2019-04-23: Produce Delivery!

From Dream Chasers
Jump to navigation Jump to search
  • Log: 2019-04-23: Produce Delivery!
  • Cast: Seraph Ragnell, Isolde, Ivan
  • Where: Kilika - Jungles
  • Date: April 23, 2019
  • Summary: Ragnell, Isolde, and Ivan all cross paths at the Kilika Temple, and possibly break some kind of record for how quickly you can get thrown out of the Kilika temple.

=============================<* Kilika - Jungles *>=============================

The island of Kilika is filled with a massive jungle, which is no stranger to Fiends. The recent attack by Sin has made the jungle a dangerous place indeed; powerful Fiends patrol, and a few Sinspawn are rumored to be sighted. Much of Althena's Guard, having arrived, is devoted to making headway into the jungle and protecting the route to the Temple, which is nestled up in the mountains beyond the jungle.

BGM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kHw2V0C-D-o
<Pose Tracker> Seraph Ragnell has posed.

    Ragnell's not sure she'll ever get used to not having a hat. It's been a decent chunk of time since she lost it, but she still finds herself reaching up for it, missing its weight, aiming to tip something that isn't there, and so on.
    
    This is one irritant. Another is that she's found herself in Spira, which would be amazing--unexplored land! The mysterious lost continent!--except they hate guns. Ragnell's had to replace her twin pistols with her old wrist-mounted crossbows, and it's a regression she's not keen on.
    
    A third irritation? Apparently EVERYONE on the lost continent has Resonance to spare. She hasn't met a human yet who couldn't see her. Kind of puts a damper on sweet pranks and also just taking whatever food or drink you want.
    
    Still, the Lightning Seraph is nothing if not resourceful and adaptive. After taking a ferry from Besaid to Kilika, she meandered around the shattered town, listening to people lament Sin and praise the Lady Summoner who Sent their loved ones in the wake of Sin's attack. None of this makes a lot of sense to Ragnell, but she listens all the same. Because she does, she also finally gets to hear about the Guards and their 'false goddess' and how their assistance is being tolerated as long as they don't proselytize.
    
    From there, she went on through the forests, fighting off the occasional fiend, until she reached the stairs leading up to the Kilika Temple. Curiosity drives much of what this Seraph does, and she's just gotta see this religious center that takes such exception to the Althenan faith.
    
    And so Ragnell strolls into the Kilika Temple, walking around slowly as she takes in the sights... Her demeanor probably marks her right away as an outlander, but, well, she's not causing any harm or dissing any Yevons, so she's left alone for the time being. A priest or two probably keep an eye on her, though.

<Pose Tracker> Isolde has posed.

 
Fortunately for Ragnell, perhaps, there IS someone here who can't see her.

The woman known as Isolde has come up to this temple. She followed the path. She walked with boldness and alone through the forest as if on pilgrimage. She has enough general awareness of how to comport herself that she has neither brought up matters of religion, other than a vague curiosity about the teachings, nor has she gotten out her gambling paraphenalia.

That last part is kind of tricky for her, but she has, thus far, managed to avoid organizing a craps game with the clergy.

Either way she is sitting on a bench, having unfastened her greaves and leaned them against the far end of the bench. She kicks her feet round like a young girl. A priest gave her a gourd full of reasonably cool water. Life, as they say, is pretty good.

"Good afternoon," she says, when Ragnell passes fairly nearby. "Praise Yavon."

Was that on purpose?

<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.

Ivan is here to help, hypothetically. As a cultural center for the town, the temple provides a good distribution point for supplies, although in this case it's unusually hard to get to for such a purpose. Still, the local religious authorities can see to more detailed logistics after dropoff.

Ivan, as a Guardsman, for the time being, is currently on dropoff duty.

It is only after carrying a stack of food boxes up approximately ten thousand stairs that an oncoming sneeze threatens to upset the balance of the load he's carrying. So intent is he on surpressing this sneeze, that he has stopped looking where he's going and trips on the edge of a pew, sending a cascade of fruit and vegetables tumbling between Ragnell and Isolde.

Ah, the grace of an assassin.

He actually did manage to catch two of the boxes in the air during his fall and is now balancing them in a slightly contorted position, but the vegetablesplosion was certainly the more noticeable bit.

The loud curse he uttered as it happened is also sort of echoing through the sacred space, if not literally, than at least psychologically.

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Ragnell has posed.

    Well that's just cheating, Isolde.
    
    Ragnell pauses and looks over her way when she greets her, because she's happy to stop and be greeted by a beautiful woman, even if she is (probably?) human. But... huh. There's something about her that seems familiar. Some dim, distant, star-flicker of a memory... Ragnell's eyebrows furrows as she rubs her chin.
    
    "Praise Yevon," she replies, largely to buy herself time to think. Hm. That figure is amazing, so you'd think she would have an easier time of recalling her. Ragnell's sure she hasn't seen this woman recently, and she doesn't look Filgaian, so she probably didn't meet her on another world. But then, she doesn't think she's met anyone who wears a bandage over their eyes like that anytime recently. Hmm... She scratches her head, then decides to do what she does best: flirt.
    
    "You'll have t' forgive me for trailin' off in silence for a moment there," she drawls, sweeping back into a joking bow, regardless of the fact that Isolde can't see it. "I was jus' so stunned by your beauty I had t' take a moment to bask in it~." A beat. "You aren't a local, are you? Don't have quite the same air as, ah." She eyes the clergypeople and worshippers walking hither and yon. "As the temple folk, as it were."
    
    Then the vegesplosion happens.
    
    It's glorious. Ivan catches himself on the edge of a pew--possibly the very one Isolde is sitting on--and fruits and vegetables go flying *everywhere*. One can almost see them leap in slow motion as Ave Maria plays soulfully in the background. Ragnell watches them go by in between her and the woman she's flirting with with slightly widened eyes. The symphony of strings lulls. Time resumes.
    
    "Oh hey, free fruit," Ragnell remarks cheerfully, grabbing a fistful of longans as they fall and peeling them one by one. She tips her no-longer-existent hat at Ivan, crooking a grin as he curses at high volume. She hopes that loud echo is *super* embarrassing for him. "Thanks for the service, m'boy. I always do like dinner with a show."

<Pose Tracker> Isolde has posed.

 
Isolde smiles a little. She does that a lot. It kind of sits on her face, like a mask. When she is praised, she reaches up and tosses out her dark red hair, saying as she does: "Oh, you flatter me. What gave me away? Is it the greaves?"

It's probably the greaves.

She is thoughtfully silent for a second before scientific progress, as it cannot go "boink," instead goes "splut." Her head turns towards where Ivan has caught himself and unleashed a shower of delicious and tasteful produce! A cucumber bounces off her left thigh and pops up high in the air; Isolde catches it, with some difficulty, even as a spray of leafy greens lands on her arm.

Isolde shifts herself. "Are you well?" she asks Ivan.

She waggles the cucumber at him. "And do you need this back? I - hm - that does sound a little passionate, doesn't it?"

"Please, lad, take a moment to think. The vegetables aren't going to run away if you take a moment to compose your thoughts."

<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.

Ivan has seen a hat without an owner, which happens to be the very hat that Ragnell lost, but doesn't possess anywhere near the kind of detective-like reasoning skills that would be required to connect the two.

"Hey! You can't just eat them!"

he protests, reaching out fruitlessly for the vegetable that Ragnell seized. "...wait, maybe you can?"

Are they for everyone? Do they have to go to specific people? He doesn't know the rules.

There is a strange dance of sorts as he tries to reposition himself so that boxes he caught on his arm and his shoulder can be balanced and held properly and put down without spilling their contents as well. He settles it all, and gives a sigh.

"Well, go ahead and eat what you took, nobody's going to want them with a bite taken out." He considers, and points at Isolde. "And you...I don't know. How badly do you want a cucumber right now?"

He starts to collect the ones on the ground, while fighting with another sneeze.

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Ragnell has posed.

    It's not as though Ragnell is wearing particularly Filgaia-esque garb right now, and that hat definitely suited her Filgaian look better. Ivan can probably be forgiven for not connecting the dots. Probably.
    
    Ragnell tilts her head at Isolde. That smile would seem friendly enough if it didn't look kind of fake. Maybe that's the effect of being blindfolded, though. Hard to see if it reaches the eyes if you can't see the eyes.
    
    "It's totally the greaves," she assures her aloud. "A--"
    
    This is the point when Ivan happens, and so Ragnell happily interrupts herself with peeling and munching on longan fruits. "I mean, I already am," she tells him with her mouth full. "Nice job, Guardsman. You *are* a Guardsman, right? You got the look o' one." Munch munch munch. "Maybe not the mouth o' one, though."
    
    She does absolutely nothing to help Ivan, nor does she offer to help him out. Ragnell's a pal like that.

<Pose Tracker> Isolde has posed.

 
"When you say 'can', I feel you're speaking inaccurately," Isolde says. "I 'can' eat them, in the sense that I can simply do this -" And then when Ivan addresses her, she says, "Ah, permission." She slides the cucumber into her mouth and bites off two inches of it. *crisp!*

*crunch crunch crunch*

"Hmmmmhhh..."

She is silent for a few moments after this, leaning back against the pew. "Tastes local," she says carefully, before swallowing deeply. She shifts forwards again, sliding her arm forwards - she offers to Ivan, "I think I heard a few of them roll down a bit to your left. I'd offer to help, but - well -"

She turns her head back towards Ragnell. "He sounds cute,' she says. "Is that the case?" She puts the cucumber into her mouth for another big crispy bite in order to give herself an excuse not to talk for a minute, but Ragnell might get the impression that she's still smiling, and perhaps this time it's a little stronger.

<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.

"More or less," Ivan answers Ragnell, as he continues to pursue the fallen produce. "I work with them, anyway."

It is only when Isolde challenges his grammar and makes a point out of savoring her cucumber at him that his brain gets around to processing the fact that her eyes are completely covered. He has to take a moment to chew on the idea rather than immediately making a rude inquiry about it. Not that he's really above rude inquiries, in general. Maybe it's the setting. Or the audience.

"All right, great, you're welcome."

At her suggestion, he starts reaching around to the left, under the pew.

"Uh, are you worshipping here or what? You don't seem--"

He retrieves an a dusty orange, and makes a dissappointed face at it and tries to wipe it off.

"I don't know...despondent enough to be locals."

He either misses that last query or his brain chooses to screen it out.

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Ragnell has posed.

    Ragnell chuckles at Isolde and her talk of technicalities and permission. This seems like her kind of lady. Aside from how she seems to relish that cucumber a little too much, verified by when she leans in and asks Ragnell if Ivan is cute. C'est la vie.
    
    "Mmm, I guess?" she drawls, giving Ivan a proper onceover. "I'm not int' dudes, but if he were a lady, I--wait." Pause. Peer. "Waaaait." Actually, now that she's giving him a good look, and picturing a female version of him... He looks EXTREMELY familiar??
    
    (This is how you might realize that Ragnell really doesn't give a damn about guys: she's only *now* noticing his rememblance to a certain other former assassin.)
    
    Ragnell presses her hands together over her mouth, considering Ivan. Then she looks back at Isolde. "Lemme put it like this," she says. "If he were a she, an' he does actually look pretty decently like a she, I'd call 'er a hot piece o' tail."
    
    She has never said this about Talia, though it is true that Talia's a very pretty young woman. This is mostly just to fuck with Ivan. You can tell because she follows up with a grin and wink at the young assassin.
    
    Is she worshipping here, though? Ragnell laughs and peels another longan. "Me? Ha, no, I'm the one gettin' worshipped most cases. Kiddin'! Kiddin!'" she adds when a local priest gives her the stinkeye. She is mostly kidding, too. Mostly. "Anyway, considerin' the town got busted to shit not that long enough, it makes sense the locals'd be despondent. I hear ya, though."
    
    Munch. These really are good fruits. A sort of dry sweetness, like dates.

<Pose Tracker> Isolde has posed.

 
"Oh, I'm travelling," Isolde tells Ivan. "Just perambulating around... I heard that there's a sunken monastery near here, actually, that's become somewhat less sunken lately, due to the passage of a certain very large creature."

*crisp*

*crunch*

"I do that kind of thing for money," she confides. Then she snorts at the statement about despondency, adding, "Keep your voice down~ You're in the house of..."

Someone, Isolde thinks, before Ragnell brings up a clearer topic and assesses the general appearance of Ivan. She nods along, shifting herself and leaning back as she then says, "I try to keep a positive attitude... it's hard, really. My, my. Being worshipped."

She then says, "Psst," to Ivan, and ooches down the pew.

She gestures with the cucumber in the approximate direction of Ragnell and leans forwards to ask him, "She sounds rakish. Is that accurate?"

She adds, deliberately louder so Ragnell can overhear, "I'm Isolde, by the way. Whereabouts are you from? Did you ever get the chance to go to the 'Saucery Globe'?"

<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.

"The sunken temple is awful, don't go there."

Ivan finds himself replaying various mildly traumatic underwater tunnel experiences in his mind, reflexively imagining what they'd be like if he couldn't see. NOPE NOPE NOPE.

"Barely survived. Bad place. No treasure. Don't do it."

He sniffles a bit. The monestary, among other things, can be partly blamed for the cold.

But there is another conversation afoot. Somewhere around the point of being described as looking 'decently' like a woman, but before he and by extension his sister are compared with 'hot pieces of tail,' Ivan successfully figures out that they are talking about his appearance! Welcome to the conversation, Ivan! He casts a scandalized look back and forth between the two of them but can't think of anything to respond with before Isolde has moved on to triangulating Ragnell's appearance through him.

"I-- I don't know! What does 'rakish' look like?"

That was definitely delivered at a volume Ragnell could hear. Ivan is bad at this.

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Ragnell has posed.

    "Oh, I heard that too!" Ragnell says brightly, of the sunken monastery. "I was thinkin' o' checkin' it out, myself. Mind you, there's a lot to check out 'round these parts." Honestly, she could happily spend the next hundred years in Spira, wandering around and uncovering its delicious secrets. And longans. Its delicious, delicious longans. Munch.
    
    But then Ivan interjects that the temple was terrible and there wasn't even any treasure. Ragnell raises her eyebrows at him. "What *did* ya find, then?" Isolde puts in her two cents on worship, and Ragnell chuckles. "Right? Sittin' around all day an' bein' holy. Goddess, that's boring. Hard pass."
    
    Her grin widens as she 'overhears' Isolde describe her as sounding rakish. "Are you that interested, hon?" she purrs, throaty and sensual. "I'd be happy t' give you a more hands-on experience if you wanna find out for yourself..."
    
    Then Ivan is over there being adorable and naive and flustered, and Ragnell breaks out laughing. Too bad for Isolde's fishing, because she's not done embarrassing/harassing him yet. "Ask again when you're a li'l older an' maybe she'll help you find out," she drawls, just before swinging a slap down at Ivan's butt.
    
    There's actually a purpose for this beyond being a jerk and/or creep! Talia is a highly competent fighter, former assassin even. How well Ivan dodges this slap--and how well-formed his glutes are if he doesn't--ought to give Ragnell insight into whether this disappointing lookalike (seriously, why couldn't Talia have a twin *sister*) is anywhere near in the same business.

<Pose Tracker> Isolde has posed.

 
"I'd say that it's usually defined by a sort of attitude," Isolde tells Ivan, "a certain flavor of repartee, an approach to life... but in practice it's usually linked to a sort of androgynous style. Sometimes it's over-done, but there's a certain... hm..."

And then she leans back in the pew. Her head turns towards Ragnell. "My, my. You want to take me out to the deep digs before you've even introduced yourself. You ARE something of a rake, after all." She then raises the cucumber to her mouth and -

    MAKRI, THE FIGHTING YEVON PRIEST WHO CAN TALK TO THE PEOPLE

steps out, his worry beads rattling at his neck. He wears no shirt. He looks like he was blitzballing at some point, only the blitzballs weighed fifty kilograms and also he picked up bears. "ALRIGHT," he booms, "ALRIGHT--"

"YOU," he says, pointing one hand and a finger the size of a generous breakfast sausage towards Ragnell, "are being EFFRONTOUS -"

"YOU," he says, pointing at Isolde, who has the cucumber in her mouth. She doesn't notice she's being pointed at, until it continues: "Are acting in a manner ILL FITTING THE DIGNITY OF THE TEMPLE, STOP SWALLOWING THAT -"

"And as for YOU, YOUNG MAN," this towards Ivan -- and Makri steps over to clap him on the shoulder, "your generous offering of food is noted, and we thank you, in the name of Yevon."

He makes that weird abdomen-hand-sign they all make around here.

"But UNLESS YOU'VE DECIDED TO TAKE THE TRIALS - The temple is CLOSED, effective NOW!"

He shouts to the acolytes. "Ball me up!"

Two large Blitzballs are thrown at him. He raises them aloft!

"Is he threatening us?" Isolde asks Ragnell/Ivan.

"I am PROMISING you," the priest says.

"Promising us what?"

"... Promising you that if you do not get out of here POST HASTE, a great SMITING will fall upon you -"

"So it is a threat?" Isolde continues, but she's getting up and moving hastily towards the edge of the pew. "Oh, I'm sorry, I'm being difficult."

"SURE ARE," Makri thunders. "Ten count, ladies and lad! TEN! EIGHT. FIVE. YES I CAN COUNT--"

"He's run into people like me before," Isolde tells Ivan as she starts scooting further towards the exit. "Are you bringing the rest of your produce?"

<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.

"Water-- more water-- monsters, ruined books..." Ivan feels that the sunken monestary has many sins to account for. But the conversation seems to turning in a saucy direction he has no idea what to do with. He is beginning to wonder if he should leave Ragnell and Isolde to their flirtations when Ragnell attempts her butt-based augury.

Perhaps disappointingly, no dodge is attempted because Ivan literally cannot conceive of such a thing being directed at him until it manifests in his universe.

He freezes into a shocked statue as if Ragnell had some kind of Medusa touch, though he does emit a choked sound of protest.

What conclusions she may able to draw about the nature of his career from the passing contact with his glutes depends, perhaps, on her skill with such assessments.

But these hijinks have at last caught the attention of a bellowing priest. Ivan finds himself clapped again in a somewhat less alarming manner, and praised, yet being shouted out the door all the same.

Still shellshocked, he shakes his head at Isolde's question, but hands her a dusty orange.

"People like what...?"

<Pose Tracker> Seraph Ragnell has posed.

    Ragnell laughs heartily at Isolde's description of a rake, and then acknowledgement that she fits the bill. "Guilty as charged," she purrs, winking at her despite knowing full well Isolde won't be able to see it. Some things just shine through in one's demeanor. "The name's Ragnell. The pleasure's as much mine as yours, Isolde~."
    
    Ivan meanwhile lists the many sins of the underwater temple. That could mean the place is terrible, or maybe Ivan is just bad at exploring dungeons. Ragnell nods thoughtfully, then smacks him on the butt. It is quite a firm butt! While she can't divine specifically that he's an assassin, it's clear that he makes excellent and habitual use of his lower body muscles.
    
    However, before she can ask Ivan about his sister, a Yevon priest lumbers over and tells her and Isolde off, while praising Ivan. "Ingrate," Ragnell complains, mostly to be a jerk. But then Makri threatens them with blitzballs-- "I think he's threatening us, yeah," she asides to Isolde-- and Ragnell decides this is an excellent time to grab more fruit and move on.
    
    The *really* interesting parts of the Temple are past the Cloyster of Trials, and she can't get in there anyway.
    
    "People like her. Try ta keep up, sweetcheeks," Ragnell jokes at Ivan, just before all three of them are forced to beat a hasty retreat under a shower of blitzballs.
    
    Ivan does not, sadly, bring the rest of his produce. This was its destination, after all; he was supposed to leave it here. But hey, at least they'll have time to talk on the way back down the stairs! ...Oh? That's another Guardsman coming for Ivan, and that's Ragnell making herself scarce? Oh well, maybe they can all chat again another time.