Multicultural Fair! [The Gym - After Classes]

[joan-notjane.livejournal.com]

The benefit of doing something like this for the second time meant that Joan and Turtle had a much easier time of setting things up since they knew what worked and what didn't.

Turtle had, once again, provided decorations from Turtle & Canary. There was the requisite refreshment table, though it was primarily there to provide beverages, since most of the booths featured culturally appropriate food.

After set up was complete, Joan and Turtle sat down to catch up while they waited for the fair to begin.


[wait for the ocd or Turtle will kick you in the shin OCD up! No shins were harmed in the making of this post!]

Comments

Re: Kaeleer -- 09/09.

[glacial_queen]

If Karla could read the narrative, she would have been even more upset. Everything wasn't his fault, dammit! There was plenty of blame to share, and she had no problem shouldering her part of it.

But since she couldn't, the only thing she could react to was his apologetic smile and the sincerity within it. Which melted away most of her frustration. After all, how was she supposed to expect him to respond? Both he and Ben had repression down to an art form.

"Well, we were mostly using raw eggs and pudding, so no real stench," she said, smiling back at him. "But no licking me. I don't want you to come away from my booth with food poisoning."

Re: Kaeleer -- 09/09.

[endsthegame]

If his psychic 'scent' showed anything, it was the slightest hint of reassured satisfaction that it had settled her. Maybe not the healthiest response, but it was his. "And there go all my plans for the afternoon," Ender said, lightly. "I'm sure I could think of plenty of innuendo to worsen that if I wanted to, but it might seem like an insult to your home."

He cast her an amused look. "Or not. I'd hate to fear causing insult where there's none to be cast; you'll have to forgive me."

Re: Kaeleer -- 09/09.

[glacial_queen]

Karla responded the mature way. She stuck her tongue out at him.

"I will never be angry with you for speaking your mind, Ender," she said. "Well, I might get angry, but the truth is important to me. Even if it's a truth I won't like."

"Now are you going to come in here and experience Kaeleer, or am I going to have to put lime jello under your pillow?"

Re: Kaeleer -- 09/09.

[endsthegame]

"I never meant to imply that," he said, wryly, "But sometimes there's bounds I didn't think of before stepping-- or thought of too much, it seems."

Which was a statement that wasn't actually applicable to their situation; it was meant to loosen Karla's softly off those tethers, that connection and significance.

"I'm going to come in," he added, laughing slightly, "Before I cause any more offense. Wouldn't want to make Ben complicit in a jello-crime." He stepped forward.

Re: Kaeleer -- 09/09.

[glacial_queen]

"I think we can agree to both be more careful of boundaries, then," Karla said with a wry smile of her own.

The coven at home would probably tell her to push the issue, to find out exactly what he meant and why, to keep probing and searching and figuring out. Karla, however, decided that she'd rather just take what he said as a peace offering and leave the what's and why's alone.

"Come in and sit, then," she offered, moving out of his way. Though she tried to catch his hand as he passed, just to lightly hold it in hers for a moment. "Friends still?" she asked in a voice almost too soft to hear.

Re: Kaeleer -- 09/09.

[endsthegame]

It was the right choice, at least as far as Ender was concerned-- even with a dollop of Ender's Worst and Most Terrible in her mind, there were things he'd rather not be probed about, facts and figures he had no intention of discussing with anyone, regardless of how many details they had. He was used to adjusting to new situations. That wasn't the issue.

Unless she knew about the Queen in Special Collections, and then he could only hope to rely on her guilt to keep her from telling Ben; see, even here, it wasn't in him to be well and truly kind.

"If you'll have me," he said, with a slight grin and a twinkle that inferred that that was well and truly a joke, meant to put her at ease. In this, the physical contact was important. He let her hand slip into his, and then moved, and sat.

Re: Kaeleer -- 09/09.

[glacial_queen]

It wasn't guilt, exactly, that he was trusting. She wouldn't tell a soul about what she'd seen because it wasn't hers to tell. And she doubted it would result in something terrible, like war or murder, so there weren't even moral qualms about it.

One day, she might talk to him about what she'd seen. But not for a long time.

"Only because I'm feeling extra-kindly today," Karla said, giving his hand a gentle squeeze before dropping it. "Otherwise my standards would be much higher, I'm sure."

Once Ender had sat down, she explained how the web worked. "I've woven some of my best memories from home into this web. Because of the nature of the web, you're going to feel as if you have been transported to Kaeleer, and you will relive those memories. I will be there to guide you and explain stuff, so if you decide for any reason that you want out early, that won't be a problem. And, through it all, your body will be here, on a chair, safe and sound. It's a full-sensory illusion, basically."

Re: Kaeleer -- 09/09.

[endsthegame]

"Interesting," Ender granted her, glancing up at her. "They've made a lot of efforts to produce something like that with technology - but it's never been full-sensory. Or believable. Let's see what a good Black Widow can do that scientists can't."

As far as he was concerned, that wasn't flattery.

Re: Kaeleer -- 09/09.

[glacial_queen]

"I'll show those scientists a thing or two," Karla said with a grin completely ignoring the fact her world's been at a technological standstill for millennia.

Karla pricked her finger and let three drops of blood fall onto the center Jewel chip. Light flowed from the chip down the lines, spreading out until the entire web was glowing.

...and suddenly Ender found himself in a whole new world. The walls of ice arched up hundreds of feet above their heads. It wasn't cold though; a warm wind blew around them. "Welcome to the Blood Run," Karla said from beside him, grinning. Smugly.

Re: Kaeleer -- 09/09.

[endsthegame]

In the back of Ender's head, other processes were turning: contemplating the changes now that she knew what she knew, and maybe more importantly, he knew what he knew. I can't fool you with an act, as natural as I might make it, but I can fool you with the truth, if I have to; let's just hope I won't have to.

He glanced up, and up, and up past the brilliant ice walls, and then down again, along the ridges, until his eyes settled back on her. He rubbed at his arms. It was a silly, unconscious gesture. "Sounds pretty exciting," he said, pulling on his sleeve to expose his arm, and get rid of any excess heat. "And looks it."

Re: Kaeleer -- 09/09.

[glacial_queen]

"Isn't it great?" Karla asked, laughing. "And I'm glad to be using that bit of Craft for this. Usually, we use it for mind-Healing and the landscapes tend to be much less pleasant."

Hey, look! Awkward territory! "So," she said in a very casual, so-not-changing-the-subject kind of way, "the three Realms of my world are completely separate entities. Tereille, the Realm of Light, is here," she drew a line in the dirt with the toe of her shoe. "Kaeleer, the Shadow Realm, is here," another line, this one below the first, "and then Hell, the Dark Realm, is below them both." A third line. "Hell is the darkest Realm, therefore the most powerful. The Runs are dangerous even at the lightest, but in Hell, death goes from a possibility to a probability. Terreille is the lightest, so the Runs are correspondingly weaker there. But 'weaker' in no way implies 'not dangerous.' The Runs are one of the very few things to exist in all three Realms."