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event } lime, coconut, explosions
WHO: All y’all
WHAT: A nice vacation to ease everyone in
WHERE: Various locations on Alkonost Island, including Navi
WHEN: Sept 12-30
WARNINGS: Use ‘em in your threads if needed!
Welcome to Alkonost, the beautiful tropical island on the planet Tetagari where you have just made an emergency crash landing! You’ll be here for a while, so settle in and get cozy with your new shipmates until Navi is repaired and ready for takeoff.
Alkonost is a small island with an eponymous beachfront village, with the rest of the land covered in tropical rainforest, dry forest, and grasslands. Most of the land is still wild, as the Alkonost population is centered at the beach, though ancient ruins can be found a bit more inland. Alkonostians are a humanoid, amphibious people, with light green skin, gills, and webbed fingers; they are friendly and welcoming to tourists, business contacts, and intergalactic refugees alike.
Speaking of business, the main exports of Alkonost are various types of fish, shell jewelry, and a unique, dark red pearl that is only cultivated in the waters surrounding the island. These red pearls are highly prized on other islands and provide the bulk of income for the Alkonost population. They’ve also recently attracted a band of pesky pirates, which has taken to raiding export ships and even the pearl farms themselves, on occasion. Warning signs are posted near the shoreline and will be explained by locals if asked.
While visiting, you can elect to work as part of a fishing or pearl farming crew, or with one of the island’s fruit collection squads, and you’ll be paid daily in fresh fish and equally fresh fruit. For necessities of the non-consumable sort, the village open-air market is open every day for all of your shopping needs. Otherwise, grab some sun on the beach, dance and sing around bonfires at night, get to know your fellow passengers, or just chill on the ship and get to know Navi.
WHAT: A nice vacation to ease everyone in
WHERE: Various locations on Alkonost Island, including Navi
WHEN: Sept 12-30
WARNINGS: Use ‘em in your threads if needed!
Welcome to Alkonost, the beautiful tropical island on the planet Tetagari where you have just made an emergency crash landing! You’ll be here for a while, so settle in and get cozy with your new shipmates until Navi is repaired and ready for takeoff.
Alkonost is a small island with an eponymous beachfront village, with the rest of the land covered in tropical rainforest, dry forest, and grasslands. Most of the land is still wild, as the Alkonost population is centered at the beach, though ancient ruins can be found a bit more inland. Alkonostians are a humanoid, amphibious people, with light green skin, gills, and webbed fingers; they are friendly and welcoming to tourists, business contacts, and intergalactic refugees alike.
Speaking of business, the main exports of Alkonost are various types of fish, shell jewelry, and a unique, dark red pearl that is only cultivated in the waters surrounding the island. These red pearls are highly prized on other islands and provide the bulk of income for the Alkonost population. They’ve also recently attracted a band of pesky pirates, which has taken to raiding export ships and even the pearl farms themselves, on occasion. Warning signs are posted near the shoreline and will be explained by locals if asked.
While visiting, you can elect to work as part of a fishing or pearl farming crew, or with one of the island’s fruit collection squads, and you’ll be paid daily in fresh fish and equally fresh fruit. For necessities of the non-consumable sort, the village open-air market is open every day for all of your shopping needs. Otherwise, grab some sun on the beach, dance and sing around bonfires at night, get to know your fellow passengers, or just chill on the ship and get to know Navi.
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It was rare for him to be surprised, he resolved to not let this opportunity slip by unappreciated.
The Ship/Navi:
- The first order of business was getting to know their host, and transport. After his time in Dualis Murmur was still put off by synthetic beings, but Navi being partially organic and certainly more agreeable did help to reassure him. He felt it prudent to spend some time getting to know Navi, as well as the layout of the living vessel itself.
- Like on the beach. A place he found himself wandering to any time he ran out of things to investigate or question and the homesickness became just a little too overwhelming. While he had no intent to speak on it; that call, that deep aching longing to return would sneak up on him. And soon enough he found himself out along the beach, far away from where the mortals were playing.
- Otherwise one could catch him out and about among the locals. Helping with the odd idle task here and there, or browsing the market stalls. At some point he would pick up a fresh set of clothing, along with a simple crystal sphere that could tuck easily away into a pocket. Should he happen along a decent length of leather wrapping he could fashion himself a proper glove to hold it in. An odd choice to carry on one's hand, but then again what about the guy wearing long-sleeves on the beach wasn't odd?
Their new home, for the time being. Certainly not a situation an angel ever expected to find himself in.
Murmur could be found just about anywhere aboard, if one were so inclined to stop to talk to him. At least in the early stages after their unpleasant landing, later on he would be much more likely to be found outside.
The Beach:
Just... Staring out to sea. Where time would escape him and sometimes he'd be out there, unmoving, for hours. Taking solace in the small fact that at least out here, no matter how far from his own universe and home, oceans were still very much the same.
Bothering the natives
Maybe more odd was how swiftly and conspicuously he'd disappear any time it sounded like pirates were starting up their antics. This was something he couldn't get involved in, no matter how much he'd have wanted to assist.
Wildcard: [Hit me up if there's any other place you might want to catch Murmur!]
life is currently a BEACH
"You know, this is my first time on a beach, and I just keep thinking about this old song by the Cure."
That's a perfectly normal way of starting a conversation, right? Anyway, she's seated on the ground back in the shade, where the forest starts to meet the beach. The journal she acquired at the market is open in her lap, and she places the pen down in valley between the pages while she stretches her fingers out.
All beach all the time
Putting his lost thoughts aside he turned to offer Jack a friendly, if perhaps very slightly sad, smile.
"What song is that?"
Maybe it is strange, not that he minds. He'd much rather hear what's on her mind than wallow in his own.
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"Anyway, it's not the Cure's best song ever, but for some reason it's the one I've been thinking about. I read that book for a class a long time ago, but it stuck with me. I guess I found the protagonist sort of relatable? He's a stranger in his own world, set apart from society because he refuses to play the same game that everyone else does."
And she knows something about feeling like a stranger to the rest of the world. Jack digs a bare toe into the sand and glances over at Murmur.
"What about you? Got any beaches where you're from?"
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"Interesting, now I think I'd like to hear this song. Should we get the chance," He knows out here, so very far from where they began, it's unlikely. A quiet, rueful laugh escaped him. A stranger in the world, yes they did have more in common than he realized. "Or at least read the book." Who said they couldn't learn anything from mortals?
Now, at that question, he let out a quiet thoughtful hum. "I suppose it depends on how you define where I'm from," Which, again, always just had to be complicated didn't it? "If we are speaking Earth of course, all of them. When we were more free to roam the world of mortals they were some of my favored destinations. If we're speaking the Eternal City... not technically. It is mutable, there could be a beach if it was desired, it could also just be a sea of cloud. Or stars." Which in a way was fun also, but the mutability of Heaven made it so much less real.
"And of course one would be hard-pressed to find water, much less desirable water, in the Halls of Morning." Jack caught him in a mood to reminisce. Fortunate for her, this is probably some of the most he's spoken plainly in a while, what with how prone to keeping his own council Murmur was.
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Jack laughs quietly at her own half-joke. Stranger things have happened, after all - meeting an actual celestial, for example. Jack never would’ve had that square on a bingo card for any year, and yet, here she is, listening to one reminisce about places Jack never imagined were real.
“How do you define where you’re from? Like, if you had to tell someone where home is, what would you say?”
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He offered quietly, a hint of amusement in his tone as well. Never had he expected he'd be kidnapped twice in short order by interdimensional shenanigans, and yet here they were. So why not interdimensional wi-fi? He grew quiet at her next question, staring off into the distance while he considered.
"A difficult question," He finally confessed. "I have existed since before place was a concept. Before the Eternal City where most of my brethren reside, or the Halls of Morning where the rest have gone. Neither are my home." He sounds genuinely a little sad about that, realizing that he doesn't really have a place that he belongs. So, since he doesn't have a time nor point of origin, does he have a home?
There's a huffed laugh. "Of course were I asked by someone I was not comfortable revealing what I am I'd simply lie and tell them something like Detroit," That's close to Hell, right? "But, if I must consider somewhere I choose to reside, perhaps my study." Which still sounds lonely.
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“So where’s your study? Hopefully not really in Detroit, because I’ve seen pictures of that town, and yikes.”
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Whether that was a boon or not had yet to be determined.
He laughed lightly at her comment. "Goodness no, it does not exist within the mortal realm. It's a small pocket dimension of my own design, much like the Celestial Library I also created. Granted I no longer hold the Lorekeeper's key, that title has been passed to another."
At least no one needs to have access to that. "So, in essence it is with me at all times. Since it exists somewhere in between."
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She shrugs, and lies back on the sand, hands folded across her stomach. "But I don't tell people about that, usually. If asked, I'm from Omaha, born and bred and never quite got around to leaving. Well, until about three years ago, of course."
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"A boon that we both have access to something like that when need be."
Not that Jack needed to worry about Murmur spreading things around, they both had their mutual supernatural secret to keep. "When you arrived in Dualis?"
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Beach
(Eventually he might do some exploring. Right now, however, he doesn't care to.)
There is, however, the matter of the sole being to catch his attention early. Not that he sets out to go looking, of course, but once he picks up that same Light he'd noticed earlier, it's easy enough to turn his steps in that direction.
"I wouldn't have thought a simple ocean to be that interesting. Unless it's something you didn't have a chance to see much of, previously?"
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Upon sensing the approach of another, one particularly interesting at that, he quickly pulled his composure back together. It wouldn't do to be caught moping around homesick now would it?
He offered a huffed sound of amusement at the comment, quietly thoughtful for some time before answering. "Come to think of it, it has been some time." Centuries. A lot of them. No wonder he found himself so drawn to it.
"What about yourself?" Despite that immense darkness he carried with him Murmur felt no need to be hostile. Cautiously wary perhaps, but that was just good sense with someone unknown. Turning to face Emet he mindfully pulled his own energy in a little tighter, aware that for beings who could sense it angels could be a bit... Overbearing.
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"Garlemald is predominantly a mountainous region. Oh, you can certainly find oceans if you go far enough in one direction or another. But they aren't on anyone's doorstep either."
Merely things that exist rather than anything anyone would seek out for the simple enjoyment of it. But the finer details of how things had been in Garlemald are of lesser importance. Something that he doesn't care to speak of, not only because he doubts there's a significant reason to (yet) but because he's far much more interested in the fact that the Light almost seems to retreat at his approach. A sign that, whatever the being before him is and whatever the nature of that Light, it's something that can be controlled.
(Which does also pose its own unique set of risks, but for now it doesn't seem that he needs to be anything more than wary.)
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Then again what denizen of the Halls would be so inclined to go looking anyway? They had far too much to do to spend the day at the beach.
In the end, they both knew that Emet-Selch hadn't approached because he was interested in talking about the sea or their wholly unfamiliar to each other homelands. At least, not at this juncture. No, Murmur expects the reason behind this visit had more to do with their uniquely shared nature: being both beings of immense, if opposing, energy. While he still could not guess Emet-Selch's full intent he did not detect hostility. Wariness perhaps, which they both shared, and not something to hold against the other.
"Of course, you did not seek me out to reminisce about the lands from which we hail. How may I be of service?"
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(Not that he wouldn't have been interested in further discussions on that topic, but it is, indeed, not the topic he'd had in mind when he'd approached.)
There's a faint smile at the question - far better to have things out in the open, or as much as they can be - and a brief nod, before he speaks again.
"Rarely have I encountered a being full of such unbridled Light. Much less one still capable of acting on more than mere instinct."
Though there's no direct question in his comment, there's a note of curiosity all the same. It's clear that the other is no sin eater (or at least, is nothing like the ones he knows), but if not that, then he has no idea what else he's looking at.
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(Murmur was ever open to intellectual pursuit. Once they understood each other a bit better perhaps they could revisit the topic.)
Far better to alleviate this uncertain tension, as well. Likely they were both burning with curiosity as to the nature and intent of the other. Though Murmur couldn't help but look faintly surprised at Emet-Selch's comment. "You have met other beings of Light?" Well now, that was most unusual. He was given to understand that they were a somewhat infrequent occurrence, compared to their darker counterparts anyway.
He folded his arms thoughtfully, reaching up a hand to cup his chin while he considered those words. "While I can attest to how some of my brethren may be mistaken as possessing little will of their own, singular in their purpose as they can be, I do not believe one would ever accuse it of being instinct," He mused, then locked his gaze back on Emet, offering a faintly apologetic smile for allowing his mind to wander slightly off topic. "I must admit I cannot recall encountering a being quite like yourself, either. Overflowing darkness, yet with no hint of the Infernal. Most certainly not a demon, you don't smell sulfurous."
That's... probably a compliment?
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"If it can be called 'meeting' when the beings in question act on little more than base instinct, than yes. On a world all but consumed by primordial Light."
One where even the very laws of nature had been altered by that selfsame force, twisting and warping the world until it stood perilously close to the brink of destruction. Which, of course, is a point he isn't about to mention, or not directly. But the truth of it lingers in his comment all the same, should one care to look for it.
"And I should certainly hope not. It would be terribly inconvenient. Besides, the voidsent are something quite different. And just as insatiable as their Light-born counterparts, though some are still possessed of some manner of intelligence."
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He did have a point, one could hardly call that a meeting. In a way that made it even more strange. Whatever those creatures were, they certainly weren't angels. Destruction on that level was wholly forbidden. A faint expression of concern crossed Murmur's features. Though muted, it was still present. "All but consumed..." He muttered to himself.
Yes, he'd like to learn more of that, as well. He didn't miss the implication, the devastation wrought by unbridled primordial light. Knowing full well his own capabilities and those of his brethren it wasn't a far cry from possible at all. Only the laws put in place by their father kept such things at bay.
"Voidsent, that is a name unfamiliar to me. It would seem were are indeed from distinctly differing universes. Tell me, the wild Light-born, what are they called?" He'll get back on track if prompted but now Emet-Selch has him dreadfully curious and he just has to know.
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"Sin eaters."
Which is a wildly fanciful name, given that they do very little of the sort, no matter how it might have seemed to the inhabitants of that doomed world. But the name has stuck, and he certainly doesn't care to try and change it. Assuming he even could, which is... frankly, unlikely.
"Still, I would agree that it certainly appears that we hail from vastly different worlds."
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"Well, that certainly paints a picture doesn't it? Mortals do have a way with words,"
And he meant that genuinely. They crafted their language like art, never failing to offer something new and clever. Sin eaters, yes Murmur could imagine exactly how such beings behaved. Terribly, putting it bluntly, and not at all angelic. After all the duty of punishing the sinful was on the shoulder of demons, not angels.
A nod at that, with voidsent and sin eaters being such foreign concepts Murmur was fairly confident that if they were even in the same universe they were definitely quite some distance apart. Maybe not even the same galaxy. That being neither here nor there at the moment, however, did still leave the matter Emet-Selch had approached him with.
"To answer your previous question; broadly I am of a group of beings labeled as Celestials. More specifically an angel, something I trust you are capable of keeping to yourself? Humans do have a tendency to become difficult when faced with knowledge of our presence." Which, of course, implied that he in turn had no desire to go blabbing to the rest of the ship about Emet-Selch. No reason to get everyone else all up in arms because strange immortal beings were living with them. "Which leads me to ask what your designation would be?"
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Not for nothing had he permitted himself a fondness in the arts - and theater in particular - during his most recent time spent playing at being mortal. And on occasion it had even managed to be genuinely enjoyable. Not always, but enough to make it worth his while.
(Nor is the assumption about how sin eaters act wrong. They are, very much, monsters, regardless of the element which has called them forth.)
"I would ask the same of you, but such a secret is easily enough kept." There have certainly been times where he's been free about his nature, yes. But that had been for a specific purpose. On that does not exist on the ship, and with few people who have even the slightest familiarity with his kind, there's even less of a reason to bother with doing so again. "As for me and mine, the proper term is Ascians."
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There really wasn't any need to go telling anyone anyway, as Emet-Selch said, these secrets are easily enough kept. Playing mortal wasn't that difficult, after all. For the time being neither had reason to oust the other's cover. Truthfully doing so would cause more grief than he doubted either of them wanted to endure. The endless questions could be quite taxing.
At the word he frowned thoughtfully, leaning a little closer to inspect the ground beneath Emet's feet. "You do not appear to lack a shadow..." He mused aloud, intrigued by the choice in name. Perhaps it had something to do with the vessel he inhabited? Curious. "Now that we have the what out of our path, perhaps introductions are in order. I am Murmur." Yes this was fairly out of order, he realizes, even so they got there in the end.
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