multiversallogs | How many goodly creatures are there here!

How many goodly creatures are there here! :: GAME OPENER

Welcome to Baedal.

These are the first words newcomers hear when the door opens and they are invited into their new world. Some fuss, some fight, some need time before they have the courage to step outside. Others, shell-shocked or jaded, go quietly along with the proceedings.

They are given brief instructions; a repeat of what's described in the pamphlet and a door key.

Please stay in your room. There will be dinner soon.

It's been almost a day for some. For others, only an hour's wait. The latest newcomer is lead straight from the arrival room to the dining hall where candles and lanterns have been set out to compensate for failing electricity. (Those who have been here longer explain about rolling blackouts.) The food, however, is warm, varied and plentiful. Seating is open, and less conventional chair are available to those who need them.

There are many strange faces around the table, the majority of these recent arrivals. The proprietor of the Valhalla Inn is here, as is some of her staff. The Sheriff of Mog Hill is introduced, his function detailed. The reason for the dinner is explained:

It's a celebration. A new cohort has finally been officiated; CeidaryBlue523. Your cohort. Please. Introduce yourself. Mingle. Get to know your fellows, they will be your brothers and sisters for as long as you live in this city.

((OOC post for discussion and coordination.))

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"Just my pistols," Mina replied. She supposed that was a bit foolhardy. It wasn't always wise to admit to being armed. Then again, even without the pistols, Mina had weapons at her disposal. And that was a secret she wasn't planning on sharing.

She enjoyed survival too much.

Mina glanced around the courtyard. "I think music is precisely what this party needs. Everything is so dreary." She turned to him. "And I can't say I've ever heard a lyre before."

From what Apollo remembered of that vampire and werewolf battle--and it was all a bit fuzzy, given how that day had ended--pistols were those strange handheld weapons that fired off pieces of metal.

Effective, he was sure, but somehow it all struck him as horribly unpoetic. There was nothing beautiful about them at all.

Of course, Ares would have probably thought otherwise. Then again, there was nothing poetic about him either. He probably would have done well in this sort of world, though. Fought his way home, or at least to some position of authority.

"I'll be sure to play for you sometime," Apollo skirted past the question. He didn't want to seem rude and turn her down, but he didn't want to be forever remembered as that strange man that had started playing music the first uncomfortable day of their arrival. "But only if you promise to dance."

Mina laughed. It wasn't an impolite laugh, but it was decidedly boisterous. "Dance?" she said. "Oh, dear me, I don't dance. I'll sing you a good drinking song, if you get enough rum in me, but dancing? That has never been my particular forte." She did a little, Spanish flourish with her arms, ending with an absent wave of her hand, as if to say, 'well, that's that.'

The truth of the matter was Mina danced just fine. The problem was that she always wanted to lead.

"You seem like a fun sort," Mina continued, the chuckle wearing off. "Do you enjoy other sport?"

"Aside from chasing shepherdesses through a sunny meadow?" he quipped. He raised an eyebrow at her, though his eyes seemed to be smiling.

"My impressive wooing abilities aside, I'm not half bad with a bow and arrow," he said. "And I enjoy outdoor games. Running and swimming and the like."

He swept another glance over her. "And you? You look like you stay active."

"Well, I enjoy shooting," she replied slyly. It wasn't a woman's occupation, but she did enjoy it and seeing as she had already admitted to having a pair of pistols, couldn't see any real harm--or surprise--in the confession. "I've used a bow and arrow before. It has a certain, rustic appeal to it, although I must say I'm better with the pistols."

Mina clasped her hands behind her back. "I enjoy sailing too, of course. I can't do it nearly as much as I used to, sadly. But every once in awhile, I like to go out onto the lake at midnight and watch the sky." She glanced up at the stars. She hated how strange they were. She missed Orion and the Dippers and most especially Andromeda.

What else? She supposed running for her life from dragons or fire or fae didn't really count as sport. "Really, I like most anything that gets me moving."

"You could consider a life of piracy," Apollo suggested. "From what I understand, it combines sailing and shooting people. And you'd always be on the move."

He shrugged a shoulder. "You'd just have to find out if there's a body of water around here to sail on." Frankly, if there was, it would be encouraging. There would be hope of sailing home from there.

Mina had to cover her mouth, pretending to stifle a yawn, in order to keep from laughing. A life of piracy? Been there. Done that. Became legendary because of it. "Piracy?" she said, when she finally managed to keep from cracking up. "Sounds like fun."

The reality of it, of course, had lacked much of the romance. The life of a pirate was often filled with long stretches of boredom, to be broken up by intense, terrifying engagements. And then there was the food. And the smell. Nothing smelled worse than a lot of men all in close quarters together. Storms at sea. Wicked cold. Lingering, terrible diseases. And yet, Mina would always miss it a little. Mostly because of Anne. Especially because of Anne.

"You can be my first mate," she said. "You'll take the helm. I'll take the crow's nest."

At that, Apollo gave a genuine laugh.

"Who, me?" he questioned incredulously. "No, no, I'm afraid a pirate's life wouldn't be good for me at all. Not nearly comfortable enough. And surrounded by far too many sweaty, unkempt men for my taste."

As a rule, Apollo preferred cleanly young virgins to old men.

And he was flexible on the virgin part.

"You have at it, though. I'll help you build a ship."

"You don't have the build for a ship builder," she told him, her voice gleeful. "And your hands aren't calloused enough. You seem more like the type who would design a ship and draw it out on paper. Maybe sketch the head. Oh, do make it something pretty."

She held out her hand, showing off her favorite ring. It was made of dark, Spanish gold. There were intricate designs carved into the metal, making it look like the ruffled feathers of an owl's face. Two gleaming orange topazes peered out like eyes. "Something like this," she said. "Preferably in burnished bronze. That'll stand up to the sea."

Mina lowered her hand, rings glittering in the moonlight.

"I don't think there's any water," she said with a bit of a lamentable sigh. "Nor do I think there are the resources available to build a ship. Pity."

"You're judging all of that based on this room?" he asked, looking up from the ring. "There could be a whole world of water out there for all we know. We could be on an island, even."

He looked at her very solemnly. "Still, I don't think it's good to build a ship out of metal. It would probably sink."

"Well, it's all hypothetical anyway. I don't know about you, but I don't have a lot of whatever they call their currency. Only what they gave me in that miserable green room." She sighed. "So, so ugly." And Mina had never particularly cared for the color green. "I suppose I'll have to find a job before I can start saving up to buy my boat."

Oh well. At least she didn't have to buy food.

"Nice to have goals, though. All my friends are incredibly goal-oriented individuals. Driven. Determined." She smiled. She supposed she was like them too. She hadn't always been though. Mina had once been motivated purely by instinct and emotion. Now, she was just getting old.

"Everyone needs to have goals of some sort," Apollo pointed out. It was the logical thing to do. "If getting a job and saving up means meeting those goals, then it's just what has to be done. A means to the desirable ends, yes?"

Of course, Apollo wasn't about to set up any goals for himself just yet. More logical yet was to observe the new location, see where they were, how long they might stay here for, and try to figure out what the purpose had been in their being transported to this place. From there, he would be able to make more reasonable goals, and learn how to best protect himself and Cassandra.

Which was, in the end, the real goal.

"True enough," Mina replied with a nod. "Still, there's a difference between having goals and living goals. I've known people who were so obsessed with getting what they wanted, they never wanted what they had." She drummed her fingers against the pad of her thumb. "I knew of a man named Ashely Chillwind, for example, who was so obsessed with this magical slab of his, that he fell in love with it, loved the damn thing more than his own fiance. Now that was tragic. I mean, a stone slab is hardly going to keep you warm at night. Quite the opposite."

She laughed. It wasn't very funny, but she laughed. Mina liked laughing.

"Well, if my goal is to build a boat and sail away to half-discovered places, what will your goal be?" She smirked a little bit. "Aside from shepherdesses, of course."

"Aside from the shepherdesses?" Apollo asked in an incredulous voice. As he looked at Mina, his eyes sparkled mischievously, though his face remained innocently incredulous. "Well, that's practically cutting out half of my regular activities."

He lifted his hand, stroking his finger against his chin thoughtfully. "I suppose if you're cutting that out, my goal will have to be seducing fruit pluckers and dairy farmers."

"Is that your way of saying you have no skills?" she teased. It was something hilarious to see a man in what she normally viewed as a woman's position. "Well, fear not. Perhaps somewhere down the line, I'll open my own medical clinic. You can be my nurse. I promise, I won't make you wear a funny white hat. You'll have to wear the white dress, of course, but I'll spare you the hat."

Mina smiled blithely. That was actually a delightful notion. And not just because Apollo was a man. She imagined he had very shapely legs.

"Won't that be delightful?"

"I'm not really sure what that entails," Apollo admitted. "But sure, I have skills. I was just kidding. I could go hunting, or work as a musician, or maybe a philosopher if they have need for that sort of thing around here."

They probably did. Philosophers were constantly in demand.

"I prefer a job where I don't have to wear a funny hat, though."

"A philosopher?" Mina raised an eyebrow. "You really are ancient, aren't you?"

She couldn't hold that against him, though. Plenty of vampires she knew had been forever stuck in the past. Some of the literally, as in the case of Primogen Brown. And of course, some of them were so old...well...she had only recently learned that Dr. M was sired back in the days of ancient Greece. She had been a priestess of Athena, for crying out loud. Compared to that, Mina felt like a bloody neonate.

"Well, I'll wish you luck with that line of business."

"I hear it's rude to ask someone about their age," he commented lightly. "But for all the questions that you've been asking me, you haven't offered up too much information about yourself."

And that made him wonder what she was hiding.

Apollo swept his arm grandly in an all-encompassing gesture. "So tell me about yourself. Who are you?"

Ah, the one question that all Kindred feared. Mina could not help but smile at it. She had a rote, memorized response, one she had used so many times, in so many different places. Unlike with most other Kindred, at least hers was only half a lie. There was a grain of truth in it. "Well," she began, "aside from being Mina Barrett of Devon County, England? I'm a doctor, specializing in emergency care and hematology. I was last practicing out of Mercy Hospital and Medical Center in Chicago, but I've traveled all over the place."

Every twenty five years or so, if she could help it.

"What else, what else?" she mused. "One brother. Father died before I was born, et cetra and so forth. Recently single after unloading a nightmare of a boyfriend." She laughed at that. "Christopher Doyle. Complete arse, I must say."

Apollo only half understood what she said, but he knew that doctors were healers of some sort. He imagined hematology was something female-related. Perhaps dealing with childbirth.

The boyfriend part, that he understood. And it made him laugh. "Every woman says that about every man she ever has a falling out with," Apollo exclaimed. "It's really just not fair to us. Tell me, what did he do that was so unforgivable?"

Mina's eyebrows quirked slightly. "He cheated on me," she replied with a surprisingly cool, casual tone of voice, "ran around with all the other women in the town. Got syphilis, which I hope really, really hurts." She shrugged. "To speak plainly, however, it wasn't much of a relationship to begin with. I can sum it up in eight words, well, seven words if you count the hyphenated term as one: He needed arm-candy and I was bored."

Despite her style of dress and masculine tendencies, Mina had no problem considering herself arm-candy. She could be very pretty, when she wanted to be. Beauty wasn't always about being born with a perfect nose or full lips. These days, it was much more about what you did with what God gave you. And Mina, for all of her bravado, knew a thing or two about the proper application of lipstick. Not to mention a corset, although they were somewhat out of style, she supposed.

They would come back.

"Actually," she mused. "I've always had the sinking suspicion he doesn't really like girls anyway. I think I could parade around naked in front of him and he'd still be more interesting in Anthony DiMarco's latest political scheme." She paused. "I've never paraded around naked in front of him, for the record."

Truthfully, Apollo had always believed that trust was more important than monogamy. Of course, he was also aware that most women did not feel the same way, and he wasn't looking to start any fights right now. Not while they were all still trying to adjust to this new location.

"I'm sorry that you were hurt," he chose to say instead. He gave the women an appreciate once over, eyes lingering in some places a bit longer than others. "His loss."

Apollo turned his eyes back to her face and smiled. "I can assure you, if you paraded around naked in front of me, I would pay attention."

It was difficult to hurt Mina. She protected her skin with Cruac rituals and her heart with a lock and key. She would, in time, forget Doyle's name. At least she had that. Still, she knew that in protecting herself, she sacrificed the possibilities for other things; romance and sex and intimacy (which were, in fact, three very separate institutions). Often, Mina told herself that her life was worth sacrificing those three things, but thinking about it now, she could question her own judgment.

Turning her attention to his horrible, horrible pick-up line, Mina smiled smugly. "That won't be happening my friend."

She was actually a bit surprised. She certainly wasn't trying to flirt. There was really no time for that. She could only chalk it up to the fact that Apollo was remarkably handsome and he wore it with confidence. Confidence was very, very attractive.

"I remember my Greek enough to know that you've had a very, very active sex life," she said. "Bacchic orgies were never to my taste. I much prefer flowers." As long as they weren't roses. Mina hated roses.

"Just as well," Apollo commented lightly. Mina, he had already gathered, was not entirely his type. He didn't feel inclined to make further efforts than casual flirting. Besides, sexual dalliances could wait until after he figured out what was going on in this world.

Still, he had to admit to himself, there had been a time in Apollo's past when the fact that a woman had rejected him would have been enough cause for him to viciously pursue her. Perhaps that was a sign of growth. Perhaps it was because of Cassandra.

Or, most likely, it could be due to the fact that since the time he'd been snatched into Willaknepp, he had been tired. Frequently. And taming women into submission could just be plain exhausting.

Mina sensed a certain measure of resignation in his voice. Is that what it was? It was difficult for her to read men, sometimes, especially since the Kindred were so good at covering up their emotions and their...well...covering up their everything, when you got right down to it. To be among other creatures was still...unsettling. She would have to rely on ancient knowledge of the way people, real people, communicated.

Of course, she wasn't entirely sure if a Greek god counted as a real person.

A minor detail.

"You and I must go out one of these nights," she said. "I can help you find something more to your tastes. Nothing makes a man more attractive to women than when he's accompanied by a woman." Mina, ever one of the lads, prided herself on her ability to find companionship for her male friends. She was good. Very good. And only rarely had to rely on her Dominating abilities.

How many goodly creatures are there here! :: GAME OPENER

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