning couches and chairs, as well as single spot on the floor that had caught fire. "The people with fire patches are from the Department of Geographical Abrasions! They use fire to clean up, and I'm helping! See how much of the furniture I've cleaned?" said the fairy with a proud look.
"How many times must I tell you, my name is Yn'hrai. Additionally, the flame flash patch marks a person as being a member of the Department of Geographical ABERRATIONS," the deep one stated. "Furthermore, the D.o.G.A. uses fire to cleanup uncanonical locations in badfic, not for housekeeping. As such,... wait, where are you going?" asked Yn'hrai as Kasaiko flew off toward the lights.
Yn'hrai considered tackling her before she could light anything else, but quickly realized that doing so would result in him catching on fire, and unlike her, he would not respawn. At this point, he noticed a rather nervous looking intern near the exit, and hopped over to him. "Hello sir," the deep one croaked, "Is my companion causing you trouble?", he asked, pointing to the newly respawned fairy.
and faced his speaker. "AUUUGH- oh, I mean, yessir. I mean, no sir. Well, I mean .. if you haven't noticed, this place is kind of... combustible. Pyro fairy and tinderbox conditions do not match."
Gaspard looked up at the rafters, where the fairy was searching for something to "clean". "Why does she keep on dying and... respawning? How does it work? And if you don't mind me asking, what exactly ARE you? I've never seen anyone like you before."
"Ah, yes, I should introduce myself," the deep one began, "I am Yn'hrai, a deep one. We are from the deep oceans of the Cthulhu Mythos. Great Cthulhu is often the only thing people know of from the Mythos, and so creatures such as myself are rarely seen. We are amphibious, and naturally very long lived."
At this moment, Yn'hrai looked up, and saw that there was a small fire burning in the rafters directly above him. "As for my companion," the deep one continued, "Kasaiko is fairy from the Touhou continuum. All fairies from her universe are associated with some aspect of nature, and also have some minor power relating to that aspect of nature." The deep one noted that she was clear across the room at this point, and continued speaking, "Fairies will also somehow revive if killed, though the exact mechanics of this are neither clear nor consistent. Additionally, fairies are very childish, and are unconcerned by death. As you have most likely deduced, Kasaiko's aspect is-"
At that moment Yn'hrai was interrupted by a rather loud shout of "HI INHI!" from Kasaiko. She had finished her "cleaning" of the rafters, which, as Yn'hrai noted worriedly, involving igniting almost the entire ceiling. While most of the fire on the floor had been put out by various agents, they would have trouble reaching such high places. Kasaiko, oblivious to her partner's emotions, shouted "Hey, who's your friend? And why does he have that strange color on his arm?" pointing toward the urple armband.
Yn'hrai then turned to address the man, and stated apologetically, "How rude of me, I have not asked your name yet."
"Yes, nice to see you again too," he said.
Shrugging, he looked around. "I have no idea. I remember someone telling me that you have to distract yourself in order to find your way around here," he said and indicated the pocket of his longcoat.
Then, he noticed a trio of people trying to catch someone's attention. "A moment, if you will, Percy," he said. Turning to the trio, he muttered, barely audible over all of the noise, "Hullo there."
"Oh, sorry 'bout that, sir. My name is Gaspard De Grasse."
Gaspard looked up at Kasaiko. "As for my armband, ma'am, it's because I'm still an intern here. Haven't been hired yet, probably due to rotten luck. I've been bounced around three times already: first, I tried getting into DoSAT but I wasn't knowledgeable enough about the tech. Then, I applied for DMS but I actually botched my first outing as an intern by failing to kill the Sue. Now I'm trying to get into Intelligence. So far, things are looking up for my career. I hope things go right."
Gaspard paused. "So enough about me. What Departments are you two considering? Kasaiko looks like a good candidate for DoGA."
...smiled in appreciation. “Thank you. I have been out of reading material for a while now.” Wondering if he had misinterpreted how Christmas presents worked (most of his knowledge about it came from half remembered commercials,) he said, a little sheepishly. “I got you something slightly more… practical.” Perhaps a Dracon Bean was not an appropriate gift. Why was he worried about this? Did he really care that much about what Ilraen thought? Orken tried to slow his racing thoughts.
Kelok shook his head ruefully as he watched the fairy light the Lounge on fire. Unger and Khazad-Dym were dancing with joy, all memories of nearly killing himself apparently forgotten. Kelok checked the position of the sprinklers and moved into an alcove that he judged to be protected.
He didn't understand the theme of this party, but Dr. Fitzgerald had recommended that he be more social, and these chocolate covered onions were particularly tasty.
Cali calmly passed out the super water guns that Castor had made for him and the children. Hannah supervised Helen, helping the toddler aim at the ceiling and not the food table. Kyle and Kevin were gone in an instant, reappearing on top of some metal shelving a few moments later, where they joined in putting out the ceiling fire.
Miah considered that neither the fire nor the water could possibly end well, and made a run on the chocolate buffet.
Frédéric De Grasse was watching the flames slowly lick at the wooden structure. He looked around for his son and eventually found him near the exit, talking to... well something. Good. Gaspard could get out in time should things get messy.
Frédéric stared back at the fire. Several agents were doing their best to extinguish the flames on the ground and a few had gotten a boost from their comrades, allowing them to fight the fire spreading in the rafters. The rest were watching the spectacle unfold, munching on various chocolate-covered snacks. The FicPsych nurse watched as one agent above him held a fuming bit of wood under the smoke detector, hoping to activate the sprinkler system.
Needless to say, it didn't work. The pipes emitted a low rumble, then spat out dust.
The agent in the rafters swore, pinching out the burning stick she held before tossing it aside. "Hey guys," she shouted to the onlookers. "There is a FIRE up here y'know. Come on, help me out here!"
Frédéric spoke up: "Instead of focusing your efforts on putting out all of the fires, shouldn't you deal with the source of the problem first?"
All were silent for a second, then every eye (or other eldritch seeing organ) in the room was focused on the flaming fairy, still gleefully setting fires to the ceiling.
*OOC: We accidentally posted at the bottom of the other part of the thread, so I copied the things we had out of order, and put them here in order. End of OOC*
(1st post) Maria: "Miah!" Maria cried in joy as she tackled the other agent. "Merry Christmas, Miah!"
(2nd post) Miah: "Ahgh! Glomped again! Um, I meant--Hi Maria. Merry Christmas to you, too. This party sure is heating up isn't it?"
(3rd post) Maria: "Yeah, it is. It's good to see you again, it's been a while! We've all missed you guys!" Maria got up and helped Miah up as well. "Oh, and I can give you your gift now too!" She reached into a pocket on her coat and pulled out a wig with long, silver, slightly sparkly hair. "This is something I made out of hair Eva dropped on me, Mark, and Cadmar's first mission together." Maria smiled wider and handed it over.
(This post) Miah: "Ooh, shiny!" Miah said, and jammed the wig on her head.
"Sue alert! Sue alert!" Kyle and Kevin shouted in unison before turning their water guns on Miah and by association--Maria.
Maria shrieked and tried to hide behind Miah from the water, to no avail.
"Nooo!" she wailed as the kids ran off, laughing. "I hate water..."
Mark walked over, laughing. "Ahah! What's the matter, Maria? Afraid of a little water?"
Maria glared. "Knee-jerk reaction."
Cali was knocked off balance by Kyle and Kevin's guilty darting through the crowd.
"What did you two do?" he shouted after them. They giggled evilly. He turned to find out what kind of damage control was needed in the direction the two had run from.
He turned quickly and ran right into Cadmar's back.
"Oof!" Cadmar was about so say something rude to whoever ran into her, but stopped when she saw it was Cali.
"Cali! Hi!" She wrapped him in a hug. "It's so good to see you! I was thinking you'd ran off somewhere!"
Thomas gave the new person a welcoming grin. “I don’t know you! But that’s fine, dude, cause this is a party. WHOO!” He cleared his throat. “Sorry, dudes. I have gone a few minutes without doing that and…” He stopped as he watched Cadmar and Cali hug, and his smile faded a bit. “You guys… friends?”
... yelled "Why didn't anyone TELL me there's a party?"
Since everyone was busy with said party, no-one answered.
The girl made a small growling sound and flopped down on the nearest couch.
Her name was Lisa, and she was very young-looking indeed, about thirteen or fourteen. Her hair was bright red and tied back in a messy ponytail, and she had an exuberant amount of freckles. Her clothes were rather nondescript.
Lisa got bored and wandered over to the snack table.
Arthur Briggs and Lynn Gillies walked through the door. Briggs wore his usual battledress, but with a Santa hat instead of his UNIT beret. The solid gold box in his arms was full of Christmas crackers.
Gillies sidestepped just in time to keep some other agents from running into the tray of pumpkin bread she was carrying. "Let me put this down first, then I'll help you hand out the crackers." She started across the room toward the snacks table.
The green velvet vest with white snowflake appliques that Gillies was wearing over her uniform clashed with her urple armband. But, what didn't clash with urple?
... snack table, searching for edible items. As in, things that were not made of cardboard, motor oil, small stuffed hedgehogs, or any combination of the three.
She finally poured herself a glass of strawberry lemonade and turned around, only to smack into a slightly taller woman who looked as if she was in her late teens. The woman had bright green, spiky hair and was wearing a radioactively green sweater with equally eye-blindingly red pants. The woman started chattering at Lisa at a dizzying rate. "Hey Lisa! How're those spells going? Cute t-shirt, by the way."
"Excuse me? I've never seen you before in my life." Lisa was certainly not amused at this.
The woman's eyes widened, then she smiled sheepishly. "Time travel. Never can get it right. Sorry. I'm the Scribe. Call me Scribe. Or whatever."
Lisa shook the odd woman's hand, rather bewiledered by her. "Erm... Nice to meet you, I guess. Time travel?"
"Well... yeah. Probably shouldn't hang around me for too long, there might be some timey... stuff... you know."
With the, the Scribe walked off, leaving Lisa blinking in surprise with a strawberry lemonade in her hand. She shook her head and walked in the other direction.
((This is going on a little before the fire. I was busy yesterday, so yeah, wibbly-wobbly timey-wimey. ))
Ilraen had nearly forgotten the box he was holding, but now that he'd seen Orken pleased with his present, Ilraen could think of himself again. It seemed heavy for its size, he thought, tearing through the brown packaging paper with abandon. It was fun, doing that.
The paper floated to the floor, and the lid to the box landed on top. Ilraen found himself looking down at a Dracon Beam. To say that he was surprised would be to say that a cat-owner feels surprise at finding a dead rat on the bed for the first time—it didn't quite suffice, but there wasn't another word for it. It was one thing, he realized, to accept a person, a fellow-being, who'd happened to be on the wrong side of an old war. It was quite another to accept a cold metal object used in the slaughter and enslavement of millions. Very much not wishing to be rude, though, he quickly swallowed and grinned at Orken, for once counting on his usual lack of mastery with the expression to cover his real feelings.
"I am sure it will be useful," he said. "We have not been in the habit of carrying weapons, but that has gotten us into trouble before. Thank you."
He meant it, too, by the time he said it. Like the cat-owner, he could forgive his friend acting on his nature. The thought behind it was meant well.
Kneeling, he replaced the box's lid and tucked it into his bag. On standing up, he frowned and looked around. "Do you smell smoke?"
Moments later, the rafters caught fire.
~*~
Agent Supernumerary was not happy. He had meant to spend a quiet evening alone in his response center while Ilraen went out and made a fool of himself at the party, but no, Headquarters couldn't allow that. After all the strange messages filtering to his console, he finally resigned himself to the fact that someone would have to try and keep people from panicking if Maintenance did put the power out, and he was probably the only one paying enough attention to think of it.
He arrived in a deep sulk, head down and hands thrust into the pockets of his gray slacks, and stopped short in the doorway to the Lounge.
"Oh, Christ," he swore, uncreatively but with deep feeling. "This is why I stopped coming here," he grumbled to no one.
The place was on fire. Again. Some people were making an effort at putting it out, but the rafters were high up and hard to reach. It looked like kids with squirt-guns were the only ones making any effort there.
Suddenly, he overheard a blessedly sensible-sounding voice— "shouldn't you deal with the source of the problem first?" —and he spotted the flaming fairy.
Well, Nume had come here to stop chaos, and by God, somebody had to do something. He strode through the crowd, not caring who he pushed out of his way, and grabbed the first bowl of punch he could reach. Waiting for just the right moment, when the fairy fluttered into range, he shouted: "EVERYBODY OUT OF THE WAY!" and flung the entire contents of the bowl at the little menace.
((Direct response to Neshomeh's last post, so same deal with timey-wimey stuff))
Orken breathed a sigh of relief. “Smoke?” He sniffed the air, and indeed smelled smoke. He frowned. “Hrm. I hope someone isn’t being unsafe with fire. This place has a tendancy to… ignite.” Not seeing any immediate flames, though, he continued. “I’m glad you like it. I noticed that you didn’t bring a weapon on our last mission. As an Assassin, I can’t imagine going into bad…” He stopped as he caught sight of the fire climbing the rafters. “Really? Again? Isn’t this getting kind of… expected?” He hugged the last two presents he was carrying close to his chest, in such a way that they shielded the books Ilraen had given him. The gifts Thomas had picked out for Maria and Cadmar would not be harmed by the eventual fire extinguishing water (probably) whereas the two paperbacks most certainly would.
“Why in the name of kandrona must people keep setting this place on fire?” Orken wondered allowed. He eyed the flames with apprehension, and calculated his chances of being able to get to the door. He estimated his chances were not good. Shortly after resigning himself to having to avoid catching fire in the lounge while stuck in the aforementioned burning room, he saw an agent he swore he had seen before (perhaps he had been around awhile?) wielding a punch bowl and screaming at the top of his lungs for others to get out of his way, as he threw punch at the instigator of the lounges nth fire. Some children were making headway on the rafter fire with their squirt guns as well. (He could not even hazard a guess as to the number of times it had happened. He had heard it had happened quite often even before his time, but no-one seemed to have exact numbers.) He hoped that there were others as innovative as the man with the bunch bowl and the children with the squirt guns, because there was a conspicuous lack of fire extinguishers. Orken silently cursed the laws of narrative comedy.
"Uh, Lee?"
Lee broke off her conversation with Ian (who had finally found her a few minutes earlier) and looked over at her daemon, who was staring pensively up at the ceiling from his perch on the back of her chair. "Yeah, Rosh-" she began, and then caught sight of the fire up on the ceiling. "Oh."
"Yeah, 'oh,'" Roshaun said. "Don't you think you should help?"
"How did I not-- Nevermind. Ian, I'll be back in a second." Lee got to her feet, Roshaun settling on her shoulders as was his habit. Lee moved forward, flexing her fingers in preparation of casting magic. She saw Nume throw the bowl of punch at the fire fairy, and, figuring that he'd probably have a little better success with that than she would, turned her attention to the fire in the rafters.
Hmm. While water might help, there was another alternative to extinguishing the flames. With a careful eye on Kyle and Kevin-- she didn't want to harm them at all --Lee started to pull the air away from the largest conflagration, essentially encapsulating it in a large airless bubble.
--
Meanwhile, Orion and Maeryn were keeping well back from the fire, over near Orken and Thomas; neither wizard nor Tok'ra wanted to get in the way.
"Does this happen at all the Christmas parties here?" Orion asked, sounding more amused than scared.
Maeryn shook her head. "I do not know," she replied. "This is the first one that Kali and I have attended, though I can say that other parties here seem to have some element of chaos to them. It is not uncommon."
Yn'hrai had anticipated the intern's recommendation that Kasaiko join the DoGA. It was the obvious choice given her personality. "Kasaiko's meeting with the Bonsai Mallorn has disqualified her from the D.o.G.A." the deep stated as his companion flew off once again. "We currently interested in joining the Department of Floaters. The Floating Hyacinth being a water plant helps with this, as is Kasaiko's willingness to burn anything, including Sues," Yn'hrai's tone was even more formal than his usual speech.
It was at this point that someone shouted something rather loudly. The deep one turned around just in time to see Kasaiko get drenched by a thrown bowl of punch. At this point it could be observed that her eyes, hair, wings, clothing, shoes, and anything else she happened to be wearing all looked rather similar to a burning fire, resulting in the already doused fairy becoming the target of several squirt guns. Kasaiko suddenly began crying, and flew directly through the flames that were now starting to engulf the exit. Her partner hopped after her, shouting something about a fire extinguisher.
Frédéric looked around for his son and found him just off to his right. "Gaspard," he shouted over the pandemonium. "Can you pursue your conversation with your friend outside please? It's getting hot in here."
His son nodded and dashed out of the Lounge, leaping over the flames. Frédéric looked up at the ceiling. The agents were putting up a valiant fight against the flames, but it looked like it could go either way especially with the fire starting to block off the exit.
The FicPsych nurse stepped out into the hall, looking around as he calmly patted down a sleeve that caught on fire. He turned to somebody who just ran out of the Lounge. "You there. I know there is an abundance of flamethrowers here but are there any extinguishers here? No? Then help me find a remote activator. If they can't put out that blasted fire in there, we'll have to portal everyone out."
Lisa squeaked as she was splashed with punch. She ran off to the side, found the pitcher of strawberry lemonade, and (after a regretful look at her new favorite drink) also threw it at the ceiling.
It didn't seem to do much, just... kind of... shatter.
And also rain broken shards down on the crowd below. Said crowd turned to look at the perpetrator.
Lisa mumbled something that was most definitely not a filthy curse word, then ran off before she could get lynched. She then grabbed her manual, opened it to a spell she knew was there (but was reluctant to use, as it took up a lot of energy) and started to speak in the Speech.
The world went quiet, as it always did in a spell, then her ears filled with that peculiar ringing sound and the silence that was so silent it was noise-
And then the flames sputtered. They didn't go out.
Lisa swore and went to go off and collapse on a couch. Maybe eat a cookie. She didn't really want to deal with other people's problems right now. Particularly when she was so new to magic.
(( I wrote my last post intending to be caught up by the end, so as far as I'm concerned it's all fine now.
That said, though, I am very much against actually burning everything down, since that would end the party and be depressing, so let's not. People are putting out the fires, everything's going to be okay (even if it smells a little funny in there now). The RP-Starter Hath Spoken.
Actual IC-post coming up next!
~Neshomeh ))
Came the shout from the inside of the Lounge. Gaspard and Frédéric came back inside.
"Man," said Gaspard as he looked at the scorched interior. "Who knew a small fairy could do all of that?"
"I have no idea," replied his father, wrinkling his nose at the smell. "But I hope that fairy girl is all right. She seemed very upset when that punch was thrown onto her."
... and closed her eyes, hoping for a short nap. Possibly a nice cookie.
Of course, this is a holidy party in the PPC HQ. Peace is not an option.
Within five minutes, Lisa was sat on, she had angrily attached the sitter to the ceiling, she was then accosted by a chaperone for the party (who, unsurprisingly, was drunk himself), she was forced to take the sitter down from the ceiling, and then the Scribe demanded that Lisa give her all her cookies.
"Why?" Lisa snapped exasperatedly.
"So that next time you see me... Well... next time I see you, which will be in... hmm... two years for you? Yes, because you're... fourteen... so you'll meet me in about a year and a half... Anyway, so that then, you don't owe me anymore."
Lisa silently handed her cookies over and stomped to the snack table. Unfortunately, her foot got caught in the tablecloth, and the entirety of the snack table (including the inedible stuffed hedgehogs in motor oil sauce) came crashing down.
Lisa swore again and felt like kicking a puppy.
July peered at the assorted snacks, pondering what to try.
Chocolate covered pretzels, chocolate covered mints, chocolate covered orange slices, chocolate covered strawberries, chocolate covered cheese balls, chocolate covered chocolates, and what she suspected was chocolate covered ham were all within easy reach.
"Hmmm." She poked at one of the chocolate covered chocolates with a tiny plastic fork. "Someone got a it too fondue happy."
Cadmar looked both directions from outside the Lounge. Then she looked up, and of course, found almost three sets of mistletoe.
"I don't SEE anyone around..." She ducked in quickly, bracing for someone to pop out. After a minute of looking foolish, she decided to try and blend in the crowd.
"Ooooh, chocolate..." She licked her lips. Grabbing a discarded christmas-y hat, she made her way off to the snack bar.
Kaliel let herself be dragged into the Lounge by Orion, who was dressed in a suitably silly reindeer headband, a red-and-green sweatshirt, and a comfortable pair of sweats. The Harry Potter native had insisted that his partner dress up for the occasion, so here Kali was, wearing an oversized woolly sweater with a Christmas tree on it. The top of said tree had a light sewn into it that flashed on and off every few seconds; Kali had privately vowed to get suitable vengeance for the abomination, and Maeryn had agreed to help.
"You've got to get into the spirit, Kali!" Orion said as he pulled her into the Lounge. "It's Christmas. Everyone loves Christmas."
Kali managed to pull her hand away from Orion's with a sigh of relief. "As true as that may be, I'm not exactly sure what Christmas is, beyond some sort of winter festival. Remember, we didn't have it back where I came from."
Orion frowned. "But you came from the SG-1 'Verse," he said, confused. "That's Earth-based."
"Ah, but you forget, we're not from--" Kali broke off when she spotted the chocolate-covered smörgåsbord over on the food table. "That... That is a lot of chocolate. Hmm. There may be some merit to this yet."
--
The sound of PPC-themed Christmas carols heralded the arrival of Ian, Lee, and Sammy, with Ian finishing off their current rendition of 'The Twelves Sues of Christmas' with a rousing "...Two mini-Balrogs, and a single glistening tear!" The three entered the Lounge, Ian keeping a tight hold on Sammy's hand as they navigated the crowd.
"There's a good turn-out this year," Ian said, looking around at the various agents and PPC staff. He thought he saw one of the Flowers in a corner of the room, but wasn't sure.
"I'm just glad I could make it this year," Lee replied, shifting the moderately-sized pile of presents in her arms in an effort to rebalance them. "I'm going to put these under the tree before they tip over again."
"Good idea. We'll stay here."
Lee nodded and then started toward the tree, trying to focus on not spilling her precious load before she got to her destination.
and Kestrel burst in, with Caleb, Hope, and Kieran in tow.
"CHRISTMAAAAAAAS!" the ferret shrieked, zipping away from her companions into the party. "ChristmasChristmasChristmasChristmasChristmasChristmas CHRISTMAS!"
Hope's eyes were wider and rounder than normal as she took in the decorations, the food, and the general partying around her. She reached behind her, and a glowing magic circle appeared in the air as she requipped a Santa Hat that, oddly enough, had a pair of green rabbit ears protruding from the sides. She made a motion to put it on, but seemed to hesitate and consider the the fox and vampire beside her.
"So..." Caleb murmured, looking somewhat uncomfortable in the festive atmosphere. "Kieran... where're Adder and Deuce?"
"Having a quiet Christmas in their RC, I think," Kieran replied. "They mixed some Bleepnog, made some popcorn, and found a DVD of their favorite Christmas movie in the Storage Room."
"It's a Wonderful Life?" Caleb guessed.
"No. Die Hard."
"Y'know what, I think I'll go back to the RC," Caleb said quickly. "See what Jack's up to--hey!"
Hope had taken advantage of the vampire's distraction to jam the Santa hat over his head. Caleb made an honest attempt to Death Glare her into submission, but the rabbit ears ruined the overall effect, and she pranced away, requipping a violin and accompanying her own singing.
"...This peppermint winter is so sugar-sweet, I don't need to taste to believe... What's December without Christmas Eve?"
And let two more people into the Lounge. The tallest of the pair, a 50-year old Chinese man with greying black hair and an angular face, surveyed the room. He turned to his son who was standing behind him.
“So as I was saying, you spend too much time in your Response Centre playing video games,” the man said as he smoothed his FicPsych flash patch. “It’s about time you got out of there and interacted with something alive, for a change.”
The figure sanding behind the tall man shifted slightly. He was a wiry 17 year old, with short black hair and brown eyes. He was clad completely in black, except for an urple armband he wore on his right arm. “But dad, I need to know this stuff. I mean, Intelligence won’t take people who don’t know half the things about the continuums they protect,” he replied.
“Gaspard, you’ve been in there for over five hours,” the man retorted. “You can afford to take a break once in a while.”
“I need to get hired.”
“You need to unwind,” said the Chinese man, pulling his son along. “I even see some other interns. This isn’t going to kill you or sabotage your chances at getting hired. Grow up for goodness’ sake.”
Gaspard stared at his father. “Fine,” he eventually replied before heading to the snack bar. He wasn't going to stay for too long: this party was not for him. Just a few minutes, a couple of snacks, and then he would be back off to the RC to finish that Starcraft campaign he had started. On his way to the refreshments, he was waylaid by a group of partygoers who jammed a Santa hat on his head and dragged him into their conversation.
Ten minutes later, he was singing Christmas carols and chatting with the rest of the group.
Gaspard's father smiled to himself, seeing that his son wouldn't try to leave the party early, and wandered off into the crowd.
One of the most awkward moments of his life, coming a close second to the time he had dived through the window and into that girl's room. I mean how has he supposed to know she was undressing, she totally over-reacted.
Anyway he had been left wandering the halls of the HQ after his run-in with a wizard, a poetry spouting man and two rather strange ghouls. After colliding with several walls that Percy swore had appeared out of nowhere and having no luck in finding Vorce, he had managed to find his way back to the lounge area he had appeared in. And to say it had changed was an understatement.
Now he was left standing in a rather large crowd of people who had seemingly come out of nowhere and was feeling rather subconcious about his appearance, Who could miss a 6"4' person with skin the same green as a christmas tree and hair that could have come from a rather flamboyant anime character.
"Should have stuck with the ghoul" Percy muttered to himself, before heading off to try and find anyone familiar and hoping no one would stop to ask him who he was.
He was reading the same book he read when he lead the wizard, the ghoul and the green-skinned man to his RC. Finally, he closed it and put in one of his longcoat's many pockets.
He looked around. Masses of people were milling around, eating snacks, drinking drinks, and talking. Already the noise seemed unbearable.
Shaking his head, he headed to the snack bar. Looking at the various chocolate-covered snacks, he chuckled. "Someone here really likes chocolate," he said. Reaching into a pocket, he took a small box out of it, opening it to reveal a few cookies. He took one, then put the box on the table.
"No. Now go."
"I'll give you chocolate?"
"As I said before, no. Now will you kindly go?"
Frustrated, Agent Skorp kicked the door, then cursed as pain raced up her leg.
"Well, why not? I /know/ you don't have Christmas where you come from, but you could at least join in!"
"..."
"Please respond."
"Give me some time, it's hard to make things rhyme."
Skorp sighed, despairing of her partner, and made for the lounge.
Even if Poet wasn't going to celebrate, /she/ certainly was!
Zanna had rushed immediately to the lounge, and was now hanging out at the food table and chatting up anyone who happened to pass by. Which was pretty much everyone.
She was also making it a point of effort to try at least one of every chocolate-covered thing.
Well, to be honest, it didn't take a whole lot of effort.
Chocolate-covered strawberries... pretzels... apricots... cookies... ham? Candy canes? Custard? Pies? Chocolates??? Zanna grinned. The PPC was by far the best thing that had ever, ever happened to her.
Having significantly less fun was her partner. David seemed to be trying to make himself as small and invisible as possible. He stood awkwardly by Zanna, giving everyone who passed by a nervous glance, as if expecting them to bust out the flamethrowers at any moment.
"Zanna," he said, his voice low, "why do you insist on doing this every time there is even the smallest of festivities?"
"Come on. You never talk to anyone - you just sit in our RC reading or watching TV or obsessively checking for Homestuck updates all the time. A little bit of socializing will be good for you. There have got to be other agents who got dragged here by their partners, why don't you find one of them and commiserate? Meet people. Talk to people. Make some new friends. You can't stay holed up by yourself in your room forever." She looked up at him and smiled enthusiastically. "Besides, they've got chocolate-covered eggnog here. Chocolate-covered eggnog. I don't even know how that's possible, but they have it. This place is great."
... on her way to the drinks table and nodded to David. "You look like you're having as much fun as I am," she said morosely. "Are you drunk too? If not, would you like to be?" She sighed. "Not that I can possibly really be drunk... it's just hot chocolate." She paused a moment. "Why am I drunk on hot chocolate? This place is weird..." So saying, she wandered off, followed at a discreet distance by a red-haired woman.
hS, we're trying to stick to keeping it one-after-another than the usual higgledy-piggledy. :P
Look at the times: I made my first post, LH cut in above me, I replied to her, then Anon replied to my first one.
hS
Aha.
Right.
Shall keep that in mind for order, noting it here for Neshomeh.
Your post Then LH's, then yours, then Shoe-anon, and all else that follows there.
First, Thomas had dragged him here, insisting that it was polite and "professional" to show up at one's office Christmas party. Then, he had insisted that Orken buy gifts for all of his friends. Luckily, that was not terribly many people. There were gifts for Cadmar and Maria (a combination Christmas/Thanks-for-saving-us present) and Orken had picked one out for Ilraen. Thomas had rolled his eyes when Orken had told him who the gift was for, but that didn't matter. At least he had resisted Thomas' requests to dress festively. Thomas had put on his best Santa hat and was wearing an ugly green sweater with a Christmas tree on it. Orken was wearing his usual all black atire.
Of course, he had not thought that finding the Andalite would be this difficult. It did not help matters that Thomas' priorities lay in eating chocolate covered foods and not in helping Orken locate the recipients of their gifts was not helping.
Then, Orken caught a glimpse of a man he thought he recognized. It took him a second to realize that it was Ilraen in human morph. He made his way through the crowd (resisting an attempt to put a Santa hat on his head) and, awkwardly shifting the presents he was carrying, tapped Ilraen on the shoulder.
Right.
Huinesoron post, LunarHuntress post, Huinesoron Post, Shoe Post, Skorp post, then the post I just posted after Shoe.
And stabbings with sharped candy canes for everyone else if they make it more complicated. >:|
... Morgan was slumped, staring into a mug.
"So I get killed by a Macrovirus," she explained to anyone who'd listen, "and regenerate into, well, this." She waved a hand vaguely at herself, took a sip of her drink. "Still not used to it. Then a few weeks later Makes-Things comes out of nowhere and tells me he's got an experiment he needs my help in. 'Sure,' I say, 'no problem,' I say. Idiot. He shuts me in this big metal box, and next thing I know, it's yesterday, my TARDIS is screaming at me - sort of, you know what I mean - for being gone so long, and there's a message telling me my parter... partnter... whatever, is dead. Hi there."
She waved to a passing agent, who blinked. "Um, hi," the red-haired woman said.
"She's got a baby, you know," Morgan went on to her now-captive audience. "Had a baby, I guess. He's still alive - lovely little thing. But not Traf." She sighed and stared into her mug. "Apparently I'm a maudlin drunk. What is this stuff, anyway?" She sniffed the drink and nodded. "Ah. Hot chocolate."
"Um, right," her listener said. "I... um, I have to do something." She stood up and walked a few steps away, then started speaking hurriedly into a radio. Morgan shrugged and went back to contemplating her drink.
"That..." he gasped, "Was the best Choco-ham sandwich I have ever tasted." He paused. "Mind you, it was the ONLY choco-ham sandwich I've ever tasted."
He adjusted his Santa hat and wandered over to the buffet. "My compliments to the chef...OOH!" He cheered. "Chocolate covered cheeze balls!"
July made a face as she saw the ghoul, and began to try scooting away from the food, hoping to not be noticed. Santa hats and expressions like that never meant good news, to her. "I think I just lost my appetite..."
___
At the drinks table, Gerry and Colt were squabbling.
" I am not going to try dunking the chocolate-covered eggnog in whiskey just because you might think it's a good idea," Gerry said, drumming her fingers on the table. Next to her, the bowl of inexplicable eggnog rippled gently, leaving the ladle bobbing.
"Oh come on, Ger!" The half-elf said. "It's practically a winter solstice party! Aren't they all about getting drunk?" He waved the bottle of whisky.
She wrinkled her nose at the strong scent. "Besides, with the amount of bleep products everyone takes it's not like actually alcohol is a good idea, I'm surprised no one has exploded yet from sheer proximity. Where did you get that, anyways?"
... and dropped her mug. "Bother," she said vaguely, "I was thinking about thinking about drinking that." She bent down to pick it up, and a gun slipped out of her holster to land on the floor next to it. "Oh, double bother," she said, and picked that up too.
The Time Lady straightened up and held up the pistol. "If I was sober," she announced, "I could tell you exactly what this is. Gods I hate this body."
"It's the Time Lady from the thing with the Sue Invasion and the Macroviruses." Colt elbowed Gerry. "Remember her?"
Gerry sighed. "Of course, Colt."
"Hey!" Colt directed this at Morgan. "Want some whisky?" He tipped the bottle towards her, grinning widely.
"I think she's already a sheet or two to the wind," Gerry murmured.
Her eyes were open wide as she took in all the colorful decorations and lights. "Oh wow! Look at this! Hey," she said trying to get her partner's attention, "Natasha! What are those?" She pointed towards the snack table.
Natasha towards where Sylvia was pointing. "Um, it looks like stuff covered in chocolate."
"What's chocolate?" Sylvia asked, but was quickly distracted, "Oh hey! Is that a ghoul?!" She started towards the eating ghoul, not hearing Natasha's calls to wait for her.
"Hi!" Sylvia said walking up to the zombie-looking agent, "I didn't know there were other people from the Fallout continuum here! I'm Sylvia."
... didn't see anyone he knew well on the way to the snacks table, though he did spot Maeryn/Kaliel there and gave the Tok'ra a wave. He made himself a mental note to go and say hello properly in a moment.
First, there was a quantity of chocolate laid before him that he felt certain wasn't allowed under normal circumstances, possibly not even under these circumstances. There was a reason most agents weren't allowed any, he thought as he reached for a chocolate-covered mint. It had to be some kind of drug—the chocolate-covered ham, for sure. That couldn't possibly be legal, it went down far too easily for something so rich and complex. He was all right, though. He had been working on his discipline of late, and as he chewed on a chocolate-covered orange slice, he felt confident that it was working. He was pretty sure he took the time to smile and nod at the other agents near the table between bites, though they did give him some odd looks in return. It had to be the smile—he just couldn't quite master the trick, and it put people off. Oh well.
He jumped at a sudden tap on his shoulder and spun around, a fistful of chocolate-covered eggnog drops on its way to his mouth. His eyes popped and he nearly choked when he recognized Orken, the one person he least wanted to catch him indulging in what Nume called "stupid Andalite cliches," however well he thought he was behaving himself. His face got hot and red, clashing ferociously with his carroty hair. He swallowed hard to get rid of the gooey mess already on his tongue, tipped the rest of the drops into a nearby plastic cup, and brushed his hand on his pant leg. The smear of chocolate on his chin was completely lost on him.
"Orken!" he said hoarsely. Desserts were murder on human vocal cords. "I didn't expect—that is, I had hoped to meet you here, but when I arrived—." He cut himself short. Babbling like an idiot wasn't going to help. He took a deep breath, straightened up, and started over. "I am pleased to see you. Have you been well?"
...ended up bumping into Zanna, tripping over the other agent's shoes, and falling onto the floor. "Ahahahawhoops hi there." She waved upwards, and promptly picked herself up.
After an awkward moment, she began, "So.... what department?" without bothering to check for the flashpatch. "'m July. Floaters."
"Mmmf! Mf-" he gulped the food in his mouth."-Sorry. Pleased to meet you!" He said cheerfully. "I'm Derwin! You wanna cheeseball?" he asked, motioning to the platter. "We have plenty."
"Whiskey," she mumbled. "I think... maybe not a good idea." She tried to focus on Colt. "So, do I know you yet? You're a little blurry right now, but your voice sounds familiar."
(Meanwhile, unnoticed by anyone, a tiny spider-legged robot dropped out of a ceiling hatch and scurried over to the hot chocolate urns, carrying a vial of some description. It let out a soft beep, which, if it could be translated into English, would doubtless read excellent perfect)
Colt grinned, and poured a shot for himself, which he promptly downed. "Couple years back! After all the macrovirus stuff and everyone went back in. I nearly shot you!" This got Colt an elbow to his shoulder. "Ow, hey, what was that for? I offered to share first."
Gerry rolled her eyes. "If you really think it's because of the liquor, you're dumber than I give you credit for."
...Derwin's offer and after examining it, took a bite out of the chocolate covered treat.
Natasha, dodging between party goers, caught up with her partner.
"Natasha! Try this!" Sylvia reached for another and handed one to her partner.
"Oh, thanks." Natasha took a cautious bite out of the cheeseball, then deciding she liked it, ate the rest.
"This is Derwin. He's from the same continuum as me!" Sylvia smiled some more.
"Uh..." Just registering Derwin for the first time, Natasha found herself staring at the ghoul. Not wanting to be impolite, she tried to make conversation. "So, um...Do you play video games?"
...was lightened slightly by Ilraen’s disheveled state. The Andalite was behaving like a fool, and no matter how well he liked this particular Andalite, well, seeing one covered in food and making a fool of itself was certainly amusing. Maybe this party wouldn’t be so bad after all.
“I am doing well enough, Ilraen.” No need to mention the recent bit of unpleasantness and the subsequent crying. “I had hoped to run into you here so I could give you a present. However, you appear to be,” the ghost of a smile appeared on his lips, “busy.”
Thomas choose that moment to make his presence at the food table known. “Dude! You’re the Andalite dude, right? Orken totally got you a…” Orken stomped on his toe. “Ow!”
“Agent Thomas, I would appreciate it if you did not ruin the surprise.”
Thomas grinned. “Dude, you were saying earlier about how the whole surprise thing was silly. Well, I guess that was before I found out you were getting Ilraen a present. It’s so cute you find being friends with an Andalite embarrassing.”
Orken’s face turned red. “Agent Thomas, I would appreciate it if…”
His waved a dismissive hand. “Yeah yeah yeah. I’ll go make myself scarce.” He wandered off in the direction of a group of people singing Christmas Carols.
"Not really." He said, giving a shrug. "Gurgan says that they overstimulate me, and that the 'last thing I need is another headache brought on by you going into other agents rooms and breaking their vases. Again.'"
"Okay then." Natasha tried again to strike up a conversation, "What fandoms are you into then? Also, um, is Gurgan your partner?"
Meanwhile, Sylvia had wandered off, distracted by the many curious things around the crowded room.
*Embarrassed
Ilraen sighed in relief and finally thought to wipe his mouth on the back of one hand while the partners talked. He frowned at the amount of chocolate that came away. He hadn't been that overtaken with the experience, had he? He quickly found a napkin and scrubbed the residue away in time to wave Thomas off.
"Good to see you again, Agent Thomas," he said before turning back to Orken.
"I am not busy now," he told the former Yeerk with dignity. "And I also have a gift for you," he added in a rush, without it. He reached into his bag and withdrew a rectangular box clumsily wrapped in paper that looked like it had come straight from an attic in the 70s. It might have been Nume's own attic, at that; Ilraen hadn't asked. All he knew was that it was traditional to cover Christmas gifts in paper with repetitive designs in green and red. He grinned sheepishly. "It was my first time wrapping presents. The tape can be quite troublesome."
"You... shot me?" She blinked at Colt and held up her gun. "With a gun?"
"Everyone /down/!" a woman's voice yelled, and the redhead who had been following Morgan around dove between her and Colt, blaster raised. "Morgan of the DMS, I charge you with-"
"Nita, no!" a tinny voice shouted from a radio at her belt. "Not a threat! The cameras have picked up- look, just /get out of there/. We'll neuralyse later. This is all getting out of hand..."
The redhead looked mortified. "Peter, I'm sorry..."
"Just /leave/!" the radio yelled, and the redhead left the lounge at a run. Morgan blinked.
"Well, that was... interesting. Ouch!" She looked down at the spiderlike robot by her ankle. "What in the worlds...?"
you have done your part the robot intoned in a squeaky voice. all is proceeding as planned take care i hope i see you again With that, it scuttled away, vanishing into the crowd.
"Is it just me," Morgan said, "or was that a bit strange even for here?" She blinked. "And why am I not drunk any more?"
"I have no idea, and yes, that was," she grumbled.
Colt was blinking in surprise, both arms up, before he properly processed that the strange woman had disappeared. "Uh. No. Nearly. But didn't."
"Only because of everyone else," Gerry added. "Now, pass me that bottle. I think I need a drink after... whatever that was about." She sighed. "Thank Eru Denny's not here." With that, she necked a good portion straight from the bottle.
"There's something fishy going on here," she said, "and for once it's not Sea Devils. But did I hear someone mention chocolate-coated eggnog?"
"And I think there's some at the snacks table too."
"There better not be," Gerry said. "I really don't want to deal with anything strange tonight. At least, anything stranger than what's normal around here."
...for Ilraen to set the present on top of the stack of three that he had. The bottom two looked hastily wrapped in balloon covered wrapping paper, most likely intended for children’s birthday presents. The one on top was smaller than the other two, and precisely wrapped in dull brown packing paper.
“The one on top is for you. I thought it might be something you would be able to use.”
Taking the present from Ilraen, he set it on the large of the two boxes Thomas had wrapped, and pulled on a loose spot on the paper with his free hand, and quickly had the package unwrapped.
" My Little Pony, Friendship is Magic, Fallout, - well. Not so much INTO it as Knows a lot about it - Harry Potter, Discworld." Derwin said promptly. "And yes, Gurgan is my partner. Unfortunately, he could'nt be here. His 'don't give a damn' was acting up, apparently." he frowned. "Ah, well. Social situations aren't really his strong area anyway."
Maria looked desperately around the room for a friendly face. "Soo... we pretend we never went under the mistletoe, and Luxury never caught us?"
Mark cleared his throat and ran his hands through his scarf. "Agreed. I am going to find something to do over there now..."
"Yeah, you do that." Maria shivered a bit. "I'm just going to go... ALLLL the way in the other direction."
"Hey Thomas!" Cadmar waved to Thomas as she approached him. "Hey! How's it going? it's been a while."
...jumped when he saw Cadmar. “Hey! Dude girl! It’s been a while, yeah, but don’t worry, I got something for you! Uh… Orken has it though. And he’s talking to his pal over there.” He rolled his eyes and gestured towards where Ilraen and Orken where talking. “I wasn’t gonna bug them. I’m trying to be nicer.” He shuffled his feet nervously. “So… how’ve you been?”