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Owner	Pose
Marigold	BEIJING DAXING WARPGATE HUB (FORMERLY DAXING AIRPORT)      Food court, 5F; overlooking Interworld Stopovers, 2F      A bored-looking gate attendant points a small chirpy device at you to check for infectious diseases, asks if you have any trade goods to declare, and... wait, hold on.      For a few minutes it seems like Cecilia must have made some kind of mistake. Maybe she truncated the address by a couple of stops. A huge, gleaming-white, hypermodern warpgate hub is about as far as one can get from pastoral fantasy; and even though it's far more impressive than the nondescript stops most trips take, it's still the kind of interstitial space designed to be at once beautiful and forgettable, never a destination in itself.      But above the soft murmuring traffic of thousands of humans (and others) bustling between dozens of artificial warpgates along sweeping halls that gently direct their traffic, with heavy-laden hoversleds and pack-beasts detained into specially-made side lanes to have their cargo shuffled off onto regulation indoor shuttles, a familiar splash of green comes into view again.      The single high roof lets the smaller upper floors overlook the lower ones. Leaning against a glass railing three stories up is General Cecilia in a cream-ribbed sweater and slim jeans, waving down to get your attention. A spellbook's open in her other hand, as if she were just reading it nonchalantly.      Following the three flights of stairs up to her reaches an unfamiliar kind of food court; each restaurant is its own free-standing or wall-embedded bubble of glass. Each one encompasses its own dedicated seating, too, except for a few sparse tables pressed up against the railings for the express purpose of people-watching the milling crowds below. Cecilia's the first to greet you as you come up, of course; just behind her is Roy in an uncomfortably-starched looking white button-up and business slacks, hurriedly standing up from the burger he was trying to eat with plastic knife and fork.      "Glad you could make it," Cecilia says with brisk handshake, glancing around to make sure nobody's suspiciously eyeing their little gathering yet. "My apologies if this works out to be nothing, but... as I said before, I couldn't not call you. It's too important to risk botching this opening."
Marigold	There's a smaller section of Roy's army present, scattered across nearby tables and restaurants in shouting distance. Rutger in a rust-colored hoodie and baggy pants is waiting in line for noodles with a suspiciously-sword-sized luggage, accompanied by a beflanneled Clarine who openly totes her healing staff on her shoulder- it's harmless, after all. Dieck, still shirtless, is unsuccessfully trying to order mead from a bar made to serve overpriced beer to depressed businessmen. Merlinus and Marcus, dressed just like a pair of retirees, seem to rest their old knees on a bench way below on the second floor as people mill past them.      Nobunaga's Masked Knight Sekva, leaning against the railing, may not have gotten the memo quite as successfully, but she's at least replaced her black handkerchief veil with a disposable face mask.      Most importantly, this is one place where Fae (adorable kiddie overalls) can just be like any other Multiversal weirdo- her pointy ears and forehead-mark are on full display as she digs into some Dippin' Dots with gusto. Her guardian Igrene (black sweater, scarf, khakis) gently scolds: "You'll get brainfreeze if you don't slow down, you know." "Fae wonf't! Fae'f stwong!" she replies through a hoovered-up mouthful. Lugh, sitting next to her (graphic t-shirt, shorts), looks a tiny bit awed, but rouses when Lucius (pretty sky-blue cardigan, brass necklace, white slacks) spots you first and sunnily waves.      "Even though General Murdoch ought to be cut off by my army at Castle Remi, he's still better-supplied than we are," Cecilia explains as she makes her way back to her table, still eyeing the crowds below- in particular whenever a cargo-laden indoor shuttle slowly passes by. "Murdoch is a product of an older generation. He's less of a fighter than Bern's other generals, but he's famed as a strategist. I thought he might already have adapted to using the Otherworld portals in his supply lines... but it's just good luck that one of my messengers spotted Bernish soldiers here, last week. If he's keeping standard schedule, the next shipment will pass through here...?"      She looks to Roy, who checks a wristwatch he clearly isn't used to wearing. "Um, within the hour, Cecilia." "Within the hour." "And then we can tail them to their stockpile and try to destroy it, whenever we like." "Look at you! When'd you get to be such a fast learner?"
Audrey Basque	What does inconspicuous even mean??     It's so context sensitive!!     Audrey spent five minutes rattling through her wardrobe before Petra reminded her she could just pack heavy. So Audrey started cramming different clothes into her handbag (bless hammerspace) and decided to worry about it after arriving. How hard can it be to find somewhere to change?     Which means, when she arrives...     It's a little bit like this! Her brown hair's actually drilled up in the more classical smaller drills look today, and she looks every bit the part of the rich girl who buys the most expensive coffee on the menu. Long red skirt, a frilled black shirt, sunglasses and even a nice white hat and a black handbag. It's inconspicuous... if you're on most Earths at a Starbucks or something a bit more refined. Surely inconspicuous at most Warpgate *hubs* too.     ... and would you know it.     "YES, NAILED IT!" Audrey exclaims, perhaps to Petra or Angela or both, before she regains a natural and normal posture.     Audrey briefly excuses herself from her company to at least greet Lucius warmly, and then, glancing at Roy's burger, greet him with a bit of a smile.     "Father Lucius, always a pleasure. Roy, how do you enjoy modern Earth cuisine?" And then there's Fae being adorable. She'd barely gotten to say hi last time, after all the gassing up Petra keeps doing!     "This place seems to agree with Fae," she remarks to Cecilia, before everyone's gathered so as to not interrupt anything.     And then she excuses herself just long enough to go buy coffee. Or rather, some iced chai latte she chances upon. "the next shipment will pass through here...?"     "Do we know what to look for?" Audrey returns, sipping from her drink. "Besides 'Bernish soldiers'. How well have they adapted to travelling through this sort of place? Surely they won't just... waltz in in full Bern colors and armor, banners visible?"     "... will they?"
Angela	As it turns out Angela doesn't have to pay peasants any money or mug them or anything of the sort because where everybody is meeting up is actually perfectly fine for what Roland tends to wear and Gebura can also wear a suit. Roland is holding onto the 'Angelapad' but it is presently in screensaver mode, it doesn't seem like Angela is going to be paying a visit unless she's required for something. Considering what she said over the Concord band, she might literally still be playing with Harriet (the Spyder). Gebura is stil pretty imposing and conspicuous even when she's wearing a normal suit so Roland did his best, putting some makeup over the scars and giving her some sunglasses to cover her wounded eye. She clearly has a pack of cigarettes in her jacket pocket and a lighter to go with but she figures Lilian's going to be here and she knows she doesn't like it when she smokes around her so she's going to just hold off on that until she gets somewhere that's a little more 'open air'. "Huh." She says when she sees Fae. "She really is the cutest thing." But her job here is to check in with Cecilia and Roy and while she's a bit sore over working for Angela now, this is a job she'd be happy to do even if the Head asked her. She makes her way to Cecilia once she speaks. "General Cecilia?" Gebura asks. "I've been sent by the Library to help out. Roland over there is here for the same. Guess it was only a matter of time before Bern'd adapt. The name's Gebura. Dame Commander can vouch for me." Meanwhile Roland actually stalls, wathcing Fae for a long moment even as Gebura moves on. He approaches Igrene. "She yours?" He asks. "Cuter than a button." There's something briefly wistful in his eyes before he bbreathes out and pushes it away. "Looks like she's having fun." He looks over Fae again and adds, "Hey...name's Roland. Good to meet you. What's your name?"
Nobunaga	Blending into modern settings is, shockingly, not something that this Sengoku-era warlord is unfamiliar with. This is also what she assumed was meant, given her usual garb is more early-1900s or late 1800s military chique. What's *unusual* is that the warlord seems to be taller, and her hair is a bright crimson red rather than the black it was in her recent appearances on Elibe. The glee in those scarlet eyes is, however, absolutely unmistakable. There is no one else this could be; this could only be Oda Nobunaga.     And her choice of garb paints her as a passing-through businesswoman at a glance; a sharp black suit with creased slacks, a suit jacket over a white collared shirt, black vest, and a red tie. There's only little bits of flair here and there, muted compared to Nobunaga's usual ostentatious accessories. Little gold chains hang off the sleeves, forming stripes, and she sports a set of three hairpins that hold a decorative braid firmly in place. The rest of her hair is left to its own whims.     Already equipped with an overpriced latte, she seats herself near Roy and immediately folds one leg over the other, "Destroy it or loot it. Whatever's more convenient." Eyes closing, she sips her drink, then takes a moment to swirl it around in its nondescript paper cup, "Whatever's useful for him is useful for you, no?"     One eye opens, glancing aside towards Fae, "She's having all kinds of fun, huh?"
Flamel Parsons	Flamel, dressed in that culturally-ambiguous-but-still-essentially-medieval robe-cloak-thing he uses as a generalized Disciple of a Vague Yet Ominous Order, regards his destination with concern. "Mmmm." He walks into a bathroom real quick, then walks out in something closer to his normal clothing, the jacket and tie of a travelling white-collar worker. No trouble, thankfully, for him.     He scratches his cheek thoughtfully, at the table with Cecilia. "Murdoch... Murdoch... that's the name of the man who helped Zephiel kill his father. And with a heck of a scheme too. He's a clever guy, and honestly I'd expect him to keep that cleverness going into old age. That kind of stuff doesn't decay the way people think! The people who think you get really uncreative in old age are the same people who wish they'd been clever when they were young, so just imagine you're trying to untangle something Merlinus put together."     "If it were *traditional*, though..." He looks around. "I'd suspect one of the businesses around here. They move a lot of containers without going through security, because the business is supposed to be above-board. If they bribed someone, or god forbid there's a Bernish manager in a manager's office somewhere here, then they could bring all kinds of stuff straight from the loading doors into here, and after that, stash it somewhere. I mean it's what the Psychonauts do, anyway." He gestures at a nearby Starbucks. "We have people stash a lot of high-caliber emotional negativity in the back of those, in most airports, just in case we need to arm up on an international mission."     Sometime during his conversation, a very slightly disoriented day-trader walks out of the nearest bathroom, dressed in medieval clothing and rambling on his phone as he takes his luggage through the next gate quickly.
Madeleine Cadrasteia	Madeleine's usual attire is pretty conspicuous for Elibe and for many other places, so 'inconspicuous' means branching out a little. She's dressed like a zookeeper, in pale grey polo shirt and khaki shorts. Tall black socks peek out of her boots, and her face is covered by a clear plastic shield under which she's wearing sunglasses to hide her unusual eyes from casual inspection.     She's also carrying a large box taped shut with a "WARNING: REPTILE INSIDE" label, within which something can be occasionally heard slithering around. Anyone who knows her can guess it's probably her living weapon, the lindworm Drogrung, in some kind of disguise. (She got it through security without them opening the box by passing it off as a hoop snake. Do *you* want to be the one responsible for a major warpgate hub developing an endemic hoop-snake population? Didn't think so.)     Arriving around the same time as Audrey, Madeleine nods in agreement at her question. "Once I know who exactly we're looking for, they'll have a snowball's chance in Hell of shaking me. I doubt Murdoch will be here himself, but does he have any... lieutenants, or quartermasters or whatever, that might be involved?"
Petra Soroka	<Q-Conversation> (NPC) General Cecilia takes a breath. "Yes. We might only have one this chance. It's a clandestine mission. Dress inconspicuously."     Of course Petra can dress inconspicuously! Blessed by her natural endowments of being white, young, and reasonably pretty, she can blend into any environment! But the question remains: which environment could Cecilia possibly mean?     The safe bet is clothes fitting Elibe, obviously. That would be Cecilia's mental framework for what 'inconspicuous' clothing means, after all, and she didn't make any suggestion that she would want to meet somewhere offworld. 'Inconspicuous', then, means something suited for the southern border of Ilia, that isn't quite as sluttily overstated as Petra's favored outfit: so, Petra comes dressed in a slightly oversized brown cloak, over a tunic cinched at her waist (because she'll die if it's not a *little* slutty) and tallll brown boots. However... <X-Concord-Chatter> 4 Petra Soroka scoffs. "You're falling behind, Audrey. *I'll* be carrying *four* outfits that I can switch between instantly so I'll never be wrong."     Petra is past her days of humorously fucking up due to being underprepared! Now, she'll never go anywhere without being *hyper*prepared! The second reason for the oversized cloak, besides to make Petra seem at once mysterious and nonthreatening, is to hide an entire guitar case underneath it-- the same one that she bought from the Stigma Workshop in the City! When it becomes clear that the goal is a modern warpgate hub rather than the fantasy-style medieval continent, Petra can simply speak a trigger phrase and smugly swap out her outfit for another one in an instant, comprised of whatever clothes she happened to have inside the extradimensional space of the guitar case! For this environment, that ended up being: a hoodie and shorts, with the former having a graphic design reading 'I'M WITH STUPID' and an arrow pointing directly down.     As proud of herself as she is for this devious little ruse, the destination being a warpgate hub proposes another problem. De-cloaked, she still has a guitar case slung across her back, and while it fits in perfectly fine into the environment, it's still a large extradimensional container that she has to get through security. The only way to verify its contents (and ignoring the contents of her mirror, since they slip under the radar), is to fully empty it out, and expose the array of clothing that Petra prepared for every contingency of 'inconspicuous'. 1) The winter-themed indie game protagonist cloak: 8/10, solid choice, would work on many otherworlds too if they're roughly in theme with Elibe. 2) The red and gold knight-ish outfit she got in Elibe: 7/10, looks great but only assuming that Cecilia asked for inconspicuouity based on a complete lack of faith in the Elites. 3) Casual 21st century clothing: 10/10, it practically turns Petra invisible in any American suburb. 4) A suit: 3/10, very improbable for this to work, but a neutral option that Petra wouldn't leave without. 5) Maid outfit: 4/10, maybe if they were sneaking into some manor for some reason?? 6) Perfectly tailored Nova Heliosanctus school uniform: 0/10. Don't do this.
Petra Soroka	"YES, NAILED IT!"     After surviving the mortifying ordeal of having to show her luggage (and insisting to security that the cinder block isn't a weapon and she really needs it back), Petra rolls her eyes and thumbs the strap of her guitar case to readjust on her shoulder. "Yeah, you look just like any other tourist. Good job." "Glad you could make it,"     Petra gapes a little bit at the presentation of the Lycian army in casual clothes, taking several extra seconds to recognize them at all and locate Cecilia by the sound of her voice. The phrase 'coffeeshop AU' comes to mind immediately, but because she's a normal human being and an adult, she manages to not say it out loud. Instead, she waves back, smiling normal-style before they're close enough to have a proper conversation. "And then we can tail them to their stockpile and try to destroy it, whenever we like."     "Alright." Petra props her palms onto a table and leans back into them, chewing on the inside of her lip. "So the goal isn't just to be hard to notice-- it's to be hard to notice for *them*. I had a little trouble recognizing you with the outfit change, but with your hair and face uncovered, do you think it'll be good enough for tailing them? Or will we be keeping a lot of distance?" "Surely they won't just... waltz in in full Bern colors and armor, banners visible?"     "They're not at war with the entire Sector," Petra points out. "We're only 'disguised' so they don't notice us, not because you can't wear a cape or a helmet in a fucking hub. At the very least, they'll be dressed-down enough to be harmless."     "Speaking of which, I have *so* many weapons by the way. If the plan's to beat them up, then I've got enough weapons on me to shut down warpgate traffic on this whole world for a week. I didn't even mean to, I just carry so many that security can't even notice."
Odette Raskins	After being told to dress inconspicuously for a clandestine mission, Odette first needs to look up what clandestine meant. Once that's done, though, she does a quick lookup of the designated location and she's left wondering if Cecilia made a mistake. Double, even triple-checking the coordinates tells Odette that she's looking at the right place, though, and so... Today, the EMT arrives dressed as a hub concierge, complete with a neatly pressed dress shirt and jacket, a matching tailored skirt, high heels, and a tiny hat. Her hair is braided neatly, too, draped over her shoulder and partially covering a little neckerchief. Dragging a wheeled luggage case along with her in lieu of her usual carrying case, she's stopped a few times on the way to the meeting spot by people mistaking her for actual staff, and she apologizes before telling them where to find the nearest information kiosk since she's on her union-mandated break right now. Eventually, though, she makes it to where General Cecilia is waiting, sliding her case to a stop nearby and shaking Cecilia's hand firmly before waving at Roy with a light giggle. "Hello, General Cecilia! Hi, Roy! No, no, it's totally fine. Better to be too prepared than lose a big opportunity, mhm." She reassures, following her towards the table and perking up when she sees even more familiar faces. Lugh and Lucius get the first excitable waves, of course, but seeing Fae demonstrating her prowess in the face of the faux-futuristic ice cream has Odette pumping her fist lightly in ill-advised encouragement. "The strongest... Oh, I've got some hot water in case you need a bit after." She offers, unzipping her luggage case slightly to reach in and pull out a thermos filled with still-hot water. She offers it to Igrene for safe holding, then turns back to Cecilia and Roy with her thoughts still lingering on the situation. "If they're moving through here... Mm, it should be easy enough to spot them unless they're... Uh. Disguised like us." She comments, breathing a little easier at Petra noting that they'd probably be dressed in their usual colors. "That's true. And I bet they won't notice us here as long as we don't advertise our presence." She adds, giggling softly at Cecilia's praise towards Roy before clearing her throat. "We might even be able to pick up some of those things for our own forces if we can get enough time with that stuff." She suggests, nudging her glasses up to try and get that cool-lady glint going on with them without blinding herself with light reflections in the process. Seeing Lucius does remind her of something important, though, and Odette takes a deep breath to steel herself before circling around to his spot at the table. "Hi, Father Lucius. Hi Lugh. Um. Can I... Ask you something important, Father?" She asks, already feeling kind of guilty from practically knowing that Father Lucius would be the sort to let her ask.
Nobunaga	> "Speaking of which, I have *so* many weapons by the way..."     Nobunaga laughs an honest, genuine laugh. Hiding her mouth behind her latte cup, her red eyes flit Petra-wards, "Ohohoho~, between the two of us, we could probably lock this entire hub down for weeks." Eyes closing, she shrugs, "I'd be on board, but I don't think that would really solve the problem that brought us here." She ends the sentence by taking a drink.
Lilian Rook	As extremely humorous as it would be for Lilian to fuck this one up and dressed totally out of place, this is one of the things that her brand of precognition (or 'divination' now) pays for. The urge to not embarrass herself alloys with the desire for a successful mission, and no frantic time-stopped changing room quasi-theft is required.     Well, it's pretty fucking difficult for her to be inconspicuous, being a literal poster-girl of the Paladins, but she can put some heavy concealer over her scar, move the usual place of her hairpin to a celtic knot in back, wear long sleeves and a real back, put in some vaguely brownish contacts, and call anything that stands out 'a replica'. She smuggles her sidearm through in a handbag that she cheats through security, folding up her tactical belt inside a technically Immunes sanctioned scan-proof compartment, leaves Night Mist as a generic chain descending under a cream-coloured ribbed sweater hanging on one shoulder more than the other, and Lilian looking litle a flirty normie in a trendy black bubble skirt on leggins and hazelnut leather boots.     Still, she'd been wondering. That foresight gives her directions and not trivia. Actually getting to the airport is sort of the end of her 'mission', and so the place itself, and Cecilia waving from on high, are a bit of a surprise. She'd expected to pass through somewhere like this, not stop at it. She wants to shout something, but then airport security is asking about diseases, and Lilian has to say "I certainly hope not, considering--"     . . . . . . . .     'My apologies if this works out to be nothing, but... as I said before, I couldn't not call you. It's too important to risk botching this opening.'     "You're not a genius strategist for nothing." Lilian says, a little blandly, but more for lack of not being sure how to feel about this than actually being unimpressed. Her eyes keep wandering around the Elibeans planted in the surrounding scenery as if ready for a Where's Waldo do-up. "It's not as if we're typically posted along a defensive line. Use all of the forces you have available to crush your target regardless of size, and eliminate every possible chance of failure, one by one." It feels so bizarre to be saying that while aware of the weight of a designer handbag on her waist instead of the usual strap. "I'd expect nothing less, if he's supposed to be your equal in any way. If King Zephiel is already making use of them, and General Galle is planning for them, then Murdoch will be doing even more. I'd never expect a competent general to be less sensible than random villagers out of mere pride." she says, thinking back to Ilia.     "So don't worry about it." she says to Cecilia, smiling and patting her arm.     "Roy, you're allowed to eat that with your hands you know."     "Dieck, memorize the local mantra 'no shirt, no shoes, no service' please."     "Don't blame Igrene when it happens anyways, Fae."     "Lugh? Lucius? Can't I buy you anything? Even a coffee, perhaps?"     "Flannel, Clarine? Are you-- no, I suppose we won't be here long enough for it to matter. Carry on."     "Mmm . . . I don't think I want to interrupt the Seneschal or Marcus. They look like they're catching up down there."     "--Rutger? I don't think . . . . . . No it's okay. You're doing your best."     'Look at you! When'd you get to be such a fast learner?'     "He's always been sharp. And now he has fine company to learn from." Lilian says, looking for a place to grab a heinous tiktok concoction from, and then order Petra to go get it while she settles in.     'Speaking of which, I have *so* many weapons by the way. If the plan's to beat them up, then I've got enough weapons on me to shut down warpgate traffic on this whole world for a week.'     "Please don't do that. I'm going to get in so much trouble if you do that." Lilian sighs.
Petra Soroka	"Flannel, Clarine?"     "She's been wearing it a lot, lately." Petra slides into the conversation more easily than usual, due to Lilian being sort-of disguised and therefore fully approachable. She shoots Clarine a look, leaning elbows on one of the white countertops. "Even more than *I* do, actually."     Once Petra comes back with Lilian's cocoction-- she kind of got tempted by one too, but it would be dereliction of her duty to make a second order while on a mission from Lilian and thereby delay Lilian's drink by several more seconds-- she hands it off to Lilian and turns to Audrey next, who already has a drink. "Hey, Audrey, could you go grab me something sweet from wherever you got that?" "Please don't do that. I'm going to get in so much trouble if you do that." "I'd be on board, but I don't think that would really solve the problem that brought us here."     "I meant metaphorically!! Obviously!!!" Petra protests, shoving her compact mirror back in the front pouch of her hoodie. "Like, it was a comparison! I *could* do that, which means I *am* equipped for what we might *actually* want to do with the soldiers!"
Audrey Basque	"Yeah, you look just like any other tourist. Good job."     "*I* look like someone who didn't get stopped by security," Audrey says, before taking a sip from her drink. "Speaking of which, I have *so* many weapons by the way." "Please don't do that."     Audrey stares at Petra, about to open her mouth and comment on the matter before Lilian beats her to it.     For once she won't complain about that.     She does NOT want to make the headlines for pulling out weapons and shutting down a Warpgate travel hub by association. "Hey, Audrey, could you go grab me something sweet"     "Oh, sure. You want iced chai too or something else?"     She's not going to think particularly ill of this because this is just standard niceties! Once Petra answers she'll go get her some fancy coffee or iced drink too. It's a short trip! No big deal.
Lilian Rook	'I meant metaphorically!! Obviously!!!'     "I thought you were studying literature." says Lilian. She takes the horrid (perfectly normal, just popular) beverage, and then holds it close enough to her to be a disguise. "Shouldn't you know what a metaphor is by now? Have you been telling me the truth?"     'Oh, sure. You want iced chai too or something else?'     Lilian looks at Audrey with a very dim sense of horror. She says, very quietly, as Audrey turns to leave, "It's like I never knew her at all."
Angela	Roland glances over to Lilian, thinking about his talk with Rita. Problem is, he can't really talk to her about what he wants to talk to her about in a place like this with all these people around and an Angela literally in his hand who can connect at any moment. And it's only going to get harder to schedule time with Lilian in the middle of a war. ''It's like I never knew her at all.'' "Well that's by her doing isn't it...?" Gebura asks offhandedly. "'Least according to her. Angela's got me putting her through the ropes but it feels like she's got teachers for miles." She is quiet for a moment and then adds, more quietly, to Lilian. "...Feel like I'm still standing out. Think I need to do something else? Like with my hair or something?"
Marigold	"A pleasure to see you as well, Audrey!" Lucius says. When prompted, Roy looks back at his plate: "Ah... this 'hamburgher' is tasty, but a little... difficult. Is this pulped veal?" "I believe they called it ground beef, Lord Roy." "And cheese on meat... it's very..." "You know, I'll finish it if you won't?"      "This place seems to agree with Fae..."      "It's strange how little your 'Multiverse' cares about dragons," Cecilia murmurs, agreeing. "When I first heard about other worlds, I assumed they probably had humans and dragons too, and maybe even their own Scourings, if that's how things were fated to go..."      "Do we know what to look for?"      "They'll be using one of the building's little carts-" she means an airport shuttle- "or a wagon, to carry the supplies," Cecilia says confidently. "I'd expect Flamel to be right if they were trying to stay completely clandestine, but the businesses here use the same carts. Bern may be trying not to look military to avoid trouble, but scrutinize anyone attending one of those, then signal to Marcus and Merlinus below to take a closer look. Especially watch for groups of people with matching boots."      "The name's Gebura. Dame Commander can vouch for me."      Cecilia forms a silent 'oh, wow' looking up at Gebura, but recovers in time to smile and shake her hand with confidence. "Pleasure to meet you, Gebura. The Library... ah, that's where Angela is now, isn't it? We haven't spared much attention to the Otherworld, but I try to know the basics."      "She yours? Cuter than a button."      Igrene smiles with sincere warmth, looking from Roland down to Fae, but the corner of her mouth twitches with a little pain too. "She's..." A pause. Fae looks up from her Dippin' Dots, a tiny bit worried. "I'm her current guardian, and we're family," Igrene says at last, stopping just shy of 'she's my daughter'. "Mmph! Fae loves you, Igrene!" "Haha, I love you too... have you got any of your own? 'Roland', was it?"      "Fae's Fae!" the pointy-eared girl introduces herself, kicking her little legs under the table. "Fae's having lots of fun! Fae got to take off her dumb robe, because the Otherworld's nice to Fae! Ish..." She takes one more huge spoonful of the Dots, and then after a moment her face scrunches up. "Ouh... owwwww...!" "Fae, I told you! Oh, thank you, Odette. Here, Fae, drink this..." She tries plying her with the hot water.      "I doubt Murdoch will be here himself, but does he have any... lieutenants"      Roy, having set aside his quarter-eaten burger to scribble in a little journal, looks up with the eagerness of a question he knows how to answer. "Oh! Galle used to be Murdoch's subordinate, before he was promoted to replace Narcian. Galle took some old colleagues with him from Murdoch's army, too. That might leave Murdoch short-staffed on officers, really; we're not sure." He looks to Cecilia to confirm it, who nods.
Marigold	"with your hair and face uncovered..."      Cecilia smiles at Petra, flattered, as she picks up a slice of pepperoni pizza from her plate and starts tightly rolling it like a burrito. "I know in the Otherworld, portraits are cheap, but in Elibe even a general isn't important enough to have paintings and statues everywhere. Besides, most of us are only here as extra eyes, or in case something truly awful happens. We don't need two dozen people to follow a trail."      Homph. She chomps into the Pizza Cylinder with dainty enthusiasm. Dear god.      "If the plan's to beat them up..."      "I don't want to start a fight in the hub if we can help it at all. Strictly, all we need to know is where in Elibe they're putting it all. Then we can hit them at our leisure," Cecilia says, with one slightly-greasy palm held up. Answering Nobunaga, Roy adds a little sheepishly: "That's true, but we're really well-provisioned for now. If we get any more supplies, we'll just have to start giving swords out to the local villages to spare our horses the burden. Burning it will be fine."      "if he's supposed to be your equal in any way..."      "You flatter me, Dame Commander. If anything, I think Murdoch's more like General Douglas, my mentor," Cecilia says, reciprocating Lilian's pats to the back of her shoulder by touching Lilian's hand. "If I have a peer over there, it's General Brunnya. I've gotten my hands on one of her casting manuals, from before the war; that woman's something."      Lilian's banter-bonding gets a few responses:      "Oh, so I just pick it up like a biscuit, and...?" Roy takes a bite, and then looks thoughtful, appraising the burger entirely too seriously.      "Hey, if these guys only have ale, I don't think they're, uh, sophisticated enough to make demands of my attire."      "Huuuurts... mmmph..." "Fae, don't eat more!"      "Ah, thank you- just a tea, could you, Lilian?" "What Father's having, please!"      "It's perfectly respectable clothing! And I picked it out all by myself, so be nice to me!"      ". . . Thanks."      Clarine scowls back at Petra while in line, so she completely misses it when Rutger orders her own noodles. "Hey! Wait! I was going to pay for both of us!" "Why?" "To say sorry for that time I said you should pay for mine!" ". . ." "And also because... it feels sort of adventurous to? You know?" "No thanks." "What do you mean, no thanks?! I'm the noble and you're the commoner! It's noblesse oblige!"      "Hi, Father Lucius. Hi Lugh. Um. Can I... Ask you something important, Father?"      "Of course you may, Odette. We've got nothing else to do but wait," Lucius says, in his typically angelic way. There's still a teeny bit of tension between him and Lugh, but that's set aside when he motions at at an empty chair next to him for her to sit. "What is it? I trust your practice is still going well?"
Marigold	Still chewing on her Pizza Cylinder, Cecilia resumes her job of staring down at the airport luggage-shuttles that lazily maneuver through the crowds. One comes every minute or two, gently parting the crowds with shrill little beeps while moving not much faster than walking pace. From all the way up here they look like fat caterpillars surrounded by ants.      Every once in a while, when a shuttle seems to have an unusual entourage or be especially heavily-laden, she gestures down to the two old men below. They get up to investigate, but each time they shake their heads up at her, returning. It's still not quite the expected time, but still, Cecilia's slowly getting more and more tense.
Nobunaga	> "I meant metaphorically!! Obviously!!!"     Nobunaga laughs, "Obviously!" The laugh cuts off and she glances sidelong over her cup, "Unless~?" > "Burning it will be fine."     "Ah ha, I understand," the Demon King hums thoughtfully, "Very well then. If that's how it is, I'll not spare a single grain of rice." She raises her hand to wave over the bemasked Pegasus knight "Oi! Sekva! Don't be a wallflower; these are your comrades. Mingle, mingle!" > "Huuuurts... mmmph..." "Fae, don't eat more!"     The warlord laughs again, a hearty and jovial noise that shakes her shoulders. The innocence of children and their love of sweets versus the concern of those who care for them. Oftentimes a one-way battle, sometimes a complete route. She swirl-mixes her warm sweet coffee, then holds it out towards Igrene, "Here. Drinking something warm will help cure it faster."     There's no way giving a small child a double-shot mocha latte could go poorly.
Madeleine Cadrasteia	Cecilia: "When I first heard about other worlds, I assumed they probably had humans and dragons too, and maybe even their own Scourings, if that's how things were fated to go..."     "Y'know, I thought something similar, when I first got out here? That there had to be a- to be all the bits and pieces of the world I'd come from, or close-enoughs, for every other world too. But there's not! Some of these worlds are pretty close to each other, but Elibe, and where I'm from for that matter, aren't so much alike to the rest." She sets the box down on the table, across from Roy's cheeseburger, and folds her arms in thought. The box's contents shift in their slumber, roused from the depths by delicious fried meat.     Looking to the young lord himself, Madeleine continues. "How about you, though? What's surprised you most about the Otherworlds, now you've had at least a bit to take some of it in yourself? Besides the food, I mean."     It's still not quite the expected time, but still, Cecilia's slowly getting more and more tense.     Maddie leans one hand on the railing, watching the goings-on below and silently thanking her (usually un-)lucky stars for her eyesight. To casual observation she's just people-watching, but her head tips in Marcus and Merlinus's direction whenever they get up from their benches to check out a passing cargo shuttle.
Angela	"...Yeah, it is. In the last big war and so far in this one, I haven't really been able to lend a hand because I couldn't leave. Not to sound hungry for war or anything, but having to sit back and send others to do the fighting was worse for me. Would rather fight ''with' these days." Like a true klingon perhaps but nevertheless. "I don't have Lilian's experience commanding so I'm gonna defer to you and her but if my people are around I'll handle them." ''Especially watch for groups of people with matching boots.'' Gebura turns her head and squints an eye. "...You're troubled that they haven't made a move yet. Think we might be looking in the wrong direction? Maybe they caught wind." But she's looking. ''She's... I'm her current guardian, and we're family.'' Roland's eyes focus and he looks towards Igrene's eyes for a moment, suddenly quite serious but before he can comment on the first, Igrene says a second. "Yeah. Name's Roland. Not your Roland, haha... Though I do swing a Durandal of my own." He rubs at his neck, glad that she didn't immediately start commenting on the shared names at least. "And...yeah. She'd..." Be around by now, he thinks. "...Be a little younger than this one." He lies, but also is just incorrect, he doesn't quite realize Fae's got centuries going on here. He's judging from appearances. "Unfortunately my work keeps me away from my family right now. I couldn't risk them, you know?" He can't quite hide that he's hiding something but he's hoping as long as it's plausible enough it'll be tough enough to read him completely . "...You know, I don't--want to backseat here, but I don't think there's any harm in just saying it, you know? You don't want to leave unsaid the stuff you want to say, even if it's a little spooky to say it. If I did that I'd probably have been single forever, though honestly I was pretty lucky that my wife was as forward as she was. She made it easy." ''Fae's having lots of fun! Fae got to take off her dumb robe.'' "Heh... Nice to know that the Otherworld's such a nice place, right?" He says. "But hey, if you gotta put the dumb robes on again, just treat it as a spy mission. Fooling the bad guys." He winks at her, encouragingly. "...But it's nice to get to run around and take a break.''Nobunaga offers something crazy to give a kid.'' "Woah woah woah--that much caffeine can be bad for a kid." Roland says. "That can really pump up the heartrate, upset her stomach--I don't mean like ice cream headaches here, I mean like anxiety attacks and maybe something serious." Roland tells Nobunaga, assuming that she just isn't aware of the potential effects here. He looks to Fae, "But there is a trick, you can put your tongue to the roof of your mouth. It'll help it go away more quickly."
Odette Raskins	"Please don't do that. I'm going to get in so much trouble if you do that." "I've been wondering, Dame Commander... Um. Why?" Odette asks, trying to puzzle something out in her mind. "I mean, it'd be bad for everyone, yeah, and Miss Angela might get in trouble for being her boss, but... You're not paying Petra or anything like that, right?" "completely clandestine" Odette's feeling so good about her decision to look that up earlier. "Cart check and boots... Okay. At least, not everyone with those carts'll have matching boots or the other way around, so that might cut down on some of what we need to look for." "Ouh... owwwww...!" "Aw, Fae... D-don't worry, the water'll help. Or..." She watches Fae playing with the water, then giggles softly and gives Igrene a brief eyebrow-nod. "Distractions are good, too. Hehe... Yeah, the Multiverse has all sorts of people going around that even a full-sized F-" Wait. Fae might take that the wrong way if she finishes that. "Ffforest... Tree wouldn't turn too many heads." Smooth. "What is it? I trust your practice is still going well?" Thankfully, Lucius is open to Odette's concerns, although even that tiny bit of tension between him and Lugh isn't missed by the not-actually-concierge. He also gives her a much needed softball, giving her some time to get her thoughts together as she takes a seat. "Mhm! It's... Well, it's been kind of staying the same?" She opens up her luggage case again and starts sliding the well worn training staff out it, then reconsiders when she remembers that her only real methods of demonstrating her progress would either involve cutting herself or starting a fire in public. Instead, she holds her fingers together near the tip of the staff, roughly the size of a standard lighter's flame. "About... That big? Not enough to really protect anyone with, but if I could figure out how to do it with something smaller than a staff..." Right. She did have that other thought running through her head, didn't she? "... Two questions, actually. Um. First one is: Do you think it's worth trying a tome? Er. I-if it works in a similar  way, anyway, but I'd still rather learn it this way if that might develop... Um. Bad habits, you know?" The second question really has her taking her time and steeling herself for the response before she finally claps her hands against her cheeks hard enough to leave some white, then red marks. "... I think I might be shallow." She says quietly. It's not even a question. "I... Um. I've been noticing that I've been feeling... Er. Feelings whenever someone sounds cool, or looks really hot, and not even after I get to know them, you know?" That's almost a question. "But now it's even happening when I'm not seeing someone's face at all." She concludes, groaning and slumping on the table with her head propped up by her hands. "I don't know what to do, Father Lucius..."
Flamel Parsons	The international secret agent looks over the constant movement of the crowd, watching slowly... "We're expecting something throughout the whole area... If it's probably not *just* storefronts, I'll need to get more creative. I've got a handle on detecting Bernish minds though, and I think--" Flamel starts, before briefly zoning out. He goes totally silent, and looks like he's just sort of mentally shut down for a bit.     ...And then he's back. "Wuh. Wha? Okay, that-- checking the memories... I tried to make a nationality-detecting psychometry and some of my base-layer psychic coding rebooted me. Oh. Oh!" He plops one closed hand into his palm. "Oh, I was gonna be *psychically racist!* Okay, maybe I shouldn't do that, but I can probably do it if you tell me it's really important. Otherwise..." He taps his chin thoughtfully. "I could look for things with a heavy military sentiment attached, but that depends on the courier knowing a lot about what they're holding or the manufacturer knowing a lot about geopolitics. If any of you know a lot about Bernish weapon manufacturing, I could try applying that to a psychometric filter, but that'd be a stretch..."     "Maybe my best bet would be..." He taps the table with one finger. "I'll get an astral presence in as much of the transit staff as I can, find any security gaps they know or don't know, and run passive data-gathering through their brains, looking for info on things moving through exactly where Bern would move them through if they've been doing this for weeks."     That's what he'll start to do, barring any other suggestions (or commands to Be Racist). It'll involve sort of zoning out at the table and platforming through several dozen transit hub staffers' minds, setting up relays and presences.
Lilian Rook	'Well that's by her doing isn't it...?'     "I have no idea." Lilian says, shaking her head. "She seemed normal at school, but I suppose I just wasn't paying attention and I assumed. Either that or it's some sort of rapid fall from grace spurred on by joining the Concord." she says. "Corruption." gets added a second later.     'Least according to her. Angela's got me putting her through the ropes but it feels like she's got teachers for miles.'     "Of course she does. She's everyone's favourite project right now." Lilian says, surprisingly without bitterness. Or any meaningful feeling. "It'll pass." She looks away, then back. "I'd actually been wondering. Are you actually intending to cultivate anything with the drills you have her on, or are you feeling a little bit justifiably petty and your intent is to convey to her the magnitude of hard work that she's been looking down on?"     'When I first heard about other worlds, I assumed they probably had humans and dragons too, and maybe even their own Scourings, if that's how things were fated to go...'     "I've wondered." Lilian sighs, without obvious cause. Her eyes skim over the crowd, but go nowhere in particular. "Mine was fated that way. So is Angela's, it seems. I like to think that it's a special, unlucky few, but sometimes I wonder." she says. "Mostly about things that a friend of mine talks about, sometimes. As in . . . the idea that they all do, in a sense, but for some, it's just difficult to see. Because the dragons are people, and the 'Scouring' is just the things people do. That you don't know it at the time, but you see that it's begun already in the ways that the world has broken down from how it used to be."     ". . . I sort of hate that the words stick with me. More and more over the years, it feels as though they could be more true. But I can't tell if they are, or if I'm just teaching myself to see the same pattern everywhere. I hope it isn't. Dragons are so much easier than humans."     'I know in the Otherworld, portraits are cheap, but in Elibe even a general isn't important enough to have paintings and statues everywhere.'     "You know I've actually been wondering about that as well." Lilian says, sipping her tiktok drink, and making an ambivalent expression. "How do you identify yourselves where you go? Do generals at least keep track of each other's descriptions?"     'That's true, but we're really well-provisioned for now. If we get any more supplies, we'll just have to start giving swords out to the local villages to spare our horses the burden.'     Lilian smiles at that. "It's a good problem for a commander to have. I'm certain that Rutger isn't complaining about having a surplus of fine swords, to say little of our mages." she says. "That's the reality of combat, though. Armchair generals love to obsess over how much they can drum up in the first place, but soldiers on the ground have to seriously consider the merits and demerits of what we have to carry into the field."     'If I have a peer over there, it's General Brunnya. I've gotten my hands on one of her casting manuals, from before the war; that woman's something.'     "I'd optimistically forgotten her, for a moment." Lilian sighs. "That makes me worry more, not less."
Lilian Rook	The general clamour from the Lycian League fills her with somehow tangible relief, swelling her lungs like the first breath of fresh air out of a stuffy office. Her body language, subtly but surely, relaxes into what they're used to.     "It's not quite high class, but even I've been known to partake." Lilian says, about hamburger.     "True, but the workers don't get paid enough to quibble. They'll be let go if they break those asinine rules, so be kind to them."     "Fae, it's in the roof of your mouth. You have to warm that up. And go slower."     "You may as well let her, Rutger. It's chivalrous to pay for the lady, here."     Oddly, instead of ordering Petra, Lilian briefly gets up to acquire the tea herself; she sets cream and sugar on the side for both Lucius and Lugh, but sneakily drips sugar into the latter's so that he can feel like a big boy using only as much or less than Lucius. Eventually, she falls to half-assing her influencer beverage, and starts on a tea for herself; red, lightly sugared. Watching Merlin and Marcus seems to fascinate her. She idly comments to Cecilia, "It's a pleasure to watch the veterans work. Even though they get less attention than our young disasters, there's never been a moment I haven't appreciated them being around. I wish I could think of a gift they'd accept."     'Yeah. Name's Roland. Not your Roland, haha... Though I do swing a Durandal of my own.'     "I keep forgetting to have you show me yours." Lilian says, archly, and probably on purpose. "You've already seen mine, haven't you? Or is a video not enough for you?"     'I mean, it'd be bad for everyone, yeah, and Miss Angela might get in trouble for being her boss, but... You're not paying Petra or anything like that, right?'     Lilian looks at Odette with a sort of surprise that can only be because she asked an intelligent question. Or rather, a question she has any reason to answer with something more than deflective sarcasm. "Because I'm 'Chevalier Lilian Rook'. I don't get to stand by and watch because I'm not on-call. Even if it's technically in my contract, people won't accept that. If some sort of disaster that unfairly affects ordinary people just trying to live their lives is happening right in front of me, I have to do something about it. So whether the Paladins reprimand me or not is irrelevant; I'd be the sort of person who just let something like that happen."
Petra Soroka	"Shouldn't you know what a metaphor is by now?"     "There's a difference between the conceptual and linguistic definitions of a metaphor!" Petra protests in the exact same whiny-indignant tone that she used when saying that she wasn't planning on doing a second 9/11 today. "Nonliteral *language* is just one category of conceptual comparison! I know what a metaphor is!" "It's like I never knew her at all."     After telling Audrey that she doesn't really care and to get her something cold, Petra turns her head to Lilian, only half-certain she heard what she said. Vaguely ashamed for no discernable reason, she averts her eyes. "I mean, I just wanted something to drink and my time is worth more than hers." "Fae got to take off her dumb robe, because the Otherworld's nice to Fae!"     "Heck yeah, Fae! You're free!" Hearing Fae be excited, Petra has to go over and give her a little fist bump, and then a sympathetic headpat when she gets brain freeze. "You know, if you make yourself think really really hard, your head will head up and balance out the cold. And since you're super smart, that'll be easy, right?" "I know in the Otherworld, portraits are cheap, but in Elibe even a general isn't important enough to have paintings and statues everywhere."     While giving Fae what's almost meditation advice, Petra looks up at Cecilia and tilts her head, almost causing her guitar case to slip off her shoulder. "I mean... everyone in Aquelia pretty much recognized you on sight, but that was Etruria, and, like, context and everything. So yeah, I guess you're right."     Petra marvels at the pizza burrito for a short time. Outsider art is truly so innovative. Sourced from nothing, why *would* pizza have a front and a back? "I don't want to start a fight in the hub if we can help it at all."     "Oh, yeah, I'd get Lilian in so much trouble if I did that." Petra shoots a dispairaging look at Odette for being so stupid that she can't intuit the simple relationship of power and responsibility between her and Lilian that is too complex to have a word in the English language. "I just meant, like, if we were planning on jumping 'em after we tail them to their location." "And I picked it out all by myself, so be nice to me!"     "Yeah, you're a natural at this, Clarine. You hardly look like you belong in Etruria at all anymore. Maybe you were meant for this all along." Sipping at her ill-gotten caffeine beverage, Petra casually fires off shots at Clarine for no purpose besides en-weirding her while idly scanning the floor below for soldiers. "And also because... it feels sort of adventurous to? You know?"     Petra chokes on her coffee and doubles over, leaning her forearm against the table to cough. Hearing Clarine say that is like an ice-cold spike that drives into the underside of Petra's consciousness and causes feelings that were never spoken out loud to re-emerge from memory, namely, about early on when she and Cinder started dating. Squeezing her eyes shut to not die from embarrassment, Petra slowly forces out, "You know... Clarine... the way offering to pay for a woman in other worlds usually works is... approaching strangers and saying you'll buy them a drink. *That's* adventurous."
Audrey Basque	Audrey returns with Petra's drink, idly handing it to her like there was nothing to it. At least, if there's one aspect of Audrey that *hasn't* been put into a blender, it's that she's never minded being the one to order for the group. The shop's right there! It's not even five minutes.     She raises a brow, lifting her sunglasses up to look between Gebura, Petra and Lilian, blue-gold eyes confused.     "Is... something the matter?"     Oh god what did she say this time for Lilian to find a problem with?? She runs everything back, and can't find it.     Her earpiece might be on mute right now and she's missed/ing all the gossip. What a fate. "Is this pulped veal?"     "Veal burgers... *are* a thing, but you're unlikely to see them in this kind of place. And you'd be paying like twice as much. Father Lucius is right, that's surely just beef." "It's strange how little your 'Multiverse' cares about dragons,"     "Right? I'm still new, like-- I've only started seeing the Multiverse some five months ago. But it's insanely diverse, in every sense of the word. Which means... surely there's worlds dangerous to Fae, too. Almost every Earth has piles and piles of stories about "brave, dragon-slaying knights" and all. I hope none of your travels take you to those. I'd bet most of everyone here has at least several suggestions of where you could visit, when the war's over and time permits it." "Especially watch for groups of people with matching boots."     "That's... something, at least. I'd guess Bern-style boots are going to stick out a bit in a group."     Though, Audrey isn't so deluded as to think tracking and finding things like this is much in her wheelhouse. She's got plenty of ways to relocate or stop the supplies from going anywhere once they're found, but finding them is...     Well the best she can do, for now, is keep her eyes open much the same as everyone else already is. Flamel's clearly got a huge plan already.
Angela	''You're not paying Petra or anything like that?'' Gebura wonders if Petra's still getting paid, actually, even at the Library. It's a bit beyond just what a normal would be doing either way. ''Either that or it's some sort of rapid fall from grace spurned on by joining the Concord.'' "Could be," Gebura admits. "It's not exactly a handholdy place. Getting your life plan put in front of you only to then be put in a group that, far as I can tell, doesn't really hold hands and mostly expects you to push on your own goals and make your own alliances. But I don't think I know her well enough to really guess." ''She's everyone's favorite project right now. It'll pass.'' "Yeah. At the end of the day you gotta look after your own regimen. You can't just go to a physical trainer every day." Then she frowns. "Well she's probably got the cash. But it feels like a waste." She hesitates at the other question though, glancing Audrey-ways a bit before adding, "I honestly don't know if I'm really a great teacher. I've gotten better since the start of Lobcorp, I'm sure, but it's not like I had students in my prime. And most of the people in Disciplinary were fighters before I met them. But yeah, 'course I want to see how serious she is. That's why we're doing the drills in the lava room." The former head of Disciplinary being into instilling discipline is maybe a bit predictable. "Most of my team's gone so it's a little different. Can take my time and focus. I'm not sure why Angela's so invested, outside of the one obvious reason, but I've got a guess. She's a rep from your school, right? So she wants her to match her expected standard of what a student there would be like. ... Without knowing anything actually about the school beyond knowing you really." ''I keep forgetting to have you show me yours.'' Roland makes a gesture like he's about to draw it, and then catches himself. "Aha... almost forgot we were being quiet right now. I'll bring it over whenever we have those drinks." Roland says. "Or uh. Whenever the fighting starts. Assuming that's my best use." He considers. "Yeah I remember seeing it." He knows there's innuendo involved here but he's just going to talk like it's business rather than get weird or flustered about it. He's a bit past that stage in his life. ''Is... something the matter?'' Gebura says, "Just talking about the regimen." Gebura says. "You've done well so far." As in she hasn't given up yet. "But I'd like you to write down what everybody else is doing with you and hand it to me before our next session. And you'll want to pass that around to all your teachers make sure they know what you're doing. Too many cooks, you know? Dangerous."
Audrey Basque	"Just talking about the regimen."     "Oh. I-- ah. It's... starting to be quite a lot, but I'm making time for it. Petra has me doing anywhere between thirty and sixty minutes of... you know, running, push-ups, stretches, all that sort of stuff. Every morning, before I go to class. Then I set at least another thirty minutes aside for what you told me to do." It's exhausting! But it's good for her.     She considers how to explain Sophia.     'Fought me for a while and then took me to a monster-filled dungeon' isn't really a quantifiable regimen.     "I'll write it down in more detail, and include Sophia's time. I can't complain, though. It's draining, but I was sleeping too much before anyway." She wasn't, really. "It's nice. My body has been feeling more responsive. Not, like, I could take someone on in a fistfight, that's... not happening. That's not the *goal*. But I'm not struggling to move as much when things get... intense."     She doesn't go into the time she's been sinking into her Tradition.     That one's just a given, even if it's increased too.     Nor does she go into always feeling a bit tired.     You think she got that chai tea for fun?     Sip.
Lilian Rook	'Yeah. At the end of the day you gotta look after your own regimen. You can't just go to a physical trainer every day.'     ". . . Granted, there are people who do worse." Lilian says, hesitantly, thinking of a certain knight-wannabe. "Wait, the what room?" she double takes a second later. "What sort of godforsaken operation is that woman running?"     'She's a rep from your school, right? So she wants her to match her expected standard of what a student there would be like.'     "I can't tell if she respects me too much, or is simply too optimistic in regards to Basque." Lilian says, suddenly sounding tired of it all. "Or if she's trying to do it for Petra's sake, actually."     'Aha... almost forgot we were being quiet right now. I'll bring it over whenever we have those drinks.'     "It's a date, then." says Lilian, monotone.
Odette Raskins	Lilian and Petra both looking at Odette Odette freezes up, worried that she's managed to blurt out something stupid once again. Lilian's surprised expression catches her off guard, though, and the EMT even relaxes shortly before frowning slowly at the answer that grows the more she hears in return. "Oh.... Oh. That stinks. That's not..." Fair? Of course not, but Lilian must know that already. "Mmn... Darn it. I mean, I guess that's... That's how decent fol-people become known as heroes, I guess, but still." The idea still doesn't sit right for Odette, and she visibly struggles to think of what to even say that wouldn't just be something Lilian's already heard before about 'working harder to take the pressure off her' or 'doing better to encourage other people to change'. Besides, it'd be really easy to say it versus actually showing it with accomplishments. Odette's pretty sure she hasn't come anywhere close to earn the right to say that yet, too. As the EMT continues to struggle with those thoughts, she quickly realizes that Lilian might very well know that she's thinking all of that already, and she starts to sweat while trying desperately not to think of anything weird. Unfortunately- "I keep forgetting to have you show me yours." "I'll bring it over whenever we have those drinks." "Yeah I remember seeing it." -innuendo is not something Odette is well-versed in, and she didn't catch the earlier part of that exchange between Lilian and Roland. Thus, her mind is forced to fill in the blanks on its own. What could they be talking about? Swords? Guns? Maybe even something like... "It's a date, then." Dating?! "Miss Lilian and Mister Roland...?"
Marigold	"Oi! Sekva! Don't be a wallflower"      'Masked Knight Sekva', the formerly-enemy formerly-generic pegasus knight, rolls her shoulders and smiles uneasily behind her mask. She's barely changed her attire, but it turns out pegasus knight attire can almost pass for modern fashion if you drop the riding boots and breastplate. "Are you sure about that, ma'am? Uh, boss? Uh, demon commander? I was trying to kill them a week or two ago. Besides, you're the one who signs my checks, not Lord Roy." "Rutger tried to kill us too, you know," Roy says, looking up and over his shoulder from his Baby's First Burger Nibbles. "And Melady. And Thea and Klein, for a little while." "Haha, you sure know how to pick 'em. Ever worry you're gonna get your throat cut in your sleep one of these days?" "I-- ... I guess that's a risk in recruiting enemies," he says, briefly staggered. "But if it happens, it happens. I can't live never giving anyone a second chance, right?" "... Huh. Alright. Guess I'll mingle, then. ... You know if that Dieck guy's single?"      "Heck yeah, Fae! You're free!"      Fae very seriously grabs Petra's fist with her clammy little palm and shakes it, then rubs her head against Petra's petting hand like the greedy little affection-sponge she is. "Fae is really smart... but Fae doesn't like to think at all." "Fae?" "Being smart means you get it right first try. If you're dumb you have to think lots. So Fae's the smartest!" "You've been talking to some bad influences, haven't you..." Igrene sighs.      "How do you identify yourselves where you go?"      Tilting her head towards Petra in acknowledgement: "Even in Aquleia, it was mostly general description, uniform, and retinue. Someone in fighting company with green hair and fancy white armor is likely the great Cecilia, after all. Or signet rings and pass-phrases, if we're taking care to be secure," Cecilia says, still scanning the crowd anxiously. "And not many people could imitate my wind magic- things like that."      "What's surprised you most about the Otherworlds"      Roy finishes chewing his next little bite of burger, sets it down, and thinks hard while wiping off his hands on a napkin. "There's a lot of things. No-one cares much about nobility here... there's so many people, and people make incredible things without using magic at all... I'd hoped to find that other places were more peaceful than Elibe, but except for Bern's current ambitions, it seems like everywhere else is just as violent or moreso." A long pause. He shakes his head to clear his thoughts, and gives Maddie a weak smile.      "Sorry. That's kind of gloomy of me. Um, travel and sending messages is very easy, I suppose. It seems like you can make friends anywhere, but neighbors don't know each other as well. How's that?"      Cecilia smiles at her student, and then answers Lilian slowly: "It's messier when you can't say, 'the people with scales are bad, and the people without are good', right?" Igrene gives her a Look. "Haha, I guess you can't even say that here anymore. But... I mean, not everywhere can be in decline all the time, if that's what you're saying. War is just tomorrow's peace, and sometimes that peace is better than yesterday's. Does that make any sense?"
Marigold	"I'd bet most of everyone here has at least several suggestions of where you could visit..."      Cecilia smiles faintly at Audrey. It's a wistful look. "When all this is over... I hadn't given much thought to it. I suppose when 'ending the war' is so important, one tends not to look beyond it. I'll probably be very busy with the reconstruction of Etruria, but..."      "It's a pleasure to meet you, Roland," Igrene says, trying to comfort an agonized Fae with a hand on the poor girl's shoulder. She soaks up his regret-informed wisdom uneasily, and then shakes her head. "You're right. Fae's... she's my girl. She's like a daughter to me. But my daughter is..."      "Igrene's daughter went away!" Fae says to Roland once her airway is clear, happy to know something. "Fae used to play with her all the time! She was fun."      "Th-- that's right, Fae."      "Igrene, when's she coming back?"      "I... keep telling you, I don't know. I'm sorry, Fae."      "Mmmm... Fae can be patient."      "Here. Drinking something warm will help cure it faster."      "Oh, thanks. She's got the warm water, but here. Fae?" "Mmm! Thanks, Igrene!" Fae starts glugging from the double-shot mocha latte, and judging by her giddy little wiggle, she loves it.      "Woah woah woah--that much caffeine can be bad for a kid."      "Huh? 'Caffeine'? It is??" Igrene looks between Roland and Nobunaga, startled and betrayed, and tries to grab the cup back. "Fae, give that back."      Fae starts drinking faster. slurrrrrrp--      "FAE! NO! SPIT IT OUT!"      gluglugluglug!!      Yeah, the Multiverse has all sorts of people going around that even a full-sized Fff-"      Rutger's head whips around from thirty feet away. Killing intent prickles on Odette's skin.      "-orest"      ". . ." "Huh? Rutger? You looked weird for a second there." "Nothing."      "You hardly look like you belong in Etruria at all anymore. Maybe you were meant for this all along."      Clarine... puffs up? With pride, instead of anger? Huh. "Ah... perhaps in another life. In this one I'm burdened to be the heiress of Reglay- but if I could forsake that station forever... if I could lose myself among all the worlds..." Rutger is slipping away without her noticing. The cashier at the counter is very patiently waiting for her order.      "approaching strangers and saying you'll buy them a drink. *That's* adventurous."      "Huh? That's dumb, Petra. How should I know if a stranger is someone I want to spend time with?"      Back at the tables, after an "Oh! Thank you kindly, Lilian" and "Thanks, Lilian!" for the tea, Lucius leans forward to give Odette his full attention. He nods along and lifts his eyebrows at her finger-width-demonstration. "Ah... staves are largely for the precise things of the body, Odette. They're best for healing, or for teleportation or putting others to sleep, in a pinch. It's tomes that give the power to destroy. You've been showing potential with staves, but that's close enough to the light magic of tomes that you could still make a switch."      "The real question is, Odette: when you ask for 'the power to protect others', do you mean the power to heal, or the power to harm? There's no wrong answer. I chose both, in the end. But you'll have to develop one first."
Marigold	"... I think I might be shallow."      He does his best not to laugh. "Oh, Odette. Weren't we all, once... but there's nothing wrong with that," he says, even while Lugh makes a face in the way of prepubescent boys. Lucius pats a slumped Odette's hair, dotingly.      "If you're feeling ashamed, don't be. Feelings like that exist to teach us lessons, too. What do you think your heart is hungry for, to make you feel this way? There must be a cause."      Time passes. Dieck returns wearing a too-small swim-shirt bought from a tourist shop and disgruntledly carrying a sad little beer. After finishing her pizza, Cecilia is back at the glass railing, staring down at the airport shuttles tensely.      "Maybe they caught wind."      "No. That's impossible," Cecilia tells Gebura, but her knuckles on the railing are getting a little white. "Discussion of this mission was only between my inner circle and Roy. We were careful. Maybe he's finding new portal routes every time, but..." She doesn't want to have been outwitted. Not now; not after calling you all in.      Flamel, digging through the vendors' minds, starts to very slowly assemble a picture. They've all seen odd quantities of military-style rations coming through here before. They all know who you'd pay to get to turn a blind eye to breastplates and arrowheads. The broad sousveillance panopticon low-level-workers' awareness turns him towards a certain gate with slightly laxer security, towards a group of odd men with a certain stiffly military way of walking, towards--      He 'sees' it through the collective mindscape before the others do, but it won't take long for Cecilia to pick it out, either. A shuttle, not so unlke the others, with about eight men walking alongside it.      One of them, near the fore, is a tall, broad man with blonde hair and a heavy coat. If Narcian was a hollow imitation of Zephiel, General Murdoch is the man Zephiel once wanted to grow up to be: looming, with a grave and tired nobility about him. There are bags under his eyes. "No way," Cecilia gasps softly. "Cecilia, is that...?!" "Murdoch. It must be. Follow him. I can't believe this. We can't let him go."      But she doesn't get long to drool at the opportunity. Walking by the shuttle's rear, in a leather jacket...      Galle happens to look up. His eyes meet Cecilia's. In a gut-dropping moment, their eyes widen in tandem.
Madeleine Cadrasteia	"Sorry. That's kind of gloomy of me. Um, travel and sending messages is very easy, I suppose. It seems like you can make friends anywhere, but neighbors don't know each other as well. How's that?"     Madeleine offers Roy a wry smirk. "Hey, I'm used to gloomy. There's truth in what you're seeing, too - everywhere that's got people 's got people causing problems. But there's other people, who try their damndest to set things right - people like you, and Cecilia. You're not fighting the whole multiverse alone. Kind of the opposite," she says with a half-gesture at the surrounding gaggle of Elites.
Nobunaga	> "Woah woah woah--that much caffeine can be bad for a kid."     "She's a dragon," Nobunaga retorts, "And besides, I don't have any tea on hand." Though as Lilian demonstrated, Nobunaga could easily have gotten up and collected some. She just-- didn't. The kid's happy reaction prompts the warlord to gesture with one hand, "See? She's fine~." > "FAE! NO! SPIT IT OUT!"     Igrene's motherly concern and Fae's childish resistance has Nobunaga laughing again.     In all the commotion though, she doesn't miss the sudden rise in tension from Cecilia and Roy. She glances between the two, then follows their gaze without turning her head, just making a soft 'Hoooh~?' sound. A nonverbal noise that just oozes with the meaning of 'that's our prey?'     Returning her attention to Fae and Igrene, Nobunaga leans forward. She reaches out, fuzzing the little dragon's hair, "Gotta keep your step-momma on her toes. Good job, kiddo. Looks like I've got some work to do, so you keep her safe."     When Nobunaga rises from her seat, there's a faint wisp of flame drifting off her eyelashes.
Angela	''The what room?'' "Lava room." Gebura repeats, without further clarification because there's none to give. It's not like she knows why there's lava there. ''It's a date, then.' ''Miss Lilian and Mister Roland...?'' Rolandalmost starts cussing Odette out but contains himself because of Fey's presence. He steadies himself, takes a breath, and then says, "This is the third or fourth time that someone tried to either use me for--" He stops hismelf again. "I'm married. I just have been saying I'm married. What kind of person do you people take me for? Someone who fools around when their partner isn't around?" He gives Lilian a nod, stressed, but isn't about to get relief from Igrene. ''She's like a daughter to me. But my daughter is...'' ''Igrene's daughter went away!'' Roalnd is stricken. The color drains from his face. He looks away for a moment. "...Ah... sorry. I shouldn't have said anything. Assuming." He tries to play it off as not being aware that Fae not being related by blood or something but Ingrene can probably sense he understands the awful truth of it. A little too easily, perhaps. He feels compelled to say something but is rbiefly tonguetied. "It's tough when you have to be apart." He manages eventually. "Glad you've got good company." His words feel dry in his mouth. What can he say? He already knows everything is hollow and awful. Oh sorrow, do you even follow me here? A constant companion you make. Fortunately there's antics. "F--Fae, your tummy's gonna hate it--" He tries his best, that ache in his chest widening. ''Maybe he's finding new portal routes every time, but...'' "Other ways than treachery to catch wise..." Gebura murmurs but then-- ''General Murdoch.'' Gebura doesn't turn her head to look until Cecilia moves to follow after her. Between all the people who they'd want in a trap first, she has to imagine Cecilia would be one of if not the most leader they'd want to ensnare. ''Galle happens to look up. His eyes meet Cecilia's. Their eyes widen in tandem.'' Gebura can' quite pretend not to recognize the situation. Shit, if it was Roland--he could probably bullshit this better. "Won't say anything if you won't." She tries with an exhaled sigh.