hexarchate_rpg | Chapter 3.2: Old and new friends, old and new enemies

Sasha has distributed flutes of sparkling water and small glasses filled with a clear liquor. She finds a clear place to stand near the edge of the party--Jedao and Alaric are to her left, the cluster of people around the mothlings falls at about 3π/8--and signals the grid to adjust the light so that she is highlighted and the other partygoers are very slightly in shadow. She asks the grid for a ringing sound and waits for people to quiet. Her voice slightly amplified by the grid, she says, "Welcome, everyone. We have a unique combination of expertise, on the Cantata. I'm glad that you are here." (It's a formal situation, so she uses the plural 'you'.) "While we are gathered, let us toast to the success of the rebellion."

Sasha waits for an answering murmur, then raises her own glass and knocks it back. The liquor tastes like snow and homesickness; but these are her people now. A slight gesture of her left hand makes illumination linger on Jedao for a moment, before the room lights return to normal.

Sasha sees Remi trying to explain that shot glasses are not for mothlings, and grins in genuine amusement.

[We have some really fascinating conversations running in the previous move. I don't want to cut them off, but please put new threads here!

Also, an out-of-character public service announcement: Remi is a youthful, apparently non-sociopathic version of Kujen, plucked from an earlier timeline. He has not yet interacted with Jedao.]

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"Oh, luck is always warranted. To the freedom of our friends?"

She clinks glasses and tastes her drink--smoke and golden grass is not a bad analogy--before continuing, "I miss the mountains I grew up with, but even at seventeen I knew I wasn't going back. The weirder thing is, sometimes I miss Isterov. Stars are beautiful, but some days I'd take even a cloudy sky." She shrugs. "I don't know why we didn't have goats, honestly. Except my mother's fucking notions of propriety. What did you hunt?"

Jedao takes a cautious sip after the toast, mirroring Sasha. "I'm not sure what I miss more," he muses, "goat milk or goat kebabs. They were very friendly, too."

On hunting: "Sometimes deer, sometimes squirrels or rabbits. If I wanted a challenge, I'd go after the jackalopes. I'm a fairly good hunter, but all the years I spent growing up on Eshpatan I only nicked one once. If it hadn't been for the blood on the rock behind it, I would have thought I'd missed entirely."

He shakes his head. "That's the one problem with command in space. Too much of your ass in a chair, not enough earth or sky. Of course," and his smile turns crooked, "the hazards are different."

[Does Sasha have any means of judging whether jackalopes are a genuine heptarchate phenomenon?]

[Some stray corner of the grid will attest that all the Shparoi believe that jackalopes are real. The heptarchate itself is a bit skeptical.]

"Oh, goat shashlik, there's no comparison. On jackalopes--let me guess." Sasha's grinning. "They have legs like gazelles, remarkable camouflage, and are otherwise made out of teeth?"

Jedao shudders. "It'd be terrible if they were made of teeth. Not far off, although they're really more like overgrown rabbits, and they have stag-like horns. And they sing--I've heard jackalope chorales off in the distance, on half-moon nights, when I was camping or hunting." His eyes grow wistful. "Are you a hunter yourself?"

Sasha curls her fingers, instructing the grid to make a note for later. Jackalope songs sound like the sort of thing the Cantata would enjoy. Assuming, of course, that Jedao isn't reminiscing about playing practical jokes on foreigners--Sasha has seen his marksmanship evaluations.

"Sometimes. I went on a few trips with my father and his friends where we looked for bigger game, but on my own it was mostly marmots. For a while I was really interested in improvising snares." Jedao is unlikely to give a fuck about whether children with House shares should waste time on twigs and roots. "On Isterov I was more interested in observation. I caught a lot of frogs and lizards, but I never tried to eat one."

Jedao's eyes flicker as he notes the movement; he doesn't ask, but neither does he hide the fact that he noticed. "Marmots," he muses. "Good fur, if I'm not mistaken? I know a few basic snares, what any backwoods kid would know, but I was much better with a rifle."

He takes a long sip of the tequila. "I've eaten some damned peculiar things," he says easily, "but usually because we were on campaign and there were logistical problems. I'm told the candied jellyfish tentacles were a local specialty, but they were probably pulling our legs."

Sasha makes a sympathetic face for the jellyfish. She has been sipping her drink steadily, and it is just about gone, but it's Jedao's turn to choose if and when there will be another round.

"I used to have a hat trimmed with white marmot fur, but the white marmots were at higher elevations. I trapped marmots for meat. If I had tried to set up tanning in an outbuilding, my mother would have made me hurt for forty days." Her smile is sardonic, here. "What's your favorite hunting rifle?"

[I am happy to keep this going, but if you want to assume that Sasha and Jedao spend the next while nerding out about firearms, that works too!]

[Let's just assume that they nerd out about firearms while continuing to make inroads on the tequila, which is something I am completely incapable of RPing in that it's been two decades since I last fired a rifle and I know NOTHING about firearms. I do have an Expert Informant, but they're sick, so I don't want to pester them for a game's sake!]

[I'm not sure that the hunting rifles in our space ghost game need to be realistic, but it makes sense to focus on the next move!]

Chapter 3.2: Old and new friends, old and new enemies

Re: A break of sorts - paging Jedao

Re: A break of sorts - paging Jedao

Re: A break of sorts - paging Jedao

Re: A break of sorts - paging Jedao

Re: A break of sorts - paging Jedao

Re: A break of sorts - paging Jedao

Re: A break of sorts - paging Jedao

Re: A break of sorts - paging Jedao

Re: A break of sorts - paging Jedao

Re: A break of sorts - paging Jedao

Re: A break of sorts - paging Jedao