[WORLD ONE] SPEED DATING EXTRAVAGANZA

[spellbindmods]

Who: Participating coven members
Where: The Palai marketplace
When: Day 49
Open/Closed: OTA

[ Any and all who are in the marketplace will find that there is suddenly a mysterious barrier around the marketplace (that may be eerily familiar to some) -- specifically one large portion of the marketplace with a large number of tables and chairs, perhaps purposefully set out for nefarious reasons.

A few Palai are ushering coven members to chairs, and everything seems about normal. As normal as the Palai can be when they're putting on a show anyway. It's not until a sizable portion of the coven members are seated (and also supplied with breadsticks and small shrimp), that things get a bit more bizarre.

Thanks to the power of the Eltos, a small band of energy keeps coven members stuck to the chair (magic can interfere, of course), but that's not the end of it. On each table, next to those delicious smelling breadsticks and shrimp, is a bowl of scraps of papers. Every five minutes, a strip of paper will pop out from the bowl.

If you ask the Palai, they'll be inclined to explain speed dating to you. Asking questions, getting to know a person, then being shimmied off to the next potential mate -- this is made possible by Elto magic yet again, through flying chairs that transport their holder to a new table at standard intervals.

The Palai are extremely invested in this exercise? Will you let them down? ]

[ OOC: In the spirit of speed dating, each character will have a top level. All who want to respond to this top level can with questions from this post, but the threads have to end at 10 comments from each character. After this last tag, the characters can be assumed to have been whisked to a different potential match. You're free to have characters make up their own questions, interact with Palai serving food, etc. ]

Comments

[doublesharp]

[Listen, it's not like making new friends is a bad thing by any means, but this? Rather than straighten up and face the facts, Riku's biting his lip and trying to figure out how to start some sort of conversation.

Don't mind him as he digs through the bowl and opens a few of the slips of paper, occasionally turning just the slightest bit pink before quickly shoving one back where it came from.]

Ahhh, why'd they have to go and make things awkward by calling it dating?!

[Is he purposely missing the point, or is it going straight over his head?]

[actus]

[ ... entirely missing the point. akira can't help the look of amusement that dawns his features for a hot second. he quickly steels his expression back into one of indifference and reaches in to grab a piece of paper for himself. ]

Ah... what's your favorite body part of your partner.

[ please don't say that with such a straight face, akira. ]

[doublesharp]

Partner? You mean Iori?

[Give him a break, here. Partner has like 8 different meanings, okay, it's totally fine that it takes him like three full seconds to realize that this definitely doesn't have anything to do with his unit partner back home.]

Oh! Uh, then, I think your hair is cool! It looks all fluffy, you know?

[Is that.... a body part....]

[actus]

[ he actually answered. oh my god. he blinks, and blinks again, and then a third time. did he just describe his hair as fluffy? really? then again, the girls have had interesting names for it, so maybe that's not too far off.

excuse him, he's going to flick his gaze away and ignore the fact someone actually made him (slightly) blush by being caught off guard. congratulations. ]

Thanks? [ ANYWAY.... he gently nudges the bowl of paper closer towards riku. ] You should pick one.

[doublesharp]

[Listen, listen. He's not super into this whole thing, but it's easy to answer something like that! Any and all potential awkwardness is sailing right over his head.]

Okay! Let's see.... I hope it's a good one!

[Give him a moment to dig through the bowl, all smiles.]

"What’s your biggest pet peeve?" That isn't too bad! [Safe. For now.]

[actus]

[ oh thank god. ]

Ah. [ now that's a tough question. ] Probably when someone takes advantage of someone else.

[ there's a shrug and he tries to push away any unsettling and unpleasant feelings that are cropping up. ]

[doublesharp]

[Leaning forward to rest his chin in one of his hands, he hums in thought.]

That's a good one.... Even if you aren't the one being taken advantage of, it's hard not to get mad if you see it, right?

[He's made up his mind; Akira's a good guy!]

Do you want to try picking one next?

[actus]

[ fine!! he will pluck the next one, nodding as he does so. he's glad this guy agrees with him on that sentiment, though. ]

Are you a cat person or a dog person?

[ THIS IS VERY IMPORTANT ACTUALLY. ]

[doublesharp]

Animals! Animals are a really good topic!

[Look at him light up....]

But I don't think I can choose.... cats are really fluffy and purr and nuzzle up to you, but you can take dogs for walks and play games with them! I've never had a pet of my own, but I've always wanted one!

Is it cheating if I ask you the same question?

[enflame]

( Ah, someone else who is also not up to this whole "dating" thing. Emil keeps getting scared that he'll land with someone looking for husband/wife material and he's really just married to the breadsticks. )

It's best to not think about it as dating. Ah -- maybe something like "dinner and stupid questions with a stranger." Admittedly I haven't read many of them...are they really that horrible?

( Hit him with your best example, let's get Embarrassing. )

[doublesharp]

[Man, who can blame him.... The breadsticks look amazing, but given what eating food here has done to everyone before, he's just a little nervous. Just barely.]

Yeah, you're right! It's probably a good way to make friends, right? Since I don't think any of us want to do the whole dating thing....

[Just barely hesitant, he furrows his brow and digs through the bowl.]

Most of them are okay, but I've read a bunch for fun and gotten some weird ones. [As proof, he turns around the first one he opens and reads it aloud.] I don't think "Are you going to eat all that?" is a very good icebreaker.

[enflame]

( Food has burned Emil in the past but it's either eating or focusing on "dating" and that's not the preferable option. )

Well, I wouldn't go that far... ( Making friends based on stupid questions sounds...stupid.

And lo and behold that question is also stupid. ) No. But at the very least it establishes whether not there's an open season on the food.

...Are you going to eat all that?

[doublesharp]

[Just take after Riku and do a whole lot of neither. This isn't such a bad deal if he just focuses on meeting people normally.... and trying not to get sick when the chairs fly him around the room.]

Uh, I wasn't really eating any of it, but.... no? [????] Do you want some? I haven't seen anyone get sick, so it's probably okay!

[enflame]

( That's an open invitation if he's ever heard one. He takes a handful of shrimp and eats them out of the cup of his palm. )

I doubt they'd try to make anyone ill when the air is supposed to be...romantic. At least to the lizards, anyway. ( Magic spazzing out would ruin the mood. ) I've got my magic down pat now, so I'm sure it won't be horrendous, even if this food is somehow tainted.

( AKA hope you have a fire extinguisher on hand. )

[doublesharp]

[This realization clearly hasn't occurred to him, so he's just going to.... try not to laugh at Emil's casual shrimp-eating and take a breadstick for himself. Win-win!]

You think so? Then I'm not holding back either! ....But I'm still not going to eat all of it. [Maybe the question did something good after all?!]

What kind of magic do you have? Mine can heal injuries and stuff, but I don't think food poisoning is part of that....

[enflame]

( Good information, it means he has the option of a breadstick if he wants one. )

Oh -- well that's useful, at least! I can start fires, which is equally useful if I do say so. ( Well, it's useful to him. ) But yours is like being a medic without the years of training and heavy supplies to carry around.

[doublesharp]

Fires?! That's super useful! It's like one of those powers you'd see in a superhero show, you know?! You could probably make up an attack name and pretend to be a hero too!

[Listen, superheroes and sentai series are the best, okay. Don't even think about judging him.]

Before this, I'd never done anything more complicated than putting bandages on cuts and stuff.... Hey, but if there are doctors here, wouldn't it be bad if I accidentally put them out of business or something?

[enflame]

( He could reassure this guy about doctors and how that's not something he should worry about (whether or not he actually SHOULD worry is up for debate), but Emil's a little too hyper-focused on all this lingo he suddenly gurgled up that means absolutely nothing to him. )

Superhero show? What are you talking about? ( The rest of it he kind of gets -- "hero" isn't exclusive to sentai shows, after all -- but it's all wrapped up in a package that feels foreign. )