untamedantinous | open: don't let the wine go to your brains

Grantaire has made absolutely certain his normal corner table did not migrate towards the center and he is happily present at it, having grown progressively cheerful as more people filtered into the room, a bottle of wine open in front of him and a full glass in his hand. As he is accustomed, he is speaking with no regard as to whether or not anyone is actually listening to him, although it's certainly at an audible enough volume. "Friends and passing acquaintances, for I am a fortunate enough man to have no enemies, it is a joy and a delight to see this gathering unfold at last. That is not to say, of course, that we have lacked for gatherings in our wanderings here, and ones full of their own sorts of joy. We all know this and have benefited from it to some degree or another. It seems the greatest sort of event here is the sort that we originate ourselves, so to have another added to that illustrious roster, even if it is of a slightly different character than previous ones, can only be a benefit."

He lifts his glass of wine toward the ceiling. "That is not to malign our mysterious host spirits, of course, for that would be tempting the worst kind of fate, and they were generous enough to me recently that I am favorably inclined, although their taste in beverages can be suspect, not that that dissuades me from continuing to explore them." He gestures with his glass towards the cups on top of the liquor cabinet. "But that's another subject entirely.

"We have something of a symposium here, and although it won't be as famous as some, it is nonetheless an improvement as we are the participants and can avail ourselves of the refreshments and the remarks, and how remarkably refreshing that is. Just look around at our good fortune. Of course we have not discovered perfection, as that is unattainable, but we have good food, good drink, good company, and asking for more would be presumption of the highest order."

He is quiet for only the span of time it takes for him to have a drink. "But all of this is beside the point. This was organized, insofar as it's organized at all, on the foundation of being able to speak on anything and everything we can think of. And although speaking at length on this meeting itself certainly qualifies as 'anything', it also seems as if it doesn't take advantage of the opportunity afforded.

"Now, as many of you know, I am not a man of conviction, and if I make a bold statement, it is entirely possible that I will ultimately end up arguing even myself out of it. However, dissent forms the fertile fields of discussion and I do enjoy watching that flourish."

He grins widely, leaning back in his seat and has another long drink, refilling his glass as he continues. "So to that end, I offer the following assertions. How much I myself agree with them is debatable, as are most things, of course, but I'm certainly willing to argue any and all of them.

"First, despite my very own words earlier, tempting fate is not only not to be avoided, it's hilarious. Second, the fact that the rooms and grounds here are changing all the time is a net positive. Third, hauling elephants across mountain ranges is not only idiotic, it is so idiotic that dubbing someone who did it one of the greatest military minds of history is an extremely dubious proposition." He grins wryly at that one and takes another drink.

"Fourth, trying to find commonalities enough between the residents of this place to explain why we are the fortunate ones to be here is a fool's errand, and liable to fall into error. Fifth, every person has a food, a drink, and an animal that they most resemble. They need not actually like, or even have encountered, that food, drink, or animal. Sixth, progress in all things is like Zeno's story of Achilles and the tortoise. Seventh, existence may or may not be real but it doesn't matter if it is or not anyway, so the entire field of metaphysics is pointless. Eighth, there is no such thing as a god that always actually knows what they're doing. Ninth, avoiding pleasure just by virtue of the fact that it's pleasurable is absolute madness. Tenth and final for now, animals are objectively better than humans are, and I include worms and insects and such things in that count."

He takes another long drink and waves a hand airily. "Discuss."

Sagramore obviously was never going to miss this -- for all he might have sounded begrudging to Mothwing, his favorite people are going to be here, and Enjolras has been working hard on his first meeting, probably, and needs some positive reinforcement or something.

"Are you just orating generically?" he asks, as he comes over to Grantaire.

He laughs and takes a drink. "I'll have you know I made several actual points there."

"Mmm. Are you all right, by the way? I was worried about you after last week. You can't imagine how much liquor I had to give to a seven-year-old."

"I think I probably can imagine, as I was fine when I woke up the next day. But no, I have no complaints to speak of. I got to fly. Oh, also the god of wine arrived to our little outpost, so there's that."

"I met the god of drama a day or two ago! We're beset by them."

He laughs. "Same god, actually! Covers both domains, as well as several others besides."

"I would have thought the wine more worth mentioning than the drama. He did seem rather vague, though."

A laugh. "Nothing against a fine drama, but yes, I absolutely agree on the relative draw of the two."

"I assume you made a good first impression."

"Oh, very much so."

"How could it be otherwise?"

"Precisely! After all, a warm welcome was the least I could do for all wine has done for me."

"You're a menace. I'm glad you've brought the elephant argument to a broader audience." He leans over to steal a kiss.

He laughs and kisses back. "An unrepentant menace. And the elephant argument is entirely too good and makes entirely too much sense to remain in such limited, though inordinately delightful, company."

"Someday you'll finish your religious treatise as well."

"It puts an entirely new wrinkle on a religious treatise to have an actual god appear, although he does say he agrees with me on deific fallibility, so it possibly even strengthens my argument."

"You can run it by him first," raising his eyebrows suggestively.

He laughs. "Oh, of course. Quite a resource."

"I'm sure he'll have an opinion on your skills."

He laughs at that. "Oh, of course. They are many and varied, as we all know."

"Infinite and distinct as stars," fondly. "It's a pleasure to know thee; even the gods will speak to it."

"Infinite is a bit much, I think, as I am in fact only a man, but broad nonetheless."

"Let me be extravagant. I like it."

"Somewhat difficult, as I am always the soul of restraint," he says wryly before waving his wine glass loosely in the air. "But very well, be extravagant."

"My thanks for thine indulgence. Anyway, I'm sure he had good things to say about thee; thou'rt a paragon of followers to him, art thou not?"

That is a delighted laugh. "He appreciates my patronage, yes."

"If he didn't I'd have to add taking gods to task to my repertoire."

"Seems it will have to wait for the next god. Alas, I would have been amazed to see it."

"If it has to happen I'll send thee an invitation."

"Oh good. I'd hate to miss it."

"Put it to the proof, then," says Laertes, lightly heckling. "What food, drink, and animal do I most resemble?"

And there's a grin and a quick answer. "In my estimation, pain au chocolat, champagne, and a honeybee."

"And thy reasoning?"

He starts to tick off on his fingers. "Many layers with a core of sweetness. Elegant and effervescent. Clever and can produce wonders."

"Thou flatterer," laughs Laertes. "I cannot dispute thee. Nor will I dispute that animals are better than people; my daughter is proof of that."

"Hardly flattery if it's plain truth. But yes, animals being better than people is so self-evident that it barely was worth saying. Still, though, I thought I would say it nonetheless."

"Hast thou met her? Szarka?"

"I haven't been so fortunate yet."

"We should take thee home with us, at the meeting's end," says Laertes. "Thou canst meet her, and feed her supper so that she'll love thee instantly and completely. And then thou canst join us for bed, shouldst thou wish."

Grantaire nods, laughing a bit. "I do like each point proposed, so I agree in all particulars. What's on the menu for your darling daughter?"

"Broth, bran bread, and meat," says Laertes promptly. "Cooked together into a milk-warm stew."

"A very well-rounded meal. No wonder she'll love me instantly upon providing it."

"Sagramore also keeps liver jerky in his pockets, and that she loves above all else," Laertes confides. "He may give thee some to ply her with, an thou shouldst ask him sweetly."

"Oh, a favored delicacy. I may have to practice my sweetness to obtain some."

"Thy sweetness is, as ever, in fine fettle," Laertes laughs. "But if thou shouldst want practice, thou know'st I have a taste for sweetness."

Grantaire laughs in turn. "A taste for sweetness? I never could have guessed."

For that, Laertes has to kiss his cheek. "Hast plumbed my mysteries."

His grin turns absolutely impish. "Oh, what I would say to that if I weren't practicing sweetness."

"As a baker, I know that sweetness must be tempered with salt," says Laertes loftily.

"Oh, now I'm just contemplating the... mysteries I've plumbed."

"I'd gladly open all my secrets to thee," says Laertes, low and easy, eyes half-lidded.

His own smile remains playful, if slightly less sharply so. "Oh, then I eagerly look forward to the revelations."

"Okay, I'll bite," Magnus says. He really only intends to be a wallflower -- he only came because he promised Enjolras, and since it's late, he's already feeling a little stir-crazy -- but Grantaire has him curious. "What's my food, drink, and animal?"

He leans back in his seat, mulling it over. "Hm. Spice cake, lemonade, and a squirrel."

Magnus blinks. "Why?"

"My proclamations are mysterious. Also, bold flavors blended with sweetness. A refreshing hint of summer. A very enthusiastic and talkative forest dweller."

"...huh," Magnus says. "I would have said falafel, mead, and mongoose."

"You would know yourself better than anyone, so by all means elaborate."

"Well, falafel is objectively the best food in the world. It's fluffy and spicy and crunchy and savory, and good hot or cold. All of which describe me. Mead can come in a ton of different flavors but they all pack a punch. If I had to pick a variety, it would be Heidrun's mead, which is generally easily available but fortifying. Not the Alfish psychedelic mead. That one's not me. And mongeese are scrappy fighters and can't be defeated by snakes." Such as, for example, Loki. "They can be cute pets but they'll also bite the head off a threat."

"Well-reasoned on all counts, then, and I will defer to you fully. I am impressed." He holds up a hand for a high-five.

Magnus slaps it with a grin, and returns to wall-flowering.

Should Enjolras manage to catch Magnus’ attention a bit later, he will give him a brief shoulder clasp and a smile. “Thank you for coming. I am aware this is…likely not something that holds much interest for you; but I appreciate your presence.”

"No man, this is cool," enthuses Magnus, who lowkey hates it here and has no intention of coming to the next one. "Thanks for inviting me!"

Enjolras just arches an eyebrow and nods. He’s not the best at reading people; but it’s clear enough Magnus isn’t exactly enjoying himself. “You are always welcome, of course; but if debate is not to your liking I understand.”

Magnus laughs. "Dude, stop. I'm glad I came." He is, too! He might really dislike everything about the environment, but he does like that his friends here are pretty much all here, and he's happy Enjolras is having his moment.

“Very well.” He nods and offers a small, pleased smile. “Perhaps next we will try communal meals, like you suggested. The café is big enough for it.”

"Cool," Magnus grins. "I'm gonna go catch up with Hanguang-jun, but thanks for the invite, dude."

"Alright," with some tired amusement. "Since I'm certain everyone else is asking: may I have elaboration on your fifth point for me?" That is all he's willing to indulge in at this point.

"I did make several other points, you know. Bread. Coffee. Swan."

"Why those three, exactly? Other than the obvious."

"Bread is the staple and foundation on which everything stands. Coffee is the obvious. And a swan is a lovely and graceful bird with a formidable temper and protective streak. It also has some pertinent mythological connections that I will decline to elaborate on."

“And I thank you for not elaborating on them,” he says with a slight eyebrow raise. “I think you have elaborated quite enough already, in fact; but you always do.”

"Elaboration is, as always, one of my primary skills, but you did make a kind request which I will accede to."

"I suppose so. Are you pleased with the number of people here? I must admit I am not entirely certain what I expected."

"I think it's a good showing for the first attempt at this. But what I think isn't particularly important. Expectations or not, this was still your idea, so are you pleased with the number of people here?"

"Mm, yes; though I do not know if all of them are enjoying the proceedings."

"It's the first one. The shape of this is still being formed. I think enough are enjoying it that it was worth doing. If you'd like, though, I can dance on the table. Maybe that would liven things up."

He snorts and shakes his head. "Pray have a care for our tables, there does happen to be food on them."

"I did plan on clearing the table in question first if you did ask me to do it."

"I cannot imagine why you would think I would ask you to do it."

"Obviously I know the odds were against it, but there was at least a possibility you'd call my bluff. And then watch me try to explain it because no one would actually believe you asked me to."

He shakes his head, unwilling to admit to the slight amusement that his voice betrays. "The odds were very much against it, I assure you."

"Very well. The option remains open if you change your mind, however."

"I do not intend to change my mind on that in the near future, I am afraid."

He doesn't look the least bit amused, honest. "I had a feeling the odds weren't particularly high on that one, either."

“Wise of you, mon ami.” He sips at his wine. “I confess I cannot recall your other points just now.”

"In summary, tempting fate is fine, the changing landscape is a good thing, Hannibal of Carthage was an idiot, it's silly to try to figure out a particular reason why we're the particular ones here, progress is an illusion, metaphysics is pointless, gods are bumblers, people shouldn't avoid things just because they like them, and animals do a better job at animaling than humans do at humaning."

"Progress is an illusion?" He settles down properly at Grantaire's table now, willing to entertain this at least for now. "Very well. Seeing as we do not have Combeferre present to defend the righteousness of progress, I shall have to do it for him." He takes a sip of wine and shifts position, affecting his very best imitation of Combeferre. "As monsieur Franklin said, 'without progress, words such as improvement, achievement, and success have no meaning.' I do not see how you can disavow progress when you yourself were part of it, if only a small part, as was I. Our barricade was not an illusion, you know as well as I our deaths were not, either -- and did not our deaths serve as some form of progress towards the second republic?"

He leans back in his seat. "Very well, Combeferre. It was a simplification, obviously. I'm not saying progress doesn't happen to a degree, but it cycles back. Gains are made and lost again. Progress towards the second republic, which fell to the second empire after a bare four years. And then progress to the third republic, and then tyranny again. Fourth republic, fifth republic, people strive, progress, settle, fall back again, and it repeats. History mirrors itself."

"It was, yes, --and I will grant you that it is cyclical. But it is still necessary, or else how would one improve?"

"Do they improve? It seems that once people attain progress, they often put all their determination into squandering it."

"Of course they do. Think of a child, learning to walk. He starts crawling, progressing to standing and pulling himself up, and then finally walking on his own. Is that not improvement?"

"Ah, and now we broach the riddle of the Sphinx. Four legs in the morning, two in the afternoon. But don't forget three in the evening. Still again there regression, in the end."

"Even so, progress still exists. You cannot say it is an illusion."

"Clearly I can say it. I just need to open my mouth and make words happen. But I will concede the point. It was a poor summary of what I said anyway. It's not an illusion so much as I think it will never actually get to where it wants to go."

"I did not expect that you would, it would be very odd of you to say so if you did."

He chuckles slightly. "Now I don't deny it would be nice if it did."

He purses his lips a little, a teasing glint in his eye. "And you call yourself a cynic."

He laughs incredulously. "I hardly think that much has changed."

"Here I thought you took pleasure in denying most anything I said." He takes an amused sip of his wine.

"Oh, well that's not true," he immediately says with a grin.

He just raises his eyebrows, as if to prove his point.

"You see, I'm obliged to disagree with that, as if I agree with it, I'll prove you wrong, which would make me wrong, and I clearly can't have that."

"Clearly not." He takes an amused sip of wine. "Then you would have nothing else to talk about."

"You know, I don't think you actually believe that. Because the idea of me having nothing to talk about is utterly inconceivable."

"I have heard you be silent before," he points out. "But you were asleep, I suppose."

"Precisely. Therefore it was not for lack of anything to talk about, and merely for the body's need for occasional rest."

--Yes, let's call it that. He simply raises his eyebrows again, but nods.

"But sleep or drunken unconsciousness notwithstanding... I basically always have things to say."

"So you do, yes."

"And not all of them are designed to contradict you."

"Just most of them."

"A reasonable percentage, I would say."

He makes a 'tch' sort of noise. "You would say such things."

"Would you expect any less from me? Or, I suppose, any better?"

"I would not, at that."

He smiles wryly. "And there we have it."

"Yes, I suppose so." He shakes his head fondly and takes another nibble of his charcuterie plate.

He smiles and takes another drink. "I do noticed you felt no need to stand in defense of dragging elephants across the Alps."

"Well, I do not intend to do so. Why should I defend it?"

"Oh, you absolutely shouldn't, as it was utter madness, but the option was there."

"So it was, but you had a good many other options as well."

"Yes, but how many involve elephants?"

'I think just the one, but there were quite a lot of them."

"Not so many at the end. Awful for the elephants."

--In answer, he just sighs and shakes his head. "You know what I meant."

He laughs. He can't help it. "All right, all right. I'll talk about anything you'd like now."

“Truly?” There’s a teasing light in his eyes. “What if I asked you to recite Rousseau?”

Well, this should probably have been anticipated. But he doesn't believe in backing down, either. "I'm certainly capable of it. Are you asking me to recite Rousseau?"

“Yes, I am. Perhaps —mm. The Social Contract?”

He rolls his eyes but it's with much more obvious fondness than it ever was in Paris¹. "Of course you would select The Social Contract. Perhaps one day you may yet surprise me and choose Julie. But very well. Would you have me start from the beginning or select a passage of my choosing?"

¹Or perhaps it was obvious there too if you knew to look.

"Perhaps, yes. It was simply the first thing that came to mind. Select whatever you may like."

He nods. "Of course." At that, he leans back lazily in his seat and begins to recite.

"When one king dies, another is needed; elections leave dangerous intervals and are full of storms; and unless the citizens are disinterested and upright to a degree which very seldom goes with this kind of government, intrigue and corruption abound. He to whom the State has sold itself can hardly help selling it in his turn and repaying himself, at the expense of the weak, the money the powerful have wrung from him. Under such an administration, venality sooner or later spreads through every part, and peace so enjoyed under a king is worse than the disorders of an interregnum. What has been done to prevent these evils? Crowns have been made hereditary in certain families, and an order of succession has been set up, to prevent disputes from arising on the death of kings. That is to say, the disadvantages of regency have been put in place of those of election, apparent tranquility has been preferred to wise administration, and men have chosen rather to risk having children, monstrosities, or imbeciles as rulers to having disputes over the choice of good kings."

Enjolras duly gives him a solemn round of applause. "Impressive. I knew you knew it, but I did not know the breadth of your knowledge."

He shrugs and waves a hand absently. "Even if I had not read the thing myself, I think it would have been hard not to have it memorized in full after even two weeks in your vicinity."

"Oh, come, I am not so bad, am I?"

"Oh, I never said it was bad."

"Of course you wouldn't."

He laughs a little. "Yes, yes, and this is where you call me biased."

He shrugs. "It remains true."

"Well, if that's the accusation I'm to be stuck with, at least I can think of worse."

"Yes, I -- well. There's no need for that."

"Perhaps that's the case, but what sort of a world would it be if everyone only did what there was need for?"

"I see you are intent on speaking without cease, then," with some amusement.

"Aren't I always? It is generally one of my goals, although I will amend that to say with brief cessation for food and drink."

"I have seen you be silent, from time to time."

"Why yes, you have seen me fall unconscious from drinking."

"Mm, so I have. But other times as well."

"Oh." He pauses. "Ah, well. Yes, I suppose you have."

He just raises his eyebrows and looks a little amused.

He's enraptured.

"To point five, I think I might already have some ideas, but if it's different from the obvious please enlighten me." A few thousand years of being associated with the same things, no matter how obvious, has him curious if there's anything else.

"And to point... sorry, I lost track. The one about gods. You're correct, of course, if anyone tells you different they're wrong. I have it on good authority."

"It's nice to be dubbed correct by an expert. As for point five, if you'd like, I can try and deliberately choose away from the obvious."

"I admit I am a little tired of being compared to a bull. No offense to cows, of course."

"For an animal, if I remove all of those that are your generally accepted symbols, then perhaps a magpie."

He raises an eyebrow. "Dare I ask why?"

"They're clever and social, like shiny things, and like all members of their family, are just a bit dramatic."

"You think I'm clever!" A huge grin. "I was worried for a moment you were insinuating I'm small and annoying."

"Oh, no, see, being annoying is my domain and I refuse to yield it."

"Grantaire, Patron Hero to all Devil's Advocates. It has a nice ring, I suppose. For you I'll say..." he considers this for a moment. "A llama, a crunchwrap supreme from Taco Bell, and wine, of course, though not just for our shared proclivity."

He leans forward a little. "All right, I'm intrigued. First, what is a crunchwrap supreme from Taco Bell? Second, I would love to hear your rationale for all three."

He laughs. “Taco Bell is a restaurant, long after your time sadly. A Crunchwrap is one of their offerings with a multitude of fillings wrapped together. A lot of flavors and textures, much like your arguments here tonight. Farmers will often put a llama in their fields with cows or other livestock, and the llama will help the poor cows should they find themselves in distress. And wine, among its many other benefits, is an excellent way to get conversation started.”

"Well. Vive la variété. I think I like all three of those answers, at least judging by your reasoning."

"Well, that's two of the ten points settled! Which shall we go after next?"

Yeah he already forgot what the other topics were.

"Tempting fate. Avoid or no, funny or no?"

"That depends. Is Hera involved?"

"Ah, true enough that the tales do not speak well of crossing her, but let's say for the sake of argument that she is not."

"I'm proof enough of that. Well, assuming my wonderful stepmother is absent, then..." he thinks for a moment. "Often funny, if you've got a good sense of things. If we're viewing fate as truly something you have no control over no matter what you do, then it doesn't matter, right? Do whatever, the same consequences will happen. Might as well have fun with it."

"Precisely! Better chance of enjoying it, or at least laughing your way through it."

"One must be careful not to become too complacent, of course, but sometimes comedy is all that we have to get through difficult moments in life."

"Perhaps so, but not being complacent can carry its own set of dangers."

"Of course. But when everyone is complacent it's even worse."

"Well, when everyone is anything, it doesn't bode well."

"A fair point, I suppose. I do maintain there's more harm than good in complacency."

"Perhaps that's so in general, but say for example, speaking in hypotheticals, that a particular action is certain to kill you. Maybe in that case it will be less harmful to stay complacent for a bit longer."

Ah yes. Hypothetically. A hand moves to the nape of Grantaire's neck.

"I'd say there's a lot of wiggle room between 'doing nothing' and --" putting yourself directly in front of a lot of guns "That. Usually, anyway. There is merit in staying alive to fight another day, if possible."

Yep. Totally hypothetically. No relevance whatsoever. "Ah. Well, in that case, we are in accord."

He leans up to leave a kiss on Grantaire's forehead. If you saw him standing on his tippy toes to achieve this, no you did not. "Moving on then to another point! I believe you said something about the rooms changing and whether or not that's a good thing? It is going to make it rather difficult for me to remember directions."

"It does add a bit more difficulty there, even if generally the most used places stay more or less in place. But giving us more rooms to discover bestows more room for discovery. Thus, a positive."

"It would be terribly boring if nothing ever changed." Shifting rooms about is a poor replacement for traveling the world, but he'll take what he can get. "I'd imagine the ability of this place to shift rooms around is likely related to its ability to give us , y'know, material objects. Clothes and whatnot. Which is absolutely a good thing."

"Exactly. The ability of generation. Even if it manifests itself in strange ways sometimes, I'd rather have it than not."

“We seem to be mostly in agreement tonight, I’m sorry if that throws off your plans to have arguments.” He laughs.

"An agreement is just finding other people on your side in an argument, so that's perfectly fine."

"I do feel bad for the elephants." Grantaire had said something about elephants, right? Dionysus takes a sip of his wine.

"Only one of them survived until the end of that war. It's preposterous! That is not the purpose of an elephant."

"No! The purpose of an elephant is to be adorable!" Another sip. "Have you ever seen a baby elephant? They're so silly, it's precious. But you're not even supposed to ride elephants, their backs aren't good for it, let alone bring them into stupid wars."

He holds up his glass. "To the memory of the elephants."

Dionysus does the same. "To the elephants!"

He drains what's left in his glass.

He polishes off his own as well and promptly refills it.

Meanwhile, Dionysus’ glass refills itself. “Now what was the one about pleasure and madness? You’re not giving away all my secrets tonight are you?”

He laughs. "Not my goal. I'm just saying that some people for some reason get it in their heads that just because something's enjoyable, that means they shouldn't do it, and that's idiocy."

“Usually the ones telling people they shouldn’t do something enjoyable do whatever it is anyway themselves,” he say bitterly. “Or it’s something they personally dislike, and they assume everyone else should dislike it too. Why humans can’t just let each other have a good time is beyond me. So long as nobody’s getting hurt why should it matter?”

"That is exactly my point! Obviously, don't want anyone getting hurt, but there's a reason for enjoyable things to exist, and that's to enjoy them!"

“You would fit in well with my maenads, I think,” he responds with a laugh before pressing a kiss to Grantaire’s lips.

He kisses back before laughing a little and ducking his head just slightly. "Well enough, I suppose, although aren't the maenads all women?"

“I guess? I’ve had male worshippers too, you know.” Maybe most of them preferred different classifications. He shrugs. “If you’re hoping for a rigid understanding of gender roles I’m afraid you’re talking to the wrong god, my dear.”

And that's a little laugh. "That's fair. I can only judge from what I've read, although I can hardly speak to the accuracy."

"A few thousand years of people, most of whom never met me, writing their own accounts of things they weren't even born yet for gets you some pretty wild accounts of things."

He takes a sip of his drink before continuing, grinning, "Unless what you've read makes me sound cool, then it's correct and you should absolutely believe it at face value."

"I will keep that in mind. The more drama the better, then, and obviously?"

"The more drama the more wine people need to get through it, it's a win-win for me."

"And the reverse can also be true, too. The more wine, the more drama gets caused."

"And then you need more wine."

"A neat little circle. An ouroboros, constantly feeding itself."

"I may not be the sun or the moon or the slayer of the nemean lion, but I like to think I still am important."

"More than simply important. You enrich humanity with joy, which is more than many can say. We'd wither on the vine without it."

He laughs. “Well in my brother’s defense, I do think we’d all wither without the sun as well.”

And that's a small smile and an amused little huff. "Well, yes, we'd wither without the sun as well."

“Do you have any siblings, my dear?”

"A sister. But she was still very small when I went to Paris, so I can't say I got to know her very well."

“I was an adult before I met any of my sisters or brothers too. … I have a lot of them.” He’s clearly not very happy about that. “There’s some I’ve still never met.”

"You definitely have quite the expansive family tree," Grantaire agrees. But as it's clearly a touchy subject, he doesn't linger too much on it. "The ones you have met, do you like them?"

"Oh yes! For the most part, I suppose, every family is going to have an occasional squabble." He shrugs before continuing. "Apollo's great, he and I actually lived together for a time. Best man at my wedding. Voice of an angel, that one. He can be something of a nag about chores, but we get along. There's Herakles, he's genuinely one of the most helpful people you can know. Secretly a fan of theatre too, though you wouldn't guess it from his reputation. I didn't meet him until relatively recently, you know, but he was so kind and, well, I wouldn't have been able to meet Shakespeare without him. Then there's Persephone! Oh, she's wonderful." He's going to gloss over the fact that she's not only his sister, but also aunt and cousin. "Shame about her commute, but boy is she great at parties, I've spent a lot of time around her and her mother both. And then --"

He cuts himself off. "Oh, but I don't want to bore you with this."

Oh, Grantaire is very much aware of the knotty nature of the Greek pantheon's family tree. He laughs. "I promise, I have not been the least bit bored. It's fascinating, hearing firsthand accounts of things you've only read of."

"Any favorites? I could tailor this exposition better for your enjoyment."

"Aside from you?" He grins. "No, whoever you like best is fine. I'm hardly particular."

“Whoever I like best? Sweetheart, I don’t think people are supposed to pick favorites in their own family.” He laughs. “Especially not my family. That’s a good way to start a war or something.”

He laughs, shaking his head ruefully. "You're right. They're your family. I may be an idiot, but I'm not that kind of idiot. How about... something about Athena."

"Alright, big sister Athena." He thinks for a moment. In truth he hasn't spent much time with her; aside from certain specifics of their birth they have little in common. Personality-wise. "She's... tall."

He sips his wine.

"Oh! She did weave some incredibly lovely fabric for me once. I'd show you, but it went missing with the rest of my luggage."

He will never stop being bitter over this, he's sure. Regardless of whatever new clothes the gods of this mansion might have in store for him.

"That's unfortunate. Maybe it will turn up one day. All right, what was living with Apollo like?"

"Apollo's great! I was gone a lot of the time, you know how I am, but whenever I wasn't off traveling somewhere I was back at Delphi. That, ah, that was his temple. He's very good when it comes to planning, and he's great to have around in a pinch. I think people assume he's going to be sort of uptight, but you should have seen some of the parties we threw with the oracle ladies."

He can't help but burst into laughter. He was right there at good planner and great to have around in a pinch, definitely with 'sort of uptight', but then the oracle parties completely throw his mental image into very odd places. "I would not have imagined that." So now, of course, he has to purge his brain of the image of Enjolras partying with a Delphic oracle.

"Don't get me wrong, some of the prophecies were real, legitimate prophecies." He drains, then refills his glass. "But a lot of it was incoherent ramblings from the girls who were drunk off my wine and high off of Apollo's... ah... medicine."

"I always did wonder what exactly the fumes were."

"Ohhh yeah, that's why we had to limit it to just one day a month." He would further explain that it was similar to laughing gas from a dentist, but he can't remember when that became a thing, and thus is pretty sure Grantaire wouldn't know what he was talking about anyway.

Correctly ascertained, in fact, but it was close. Another twelve years, sadly. "There must have been quite the line on that one day."

"That's why they weren't all real! Apollo could definitely do real prophecies, I mean, but when you've got people camping out outside you sometimes sort of just..." he makes a vague gesture.

"Generally speaking people were fine with either option they ended up with. If it didn't seem to make sense they just assumed it was the gods being mysterious and speaking in riddles they couldn't figure out. Everybody wins."

That is a delighted laugh. "The gods are inscrutable indeed. A fondness for wine and a talent for nonsense? Clearly I could have been an oracle."

"The night is young, there's still time for you to start speaking gibberish if that's what you want to do."

"Oh, I'm always speaking gibberish."

"Yet everything you've said tonight makes perfect sense to me."

He laughs a little. "Oh no, what am I coming to if I'm starting to make sense?"

"Fear not my dearest," he tries to stifle his giggles. "I've been called the god of madness, so I think you're still in the clear."

"Oh, excellent! In that case, everything is quite as it should be."

He smiles, a hand going up to twist in Grantaire's curls as he presses a warm kiss to his lips.

He smiles around it, relishing as always the rich wine taste of Dionysus' kisses. "Yes. Quite as it should be."

Crowley appears like a man on a mission, drink in hand. "Who's the target?" is all he asks Grantaire.

He looks thoughtful for a moment and then grins. "Temeraire."

"The dragon? Really?"

"Why not? He's a protégé of Enjolras and it could be interesting. You could try Susan if you'd prefer, but I don't think you'd win that one to your satisfaction."

Crowley is about to protest that he could win that one, if he really wanted to; he is a demon, after all. He looks over at Susan for a moment. "Nah, I'll take the dragon."

He laughs and nods. "Enjoy. I understand that he very much likes asking questions."

Claudius is struck by a wave of fondness so fierce and so (objectively speaking) absurd that it makes him he realize he loves Grantaire. No other emotion but love can explain it. Perhaps some of it is admiration for Grantaire's ability to craft a speech simultaneously so inviting and so contrarian. Whatever its aim, Claudius respects skillful speechcraft. But he also feels like he's discovered another secret ideal of Grantaire's: Grantaire values discussion more than he values being right or wrong, so he can speaks all sorts of nonsense, because all that matters is giving his friends and acquaintances the right to speak their minds.

Claudius wants to start an argument with Grantaire about it, because Grantaire would surely object to having another ideal assigned to him. He shakes his head and, rather than confess his love to Grantaire right then, says, "You know, you've a point. Back at the very beginning, when you said the greatest event is the sort we originate ourselves. Do you think it's more entertaining to our hosts when we come up with our own ideas to congregate, or when they conspire to control events to bring us together?"

He laughs, a grin spreading over his expression. "Easy enough. I think. It would almost have to be when we come up with our own ideas. Because they're going to conspire to bring us together anyway, so when we come up with things independently, it's just adding to their entertainment, so it would by definition have to be more. Unless you mean each individual event, in which case my answer would be the opposite as they can tailor those to their own very odd tastes."

Claudius laughs. “We’ve been assuming a plurality of spirits instead a single entity — perhaps they have debates even amongst themselves. Perhaps we’ll inspire some. What question would a contrarian ask a group of mysterious and playful spirits who contrive meetings between their favorite characters?”

"Oh, now that's an interesting question." Of course, the first thing that comes to mind is wondering how on earth he could be anyone's favorite¹, but there is no accounting for taste, even among spirits. He takes a thoughtful sip of his wine. "If I got one question, it would be... All right. On the assumption that we are all from stories, and Dionysus himself says I'm from a play, so I have no reason to really discount the theory, why choose the stories they did? There's quite an interesting variety, even though some are thankfully duplicated."

¹ R. Come on. You're delightful. And we know you're squishy (not so) deep down. EVERYONE knows that.

"Oh, that's a good one. It's a question none of us can answer, but can certainly speculate on, and our speculation may entertain them. We come from quite an interesting variety of worlds, but there could be common themes -- or it may be that each individual spirit has individual tastes." Laughing, he says, "It's more amusing to imagine they've individual tastes. Perhaps they take turns choosing, and you can tell something about a spirit by the choice of characters it favors."

"It could also be that each spirit has selected one of us in particular, and whenever there is a new arrival among us, there is also one among them. But it is certainly more intriguing to imagine that each spirit is responsible for the arrival of a small handful of us. One could learn a lot about them from those individual tastes, if you could only ascertain which of us share an origin spirit. That would be an amazing discovery." He laughs a little. "Of course, there's always the possibility that it is just one or two of them with incredibly eclectic tastes."

Claudius laughs. “It’s a new astrology. Not the stars you were conceived under, but the spirits you were ushered under. Mind you, I've met some astrological skeptics in my time," he says, aware it's the wistfulness of new love that makes him remember other charming contrarians in his life. He left that one behind in England, without looking back. "But I think men of every age enjoy drawing patterns, particularly patterns that teach them something about themselves. Take me. Knowing me and my quirks, who here is most likely to share an origin spirit with me?"

He can't help but smile, intrigued and thoughtful. "Oh, that's an interesting question. It does presuppose that an individual spirit would choose to bring people here who share at least some sort of similarity, instead of trying for stark contrasts, as that would make it much more difficult to divine. But of course, not identical, as that would be dull, not that there's anyone here that perfectly similar to anyone else."

He takes a long sip of his wine, mulling it over before coming to his determination. "I think... Crowley."

Claudius feels the same delight he did when Shen Yuan assigned both him and Crowley Dark type. "Well, tell me why," he says, with a playful nudge. "I want to hear your reasoning."

"Oh, am I not allowed to be inscrutable and mysterious?" he says, as if he's been inscrutable or mysterious a day in his life.

"Again, this does somewhat depend on similarities being part of the criteria, which is entirely speculative, as the mansion spirits are in fact inscrutable and mysterious. But similarities are also one of the things that help form friendships, so I'm sure you have some idea already on that score. But then, if you think more broadly, assuming that we are, in fact, favorite characters, then if you look from a lens of fiction, it's themes. If you do in fact share a spirit who brought you here, that spirit may be interested in looking at facets of virtue and vice, and see what spectra can be formed by your prisms. You'd be archetypal antagonists in very different ways but also both embody joy. It could be a compelling commonality."

His smiles spreads through Grantaire's description. "Compellingly reasoned. And flattering only due to an incidental drawing together of themes, I'm sure. I don't know how much either of us embodies joy. Crowley suffers from the same cynicism you do ... by which I mean he's a frustrated idealist. One who fell in with a group that started a rebellion, and he happened to get swept along with it. And myself, well, all that needs to be said is I'm a character from a tragedy." He rolls his eyes in an overdone, self-deprecating way. "But he did inspire me to laugh more often at the utter absurdity that is God's creation. So you could say he embodied joy for me. I think the genre of my life changed when I met him."

"He's not in Eden, and you're not in your tragedy. Whatever you were written as, you've both found joy here, and that's a perfectly good thing. If the two of you do share a spirit, maybe your spirit figured you both deserved some joy. That said, cynicism and joy are hardly mutually exclusive." He takes a drink of his wine. "But at the risk of another comparison anywhere near as tenuous as mapping the barricades to the Fall, who do you suppose I'd share with?"

"Let's see. Now I may go against the grain, and speculate these spirits, whose chief aim is entertainment, bring together contrary personalities for the sake of seeing sparks. You and Enjolras are ideal counterbalances... and whoever summoned you, they made sure Enjolras wasn't far behind. But for that reason I think it's unlikely. These spirits are playing a game, taking turns." Claudius thinks of the people who were here from the beginning, that first week or two when every other day marked a new arrival. The game isn't like chess, with pieces lined up on both sides of the boards, but like weiqi, with pieces being dropped in as they go. But if he had to choose from the people in this room ...

"Lan Wangji," he says. "Two extremes of eloquence. He's a man of most extraordinary wit and humor, know'st thou -- his wit is a well-aimed bon mot with a raised brow. Yours is a very whirlwind of words, wherein thou hid'st wisdom."

"I don't know if I'd say I hide any wisdom so much as it occasionally sneaks its way in to hide itself, but that's entirely beside the point." He is grinning, though, at Claudius's conclusion. "Lan Wangji? Definitely a contrast on several axes, and I like the thought. Our conversational methods, as you mentioned, of course. But I can think of several others even from our brief acquaintance. For instance, on a spectrum of much less import, I never really managed to pick up cooking, and he's wonderful at it. Have you had his cooking, by the way? It's delicious, although I'm somewhat convinced his husband has a nearly indestructible digestive tract, given the amount of spice he apparently requests. But yes, delicious."

He takes a drink of his wine. "Excellent deduction, and I'm sure the mansion spirits are laughing at our attempts regardless."

"Then we've fulfilled our roles. The rest of the night is ours to do with as we will." He smiles fondly. "I have had Lan Wangji's cooking, by the way, but only when I was transformed into a child. You arrived after that. That's for the best -- I can still maintain an air of mature elegance around you."

"Oh, you know, that's exactly the two words I'd use to describe you if asked. Mature elegance."

"Brat," he says, smiling as he says it, brushing his shoulder against Grantaire's. "Thou shouldst have three words, at least. A food, a drink, and an animal."

He laughs. "You know, I do not recall at any point saying that I was somehow the ideal arbiter of them. Just that everyone has them." It's a lukewarm objection at best, though, as he has an immediate answer. "Soufflé. Cabernet. Raven."

"Soufflé!" He laughs. "Truly? So light and airy a dish?"

And that's a grin. "And see, even you help the comparison. You look at a soufflé and say, oh, it's a light an airy dish, which of course it is to look at, but it's also a dish that requires precision and care to make, and is tremendously rewarding when you succeed."

Claudius raises an arch eyebrow at that, impressed by the aptness of the metaphor and by how well it shows Grantaire knows him. It does nothing for the emotions still coiling in his chest, where he bids his heart beat a little quieter, he can hear his own pulse hammering in his ears. "Well," he says briskly, "then thou must be something tart and sweet, that can pair as well with savory dishes as desserts. A cherry compote with shredded ginger, mayhap."

He laughs, delighted. "And better when added to other dishes than on its own. I don't think I would have thought of it, but I like it. Very well-aimed."

"For a drink, thou art bourbon," Claudius continues, enjoying the sound of Grantaire's laugher far too much to stop now. "For an animal ... I would say thou wert a dog, but every dog is bred for a career. That would be too dull for thee, like being forced to study mathematics. Perhaps thou art one of those charming birds from overseas that can be taught to talk."

"A parrot makes entirely too much sense," he says with a grin. "Although unsurprisingly I'm wondering most about the drink. Why bourbon, of all of the varied options?"

Because you tasted of it the first time we kissed is, Claudius realizes, too personally embarrassing an answer to give. "It's my favorite drink," he says, which is no less embarrassing. "One of my favorites, but you feel more like a bourbon than a scotch."

Grantaire's eyebrows flicker upward in mild surprise, but his grin doesn't at all diminish. Quite the contrary, if anything. "A high honor indeed, to have secured a small corner on the shelf of favorites."

Claudius is two steps away from telling Grantaire I love you, and he can't even articulate to himself why that would be a bad idea. He just has the vague, instinctive sense that they're not there yet, without the slightest idea of what would bring them there. Perhaps it would be a fitting subject for philosophical debate. Perhaps not. "I'll let you catch up with your other admirers," he says instead. "Bourbon is best shared, I believe."

He grins. "A bottle of bourbon is indeed best shared. A whole House of Bourbon is, apparently, best overthrown, so it's probably best that there is just the one of me."

"Thou ridiculous sophist," Claudius says by way of farewell. By now, sophist has become his pet name for Grantaire.

Mothwing, back at her cat height, leaps onto Grantaire's table in order to be able to see and hear him properly.

"I'm not sure animals are better than twolegs," she says drily. "Cats haven't invented pancakes."

Grantaire looks a bit surprised at the sudden appearance of Mothwing but smiles easily at her point. "Ah, yes, we do have at least some compensation in our cooking to make up for our poorer digestive capabilities. You like pancakes, then?"

"I quite enjoyed them when I was Nina for the day," she meows, wrapping her tail around her legs. "What do you mean, our host spirits were generous with you? Being trapped here is hardly generous treatment."

"The recent generosity I referred to was that I switched with Temeraire and therefore got to actually fly, which I had never expected. As for being trapped here..." He shrugs. "If I weren't here, I'd be dead instead, so I prefer this. More generosity, I think."

"I did like the switching," Mothwing admits. "I, however, certainly wouldn't be dead, so I can't say I feel the same way." In fact, Mothwing wonders what will happens when she dies here. Can she still get to StarClan? Would she be going to StarClan in any case?

"I wouldn't expect you to under those circumstances. I'm fortunate, but I know there are many here who would much rather be back home where they belong."

"Not to say dying wasn't terrible," Mothwing meows a little belatedly. "I'm sorry that happened."

He shrugs. "As dying goes, I can think of worse ways. And much worse places to arrive afterward."

"There's definitely worse places you could go," Mothwing agrees. "How did you die, if you don't mind me asking?"

"It's a somewhat long and complicated story. To simplify it, though, my friends were trying to rise up against the leader of our country and... it didn't work out as they were hoping."

Mothwing's surprised. She hadn't thought this seemingly silly tom-twoleg was very serious, but he's a rebel?

"Really!" she exclaims. "Why were you rebelling?"

"They wanted to bring back the Republic. Um, put power to rule back in the hands of the people as a whole instead of just the king."

Mothwing's tail flicks as she studies his face. "Was the king unfair or cruel?"

He shrugs. "I'm probably not the best person for this, but... Well, as kings go, there were worse ones. But it had been a hard few years and there were a lot of people worse off than they had been when they hadn't even started off well. So it made things ripe for something to start. Besides, they'd say it was the principle of the thing. That even a good king, if there ever was such a thing, isn't as good as self-determination for the people. That if the people were to be driven into the ground, at least let them be the ones doing the driving."

Mothwing is silent for a long time thinking about this. "I definitely support driving out an unfair leader, but someone has to lead, surely. Otherwise what happens when the clan disagrees?"

He takes a long drink. "The general idea of the thing is that the people vote to choose a group of representatives who convene to make the larger decisions. And if the decisions are bad ones, well, at least the people had their say in the matter."

"So, elected leaders," meows Mothwing. "I guess it's not too bad of an idea, though it does seem like it would favor the most popular candidate over the wisest leader."

"Oh, absolutely, but hereditary kingship doesn't tend to favor wisdom either." He laughs a little and takes a drink. "Human beings are somehow generally averse to wise leadership, no matter how it's selected."

"In the clans, the leader picks a deputy from all the warriors who have already mentored an apprentice, and then the deputy takes over when the leader dies. It's not a perfect system, but it's better than hereditary. Of course, it does sometimes lead to deputies killing their own leaders, but leaders have nine lives, at least."

"Nine lives would definitely be a help there, yes. I think that's the sort of system that breaks down when the population gets too big, though. There are millions of people in France to attend to."

"Millions!" Mothwing pictures twolegs swarming like a school of minnows. "That's much too large for sensible organization, definitely. I think the largest a single clan has been is about fifty cats?"

He nods. "There are... layers of organizing. We do like to complicate things."

"Still. You believed in a cause and tried to change things, right? I have to respect that."

"Eh." He shrugs, shifting a bit in his seat. "My friends believed in a cause and tried to change things. I was mostly just there."

"Right." Mothwing's ears flick in distaste. "So you were just acting on blind orders?"

"No, that's not—" He shakes his head and takes a drink of his wine, his gaze flickering very briefly over towards Enjolras before returning to Mothwing.

"There was nothing blind about it¹ and I wasn't taking any orders. The... All of my friends were bound and determined to fight a fight I knew they wouldn't win. I was where they decided to do it. I could have left, but... Instead I just got drunk, passed out just long enough to miss the fighting, and woke up in time to not miss volunteering for the firing squad."

¹ Other than blind drunkenness?

Mothwing's gaze softens. "Oh, I see." Grantaire's like one of those poor ShadowClan apprentices who got swept up in Darktail's reign. She looks at Enjolras with interest. "So he was one of your friends who led the rebellion? And then you both ended up here?"

Grantaire nods. "He was the leader, really." He smiles a bit and waves his free hand in a loose circle. "All of this is to try to be like one of our meetings back home. With all the talking about anything, but less worrying about having a government to try and overthrow."

"Interesting." Mothwing will have to meet this Enjolras and see if he's anything like Spotfur. "It seems chaotic, but sort of fascinating."

"Oh, it is indeed both chaotic and fascinating. More fascinating because it's chaotic, in my opinion."

"I think I'm neutral on chaos."

"Well, better than being broadly against it. At least I think so."

"Agreed." Mothwing washes one ear with her paw and then gives Grantaire a nod. "Alright, well, it was nice to meet you. I'm going to go see what other chaos I can be neutral on."

He nods back and smiles. "Enjoy yourself. Feel free to let me know if you need anything while you're here."

As soon as Grantaire moves from talking about talking to making actual assertions, Shen Yuan whips out his little notebook and writes them down, and then sits, considering them, and ranking them by things he has a quick and immediate reaction to and things he has a longer and more complicated reaction to. He clears his throat, and then counts on his fingers:

"On one - can something not be both hilarious and to be avoided? On three - who the fuck was moving elephants across mountains? On five, you're right, and we should compare our conclusions about animals. On ten, you're right, but monsters are objectively better than both humans and animals. Oh, and to loop back on seven, I think it's incredibly bold of you to assert the pointlessness of metaphysical discussion in the middle of a self-professed pointless list of points." He sets his notebook down. "Reserving two, four, and six for discussions of their own. And you're just right about eight and nine, so we can ignore those."

Grantaire is delighted by engagement with several points at once so he immediately begins his rejoinders, ticking off on his fingers as he completes each point. "Why would you want to avoid something hilarious? Hannibal of Carthage against Rome during the Second Punic War. We can absolutely compare thoughts on animals. I have not had the pleasure to meet any monsters so can make no judgments there. And my assertion may be bold, but it isn't incorrect."

Shen Yuan mirrors him, keeping track on his hands. "Well, some hilarious things can also be dangerous, or lead to unintended consequences. Like Jackass. I've literally never heard of that guy, so he can't have been that good at war.¹ We'll loop back on the animal comparisons. You haven't met Drosera? And I'm not saying it's incorrect, I'm saying it's also meaningless, because to accept its pointlessness is to accept the pointlessness of this whole endeavor, and clearly you think this has some point." He punctuates last point with a meaningful glance toward Enjolras.

¹ Yes, it's definitely this and not that you just don't care about Western history if it hasn't been adapted into bad anime.

And we'll keep going point for point, then. "What's Jackass? It sounds amazing. You should look up the Punic Wars, I know there are some books in the library. He dragged a few dozen elephants across the Alps, only one ended up living past the war. I have met Drosera, but I'm not sure a griffin qualifies as a monster. Sometimes a thing may itself be pointless, but discussing the pointless thing has a point... Which then imbues a point to the pointless thing, I suppose, so that rounded quite neatly back on me."

Shen Yuan had kept his fingers up as Grantaire talked, and he folds down the last finger with a little smirk. "Point to me, then, on that one." Then he loops around to the beginning again. "Jackass is a kind of... public show where people do reckless and stupid things and hurt themselves for the entertainment of others. If I read anything about a guy called Hannibal it'll be the cannibal, not that dude. And if a griffin is not a monster, what does qualify?"

"Point to you on that one, yes. Jackass sounds... interesting. And appropriately named. There's a cannibal? I'd say a monster is more like a hydra, a harpy, a chimera. That type of thing. Nothing nearly as charming as Princess Drosera."

"SecUnit says it has some entertainment media stored, maybe some of it will be old Jackass. Hannibal Lector - the book's called Silence of the Lambs. Or at least the movie is, the book might be called something else. And I would argue—" he realizes that his last three points were more informational rather than actual arguments, so he puts some fire into this one. "—I would argue that before you'd met Her Highness, you would have put griffins on a list of monsters, and for that matter before you'd met Temeraire you'd have put dragons on one too. A monster doesn't stop being a monster just because they're charming. Sirens and succubi are monsters, but no one would deny their charms."

Grantaire just nods at the informational bits and then grins at the last bit. "Dragons I will certainly admit to, with apologies to our compatriot. And you may be right about griffins, even, although it's difficult for me to say for certain, as I never had need to craft such a list before. That said, it's definitely a different sort of charm, as sirens and succubi have actual powers of compulsion that outstrip simply being adorable."

"Sure," Shen Yuan admits, "Sirens and succubi are an extreme version of a charming monster. But even a monster like Drosera is cute because someone designed her to be cute. That's why monsters are better than both animals and people, because you get not only the cute or scary or fascinating appearance and personality and abilities, but you also get to think about the purpose for which they were made--whether by a single designer or the sort of, mass consciousness of humanity crafting a mythological being to suit a need."

"Huh. So you think it's a monster's... unreality, to simplify it a bit, that enhances them?"

"Exactly," says Shen Yuan. "Animals and humans evolved, right? But monsters--" he pauses. Which year is Grantaire from? "Hang on. Do you know about evolution?"

Darwin was in fact on his fateful Beagle expedition when Grantaire was killed. He would have, in fact, been in Rio de Janeiro. Therefore... "I've seen it mentioned offhandedly in a few books I've seen since I got here, but no, not in any substance. Please, go on."

"Okay, so. First of all, I'm not an evolutionary biologist. Or any kind of biologist, for that matter. But—in your future,¹ this guy Darwin is going to observe some animal behaviors that make him believe that—basically animals evolve into other animals, and humans evolved from animals of the past. Specifically monkeys of the past. Since then, scientists have found all sorts of fossils and other evidence that he's right, which of course pissed off and continues to piss off a bunch of people who think humans were made out of dust and ribs and whatever by God."

¹ Well, present.

He laughs. "Oh yes, that definitely sounds like something that people would get upset about. But really, when you think about it, humans as monkeys who lost most of their hair makes absolute sense. Traded it in for extra foolishness, I wager."

Shen Yuan laughs. "Pretty much. I think it's mostly bullshit we don't have tails. But my point is, like—humans and other real animals exist because we evolved characteristics that help us survive, and we did so over hundreds of thousands of years, and we sometimes still have weird vestigial stuff like appendixes or whatever. But monsters didn't evolve. They were created, like some people think humans were, and so everything about them has a reason, even if that reason is like, some guy somewhere thought it would be cool."

He nods and takes a drink, thinking it over. "All right, but on the other hand... if we're all fictional, we were created for a reason too, so would that make us like monsters?"

This is a great point, actually. "I wasn't sure you got the fictional memo," Shen Yuan admits. "But yeah, I guess? But fictional humans are still created in the image of real humans, as it were, which IMO precludes all the really interesting stuff. Like, nobody's shown up here with cool bat wings for a snake tongue¹ or whatever."

¹ You sure?

He shrugs. "I heard the speculation and then when Dionysus arrived, he informed me that I'm from a musical play¹. I figure it doesn't matter much here... which just informs my point about metaphysics. That said, maybe someone has bat wings or a snake tongue and just hasn't showed anyone."

¹ Dionysus clearly neglected to note that it was an adaptation, but as R just said, there is no such thing as a god that always actually knows what they're doing.

"True. And the second they do, they'll move up in my estimation—and, in my opinion, get more monstrous. You're from a musical?"

"So the more like a monster, the better. But not, I assume, in the normal ways that people can be monstrous. And yes, or at least that's what he said." He shrugs. "I've obviously never seen it."

"Nah, the normal ways of being a monster suck, obviously." Shen Yuan could expound on this, but it would probably involve Shen Qingqiu's body and human beauty vis a vis human evil, and that's a lot to get through to eventually just end up accidentally complimenting Airplane on character design. "Can you sing?"

He laughs and shrugs again. "I can sing¹, but not particularly well, and people aren't generally lining up to hear it."

¹ 'A rover, a gambler, a libertine, and often drunk, he annoyed these young thinkers by incessantly singing "I loves the girls and I loves good wine" to the tune of "Vive Henri IV."' You could make a case that Grantaire was at least partially in a musical even when nobody else was!

Edited (punctuations?!) 2024-03-06 18:58 (UTC)

"I suppose expecting people from a musical to be able to sing is like expecting people from Shakespeare to speak in iambic pentameter all the time," muses Shen Yuan. "The genre trappings are for the audience, not the lived experience of the characters. Hey, do you think you look like a specific actor that played you, or like a combination of every actor that's ever played you, or like the original writer of the musical imagined you in their head?"

"You know, I couldn't say. It's odd to think that I might be essentially stealing someone's face, though, so I'll lean towards the imaginings of the writer."

"Yeah, I get that," says Shen Yuan. "I know I look like the imaginings of the writer of where I come from, so I think everyone probably does, even when it's not a strictly prose source."

"It makes sense, I suppose. Unless, I suppose, my writer had an actor in mind, in which case¹..." He shrugs. "It doesn't make much difference in the end, I suppose."

¹It's a little more complicated than that, R, but don't worry GBlags's pretty little head over it.

Shen Yuan snorts. "Now we're getting back into the metaphysics paradox. Out of curiosity, what would you say does matter?"

"Oh, that's a tricky one, and it completely depends on your perspective. From the point of view of... the stars, let's say, I suppose nothing we concern ourselves with matters at all. What matters to me, though? Good food, good drinks, good fun... good friends. The last one most of all."

Shen Yuan grins. "Sure. I get it. It doesn't matter if the debate itself is pointless, because debate is a means to an end, and the end is friendship." Just like getting into arguments online. "I've been teaching Galahad to argue for fun."

He laughs a little. "Oh, are you? How is that going?"

"Pretty good, honestly," says Shen Yuan. "Mainly we've been arguing about food—noodles verses falafel."

"And who is taking which position?"

"He claims falafel is the superior food, when it couldn't be more obviously noodles."

"I see. Clearly the debate has come to no resolution yet."

Shen Yuan grins. "He's gathering more information by eating more types of noodles. Which really proves my point, because there's only the one type of falafel, and a food you can experience the entire breadth of in one sitting just doesn't compare to one you need probably days for."

Edited 2024-03-18 14:17 (UTC)

He laughs. "Possibly. Although I would be tempted to throw bread into the competition."

Shen Yuan makes a face. "Bread? That seems way too broad to be in the same contest. What kind of bread?"

He grins, amused. "What kind of noodle?"

Shen Yuan rolls his eyes. "Sure, fine. But noodles at least are a dish. Bread's an ingredient."

"Do you frequently eat noodles with no sauce or broth or anything?"

"Sauce and broth are how the noodle is prepared," counters Shen Yuan. "Bread is already prepared. You have to do more things to it in order for it to be good, but not for it to be food."

"Just because nobody wants to just boil noodles in water and have them plain doesn't make it impossible. Not good, but food."

Shen Yuan shakes his head, but he's grinning, getting into it, now. "Fine. If we say plain, boiled in water noodles vs plain, untoasted bread, that's its own comparison. But you can't compare either of those to falafel, because falafel is a finished and complex dish. Thus, the noodles we've been arguing about are noodles as a category of dish, not an ingredient, and bread cannot compete."

"Oh, if that's the case, then bread is also a category of dish inclusive of bread with things on top of it. Like a pissaladière."

"A piss--do you mean pizza?"

"What? No. It's named after pissalat, which is an anchovy paste. It's a bread with anchovies, onions, and olives."

That basically sounds like pizza but worse to Shen Yuan. "If it has another name other than bread, it's not bread anymore," he challenges.

"Oh, are you implying that exacting standard to noodles as well, then? Because I for one cannot think of a noodle that doesn't have a name other than 'noodle'."

Shen Yuan rolls his eyes. "Skill issue," he says. "Noodles,¹ noodles,² noodles,³ noodles⁴—" He frowns. "Wait, shit, the translator."

¹ Yóu miàn.
² Liáng miàn.
³ Lāo miàn.
⁴ Cū miàn.

He laughs. "I get the idea. France borders Italy, I could add several more. Which is exactly my point. Different noodles have different names just like different breads. So if you logically extend your restriction, you are at a disadvantage as well."

"Well, wait," says Shen Yuan, pivoting because Grantaire actually does have a point. "Okay. So if bread and noodles are the same, then falafel should be discounted, because it only has one name."

"I am not enough of an expert in falafel to say with any certainty, but it does seem as if it's a strangely dissimilar matchup. Comparing cabbages and carrots."

Edited 2024-03-30 17:46 (UTC)

Shen Yuan wrinkles his nose. "No, no, comparing cabbages and carrots is reasonable. They're both vegetables."

He blinks. "Oh! Oh, no, it's just a phrase¹. Of course you can actually compare vegetables, but I was being figurative."

¹Did I look up French equivalents to comparing apples and oranges? Yes. Yes I did.

"Oh, like the English expression apples to oranges," says Shen Yuan. "Sure, I'm familiar. I don't think there's really an equivalent in Chinese."¹ He twirls the end of his brain around one finger idly. "Bread and noodles, then."

¹ If there is, this typist can't find it!

Edited 2024-04-25 17:15 (UTC)

"Bread and noodles. Although maybe you could compare falafel with your favorite noodles."

Shen Yuan's favorite noodles are obviously the ones Binghe made on their first date, but comparing any food with Binghe-crafted food really is cheating, and anyway Galahad probably wouldn't eat those noodles without this argument becoming distinctly less fun. Shen Yuan's second favorite noodles are the ones from the takeout place by his meimei's apartment with spicy pork and green onion, and his third favorite noodles are cup noodles with a perfectly softboiled egg. Of those three, the last ones are really the only replicable ones, because they're the least context-specific. But eliminating two vastly superior kinds of noodle just because they're context-specific is deeply dissatisfying to him. "Hm. We should figure out a way to determine the scientifically best kind of noodle, and then compare that with falafel."

"Is there a scientifically best kind of noodle? It seems to me just as subjective as the entire exercise is in the first place."

Shen Yuan rolls his eyes. "Oh, so now we're just admitting to things being subjective?? Doesn't that undercut the whole purpose of arguing in the first place?"

"If something isn't subjective, there is no point in arguing it. Someone trying to argue that adding two and two results in sixty just looks like an idiot."

"But you can argue that something is objectively better than something else, because if you're saying that it's just subjectively better you're not arguing at all, you're just stating an opinion really loudly."

"And you're under the impression you can't argue about opinions?"

"Not if you acknowledge them as subjective," argues Shen Yuan, "because to acknowledge something as subjective means it's, like, personal and formed from the other person's experiences, and I can't argue with your experiences because I'm not the one that had them."

"Yes, but if your opponent is arguing in good faith, a compelling enough argument could sway them regardless, if you make a point that has not occurred to them despite their personal experiences. Because you also bring your own personal experiences to it and in arguing, you both have the opportunity to share the benefits of your own individual experiences."

"Yeah, obviously, but that's just another way of saying that you're making them see the objective truth of your argument," counters Shen Yuan. "The more you can make them see something, the closer they're getting to having the objectively correct opinion."

"No, the closer they're getting to sharing your subjective opinion, and even then they'll likely not share it in all particulars, which makes things much more interesting, as makes for a fuller spectrum."

Shen Yuan frowns, slightly. "But if your opinion clarifies and shifts theirs because of the arguments you're making or the perspective you're bringing, doesn't that make it a more objective opinion than theirs?"

"Or you just have a convincing argument. But then, perhaps the definition of objectivity has shifted between our times."

Shen Yuan rolls his eyes. "Oh, so now there's subjective definitions of objectivity? Please."

"It's hard to tell. After all, you seem to have one."

"You don't?"

"Objective is objective. Objectively, you're taller than I am. Opinions are in the realm of subjectivity. Subjectively, pinball is more entertaining to play than Smash Brothers."

This pinball opinion is so clearly designed to get a rise out of Shen Yuan he almost admires it. "No, subjectively you find pinball more fun to play. Smash is objectively a better game, despite your personal taste, it just has a higher learning curve, especially for someone with no other video game or television experience. That doesn't make you wrong about which one you enjoy more."

"Oh? I am curious then, as to what the objective criteria are that make one game better than another."

"Fun is one thing, obviously. But there's also stuff like quality of visual design, replayability, responsiveness of the controls, how engaging it is for a breadth of people, how long-lived it is. Storyline, if applicable. How well the game does what it's designed to do." It's actually a little hard to come up with criteria that work for both Smash and pinball,¹ but he's not going to admit that. They'll just get back into the noodles vs bread fight.

¹ Almost like this isn't how anything works, dude.

"... Quality of visual design. So chess as a game improves if the pieces are carved more intricately?"

"Sure," says Shen Yuan. "Doesn't it improve the experience for the players, if they're having both an aesthetically and strategically pleasing time?"

"But it's still the same game. A minor aesthetic difference doesn't make a substantive change to the quality of the game¹."

¹Despite what EA might tell you with its iterative sports franchises.

"But it's all cumulative. Aesthetic doesn't outweigh strategy or anything else, but if you put a cool pinball machine with beautiful art and lights and bells that work next to one that's plain and dull, and they both work exactly the same, wouldn't you say the beautiful one is better?"

"I would personally enjoy the more lively one more, yes. But I don't know if I'd call that objective. Someone who finds loud noises intolerable, for instance, may well prefer the plainer one. It may in fact be the only way they could enjoy pinball at all."

For a second Shen Yuan imagines Galahad playing pinball on the plainest, saddest pinball machine of all time, and then waves it away to continue arguing. "But them not enjoying loud, beautiful pinball doesn't make the machine less beautiful, and doesn't change the fact that the vast majority of people would choose something aesthetically pleasing over something that isn't."

"Of course. But that just makes it a very common opinion, not an objective fact. Facts make the structure of existence but it's the opinions that decorate it and actually make it interesting."

"Okay," says Shen Yuan, crossing his arms. "Let's pretend that's true. Tell me a fact."

"Earth is mostly covered in water."

This is, Shen Yuan has to admit, a pretty good fact, but he soldiers on. "How do we know?"

"A great number of people in boats making maps."

Shen Yuan blinks. "Right, you're—right. I forgot I was speaking from future privilege. See, I know because a great number of people worked together to send a small number of people to space and they took photographs of it."

"Well, that's remarkable. Quite the opportunity."

"Yeah, it's wild," says Shen Yuan. "Anyway—I'm not arguing that the Earth isn't mostly covered in water, I'm not, like, a flat-earther or whatever. But that's a fact because it's a consensus of experiences. Both your boat guys and my astronauts observed the world and drew conclusions about it, and those conclusions were backed up by everyone who used the boat maps to navigate or whatever, everyone who looked at pics of the earth, and the consensus of that became the fact. And if you told that fact to—I don't know, someone from far further back than anyone here, before they'd made all your boat maps, they'd disagree, because it conflicts with their consensus reality."

"I admit I am now curious as to what your line between fact and opinion is."

"It's not really like there's a line," says Shen Yuan. "It's like—every opinion and experience is closer or further from the objective truth of a thing, including factual reality, and an opinion becomes more or less correct as it moves closer or farther from that objective truth."

Edited 2024-05-13 16:30 (UTC)

"Ah, I see. Plato's shadows on the cave wall, then."

Shen Yuan has never read Plato's republic, but he's been online in his life, so he gets the reference. "Basically. You disagree?"

"Oh, I'll happily disagree with anything," he says with a grin. "That said, I think some things are inherently subjective. 'Better', for instance, is firmly in the field of opinion, even if that opinion is a near universal consensus."

Shen Yuan shakes his head. "I just think there's two kinds of better," he says, "better objectively in terms of nearness to, like Plato's Truth or whatever, and then better for specific people, based on their unique experiences and how much they like flashing lights or whatever."

"But something that is truly objectively better wouldn't be able to be worse for specific people based on their unique experiences, or it wouldn't be objective. Something actually objective is true regardless of personal experience. Therefore I put forth that far fewer things are objective than most people think, and even those bare facts that are widely regarded as objectively true still do have the potential to need refinement based on further discovery."

"Well—" Shen Yuan shifts, uncomfortable. It's true that something he's always considered objective, unshakeable fact (Luo Binghe is the hottest man in any world and anyone would fall at his feet and spread their legs if given half a chance to know him carnally) has proven to be both much more subjectively true (Shen Yuan is himself interested in knowing hot men carnally) and untrue for other people (many people here who are interested in men are somehow not interested in knowing Luo Binghe carnally, or at least not as interested as they should be).

But—that doesn't mean he's ready to let go of the idea that being interested in Luo Binghe is more correct than not being interested. Because it is. And he suspects Grantaire might have a similarly subjective sticking point. "So—for example. You're saying there's no objectively most beautiful man at this Mansion."

Well there is absolutely zero doubt that Grantaire's gaze is inevitably going to stray to Enjolras at that question. "I am saying exactly that, although I certainly have a personal preference."

Shen Yuan shakes his head. "Damn, I really thought you were enough of a simp to fold on that one."

"How boring the world would be if everyone had the same tastes as I did." A brief pause. "And how annoyed Enjolras would be at the legions of people hanging on his every word," he adds with a wry grin.

Shen Yuan shakes his head. "Not everyone's cut out for six hundred wives." He's not sure Enjolras could handle one wife, even a male one, but that seems rude to say to the guy currently gunning for the position.

"I think it's safe to say most people aren't cut out for six hundred wives."

Shen Yuan could point out that this is another point in Binghe's favor—he might not have actually loved any of his wives, but he'd created a sustainable harem system out of an unbelievably complicated and badly written political situation through the use of his big brain and bigger dick. But he's not sure it would do any good for Grantaire, who seems to have undermined his entire concept of argument in the last... however long they've been arguing. He makes a face, sips his drink, and changes the subject. "Why is all of the rooms changing here a net positive?" He taps his notebook. "Point two."

Edited 2024-05-29 16:05 (UTC)

"I thought that one was obvious enough. If we're in the confines of one main building and its grounds, if nothing changed it would be absolutely dull and intolerable long-term. Yes, occasionally where you were going is in a new spot, but it's usually close enough to find easily and you get to have used your brain for a bit."

Well, okay, how come now Shen Yuan, who had spent 90% of his first life in basically the same building and the majority of his second life begging off anything that would take him out of his cute little bamboo house where his favorite disciple brought him delicious snacks, is being forced to yet again consider that his experiences are not universal??? He was trying to change the subject!

But, wait, is this a chance to give Grantaire a taste of his own medicine? "It would be intolerable for you," he points out. "Others may prefer the stability of rooms staying where they are, or a more Logical—" borrowing the capital L from Kade, "—means of attaining food, and drink, and books, and games than vague wishes and guesswork. Can you really say it's objectively better?"

"Oh, of course not," he says with a delighted grin. "Everything I said was a potential topic for discussion. You're absolutely right. I'm sure there are some people who wouldn't like it at all. I'd disagree, but I'm also someone who liked going places before here." He considers. "Thinking on it, I did assign objective status to one of my topics, but you immediately agreed with me on that one anyway."

Shen Yuan flips back through his notes, then nods. "Right. I don't even think I could fake an objection that humans are better than animals, because then it's like, better for what, and neither humans nor animals are good because they're good for something. They're just good."

"Although I will say that Mothwing disagreed with that particular point on the basis that humans were the ones who invented pancakes. So we're good for that, at least."

"Pancakes are good," Shen Yuan allows. Grantaire keeps tricking him into agreeing with him about innocuous things, like, inside his arguments, which is a very frustrating way to argue. And then he's suddenly struck with an extremely adorable image. "Wait, Mothwing eats pancakes?"

"She had pancakes when she was caught up in the body switching, and apparently enjoyed them quite a lot. What an interesting event that was in general."

After Shen Yuan destroyed her nest, Ragnelle has been staying inside. She needs to find another outdoor place to live in, but she's too slow-blooded to construct one by herself, now that she's back in her own body. So, for the meantime, she's in the mansion (and crabby about it).

She's been visiting the cafe periodically to steal all available pastries, and when she sees the commotion going on now she pokes her head inside.

"Mary! An thou wilt argue the merit of worms and little crawling things thou might yet be worth knowing."

He shoots Ragnelle a grin. "Well, I don't get into lengthy conversations with them, but I can easily admit they do what they do to perfection."

"An oversight, sirrah, they have much to speak on."

"I do not doubt that, but I share a defect with most men in that my ears don't work nearly as well as my mouth does."

"Ay, Men do love talking before all other things."

"Unfortunately true. We have a compulsion to fill the air with nonsense. I at least do have clarity enough to recognize it as nonsense, even if that doesn't dissuade me. But now you have me curious. What do the worms have to say for themselves?"

"How tastes the soil and whether it will rain, and mainly complaints about moles. Practical things."

"That makes perfect sense. Do the moles complain in turn about the worms, then?"

"Wherefore shouldst moles complain? They eat of the worms."

"They might like eating other things better, but worms are just more available. If you're just eating worms every day, you might get bored of them."

"Then have they acorns, which will not wriggle away. Fie, sir."

"I bow to your superior knowledge, in that case," he says with a smile, dipping his head in accordance. "The moles have a nice and varied diet, and I'm sure they delight in the worms as a result."

Ragnelle looks very pleased to have had her superior knowledge bowed to. "What other arguments hast thou?"

"Oh, I have arguments for nearly anything you might imagine. Is there anything you feel particularly inclined to argue about?"

"What color are cats in the dark?"

"Whatever color they want to be."

In typical Ragnelle fashion, she is annoyed that he didn't run with the innuendo, and she gives him a Look to let him know. "Mary, I'll remember to choose green next time."

He laughs and shrugs, as he is a man very used to getting annoyed Looks. "That would be an unexpected surprise, to be sure."

"So thou sayst."

"So I do. Of course, I am generally unreliable and not to be trusted, so that does put a slight wrinkle in it."

"So untrustworthy as that, sirrah? On what grounds, then, should I believe thine own report of thy character?"

"Quite the conundrum. I'd say you probably shouldn't, although that would then logically lead to the conclusion that you should, but then that contradicts my statement as well. So really, you can only use your own judgment, which is almost certainly better than my own in any case."

"It would please thee to hear me call thee foolish, so I'll give thee not the satisfaction."

"Well, I suppose it won't be the first time I've had to wait for satisfaction."

"That's a better answer. An thou'rt practiced thou hast certes some measure of fortitude in thy flesh."

"As much as I've needed, on the whole."

"The better to be mounted, since thou'rt an ass. There, that's mercy."

Grantaire laughs. "Mercy indeed, and truthful at that. I could hardly ask for more."

"Now then. I'm hungry; stand not in my way."

"I wouldn't dream of impeding you having your fill."

Beware, Grantaire, she is going to fill her pockets with charcuterie. On the other hand, there's not much he could do to stop her, so his gracious acquiescence is probably the best way to stay on her good side.

Temeraire would not miss such a meeting for the world! Especially not if one of his dearest friends in the mansion is hosting it. To that end, there is a window open near where Enjolras is seated, with a large bowl of tea and --whatever kind of noodles Temeraire requested of the host. Finger foods are difficult when you've no fingers to speak of, after all. The dragon in question has his head shoved through the window, listening to Grantaire's ramblings with some bemusement.

After he gets a moment to refill his drink and move on from whatever he was talking about, Grantaire looks over at Temeraire. "I know it wasn't your choice, Temeraire, but I still want to thank you for the use of your wings. It was amazing in all particulars."

Temeraire's not sure, but he was certainly listening, even if he didn't understand half of it. "Oh! You are quite welcome of course; but neither of us had any say in it. If you are thanking me for that, I suppose I must thank you for the use of your hands." He sounds amused.

"My hands were, I'm sure, grateful for the opportunity to help." He pauses. "By the way, what on earth did you have me wearing?"

"Oh, it was quite a fine robe that I found in the closet there. I wanted something green, without buttons: they are too difficult."

He contemplates that for a moment. "I suppose buttons would be tricky if you'd never used them before."

"Yes. Your hands are quite different than mine, you know."

He laughs a little. "I am very aware, having borrowed them for a day."

"Did you not like the robe? I thought the green was quite pretty, it almost matched Laurence's coat."

"Oh, it was quite a fine robe! It's just... very different from anything I'm used to wearing, if you'll excuse my French barbarism."

"Well," he sniffs, but it is said with all fondness. "The French cannot help it, I suppose."

He laughs brightly. "You're right. We are insufferable."

"Very much so, especially when one is fighting a war against France."

"One you end up winning, at least."

"I don't believe we've met!"

He's pretty sure he would remember a dragon.

"Oh! No, I do not think we have, hallo," Temeraire says cheerfully. "I am Temeraire."

“Wonderful to meet you, I am Dionysus, god of Drama! I’m sorry you have to peer in through the window.”

“It is alright; it is only that it is uncomfortable for me to be inside the building properly for too long, and besides, I should take up all the space if I was inside.” He lowers his head to take a delicate lap of tea, like a large cat. “What does a god of drama do? I have never met any god before.”

“Ah, well…” Darn good question. “Mostly I have fun. I know a lot about theatre. I’m also the god of wine.”

That one has much more obvious powers, and he makes a few vines grow as an example.

"Oh! I have only ever been to the theatre once, in China." He hesitates and watches the vines grow curiously. "I hope not all plays ended as that one did, it was not pleasant. But perhaps that was not the fault of the play."

"Only once! My dear that simply won't do!" If Dionysus had it his way he would take this dragon to a show right this second. Alas.

He's about to ask if the play was a tragedy, but then Temeraire mentions it might not have been the play's fault itself, and now he's intrigued. "What happened at the end?"

"Well, it is not as though I would be allowed, in England," he says, a little petulant. "Oh, Prince Yongxing was killed. But he should not have had that man attack Laurence, I was only protecting my captain."

Give him a minute, there’s a lot to unpack here.

“I… promise that’s not how most plays end.” Usually.

There is, and he hasn’t even gone into the meat of it yet.

“Oh! Well, that is good, it would be quite inconvenient if they all ended so, I think.”

“Usually they just end with a round of applause for the cast and crew.” Deserved or otherwise.

“Why doesn’t England let you go to a show?”

"A crew?" He looks a little befuddled. "Surely they do not have a dragon-crew in every play, or a ship's crew. Are there crews for plays, as well?"

Dragons have crews? He makes a mental note to inquire about that later.

“The actors, bless their little souls, can’t do everything on their own. Some can hardly manage the bare minimum if we’re being honest. You need people to run the lights! The sound! To help them get dressed and in makeup and move the sets and build the sets in the first place, to make everything start on time, to make sure everybody knows what to do and where to go and when to go there. It’s a very big operation, you know.”

Yes, but he has none of his here, sadly enough. "Ah! I see. I have never seen anyone put on makeup before, is it terribly difficult? It sounds as though it must be a very big operation."

"Well that depends on the makeup! Sometimes it's fairly easy and straightforward, but sometimes if it's for a particularly involved role they might have to do something like glue a prosthetic on, or do a very detailed paint job, or both! We used to just wear masks, but times evolved and now it's something of a rarity for a production to have masks at all."

"Oh, that is fascinating. Are there very many colors of paints and the like?"

"Oh, any color you can imagine! Different finishes as well, some are matte, some shiny, there's ways to get a glossy look, truly whatever someone wishes or requires is possible."

"I see," Temeraire replies with great interest. "It is usually -- what ladies paint themselves with, is it not? Most of the ladies I know do not do that sort of thing."

He frowns. "It doesn't have to be only ladies, you know."

"Oh! I did not know, I am sorry. I have only ever heard a very little about it."

"Oh, no need to worry! It can be great fun; some people like the artistry behind it, some people like it as a way to emphasize the features they're most proud of, but regardless it's great fun! I've only just arrived recently, but as soon as I find some I can come and show it to you, if you'd like? Perhaps something that might match that lovely necklace you're wearing?"

"Oh!" Temeraire preens a little, pleased. "It is quite fine, isn't it? My captain gave it me, and here I am small enough to wear it again."

He has so many questions.

"You used to be even bigger?"

"Oh, yes, at home I am the size of a frigate-ship at least: here, why, I am scarcely bigger than a hatchling."

"Heavens! That must be why you keep mentioning a crew!" He pauses, a realization coming to him. "Do... do they treat you like you're a ship?"

He huffs out a sigh and takes a sip of tea, shaking his head. "I am a part of the aerial corps, in England -- that is what is done with dragons there. In China, where I am properly from -- it is not so, Celestials such as myself are companions to the imperial family, and dragons are treated the same as men."

"...Yeah, that does check out for England, historically speaking," he responds, more than a little glumly. "I'm sorry you've had to deal with that, my friend."

He gives the draconic equivalent of a shrug, but it's difficult to see since the majority of his body is outside. "My captain and I shall change it, do not worry."

"They sound like a truly good person then! With great taste in jewelry."

"It is the first thing he bought me," Temeraire says with some fondness. "And he is the best of men, I am his as he is mine."

"How sweet!" A hand goes to his heart, touched. "I should like to meet him one day!"

"Oh, I have been looking for him: he was lost overboard, before I arrived, but I shall find him." He is well aware of how naive that sounds, but he is determined regardless. "Laurence cannot be dead, I would know it."

Dionysus can feel his eyes starting to tear up. "May Poseidon bring him to safety. I know all too well the pain of losing a cherished partner."

"Oh, I am quite certain he is all right. I must only find him; I have done it before."

"I wish you all the luck in the world, my dear."

"Ah, thank you." He inclines his head graciously. "Though, I cannot get home; but perhaps he might arrive here."

"Oh I do hope so!"

The nature of this place to bring people back from the dead works in Temeraire's favor in this instance, he thinks. It's not unheard of for someone to survive being tossed overboard, but under normal circumstances it would definitely lower the likelihood of a reunion. Here though that doesn't seem to matter, all that matters is the whims of who-or-whatever is deciding to draw in new housemates.

"How are you faring in the winter weather, if I may ask?"

It would, but he has thought Laurence dead before; and they came out alright in the end. His hope is not altogether that naive.

"Oh, I am quite fine, thank you. My pavilion has lovely heated floors, and there are tapestries upon the walls as well to keep in the heat."

"Good news then! I was worried for you, in my experience reptiles don't have the easiest time with colder weather. But it sounds like you've got quite the snuggly home to stay in!"

"Temeraire, hello," Claudius says casually, sidling up to the dragon. It's difficult to sidle up to someone whose head is coming through the window, but he manages. "Let me ask you a question. "Let me ask you a question. If you had to depose a tyrant, with the resources you have here, how would you go about it?"

“Why, my dear fellow, I am a resource, am I not?” He sounds mildly amused, stretching to lap up a few more sips of tea. “You have seen a little of what I am capable of, I think, and surely there are enough here that can manage weapons should it come to that. I have lead squadrons, I could be a captain if I must.”

“Well-said.” Claudius smiles appreciatively. “Bravely, too. It’s easy to forget the resources we have, and you’ve been here from the beginning. I’ve always been one for cloak-and-dagger secrecy, trading in favors and alliances, rather than risking open combat. But my alliances have since become simple friendships, and I see the benefits of openness in them. You’d be an inspiration to anyone who fears we’re outmatched. And you’ve always had friends among your comrades-in-arms, haven’t you?”

"I've also my harness, if it should come to that. I cannot put it on myself, there are many belts and buckles, but I think between Enjolras and Galahad and I we could set it to rights." Temeraire has never been one for the more subtle side of politics, he leaves that to ambassadors and the admiralty, and does what he thinks is right, generally. "Of course," he adds. "Aside from --ugh, Caesar, I suppose, but his captain is an awful man so it is no surprise that Caesar is the same."

Momentarily Claudius covers his face with a long-fingered hand, ears burning bright red, before clearing his throat. "My apologies," he says, straightening. "I'm envisioning Galahad dragonback. It would be a thing to behold, to be sure. Now tell me about Caesar?"

Temeraire looks briefly perplexed; what could be so distressing about Galahad riding him? "He is the son of Arkady and Wringe, and we brought his egg to Australia with us so as to help start an aerial corps there. Arkady was insistent that his egg should have a very rich captain, and I suppose that Caesar took that to heart; as he immediately enquired after Rankin's prospects as soon as he met him." If a dragon could roll his eyes, Temeaire would be.

"Rankin is --an awful man. He abused and starved poor Levitas, his old dragon, and did not even care when Levitas was dying; he was not even there until Laurence made him go."

Edited 2024-03-25 21:53 (UTC)

Crowley is a demon on a mission. "Hey," he says, nodding at Temeraire. "Long time no talk. What do you think of all of this?"

"I think it is quite enlightening! I am enjoying spending time with everyone, though I do not think it is very much what Enjolras expected. He has told me all about his friends at home."

"Sorry, I don't think it's enlightening at all," Crowley says, with purpose. "Who's said anything new that we haven't heard a thousand times already?"

"Well, I do not know about you, of course, but this is certainly the first time I have ever been to a gathering such as this."

"Would you really call it a gathering, though? The word gathering implies a specific purpose. A bit of cohesiveness." He gestures around expansively.

"Well, yes, people are gathered here, are they not? For the purpose of Enjolras' meeting."

"Hmm," Crowley says, with a hint of disapproval, eyeing the wallflowers and people just there to listen. "Depends on your definition of purpose, I suppose."

"There is a meeting, and people are here for it -- whether it is to talk, or to listen, or to please Enjolras, then that is their purpose, I would suppose."

Laertes, choosing violence, offers to the general throng a series of questions for discussion: "Ought any to govern this place? If so, what means of governance is best? Monarchy, democracy, republic, or another still? What strictures might we place upon those who govern, that their power not tempt them to tyranny?"

"You already know my thoughts on the matter," Enjolras says mildly. "I would, personally, tend more towards the side of a republic or something more democratic, but I cannot and will not make such decisions without hearing the thoughts of others regarding this. I do not wish to hold power, particularly, but I might be convinced to participate if there was a group endeavor."

Laertes nods in assent. "I'm not sure that this place requires rule--but like musicians working in concert, we may do well to know our parts, and to perform them to the greater joy of all."

"It may not, at that. We seem to have been doing reasonably well so far, despite all this place has decided to throw at us."

"I think it doesn't much matter," Grantaire points out, "as regardless of what we decide, our mysterious benefactors will confound all our efforts somehow, like monthly clockwork."

"Better, then, not to vest all our decisions in one person who might be reduced to an infant or a chicken at any time."

"Huh. Why haven't we turned into chickens yet? Have they just not gotten there on their list at this point?"

"We must presume it."

"Which of course begs the question. Does everyone become chickens, or is it a wide variety of animals?"

"Thine earlier argument suggests that each person hath an animal most suited to them."

"Which is patently true, although that doesn't mean those will be followed."

"To be transformed into creatures unsuited to our souls--there is no greater insult," says Laertes gravely.

"It's a challenge indeed, but it would, at least, be a short one."

Susan has poked her head in to the event, just to see what sort of crowd has gathered, and arrives right on time to hear Laertes's question. She can't quite stop herself from rolling her eyes extravagantly.

Laertes just raises his brows at her, a clear invitation to voice whatever perspective she's smothering.

Susan sits down at his table. She's not interested in a broader discussion, but to Laertes alone, she says, "This rather strikes me as the sort of question designed to forestall taking any necessary actions. What alternative would you propose? Anarchy?"

"Nay," says Laertes. "A sharing out of responsibilities, each of us working by the means that suit us best, to attain our mutual happiness. Such things, I think, can be done without governance--and indeed, are being done already."

"But what of the thankless tasks no one wishes to do?"

Laertes sits back in his chair, taking a long drink of his lemon water. "Dost feel thy tasks are thankless?"

Susan certainly doesn't see anyone else lining up to do them! The fact that she does genuinely enjoy them seems to be a mark in favor of Laertes's argument, though, so she raises her eyebrows at him. "Would you like to take them over?"

"I know not what they are," he says.

"Resource management," Susan says, immediately, ticking items off on her hands as she goes. "Inventory, infrastructure, organization, cataloguing supplies and changes in supplies, making an accounting of the shifts in this world... conducting and interpreting censuses, identifying skills, interests, and strengths, narrowing down the possible and impossible, seeking to understand the gaps in all of the above." She stops there, though she could keep going, because she has run out of fingers.

"I knew none of this," says Laertes, marveling. "Where hast thou shared thy findings?"

"In conversation, mostly," Susan admits. She'd spoken of it a little with Laertes at his wedding dance - or at least hinted at it - but he shall be forgiven for not remembering the particularities that night. "I've documented it all, of course." She's on her third notebook now. "But I've not yet collated a final report."

"Perhaps, were thy labors shared with the house at large, thine efforts would be better rewarded," says Laertes. "I remember thou hadst said thou wert working on a project a little like that, but had no idea of its breadth of scope. Thy work is to the benefit of all; let all see it, that all can benefit and praise thee as thou deservest."

"Oh, I'm not doing it for recognition or praise," Susan says, clearly a little startled at the very idea. "I'm doing it because it needs doing." This has always been the way: in Narnia and in England, her siblings would do the awesome, eye-catching sorts of deeds, and Susan was there to do the supporting work that they didn't realize was needed. Some (as she is beginning to think) was perhaps a little misguided - the ferocious fights over whether Narnia was real come to mind, for example - but she's used to being paid primarily by internal satisfaction.

"Then it seems thou hast answered thine own question--the thankless tasks are thine, because thou needst not thanks for them."

"And so if more necessary but undesirable tasks emerge, they become mine simply because I've already taken on the few that I am committed to?" Susan asks. "If tasks must be delegated, then surely there must be someone to do the delegating."

"No one delegated these tasks to thee," Laertes points out. "No one else even thought them tasks. Thou didst make and seize them willingly."

Susan gives Laertes a long look. She inclines her head, willing to accept that she did create her own set of chores as part of a means to claw her way out of the hole she'd been nesting in when she first arrived. "How many here have true leadership experience?" she asks. "Say - at least several years, in a position of power and governance, who must make truly impactful decisions on behalf of a people?"

"Some few," says Laertes. "Claudius, Janet, Luo Binghe, Aleksandr; Tress, for a lesser time. But my lady, the question is not which of us should rule. It's whether rule is needed. And I contend that, in a place where all is provided for us, it is not."

Susan has her own opinions about whose experience counts, but she keeps it to herself; Laertes needn't know she only truly trusts herself and Janet with this sort of thing. "And if the provided resources here are finite, and we've just not yet discovered the limit?" she asks.

"Then what would a singular leader offer that could not be done equally well collectively?"

"And who said the leader must be singular?" Susan might have more leadership experience than most here, but it's not as if she was ever alone in her efforts for more than a month or two, whilst her siblings dealt with issues abroad. "Are you suggesting a form of libertarian socialism?"

"I know not what that means," Laertes admits.

Ah. Ah! Very well. Susan reminds herself, sternly, that these discussions are meant to be in fun, though it's rather startling to consider that men who think to debate political theory mightn't be familiar with the most basic forms of it. She wouldn't consider herself an expert on the subject, by any means, but at least she's taken a few classes delving into such things. She takes a deep breath. "What school of thought do you draw from, then?"

"I think that school of thought comes from after my time, and my researches have not yet uncovered it," says Laertes.¹ "There is something of the republican in my thoughts--I have learned of a republicanism in France and in America that builds upon the Roman model--but the efficiencies of a republic seem best suited to a much larger scale than ours. There is something, too, to be said for Athenian democracy, but again, I know not that it would suit our purposes to be ruled utterly by majority. I know only this: I have witnessed a court ruined by a bad king. I have no desire to live under one again."

¹ Laertes desperately needs to read some Hannah Arendt.

Susan takes another deep breath and releases it slowly, urging her hackles to go down. "And what, in your estimation, makes a leader good or bad?"

"King Hamlet was a warlike king," says Laertes, "and more than that, his wars were meant to swell Denmark's territories, and to end rebellions. Dost thou see how such a project pits a king against his people? He must always see them as both subjects and foes, and any act that he did not authorize must thus be answered as an uprising. If thou hast read Machiavelli, thou wilt recognize his type--a man who preferred to be feared rather than to be loved.

"But it does not end there," continues Laertes, and his voice is beginning to shake. "If thy subjects must always be treated as foes in waiting, then it is the duty of those with subtler craft to find out where rebellion lurks ere it can be fanned to a blaze. It is their duty to descry every secret, and thus they must listen at every arras, spy through every peephole, read every missive passed between friends--for in any of those, the spark of rebellion may be burning. Or perhaps not even rebellion! Perhaps only imperfection. Perhaps only thought that there might be a fucking place on Earth where the world might be different, and better--because the thought that things might be better is in fact the seed and fount of rebellion--"

"Laertes," says Susan, sharply, not worrying one whit about interrupting him. "Stop. Breathe."

He inhales through his nose. "What I mean to say," he finishes carefully, "is that I am sure King Hamlet thought himself a paragon of leadership."

"Many men do," says Susan. "Few men are." She wants to ask, again, what Laertes might imagine a good leader should be like, but she doesn't want him to work himself into a lather about it.

"Would Christine de Pizan could build us a City of Ladies here," says Laertes wryly. "Alas, the virtue of Reason is absent."

"The issue, I think, is those who seek leadership as a means to consolidate power, rather than to serve those they lead," says Susan, and then, after considering and discarding at least four different continuations of the topic, all of which involve her making assumptions about his intention, takes several steps backward. "What would your primary objective be, in the functioning of our little society?"

"That all should be as happy as they may be, and no more troubled than the natural course of human life dictates," he answers.

"And what sort of practicalities might be needed to achieve that?"

"That all should have the means to provide for their own needs," says Laertes.

"And if one person's need runs counter to another's?"

"What conflict dost thou imagine?" Laertes asks. He has the feeling of being herded, and he likes it considerably less when Susan does it than when Szarka does it.

Susan truly isn't working any particular angle - she's just trying to understand Laertes's perspective, so that she might respond to it appropriately. At his question, she blinks. "I'm not certain," she admits, and thinks for a moment. "Most examples I could draw on would be appropriate from the world I came from, not necessarily this one, beyond the normal sort - need for space counter to someone's need for companionship, and the like. I imagine, though, that from a group of people who largely share little background, there might be different understandings of what constitutes a need, and what ways are appropriate to seek fulfilling them."

"That's true," says Laertes easily enough. "For some of these conflicts, I fear we must do as we have ever done, and resolve them amongst ourselves. If I want space, and another wants my companionship, I would take it very ill to be compelled to provide it."

"And what if someone does behave reprehensibly?" Susan wonders. "We haven't got clearly-established laws, nor a way of responding to the breaking of them. I'd hazard to guess that, because of the disparities in our backgrounds, we'd find little consensus on appropriate forms of punishment."

"That does trouble my thoughts. Claudius was himself ill-used by another here--tortured with his own blood as the scourge. But I know none who could have compelled his torturer by force, should he not have chosen to end it of his own accord."

Susan gives Laertes a long, penetrating look. "Is this the source of your initial question?"

"In part," says Laertes, "but in larger part, I wanted to give Enjolras a taste of home."

This, Susan takes into account with a shallow nod. She says, "When you were studying the French and American republics, what sort of time frame did you focus on?"

"Their foundation, through to the Terror," Laertes answers.

"Oh, so early stages indeed," Susan nods. This, too, squares with what she knows of Enjolras. "I suppose that sort of thing is a fine ideal but in practice, I've got... concerns."

"Ay, France soon found itself beneath an emperor; I would not doubt but America did the same. They did, after all, follow the model of Rome."

"What? No," Susan says, frowning. "America's was still well-enshrined when I arrived here from 1950, and from what I've read since my arrival, it will continue to be thus for some while. And France's returned, eventually, and even England had her Reform Acts, which have slowly been shifting the balance of power from the king to the prime minister, and from the House of Lords to the House of Commons, for decades. No, I speak of universal suffrage." (Aunt Alberta might be intolerable in many ways, but Susan shall allow that she is right about one thing.)

Edited 2024-02-26 03:46 (UTC)

"Ay, on this we agree," says Laertes at once. "So long as any are held in thralldom, and barred from the same powers and freedoms enjoyed by those who own them, the republic and the monarchy are one and the same."

"The equivalence of women's suffrage to men's, in Britain, is precisely as old as I am," Susan says. "And that's only true of the Isles, not the rest of the Empire, where few at all may vote. America has had similar problems. France only gained women's suffrage five years ago - I can still remember the headlines. And women are just one class of people." A vastly superior class, but one class nonetheless.

"Ay, Denmark has a similar bar on the election of the king," says Laertes. "Of all her many people, very few are the men who can cast their votes for him, and none are women."

"Voting for a king," says Susan, shaking her head. "It always sounds ever so queer to me. Much better to be appointed head of state by a lion."

"By a--" Laertes tries to remember whether at any point in their relatively short acquaintance Susan has ever mentioned a lion.

"A wild talking lion," Susan confirms with a solemn nod. "...In recompense for dethroning a dictator."

"Thy Narnia was a stranger place than I could have imagined," Laertes manages.

"His name was Aslan. In retrospect, I believe," says Susan, thinking of Lucy's visit and then trying very hard not to think of Lucy's visit at all, "he must have been God." Her tone slips, as she says this; she's been teasing (however poorly) since she first mentioned him, but now she sounds somewhat grim.

"Few kings who claim divine right ever meet the author of their sovereignty," says Laertes. "It sounds awful."

"At the time, I thought it magical," Susan says, in tones that suggest she disagrees with her childhood assessments.

"Ay," says Laertes wryly, "for then thou wert in accord with him."

"I suppose that must be true."

"I have no taste for God," says Laertes. "If I am to be damned for loving this world's sweet pleasures, then let me be damned."

"If Heaven is anything like Lucy described when she was here," says Susan, quiet enough that Laertes might have to strain to hear it - this is a revelation to herself too; she's thought it, off and on, but hasn't been brave enough to commit to the thought - "I shouldn't want to go at all."

It's instinctive--not calculated at all--when Laertes takes her hand and presses it. He hears something in her voice that sets a hook in him, and he reaches for her.

Susan looks up at him, shocked - but then she smiles at him, small but grateful.

After a moment, he lets her hand go, and drains his glass of water. "I ought to go speak with Claudius now," he says, "but I thank thee for the conversation."

"What?" with some surprise; in her mind, she takes herself forcefully by the shoulders, lifts herself from the ground, and gives a good, sharp shake to get the wrinkles out. "Oh, of course. Yes. Thank you, as well; it was... illuminating."

"Oh, I hope not," Laertes laughs. "Good day, Susan."

Susan considers belaboring the point - Laertes has given her a lot to think about, actually! - but decides to let it go. "Until next time, Laertes."

Enjolras raises his eyebrows from his couch in the corner, admittedly a tad surprised, but gives her a small nod.

Claudius is enjoying a nice red wine and attending the back and forth flow of conversation. "Well, this promises to be a lively discussion. Let me ask something," he says, and he proposes it as a general question, to Laertes or to anyone else who might answer. "What of those powers not granted by governance? Are they not also temptations to tyranny? The strong can compel the weak by force, or by the threat thereof. The well-connected can corner the friendless, and starve them of support. Absent of any governing body, individuals still possess power over one another, and exercise it freely. Should we propose strictures for them? Or can we only do so after some man crowns himself king or emperor?"

"The peril there is how a weaker person might enforce such strictures over a more powerful one," says Laertes, mulling it over. He recognizes quite well what Claudius is driving at, although the name Luo Binghe has never passed his lips. "Rousseau saith that societies are contracts, but what might induce a powerful person to submit himself willingly to those less powerful than he?"

“What indeed?” asks Claudius with a sigh. “Perhaps we might appeal to Enjolras’s experience mounting rebellions, or Magnus’s experience flyting gods.”

"No, it was a genuine question," says Laertes. "Thou hast not been troubled again, hast thou? And no rebellion nor battle of words was needed to reach that end. What changed?"

“Mine was a genuine question, too,” Claudius says with a tilt of his head, surprised but not displeased by how incisive Laertes is. “But I’ll try to follow yours to an end, and not introduce too many of my own. Do you mean what changed the first time a certain emperor attempted to establish power through intimidation and torture, then stopped? I’m afraid he didn’t enlighten me, so we’ll have to speculate.”

"It seems to me," says Laertes carefully, "that the bonds of affection between us can be credited--for the more interconnected we are, the more friends each of us has to be harmed by our suffering and to come to our aid to end it, the less likely violence is. Thus, we need fear only those who have no desire for friendship." There is an unspoken name there, a name that if spoken would ring a distant bell.

Claudius takes a considering sip. “That accords well with my own beliefs. Let’s speak in hypotheticals, then — no need to name names.” Least of all a name that’s also a yawning portal to Hell. “Say someone comes along who desires no amity, who has the power to tyrannically impose their own laws on us. What’s our recourse?”

"There, I think, we return to the question of flyting gods and mounting rebellions."

Claudius smiles appreciatively. “Well, we won’t have a better chance to discuss contingencies than right now, with the people gathered in this room.”

"But I would have us know, with certainty, that we aim to depose a tyrant," says Laertes with a sigh. "I'll seek out SecUnit again. It may have made progress since last we spoke."

“Ah, fair enough. Still,” he says, letting his voice lower to more intimate tones, “I believe it’s Grantaire’s aim to create a space where everyone feels free to speak on any matter that moves them. Whether or not it’s to any practical end — preferably not, I think, in his case. You needn’t be certain to start a discussion. Contingencies are contingencies. They’re what-ifs, and thus uncertain by necessity.” In his musing tones, he asks, “Do you think it would excite any interest if I went about the room and asked if you had to depose a hypothetical tyrant here, how would you go about it? Or is that too confronting?”

"My friend, I will counsel thee to unhappy ends here," says Laertes. "I think thou shouldst."

Claudius laughs. "You can be confronting, when the situation calls for it. It's a talent of yours."

"If such a need arises, thou wilt have my blade," says Laertes, reaching for Claudius's hand. "I dearly hope it does not."

"Then I know thy answer." There's a sincere gratitude there. With a sigh, he says, "In truth, I hope it all remains hypothetical. An outlandish discussion to pass the time, like asking what one would do if ..." He shakes his head. "Thou know'st, it has become a struggle to think of outlandish enough scenario. What one would do if one were transformed into a child for a day? What one would do upon switching forms with a friend's lover, and finding yourself in his bed?"

"Nothing is impossible any longer," says Laertes wryly. "Except, perhaps, reconciliation without sincere repentance."

"'Tis why God and I will never be reconciled," Claudius says with a roll of eyes, eliding any other reconcilements he might wish for. "Either I must repent, or He must. And God's far more likely to say something along the lines of 'Where wast thou when I laid the foundations of the earth?'"

"Sooner be transformed into a chicken than repent thy sins," says Laertes, but it's deeply fond.

"Why a chicken?" he asks with a sincere laugh, startled out of him. It's a little less smooth than his usual laughs, which are seldom involuntary even when they're sincere.

"Why not a chicken? Thou mightst as easily ask 'why children,' or 'why another body.' This place is one of caprice and whim."

"There has to be some reason for it. Or does it fall under Kade's classification of Worlds? Am I expecting Reason from a World with Nonsense gods?" He's genuinely interested in the puzzle, for the moment, then shakes his head. "I could propose a theory for each, but it rather depends on you telling me when you do something like stop an influx of zombies. Zombies are a movie creature -- Crowley told me that -- and you and Crowley stopped them by re-enacting something from a television show. That would suggest the spirits sometimes borrow elements from fictional stories, and follow the logic those stories dictate. It didn't work quite as well with the Freaky Friday situation, but that was least a film." This is a very roundabout way of saying, "If there's a story about princes turning to chickens, I suppose there's a chance. So why didn't you tell me about your heroics during the zombie attack?"

"The simple answer is that I did not think them heroic," says Laertes, who must have explained this fifty times already. "I found Crowley, who had some understanding of such things from the stories of the Winchester brothers, and I bade him try what they would have done. My part in this was small, and not worth the telling."

"Dost truly think so?" Claudius sighs. "I would blame thy father for spoiling thy sense of what an accomplishment is, after only letting thee choose from an approved list of accomplishments for gentlemen ... but I'll spare thee another rant against him. What about it wasn't worth the telling?"

"Why--any of it. Others fought just as bravely. We merely happened to be in an opportune place."

"Ay, and they would've kept fighting and fighting without end, if thou didst not find the source. We could've carried on, I'm sure, with the martially inclined among us protecting the house in shifts, but some of us have no such skills. I would've been confined to the house, never able to go out in the garden, which would make me more miserable than I am now. Take care not to demur too much, and deny the good thou hast done. Wouldst thou really insist thou hast done nothing of note, when thou hast saved our way of life and my happiness?"

"Very well," Laertes concedes, charmed despite himself by Claudius's unexpectedly spirited defense. "Perhaps I should have said something. Forgive me."

The concession mollifies Claudius, who had many more arguments he was prepared to make. Waving off any need for forgiveness, he says, "Remember that those who love thee want to praise thee and tell thee how good thou art. Thou hast a dog now, thou shouldst understand." A beat, then he corrects himself, "A second dog, I should say."

"Szarka, at least, knows how to take praises." A slight lift of the eyes, not quite an eyeroll.

Claudius laughs, and fondly shakes his head. "Szarka is young. All creatures are born craving approval -- I said so to Sagramore, and will say it to thee. We rely on it. Humans, more than all others, since some creatures can walk minutes after they're born, or learn language in the egg like Temeraire has. But a young human is a clumsy, ignorant thing, unable to do anything for itself. We need others' approval and care to survive, others' approval and guidance to learn. Without it we wither, like plants starved of sunlight, and know only our own insufficiencies. But such insufficiencies are shared among anything born helpless."

"And how wilt thou take praises, my heart? Like a plant long starved of light, unable to raise its head and drink in what nourishes it? Or like a young creature that knows no purpose but to flourish?"

The back of Claudius's neck flushes at my heart, and he raises both eyebrows. "Wilt thou try it? Praise me."

"Then let me tell thee how much I admire thy swift defense of those thou lovest--how willingly thou wouldst take any blow for their sakes," Laertes begins.

Ah, and there's that flush creeping up behind his ears. He takes a swallow of wine, since he can't really deny that, after the whole business with Hastur. "I am quick-tempered and prone to making myself a target, yes," he says loftily.

"My withering chrysanthemum," Laertes laughs. "My sun-starved lily! We shall see thee learn to bear tending yet."

"I knew not what compliment thou wouldst make," Claudius says in mock-sulking tones. "I hoped that thou wouldst compliment my face or figure, or my turn of phrase."

"All very fine indeed," says Laertes, raising his knuckles to skim Claudius's cheekbone. "Thine eyne well set to give thee an air of deep consideration; thy lashes long and beguiling; thy mouth generous and expressive--" and his thumb traces Claudius's lower lip, teasingly, before he lets his hand fall. "But of all thy graces, I love best the fierceness of thy heart."

This praise Claudius all but basks in, leaning towards Laertes's touch like a cat, or like some other creature meant to be stroked and admired. When Laertes's hand leaves him, Claudius's lips are parted open, his eyes soft. It bares him to receive the stark fact of Laertes’s confession, and fold it to his heart. "Thou art a graceful flatterer," he says at last.

"Nay, flattery is meant to ensnare," says Laertes with a warm smile. "I already hold thee fast."

Claudius laughs. "Oh, thou caughtst me long ago, ere thou knew what thou hadst caught. What of thee? Canst thou take praise, or art thou looking for snares?"

"I can take it," says Laertes, bracing as though for a blow.

"Boldly said." He watches Laertes's face across the table, thoroughly endeared by how brave he makes taking a compliment look. Perhaps it needs some bravery. He remembers Laertes saying he didn't enjoy praise that sounds like expectation, praise like Laertes can learn anything. So instead, he says, "I admire thy many passions. Thou hast combed such wonders from such a vast shore of subjects, brilliant little pieces of learning like collected shells on the beach. All from moments where something happened to catch thy interest -- a book thou saw'st in the library, a particular remedy thou didst hope to find in herbalism, a time someone mentioned boats. Whatsoever the spark, thou wilt take that first curiosity and follow it to its end. Or in all directions -- either way, thou wilt cover more ground. Thou art devoted to thy projects, devoted to the people who inspire thee. Even if, at times, thou art impulsive, disorganized ... that impulse is thy passion, that disorganization a necessary step to learn something new. Thou hast to take apart a toaster to see how it works, to use a metaphor from Tress's workshop."

Smirking, he adds, "That's why it surprises me not at all thou didst save us all during the zombie attack. It may have been opportune, but thou wert always able to take one moment's curiosity and turn it into an opportunity. It speaks to thy speedy wits, that thou canst start with something Crowley said to thee about a TV show, follow that thought and find him, then discover the secret source of the zombies. Many fought. But thou foughtst and wert clever. I happen to find such cleverness attractive."

And when Claudius says it like that, Laertes can feel that there was merit in what he did--caught in the frame of Claudius's perceptive eye, Laertes feels seen, understood, worthy. His heart gives a hard, urgent throb that he recognizes now as love. "Come away with me," he says, and takes Claudius's hands across the table. "I love thee. I want thee. Come away with me, and let me learn thee anew."

Claudius rises from the table, with an inviting smile cast over his shoulder, hand still linked to Laertes's as though to lead him off in a dance. "Happily."

“I do not think so; but surely living within the bounds of polite society implies that there are at least some structures. If it should get out of hand—to the point that one notices it regularly; certainly something should be done about it. What are your thoughts, Claudius?” He sprawls back on his couch and nods towards it, inviting.

The sprawl itself is rather inviting, but Claudius declines to comment on it. He simply observes, before taking a seat beside Enjolras, wine glass in hand. "Are we living within the bounds of polite society? This whole place feels like an experiment, combining chemicals and reagents. We've all been mixed together in this beaker of mansion, and something's outside of it observing us, observing what this admixture will produce. We come from different worlds, with differing expectations, and those include social expectations. What's socially unacceptable to me is simply the done thing for another. It creates conflict, but also the resolution of conflict. Shared understandings. Friendship and love. Do all those reactions even out to society?"

"They might, yes; I do not consider myself at all wise enough to dictate the makings of a society. If we were to have the primary definition, I think, it would count as one -- we are an ordered community all in the same place, such as it is, even with the chaos the monthly happenings cause. There is shelter, there is food, there is...ah, relative harmony, does that not count for something? It may be a society even if it is not polite, I suppose, as by the bonds of the church in my home and -- I assume, yours, none of this would be considered polite. But I have never cared much for the words of the church."

"I sometimes forget how different an experience anyone has to me," Claudius says, a touch wistful, looking at the light through his wineglass. "I was the first person in the house, you know. The rest trickled in, one by one. With each new person, I thought ah, at last we're approaching civilization. But because we approached it by such small degrees, I never noticed when it arrived." Taking a drink of his wine, he says, "You know, I think this café of yours had something to do with it. Your meeting-grounds."

"We needed somewhere we might all come together, is what I had originally planned. Certainly not for meetings, though this is rather enjoyable even if it is truly only a beginning. I think it perhaps came when -- ah, you began planning the wedding dance. Perhaps our first true event that someone planned here."

"That may be the most generous thing you've ever said to me, Enjolras. Clearly I need to draw you into more discourse on the definition of society." With a smile, he says, "The event that precipitated the dance may've had something to do with it, too. Hugger-mugger though it was, theirs was the first wedding between worlds, with means of ceremony native to neither of them. I daresay such bonds and ceremonies are foundational to society. If the mansion were a test to see how the cultures of many worlds meld, Laertes and Sagramore would be one model. It only took them a month." Serious discussion or no, Claudius can't resist a small bit of gossip. "You've gotten rather close to them, haven't you?"

"It may have, yes, but I do not think I was here for the wedding itself, and so cannot comment on it." He clears his throat a little and nibbles absently at some of his food. "Yes, and? It is common knowledge, I think."

"Yes, as I recall you all three shared a dance, and shared a few other things after. I suppose that's common enough for knowledge. That dance was quite successful for you." With an air of great reflection, he asks, "Is that why you're willing to credit me with the start of civilization here? You've learned to like dances."

"I would not say I like them. In truth I only went for the company; I am not --as you can see, someone that is especially sociable." Yes, there are plenty of people here, but he is not what anyone would call the center of attention. He is content to stay off to the side, absorbing the general surroundings and conversations and pleasant chaos of it all. "It was, as I said, the start of our group events here. I think that helped."

"What did you think dances were for, if not for the company?" He tilts his head, eyes bright and curious. "Let me guess. Your father let you learn gunnery in the hopes you'd be going to hunting parties and making political alliances. Dances, the domain of debutantes, would be for making alliances of marriage -- meeting pretty young girls from good families, the kind of company you like the least. You like raucous men who can fill a room with conversation." He nods over in Grantaire's direction. "Or philosophical men who can discourse on the new sciences and let you listen."

"My father did indeed encourage learning how to use a gun. I of course learned; but I only ever attended such dances Courfeyrac would insist upon, or if I was at home, my parents. I much prefer to keep to myself and my books, for the most part."

"'Books' is an interesting epithet for Combeferre," Claudius says, with a flat tone that barely belies his teasing. "You lot and your nicknames."

Enjolras very nearly chokes at that, reddening to a degree that he hasn't in quite some time. It is only partially due to the fact that he knows Claudius is teasing him, which doesn't make it any better. "That is not what I meant! We were not-- he is a friend. A very good friend."

Claudius laughs, loud and delighted. "Finally thou hast caught on. I did hope thou wouldst take my meaning when he was here last, but each timed it sailed over thy heads."

"We were quite distracted." That blush certainly hasn't faded, and he looks a tad disgruntled now. "Needless to say, it remains true. He is my friend. Surely you can conceive of a platonic relationhip."

"I can, but I have multiple conceptions. I've platonic friends who I find very attractive, and I've had lovers who weren't as platonically intimate with me as you with Combeferre. Or as thoroughly distracted with that intimacy.

He shrugs a little. “We are two halves of the same whole. Thirds, if we are including Courfeyrac. Combeferre was my first friend in Paris.”

"I do feel I understand thee better, when thou art in thy element," Claudius says fondly. "First when thou wert with thy other half -- or third, an thou prefer'st -- and now here, at this forum for discussion. Thou art more like to listen than to argue, unless thou art drawn into argument. When Grantaire draws thee, the argument could be never-ending. But thou art not a man to call a meeting so thou can'st expound on thy own opinions, or push thy own agenda. Rather, thou wilt trust thy fellows to be self-sufficient, to speak their own minds, and form their own conclusions. I see why thy friends show thee such loyalty. They all repay the trust thou hast given them."

"My amis are certainly capable of speaking their own minds, yes. You saw a little when Courfeyrac and Combeferre were here; but all together it is even more chaotic. Imagine all of that, but with 5 others. But yes, I am -- generally one to keep quiet, unless I feel it is otherwise necessary."

"What form of governance best supports hedonism? I'm in favor of that."

"Mine over thee," Laertes laughs, and pulls Sagramore down for a kiss.

Sagramore kisses back warmly, lingering -- Szarka is back in the room in her crate, and it's one of their first nights out, as it were, since they got her. It's just nice for them both to be somewhere different together, even if they're mostly in separate conversations.

Such heavy topics! "I will admit I'm new here, but has it been an issue? I would have hoped such a small group could innately work together without too much strife. Though I've been called naive before."

"In truth," Laertes admits, voice pitched a little lower, "I only wanted to give Enjolras the gift of hearing his friends discuss politics. His friends in Paris were lively, and committed to the subject, and I'd hoped it would ease his heart." He smiles, and rises to bow. "My name is Laertes. What's yours?"

At once Dionysus' eyes light up. "The famous Laertes! I admit I've heard a lot about you." Since arriving, as well as before, but no sense in bringing... all that up right now. "Love your dog. I am Dionysus! I met your husband recently."

Laertes can't help laughing. "Ay, my husband does me too much credit. Szarka deserves all of your praises, though. Forgive me, did you say your name was Dionysus?"

"I did! God of Drama, at your service." He gives a small, informal bow.

"Then should I credit you for my existence?"

"In an extraordinarily roundabout way, though I believe more of the credit is due to Will."

His good buddy Will Shakespeare who he is close personal friends with.

"Ay," says Laertes, lining the balls up for a joke in the corner pocket, "drama is an extraordinary effort of will."

He laughs, loudly and heartily, clapping Laertes on the shoulder. "You would make him proud! I don't know if anyone's told you, but your play is often considered one of the best ever written."

"You're the first," says Laertes. "I've read so many plays about you that are among the best ever written--Euripedes's Bacchae is a singular work of genius."

"Ah! One of my favorites as well! Euripides was truly gifted! A shame he never got to see it performed." Dionysus realizes all too late that perhaps he should have tried to visit him when he went to Hades. Not much can be done about that now.

After a pause, he adds, "The events in that play were highly exaggerated, please don't hold anything you've read against me."

"Did you not dress your cousin in women's clothes, and have his mother rip him apart in the belief that she'd slain a lion?"

"I have dressed many people in women's clothes, but that second part sounds so gruesome, why would I do that?"

"I had many a debate at university on just that question," Laertes admits. "If you like seeing a man in a gown, my husband's collection grows by the day, and every one is lovelier than the last."

"I admit I'm jealous! My own carefully curated wardrobe was lost to me when I arrived here." He's still in mourning.

"Ah! Has no one taught you about the closets here? They can produce anything you desire, should you merely think of it. They can be difficult to persuade, at times," he admits, "but the clearer your sense of what you want, the more responsive they are to it."

He lights up again. "This is absolutely such a relief! Why, I'm half tempted to go test it now!" He won't though, he'll wait until at least after the gathering has concluded.

Laertes grins. "I shall look forward to your new habiliments with rapt interest. And should you require the services of a tailor, Kade--" he gestures with his cup of coffee in Kade's direction "--hath some skill."

"Is that so?" Truthfully, what he chooses to wear on a regular basis doesn't really require any tailoring. An occasional replaced hem, but there's a big difference in the structure needed in a chiton and a more 'modern' outfit. Maybe a new place requires a branching out of fashions though.

"What sort of outfit do you think I should try for first?"

"Oh, that I know not," Laertes protests, with a laughing gesture at his t-shirt, jeans, and scuffed combat boots. "Fashion and I are not acquainted."

"Oh, no, don't say that! You wear it well!"

"Thy flattery is very kind--but I know the worth of my body, and I would wear nearly anything equally well," says Laertes. "I have not the discernment to choose something singular."

“Maybe I’ll stick to my usual for a while longer… After all, if you find what works why mess with it, right?”

Besides, he’s fully aware he’s… well, he’s no Heracles.

"It's a fine look," says Laertes gamely. "Very comfortable."

“Comfortable is precisely why I like it,” he responds, but suddenly he’s not sounding convinced. In his experience describing someone’s look as ‘comfortable’ is often a backhanded compliment.

"I could not carry off the color, but it suits you."

"My dear, sweet Laertes, I doubt there's anything on Earth you couldn't carry off, color or otherwise." He places a hand gently on Laertes' upper arm for a moment, before grabbing his glass up off the table and taking a sip.

"Sir!" says Laertes with a slightly incredulous laugh. "Are you flirting with me?"

“Not if you don’t want me to be,” he says, a little apologetically. There might even be a bit of a blush on his cheeks, though that could also be the alcohol. Hard to tell.

"Sir," says Laertes again, and this time there's a laughing look in his eyes. "The attention of a god is a high honor--but a dangerous one, too, if the plays tell me aright."

“I like to think I’m a nicer person than how I’ve often been written.”

"I know not how I was written," says Laertes, with a light air of challenge. "Am I nicer? Or worse?"

Oh no. No no no no no noooooo no no nooo nope nuh uh nope no thank you no. He can practically hear alarms going off in his mind, even through the slight buzz of the wine he has consumed.

“Well, ah,” Zeus help him get through this. “Granted we have just met, but I’d say you seem more or less as I would have expected. There are normally very sweet actors cast in your role.”

Maybe the compliment will deflect. He got out of the prophecy business long ago.

"Ah," says Laertes. It makes sense--the better to make the audience feel for him, upon his inevitable death.

Setting that subject very deliberately aside, he asks, "Have you made friends here?"

Thank heavens. Dionysus makes a mental note to find something to offer up to his father for helping get through that.

"I certainly have! Grantaire has been a better friend than I could have ever asked for, but there have been so many others who I've met so far, and most of them have all been quite friendly."

"Ay, it's a friendly place, with much employment for a ready mind," says Laertes, who has never once found it boring here. "Have a care, though; with much time for thought comes much time for reflection. If there are sorrows in your past, you will have time to meet them."

“Well we should all look on the bright side in that case, it’s cheaper than paying for therapy.”

Laertes has heard the term therapy from Magnus, but magnus says a lot of things that he doesn't particularly understand, and Laertes has more or less learned to roll with it. Dionysus, he thinks, may have new insight on a form of catharsis that is neither dramatic nor induced by a tonic. "What is therapy?" Laertes asks.

What is therapy asks Laertes from Hamlet. What is therapy indeed. Dionysus isn't so heartless as to laugh, but there's a small part of him that can appreciate the absurdity of this entire conversation.

"It... well, it can be a lot of things. There's physical therapy, so doing stretches and such when you've suffered an injury, to help it heal. There's also therapy to help with emotional conditions. Ahhhh, in the future from your time, it's a big thing. If you've had something traumatic happen and need to talk to someone to get your feelings out, or maybe advice on how to cope with things, there's -- sort of like going to a doctor? A professional you'd meet with, to sort of just chat."

Can you tell he's also never actually been himself?

"Must it be a professional? Well I know that there is little to distinguish between a physician and a mountebank but the price."

Dionysus shrugs. "There's something to be said for confiding in a friend, that often helps too. I think the benefit of it being a professional is that first off, they're less likely to steer you in a... less than healthy direction, when you need advice. And secondly, if it's someone removed from your personal life you might be more inclined to speak openly."

That much, at least, Laertes understands all too well. He tries to imagine confiding his deepest fears and insecurities to Ophelia--let alone to his father--and his mind rebels at it. Ophelia has burdens enough, and he knows full well that his father would have a great store of (often contradictory) advice that would bring him no ease. The mere act of needing something from them is horrifying. Repulsive.

"I see why such people are needful," he says, after a long moment. "Self-reflection can lead one down well-trodden paths, but seldom blaze new ones."

"It's useful, for certain."

"Forgive me," Laertes says, with a wry look. "It seems I cannot meet a new friend without turning the conversation toward grim subjects. I swear to you, I am capable of other passions."

"Oh, psh, don't worry about it! Comedy and tragedy are equally important if you ask me. But if you want we can switch gears! I know you've read Euripides, what other sorts of plays are you a fan of?"

"I've read so many," says Laertes with a laugh. "Aristophanes, Aeschylus, Sophocles, Plautus, Terence, Seneca--and some few of mine own time, too, although they tended toward the same themes."

"So well read I could almost die! And the classics!" There's some part of him that knows he's maybe overreacting, but he can't help it. He gets so excited whenever meeting what he would consider a kindred spirit in this manner. "Would you be interested in any recommendations of playwrights from past your time? I think you'd like Shaw -- granted I think most people would like Shaw, the man was truly gifted. A bit of an -- please pardon my expression -- a bit of an asshole on a personal level, but meeting him did nothing to make me like his writing any less. What are your thoughts on musicals?"

"... musicals? I like music well," says Laertes.

"It's a play where the dialogue stops and the plot is conveyed through song."

A memory sparks. "I've heard that The Lion King is a musical," he offers.

He's ever so thankful he wasn't taking a sip of his drink at that moment, because he definitely would have choked. "Who told you about The Lion King?!"

"Several people," says Laertes. "Shen Yuan most prominent among them--and someone told Claudius, who spoke on it with me."

"You haven't... seen it, have you?" Obviously not the stage musical, but maybe there's a copy of the film here somewhere? At least Nala survives to the end of the show, that's a relief.

Unless she dies in the movie?

He hasn't seen all of the movie.

Oh no.

"Nay, never," says Laertes. "All I know of it is that I do not appear, as a lion or otherwise--and that Claudius's character has the best songs."

He tries not to make his sigh of relief too obvious. "I admit Scar -- that's the lion's name -- his main song is wonderful, but the best? I don't know, Hakuna Matata is probably my favorite, but there are too many to narrow it down too much. Shadowland is great, there's also They Live In You, ah! It's such a good musical. You should see the costumes!"

Dionysus's enthusiasm is infectious; Laertes can't help grinning. "Speak to Susan and Nina," he says. "They mean to put on a play. And I know Kade has some skill with a needle--he may be able to recreate the costumes of thy memories."

"Oh, you -- you think we should do Lion King? Ahhhhhhh, well. I'm not sure we have the numbers for that show, it's quite a large cast."

And also it's probably just not a good idea. It's different enough, but still.

"I do," says Laertes. "I think Claudius would love it."

Dionysus can't help but to laugh a little. "Do you think he'd audition for Scar?"

He still very much thinks this is a bad idea, but he has to indulge the humor of it all.

"I want so much to hear him sing."

"Even if another play is chosen, we could always corner him with vocal selections to try out."

"We should. He'll indulge me in this," says Laertes with great confidence. "And you? Have you a fair voice?"

"Me? Oh, oh no, I mean I'm not completely tone deaf or anything, but a triple threat I am not."

"Triple threat?"

"Ah, someone who is a strong singer, dancer, and actor all at the same time."

"Ah! For my part, mine only real skill is dancing; my voice is fair enough, but I cannot put on semblances or seemings."

Edited 2024-03-04 20:54 (UTC)

"If you decide you would like some lessons some time I have nothing going on."

"In acting? Can one learn the art of it through patient craft?"

Edited 2024-03-06 21:02 (UTC)

"Everyone's gotta learn somehow!" He shrugs. "There's methods -- well, there's also Methods -- people use to get better. Some even go to college for it. Don't worry though, I won't give you too much homework," he says laughing a little.

"Oh, don't stint me, sir," Laertes laughs. "I will be as good a student as I'm able."

"We'll make a triple threat of you yet!"

"Wonderful, I've oft been told that I'm at my best when I'm threatening."

"But, truly, if this is something that interests you, please do let me know! There might even be some others also interested, we could make a whole thing of it if you'd like."

It sounds like Dionysus is the one interested by this, more than anything.

"Nothing would please Nina more than to have another actor for her play," Laertes muses--an exaggeration (he knows so many things that would please her more, so many sorrows that he cannot ease), but a fond one. "Very well. Teach me thine art."

"Wonderful! Oh, I simply cannot wait! Do -- do you think we ought to put up a sign up sheet in case anyone else would like to join?"

"Ay, it can do no harm," says Laertes. "I'll seek you out when I'm ready." If he remembers, anyway.

It's a party, of course Dionysus is here. 'Party' is practically his middle name. He is still trying to make up for the first time he met Enjolras though, so he'll be making an attempt at being on his best behavior.

No promises it'll last all night, but for the moment he is sipping some wine and mingling.

Enjolras had not actually expected Dionysus to come; but then again, perhaps there had been a flier on the welcome table. However, all are welcome, and so he has no objections to the god's presence. When he sees the god enter, he gives him a brief, uncertain nod; but does not rise from his seat on the couch. Hopefully Dionysus will consider the alcohol offerings acceptable, he had left that portion in Grantaire's probably-capable hands.

Dionysus, bubbly and oblivious, bounces over to Enjolras. He is aware enough to keep some distance, at least. "Quite a lovely affair you've put on!"

“Mm. Thank you, I had quite a bit of help.” If it was up to him, there would likely be the bare minimum of food and alcohol. “I did not expect you.”

"It sounded like fun!" Though he's now starting to be worried he maybe wasn't wanted..

"And, besides, I wanted an opportunity to apologize to you. In person." There had been the gift basket, but he feels words are needed too. "I -- I got carried away, let my excitement get the better of me. I'm sorry."

"Did it?" He perks up a little. "My friends and I used to have meetings like this quite often at home; obviously with a larger goal in mind. That is not the case here, it is -- not quite the same. But regardless, I -- ah." He clears his throat, and nods. "I should not have left as abruptly as I did, I suppose. Thank you for the basket."

"Why wouldn't it? A chance to meet everyone, and have nice conversation. Are you enjoying yourself tonight?" He seems quieter than Dionysus would have expected. Maybe this is just how he is when not singing about colors?

"I am. Feel free to converse about whatever you like: despite appearances this is not just meant for philosophy and politics, that is just what I find myself drawn to." If he had more of his friends here, certainly he would be engaged in a loud conversation with them; just ask anyone who saw them all during the brief time Combeferre and Courfeyrac visited. As it stands, however, there is only Grantaire and himself, and he knows Grantaire will happily go on for ages about anything, so much so that it is hard to get a word in edgewise. Therefore Enjolras is content to let it be, for now, and to try and foster the small sense of community that he had hoped this gathering might bring.

"You didn't say you were a god of wine," in mildly accusing tones.

Dionysus turns at the familiar voice, all smiles. "It didn't seem relevant to the conversation! Would you like some?"

"I'm amenable. Do you conjure it out of the air like Crowley?"

A small vine appears in his hand, quickly growing larger into a dense ball. After a moment the tendrils and leaves fade away, leaving behind a full wine glass.

"Nearly." He hands over the glass.

"Tremendous, you have a real flair for the dramatic. I suppose that's apt." He takes the glass, having at least the grace to put down the one he was already holding (though to be fair that wasn't wine), and has a sip.

It does still make him sad, but that's fine. He's trying to draw a stronger association with Claudius about wine, and he glances over to find Claudius amongst the assembled, just to strengthen that connection. Perfect.

"If you're ever in need of wicker furniture, I'm your guy." He makes no promises that anything will be level, symmetrical, or functional, but it is something he could theoretically accomplish.

Sagramore laughs. "Is that a third purview?"

"Simply a byproduct of the second. Vines."

"Oh, I see. Well, I'm quite impressed," with another sip. This time it goes down easier; he keeps his eyes on Claudius. "You're a welcome addition."

He could almost cry. "That means a lot, thank you."

"Of course." He toasts Dionysus.

“Do you mind if I ask, what was life like for you before coming here?”

His easy smile doesn't slip. "Tedious, mainly. I spent a lot of time trying not to get sent on any quests of any kind and when I was lucky I had rather nice intervals of carousing."

“Sounds like a nice life,” he responds.

Sagramore laughs. "Oh, I was miserable. I'm far happier here."

"That seems to be something of a theme among our fellow residents, unfortunately," he says, thinking about two somebodies in particular. "Les Misérables, some might say."

It's Dionysus, he's the some who might say.

"I beg your pardon?"

"Don't worry about it. I'm glad life is treating you better here! It is, I suppose, quite a marvelous place to live."

"Quite marvelous. There's no work to be done except what pleases me, I have a dog and a husband and three or four other lovers besides, and this place produces infinite alcohol. How could anyone be melancholy?"

He raises an eyebrow. "That does sound ideal, in all respects. The infinite alcohol might make me a little redundant, though."

He takes a sip of his wine, having been reminded that it's there. "I don't know, I can do decent work mixing liquors but I don't know anything about wine. I like the idea of being educated with practical knowledge."

“You know, I’ve been thinking, once the weather warms up I might try to start a little vineyard out back, if I can find a suitable spot.” It’s hard to tell with all the snow on the ground right now, but he thinks he might just be able to get it to work. At the very least he could make it work. “Maybe you and some others might be interested in learning how to make your own wine? I used to do this sort of thing all the time, but it’s been a while.”

"I'd be very interested! Grantaire and Laertes and I are crafting a way to distill our own liquor; we can add wine to our slate of knowledge."

He’s grinning now ear to ear. “Oh that pleases me greatly! I hope we can make it work then! Something nice to keep our time occupied!”

"I hope you won't want for occupation regardless," unable to stop himself.

Oh. In that case. "Well I'll defer to your expertise on what might be a good way to spend one's time here."

"I think I've told you enough for you to make your own inferences on that point," his dark eyes sparkling.

He steps close and leaves a kiss on Sagramore’s cheek. “Sounds lovely, my dear.”

"Bold, sir," sounding very pleased about it. He has another drink of the wine -- without knowing anything about wine he knows it's good, by virtue mainly of the flavor, which is fruity and complex -- and lets Dionysis get a good look at the line of his throat when he swallows; he knows he looks good.

He thinks this is maybe not a very bad place to be trapped for all eternity after all.

“Well, you know what they say about who fortune favors, after all.”

"I have heard something about that, but sometimes I like a practical demonstration for clarity's sake."

It's strange (or perhaps it's not) how after these periods when he's miserable over something, losing Janet or switching with Asmodean or Mordred's visit or whatever stupid thing, flirtation makes him feel so much better. It reminds him that he can be someone who isn't a misery to be around, that there's still playfulness and happiness left in him. He likes Dionysus perfectly well; he likes that this is another way to get to know him, and perhaps come to like him better. Dionysus seems to have about as much godly authority as Aziraphale does, frankly, but the humanness is rather charming.

More the point, he's never been kissed by a god before.

Edited 2024-03-02 23:09 (UTC)

"Hi! I don't think we've met yet." Nina has a pastry in one hand and coffee in the other. "I'm Nina."

Oh! Oh oh! Upon hearing her name, he excitedly sets the small plate of snacks he was working on down on a nearby table.

"Nina! Hello! Yes! I have been wanting to speak to you! I am Dionysus, I hear you are organizing a play?"

"Dionysus! It's great to meet you. Susan and I are organizing one. I'm assuming you have an interest in plays?"

"I invented them."

Nina’s brow furrows. “In your world, you mean?”

"...Huh." That's quite an interesting question. "I am the god of Drama, but I suppose I'm not going to be present in every world, though there have been several others here who have heard of me before, even though they're definitely from different worlds."

"Oh, Magnus taught me what gods were when I arrived. We don't have them where I come from. We only have Saints." Her expression should show the mixed feelings she has about Saints but it quickly pivots to something friendlier. "But as the god of drama, of course you'll have to be involved with the play."

Some other time he might be curious enough to ask what the deal is with these saints, but he’s kind of focused on other details right now.

“I will take part however you need me! I know you were inquiring about preferences, but I don’t suppose you’ve narrowed down to what sort of play we will be putting on yet, have you?”

"No, you'll have to take that up with Susan," Nina tells him, then gives him a little grin. "I'm just the hired muscle, bullying everyone into joining."

"Ah, yes, Susan! She's lovely!" Their meeting did not go as well as he would have liked, but he's hopeful that their next will be better. Especially if she's involved in the production.

"Does your job end once the cast and crew are finalized, or are you planning on taking part some other way?"

"Oh, I'm an actress," she tells him confidently, with a little grin. "Can't you tell from my effervescent personality?"

“I should have guessed as much! Hoping for the lead in whatever we end up selecting then?”

"We'll see. I'm mostly trying to stay busy and social!"

“As noble a pursuit as any other! I imagine things could turn rather boring here really quickly if we’re not all careful.”

"I've been turned into a 4 year old and a cat," Nina tells him brightly, then laughs. "You'll see."

“Which was better?”

"The cat," she says, without hesitation. "I was a little helpless as a child. It was so nice to just drink cream, catch fish, and nap in the sun all day."

“That does sound lovely! Though I’d argue you don’t have to be a cat for any of that, you know. You can go out and live your sun napping dreams whenever you’d like.”

A pause in which he glances to the window, remembering the season.

“Maybe wait until springtime first though.”

Nina looks outside. "I don't mind the snow too much. It's frequently cold in Ravka. Do you come from somewhere warm?"

“Oh, I’ve lived all over.” He shrugs. His childhood was a long time ago, and there have been several significant climate shifts worldwide since then. “I prefer not to be cold though, as often as I can help it.”

"Unfortunately, you came at the wrong time," Nina says, apologetically. "The weather was beautiful when I first arrived."

"Oh, I'm sure it will warm up soon enough! It usually does." Shout out to Persephone, what a pal. "I look forward to exploring the area once there's no more snow."

“Well, let me know if you need a tour,” Nina says, helpfully.

"That would be lovely!"

"Consider it done." Nina gives him a warm smile; they're currently entrenched in the meeting, but she makes a mental note to check in on him in a few days and offer that tour.

"Dionysus," Claudius calls in greeting, raising the wine glass he's already holding. "A pleasure to see you. How are you enjoying our little symposium?"

Dionysus is mid-sip when he hears his name, turns and sees, “Claudius! Hello my dear friend!”

He’s definitely feeling the effects of the wine he has already drank, though not yet at the level most would call drunk.

He approaches, wrapping an arm around Claudius in a half-hug. “As great a party as any there ever was, I assure you!”

Claudius laughs, half-startled by the familiarity of the greeting. After all, Claudius greets one of his best friends with a formal exchange of names while standing six feet apart, and only recently have they progressed to hugging. But he finds he doesn't mind the attention from Dionysus. He evenly gamely pats Dionysus's back. "A party could hardly fail with you in the company."

"What, just because they named them after me?" he replies with a joking grin. He's still got his arm around Claudius, completely oblivious.

"Yes, I think that has something to do with it. And for a party like this, where the aim is that all should feel free to speak their minds ..." He idly toasts the air with his wine-glass. "Wine has a way of loosening tongues. In vino veritas, as they say."

"One of my favorite phrases!" he says, except he has now switched to latin. He figures there's a chance Claudius maybe speaks it, or maybe whatever translator magic the house has will just fill in the blanks.

The translator does it work, and Claudius detects only a slight shift in accent, as though the words are more familiar on Dionysus's lips. He can do little with it, except sip his wine and take note of it. "And what's on your mind, Lord Dionysus? Is there some subject you'd care to discuss?"

"Oh, please, don't call me 'lord'. Makes me feel old." Usually when speaking with any of the residents, he matches whatever language they're speaking. He caught on to the fact there's something translating everything the first time he heard two people talking to one another, but he generally doesn't want to trust someone or something else with handling his words. It's nice to have control over the exact connotations in speech.

Right now though he's a little tipsy, and decides to just have fun. He switches to Middle Egyptian. "I was wondering if you'd like to introduce me to that drinking game you mentioned the other day."

"Now there's an excellent idea," Claudius says with cheer, cocking his head to notice another little accent shift and smiling at the subtlety of it. "It behooves our side to practice before the day of the wager. And Grantaire is here, so he'll know where to find the drawing pool."

"I will admit, dear Claudius," Haitian Creole now, "I'm not entirely certain it's fair to consider me on your side in this. I very much want to see the end result should you lose." He switches to English. "I'll do my best to root for you, but in the interests of full disclosure, I also kind of want you to put on that performance you mentioned."

This one isn't a Man, and Ragnelle gives him a bright-eyed bird's look, assessing, when she sees him. "What art thou?"

Dionysus greets this stranger with a grin. “I am Dionysus, god of Drama!” A pause. “… Are you of the forest?”

"A God, art thou? Of what provenance? Whose worship grew thee?" She puts her hands on her hips, still assessing -- she hasn't made up her mind about him. "Mary, I am."

He could just about cry. What great news! “Of Thebes, originally, though I was raised by wood nymphs in Thrace! So let’s just call it Mediterranean. It’s an absolute pleasure to meet you, my dear!”

Edited 2024-02-28 21:08 (UTC)

"I know it not. 'Tis of no consequence," graciously. Then, "Thou wilt find me no mother to thee."

“Oh I would never impose! Don’t worry!” He laughs, shaking his hands to emphasize his point. He then adds, “But if there’s ever anything I can do for you don’t hesitate to ask!” He can be useful sometimes!

Oh, she's being offered favors! That's different.

All told, Ragnelle has spent her three years in Camelot getting used to being disrespected by the majority of Men: the men treated her like a yielding, subordinate creature, and the women treated her like an equal. Only her husband could be reliably expected to look at and speak to her like something to be cherished, an exceptional gift that had been generously bestowed on him, and it was part of why she liked his company so much. If she bade him stay with her rather than attend to his other duties, he would stay; if she bade him miss a tourney where he ought to have won honor, or kiss her carelessly in plain view of everyone, or bring her some hard-to-find delicacy, he would obey, because he loved her.

Here has not proved remarkably different from Camelot in the main, but there have been bright spots -- Magnus, whom she adores; Little John, who leaves her cream, and Kade, who makes her bright ribbons; and of course the interesting witch-women, who she likes very much but who have shown no recognition of what she is (she leaves Gu Xiang pointedly off her mental list). On the other hand, a number of the residents have said things along the lines of if you need anything, if there's anything I can do, if you should get cold, and she's finding she likes that very much.

"What canst thou do?"

"Oh, lots of things¹." He shrugs. "If you mean what powers do I have as a god though, it's a little more, ah, specific." He holds out a hand. A mess of vines begin growing, then dissipate, leaving behind a bunch of grapes, which he then offers. "I can also make wine."

1. Debatable.

As it happens, plant-growth-based powers are probably the thing most likely to get her good opinion, and she takes the grapes with a look that isn't quite impressed, but probably as close as she's going to get to it.

"That's well," she says approvingly, and then, after a pause, "Couldst thou grow a bower thereof?"

"I suppose so, as long as you don't mind it being only grapevines."

"My winter home hath been despoiled, and I like not the house to live in," casting her eyes at the walls around them. "An I find a place betimes that likes me I would have thee shape thy vines unto a bedchamber for me -- I'll furnish it myself."

"And it's so cold out too! My poor dear, you'll catch a frost! Simply name the time and I'll do what I can."

"Ay, so I will. When 'tis light tomorrow, an the weather hold."

“Of course!”

He’s hoping he’ll be able to find an alarm clock when he gets back to his room.

“Out of curiosity, what should I call you?” He’s careful not to ask specifically for her name, as he knows that can be… a tricky subject among certain populations of fae.

"Dame Ragnelle is my name," with an airy toss of her masses of hair. "Call me so."

Because Lan Wangji likes Grantaire, and because he said that he would likely be there, he is there. He enters precisely on time, carrying his own teapot in his hands. He finds the seat farthest from the center, sits, produces a teacup from his sleeve, and fills it for himself. It would not quite be accurate to say that he settles back, because he sits as perfectly straight as ever, but there is a certain air about him that makes it clear he intends to do very little other than observe as he lets his tea cool.

He doesn't mind letting conversation wash over him. He has been doing that for most of his life. Political meetings, war strategy sessions, and discussion conferences. If he had something to say, he would say it, as he did at Carp Tower when Wei Ying burst in to demand the whereabouts of Wen Ning -- but today, he has nothing. If someone should govern the mansion, it isn't going to be him, and he would rather not see the privileges of leadership fall to anyone too eager to claim them. The thought of entering into a squabble about it as a form of entertainment is exhausting. Power ebbs and flows, and those who grasp it abuse it as often as not. Expressionless, he sips his tea once enough of its heat has leached away and remains silent.

"Oh, thank gods, Hanguang-jun," Magnus says, parking himself right next to him. He whispers a confession: "This is a lot more boring than I thought it would be. And I already kinda thought it would be pretty bad."

Lan Wangji's mostly straight face does soften into a minuscule flicker of a smile, particularly in answer to the word boring. He gives a tiny nod of acknowledgement and of some private agreement, then produces a second teacup out of his sleeve and holds it aloft to ask Magnus if he would like some.

Magnus nods earnestly. "Thank you," he says. "That sounds great."

Lan Wangji looks fondly at him for a small moment, and then holds back his sleeve to pour him a cup as directed. It's still hot, steaming once it fills the cup, and he passes it with care to Magnus.

"Thanks, Hanguang-jun," says Magnus. He scoots a little closer as he takes the cup, and then leans against him.

Feeling as indulgent as ever, and surprisingly glad to have some company here, Lan Wangji folds his arm around Magnus' shoulders. He can use his other hand to continue drinking his tea for the time being.

Galahad came from a sense of loyalty towards Grantaire above everything else, but this environment is perfectly designed to make him anxious and overstimulated. As soon as he sees Lan Wangji he goes to his table and sits there; the overlapping conversation is already wearing at him. Lan Wangji can be trusted not to speak unnecessarily. At the moment Galahad is quite grateful for it.

Lan Wangji gives Galahad a small nod of greeting, then sets down his tea so that he can also put his hands together to perform a seated version of a bow. He would be happy to entertain any of his more talkative friends here, but there is a certain relief to seeing Galahad, whom he knows will not add to the cacophony of voices. As he did with Magnus, he rummages in one of his sleeves until a second teacup finds its way into his hand, then tips it toward Galahad to ask whether he would like to share.

He nods without speaking. He knows Magnus is teaching Lan Wangji some sign language, so he signs thank you but not necessarily with an expectation of it being understood.

Lan Wangji's expression doesn't, strictly, change, but understanding lights his eyes. He sets down that teacup, then signs you're welcome back at Galahad. The collection of his known signs remains fairly paltry, but he likes to be polite. That done, he holds back his sleeve with one hand and pours Galahad a cup of tea with the other.

A wash of relief, an easing of tension, goes through him. He always wants to be understood, and the way Lan Wangji understands him feels like the pleasure of finally being clean after a day of sweating and effort -- something that was uncomfortable is better now. It's strange to think of how completely they misunderstood each other in the beginning now that Lan Wangji is a person Galahad can be at ease around.

He puts his hands around the teacup, letting his cold fingers be warmed by the heat of the tea, and is grateful, again, at how he's gone from such loneliness to having so many people he likes and trusts.

Lan Wangji watches Galahad wrap his hands around the teacup and settles into his own relief, outsized as compared with that understated exchange. When Galahad was Damien, burdened by his past and by his power, Lan Wangji had seen Wei Ying in him. That was easy, because he sees Wei Ying in almost everything, and because Galahad's identity was so muddled at that time, sheets of rice paper pressed together so that the words written on them blurred as they overlapped. It had never occurred to him to see himself in Galahad, because it never occurs to him to see himself in anyone. Even his mother, who loved him, would ask him, balancing him on her knee and patting the front of his perfectly clean robes, how she produced such a singularly serious and dutiful child. He always understood that there was something about him that kept him at an insurmountable remove from other people. At times, it was like a gift, and at others, under the gently insistent weight of his brother's concern, it was a cause for shame.

After a moment's thought, and a slow mouthful of tea, he lifts his hands again and makes the signs for Galahad's name as Magnus taught him, G, flower, choice. His hands are unused to these specific movements, but he doesn't find them so difficult to recreate after all his qin practice, so long as he reminds himself that each gesture has meaning like each fingering position produces a unique chord. He pauses, looking at Galahad to be certain he has it right.

Galahad nods, signing his name more fluidly with the ease of familiarity. Then he gives Lan Wangji a questioning look: has he chosen a name-sign?

Before answering, Lan Wangji signs Galahad's name again, already more easily. As for his own name, he shakes his head a little. He has only the sign Magnus showed him, the hand at his temple and then his thumb drawing a line across his forehead ribbon, so he does that, with a tiny quirk at the corner of his mouth.

In spite of himself, Galahad smiles: he still sees the echo of father in that sign. He copies it, however -- and then he points across the room to Claudius, deep in conversation with Laertes, and signs C-snake-dragon.

Lan Wangji knows two of these signs. Later, he will have to ask someone or look up the third one. Still, following Galahad's gesture toward Claudius, who is clearly enjoying himself on a level completely inaccessible to either of them, softens his face with fondness, and he dutifully copies all three, once and then again to be certain he can remember for whenever it becomes relevant.

His own expression is soft too, though there's a little of that what-if ache inside him again. He's so untried -- but Claudius looks so happy with his glass of wine and his animated conversation, the rather wry set of his mouth and the way Galahad can almost hear the drawl as he speaks. He laughs at something Laertes says, and Galahad's heart clenches like a fist, not in anxiety or jealousy but in love.

He wants to tell Lan Wangji that they're betrothed -- he hasn't told anyone yet, because Claudius himself already told Magnus, and Claudius should certainly be the one to tell Lan Wangji, his best friend -- but Galahad wishes he could, nonetheless. He rubs his thumb along the braid of his watchband, and tries to resolve the ache of both love and uncertainty inside him.

Lan Wangji watches again as Galahad toys with his jewelry. Although Galahad's face is often as unmoving as his own, the realization of how similar they are makes it simple enough to perceive that there must be a multitude of thoughts and feelings behind that inexpressive expression. If they were not sharing this silence together, surrounded on all sides by clinking glasses and arguing voices, Lan Wangji might gently make space for Galahad to speak about it, but that will need to wait. For now, he can only guess. He knows what it is to be a man who lived all his life in the quiet and then gave his heart away to a smiling, laughing whirl of flirtation and precious, frivolous words. He had thirteen years to, without knowing he was preparing for something, become the man Wei Ying needed. Galahad is very young.

He picks up his tea and takes a measured sip, such that Galahad can follow his lead. There will be another time for them to speak, if it is necessary.

Galahad's gaze flicks back to Lan Wangji, and he lifts his own cup in turn, copying the slow, thoughtful way he drinks his tea. It tastes green and earthy; Galahad savors that taste. It's late enough in the evening that he's allowed to drink now, the sun having disappeared beyond the tree line, and after a day of fasting the warmth of the tea in his stomach and the flavor of green on his tongue is as heady as the mulled wine at Wanderers Gather. He closes his eyes. The noise recedes to a bearable level as he lets himself stop being present and sink into his field instead, and as he sits cross-legged there watching the heads of wheat and the fish move as if caught in an invisible pull of tides he feels such immense gratitude towards Lan Wangji.

Galahad's eyes shut, his young face turning smooth and his aura palpably calming. His breathing slows and deepens. It almost makes Lan Wangji smile to witness it. He remains alert, to keep an eye on Galahad, but he matches his breathing to Galahad's, a small reminder to both of them that this is a moment they are in together. He could be meditating with his brother, or even with Sizhui; there are, he is realizing here, a thousand ways to brush up against the reality of another human spirit, none of them quite the same but nearly all of them worth nurturing. He drinks his slowly-cooling tea, maintains quiet awareness of his companion, and lets the bustle of the room wax and wane apart from them.

Kade is here, mostly because he's trying to make a point to get out of his room more and the flyer on the welcome table seemed interesting enough. He doesn't plan to participate--he's pretty sure most of the people here are European, and probably from history, and as previously established he has little knowledge or interest in any politics related to all of that. His other areas of knowledge, of course, encompass Prism (a non-starter), and twenty-first century America (the less said about that, the better). He's not going to write it off, though, especially since there seemed to be a slim chance other things might get discussed, as well.

So he brings his embroidery, notes what seems to be the quiet corner, and goes to pull up a seat there. He gives Lan Wangji a friendly nod as he does.

Ah, the one with the pipe music, who has students of his own. Lan Wangji returns the nod, adding a polite little seated bow as well. Because he has offered tea to everyone who's come to join him thus far, he does the same for Kade, lifting a cup toward him in a silent question.

Oh, why not. Kade's more of a coffee guy, but he has fond memories sipping hot beverages in an island of calm surrounded by an ocean of chaos (i.e., with Aunt Ely in her office back at the school), and it's definitely too late in the day for coffee. He nods.

Dutiful, Lan Wangji pours Kade a cup of tea, letting the leaves settle before he passes it toward him. He glances at Kade's embroidery with mild curiosity, but this is not exactly the time to add to the number of voices filling the room with excessive noise.

Kade catches the glance and passes it over so that Lan Wangji can see it better as he takes the tea. It's a wide ribbon that he's embroidering right now, mostly just trying out new patterns to see what he likes best; currently, he's trying out a geometric pattern just half a shade darker than the ribbon itself.

Since Kade offered, Lan Wangji takes the ribbon and examines it along with the partially-completed design that spans some of it. His eyes flick up briefly toward the ribbon that sits snugly across his own forehead, the cloud insignia embroidered there. He hopes never to need a replacement or to need repairs for this one, especially as he would not like asking Kade to touch it, but it cannot hurt to keep the potential resource in mind. After a moment or two more of thought, he hands the ribbon back with a nod of thanks.

Kade nods back. He takes a sip of tea and toasts Lan Wangji with the cup, then turns his focus to his stitches, letting the noise in the room wash over him.

Enjolras drifts by on his way to get some more bread and wine. Certainly, there are many good conversations going on, and he will be part of them at some point; but he is also content to listen and let the waves of conversation pass over him. It is what he tended to do at home, after all, when not making fiery speeches or collecting weaponry for the cause --and a good number of people that are present have already discussed philosophy with him at some point or another. He can appreciate the necessity of an island of quiet in the midst of all the chaos, and he gives Lan Wangji a small nod -- a silent thank you for coming, it is truly appreciated.

Lan Wangji happens to be perfectly cognizant of the extent to which the success and attendance of this meeting constitutes a gesture of love from Grantaire to Enjolras. It is not to his tastes -- clearly enough -- but that doesn't matter. He catches Enjolras' eye with a little banked warmth in his blank expression and gives him a small nod, and a seated half-bow, in return.

On some level Enjolras is aware of the gesture as well, but he's choosing to ignore that for the present. Grantaire will receive his thanks later; in a more private setting. (He likely can already tell how grateful Enjolras is, Grantaire has an odd way of reading even the slightest alterations in his attitudes.) He also realizes that this event is certainly not to everyone's tastes: perhaps at the next they will try and avoid talk of politics and philosophy, though that is not particularly to Enjolras tastes, either. It is the first step in his attempt at fostering a sense of community here, and those are always uncertain, but he is determined to continue trying.

In any case, Enjolras will linger a few minutes longer in the small oasis of quiet surrounding Lan Wangji and the others, grateful for it in his own way.

Grantaire will of course notice Lan Wangji's entrance, because he's keeping careful track of the arrivals even as he's lounging, insouciant, in his seat. His expression brightens a bit to see him and he waves, but doesn't do much else to call attention to his arrival.

Frankly, the absence of fanfare is appreciated. Since, at that moment, his tea is still cooling and the bulk of the conversation has yet to commence, Lan Wangji directs the most polite bow he can muster without standing, and drawing more attention to himself, toward Grantaire. For his sake, after the way he spoke of Enjolras' regard as a sublime gift, Lan Wangji hopes that this meeting goes precisely the way it is meant to.

Aleksander had promised Grantaire he would attend and so here he was. He cajoled a glass of kvas from the liquor cabinet and found a seat near the back. He wasn't sure he was ready to jump into some of the more lively debates so in the meantime, he took sips of his drink and people-watched. Whatever else came of this night, it was good to feel part of a community.

"Sanyi!" He has a drink in his hand, as usual, and when he catches sight of Aleksander he comes over, stopping himself at the last moment from greeting him with a kiss to each cheek.

Aleksander turned at the sound of Sagramore's voice and smiled widely. "Seryozha, hello! It is good to see you. Enjoying yourself?"

"Oh, you know. I wasn't built for arguing, but I'm glad to see everyone."

"I will admit that it is much more pleasant to be on the sidelines listening in then participating," Aleksander said. "Nearly every cabinet meeting I attended turned into a debate and I hated every minute of it. Such a waste of time and no one listened to me or my advice except when they wanted Grisha power to support their own projects."

"If they had listened wouldst thou have liked it better, or would it have been never more than a trial?" He nudges against Aleksander's shoulder, a casual intimacy in the way he arranges his body around Aleksander's. "Didst thou hear Laertes there trying to stir up arguments?" he adds, indulgently fond.

The touch was comforting and Aleksander smiled warmly pressed his shoulder against Sagramore. He considered his answer for a few moments before speaking. "It would have made my job easier and would have been better for Ravka as a whole if we could have worked together. I am not sure I would have liked the meetings any better. I would rather do things then talk about them endlessly."

"I did," he added, amused. "He is enjoying himself, isn't he?"

"A man of action. I know thy kind." He looks over at Laertes, who is, he's fairly sure, being flirted with by Dionysus. "Christ, I hope so. He deserves it; he works too hard."

Aleksander smiled wryly. "Sometimes we men of action fear the quiet that comes when there is nothing to occupy the mind. It can be hard to rest even when you know you should. But I imagine you both are aware of that."

"I am, unfortunately, intimately familiar with that affliction."

"It was easy enough to be busy out on the front lines but not so much now." Aleksander sighed but leaned against Sagramore for a moment. "Still, I would much rather be here. I will have to keep looking for distractions. Maybe I should consider holding dance classes after all."

"Thou shouldst!" straightening up again to look at him with delight. "I'd love to learn from thee."

"Would you really?" Aleksander asked, surprised. "I can't imagine too many others would. But that doesn't mean it is not worth doing. I don't know how well I can teach but I would like to try."

"If only I came and thou hadst no recourse but to teach me alone, wouldst thou suffer?" he teases.

"Oh indeed," Aleksander answered playfully. "What a hardship it would be to provide personal instruction to such a promising student."

"Thou knowst me to be promising? I suppose we have danced together once."

"Indeed! It was only one dance, yes, but it was enough to let me see your sense of rhythm, your grace, your musicality... I see much promise." Aleksander was being a little ridiculous but he meant each word.

"Sir! Thou'rt too kind. But I'll be thy diligent pupil for words like that."

For a moment, Aleksander considered reaching for Sagramore's hand to give an ostentatious kiss but thought the better of it. "Unlike others, I have never thought cruelty or unkind words appropriate methods for teaching."

"Thou wouldst train dogs well," with a little grin.

"Would I? I am not sure," Aleksander said playfully. "I do rather enjoy being a dog uncle and thus getting all of joy but none of the hard work."

"Well, that's a choice, that doesn't speak to thine own natural talents."

Aleksander nodded, conceding the point. "I've never had the opportunity thus far but I wouldn't be opposed if it ever became necessary. It surely can't be any worse then teaching students."

"Good, it's decided," and this time he does kiss Aleksander on the cheek -- it doesn't matter, he's not ashamed to be seen affectionate with Aleksander and Aleksander probably isn't ashamed either.

Once, Aleksander would have shied away from such displays of affection. Now, he smiled fondly and returned the kiss. "I wonder now if I should consider establishing a dance school for dogs as well."

"I'm in!"

"You and Szarka will be the principle dancers," Aleksander grinned. "Kade does sewing work, does he not? I'll have to commission him for costumes."

"She'll be beautiful. I'll see if he can make her a little diadem for her brow."

"She will be the fairest princess in all of the land," Aleksander declared. "Not that she isn't, already."

"No, no, but once she's crowned it will be another matter." He glances towards Enjolras, with a grin. "We'll just keep it to ourselves lest she be overthrown."

It took Aleksander a moment then he remembered Enjolras's opinion on monarchy and laughed. "Of course. We have to give her time to grow into her role, pave the way so all will know and love her."

"Right, once she has the hearts of the people there'll be no one who can move against her."

"She'll be such a wise and benevolent ruler," Aleksander said, putting a hand to his heart dramatically. "It shall be a golden age."

"A time of plenty and peace."

Though Aleksander knew they were only being ridiculous, he couldn't help the note of sadness in his voice.
"That is all I ever wanted."

Sagramore's face falls, and he reaches for Aleksander's hands. "My heart--"

Aleksander quickly shook his head though he let Sagramore take his hands. "I am all right. I did not mean for that to come out how it did."

"Thou shouldst have had the peace thou didst long for."

"I have it now," Aleksander said softly. "And I am grateful for it."

Nina is present, grabbing a pastry or two and listening in on the conversations. While she has been political and involved with schemes, discussions of morality, espionage, and other debates in the past, she usually wasn't the one talking in those situations. For all her charm, she was always more of an enforcer. In Ketterdamn, Kaz told them what to do while she and Jesper bickered in the background. In Ravka, her status wasn't high enough that she worked directly with the crown and his advisors.

In any case, in the spirit of discussion and following her conversation with Susan, if anyone greets her and starts chatting with her, she'll probably ask them, "So... did you want to get involved with the play?"

"Ay," says Laertes, who has risen from his own chair to give her a hug in greeting. "Didst ask for someone to help build sets, didst thou not? I may be able to help with that."

"One of the most important parts of a play," Nina says, with a smile. "Do you have any plays that you like? Genres?"

"Tragedies move me," says Laertes, "but I would not have us play tragedies here. Something like Lysistrata, perhaps."

"I'm not familiar with that one," Nina says, taking a sip of her coffee. "What's it about?"

"The women of Athens greatly resent the ongoing war between Athens and Sparta, and so they propose a means of breaking the war: to deny their men the favors of their sex until the war is ended," says Laertes.

Nina raises an eyebrow, amused. "I'm guessing it worked? When I worked at the House of the White Rose, the girls would always talk about going on strike. It'd probably ruin the entire economy of Ketterdam if they ever did."

"Then they should have," says Laertes immediately. "Should they be so vital to the city, they deserved to be treated with all the respect such a position owns."

"Unfortunately, most of the girls were Grisha as well-- second-rate citizens in Ketterdam. I was lucky I could soothe anxieties and stress with a wave of my hand instead of touching anyone." She waggles her fingers, making light of it -- but she does also think of Inej and her time in the Menagerie. "Anyway, that was a tangent. What happens at the end of the play?"

Everything Nina's just said is deeply alarming--but she doesn't seem to want to talk about it, so Laertes gamely continues, "At long last, Athens and Sparta come to talk of peace, and a beautiful nude woman called Reconciliation presides. Captivated by the sight of her, Athens and Sparta swiftly agree to the terms of the peace, and the war and the strike end with merrymaking."

"I'll have to see if I can find it a copy of it in the library! ...Who would you cast as Reconciliation?" She asks, mostly just to see how he'll react.

Laertes goes crimson to his throat. "My lady," he manages, "I am but tasked with building the sets. Such matters as casting are beyond my purview."

Oh, that's a great reaction; almost as great as when Sagramore's soul almost left his body when she made a meat-related joke. "Of course," Nina says, solemnly and apologetically -- but with a hint of mischief. "Any interest in acting?"

"I fear I have not the skill for it," says Laertes, just as apologetic. "I can read a part cleanly, but not make it blaze with life and feeling."

"Really?" Nina asks, doubtful. "I find that surprising. You have so much feeling and passion when you normally speak, it's hard to imagine it wouldn't translate to the stage."

"Hast never heard me lie," Laertes laughs. "I can't speak with feeling or passion when I feel no passion myself."

"Laertes," Nina looks at him. "Do you really mean that? No passion?"

"Not enough to make the show convincing."

"Oh-- for a second, I thought you meant you didn't have any passion for anything and I was about to find two slices of bread to turn you into an idiot sandwich."

"Dear Nina," Laertes laughs, "pile me about with bread all thou likest, but never do me the insult of saying I want for passion."

Nina was about to let him have it¹ and all of that momentum needs to go somewhere, so she laughs as well. "I was concerned you had a very poor sense of self!"

¹Aggressively compliment him on how inspiringly passionate he is.

"I'll admit it, but not so poor as that."

Nina lets out one last giggle over the situation, then takes a bite of one of her pastries, looking around. "What do you make of all of this?"

"Alas, I fear it's not quite as lively as Grantaire and Enjolras might have hoped," Laertes admits. "To hear them tell it, their friends could scarcely be induced to stop talking; here, though, it seems that far more have come to listen--or even only to be present. Thy prompting on the subject of the play has been a welcome bulwark against silence."

"Maybe... that's just the nature of the French?" Nina ventures, though she's only just recently learned what France is.

"Oh, I would be very curious as to Enjolras's and Grantaire's opinions on that."

"Maybe I should ask them," Nina suggests. "'Do you think your friends talk and debate more because they're your friends and like calls to like -- or do you think it's because they're French?'"

"Go to," Laertes laughs. "Whatever thou learnest of the French by it, it will be a useful education."

"Enjolras," Nina says, putting on a serious expression. "Are you the way you are because you're you or because you're French?" She grins a little. "I think that would go over great."

"The worst of it is, with that framing, he would be bound by honor to answer yea."

"Well, let's see what happens then," Nina says with a grin.

"Godspeed." Laertes toasts her with his water, then turns to other conversations.

Grantaire, who is always up to chatting, answers the question easily enough. "I could paint a fair enough backdrop. At least so that the audience would probably have a reasonable idea of what the scenery looks like."

“I didn’t know you were an artist until you mentioned that in your survey answer,” Nina says, delighted. “You and Laertes could work together for the set and backdrop. No interest in acting, though?”

"Studied art, don't know that I'd really say I'm an artist, but I'm middling enough with paints and would be happy enough to help with that. As for acting..." He shrugs. "I have no qualms with public speaking, but that's not exactly the same. I'll say... if you're in need of more after those who are enthusiastic about the prospect have come forward, I'll join. Otherwise I'll be perfectly happy to watch and enjoy the production."

"Or if we're in need of someone to perform a monologue?" Nina asks, with a little smile.

He laughs. "There is that, although mine tend toward the extemporaneous, as opposed to the memorized. Not that I'm incapable of memorization."

"Well, we'll at least put you down for backdrop painting." She looks at him, curious for a moment, having overheard his earlier speech. "By the way, what's my food, drink, and animal?"

"Ah, of course. Let me see... From what I've ascertained from our acquaintance so far, anyway, croquembouche, Fireball, and perhaps a fox."

"Oh! The fox is the Ravkan national animal," Nina says, delighted. "What's... a croquembouche?"

"Small round cream-filled choux pastries," he holds up a hand in a circle to indicate the size, "piled into a stack and bound with spun sugar. Sometimes with other additional tasty decorations."

Her eyes widen to nearly the size of a choux pastry. "That sounds incredible."

"Excellent dessert for special occasions. Livens up a table."

"I do liven up a lot of things," Nina muses.

"And there you have it, then!"

"Grantaire," Nina begins very solemnly, "do you think a meeting like this is a very French thing or do you think it's more of a social circle thing?"

He looks thoughtful. "You know, that is difficult for me to say, as up until a few months ago, my social circle was entirely French. I think perhaps there are facets of it that are particular to social circles and facets that are particularly French, and it falls into a nice convergence."

That’s a nice, reasoned reply to a silly thought she had while speaking with Laertes. “Do you miss it? France and your friends?”

He shrugs. "Sure." It's an easy answer and a complicated one at the same time. "But that hardly matters. It's hardly as if I could go back, and if I could, they wouldn't be there anyway, so that takes away half the point." He takes a drink. "But I also like it here, and despite the fact that it's smaller, there's still a lot to be discovered and enjoyed here. And maybe one day they'll make it here too."

Nina nods slowly, understanding. For her, there's someone very specific she had been hoping for, though the longer she's here at the mansion without a hint of him (not even during visitor's day), the more she's resigned to the fact that she's said her final farewell. "I hope that for you as well. It was great to meet two of them when they were here."

Grantaire is lucky enough that if he'd had one specific hope of a person, that person arrived before he could have even mustered hoping for it. But the rest would be marvelous additions too. He smiles a little. "That was a lovely day."

“They seemed like amazing individuals,” Nina says, with genuine warmth.

He nods. "They were. All of them were. As wonderful as it is here, as much as I like it, I'd switch places with any of them in an instant if I could."

"You're a good friend, Grantaire," Nina tells him.

He shrugs. "I'm all right. Could be a better one, but could be worse."

"You're loyal and kind and funny," Nina tells him firmly. "You're thoughtful."

Grantaire scratches the back of his neck and takes a quick drink. "That's a slight overstatement."

Nina gives him a skeptical, stern look, briefly wondering if she needs to head back to the pantry for bread to make an idiot sandwich.

That is a worrisome expression. "Now, I hardly dispute being funny, and will even admit to loyalty, much to my occasional chagrin. But most all people can be thoughtful occasionally, and I include myself in that."

Nina purses her lips slightly. "Occasionally? Mr. I can think of the perfect dessert, animal, and drink for someone I've only known for a short while?"

"In my defense, I have no idea whether or not they are truly perfect choices. There could easily be something more suitable that I am unaware of, either because I don't know the animal or foodstuff in question or because of short acquaintance."

"And yet you're still trying to create community and make friends because you're thoughtful." Nina sets her hands on her hips. "Are you going to keep debating with me about this until I have to bully you into admitting you're a good friend?"

"I have no doubt that you would, clearly. So I shall concede this time."

Nina nods imperiously once, then gives him a bright smile. "Good."

He laughs almost despite himself. "You are a formidable opponent indeed, mademoiselle."

"So I've been told," she tells him with a little wink, before heading off to speak with someone else.

There was an open invite for the meeting posted in a public area and Aornis was intrigued, so... she's there, slipping in a little later. She's wearing a black Armani pantsuit today with contrasting neon pink nails and will nod politely at anyone who makes eye contact with her. For the most part, she's content to sip at a cup of tea and listen.

"Aornis," Claudius says pleasantly, sitting across from her with a newly-topped glass of wine. "I've a question I've been tossing around tonight to anyone who will answer. If you had to depose a tyrant, with the resources you have here, how would you go about it?"

"Claudius," Aornis returns the greeting, with a raised eyebrow. "I suppose the first counter question would be what kind of tyrant they are. Did they simply seize power without legal right? Or are they actively cruel and oppressive?"

"Would your answers be different for each? That makes a challenging choice for me -- I'd quite like to hear both." Claudius sips his wine, considering. "Let's say whichever tyrant you would enjoy deposing the most."

"Clearly the cruel and oppressive one." She gives him a small smile; she is a law enforcement agent, of course. That's an easy answer for her. "If I didn't have Jurisfiction behind me, my scope would be pretty limited, if I'm going to be honest. I would try and gather information first and then subtly spread that information to see who else is sympathetic to my cause. Then the next step would be to assess this tyrant's abilities. What are they capable of?"

"Oh, I like those opening moves," he says in appreciative tones. Those would be his first steps, after all, and since this is only a hypothetical, he can take a tone of confident conspiracy. "Perhaps in such a scenario, we'd end up as allies. We both value gathering information before deciding how to act. In the tyrant's case ... how would you go about testing their capabilities? Deliberately provoking them? I'll admit that's my own bad habit."

"Is it a bad habit if it works?" Aornis asks, quite blandly. It is all hypothetical, after all. "I'd imagine it would be the best way to discover their weaknesses."

"It's a risky gambit. But if you can manage the risk, why not? What's your favorite form of provocation?"

"Do I look like someone who could provoke anyone?" Aornis asks him, dryly. Despite being put together and objectively fairly attractive, her general appearance is quite ordinary and forgettable¹. "I know this is all hypothetical, but that might be a step too far."

¹:drum_with_drumsticks:

"Ah, so that's less your style, then. You're the one they don't see coming because you're beneath their notice. That's useful in deposing a tyrant," Claudius says in the blithest of blithe tones.

"I do find it easy to blend into any genre," Aornis allows. "If you're asking everyone this question, maybe you could use these answers to help you depose the ultimate tyrant here." She pauses briefly, then gestures. "This house."

"You have my attention," Claudius says with a slow, impressed smile. "How does one depose a house?"

"If we're speaking hypothetically, that would be the most hypothetical situation," Aornis replies, tone quite dry. "Unless there's someone else you'd like to depose?"

“No, no, I’m liking this turn. Your first move was to assess your opponent’s abilities, correct? We know the mansion’s abilities rather well. It can endlessly generate objects — whether that’s ex nihilo or out of other worlds is unclear. Sometimes, in a mischievous mood, it leaves out items with enchantments on them: books that foretell possible futures, precious trinkets from childhood that transform you to a child once more. Or the house itself bears the enchantment, as it did the day when passing through any given doorway could compel you to tell the truth. It can conjure beings from fictional worlds, of course, either one by one or en masse, like that horde of movie monsters. More mysteriously, it can recreate fictional situations. The body swapping from the film Freaky Friday, for example. At the same time, it makes fictional characters forget that we’re fictional, gives us memories outside of our canon that feel entirely real. It tries to hide that from us by keeping out the books we came from.” Smiling and spreading a hand, he says, “When it’s all laid out, it’s the ideal challenge for you, don’t you think? How would you take it on?”

Aornis looks at Claudius for a long moment, then pauses for another moment to consider his words carefully. "I suppose this does fall under my jurisdiction," she finally says dryly, making a small joke out of her job title¹. "Considering this place provides us with food, shelter, and entertainment, I'd first make sure we were well-stocked on all of the above before taking on anything. If we were to approach this from a Jurisdiction perspective, it would take months. Perhaps years. Legislation and regulations move slowly. If we were to go under the table and approach it from a more basic literary route, though, more options are open to us. Since this is hypothetical, I'll assume we can import items from my world, in which case we could destroy this place from the foundation with Grammasites or a Mispeling Vyrus -- but that would destabilize the living situation here as well. We could also make it unreadable and uninteresting; too many of one type of character, boring scenarios and interactions, or taking away all potential plot routes. If we're assuming that we've all been pulled here because we're interesting literary characters, then we take away the interest. After all of this is completed, we'd of course have to have some sort of protection against retribution or backlash. Maybe even ensure there's a backdoor or a way out."

She pauses, thoughtful. "When we say depose, are we talking about abandonment by the forces that govern this place or destruction of them?"

¹Citation needed.

"Oh, you know my favorite way to do things is under the table." He considers an off-color joke here, but decides against it. He has standards. "And I admit, were I at the helm, I would be content to send them into exile -- it's more civilized. I want to keep more options open. But I'd like to hear how you'd utterly destroy them."

“Claudius,” Aornis says, affecting mild shock, “are you essentially asking me how I would kill a god?”

"Why, yes," Claudius replies with a sharp-edged smile. "I believe I am."

"Everything has a weakness, even so-called gods. Since this is all hypothetical, my answer is that hypothetically, the weakness of these... gods? Shall we call them that? -- is us." Aornis already knows what she would do to take down these gods or spirits, but unfortunately (or fortunately), it's nothing she can speak out loud to Claudius. That isn't what she wants, after all. She'd much prefer their full cooperation.

"Oh, that is fascinating," Claudius says in full appreciation. "How so? Hypothetically."

"Please," she says, with a brittle smile. "You're intelligent enough. You can extrapolate."

Claudius thinks in silence through his own theories, the ones first fomented with Crowley. He’s gone along with the idea that the mansion is a tyrant — a gaoler, certainly, holding the key to worlds beyond — but it’s not a danger to those inside it. They’re all someone’s favorite character. The challenges the mansion sends them are meant to be overcome, like the waves of zombies which were never a threat, but a chance for every fighter to combine their strength and cunning against a common foe. The stuff of stories, for distant spirits to watch and applaud. Despite all his desperate curses that day, Claudius is convinced now they wouldn’t let him die.

But if he held the knife to his own throat, threatened to end his story here, and rob them of their entertainments, what would they do then? What if he didn’t wait for an answer? They’d lose one of their favorites.

If you want to strike at someone’s heart, strike someone dear to them. “I see,” Claudius says. “No need to elaborate. You said it clearly. We are their weakness.”

Aornis can pinpoint the moment he has the realization and she arches an eyebrow at his response. "Precisely. Now are you going to tell me why we're going through this thought exercise?" It's all hypothetical, of course. But hypothetically, she has seen enough to believe that the gods or spirits of this place may be behind her. Up until a point. She's willing to test what that point might be.

“Well, you know how I would deal with a despot. Poison him in the garden for his estate. I’d like to know as much about you as you do about me. But if you asked me why I’d like to …” He smiles. “I’d say it’s because you fascinate me.”

"Surely there's nothing fascinating about an average British woman with a corporate job who spends her weekends partying in Paris and Mallorca," Aornis says, quite dryly. "I'm quite typical, I assure you. If there was a book written about me, I'd be a fraction of the celebrity that you are."

"You're biased by the narrative. I wasn't always a poisoner king -- I was a prototypically Danish diplomat, attending masques in Illyria and Navarre. You could be so much more, or," with a provocative headtilt, "perhaps you always have been."

Aornis gives him a mild smile, though she knows that he saw a slightly different side of her in this conversation, one that she surprisingly isn't going to take away. "I'm not sure what you're talking about."

“Then I’ll leave you to mull. It’s been an absolute pleasure, Aornis,” he says, rising from his seat. “Do keep in touch.”

"Until next time," she tells him.

Oh, another ugly who isn't totally fashion-missing! She has to go say hello.

"Hi, I'm Tally," she enthuses. "Totally bubbly nails!"

"Aornis," she offers with a small smile, opening her free hand so Tally can see the nails better. "Thank you. Just because there's an audience of only 30-odd people doesn't mean we should let fashion fall to the wayside."

"I totally agree!" Tally herself is dressed in a minidress and boots, which is definitely more of a going-out look than this bash had required, but that's Enjolras's fault for not specifying a dress code. "The flier said we should discuss fashion, but no one seems to have dressed cute besides us. It makes me feel utterly missing."

"They don't have their priorities right, clearly." Aornis does believe in this. A carefully planned outfit can get her into a variety of different events without having to use any additional ...encouragement. "Well, we can talk about fashion. I like the dress."

"Thank you!" Tally gives her a pretty smile. "I've been experimenting and trying to make as many new clothes as possible. My room is utterly covered." The dress she's wearing now is the same shape as the one she gave Gideon a heart attack with the first time they met, but metallic silver instead of black.

"The outfit selection here is convenient," Aornis agrees. She doesn't even need to shoplift. "Where are you from, Tally? Or maybe -- when?"

"I'm from Seatac in the year 505, but I'm guessing you're a Rusty and the year sounds totally weird. It's about five hundred years past the Rusty year 2005."

"A Rusty," Aornis repeats. "Interesting term. I'm from England in 1986 -- but it seems as though I'm from an alternate universe, based on other histories."

"You're definitely a Rusty, then. Unless your version of society isn't totally obsessed with oil and destroying the planet?"

"Mmm, not obsessed, I would say. The national technological obsession is literature."

"Huh? Like, writing?" Tally blinks in confusion. "How is that technology? It's, like, paper."

"There's a lot of technology that controls and helps the reading process. I think they're planning on releasing UltraWord soon. It's a new technology that's supposed to have a 32 plot system that allows the reader to control the plot."

"Oh, what?" Tally says, totally confused. "I guess complicated ereaders are cool..."

"It's more..." She taps her forehead lightly. "All up here."

"Like augments after an operation? For reading?"

"No operation needed. Reading books alters your brain in a specific way that affects your reading experience." Her tone turns slightly wry. "I've learned that a lot of what is normal for literature in my world isn't the norm for everyone else here."

"I mean, obviously. But I totally get that. No one really seems to share my world's norms, either."

"What are some of the things you take for granted?" Aornis asks, tone curious.

"People here eat meat, and they sometimes like only one gender, and they're really weird about surgery."

Aornis nods, understandingly. "Not too much I've discovered here surprises me. I travel a lot for the fashion events that I go to -- or it might just be my line of work."

"Oh my gosh, fashion? Bubbly!" Tally enthuses. "I did notice you were utterly not fashion-missing, especially compared to most people here. Um, no offense to them! What are some ugly fashion trends right now? Or, from when you were before you came here?"

Aornis tilts her head at the word ugly, but it's clear it doesn't carry the same connotations in Tally's world. "Pretty flashy," Aornis admits. "Leopard print. Brightly colored satin and velvet, even in the high fashion world. I like a sleek silhouette myself -- but with a pop of color to make it less boring."

"Totally bubbly. I had a leopard print hoverboard for a while," Tally says, hoping Aornis will think she's not too fashion-missing. "Velvet seems totally dust-attracting, though."

"True. Unfortunately, a lot of high fashion is worn once and then stored away, perhaps never worn again."

Tally nods, eyes wide and serious. "I know, the Rusties were famous for creating totally bogus amounts of waste. Don't worry, though, by my time we've figured out nanotechnology so that you can wear clothes once and then recycle them, instead of creating garbage islands."

Aornis nods. "Technology can do a lot. It's brought back extinct animals and created time travel in my world; according to Magnus, that's fairly rare."

"We have the extinct animals," Tally brags. "But no time travel. Unless you count going forward." She giggles nervously.

“It’s not all it’s cracked up to be,” Aornis says dryly, thinking about Thursday getting out of a truly evil end of the world conundrum with the help of her idiotic, meddling time-traveling father. “A lot of rules and regulations. There are even restrictions on cheese; the government thinks it’s too addictive.”

She was legitimately shocked when she opened up the fridge in the kitchen and found an entire cheese drawer.

"Like... for environmental concerns?" Tally asks. "I know raising cows was totally killing the planet."

"No, for health reasons. I believe the Cheese Duty Act started in ...1963?" She had gone out with someone who worked in cheese legislation once. He told her a lot about it until she became bored and had to ditch him. "The original reasoning was that sustained cheese abuse caused infertility, memory loss¹, tastebud destruction, and ...well, death."

¹Hmm.

"That's totally crazy!" Tally exclaims. "Just try some plant-based cheese. It's great."

"I'm sure I can find some here." Aornis eyes the coffee machine. "I think I might need something stronger than tea to get through this meeting, but it was good to meet you, Tally."

"Good to meet you too, Aornis!" Tally lets her go, since she can't have a drink herself.

"Thank you," Galahad says quietly. "He liked the book."

"You're welcome. There's a reason it's a classic. You don't read mysteries yourself?"

"Romance."

"Oh, really?" Her tone isn't judgmental in the slightest, simply mildly surprised. "Do you have any favorite authors?"

"Alexis Hall." He's aware that his choice of books is frivolous, but all books that aren't scripture and writings on scripture are inherently frivolous, so there's nothing more shameful about the romances than anything else he might read.

"I've never heard of them. I like to read fantasy romances, sometimes. I pick them up in the airport when I travel."

"I like historical." He pauses. "Which kind of fantasy?"

Aornis shrugs. "Whatever I can find. Kings and queens, court intrigue, the usual drill."

"That's just home," with the faintest hint of amusement.

"With less pining and lovelorn looks. Perhaps," Aornis suggests, dryly.

"Less in the books."

Aornis gives him a wry quirk of her lips to acknowledge the joke. "Well, if I find any interesting mysteries or romances, I'll be sure to let you know."

Shen Yuan notes Aornis enter, and sneaks a few subtle glances at her from across the room, trying to get the measure of her now that it's her and not Magnus in there. She moves differently than Magnus for sure, but without being able to hear what she's saying it's hard to tell what kind of person she is, other than fashionable.

He drifts closer, pretending to dither about the food offerings and eavesdrop on her conversations with other attendees.

"Shen Yuan," Aornis says, when they pass each other later on. "Good to finally meet you. I can't believe our paths haven't crossed up until now."

Oh, crap. Play it cool, Shen Yuan. "Haven't they? I guess it depends on how you count." He smiles, slightly, before clarifying: "I spoke to Magnus in your body, last week. Sorry, this--" he gestures around at the general aura, "has me in a kind of philosophical mood." And also you've read about me!! Or about Shen Qingqiu, at least!!! So that's also what I mean, actually!!

Edited 2024-02-27 02:24 (UTC)

Aornis gives him a wry little tilt of the head that would be familiar if he could remember... "Who didn't Magnus speak to last week?" She asks, dryly. "That's the most extroverted my body has ever been."

"Yes, well, we can't help what people do with our bodies if we're not in them," says Shen Yuan. For example, Shen Jiu would be horrified by how much gay sex he was having¹ with Luo Binghe.² "You're here, though—that's not not extroverted behavior."

¹ Would he?
² Okay yes, this part he would hate.

"Just seeing what everyone else has to say about our predicament," Aornis says, mildly.

"Is it a predicament?" asks Shen Yuan, matching her tone. "Many people seem to prefer it here."

"For me." She shrugs. "I do have a job to get back to."

Shen Yuan raises his eyebrows. He knows what her job is, of course, or at least what she says her job is, as a cover for trying to fix this disastrously chaotic crack fic bubble world she's created. But she doesn't know he knows.¹ "You must really love your job. Most people who're still trying to get back are doing so for people, not work."

¹ And there's nothing that she knows that Shen Yuan doesn't know she knows, obviously.

"It's a familial trait," she explains. "I'm a workaholic."

Eyebrows still up, Shen Yuan asks, "a family business, too?"

"No, just a Hades family familial trait. We're all very focused and career-driven."

Hades family?? Her name is Aornis Hades?? Lady, that name is too fictional to be actually fictional. That's absolutely, one hundred percent the name of someone pretending to be a fictional character to fit in, and Shen Yuan has your fucking number. Give it up! Admit it! That's your MSN screenname from when you were 13! That's your Wattpad profile where you came up with this entire deranged situation!! Aornis Hades.

It is, he admits, creative of her to make up a brother, though. Self-insert protags almost never have family that might miss them when they're kidnapped by idol groups or whatever.

He hasn't had to be this impassive in a dangerous situation since he pretended to sacrifice Luo Binghe to a skinner demon so he could use his protagonist halo to survive. He pastes on a bland smile. "What business are you in?"

"Jurisfiction. It's a literary law enforcement branch." She leans in conspiratorially. "Though I've already told a few people that I'm not pursuing any leads here."

A likely story. Shen Yuan, with an effort, does not narrow his eyes. "Good," he says instead. "I imagine it would be difficult to know where to start."

"Much too difficult," she agrees. "I'm going to get a cup of tea but it was great meeting you, Shen Yuan." Perhaps he experiences slight deja vu as she walks away, but this time, he'll remember the conversation.

Oh my god, how totally boring. Some things about being pretty have turned out to be bogus, but not having to listen to long educational speeches isn't one of them. Tally's here because she thought it might be a party, but it really is just a meeting like the ones they had in the Smoke about resource management. Still, it would be utterly missing to just bounce right away, so she snacks on bread and cheese, listens, and looks for any friends she might be able to actually have fun with.

Edited 2024-02-25 16:18 (UTC)

"Tally," Susan says, coming up to her side. She's still here, for some infernal reason, even though so far the event seems to primarily consist of men bloviating in that way that men do - all conjecture, with neither intelligence nor action behind the words. At least Tally was an interesting conversationalist at the feast. "Hello."

"Hi, Susan-la!" Tally says gratefully. She can tell that Susan is kind of bored too. "Not as fun as the last bash, huh?"

"Certainly not," says Susan, with firm conviction. In tones of great confidence, she adds, "but I suppose men will always want to make themselves feel important."

"Men?" Tally blinks. "What does their gender have to do with it?"

"I mean, they're rather just speaking to hear the sounds of their own voices, don't you think?" Susan asks. It's loud in the room, and every other word she can pick out is just pure nonsense. "This might have been a productive discussion about improving our situations, and yet."

"I've met lots of girls who do that," Tally laughs, "but you're totally right. So bogusly attention-hogging." As much as pretties are supposed to be eye-catching, a party is all about cohesion where Tally comes from. You're not supposed to do a presentation like in school.

"I suppose I might've known," Susan says. She squares her narrow shoulders, shaking off a little of her irritability. If it's truly that awful, you can just leave, she reminds herself. New topic! "What sort of social events do you prefer?"

"I love ice-skating parties," Tally says immediately. "Or beach parties. Anything physical like that. It's totally bubbly to have an activity to do and an easy way to know what to wear."

"Oh, clear dress codes are ever so helpful, are they not?"

"So helpful. I hate when an invitation says something like semi-formal. Like, what does that mean? Just say formal if you want formal!" She's getting worked up. "I love dressing up, but there's literally infinite options. I need guidelines!"

"Agreed," says Susan, tilting her head. "I don't know that the lake will freeze well enough to support skating, and there isn't a beach, but - what sort of parties do you think we ought to have here, given our limited resources for activities?"

"Annie-la said she'd take me out on her boat in the summer, so maybe a boat party?" Tally muses. "Maybe we could rollerskate inside one of the big rooms?"

"I'll note it down," Susan promises, though she's fairly certain the boat is too small for such things and roller skating sounds rather unpleasant. The point is to produce social activities that appeal to many.

"Are you, like, a party planner?" Tally asks. "Bubbly!"

"I certainly am a planner," Susan says, with a fair amount of good humor.

"What kind of parties do you like?"

"The sort that would scandalize my family," Susan says, with the faintest of smiles.

Tally grins. "Oh, bubbly," she says. "Totally crim. Like what?"

"Oh, drinking, dancing, s--" Susan coughs. "Going home with someone new at the end of it after vetting several options, the like."

"I know what sex is, Susan-la, I'm not totally missing," Tally laughs. "A party like that sounds totally bubbly! Ugh, except I'm not supposed to drink any more."

"No? Whyever not?"

"It makes me not bubbly. Like, totally spinning and not present-feeling."

"So... drunk?" Susan is truly trying to understand.

Tally laughs. "Um. Well. Yes. But I kind of feel drunk all the time already. I have, like, brain damage? Sort of? I'm working on it. Thus the no drinking."

"Brain damage! Ah. Well. Yes, then; I can see how drinking might be a complication."

"I got it on purpose," Tally confesses. It feels important to let Susan know she didn't, like, fall off a hoverboard and hit her head. "To try and test an experimental cure for it."

"That's a queer approach to scientific discovery," Susan muses. "Is that how research is conducted in the future, then?"

Tally giggles. "I mean, no. The person trying to cure me is kind of, like, a renegade doctor? It's so weird to just tell people this. It was a big secret back home, but I guess there's no point in hiding it here. My government basically gives everyone brain damage when they give them the pretty operation at age sixteen. I'm part of a group trying to, um, stop that. Or... I was." Tally sighs, thinking about how David had never showed up for her, and never can, now.

Susan now gives Tally a look of muted horror. "I beg your pardon?"

Tally shrugs helplessly. "Um. What part is confusing you?"

"This is what the future holds?"

"I mean, we also don't have war, or, like, scarcity, or ecological collapse," Tally says, trying to avoid another Georgia situation. "It's not all bogus."

"At the cost of compulsory medical procedures resulting in brain damage?" Susan has strong (negative) feelings about this sort of thing, honed sharply in the process of keeping abreast of the news in the aftermath of the War.

"I obviously totally don't support it," Tally says, a little defensively. "Like, duh, I got brain damage just to test the cure." After getting Maddy's husband killed and betraying her son, her brain unhelpfully adds. And now Maddy can't even get her results, because Tally is in a bogus pocket dimension. "I'm sure once the cure is widely available, we'll have good things and freedom." She's not sure, actually, but she has to believe it.

"I beg your pardon; I didn't mean to imply that you did," says Susan. "I was reacting generally to the information. How many others are testing the cure?"

Shame heats Tally's cheeks a little at how defensive she'd gotten. "Just my friend Zane," she says sadly. "It was only supposed to be me, but I was too scared to take the cure by myself. See, I was supposed to test the cure because I found out about it before they turned me pretty, so I could give my informed consent to be treated once I was pretty. You can't just ask a pretty to do it, because of the brain damage, you know? They might not understand what they're getting into, and that's utterly bogus. So I gave myself up and got turned after giving the inventor of the cure my consent. But part of the operation involves forgetting your ugly days, so I hardly even remembered that I'd consented. Zane was with me when they got the pills to me, and even though he only found out about it that day, he was really brave and split the pills with me."

"I suppose that's one way to go about it." Susan is relaxing a little, though; her initial horror - though not subsiding in a global sense - is relaxing when it comes to Tally's involvement in all this.

"We didn't have much choice. Special Circumstances is always trying to get us shut down. Our authorities. When I first got here I wasn't convinced this wasn't some weird prison they'd made for me. But everyone here is too ugly-minded for that. That's a compliment," she adds quickly.

"Ugly-minded!" Susan repeats. "A fascinating term. Whatever does it mean? Just a lack of the brain damage?"

"Um... kind of, yeah. Pretties don't fight. Or think for themselves."

Susan's mouth draws into a thin line. "Then what you've done - testing the cure - is a great thing," she says.

"Um. I don't know. I mean, thanks," Tally says guiltily, thinking about how much she's defended the pretty regime. She's helping now, sure, but she winces to remember what she said as an ugly, or even a few weeks ago at the mansion. "I can't really give anyone my results when I'm trapped here, so that's totally bogus."

"Yes, that is rather unfortunate," says Susan. "At least this Zane is a second subject?"

"Yeah, thank goodness. I'm really glad he was brave enough to volunteer, even without a letter from himself. Hopefully Maddy can find him." Tally's worried that she won't, but who is she kidding? It's Zane. He can do anything. "I wonder if maybe my world is changing already. I've been here for so long."

Susan opens her mouth to say something, and then pauses at the look on Tally's face. "I believe," she says, carefully, "It mightn't be bad if you think of the best case scenario, whilst you're here."

"Maybe," Tally says dubiously. "Isn't that a little pretty-minded, though? Just hoping someone else is taking care of it?"

"Very well," says Susan; she's always willing to deal in hypotheticals. "What else can you do, from here?"

"Well, I'm trying to get this off." Tally holds up her wrist with its interface cuff. "This tracks my position and records me, so I'm trying to get rid of it while I'm here."

"And that would make you feel more meaningfully involved in things going on back in your home?"

"I mean, kind of," Tally says. "I totally get that you're trying to get me to move on or whatever, but I don't want to give up."

Susan blinks, surprised. "Is that what you think I'm doing?"

"Um, yes? You were all, just think of the best case scenario, and totally don't worry about it, because there's nothing we can do from here." Susan's talking like Tally's minders, or her parents, all gentle suggestion.

"When did I say 'don't worry about it, there's nothing we can do'?" Susan sounds a little affronted now. "If you don't want my help sorting out options I can stand down, but I'll thank you not to put words in my mouth. I asked you what you can do. I'd imagine the next step would be to find a way to do the things you can, rather than giving up."

Tally sighs. "Maybe I'm just used to people telling me to give up," she admits, not quite an apology.

Susan can empathize with that, and she simmers down. "Very well," also not quite an apology.

It's hard, having conversations with people who have their own complicated, ugly thoughts swirling around.

"It is probably good to hope for the best," she says. "You're right, that's totally not the same as assuming everything's fine."

"Hope for the best," Susan says, nodding. "And plan for any number of contingencies."

"Totally bubbly ideology," Tally agrees.

Lancelot was headed to the café anyway, but he is a little surprised to hear the amount of noise that is present -- there are many more people than he expected. It seems to be some kind of event. He pauses, reconsidering whether he means to go in, but a quick glance shows him that many of his friends are here and so he might as well have a drink and see what's going on.

He does his best to enter unobtrusively and goes to find something like wine, or perhaps bourbon. He plans to keep to the fringes. (It's not that he's unused to crowds, and he doesn't find them terribly overwhelming -- it's like any court feast or event. But neither is he interested in holding forth about anything or being the center of attention, so this seems a good compromise.)

Magnus plops down across from him. He's never going to like the guy, probably, but because he cares about Galahad and also the women of the world, he can try to make an effort one time. Especially since he, Magnus, is Galahad's real family here, and you make sacrifices for family, or whatever. "Hey asshole," he says, tone polite and friendly. "How's the reading coming along?"

Heroically, Lancelot does not sigh.

"Hello, Magnus," he says, flatly polite, "What reading is that? Your recommendations or that according to my own interests?"

Magnus gives him a cheery grin. Look, he's being sooooo good right now! "What do you think?" he asks, and then, because he can't help himself: "What interests?" (The implication here is that Lancelot is too boring to have them, but he phrases the question as if he's genuinely curious.)

"I'll converse with you on that, if you will answer a question for me."

"...okay," says Magnus, suspiciously.

"You seem to think I lack respect for women," directly. "Why is that?"

"Um, the slut-shamey weirdness, for one," Magnus says, remembering just in time that he's being eminently polite, rather than accusatory or argumentative. "And the way you get every time I bring up feminism, for another?"

He looks genuinely confused. Lancelot works to keep his tone level and open. "Explain," a pause, and then, "please. I would like to understand."

"Okay," says Magnus, still clearly suspicious. "Do you know what a slut is?"

"Yes."

"And did you know that it's fine to be one? And that women have the right to pick and have whatever sexual partners they want, and it's only your business who and how many they sleep with if you're explicitly in a monogamous relationship?"

Now he's even more perplexed. He pauses, parsing this out, and then says, "I shall be frank with you. While, in my experience, few would claim the term with pride, I myself have never said it of anyone. You-- on that first day, you asked me about the Queen, yes? Do you think I judge the Queen for choosing and taking me into her bed? Or that I judge her for-- having another partner who is not me? Or..." He thinks of Susan, and the fact that they both feel free to pursue other people, but leaves that aside.

"I would agree that whoever and however many folk anyone might lie with is not my business. Did you think I disagreed with any of these points?"

"Dude, you got really freaking weird when I implied she had a sex life."

"Magnus," Lancelot sits forward, "I knew not where I was. Or what had happened. Or who you were. I did get defensive -- I did not think you were... implying she had sex. I thought you were commenting directly on that fact, which at court is the same as speaking ill of the Queen, and it is my charge to defend her. At Camelot, it would not be permissible for anyone to speak in public of whatever may take place in the Queen's bedchamber. As you may know, now, if Galahad has told you, at home such talk -- good or ill -- is answerable with violence."

He pauses, giving Magnus a flat, wry look. "At any rate, I was well aware that the Queen 'had a sex life.' It seems you were unaware that this was not for you to speak on."

Edited 2024-02-29 21:51 (UTC)

Magnus crosses his arms, annoyed. "Okay," he says. "I guess you were brand new here and that can be, like, disorienting or whatever, and maybe you didn't expect a sex-positive einherji to support a queen's right to choose whatever partners she wants." The look he's giving Lancelot sharpens abruptly. "Did you read any of the books I told you to read?"

But now Lancelot is honed in, as well -- where before he has seen fit to pay as little attention to Magnus as he could politely manage, now he knows he has a point (a legitimate point) to make.

He says, as kindly as he can, "That is a deflection. Let us return to what we were already speaking of. What about what you know of me and of my affair with the Queen -- which you mentioned within moments of meeting me -- makes you think I don't believe a queen has a right to choose whatever partners she pleases?"

"No, it's topical to the point I'm trying to make."

"If that's so, you'll have no trouble making that point on your own," he says mildly.

He has looked into a few of the books Magnus recommended. If pressed, he would discuss them. But in his view, this is not about books or theories or some other understanding that a person with no personal experience in Camelot might dream up. If Magnus wants to press him, Lancelot would be pressed on facts. (For all of the things he has not considered, has not been able to see -- perhaps cannot see still -- one thing the mansion has granted him is a different view of his relationship with Guinever. He has no enmity for either the Queen or himself.)

"Fine," says Magnus, very obviously biting down on the asshole he wants to append to that word. "Don't tell me. But it would be very helpful if you'd just say which ones." Especially if Sir Sucks-a-lot has read one of the trauma ones or Odin's motivational bullcrap, because then Magnus doesn't have to spend sixteen hours explaining things first. "Or if you're like, 'oh no, this child will scold me because I am exactly the kind of meinfretr who will obstinately ignore good advice because of who it came from' you might as well 'fess up now."

"I don't think you a child," his tone is level, open. "But I do think you ought to explain your sincere feelings without resorting to your list of books."

Lancelot takes a breath and says, "Hear this: I understand your loyalty to Galahad. I would not ask anything less of you -- he should have as many friends as he desires -- and I don't expect you to change your estimate of me." Lancelot stops himself from saying that he wishes his understanding or truce with Galahad were such that he and Galahad might get to know one another better, but that's outside of this discussion with Magnus.

He goes on to say, "If you are to cast judgments on my other relationships, or on how I interacted with you when I crossed some unknown border during perhaps the worst time of my life -- that bears real talk. If you would defer to your reading list, that's well enough, I suppose. But I know not what you expect of me, and so I cannot satisfy your questions."

"Okay, well, why are you so averse to answering a simple question?" Magnus demands, chin jutting out obstinately. "I'm not trying to use my 'list of books' to 'explain my sincere feelings,' I'm trying to figure out if we have any common ground for a discussion at all! What I expect from you right now is a simple 'yes' or 'no,' or maybe, maybe a 'some,' with a clarification of which!"

At this, Lancelot does sigh. He gives Magnus a long look, then takes up his glass to take a healthy sip of bourbon. When he sets the glass down again, he is sitting forward in his seat. If he is going to deal plainly with Magnus on this, he does not intend to hold back.

"Very well. My answer for you is some," he begins. "I cannot recall the order in which you gave them to me, but I shall group them in my own way."

He takes a breath. "I did not seek or read Odin's Plan: How to Have a Successful Afterlife because it does not pertain to me. I am not dead, and whatever afterlife I may have is unlikely to look similar to yours. Along the same lines, Who Moved My Cheese seemed to me ridiculous nonsense -- I did not understand the story or its relevance or how 'business' might function, and so 'twas useless to me."

Lancelot does not, let's be clear, give Magnus space to step in or respond. He barrels on.

"Two of the books you listed have to do with... self-esteem or managing things that have happened to you that have caused harm. I cared not to think on that in ways that asked me to write down my thoughts about -- well. I have things I must come to understand. I will not do so in a book, and I cared not to think on it any further in this way. Moving on: I came to some understanding of what are considered to be the Seven Heroic Qualities but found I needn't learn anything more. When I had my vigil and took my vows as a Knight in the service of the High King, I dedicated myself to similar qualities and have tried to live my life by those. I have failed, often enough, I am sure. But I continue to use that code to guide my thoughts and actions."

He takes a very quick sip of his drink. He has no intention of letting Magnus cut him off, because he knows that Magnus is looking for some weakness and he would prefer to get out everything he is thinking.

"This brings us to the matter of women, respect-- feminism," which he says very carefully. "Introduction to Feminism for Dummies did not seem to be something the library could provide. No matter. I did read The Second Sex and The Feminine Mystique." There is no need to say here that both of these gave him a considerable amount of questions for and discussion to have with Susan, but that is a very nice fringe benefit. "I think from these, I understand your meaning when you speak of feminism, and while I could find nothing I disagreed with, nothing that felt wrong, there was much that was hard for me to understand in terms of..." He squints, seeking the right term. "There are several hundred years to come, for me, before any of these are written. There are pieces of the world, a future world, I cannot understand. Here I would seek Susan's knowledge, but-- that isn't the point. I found interesting Beauvoir's points on monogamy; I think I agree. On homosexuality as well. I had not quite the same terms or understanding, but that is useful."

A tiny pause. "Still, the main concern with these is women and their lot in life. It was helpful for me to see, in each, experiences women have that are unlike my own. I had some small sense of it -- or rather, I recognized it as I read -- but the details had escaped me until then. The ways that our culture or laws, or expectations, or marriage may create a prison for women. In my time, it is rare for a woman to choose her own husband. The Queen does, I am sure, love the King, but theirs was not a love match and the Queen did not choose him. In my world, women are oft treated as possessions and exchanged between men -- I understand, a little better, what that may feel like. I understand some, I think, of why Guinever was so often angry. That was hard for me, because so often it felt she was simply angry at me for what I had or had not done, and because I love her it was my desire to do whatever might bring her happiness. For this understanding, I thank you. I can see, now, that I have had many advantages as a man that were not available to the women I knew, and I can see a little of how those limitations, the lack of ability to direct one's own life, may have led those women to certain actions."

At last he pauses, picks up his glass again, and says, "Does that appease you? Have we found common enough ground?"

The entire time Lancelot has been talking, Magnus has been leaning back in his seat, arms crossed, brow furrowed. There's a moment where he kind of wishes he had a pen and paper, so he could take notes, but -- his mental notes are good enough. There's another moment where he wishes Qi Yan was there. She's so good at asking thinky questions, especially ones that are sneakily feminist.

"No," he says, grudgingly, after waiting a minute to make sure Lancelot didn't have anything else to say. His objective here was really about the trauma workbooks, and Lancelot just dismissed those out of hand! "But thank you for answering my question." He fidgets for a moment, playing with a hairband that he has around his wrist, thinking, trying to set aside his knee-jerk distaste for Lancelot so he can really parse what he's saying long enough to respond in detail. After all, he's not going to let Lancelot be the bigger man here!

Finally, he sighs. "Galahad told me a little bit about what Camelot was like," he says. "The, like, violence and stuff."

Edited 2024-03-02 00:52 (UTC)

Lancelot manages not to frown. If that did not appease Magnus then he has no idea what might. He takes another sip of his drink -- it's nearly gone and he's beginning to wish he had more.

He responds, "Did he? And what did you make of it?"

Magnus sighs. "Do you know about the Vikings?" If Lancelot had bothered to read Odin's book, he sure would, but apparently it wasn't relevant to him.

Edited 2024-03-02 02:17 (UTC)

"Aye, of course."

Edited (Oops, icon) 2024-03-02 02:27 (UTC)

"What do you know about the Vikings?"

Lancelot gives him a flat look, "Ere I came here, I lived in Britain. I know enough of Vikings."

"Yeah, yeah, the marauding and plundering and settling and stuff," Magnus says, and smiles brightly for a fleeting moment. "One of my best friends fought and died under Ivar the Boneless in the 800s! I think that was before your time though." His smile fades. "So you know about the, like, Ragnarok thing, and the dying gloriously in battle thing, and the whole, like, concept of the dishonorable dead thing?"

"Aye, I do."

Magnus blinks at him, surprised and begrudgingly impressed. "Wait, you do?" he asks. "Almost nobody ever does."

"I do. Most of those raids ended many years ago, but their tales and ideas carry on, even in spite of the Church."

"Huh. Is that why Camelot is the way that it is?"

Lancelot keeps the frown from forming. "I suppose that depends on your understanding of 'the way it is'."

"Punch first, ask questions later?" Magnus suggests. Then he makes a face. Actively being the bigger man around a guy like Lancelot is so hard. "Okay, I swear I wasn't actually trying to throw shade just now."

Lancelot gives a little shrug and moves on. "Magnus-- I did not seek to attack you, that day, did I? Despite the fact that I might have had what passes for a reason. When I hit Galahad -- which I should not have done -- I was reacting to something else entirely. A personal pain. I had no way to understand who he was or what had happened. I know you think it an excuse, but I was not certain he was real. When he put me down, things became much more clear. I knew where each of us stood, and I knew, too, that I did not understand what was happening."

He thinks for a little moment, then says, "It is true-- we are more likely to strike first. I know not why we are as we are. I do know that there has been little peace in my lifetime, no matter where I lived. I was raised to make war, and sometimes that is my first inclination."

"Yeah, dude, that's my entire point," says Magnus, as if Lancelot should be able to make any connection between the zillions of questions he's been asking with very little context.

He actually laughs a little, and his tone is friendly enough when he says, "Aye, well-- it seems that's what you should have said first. It is hard to talk to you, Magnus. I am trying to understand you, but you do not make your thoughts clear. I'm not interested in a contest, unless it is with blades. Speak plain."

"I'm not going to fight you," Magnus says, immediately. "I promised Galahad I wouldn't kill you," Well, basically. It was definitely implied. "No, I mean -- look, I came here from Valhalla, okay? I get what it's like to be from a a society that's all battle, all the time. And I do get that it can be super disorienting when you first get here. What I'm saying is that it's not an excuse. I--" He breaks of, registering again that they're in a crowded room, and even though everyone else seems to be talking and mostly ignoring them, he's not actually going to start airing Lancelot's personal business to his face. That's a blush too far. "Can we talk outside?"

Lancelot gives him a perplexed look, but he takes up his glass and says, "Aye, I suppose."

He stands, nodding to Magnus to lead on.

Magnus leads him out. For lack of a better place to go -- he'd rather be outside outside, but he guesses neutral ground is better -- he heads to the nearest kitchen, where he retrieves a couple root beers from the fridge and tosses Lancelot one. He hoists himself onto a counter, then, sitting and swinging his legs. "Look," he says. "Don't take this the wrong way, but you really should read the trauma books."

He opens the root beer, sniffs it, and then takes a tentative drink. He doesn't much like it, but that's fine.

He's also a little tired of trying to work his way through whatever it is Magnus expects, so in response he says simply, "Explain. Please."

"I think you could use it. I think it would help you." Magnus sighs and scuffs a hand through his hair. "Okay, you know what? Realistically, I don't expect you to listen to me. I know I'm, like, just some dickhead kid. Well, dickhead twenty-five-year-old who looks like some dickhead kid. I don't like you and you don't like me and that would be true even if there wasn't, like, a culture class misunderstanding about the queen or whatever." This is the most that he's going to give on this front, by the way -- a shared misunderstanding. "Or even if -- you know, everything with Galahad."

He frowns. "I don't like it, and I think that even if you come from, like, Violencelandia you can still choose another path--" he gestures to himself demonstratively "--and not hit people, no matter how insistent Galahad is that it's fine that you did. But, like, even without all that, I just don't like your vibes. Um, no offense. But I don't. And I get that it's mutual, or whatever. But Galahad is really insistent that you get to pick your own path here too, which, like, yeah. Everyone deserves a second chance, I guess." This is actually something he fervently believes. Maybe not for Loki, but for everyone else. "So you should deal with your trauma."

Edited 2024-03-02 04:48 (UTC)

Lancelot takes this in, and then pauses. After a long moment, he sets the bottle aside. It costs him something, but he does not draw himself up straight as is his impulse. Instead, he stays leaning against the counter and says, carefully, "Magnus. There is something that I need for you to understand."

He meets Magnus' gaze, "It is well if you do not like me. I do not need to be liked. But if you are going to insist on bringing me back to one moment, again and again, then you should recognize--"

A breath. He stops. He has already said to Magnus that that was the worst time in his life. He doesn't want to say it again. So he changes paths.

"I am not making excuses for what passed between Galahad and I. I was wrong. That I know. Regardless of why it happened, I was wrong. But, too, I was dealt with, swiftly and rightly, by the one who was wronged. So now I will ask you to consider: have I raised a hand against anyone else here, after that moment? Have I shown violence to anyone -- anything, other than the walking dead?"

He is regarding Magnus very directly, seriously, his expression no longer flat, but edging into vulnerable.

The bigger man, Magnus reminds himself. He forces himself to meet Lancelot's eyes. "So," he says, willing himself not to sound guilty. "Speaking of the zombies. You know how you almost died and I healed you?"

"Of course I do. I am grateful."

"I see people's memories when I heal them. It was a bad wound. I saw a lot of your memories." Magnus exhales. "I haven't told anyone any details. I wouldn't."

This takes a moment to land, and another to process. He pales a little. Lancelot takes a breath. "Fine. Very well. What do you think you saw, then?"

"Do you really want me to say?"

"Yes. I do." He is watching Magnus with a frank, open expression.

"Okay. I saw your fight with Galahad, for one. But I also saw a guy -- you -- on the verge in this, like, miasma of directionless anger for weeks. I saw some of the stuff with... with Galahad's mom, mostly from when the, uh. Deception became clear. I saw a few fights with the queen. I saw a lot of actual fights with actual weapons. Not a lot of context on those. I guess some might've been fun but by and large the emotional tone was pretty grim."

Obviously, none of this is a surprise to Lancelot, other than the fact that Magnus has seen it and been carrying around with him for ... however long it's been since the walking dead attacked. Even so, his brain actually sort of stalls out for a moment. So much of what Magnus mentions flickers up, like a fresh wound, heedless of everything he's done to tamp it down.

He takes a breath or two. He very carefully does not move.

Lancelot tries very hard to sound level when he says, "If you have seen all of this, I cannot imagine why you are still questioning the state I was in when I arrived. I also cannot understand why you think I-- whatever it is you think."

"I'm not questioning the state you were in, dude, I'm saying that kind of shit builds up if you don't deal with it, and if it overwhelms you again I don't wanna be around when that happens." He sets his jaw. "Like I said, I promised Galahad I wouldn't kill you. Or defeat you, or whatever else. So I don't wanna be in a position where that's a possibility."

Lancelot shakes his head a little -- partly to attempt to shake off the sensation of... something like panic. Whatever it is. But partly, also, to demonstrate to Magnus that that's no longer a possibility.

"You assume," he says, more careful than he probably needs to be, "that nothing for me has changed since I arrived. That seems unfair."

"So you're dealing with your shit?"

He does -- somewhat to his shame -- have a little flash of anger at that. Who doesn't change, in an environment like this? Who could spend months here and not question where they've come from?

Lancelot pushes that down. He still feels disconnected but he tries to meet Magnus' gaze. "I am trying. I think most of us are. Are you?"

Saying I slept inside four nights in a row would mean basically nothing to Lancelot, and require context that Magnus isn't inclined to give him. "Sure," he says instead, trying for a crooked smile, and waves a hand between the two of them. "I'm Magnus Chase (hi, Magnus), and it's been 140 days since I last died and/or killed someone else. Zombies obviously excluded. And hey, you've brought the grand total of friends' dads I've met and not defeated or killed to a whopping grand total of one, so. Setting some major new records over here."

Edited 2024-03-02 06:08 (UTC)

Lancelot nods, glances down. He does not owe Magnus an explanation, his time, anything. Even so. Magnus is, he understands (he thinks), trying to help.

He doesn't look up when he responds. He's willing to be honest but any additional vulnerability will be too much. (And besides, Magnus has already seen everything -- nearly everything -- that's dogging him.) "When I first arrived here, I did not even understand that I had been harmed. No, rather, I did not understand that I had been wronged. It took many conversations with Galahad, Laertes, Sagramore, Susan, to come to this realization. It has not been easy."

"Being here, things are very different. At court, after... Elaine, the Queen's reaction, every day was like," he shakes his head, "I don't know. Being burned. There was no relief or rest, and I would not take any of Arthur's comfort. That made it very easy, very likely, for me to lash out so I understand your concern. But here, there has been rest. I'm not being wounded, freshly, every day. My friends, and even Galahad, have given me other ways to understand things. When it overtakes me now, it is not like rage. I don't want to describe it, but maybe you know."

Edited 2024-03-02 16:31 (UTC)

Magnus fiddles with the label on his bottle of root beer. Mostly he still gets the anger, when he's, like, triggered or whatever. "Grief?"

"No," quietly, "That's separate."

He pauses, and then decides to risk describing it. Magnus is listening, maybe he can make himself clearer. (It still matters little to him, ultimately, whether Magnus likes him or not. It doesn't really matter. But if Magnus will insist on coming at him instead of just leaving him alone, Lancelot may as well give him some chance at understanding.)

"It is like slipping outside of my body, standing next to myself, waiting for a blow to strike that doesn't land. Or-- the way it feels when one has a very bad injury and you have to stay alert anyway. It feels awful. I can't think. Once it passes, I'm exhausted."

"Oh, yeah, the dissociation." Magnus crosses his arms again. "Like I said, those books should be helpful."

"The what?"

"Dissociation." Magnus says it slowly. "It's a--" he taps his temple a few times. "--thing."

"Ah," with interest. Some of his caution ebbs off. "Susan called it a 'traumatic neurosis.'"

Magnus shrugs. "Never heard of it."

"Perhaps they mean the same thing. I've noticed terms change, over time. We had no word for it at all, in my time."

"Huh," says Magnus. He supposes this tracks, based on his conversations with Galahad and, to a lesser extent, Sagramore. "I'm pretty sure in Valhalla they just call it 'proof of valor.'" This, for what it's worth, is a joke. A really bad joke.

Lancelot absolutely does not grok that this might be a joke. He still looks thoughtful. "Well, since now I understand what you might mean, I will consider the books."

Magnus sighs, drains the rest of his root beer, and tosses the bottle in an easy arc directly into the trash can, where it clatters against the walls as it falls. Oh, score.

Then he forces himself not to cross his arms again. Bigger man, he reminds himself. Lancelot is being, like. Surprisingly decent? Horrifyingly. To keep himself from crossing his arms, he wraps his fingers around the edge of the counter, letting it bite into his palms. "Look," he says. "Some of my issues with you are on me and my issues, not on you and your behavior. I'll own that."

Edited (icons lol) 2024-03-03 04:43 (UTC)

A little nod. "I appreciate that admission."

"Like," Magnus releases the edge of the counter long enough to gesture vaguely at Lancelot. "It's the cop energy. Your vibes. Also," he adds, and then slams his mouth shut. Galahad said Lancelot isn't a dad to him, so maybe Magnus shouldn't judge Lancelot for being a deadbeat dad. "Yeah."

"I don't understand cop energy." The question is sincere, even if it does come out a bit flat.

"The energy of a cop," Magnus says, always the picture of a helpful young man. He knows exactly where Lancelot's confusion comes from, because nobody here knows what a cop is. "A bearing which evokes memories or the ambiance of cops." Then he relents. "Police officers. Sagramore said the parallel from your time might be reeves."

Lancelot thinks for a moment, then nods and shrugs. "Perhaps knights as well," he admits. "I am sorry it is so, but--" That little shrug. "I was trained from a boy to serve and keep peace. There's little need of it here, so I try to keep to myself if I know someone dislikes me."

Oh, gods, he's copping to his cop energy? This is grim. "The thing is," Magnus explains, helpfully, "All cops are bastards."

He has an initial thought about his parentage, then adjusts once Magnus' actually meaning dawns on him.

After a moment he says, "I am sorry, but I can change neither my past nor my training." He thinks, briefly, that there is little he can do about his demeanor, as well, but he isn't sure he agrees with that any longer. "I strive for peace and accord. I want us to get along. But I do not need you to like me, if you do not already. I will treat you with as much respect as any here-- and not just for Galahad's sake."

"How did you 'serve and keep peace?'"

"I'll not bore you with history, but I was always meant to serve the High King of Britain. I fought with him against those who made war on him. We sought alliances where they could be found. I served Britain as he bade me." He knows this is a poor explanation. "There was nearly always war, in which nobles or kings made wreck of the land in their pursuit of power. Arthur's goal was to end that, unify Britain, so that the folks might prosper."

He pauses, wishing he had more bourbon, because he has begun to question how that was ever meant to work. But he's only begun to question it and so he will say nothing of that to Magnus.

"So you tried to stop people from destroying the land, or whatever?" Magnus is quiet for a moment. "And what about the people who got in the way of that? What did you do?"

"Yes. None can live well if crops and lands and towns are destroyed. Everyone has a place." He takes a breath, "As to your other question -- unless those people were knights or nobles commanding them, they were not mine to deal with."

He glances up to meet Magnus' gaze. "Everyone has a place. Everyone has a role. I've no power to -- not interest in -- punishing someone for the sake of punishment. We are, I think, in the minds of many here barbarous. I doubt that folk after me were much wiser, but I understand that my world and yours are not the same."

Despite himself, Magnus snorts at that. "Would you call the Vikings barbarous?"

"Many Britons in my time would, aye. Though-- you have spoken of the violence of Norse deities, as well." He finds the root beer and takes a sip. "I do not think any of us have every answer. I have made many mistakes, and will make many more, but I am glad enough that this place has spared me some of the worst of what will happen to me, and what I will do in the years to come-- though it did not spare Galahad or Sagramore¹ my worst."

^{1: Here he is talking primarily about his attitude toward both, his anger at nearly everyone around him. He is unaware of the worst of the damage he does, in future, to either of them. Which, at least in Sagramore's case, is far worse than a shitty attitude. The typist hopes that they are as unaware as Lancelot is.}

"You know I came here from Valhalla, right?" Magnus has mentioned it to the guy before, but it's been awhile -- he's realizing he never fully chased that thread down with Lancelot when he was asking about how much reading Lancelot has done.

"Yes, though I am not sure what that means. I understand the idea of Valhalla well enough-- I doubt that is the truth of it."

"It means I died a heroic death in battle with a weapon in my hand and was, uh, 'lucky' enough that a valkyrie was watching so she could, like, reap my soul or whatever, and was accordingly granted the, um, honor of serving Odin as one of his einherjar -- his half of the glorious dead; Aunt Freya gets the other half at Folkvanger. And unless I'm on a quest or, like, stuck in a mansion disconnected from the Nine Worlds, I spend every day practicing in Battle Practice to die again but, like, permanently in Ragnarok, and feasting on the flesh of the great beast Saehrimnir and the mead of the magical goat Heidrun. ...mostly that just involves dying in more ways than you can possibly imagine every single day forever." He frowns. "You don't like the root beer, do you?" Either that, or the face Lancelot is making is about Magnus. Okay, so it's a 50/50 shot either way.

Lancelot looks faintly surprised and says, plainly, "I do not care for 'root beer,' no."

"Is it the flavor or the bubbles? Or both?"

"The flavor," without hesitation.

Huh. Part of Magnus wonders if Lancelot would like Mountain Dew Code Red, like Galahad does, but another part of him doesn't want to know. He hops down from the counter and yanks the fridge open. "So don't drink it," he says. This time he's pulled out a couple of the weird bottles this place likes to generate of Heidrun's mead. "Have this instead." He tosses one bottle to Lancelot again -- either he'll catch it or he won't, whatever -- and then climbs back up on the counter. "What's your future?"

(It's a genuine question, even though Magnus has some idea of the shape of it. His mom would tell him stories, after all, and he had one of those kids' books about King Arthur's court. He can see some of the pages in his mind's eye. This is Merlin! He was a wizard and advisor to the king! This is Sir Lancelot! He fought a lot and was lost sometimes! His love for the queen was doomed! Not a lot of detail in that kind of thing. The people who write kids' books about stuff that's actually ultimately surprise! real! should put more useful information in there. None of this Freya, the goddess of love, was really pretty! She had cats!-level BS.)

Edited 2024-03-04 03:50 (UTC)

He does catch it, and as he considers how to answer Mangus' question he opens it and takes a sip. "Much better," he says, raising the bottle in something like a toast. Mead is familiar, and something he likes.

After another long moment Lancelot says, "I know only what Sagramore and Galahad have told me." Susan, he thinks, might know even more but she hasn't mentioned that in a long time, which suits Lancelot just fine. "You have seen, you say, what happened at Corbenic. I'm told that, some time later -- I know not when, but before Galahad came to court -- Elaine came to Camelot and... it happened once more. I'm told it drove me from my own mind. That I ran mad and was lost from court for quite a long while. That after that I was never the same. Sagramore tells me I was always angry, which many saw as arrogance, and that I kept myself apart from nearly everyone."

He takes another sip of mead. "I know what it felt like the first time, before I came here. I know what it feels like now. I cannot imagine living in that for... years. Decades. I do not doubt that I'm worse for it."

Without thinking, he adds, "Here, Galahad asked if I resent him, if I see his mother in his face. I do not. He has done me no wrong and I recall little enough of Elaine herself. In his time, though, I think it's much different. I acknowledged him as my son but gave him nothing else. I imagine it was too painful. I don't know. I cannot change it, but-- I would."

"Galahad doesn't need a dad," Magnus blurts, and then he clamps down -- not his business; not his objective. He shakes his head, wrinkles his nose, takes a swig of mead, and says, "I mean. But you're here now, instead of there, doing--" he gestures loosely. "--all of that."

"You're right. He doesn't. He had one who did him no service and little honor. I am not seeking to be his father, here. But I care for him, and would see him happy. And-- should this place send me back, I would hope things turn out differently."

He doesn't call it what it is, which is fear, but perhaps he doesn't need to.

Magnus chews on this for a moment. "Right," he says, and then offers: "I'm supposed to die in Ragnarok, if I don't bite it outside of Valhalla first. The fire-giant Surt is going to get hold of my sword, use it to free Fenris Wolf, and then bear it to battle, where he's gonna kill my dad with it, since Dad gave the sword up for love and can never wield it again. But," and he strokes his pendant; Jack hums sleepily back at him. "Me and my sword are here, and I figure Surt can't get to either of us when we're here. So maybe the world doesn't end."

"That's well," quiet and sincere. "Would-- would you rather go home? If not for that?"

"If not for preventing the end of the world?" Magnus laughs, sharp and harsh. "I haven't thought about it. I have responsibilities back home. I miss my boyfriend and my friends and traveling. My best friend is getting married soon and I won't be able to see it. I don't miss dying every day. I would miss people here if I went back. I wouldn't be able to figure out a different purpose besides fighting, and dude, I haven't practiced in months. I'd miss my other best friend getting married if I went back to Valhalla." Oops. That's probably not common knowledge yet. Certainly not Lancelot knowledge. "But it's moot, anyway."

Lancelot raises an eyebrow at the mention of a marriage, but doesn't pursue it. "At first, I thought of almost nothing else. As things have changed -- I would choose to stay. But I suppose it's as you say."

He takes another drink. "This is very good. Thank you."

"Straight from Valhalla," Magnus says, and because he's extremely mature, doesn't add, which is the closest you'll ever get, buddy! to the end of that sentence. He fiddles with the bottle for a moment -- there are no labels to peel, unfortunately -- and then says, "It's kind of easier that the only choice is whether or not you're going to accept that you're stuck here. You know?"

He thinks of Arthur's visit, of the agonizing feeling of being caught between choosing to stay or return. It was not made any less agonizing by his belief that the choice was not actually a choice.

(What if Arthur had been right? What if Lancelot could have changed things by choosing instead to believe his King, his best friend, the center of everything? What if Lancelot had been tested and failed and that is why Arthur was gone? He still wonders. He still wakes in the middle of the night with the sensation of a gaping wound in his chest, that bleak feeling of utter loss. And while he knows he still loves Guinever, his feelings for her are different now that he sees things differently. But his feelings for Arthur have changed as well, sharpened or at least have been made clear to him, and to have had him here for a day, to know that Arthur sought him and found him and loved him enough to let him go -- it's still too much. Of course he will say none of this to Magnus, but he doesn't mind if Magnus sees it move through him.)

He glances down and says, "Aye. I understand your meaning."

Edited 2024-03-05 16:49 (UTC)

"Galahad wants you to have the space to be able to become a different guy here," Magnus says, still staring down at his bottle of mead. He takes a sip. Yep, it's still like the creamiest sweetest cold brew. When he closes his eyes, it's almost like he's back in the Feast Hall of the Slain, next to -- gods, he misses Alex. "Instead of, I guess, who you'd become if you weren't here." He glances up at Lancelot then. "Galahad was my biggest supporter when I decided I wanted to stop being Fighting Guy, and now I guess instead of sparring with our swords all the time--" or, more accurately, trying a little every day to see if he could last one second longer without Galahad disarming him, Galahad is so cool "--we just let them date each other instead and do better things with our time."

Okay, that's less central to your point, Magnus! Get back on track! "Also he's like a brother to me. Which does not make you my dumb deadbeat dad, by the way. I already have one of those."

Sorry, Fray, he prays, as his own words register, just to be safe. But you kinda are. Amen, Magnus Chase -- your son, in case you forgot.

"Anyway, so I'm inclined to let him call the shots on this. But you have to understand: I have a code. A really important code that I live by."

Edited 2024-03-05 17:12 (UTC)

It is, he admits, a little annoying that this seems to imply that Lancelot -- who has quite literally taken sacred vows to uphold his own code -- does not have a 'really important code' to live by. But Lancelot lets that go.

"Aye? Say on."

Lancelot has nothing to fear, actually; this was actually a very finely-wrought attempt to appeal to Lancelot's sense of duty, such as it may be. Magnus figured Lancelot might get having some kind of code. "I know you guys have old-timey codes that are important to you, too," Magnus clarifies, just to be sure. "These crows I talked to in Flam were all about it, and Galahad has told me a little, too. Norman whatsits, right? So I imagine you get it. Vikings didn't really go for it though. But I, obviously, abide by Girl Code. And Bro Code. And Best Friend Code, and also Other Best Friend Code too I guess. So I suppose it's actually a network of codes. Codes all the way down."

He stifles a look by taking another drink of mead. "And what does all of that mean?"

"Obviously Bro Code is you don't sleep with your bro's love interest," Magnus says, wisely. "That's never an issue for me, of course, because I'm deeply committed to Alex, but I still abide by it on principle, you know? Best Friend code is you form honest but supportive opinions on the people your best friends love. Other Best Friend Code is you hear your best friends out and give their arguments full consideration even if you disagree with them -- it's a respect thing. And Girl Code," here he makes direct eye contact with Lancelot, "is that if your friends are softening towards someone who could be bad news for them, or whatever, you support you friend but also hate the guy for them, so they don't have to but there's still someone keeping an eye out."

"And you believe I could be 'bad news' for Galahad." It isn't really a question.

"I hope you're not."

"Here, as I am now, I am not. But I don't expect you to take me at my word." He holds Magnus' gaze. "I appreciate that Galahad has those who love him and will protect him. I shall simply continue to do as I have been doing. You can make whatever judgment you will."

Magnus considers the evidence carefully. It takes some time, to sift through this entire conversation and all their others, as well as all the conversations he's had with both Galahad and Claudius about Lancelot, too. Probably Lancelot is starting to feel antsy by the time he takes a big, decisive gulp of mead and sets the bottle to his side. "Look," he says. "I believe that you don't plan to fuck his shit up."

"Thank you," wryly.

"In addition to the cop energy," Magnus explains, as if they're still on the subject of his personal issues and haven't digressed from that for easily at least ten or fifteen minutes of conversation, "I have issue with fathers. As, like, a category of people."

"I see." He's tempted, for a moment, to point out that he didn't even know he was a father until he arrived here and encountered his fully grown son.

"So in that way, it's not really about you," Magnus allows. Then he frowns. "Or it's exactly about you, I guess, depending on how you look at it."

"I think," gently and with as much respect as he can telegraph, "it is moreso about you."

"Yeah, that's what I said," says Magnus, who hadn't, precisely.

Edited 2024-03-06 01:45 (UTC)

A little shrug of disagreement, but his expression is mild. "So then. Do we understand one another better?"

"Maybe," says Magnus. He crosses his arms. "It's your turn now."

"My turn for what?"

"I mean, if we're asking questions and airing grievances," Magnus says. "I've been pretty relentless since you got here, on account of Girl Code and my personal issues." And also his general distaste for the man. "I do see that. But I'm not War Dude anymore, and so I guess that means mediation and conversation. So! It's your turn."

"I don't think I have any grievances with you," thoughtfully regarding his bottle of mead. "As for questions -- why did you come to have this conversation, this evening?"

Magnus squints at him suspiciously. "You don't?"

"Should I?"

"I mean, yeah? I've been a total dick to you." Magnus, as the bigger man, is man enough to admit this. "Gods have put me on their hit lists for less."

He takes a drink. "It's true, you have not been... kind. Or polite. But-- as I've said. I do not need to be liked. I figured that you had your reasons. If you were trying to be supportive of Galahad, I cannot find fault in that."

"Weird," says Magnus, not bothering to hide his surprise. "Anyway, I didn't mean to have this conversation with you tonight until we started talking, but you might as well thank me. That meeting was totally uncomfortable."

Lancelot laughs, "It was not very much to my tastes."

"Between you and me, I don't really get the appeal. Getting together just to fight about things? Boring things? In Valhalla half the room would be dead by the time you got there." Which seems a more efficient use of time, if you ask Magnus. Fast-track to no longer fighting about old timey politics.

"Grantaire was entertaining. But then that's usually true."

"Yeah, sure." Magnus hesitates. "He was wrong about gods, but I guess he was just trying to stir up conversation."

"Most likely," Lancelot agrees. He sobers a little. "I do thank you, though-- for hearing me out, and for being helpful even when you had no reason to be."

Magnus gives him a quizzical look.

Another short chuckle, "I assumed your reading list, annoying as you were in presenting it, was meant to help?"

"Oh, that. Yeah." Mostly it was meant to help the women of the world, but that does still technically count as help.

"And--" Lancelot hesitates briefly, "this conversation this evening has been helpful."

"Helpful how?"

"I did not understand you-- I understand a little better, now," he finishes the mead off and sets the bottle aside. "I am glad you told me, as well, of what you saw when you healed me."

Magnus is, it must be said, still squinting suspiciously. "I haven't told anyone else," he says. He said it before, but it seems important to reiterate. "That's your business."

"I appreciate that. Thank you."

"Sure. No problem." Magnus fidgets, clearly debating whether he should say something else.

Lancelot says, after a very long pause, "Is there aught else?"

Magnus crosses his arms again and glares at Lancelot -- not because of anything Lancelot's done, but because he's coming to a realization he doesn't particularly like. "Yeah," he says. "I have one more thing. But you can keep going if you have more."

He shakes his head, "I've nothing more, for now."

"Okay," says Magnus. Extremely grudgingly, he says, "You're alright."

It might be the mead on top of the bourbon, but Lancelot cannot help but laugh at this. "The highest praise," his laugh and his voice are both genuine, even warm, and it's not meant as a tease. "I would never have thought it possible."

It actually is extremely high praise, from Magnus Chase, given everything Lancelot represents, so he just nods, takes another swig from his mead, and slides back down from the counter. Then he gives Lancelot a shit-eating grin. "Good talk, asshole." If he sounds almost nice about it, well. Nobody else would possibly believe it, so it's fine.

"Good talk, Magnus," leaning back against the counter to watch him go.

"I am keeping my eye on you," says Magnus, hovering in the door. "Girl Code. Read those books." He raps his fingers on the door jamb, and then he's gone, without even flipping Lancelot off even once.

Once the meeting has started in earnest, and Enjolras has tolerated Grantaire's monologuing for what seems an appropriate amount of time; he rises from his couch to mingle. He is not especially drawn to making speeches unless they are particularly called for, and that does not seem altogether necessary at the present. He will likely not speak on anything unless someone draws him into a conversation; but he is certainly attentive to the goings-on, though he is refilling his plate.

Laertes eases in behind him, an arm around his waist, and leans up to kiss his cheek. "Is it all thou hadst dreamed it would be?" he asks.

He shrugs a little and sets his own arm at Laertes' waist. "It is certainly different from anything like we had done at home, but that is to be expected. It is a start. I do not know how many people are enjoying themselves, particularly; but Grantaire does seem to be in fine form."

"Ay, I know not whether I was right to steer the conversation toward politics. Lighter fare might have better suited our crowd."

"It may have, at that." He shrugs a little and tries a small smile. "I appreciate the effort regardless, though."

"Art well?" Laertes asks, a little more gently.

"Yes, quite fine," with a nod. "It is -- making me miss them a little more than I anticipated, but as I said, it is early days. I think it may work well if we continue it."

"Let us try, then--and perhaps the next will be a lighter affair."

"Perhaps, yes." He leans down to kiss Laertes' cheek, gentle. "Thank you for coming; though I must apologize that the food is not up to your standards."

"I like it," Laertes protests. "The cheeses are very good, and I've not yet learned to make a good sausage."

"Neither have I, but I have never tried, either. Perhaps when Szarka gets a little older she might benefit from our mistakes, if we should learn it."

"She'll love that," laughs Laertes. "Thou wilt be her favorite uncle, for introducing her to sausage."

"You mean I am not already?" He looks mock-offended, but there's amusement definitely lingering in his eyes. "I shall have to have words with her."

"Be not too stern. She's only small; she cannot help loving every new person best."

"I shall not, she is the best and softest niece I could ever hope to have."

Laertes gives Lucien one last, quick kiss, then stops blocking the snacks table. "Shouldst visit her again soon," he suggests.

He returns that kiss fondly; but yes, now is not the time. "Perhaps I shall, she may be in need of spoiling from her uncle." As if she isn't already the most spoiled puppy in the mansion.

"I'll see thee soon," Laertes promises, and wanders back to his seat.

"Enjolras," Nina says, quite solemnly and without preamble, going up to him after her discussion with Laertes. "Are you the way you are because you're you or because you're French?"

"The way I am?" He tilts his head curiously, taking a sip of wine. "What do you mean?"

"You," Nina says with a small, amused gesture. "Who you are as a person!"

“I would say perhaps both? I am the way I am because my family made me so; but in truth, my mother is France.”

Nina's brows knit slightly. "The country?"

"Yes. Of course, I am speaking metaphorically."

Nina drops the teasing for now because she is genuinely curious. She's heard so much about Paris and France, about pastries and wine and rebellion, and she's learned some of the language -- but she still feels as though she doesn't have a good grasp of the country itself. "Where I come from, there are stereotypes for those from Ravka, Fjerda, and everywhere else. What do you think makes someone French? Or... stereotypically French, I suppose?"

"Mm. Well, if you would ask anyone else in Europe, they would say that the French have a tendency to fight quite often, whether it is among themselves or other countries. ....Typically the English, but Buonaparte was a special case, I suppose, in that he attempted to fight the whole of Europe and possibly the world."

Nina knows what Europe is; she’s looked it up and tried to learn it’s geography. It seems as though a lot of people are from there. She tilts her head. “Who’s Buonaparte?”

"He is -- was, I suppose, as he died while I was a child -- a general who rose to power during the first republic and its fall, and claimed himself to be emperor of France. He intended on making all of Europe part of France." A beat. "He was not even properly from France, he was from a small island off the coast of Italy."

open: don't let the wine go to your brains

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