redshiftlogs | Let's partyyyyyyy! [open]

Entry tags:

Let's partyyyyyyy! [open]

Who: EVERYONE.
What: A meet-and-greet party for everybody in Anchor!
When: early October
Where: the VR room lobby
Warnings: none yet
Format: go wild!

[ The day before, a wild network post appears, from the username @aa : ]

hi everyone!
i just wanted to let you all know
the meet and greet party previously discussed in this space
will be held tomorrow afternoon!

it will take place in the vr room lobby
and of course everyone is invited
refreshments and games will be provided
but if you would like a little extra challenge
please feel free to bring something to share!

attendance is mandatory!
(lol just kidding)
seriously though i do hope to see all of you there ;)

[ She's also posted handwritten signs to that effect in the mess hall and several of the staircases. Just in case! ]

The day of, a party appears in the VR Room lobby area, as promised!

Though it's not brightly lit, the lights there are are brightly colored, creating a chilled-out evening atmosphere like you'd find at a club. Plush chairs and couches are interspersed throughout the room, and there's been a solid attempt to clean the place up, or at least do something about all the dust.

A shortage of conventional party supplies has forced Ami and Cho to get creative, so the tables and parts of the wall are decorated with paper flowers, and the buffet table is presided over by a number of ... weird, pink, glitter-covered, vaguely animal-shaped sculptures made out of spare plastic pipes and stuff. With googly eyes. If nothing else they're a conversation piece.

FOOD: The main offering is barbecue! There's a pretty wide assortment of meats, all of which Cho has certified safe for human consumption, and also certified delicious. Chips, dried fruit, and a few different desserts are available, including homemade chocolate chip cookies that Ami made herself (wich Cho's help). All the trays are helpfully labeled, including allergy information.

Any and all potluck submissions are welcome as well! Just set it down over here and make a little card of your own.

DRINKS: Sadly, the coffee machine is still out of order. But there is a cooler stocked with ice and a few different choices of juice and soda. Alcoholic selections are limited to two types of pre-mixed drinks, which are intentionally weak on the alcohol, but at least they're not tequila sunrises. If guests want anything stronger, they'll need to bring it themselves.

ENTERTAINMENT: In fiddling with the controls, Ami got the overhead speakers to play some music, but couldn't figure out how to modify the playlist, so it's just one song on loop. Maybe if she keeps the volume kind of low, no one will notice. No live music is scheduled, but if anyone wants to bring a guitar and jam for a while, they will be more than welcome to.

And most of the arcade games are online! Anyone for Fruit Ninja? Air hockey? Dance Dance Retribution? Virtual Billiards? Or perhaps you'd like to try out a full-simulation game in the VR Rooms proper? Now's as good a time as any!

Oh, and don't forget to enter the raffle! The winner will be chosen randomly and announced a few hours into the party.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Cole really hadn't planned on coming to the party. There's been a lot of tension and fighting and in his experience, large social gatherings end up blood baths, either emotionally or literally.

But he's aware that someone's looking. And he can't resist that call, which is why he moves through the crowd, unnoticed by many because he's not prepared to let everyone see him right now.

"Hello, Kieran. You're lighter than you were. It's good."

The first and only conversation that Kieran had with Cole left such a profound mark on him that he'd found himself returning to it at odd hours of the day and night. As simple a concept as it is, that intense session of pure, cathartic relief had cleansed Kieran's emotions into a state of purity that he never believed possible. Enough that for the next few days, he felt like he'd been walking on air, the weight lifted from his shoulders.

He still startles fairly easily, though, and when Cole pops up (literally, in Kieran's eyes), he jumps.

"Oh my Lord!"

Give him a second to calm down... annnnd... okay good.

"H-Hey, Cole. Nice to see ya! Didn't notice you comin' in! I was wonderin' when you'd show up."

"I know you were, that's why I came."

He glances around, the weight of people's disagreements and anger simmering below the surface.

"Because you wanted to see me. Just to see me. You don't want anything, you just thought it would be nice."

The fact that Cole just knows when someone is thinking about him, no matter the time or place, is a little bit unnerving to Kieran. But when combined with the sort-of spirit’s genuinely benevolent nature, it doesn’t seem bad. The source of a lot of different questions, sure, but not necessarily bad.

“Is that somethin’ you don’t get often? People who just wanna see you just because?”

Cole thinks about it and then he gives a very small, very shy smile. "Well, Ben does. Ben gave me a gift, just because he wanted to."

And Cole... seems a little less deathly. That might even be a touch of colour on his cheeks (though under the hat, it's hard to say).

"But no. Most people don't remember me. I try hard to be remembered here."

Kieran spies Cole's smile and matches it with a small one of his own. He can understand the bashful life, having lived its tenets for quite some time.

"Yeah, Ben's a good guy. Makes sense he'd do somethin' like that for ya."

Although Kieran hasn't really had any terrible interactions with his fellow arrivals on Anchor, there are a few people in particular who've made his time here worthwhile. Meaningful. Ben is definitely one of them, especially after that open and raw heart-to-heart following their first reading lesson.

"I-Is there a reason why yer tryin' to be remembered here? Didja try to be remembered back home, too?"

Cole sways from side to side, humming softly. "I was in a place before this. The Drift Fleet. People got uncomfortable seeing me and only half remembering, not being sure if they dreamed me or not. In Skyhold, there were so many people no one noticed. Here... I don't want to cause people distress like that."

He makes the effort, mostly. When he interacts with people.

That's understandable on both ends--it's easy for people to feel a little perturbed over a pseudo-specter, no matter how much they wish to help and mean well, but it's not as if Cole had malicious intentions. He's proven that well enough just with that talk with Kieran.

"If it helps, uh, you've been doin' the opposite of causin' distress. A-At least as far as I've seen. Hell, yer doin' some real good things fer the people here, Cole!"

"I try. I don't always get it right. I don't always help like I should. And sometimes..."

He pauses, watching Loki.

"Sometimes I can't help, because it's not right yet."

He looks back to Kieran. "I'm glad I helped you. You deserve happiness."

Kieran definitely sympathizes with Cole on that delicate balance between doing your best and the failures that can still arise from those ventures. But Cole manages to summarize it in the best possible way: sometimes you can't help because it's not right yet, and sometimes you just don't get it right. That's okay.

Feels like crap, but it's okay.

Kieran nods and, upon that last assertion, blushes a little.

"I, uh, th-thanks."

It's still slow going, getting used to these earnest displays of well-wishes, but it's the kind of slow-going that Kieran doesn't mind. He just wishes he knew of a way to reciprocate, what with his highly specific set of skills.

"I-I'm glad yer glad!"

Cole tilts his head slightly, then looks out to the crowd again. "You remind me of Cole, in a lot of ways. Your life didn't have much kindness."

Oof. That was pretty direct.

But not untrue, and Kieran can't protest against that.

"Nah, not really."

It feels weird, unsettling, saying that aloud. Acknowledging it with someone else instead of just in his own head.

"You said Cole had it the same way?"

"Mm." Cole nods slightly. "Yes. There was not much kindness in his life. His mother was kind. When she could be. Before she died. No one else was ever kind to him. That was why I was with him when he died."

Yeah, Kieran can sadly relate. Granted, his father had been kind to him, as well, before both of his parents died, but any other signs of generosity or compassion had been few and far between since then. To hear that someone had been just as bad off—perhaps even worse off—sends a deep pang through his heart.

“Did he, uh, did he call out to you? Or didja just know?”

He’s still not entirely sure how Cole, for lack of a better word, ‘works’, but no matter the answer to that, Kieran knows for certain that Cole’s powers are nothing short of beneficial. At least to people like him.

"He wanted someone there. He wanted it more than he ever wanted anything. And I heard, so I came." That simple.

Simple. Right.

Kieran can’t really find anything to respond with, tongue-tied by the sheer admiration for such a basic but life-changing gesture given to the human Cole at the end of his life.

“Did you ever have anyone do the same thing fer you? Who do you go to when yer feelin’, I dunno, down, I guess?”

"I find someone to help." Cole isn't a person, a mortal, if he's getting down, it's because he's not helping enough and once he does that, it's better. "I'm Compassion, that's what I should be doing. Helping when it hurts."

Kieran’s brow furrows. To him, a mortal, a human, a living breathing individual who’s used to messy emotions getting in the way of every action, no matter how well-intended, the idea of not having some sort of support network boggles the mind.

Cole is admirable, yes, but also a thoroughly confusing feller.

“W-Well, uh, I dunno how much it’s worth, but, uh, you can also talk to me if you ever want to! Or if you can’t find someone to help.”

"... thank you." Cole reaches out to softly touch Kieran's hand. "That you care like that, that means a lot. Helps me."

Although not unused to friendly physical contact, it's still a gesture that gives Kieran pause. The kind of pause that's brought about by a genuine warmth spreading through his chest with every beat of his pockmarked heart. He smiles.

"Yer very welcome! That's what friends are for, right?"

And with that, he gives Cole a happy clap on the shoulder with his other hand.

Cole looks at where he was clapped on the shoulder and then up to Keiran, smiling after a moment. Still that tiny smile, but a smile. "I don't know, but I think so."

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Let's partyyyyyyy! [open]

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject