spellbinders | [HUB ISLAND | MANSION CLEANING]

Entry tags:

[HUB ISLAND | MANSION CLEANING]

Who: Coven members
Where: The Hub Island (the mansion, beach huts, etc)
When: Day 83
Open/Closed: Open to All

Not much has changed about the Hub Island since the first coven members ended up here, but there is an obvious unkemptness that's crept over the existing structures. Rains and winds have come and gone, flora and fauna have taken over some of the mansion and a few windows are broken.

In short, despite activity levels being low, a lot needs to be done.

First on the agenda is getting the mansion in working order -- there's also an incentive from Brie who doesn't want to do literally everything on her own. Helping with this task AND unloading the caravan means you get a boar roasted in your honor. Well, everyone gets one single boar roasted in their honor, but that's better than starving, right?

Door fixing
Sweeping and other cleaning busy work
Window repair

B ▢ If your character is less inclined towards hard labor, there are a lot of individual rooms that could use some sprucing up. Some of the Palai blankets can be used to make the multiple bedrooms more presentable, but a thick layer of dust exists on almost everything. From the kitchen to the bathrooms, only slight plumbing work needs to be implemented in order to get the water running again...but your character can also hole up in a bedroom and pretend to fluff pillows if your character wants to slack off. If your character's got a source of electricity, wink wink, your character can also help to power the lights, kitchen appliances and other electrical things in the house.
Plumbing repair
Dusting
Bedmaking
Sweeping (or vaccuming, if your character can find a way to power one)
Making the kitchen clean and functional

C ▢ The beach huts, on the other hand, are much less affected. While those pesky crabs that used to live in the bathhouse have fled into the wilderness, for the most part, some of them have taken up residence in these beach huts and aren't happy to see returning coven members back to claim their territory. In one beach hut, a boar has decided to have their babies there. If your character wants to clean out this particular home, beware that mom could come back at any moment for her piglets.

D ▢ If your character want to take on a true challenge, someone can find a way to start cleaning out the bathhouse. Your character may have a solution to the bigger problem of getting the heat back to the water, but the more pressing issue is the layer of pond scum covering everything. It's gross, but something should be done!

E ▢ There's a lot of things to be unloaded from the caravan and brought into the mansion after it's been cleaned out. From crates of shrimp to all of the supplies and gifts the Palai provided, someone with muscles needs to help with the heavy lifting! ...Or if your character has magic that can make this easier, they can of course use that.

F ▢ Later on that night Brie makes good on her promise of boar -- and it's that massive boar. It pays to have violent magic when it comes to hunting and gathering, although I'm sure someone's character could have helped with lugging the giant thing to the beach. For new coven members, unfamiliar with how boar meat is something of a meat to get used to, this meal could potentially make them ill. Either way, the work is somewhat done and it's time to relax under the stars...untill it starts raining, anyway.

G ▢ Wildcard!

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[And just like that, the tension seems to be gone. 9S is relieved for that, unsure how he'd remedy it otherwise. He can only wonder when something as commonplace as touching his hand came to have a different air about it, but it appears to now.

He glances down at their hands as he considers that. Just like occasions previous, what he notices most is simply how warm it is]

Just because? [he echoes the words, not entirely certain what they mean] Well, you can anytime you want to, you know.

[Not like he'd ever object to it]

Yeah. Just because.

[ that makes jude smile. he gives 9s' hand a light squeeze. ]

This makes the stars even nicer.

You think so...?

[That prompt 9S to glance back up at the sky. It's strange, seeing a starry sky through the atmosphere, rather than their cold sharpness in space. Somehow, they seem softer this way, filtered as they are.

Actually, this makes him wonder about something. If holding his hand makes a difference to Jude, then—]

What does the sky look like, where you're from?

[ there are two possible answers to that question. ]

It depends on which world you're talking about. On Elympios, it looks more like this. Dark, with bright stars dotting the sky, constellations and all...

On Rieze Maxia, the sky is different everywhere.

Do you mean...it depends on the region?

[9S could relate, in a way. With the Earth's rotation arrested, half the planet remains locked in perpetual, dusky day, and the other half remains in unending night. He's never seen the dark side of the planet, and so, night itself was a novel concept to observe in Aimintas.

But it's so much darker here]

What about where you live?

Yeah, it does. For example, it could be dusk in one region and dawn in another. It's an interesting phenomenon.

Where I live... I only just moved to Elympios, but before that I lived in a huge city called Fennmont. It's where I went to medical school.

I.. can't even describe it. Something called a spirit clime cloaks the city in perpetual nighttime, but the city is so rich in spirits, they light up the trees and cast the streets in a constant glow. There were always stars there. Everywhere.

Edited 2017-10-01 03:37 (UTC)

...Just a city?

[Something that incredibly localized is a shocking notion. And then there's those spirits again, something elemental that can somehow take human form if powerful enough, which is far more difficult to imagine.

But the lights make him think of the Amusement Park, the way it was before the machine network was driven mad]

Half the world's in perpetual night, where I'm from. But I was never deployed there.

The capital, but still, just a city.

[ jude nods, absently rubbing his thumb in little circles against the skin of 9s' hand. it's soothing, something he doesn't even realize he's doing. ]

Where were you deployed?

[On the other hand ~~no pun intended~~ he's very aware of that minute movement]

An area around the North American continent.

[Despite the presence of clearly Japanese items, 9S is nevertheless shown heading toward this continent from the Bunker, so that's the best one can surmise here. He imagines that the location won't mean too much to Jude, but names still make places feel more concrete]

The planet's rotation ceased a long time ago, so it's always daytime. Not as bright as here or Aimintas though.

I see...

[ he doesn't see entirely, but it's enough to just imagine it. ]

I mean, our worlds are different, but they do have their similarities, too. There are places in Rieze Maxia where it's always daytime.

... I wish I could show you Fennmont one day. I think you'd like it.

If it's the place you lived, I'm sure I would.

[It must be a nice enough place, after all, if Jude decided to stay there. If he could, he'd certainly be interested in seeing it for himself, curious as he always is. But he doesn't know if they're bound to ever visit the places they came from.

Still, it's a nice enough thought that he can't help smiling. Unfortunately he's not sure there's anywhere for him to show Jude in return, if he had a way to go to his own world. It'd surely be too dangerous]

[ jude smiles back, sincere, as always happy to see 9s' smile. ]

Just because I lived there? Really?

[ his smile takes on a teasing turn. ]

[He hums]

Yep. Just because you lived there.

[That makes it relevant to his interests, of course]

So long as I had you to show me around, anyway.

[Although he's made for scouting, he'd like to see what Jude would consider important]

Sure, but still, isn't that technically your job? You're the Scanner here. I'm just the Scanner in training!

But it's terrain you already know.

[He taps Jude's knuckles with his fingertips, simply because they're there]

And even though I can gather data, that can't tell me what you think matters there.

I guess that's true— wait, it isn't just about exploration? It's about what's important to me?

[ jude looks genuinely surprised, glancing down at their knuckles. ]

Edited 2017-10-01 05:23 (UTC)

It's something I'd like to know.

[He'd be curious about Jude's hometown too, for that matter. As a YoRHa unit, he's never had something like that. Besides, it would also give him an opportunity to better understand his friend, wouldn't it?

Intuitive by design as 9S may be, but some things aren't easy to discern]

Why?

[ jude... can't help but ask. ]

Is it that important to you?

[ am i that important to you?

jude grazes 9s' knuckles, looking thoughtful. ]

Edited 2017-10-01 05:31 (UTC)

[His answer to that question is one of his own]

Is that strange?

[That he'd want to know more, if he could? Scanners are curious by design, so he wouldn't have thought so. But there's also the fact that he spends a lot of time around Jude, and he's the human he's most familiar with.

Despite that, there's a great deal he doesn't know about him]

No... It's not strange.

[ there's a long silence, save for the waves lapping at their feet. ]

I know that we just agreed to ask each other as many questions as we want to. It's stranger that I'm the one questioning it.

Maybe I just want to know...

[ jude swallows thickly, not for the first time that night. nervousness creeps up on him again. ]

How important I am to you.

[9S sits up straighter, lips pressed into a thin line as he considers for the first time how he would quantify something of this nature. How would he? It's a simple answer when it comes to 2B, because he knows what it was like to be without her. He's lived and died with her so many times over, so he knows the word for her is family. No matter what, she's a part of his life, a part of him, and always will be. And he would have it no other way. Without her, there existed only a profound emptiness he couldn't overcome.

But what about somebody like Jude? A human he'd met not so long ago, has spent time talking and helping and occasionally being at odds with. Someone with a kind smile and warm hands and confusing behavior he hasn't learned how to read. How important is all of that?

Androids were created to love and serve the race that gave them life. It goes without saying that he and 2B would be prepared to die for them, but that doesn't speak to something personal and individual, does it?]

You're the human I think of first. When it's dangerous, or when I'm wondering what people are doing, or just when I'm scouting terrain and my thoughts sort of drift, because I'm a Scanner and they do.

[He cares about the others, of course he does. He's friends with so many more than he expected he ever could be, and he understands them all differently. Appreciates them. Some of them are soldiers like him, some of them can relate to him in ways he never anticipated. But none, he thinks, have spent so much time with him as Jude, nor tried so stubbornly to understand him. To simply be close. He knows that's just how he is, with everyone, and that's fine.

But it still means a lot to him]

Something like how much... [He looks out at the water then, not quite sure] How would you define that?

I...

[ jude knows that that answer must have taken some puzzling for 9s to figure out, and he appreciates the clear thought and the effort that went into it.

he has to mull over his own response.

jude squeezes 9s' hand. he hopes it's the reassuring gesture it's meant to be. ]

It was a selfish question, but it was something I was curious about, and you gave me an answer. That's all I need.

[ jude gives him a kind, patient smile. even moreso than usual. ]

[Huffing out a breath that might well be a voiceless laugh, 9S shakes his head]

I doubt you could be selfish if you tried.

[Truly, it's not as though he asked him for anything but his own thoughts. He wishes he had a more cohesive answer for him than something like that, but he's never evaluated how important Jude is on some scale, only acknowledged that he is important. That he matters.

All of the humans around him do, but the ones he's gotten to know have their own unique, personal value to him. And that, without question, includes the boy next to him]

But...why something like that?

[Surely Jude doesn't doubt that he matters to others. Kind as he is, he's got to have a lot of friends around here]

Maybe you'd be surprised.

[ jude looks down at his feet in the sand. aren't these feelings he has for 9s, whatever they are, selfish? weren't the feelings he had for milla selfish? the feelings he had when milla died, when he thought she just left him? when he treated leia so cruelly?

jude is not perfect. not by any means. ]

Because I wanted to know if... if I'm anywhere near as important to you as you've become to me.

[ he draws circles in the sand with his toes. ]

M-Maybe we should change the subject... I didn't mean to make things weird, or— or— I don't know.

[ jude is rather flushed again. ]

I'm important to you?

[Him? This YoRHa unit right here?

There's no masking his surprise, not that 9S has the presence of mind to do so. He knows, of course, that Jude's a kind person and that he cares about people. And yet he's still startled by the thought, even a little honored by it.

Because he's an android and that awareness of the difference in their status is still a part of him, although he knows Jude doesn't agree with that notion]

I...you're not weird. [Not ever, so far as he's concerned] But what would you rather talk about?

[If Jude prefers to talk about something else, he shouldn't belabor the subject though]

Edited 2017-10-01 07:09 (UTC)

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