new player welcome post

[yhlee]

[Hello, new players! This post is for new and old players to get acquainted with each other in-character (IC) and out-of-character (OOC). I will be updating the character roster shortly for easy reference. Characters from the first arc who are still wrapping things up in Move 24, feel free to continue; I'll get to y'all shortly.

In the meantime, feel free to introduce yourself in OOC threads, including any information you want other players to have about you (including pronouns if relevant, or what time zones you're usually on, that kind of thing.]

[IC]
Ashari has just recruited a number of newcomers to the team in the hopes of shoring up its weaknesses and is, in classic Andan fashion, throwing a party on the Cantata (the moth ship formerly known as the Wasp and/or Bumblebee) so that folks can meet-and-greet. There are canapés, and Ashari promised Sulen that there are no recreational substances other than the alcohol if anyone wants it; Ashari is currently in the galley mixing drinks for anyone who asks. The public spaces of the interior have been decorated with somewhat lopsided and overly colorful artificial flowers (the matter printer was feeling cranky) as well as plush moths. There are in addition six friendly levitating baby moths, all wriggly tentacles and eyes, who will gravitate toward anyone who sings to them, and who like to be petted.

For the purposes of this post, "public areas" include the galley, the common room, and the storage hold, which has been temporarily pressed into service as a place where people can hang out. People are also welcome to hold private conversations elsewhere. For the moment, however, the cockpit, engine room, commander's office, and communications room/gunnery are off-limits.

[See this wiki entry on the Cantata-Wasp for more details on its layout.]

Comments

Re: questionable life choices

[zuhrovet]

Sasha tilts her glass back and forth, watching the colors change. She's thinking about what it would feel like to have an earring ripped out of one's ear. This is a distraction from wondering if Ashari noticed Sasha noticing Ione not-quite-touching her hair.

Eight hells, even Sasha should not be this bad at parties. She needs about two more drinks. Then she will feel pleasantly floaty, and can retreat to Environmental to sing drinking songs with Cantata.

"Do you want to try to print a violin?" she asks Ione. "I can't make any promises as to sound quality, but I'm sure we can turn up a pattern."

Re: questionable life choices

[bariolage]

Ione is terribly scandalous and touches her hair in front of people fairly often, though she is not doing so now because she's touching the drink and watching it bubble when she isn't looking at Sasha. She's good at parties generally, when she has that sort of mask on, but at the moment: these are colleagues, right? She doesn't need to try painfully hard to impress them, and she isn't extracting information, or distracting people so someone else can extract information.

She should probably learn what physical mannerisms unnerve people though.

And maybe take out the earrings.

"I wouldn't presume to waste resources, but if you think one might be needed. Or particularly enjoyed by the ... mothlings," Ione carefully tries out the vocabulary. "I'm trying to imagine mission critical violin playing."

Admiring a Mothling

[hoardingpearls]

"Aren't you cute," Reshad coos to a mothling, ignoring the fact that tentacles aren't in the usual definition of the word. She glances about - several people are in attendance already, and she picks a small group close to two more of the hovering creatures.

Despite the casual atmosphere, she's wearing bright, upswept eye makeup. As one of her new associates touches her hair and shows a bright, twisting earring, she looks closer. "Those are beautiful," she offers, and asks Ashari for a drink of her own - sweet, for preference.

Re: Admiring a Mothling

[bariolage]

She is not alone with this assessment: this is where Ione came in, too.

"They are, aren't they? Cute, I mean. The mothlings. Not my earrings," she clarifies in a way that sounds a little more socially awkward than intended. "Which, thank you for saying so; I should likely take them out before too long."

Re: Admiring a Mothling

[hoardingpearls]

"It's amazing, to think that something so small can become...well." She looks around at the walls, still adjusting to the idea that moths are anything but a clever, biotechnical vehicle.

And what does that imply in other areas? She sips her drink, a shimmering concoction in orange and sunset gold, and smiles.

"Do you expect trouble so soon?" Curiosity, but with a professional edge: if it's already time to prepare for trouble, Reshad is running behind.

Re: Admiring a Mothling

[zuhrovet]

Three-faced saint, it's conservation of pretty people. Sasha should have realized that with Strashik sick there would be an opening. Or looked at the fucking profile picture. But this is one of the Shuos, or former Shuos, and two distinct and obvious potential connections to whoever sent Mishka was two too many, so Sasha hadn't exactly been focused on Reshad's face.

Sasha finishes her drink quickly, because an empty glass is always a good excuse for being somewhere else, and says, "I am not aware of an immediate threat, but we expect many people will find the mothlings interesting."

Re: Admiring a Mothling

[hoardingpearls]

"That's certain. Alas, not for their charms alone." Discomfort? It's not so uncommon as to excite notice, but if Reshad wants to work together with the rebels and not just push toward the same goals, she's going to need to get to the bottom of it.

Still, that doesn't need to be this second. For now, friendliness may suffice. Thus, she wiggles her fingers at one of the mothlings and smiles again, as if at a very small child.

"I hope I haven't interrupted you two?" She shifts her weight backward, an alert, polite expression on her face.

Re: Admiring a Mothling

[zuhrovet]

Well, there's a tidy conversational box to keep Sasha from immediate flight. She supposes that's part of a pretty person's job. "We were just talking about the matter printer, and whether we should try to print a violin. Its chemistry module is unreliable, but I don't think that will matter for an instrument."

Sasha dressed up for this party, in the sense that she dug out a jacket of approximately the same shade of black as her headscarf. (It's too big for her, but so is everything.) This has the advantage that she can now shove her hand in a pocket awkwardly.

expanding the party

[zuhrovet]

[We should probably jump down to Mafyyil's interruption here.

ETA: That got more elaborate than I expected! It would also be reasonable to assume that Sasha followed Ashari's bidding and the conversations simply separated.]