fandomhigh | Try Not to Die, Monday, September 18, 2023

Inspired by the party on Friday, today's diplomacy class would find themselves in the Danger Shop surrounded by hundred of computer-generated party guests. Anakin strode through the crowd, Jedi cloak swirling around his boots. "It's not all fun and battles in the life of a diplomat," he said, gesturing around at the party with a slight wrinkle to his nose.

Because Anakin would prefer a firefight to passed appetizers, the weirdo.

"Sometimes you have to go to these...contact-building exercises, where everyone has their own agendas and information they are trying to retrieve from others. Today you'll practice that." He held up a pile of business cards. "I have created these for each of you. Your goal today is to retrieve two from your classmates, demonstrating that you have engaged in small talk. I will be making my way through the party. My job will be to waste your time so you cannot use the party in an effective manner."

Because there was always someone at the party would stayed in a conversation entirely too long.

He waved his hand and music started. "You may begin."

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Eleanor knew, if push came to shove, she could always just use her ability to get her out of a conversation or a task around the party, but she would not feel good about using it for such low stakes. So she just sort of fiddled with her business cards a little while trying to think of some good excuses while also looking for who might be easiest to talk to hit the goal for the class and go from there.

"Hello," Charlie said, handing her one of her cards. "Charlie Gale, nice to meet you."

"Eleanor Zarrin," said Eleanor, with a bit of a relieved sigh in her smile as she handed one of her own cards over to Charlie. "The pleasure is all mine."

And that? Seemed way too easy and she was sort of waiting for the other shoe to drop.

"That was easy enough and now we're half done," Charlie said with a smile.

"That was easy," Eleanor admitted, somewhat warily, but then she sort of shrugged and smiled and held up Charlie's card as if proving to the universe that she did, in fact, have it, see? "Well, good luck on your second card, then, I guess?"

"Thank you! I guess sometimes things are easier than we make them out to be," Charlie said with a smile. "Guess we should appreciate them when they happen."

"Hi, I'm Gonzo! Can I have one of your cards?"

Sometimes the direct approach was best.

"Hi, I'm Eleanor," she responded back, holding out one of her cards. "And you can have one of mine if I can have one of yours."

Which meant she'd have already had her two cards, and then would be done, and it was so simple that she wasn't sure she should trust it.

"Sure!" Gonzo handed her a card. It was not one of the ones that Anakin had handed him, but it did have a lovely holographic design of a pipe wrench and advertise his skills as a boarding house super and a plumber!

Also "marriages performed". Though who would ever ordain Gonzo to perform marriages was a mystery for the ages. (He was only supposed to play a priest in a show on Broadway, and he hadn't even actually done that in the end!)

Eleanor did notice that the card she got from Gonzo was just a little bit above and beyond the ones Anakin had handed out to them all, so her head tilted a little in interest as she read it over, and, well, if the point of the class was about small talk, she should probably remember to engage at least a little bit further, especially since she already had her cards, what else was she going to do for the rest of the time?

"Have you performed many marriages, Gonzo?" she asked, tucking the card into her pocket, and figuring that the marriage thing was slightly more interesting than the plumbing, which she would have dismissed entirely if it were anyone less interesting-looking than Gonzo.

"Not yet, no," Gonzo admitted. "People have the weirdest standards when looking for an officiant these days."

"....like what?" Eleanor asked, even though she could probably guess maybe a few of them.

She also, however, had the feeling that there was no way she could guess some of the others.

"Well for one, they're really hung up on what species the officiant is. Which is just -- I guess not 'racist' exactly, but definitely something."

"Species-ist?" Eleanor offered, with a smile that was genuinely sympathetic, especially knowing that she had it pretty easy, considering no one would really think she was anything else based on just her appearance. "I'm sorry you have to deal with that, that's really unfair."

Gonzo shrugged. "It's okay. People are starting to get a bit more open to someone identifying as a 'whatever' these days."

"Well, that's good," said Eleanor, who supposed she could consider herself a little bit of a 'whatever', too. "I hope you get the chance to officiate a wedding soon, then. I bet you'd be really good at it."

"I hope so! I have a great speaking voice!"

It was . . . sure a distinctive speaking voice, anyway.

Try Not to Die, Monday, September 18, 2023

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