Fine. Tonight. [ Ughhh, now he has to figure out where they should go. ] As if there's anywhere worthwhile to go...
[ But the change of topic pulls him away from that line of complaints. She wouldn't shift from something that involved hopeless romantic tidings to a party that's since passed without good reason. He sits up straighter, away from the lazier slouch from just before.
( not even admonishing, to find herself perpetually amused by his need to find something to complain over. as if she would ever be the difficult one. it was fun, in a way, seeing him do what he does paired with the complaints that glossed over the world around him.
her thumbs fold over each other, then twitch. )
Lavi, Tyki, Lenalee... I guess it's some of all of that. Their war, the things that make Tyki dangerous. Why he recognized you.
( she glances up as she shifts into recollection. she doesn't feel like it's a confession; something about the idea of confess sat poorly with her right now. )
Was it a month? Must have been... after being out of the hospital, back home. Lavi went back to his world for a while, like some people do, but he came back and he was in a bad place. He needed helped. He got me.
( she smiles, reflecting on how that, to so many, would not be a blessing. how it'd taken all of the andalite's gift, and the initiative's, to turn her into something, someone dependable. not just a liar. not just a girl looking for a world with a prettier answer than the one she had. )
I'm slower than most people, just on my own. On a straight way, though! ( a short laugh. ha! then, the story changed! ) I needed to be able to move fast and be something people could recognize as needing help. Not the things I usually am. People just ask more questions, which I like, but questions were going to waste time.
( lavi had asked for help, and he'd gotten her. she'd needed to move, and so she'd become... caesar. she doesn't spell it out: it's obvious, something he had doubtlessly guessed she'd done around that man, that more-than-human, with how tyki had behaved at the celebration. )
[ One punch to the face is enough, thanks. It's true that Collette will be happy no matter where they go, but Caesar, on the other hand... Well, he's bound to find an excuse to be unimpressed with the place no matter what.
As for Lavi, Tyki, Lenalee...
He had wondered about that entire mess at the party, although he's already guessed most of what happened. The reference to saving Lavi's life, Tyki recognizing him and Collette being uncomfortable about that, the explosive reaction to that man even being there. It's not a long shot. ]
You used my form to save Lavi's life. That's how Tyki met me.
He's kind of an equal opportunity enemy, when he's motivated to be. Tyki's a Noah, and I guess the simple way of describing them would be to say they're... formerly human? Sort of...
( Lavi would be better at explaining. Lavi didn't want her sharing at all. )
He and his want to destroy the world. Pretty standard, I guess, though usually that's a containment thing. The only people who wanted to do that to mine were trying to stop another Empire from winning.
( And were, she does not say, the supposed heroes and allies at one point. )
Did you see him come through the door? That's kind of his thing. I'm not sure it's all of it, because I don't think he's that simple, but he can move through anything he wants -- and become partly solid in anything he wants. He makes things do it, too. He took the parasite out of Lavi that was killing him, and if I hadn't done what I did, he probably would have kept it, too. Just reached right in and... ( she brings her hands up, fingers pressed in to her palms, then abruptly opening; ) ... pulled it out!
( Part of her thinks that potential is cool, even as it's frightening and disgusting. )
He's not sane, and he's not stable. It's like he goes along with whatever whim strikes him, and there's no rhyme or reason behind what he does. Paying attention to what interests him, just that. Which he might stop with you, since you clearly didn't know what he was talking about.
( She hopes it ends there. She glances away, then back to Caesar. )
Sorry I didn't tell you before. Um... Has Lenalee talked to you about her world before? At all? About their war?
No. Those two roommates of mine, they really never about themselves.
[ And he doesn't exactly ask, either. ]
It's not really always about containment, either, the whole massive destruction thing. Someone trying to destroy a world is utter madness, as they, as well as I, only have one. [ If not the world, then a continent, in the case of his war, but if everything you know and care about is there? It may as well be the world. ] You just happen to live somewhere with worlds to spare, if I understand space correctly.
[ Although, the idea of considering a planet a strategic point to destroy, if all else fails, rankles of the UE to him, even if it makes sense in its own terrible way. They have hundreds, thousands of worlds to choose from. Losing one means nothing to someone with that kind of power.
Anyway, he leans forward enough to rest his arms across his knees. ]
He would have kept it if you hadn't done what, exactly?
( She rankles in her own way, looking troubled and down at her hands, bursting out, almost interrupting -- )
No -- no, we don't. We don't have worlds to spare, and the people who were going to take it away, who were going to burn our whole world to ash, were going to do it and kill all of humanity because it was a cost they figured was worthwhile when we were a planet-bound, backward, inferior species anyway.
( Whatever anger might have been in her voice at the start bled out, turned into a recitation of factual information delivered without a smile, without explanation, with slight emphasis on a word that she finds amusing. The amusement for that alone bleeds through. That's my war. And it was only one part of it; and it was not something she was really here to talk about anyway. )
Squished it. Killed it. Murdered it, I guess, if it had a thinking brain. I don't like parasites.
( Jesus Christ never let her get pregnant )
I think it was from someone else like him, another Noah. It was disgusting.
[ The general you. Humanity. Whether she takes it that way or not, oh well, though perhaps he should save the attempts to explain why the species that was planning that would be so uncaring. Maybe she already knows, maybe she doesn't want to know... ]
Just everyone else might. Look, I'm not excusing it, okay? [ And it is off-topic. The wrong war! ] Okay. So you killed it. Was he upset about that? Do I need to worry he'll come after me?
( Hand to her face, pressing a cheek, an eye, into other fingers, the palm of her hand. Right. Right. )
Mildly put out He doesn't care. He was probably more interested in what I did with time than anything else. And with you not knowing who he is, he'll be looking for a copy, or an explanation. Or else anyone else who plays around with time, and that -- kind of leads toward Oz's world.
( Her other hand on her face, rubbing. )
Lenalee's world makes monsters out of people who lose the people they care about to grief. It's a devil's promise. You can't bring people back. ( hands pulling away from her face. god, then she smiles. eyes closed, but she gives him a close lipped smile. ) Nothing but miracles bring anyone back. Oz's world is like... power games, probably, all in one country. It's just that something unstable's here from there, and I'm not sure how much, or how careful we need to be, but with what Oz can do, and what his friends probably can... I'd say be careful enough around Jack.
( Does she even have the right to say? Maybe, maybe not, but what is holding back going to help Caesar? What is not telling him, even for all she leaves out, for the promise to Oz she's keeping right now, going to save? Going to protect?
I'm not supposed to be the one making the guesses. And so many people are asking her to be quiet anymore. )
[ And if this guy is dangerous and looking, he really doesn't want her drawing attention to herself, but they'll get to that later. He falls back into listening quietly, then frowns as an entirely new name is brought up.
Jack? ]
Whoever that is, I haven't met him. What do you mean what Oz can do? Do you mean his summoning? [ At least, he's pretty sure that's what it was. Something like that. ] And what does Tyki's search have to do with this Jack fellow?
( Oh, she's making such a mess of things! Collette stops herself, slowing down, and breathing nice and even.
Then she smiles. )
Nothing. It's just, they're both dangerous. I'm not sure how much that means with Jack... but Tyki, that's easier to see. As far as stuff with Oz goes... you need to ask him. In fact, it'd probably be good if you could handle a heart to heart with both your roommates, one on one.
And see how much they'll lie to me? That should be a whole barrel of fun.
[ Though they might not. In most cases, they might smile it away and find something else to talk about, he imagines, but if he were to put them on the spot... Ah, and just after he's patched things up with Lenalee, too! Figures something else would come up.
He sighs at her. ]
If it's nothing, you wouldn't have said anything. I know we have this trend of not telling each other all sorts of things, but really, you could at least describe the other guy I'm meant to be avoiding.
Yeah, I know. Which is why I'm trying to work on it!
( And it's frustrating to realize exactly how hard this really is. Aah! What the hay! )
It's not like any of us are particularly honest unless it suits us. You go silent or redirect, Oz lies by smiling and redirecting, Lenalee bottles it up just as bad as he does. ( She's shedding some of her frustration, stating a litany of facts. ) Except Lenalee knows she's bottling, and I don't think Oz does. He needs us to help with that, on top of Gilbert, and Break. He's got you and me and Lenalee.
( She doesn't name Caesar as part of that lightly, regardless of how she usually would. )
Let me grab my tablet. I think Jack might be on there. It's easier to show than tell!
[ He doesn't! Redirection isn't lying! But he doesn't disagree on the rest. That's about how he pegged the others as, so it's no surprise. Yet the last part... Second to last part! Not the tablet thing, but... ]
Like I haven't had enough pep-talking of melodramatic kids in my life!
[ lookin at u, hugo (except not, because he is not here, but shh). After that declaration, though, he'll fall silent again and wait for her to get her tablet. ]
( It's not something she says with any heat; just a smile. A soft, almost amused one.
He's far from the only one. Either way, she wrangles her tablet back out into the open, tapping through things until she comes across Jack's most recent post. )
See, the kind of awkward thing is... he looks a lot like Oz.
( Turning the tablet over, she offers it out to Caesar. And she grins. )
Pfft, he doesn't need those kind of pep talks. He needs grounding, something you're good at, like it or not! If maybe not for him. I haven't decided.
[ He rolls his eyes and leans backwards until he can softly flop over across the bed. It wasn't the same thing! It's not as though he could just go around sharing all sorts of information! ]
Some kid.
[ Then again, would you call convincing him to go out and lie to a bishop a pep-talk?
He would. He even complimented him after the fact, so there! But that's all old news to him, so he shrugs and turns the conversation back to the more immediate worry, which really should be the psychopaths from the worlds of his roommates, but is apparently now Oz. ]
He'd need to have any kind of sense at all first. All he ever does is smile like an idiot or look startled.
[ Also like an idiot, but can't that go without saying? ]
A mask is a mask is a mask is a mask. So his is a smile! I've seen you do the same thing.
( Minutes earlier, though that's more like a tease; all the time as Terri, knowing that it wasn't something she'd thought was part of his nature, when he'd been using charm to get toward the information he wanted when they first planned to get into the UE. )
[ The claim she's seen him do 'the same thing', though, gets a snort. When? He has to think on it for a bit before shooting back with: ]
I was only joking around all those times, so they hardly count. If anything, mine is the opposite of a smile, but it actually serves a purpose. He's just being selfish with his.
( If she looks amused and like she doesn't believe him -- she doesn't. He used Terri, and he played her with a smile, but it does occur to her she's not supposed to know.
And that hadn't been teasing, but that, to... might even just be Collette wanting to believe none of it was real. If she thought it might be, it hurt in a way she had only inflicted on herself.
Ugh. She rubs her arm, snorting. )
'Cause he's related to you! How many times do I need to tell you I want to know before you really get it, smarty pants?
( She leans forward to lightly slap at his knee. )
And I'll keep pestering 'cause it is! What's his name? Then you can nap, though you should figure out where we're going tonight sometime before it actually becomes tonight.
( She remembers that name from way back, and the elemental association, part of a different conversation once upon a time. Ha! So that is what that'd been! Or more, so that was who he'd been working with. For some reason, she'd assumed Hugo was older than either of them; that realization has her laughing now. )
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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[ But the change of topic pulls him away from that line of complaints. She wouldn't shift from something that involved hopeless romantic tidings to a party that's since passed without good reason. He sits up straighter, away from the lazier slouch from just before.
Okay, she has his attention. ]
What about it?
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( not even admonishing, to find herself perpetually amused by his need to find something to complain over. as if she would ever be the difficult one. it was fun, in a way, seeing him do what he does paired with the complaints that glossed over the world around him.
her thumbs fold over each other, then twitch. )
Lavi, Tyki, Lenalee... I guess it's some of all of that. Their war, the things that make Tyki dangerous. Why he recognized you.
( she glances up as she shifts into recollection. she doesn't feel like it's a confession; something about the idea of confess sat poorly with her right now. )
Was it a month? Must have been... after being out of the hospital, back home. Lavi went back to his world for a while, like some people do, but he came back and he was in a bad place. He needed helped. He got me.
( she smiles, reflecting on how that, to so many, would not be a blessing. how it'd taken all of the andalite's gift, and the initiative's, to turn her into something, someone dependable. not just a liar. not just a girl looking for a world with a prettier answer than the one she had. )
I'm slower than most people, just on my own. On a straight way, though! ( a short laugh. ha! then, the story changed! ) I needed to be able to move fast and be something people could recognize as needing help. Not the things I usually am. People just ask more questions, which I like, but questions were going to waste time.
( lavi had asked for help, and he'd gotten her. she'd needed to move, and so she'd become... caesar. she doesn't spell it out: it's obvious, something he had doubtlessly guessed she'd done around that man, that more-than-human, with how tyki had behaved at the celebration. )
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[ One punch to the face is enough, thanks. It's true that Collette will be happy no matter where they go, but Caesar, on the other hand... Well, he's bound to find an excuse to be unimpressed with the place no matter what.
As for Lavi, Tyki, Lenalee...
He had wondered about that entire mess at the party, although he's already guessed most of what happened. The reference to saving Lavi's life, Tyki recognizing him and Collette being uncomfortable about that, the explosive reaction to that man even being there. It's not a long shot. ]
You used my form to save Lavi's life. That's how Tyki met me.
[ Without really meeting him, that is. ]
He's their enemy, isn't he?
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( Lavi would be better at explaining. Lavi didn't want her sharing at all. )
He and his want to destroy the world. Pretty standard, I guess, though usually that's a containment thing. The only people who wanted to do that to mine were trying to stop another Empire from winning.
( And were, she does not say, the supposed heroes and allies at one point. )
Did you see him come through the door? That's kind of his thing. I'm not sure it's all of it, because I don't think he's that simple, but he can move through anything he wants -- and become partly solid in anything he wants. He makes things do it, too. He took the parasite out of Lavi that was killing him, and if I hadn't done what I did, he probably would have kept it, too. Just reached right in and... ( she brings her hands up, fingers pressed in to her palms, then abruptly opening; ) ... pulled it out!
( Part of her thinks that potential is cool, even as it's frightening and disgusting. )
He's not sane, and he's not stable. It's like he goes along with whatever whim strikes him, and there's no rhyme or reason behind what he does. Paying attention to what interests him, just that. Which he might stop with you, since you clearly didn't know what he was talking about.
( She hopes it ends there. She glances away, then back to Caesar. )
Sorry I didn't tell you before. Um... Has Lenalee talked to you about her world before? At all? About their war?
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[ And he doesn't exactly ask, either. ]
It's not really always about containment, either, the whole massive destruction thing. Someone trying to destroy a world is utter madness, as they, as well as I, only have one. [ If not the world, then a continent, in the case of his war, but if everything you know and care about is there? It may as well be the world. ] You just happen to live somewhere with worlds to spare, if I understand space correctly.
[ Although, the idea of considering a planet a strategic point to destroy, if all else fails, rankles of the UE to him, even if it makes sense in its own terrible way. They have hundreds, thousands of worlds to choose from. Losing one means nothing to someone with that kind of power.
Anyway, he leans forward enough to rest his arms across his knees. ]
He would have kept it if you hadn't done what, exactly?
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No -- no, we don't. We don't have worlds to spare, and the people who were going to take it away, who were going to burn our whole world to ash, were going to do it and kill all of humanity because it was a cost they figured was worthwhile when we were a planet-bound, backward, inferior species anyway.
( Whatever anger might have been in her voice at the start bled out, turned into a recitation of factual information delivered without a smile, without explanation, with slight emphasis on a word that she finds amusing. The amusement for that alone bleeds through. That's my war. And it was only one part of it; and it was not something she was really here to talk about anyway. )
Squished it. Killed it. Murdered it, I guess, if it had a thinking brain. I don't like parasites.
(
Jesus Christ never let her get pregnant)I think it was from someone else like him, another Noah. It was disgusting.
( How's that for derailed? )
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[ The general you. Humanity. Whether she takes it that way or not, oh well, though perhaps he should save the attempts to explain why the species that was planning that would be so uncaring. Maybe she already knows, maybe she doesn't want to know... ]
Just everyone else might. Look, I'm not excusing it, okay? [ And it is off-topic. The wrong war! ] Okay. So you killed it. Was he upset about that? Do I need to worry he'll come after me?
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( Hand to her face, pressing a cheek, an eye, into other fingers, the palm of her hand. Right. Right. )
Mildly put out He doesn't care. He was probably more interested in what I did with time than anything else. And with you not knowing who he is, he'll be looking for a copy, or an explanation. Or else anyone else who plays around with time, and that -- kind of leads toward Oz's world.
( Her other hand on her face, rubbing. )
Lenalee's world makes monsters out of people who lose the people they care about to grief. It's a devil's promise. You can't bring people back. ( hands pulling away from her face. god, then she smiles. eyes closed, but she gives him a close lipped smile. ) Nothing but miracles bring anyone back. Oz's world is like... power games, probably, all in one country. It's just that something unstable's here from there, and I'm not sure how much, or how careful we need to be, but with what Oz can do, and what his friends probably can... I'd say be careful enough around Jack.
( Does she even have the right to say? Maybe, maybe not, but what is holding back going to help Caesar? What is not telling him, even for all she leaves out, for the promise to Oz she's keeping right now, going to save? Going to protect?
I'm not supposed to be the one making the guesses. And so many people are asking her to be quiet anymore. )
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Jack? ]
Whoever that is, I haven't met him. What do you mean what Oz can do? Do you mean his summoning? [ At least, he's pretty sure that's what it was. Something like that. ] And what does Tyki's search have to do with this Jack fellow?
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Then she smiles. )
Nothing. It's just, they're both dangerous. I'm not sure how much that means with Jack... but Tyki, that's easier to see. As far as stuff with Oz goes... you need to ask him. In fact, it'd probably be good if you could handle a heart to heart with both your roommates, one on one.
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[ Though they might not. In most cases, they might smile it away and find something else to talk about, he imagines, but if he were to put them on the spot... Ah, and just after he's patched things up with Lenalee, too! Figures something else would come up.
He sighs at her. ]
If it's nothing, you wouldn't have said anything. I know we have this trend of not telling each other all sorts of things, but really, you could at least describe the other guy I'm meant to be avoiding.
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( And it's frustrating to realize exactly how hard this really is. Aah! What the hay! )
It's not like any of us are particularly honest unless it suits us. You go silent or redirect, Oz lies by smiling and redirecting, Lenalee bottles it up just as bad as he does. ( She's shedding some of her frustration, stating a litany of facts. ) Except Lenalee knows she's bottling, and I don't think Oz does. He needs us to help with that, on top of Gilbert, and Break. He's got you and me and Lenalee.
( She doesn't name Caesar as part of that lightly, regardless of how she usually would. )
Let me grab my tablet. I think Jack might be on there. It's easier to show than tell!
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[ He doesn't! Redirection isn't lying! But he doesn't disagree on the rest. That's about how he pegged the others as, so it's no surprise. Yet the last part... Second to last part! Not the tablet thing, but... ]
Like I haven't had enough pep-talking of melodramatic kids in my life!
[ lookin at u, hugo (except not, because he is not here, but shh). After that declaration, though, he'll fall silent again and wait for her to get her tablet. ]
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( It's not something she says with any heat; just a smile. A soft, almost amused one.
He's far from the only one. Either way, she wrangles her tablet back out into the open, tapping through things until she comes across Jack's most recent post. )
See, the kind of awkward thing is... he looks a lot like Oz.
( Turning the tablet over, she offers it out to Caesar. And she grins. )
Pfft, he doesn't need those kind of pep talks. He needs grounding, something you're good at, like it or not! If maybe not for him. I haven't decided.
( As if it's up to her to decide. )
Who'd you pep-talk for before?
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Some kid.
[ Then again, would you call convincing him to go out and lie to a bishop a pep-talk?
He would. He even complimented him after the fact, so there! But that's all old news to him, so he shrugs and turns the conversation back to the more immediate worry, which really should be the psychopaths from the worlds of his roommates, but is apparently now Oz. ]
He'd need to have any kind of sense at all first. All he ever does is smile like an idiot or look startled.
[ Also like an idiot, but can't that go without saying? ]
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( Minutes earlier, though that's more like a tease; all the time as Terri, knowing that it wasn't something she'd thought was part of his nature, when he'd been using charm to get toward the information he wanted when they first planned to get into the UE. )
Does that kid have a name?
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[ The claim she's seen him do 'the same thing', though, gets a snort. When? He has to think on it for a bit before shooting back with: ]
I was only joking around all those times, so they hardly count. If anything, mine is the opposite of a smile, but it actually serves a purpose. He's just being selfish with his.
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( If she looks amused and like she doesn't believe him -- she doesn't. He used Terri, and he played her with a smile, but it does occur to her she's not supposed to know.
And that hadn't been teasing, but that, to... might even just be Collette wanting to believe none of it was real. If she thought it might be, it hurt in a way she had only inflicted on herself.
Ugh. She rubs her arm, snorting. )
'Cause he's related to you! How many times do I need to tell you I want to know before you really get it, smarty pants?
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[ The usual complaint when personal things come up, not that this would fall into anything too personal. It was just business! ]
In any case, I duly warned, so do I get to sleep now?
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And I'll keep pestering 'cause it is! What's his name? Then you can nap, though you should figure out where we're going tonight sometime before it actually becomes tonight.
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( She remembers that name from way back, and the elemental association, part of a different conversation once upon a time. Ha! So that is what that'd been! Or more, so that was who he'd been working with. For some reason, she'd assumed Hugo was older than either of them; that realization has her laughing now. )
Yeah, yeah, quite a few, I know my fair share!
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[ So he had mentioned him before! ]
And good. Then I've decided where we're going.
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( Perky. Curious. Tugging on your knee. )
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