[Open Mingle] Remember Me For Centuries

[achievementhunter]

Who: Chara, The Knight, Ginko, Hinata, Chip, Seto, Muffet, Ren, Xion- and anyone else who'd like to jump in!
What: Some exploration occurs, blood is spilled-- everyone has a picnic. In that order.
When: 4/20 BLAZE IT
Where: Ziziphus : C5 and D5 closed prompts, B5 for picnicking!
Warnings: Please post your warnings in comment headers!


CLOSED C5 - You're a cherry blossom

CLOSED D5 - You're about to bloom

OPEN B5 - You look so pretty but you're gone so soon

OPEN B5 - ???

Comments

the drifter | ota | i'll match your format!

[hyperlit]

[It's all well and good and for the best that the Drifter is not getting stoned out of their mind - they're fairly certain such is not acceptable behavior for a warrior such as they to display, and so they steer clear of that field of indulgences entirely. Here they have a much better and more preferable field of grass and of friends.]

[They've gotten better at making chains with flowers, and their fingers work nimbly in creating great long streamers of multicolored blooms. They've not any particular plans for what to do with them just yet, though if you're in need of a crown or two, they won't complain if you pick from their rapidly growing supply.]

[But that's not all. Eventually, they'll take something from their pack and start to kick it about in the grass - a slightly worn but nonetheless quite charming ball.]

[If you've never played a game of soccer, now might be the time to learn.]

[flyfisher]

[Myia can't tell what type of person this is, but they certainly look more normal than most of the weirdos populating these islands.

But they're playing a kid's game. Myia never got to join in with the other freshly pupated kids playing with balls, so she doesn't recognize the game and mostly just marvels at the stranger as they kick around the ball.

She doesn't get what the point of this is, but... it seems fun. She simply watches, compound eyes following the ball closely.]

[hyperlit]

[Myia, likewise, is more on par with the sorts that frequent Buried Time. She lacks the lizardlike scales or the feathers or fur, but the insectoid appearance is at least more recognizable than the bald skin of various gradations that so many humans here seem to boast.]

[The Drifter halts after a few moments, tipping their head to one side to regard Myia curiously, before issuing a text-based query.]

know how to play?

[flyfisher]

[Myia squints at the text, having to lean in close to read it.]

Duh. Course I know how to play. You kick the ball. You're playing. Done. It's just kicking. Just kicking.

[Drifter now has the chance to avoid explaining there's a reason or goal behind kicking the ball, and let her live without that knowledge forever. If it were Myia, she'd take that opportunity, but the Drifter is not Myia.]

[hyperlit]

there are goals

[It is true; the Drifter is not Myia, and they are very sincere in imparting this nugget of wisdom, because they are some kind of Lawful alignment here, it would seem.]

score points against opponent

[catpiper]

[They catch her attention somewhere between shoving food into her mouth and into her pocket and while she fancies herself to be quite the connoisseur of games and game related nonsense, that ball is larger than a normal baseball and that puts her at an immediate loss. What.

Crumbs still on her face, she ambles over to them and asks-]

Are you pitching with your feet?

[hyperlit]

it's soccer
you kick

[To be fair, the Drifter's notion of what is involved in soccer is...perhaps not the most accurate, considering that they've done a fair amount of whacking the ball with their sword and being thrown onto their front with the force of the ball being launched at their abdomen by an exceedingly talented, seemingly unbeatable child of a soccer player.]

[They demonstrate by nudging the ball with one of their feet, watching it roll amiably in the grass.]

[catpiper]

[She can get on board with this. Whatever the game entails, she's ready. All her expertise and experience will come together to help her win. Somehow.

She trails behind the ball, lightly kicking it back to them with her bare foot. Except her aim is bad and it ends up veering to their left, but that's fine. It's whatever.]

Do you like soccer? Do you play this a lot?

[hyperlit]

only a little

[They don't have any goals set up, and thus there's no real means of scoring points or keep track of said points, but...does that matter very much, either? The Drifter is nimble in strafing to one side and bumping one heel against the ball so it doesn't go careening into the grass, and potentially disappearing.]

a child taught me

[shineinside]

[At some point, Yuka quietly joined in with making flower crowns. She has no idea how to do this, but it's not especially hard, so it's not long before she gets the hang of it.

Yuka likes the Drifter. She doesn't know much about them, but she doesn't feel obliged to keep finding things to talk about with them. It's nice to know someone who you can just be comfortably silent around.

Just gotta figure out how to tie off the end of the chain to make it into a crown...]

[hyperlit]

[Ren had taught them this; not merely the ways in which one threads flowers together, carefully, making sure not to knot the stalks too tightly and split open the green and threaten the integrity of the entire chain, but also the way one can sit like this, for hours, and simply allow themself to do nothing. The Drifter is no stranger to meditative stillness and rest, to needing to be still, but this, this is stillness of a different sort. Wanting to hold their position, and not merely out of necessity because of injury or fatigue.]

[Their eyes pinch into dark half-moons when she joins them, though eventually her struggle draws their gaze.]

done this before?

[shineinside]

[Yuka looks up when she realizes that the Drifter's asking something. Between the lack of a voice and her concentration on the craft project, she almost didn't notice.

She shakes her head.]

It wasn't too hard to figure out how to braid them, but now I'm to the end and I have to loop it back together...

[hyperlit]

[The only sounds they can make are soft, voiceless coughs - little huffs of pained air spurting from feeble lungs. Often, it is not worth it merely to get one's attention.]

can show you

[It's a polite query, not an insistence. They would fully understand if she would prefer to learn on her own pace.]

[demonpuppy]

[Chip has been watching for a while from a distance, unsure if they would be a welcome intrusion. It's one thing to be working as part of a search party, but asking to join a game...kind of assumes the other person even wants to bother with you. And everything they'd seen of Drifter so far has been utterly capable, not the type of person that would put up with a nuisance like them.]

[But...they haven't played a proper game like soccer in ages.]

[Finally Chip gets up from their spot at the picnic and wanders over, glancing away and back to them a few times before piping up:]

Can I play?

[hyperlit]

[Another child in the vicinity isn't a surprise any longer - these islands are crawling with too many children, and too many of them know the unforgiving nature of this world and infinite others, and not enough of them know the idle ease and bliss of a game of soccer, the way a solitary drive and unilateral need to complete an objective can burn away like mist in the sun, beneath an unfamiliar roar of spiking adrenaline and a competitive streak they didn't realize they had.]

[Children here don't do many things they should. Children here do not play soccer, because they are too busy learning to fight with knives and teaching themselves to set buildings on fire.]

[The Drifter stops batting the ball between their toes and stops to nod, a swift dip of the head that might almost be construed as eager.]

know how?

[mamaterasu]

[The bouncing of a ball - big or small, certainly catches the attention of a curious pup wandering through the area. Ammy certainly has enjoyed this island, despite its many dangers - both in monstrous form and ways of deadly, poisonous flowers, so her wanderings have taken her to many places. She's a bit dusty, covered in probably a heap of pollen and a few dandelion seeds, so hopefully they don't aggravate the poor Drifter when she approaches, tilting her head and pawing slightly at their ball.

This ball is far too big to throw...but she's sure she could catch it either way. And she's very determined to try and fit it into her mouth as well. So...hrm. Are they going to throw it? She plants her bottom on the grass and looks almost expectantly from the ball, to the Drifter, and back again.]

[hyperlit]

[Dogs like to play with soccer balls and tennis balls and all sorts of spherical objects besides, and what is a wolf god but a sort of dog, in many respects? She certainly behaves like one at times - such as now.]

[Hm. Plainly she does want the ball, but it wouldn't be as simple as kicking it to her. That does not sound particularly fun for a quadruped, after all.]

[So the Drifter draws their blade, igniting the blaze of cerluean, and winds back with the flat of it, aiming carefully - ]




[befoRE STRAIGHT UP WHACKING IT RIGHT AT HER]


[FORE]

[mamaterasu]

[Ammy blinks when her blue-skinned friend draws their blade, tilting her head to one side with a questioning noise, but it's too little too late to be asking questions. The blade strikes the ball and all of a sudden it's speeding at her with such a speed and such a force that Amaterasu reacts before her mind can even think to do so.

She jerks her head to the side and catches the ball with her reflector on the swing, smacking it back like a tennis player might. Not the correct game for a soccer ball, but...eh, it's still within the rules. Kind of. Of course, once she realizes they're playing this sort of game, the wolf begins barking frantically and bouncing around with her tail wagging behind her, tongue lolling out from her smiling face.

Again!!]

[hyperlit]

[The soccer child had only ever batted it about with their feet, seemingly perfectly content with the Drifter's use of their weapons in the game - likely because the child could best them even with their weapons in the playing field - and so it is not perhaps a shock that the wolf god would react accordingly.]

[The ball comes skating past with enough force for the Drifter to skid across the ground in an attempt to catch it. It bounces and rolls across the grass before they can batter it back, but Amaterasu is clearly delighted enough with the initial volley for the Drifter to immediately comply and slam their blade it into it again.]

[Let's see if they can keep it in the air for longer this time.]

[exbarathris]

[The Liberator has never played a game, period. She, and everyone else, were always spending too much time just trying to survive. Spotting a familiar face, however, she makes her way over; despite running into vicious plant monsters on another island, everything here seems so much more idyllic, relaxed. Something about that fuzzy dream with Lup and the ball the Drifter has reminds her...

She offers the mental image of a volleyball net, questioningly. Not that she really understands quite what Lup was trying to get at, but something involving people and balls and nets, anyway.]

[hyperlit]

[The surprise that she'd know what "volleyball" is, is...well, it's not precisely what they would have expected from her, but it's possible she may have picked it up from someone else.]

[A sequence of images strung together forms a thought, and a loose fragment of narrative - two silhouettes battering a ball back and forth between two goals, intending to lob it in between two markers for points.]

[exbarathris]

[Hey, she's picking up all kinds of things! Slowly.

Thinking about this scenario a little, she nods. It makes sense, after all. Clearly combat practice with a harmless target. Extending one clawed finger, she points at herself, back at the Drifter, and taps her ever-present spear end against the ground. She's willing to give this a shot.]

[tenthstreetbred]

[Shepard isn't the most... comfortable around recreational drugs. Which is a surprise for anyone who knows her, seeing as she grew up surrounded by them, but it is precisely that reason as to why she is wary. So this picnic is more navigable territory for her. Her initial plan was just to be present, passively enjoy everything, then head back home- but seeing the Drifter, a person she hasn't talked to much since they both arrived, with what looks like a soccer ball catches her interest.]

Hey there. Looking for people to play with?

[hyperlit]

[Hello, Shepard. They remember you, though not very well; human faces still have that quality of sameness to them, unless there's something they can consider unique enough to set them apart. Such is the case with most of the children present, for example: most of them are a good deal smaller than average.]

[They tap the ball with one foot and send it rolling over in Shepard's direction.]

do you play

[tenthstreetbred]

[She catches the ball with her foot and kicks it up a bit into her hands.]

A little, yes. I’m no pro, but I’ve played soccer before.