(no subject)

[wontturntofoam]

Who: Shrieky, Jae and Wolfgang (in separate threads)
What: DAY TRIPS GALORE!
When: Last Misdi for Wolfgang, Givdi for Jae
Where: The Beach and Howl Barrow respectively
Warnings: Potential for the risque revelation of nipples in the beach thread.

[words for all in the comments below]

Comments

Givdi, Jae-Hyun Kim, BEACH ADVENTURES.

[wontturntofoam]

Shrieky still doesn't quite know what he thinks of Jae. There's something about the blanket kindness that he finds inscrutable. Does he actually want to spend his time accompanying new members of his Cohort to the beach, or is he acting out of some kind of sense of obligation? Does he genuinely not mind the fact that Shrieky had quarreled with his friend and tried to persuade him to renounce his humanity, or is he merely adept at containing a quietly seething resentment which he carried throughout his life?

Ordinarily, Shrieky would just assume the latter in both cases and move on with his life contentedly, but... well, frankly, he would like Jae to like him. Whether sincere or not, the man's overlooked his more caustic personality traits, and may be taking him to the beach, and Shrieky wants his seemingly boundless good nature to be genuine.

It's this problem that he's turning over in his mind as he waits for Jae to come and meet him outside the Valhalla Inn, fully equipped with a new set of swimming trunks under his trousers.

[boomvox]

There are several elements at play, here; Jae is curious, for starters. Even though there's a lot about Shrieky's anger that ruffles Jae's feathers, he feels like it's something he could do with being exposed to. He takes the idea of camaraderie on the cohort seriously, as well, because being abducted and trapped has been so personally traumatic for Jae.

And there's just the fact that he himself doesn't like being without anything to do for so long. He gets lonely, and then he starts stressing. It's better to be social.

"Hello, mermaid," he greets when he arrives, easy-going. (Mermaid sounds like in-eo, and does not have a handy youtube.) He's got a jacket on because it's fucking cold, but he's still dressed relatively sporty - fashion is pain - including a neon pink bag full of things he's not sure if the other man would have packed. Like several beach towels.

[wontturntofoam]

Shrieky glances up at the voice, and though he doesn't understand the words being addressed to him, he still smiles widely at the sight of Jae. "Hello! I'm glad you came!"

Not that there had been any reason to assume that Jae wouldn't come, of course. He had offered to bring Shrieky here, and he'd not shown any sign of recanting that offer, but the concern had still been there.

Straightening up from the wall, Shrieky surreptitiously admires Jae's outfit. He's taken to wearing whatever clothes are the easiest to put on, and while he doesn't think that his black t-shirt and sweat pants combo is that unattractive, he still can't help but notice that it doesn't look actively good, the way what Jae's wearing does.

[boomvox]

"You ready to rock and roll?" A beat. "I mean, go."

He'd better be ready, because Jae isn't going to go inside the Inn with him if he forgot anything. Even being this close to the arrival room is twigging his anxiety, though he's currently experiencing a curious emotional clash; usually he just feels panic, today he thinks it might be a better use of his time to blow up the entire hotel.

... Time to go to the beach!!

"Hopefully it'll be a little warmer on the other side of the city."

[wontturntofoam]

Cheerily oblivious to any quiet terrorist urges which Jae might be experiencing, Shrieky steps away from the side of the building. "Yes! Always ready!"

Well, that's a bit of a lie, but he's ready right this particular second, and that's probably the important bit. The cold doesn't bother him enormously, but he still gives a little nod at that suggestion, "Is the city large enough for the weather conditions to be substantially different on the far side of it?"

[boomvox]

"Sometimes." He shrugs one shoulder and begins to lead the way - it's an easy trip on the El Train, and by now, Jae's learned how to keep from getting too wigged out as they pass over Bonetown. "It seems to heat up quicker by the water, but I think it's just... light reflecting off the ocean, or bad weather getting blown inland or... something."

He's not a meteorologist, okay.

[wontturntofoam]

Shrieky falls into pace beside Jae, trusting him to be able to figure out a route that won't leave them lost and broken hearted in a ditch somewhere. "Perhaps the side with the water is closer to the sun? Or maybe it's got something to do with how the two moons pull the tides..."

Shrieky is enjoying this game of 'speculate wildly about the weather'.

Last Misdi, Wolfgang Einhorn, HOWL BARROW ADVENTURES

[wontturntofoam]

There's a spider (or something very much like a spider, at least) spinning it's web in the corner of one of the windows outside the Valhalla Inn. While he waits for the blond haired man to arrive, Shrieky's slid down the wall of the Inn, and is crouched in front of the spider, watching it weave away to it's hearts content.

He's feeling quite relaxed about this meeting, if he's honest. The conversation they'd had over the CiD had been one of the least stressful since he'd arrived. There had been stories, and smiling, and they hadn't had to exchange names, so that whole awkward situation had been avoided neatly.

Every few minutes, he glances up from the spider and searches the street for sight of the person he's supposed to be meeting there, before turning his attention back down again.

[gramarye]

The trains in Baedal are more reliable than any he's ever used, but they're not perfect, so Wolfgang is a few minutes late. He has no excuse, really, he's been up since... well, forever, it's not like he ever has slow mornings. He still hasn't realised that he completely forgot to ask the other man's name, nor did he give him his -- he would remember under better circumstances, but it's been two days since the last time he slept and "forgetful" is an understatement when it comes to Wolfgang's normal operating conditions.

He is very tall in person, and very thin, dressed all in shades of grey. All in all, not terribly difficult to pick out of a crowd, especially with all that hair. He nearly misses Shrieky, but stops and doubles back when he notices him out of the corner of his eye. "Oh, hello!"

[wontturntofoam]

Shrieky is particularly engrossed with the spider when Wolfgang arrives, but he glances up at the sound of the other man's voice... and takes a good long moment to just impolitely stare at him. The CiD hadn't quite captured just how striking Wolfgang was in person. He didn't look how Shrieky tended to expect boys to look.

"Hello." Shrieky straightens up quickly, averting his eyes back to the spider, as if doing so will distract from the fact that he's just had a nice long gape at the other man. "I was just... I was watching..."

He gestures towards the spider, and immediately the pastime feels foolish. "I was finished here though. It's nice to meet you."

[gramarye]

He's used to being stared at but it still makes him rather self-conscious, especially when he's not sure if it's a good or bad kind of staring -- he's not the best at reading people and there's something a little off about Shrieky that he can't quite put his finger on.

His smile is anxious like the rest of him, as if he is very concerned about what this complete stranger thinks of him. (That is exactly it, actually.) "It is nice to meet you, too -- I mean, in person, anyway." He holds a hand out for him to shake, his right hand, hoping to breeze right past any awkwardness.

[wontturntofoam]

Shrieky is familiar with the concept of handshakes, although he has participated in relatively few of them himself. He's acutely aware of the tension which he's managed to instill into this first meeting, and he tries to ignore it, as he extends his hand to take Wolfgang's hand in his. He holds it for a moment, as if he's not certain what he's meant to be doing, before quickly withdrawing it.

"I don't mean to offend you by saying this, because it is not a bad thing at all, and it is certainly not your fault..." He speaks suddenly, and quickly, because maybe if he just gets all of his words out right now then the remainder of this meeting will become less awkward, "...But, you are very beautiful, and I realize that having seen you on the CiD, I should have been prepared for that, and not surprised by it, but I think I didn't anticipate that you would look quite like this in person."

It's a little intimidating, if he's completely honest. Wolfgang evades definition.

[gramarye]

He ducks his head and purses his lips as if he's trying to school his expression into something more serious and failing miserably. He is determined not to be one of those obnoxious people who can't ever take a compliment, but neither is he capable of playing it cool. Because Wolfgang is not cool. By anyone's definition. (Nerd.) "No, it's fine, I'm not offended --" He feels vaguely as if he ought to apologise, but... that's just him, Wolfgang consistently feels as if he ought to apologise for existing and taking up other people's air. "Thank you, though?"

Before either of them reaches critical awkward mass, he nods his head in the direction of the nearest train station. "Are you ready to go?"

Last Newdi, Ilde Decima, HARP PLAYING ADVENTURES

[wontturntofoam]

Shrieky sets out early to find his way to the waterfall, because he is entirely confident of his ability to get lost on the way there. He stops maybe five people for directions along the way, and only bothers to memorize the beginning of what they tell him, since he can always just ask someone else once he's gotten some of the way there.

Eventually, he manages to piece together the route to his meeting place with Ilde, and arrives maybe half an hour before noon. So he hangs around, watching the water crashing down on the rocks, and the light shining off the water. As far as places to meet people go, this is one of the better ones in his book.

[rhinemaid]

It's a while later that Ilde surfaces, pulling herself up out of the water and wrapping illusion around herself as she does; by the time she stops beside him, she looks almost human (almost-- there's an otherworldly edge that she could hide, and chooses not to). The illusory dress spun around herself is half-hearted and gauzy, seasonally inappropriate to say the least, but unlikely to raise any eyebrows in Raven's Gate among people who've seen stranger or are simply already accustomed to her comings and goings.

"Hello," she says, twisting some of the excess water out of her hair as she straightens, smiling.

[wontturntofoam]

Shrieky grins widely and rises to his feet as Ilde arrives. He looks considerably less mysterious and wispy than she does, in his second hand tee-shirt and slightly oversized sweat pants, but pleased to see her never the less.

"Hello! It's good to see you again!" There's still a pang of jealousy there, at the way she can move so seamlessly from water onto land, but he pushes it down into the bottom of his stomach, and pretends it doesn't exist, "So, your home is close to here?"

[rhinemaid]

"Pretty close," she agrees, barefoot and unconcerned by it; there's a languor to the way she moves that's more some kind of mental exhaustion than mysterious fae behaviour, but her illusory appearance hides any other possible tells, so maybe it is just some manifestation of otherworldliness.

(It's nice when what you are will hide, sometimes, what you are. As well.)

"Do you mind dogs--? Orion is very well-trained, but he'll come and say hello." More accurately he'll come to the gate, flank Ilde, and warily keep an eye on the stranger.

[wontturntofoam]

"No, I'm very fond of them, actually." Shrieky's never actually seen a dog from above eye level before, since most of his contact with them has involved him slumped up over the edge of his moat, and the dogs in question trying desperately to figure out what exactly he is.

His steps are still slightly awkward, as if he's not quite confident in the way he moves yet, but his spirits are undampened, and he's not astute enough to pick up on any of Ilde's weariness.

"So how did you learn to play the Harp? Is it a common thing, where you are from?"

[rhinemaid]

It's a bit awkward to watch someone to lipread while walking, but Ilde's been doing it long enough that she manages, and tends not to miss as much as she used to. (It used to involve a bit more tripping over her own feet than it does now, too.)

"No, it's not really," she says, shrugging, "but my family's very musical. My father." Her extended family is mostly unrelated; it had been Emery and his baby against the world for a long time. "He's a composer, and we had a lot of instruments; the first one I learned was piano, and I mostly focused on the cello, but we had a concert harp that had been in the family and I really liked it. He taught me, mostly."

Piano first because it was Emery's own instrument of choice, then singing lessons with the piano lessons, then the cello and harp later, and she's picked up violin on her own in Baedal so as to offer it as one of the instruments she can teach. There's a lot of music in Ilde's life, one way or the other, and she's accustomed to it being that way. It's the only thing, above the water, that she never has any difficulty in hearing.

It resonates in other senses.

RIGHT THIS INSTANT! Tyrion Lannister, The Library

[wontturntofoam]

The people who worked in the library recommended The Cat In The Hat a lot, But Shrieky who needed to read it did not!

The book had the advantage of being more or less at a level where he was able to phonetically figure out what most of the words said, and when he couldn't figure them out, he could always scrutinize the pictures for clues (Although frankly it was a good job he'd managed read the word "Cat" without too much difficulty, because there was no way he would have recognized that from the drawings).

The problems which he was finding were more thematic than anything else, the main one being that the book was basically about home invasion and the menacing of a poor aquatic creature which would die if it was dropped out of the bowl which was currently being balanced precariously on top of a rake along with a cake and a toy boat and some other things.

The point where the Cat in the Hat decided that his definition of fun involved creating this extremely perilous situation for the fish, and then hopping up and down to compound his torture? Was the point where Shrieky decided it would be appropriate for him to fling the book across the room in a silent fit of rage. He would have shrieked some for good measure, but the Librarians had already had to talk to him about that a few times, and he didn't want to get kicked out.

[theimp]

The book bounces off a shelf and clatters to the ground at Tyrion's feet. He has, with the permission of the librarians, commandeered a small rolling stepladder, which he pushes about, and which would probably have saved him a book in the face had the book come that close anyway. He peers at the man who threw the book with less caution than appreciation. It's good to be passionate about books. But... what book is this.

Wordlessly, he turns the stepladder, seats himself on the lowest step, and picks up the book, leafing through it.

"Yes, I'd throw that too," he concludes after only a few pages.

[wontturntofoam]

Shrieky wasn't trying to initiate conversation with Tyrion, but he's not about to dismiss anyone who validates his temper tantrum. He frowns, giving the book a disapproving look, "The women at the desk told me that it was a good book for starting out with, and that she had read it when she was a little child. Why would someone make children read that?"

Unless they were trying to turn the children against either cats, or fish, he's not entirely certain what they could be expected to get out of it. Reading seems pretty overrated so far.

[theimp]

"I suppose there's something to be said for its simplicity," Tyrion allows, glancing up from the brightly-colored pages briefly. "And it's interesting that somewhere, somehow, paper is readily available to waste on such a thing."

He shuts the book in a decisive manner, hopping off the stepladder to amble over in Shrieky's direction, intending to return the book. "But it's no book for a grown man, that's true."

[wontturntofoam]

Shrieky does not want the book back. He stares at it with a rueful expression as Tyrion approaches, before glancing up from it towards Tyrion himself. "There doesn't seem to be any particular shortage of paper here. Perhaps they have a great excess, somehow?"

He wonders briefly if he should ask why Tyrion is so short, before deciding that the answer is probably that Tyrion is a dwarf, and just blithely assuming that this is the case will save him the trouble of a potentially awkward conversation. "Do you know of any books for grown men?" Pause, "Preferably for grown men who can not read that many words yet?"

[theimp]

He puts the book beside Shrieky, but as a concession, face down. No accusing googly eyes will stare at Shrieky now.

"Well..." Really, this is a job for a librarian, but Tyrion appreciates people who don't ask why he's short. And people generally haven't, here, because there are stranger things than him walking around, but he's still been cautious. At home, he has his family's name to protect him. Here he has Jaime, who can't be by his side all the time. "... what are you interested in? Or will anything do?"