2019-10-01: Meet the Parents
- Log: Meet the Parents
- Cast: Riesenlied, Ivan, Noeline, Lydia Seren
- Where: Djose
- Date: 1st October 2019
- Summary: Riesenlied takes Ivan and Lydia to meet Noeline.
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.
Riesenlied was eager to help Lydia introduce Noeline to Ivan!
This... probably takes place before a number of the horrible and terrible things that's currently happening in Macalania! She's managed to scoot her way up to the top of the Fereshte where she finds her beloved and waves and calls out to her. "Noeline~!"
Did something happen recently? Well, with the magic of the timey-wimey ball, the whole confession about the letters happened.
She's looking so cheered that she actually braves getting out of her wheelchair as it's pushed and-- takes a few wobbling steps, then internally goes 'i can do this' and kind of swan-flops to Noeline's side.
Ugh, so lovey-dovey!?"Look who I brought today."
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.
Ivan is! Very nervous!!
There have been indications that Noeline has the higher challenge rating of the two Lydia moms.
He raises a hand in a frozen wave which then becomes a nervous reach forward as Riesenlied wobbles and ultimately flops toward Noeline.
"Oh, are you..." 'okay?' he is going to say, but Riesenlied is probably caught safely by Noeline.
/Look who I brought today!/
Ivan bristles with alarm at the introduction to an introduction.
"Uh, yes, I'm..." He looks to Lydia with sudden panic: "Who am I?!"
<Pose Tracker> Noeline has posed.
Noeline is already in the middle of a rather warm and fuzzy aura of nostalgia even before Riesenlied calls to her. The top deck of the Fereshte has more or less become a shared space for those on board the ship to relax, and the Crimson Noble is seated at a table, slowly leafing through a set of aged envelopes with the infinite care of someone who knows how easily paper can degrade.
She's been taking her time in working through her memories, aided by the bundle of letters that Riesenlied confessed to her about. She wouldn't exactly admit to being the sort who goes misty-eyed, but she's certainly feeling it right now, smiling fondly at some of them as she compares their contents to a rough map of Filgaia laid out next to her.
(For someone who enjoys being meticulous, she's sure been quick to mark her old route in pencil right over the top of the thing.)
She blinks up at Riesenlied - and then nearly lifts up from her chair in a mixture of concern and pride as the other Hyadean gets out of her chair to stagger forwards a few steps. She does thankfully manage to catch Riesenlied just in time, sagging in relief as she tucks her partner closer to her in a hug--
--and then registers the other person present, blinking up from Riese's shoulder. "Ah--" she blurts, and you can just see the cat-like way she tries to sit up and look more serious. And the way she can't, because her arms are kind of overriding the rest of her.
<Pose Tracker> Lydia Seren has posed.
Lydia is smiling broadly because she's a big fan of Sassmom. And really Chickenmom too. She's a fan of both moms here.
"Hi mom!" Lydia chirps to Noeline, waving excitedly in her direction. "How's it--uh--" She trails off as Noeline gets all romance novel with Riesenlied for a bit and she just kind of hums a bit and looks away. It's not that she doesn't find it all super sweet but she gets shy about PDA despite everything else about her. Especially at first meetings!
"Huh?" Lydia asks as Ivan suddenly forgets his name. "Wha?"
She looks back to the parents for a moment before leaning in to Ivan to help.
"Um... Ivan, right?"
Somehow Ivan forgetting makes Lydia wonder if she somehow had it wrong all this time.
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.
Riesenlied looks just a bit shy on whether she's overdoing it, looking to Lydia's shyness and Ivan's panic, but she's feeling so good right now. She smiles just a bit cattishly (yes she can do that too you know) at Noeline's instinctual stiffening-up.
"I'm sorry, I'm just so happy right now," she expresses, then looks back to Ivan and Lydia.
"This is Noeline, my beloved partner and soulmate," she introduces with a flush. Oh no, more PDA! She looks to Noeline and urges, "Be nice to him, okay? You know it can be nervy to meet a parent."
... Riese your parent was /Siegfried/ which is probably a whole other level of anxiety for Noeline back then.
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.
"Yes, hello, that's right -- /yes/. I'm Ivan."
For Ivan's part, he seems undeterred by the loveyness, perhaps because he has no basis of comparison and is inclined to assume that everyone around him is surely behaving in the appropriate manner for the circumstance, henceforth all parental meetings must involve swan dives and embraces. Seems plausible.
"Thank you for meeting me."
No, that isn't quite right... "I mean, pleased to meet you! I'm Lydia's, um... ...I mean ... Lydia and I... do things together... wait, no! That was too vague! That sounded wrong...!"
<Pose Tracker> Noeline has posed.
Beyond the tell-tale puff of mild embarrassment at Riesenlied's smile, it doesn't take Noeline that much time to recover herself - she glances at Lydia, and then chuckles softly as she helps both herself and the other Hyadean sit up a little, shifting to better accomodate her partner. "It's going very well, I think," she answers the question that got cut off. "I was just going through some old memories thanks to Riese."
She motions to the map with a smile, tilting her head towards it to offer Lydia a look. The pencil line is dated with the year at points; it travels from the east of Elru to Arctica, then to Adlehyde, and then ever westwards in a rather meandering path.
"Ah, that's right. We've heard a great deal about you - honestly, would I do a thing like that?" she breaks off her greeting for a moment to wonder aloud in return to Riese, never mind the impish light already glinting in her eyes and the fanged grin that's tugging at the corner of her lips. "That said, I'm glad to finally meet--"
She had just been intending to reply to Ivan's initial greeting, but then the young man explodes in a torrent of corrections and one double entendre that makes her eyebrows shoot upwards. There's a long pause from her, and a glance of 'this is /too good tho/' to her beloved, and she props a hand under her chin as she leans forwards, gaze low. "Do you really," she deadpans. "Such as?"
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.
You can tell Riesenlied is in a Great Mood because she actually takes her finger and lightly pokes it against Noeline's cheek. "Hmmmmm?"
<Pose Tracker> Noeline has posed.
In the midst of trying for a Suave Crimson Noble Smirk, Noeline gets booped. She can't really help the light and playful laugh, though at least she tries to hold the smirk, albeit now a rather blobby one.
<Pose Tracker> Lydia Seren has posed.
"Oh yeah," Lydia says. "We do all sorts of things together. Sometimes a little bit of this, and sometimes a little bit of that, and sometimes a bit of both this and that." She manages to stay straightfaced during all this.
She turns her head to look towards Ivan. "But for me, I've always been a big fan of the whichevers."
She winks at him.
"..." "..." "(Sorry was that too much?)" Lydia whispers.
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.
Riesenlied does, at the very least, manage to settle down after her boop; she's looking back towards the map fondly, in the midst of charting their course together and comparing to which penpals she's had when and where through the ages. She gives Noeline a quick peck on the cheek, then leans back slightly as she settles a bit more comfortably against her partner's lap.
"Take a moment and breathe," she encourages Ivan warmly. "It's okay, none of us are the type to be harsh and stern parents."
She does pause to think about this, since she has been a parent to more than just Lydia -- but it seems like she's already learnt her lesson to not fuss /too/ much about the independence of her children from Janey and Mikaia.
She's blessed to have such independent and wonderful children.
"I'm very happy and proud of the both of you," she smiles encouragingly, cheeks red and her voice full of affection.
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.
She's already heard of him? Oh no! What might she already know...? And why couldn't he have waited a little longer to try to explain his relationship with Lydia so that he could find out that his stumbling explanation wasn't needed...!
Lydia helps 'elaborate' on what sort of stuff they do together. N-no wait she's actually just playing into it further! Aaaaa! Ivan makes a scandalized face at her, and adds 10 percent more scandal to it after the wink, reddening. Lydia, you have forsaken him...
She actually asks him if it was too much and he makes kind of an incoherent woeful noise, but he's probably okay.
There's a long time where Ivan remains silent after this, vetting the words in his mind for unintended double meanings, before trying to give Noeline a real answer: "...Picnics?"
He was gonna say treasure hunting but that had a self-assigned double entendre score of 7.5.
He tries to take Riesenlied's advice and breathe, though the comment about being proud is puzzling. Of Lydia and Noeline? Do parents feel proud of one another? Not like he'd know.
<Pose Tracker> Noeline has posed.
"Hum," Noeline sounds out in response to Lydia's deadpan challenge, a hand at her chin as she makes a show of thought. "This and that at the same time is a little daring of you. I'm not sure if I should approve, but I suppose we should really be supportive of your choices," she hums in agreement. "Of course, I'll have to test him to make sure he's good enough for you. Standard parent procedure. There's a handbook you get."
She straightens, though, and closes her eyes with a smile as she accepts the quick kiss from her partner. Taking the cue from Riesenlied, she softens her expression a little, chuckling to herself as she nods. "When it comes down to it, we're still learning about how to be parents ourselves. But I'd like to think we err on the side of kindness. If a little too much, sometimes."
She studies Ivan properly this time, watching the young man thoughtfully. "Picnics /are/ a good start," she chuckles after a moment, tilting her head into a nod. There's a pause before she continues: "I won't pretend I know everything that has happened, and perhaps it is a little late to say it, but... it's good to meet you here, like this. Both Lydia and your sister were worried about you for quite a while."
Oh no! She's flipped right from one end of the 'oh god mooom' scale to the other!
<Pose Tracker> Lydia Seren has posed.
"You're having a good day, huh, mom?" Lydia asks of Riesenlied. "you're significantly more affectionate today in terms of your tells." She crosses her arms, grinning. "Are Janey and Mikaia around too? They haven't met Ivan either!"
She looks to Ivan. "They're the real tough challenge just so you know. Mikaia's super insightful...and Janey's the Lord of Calamity, I think it was? The moms rescued em before I met 'em but they're family too."
She silvers herself when Riesenlied says she's proud of her. Lydia looks up to Riesenlied a lot and she's a person Lydia tries to emulate with mixed success because she honestly just doesn't have the patience. Or the Mom points to be real here.
She pats Ivan on the arm encouragingly.
"Oh yeah we had a picnic! He made a whole bunch of food but he's still new at cooking, but it wasn't bad for a newbie but it was very like--tea. So much tea. But it wasn't poison so, like, we dodged that one."
She sticks out her tongue briefly and looks back to Ivan. "Don't let them trick you...! They may be new at the parenting thing, but they're triple S class parents!!"
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.
Riesenlied's horns kind of floople downwards a little at Ivan's slight puzzlement of her last statement. "I mean the both of you," she corrects, though she isn't sure if she's overstepping it a little. "I'm rooting for you and Lydia, okay?"
Ivan mentions picnics, though, and Noeline reacts accordingly; there's a chuckle and a flush as she remarks, "We really are still learning. I don't think you stop learning either. But, just like Noeline says... I'm happy to get to know you and Talia."
She lowers her head a little. "I can only hope we can add to the spaces where you can feel accepted and safe."
Lydia points out she's more affectionate today, and that kind of puts her in a bit of a brighter flush! "A-aah, ehe... am I overdoing it?" she gets a bit self-conscious. "I really do feel quite good today."
Riesenlied looks very happy at being called a Triple S parent, so much that she misses...
She misses... the little pair of wings and the tuft of gray hair hiding in the barrel behind her. Oh, there they are.
"ooh is that Lydia's boyfriend?" whispers a voice behind the barrel. "I can't see!" whines the pair of wings.
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.
"Ah, I'm definitely not good enough, you don't need to test me or anything," Ivan assures Noeline. "I hope you can consider putting up with me anyway..."
/Both Lydia and your sister were worried about you for quite a while./
Ivan blinks. "Worried? Ah, yeah, I was causing a lot of trouble there for a long time..."
Ivan looks at Lydia. "More siblings?" This is concerning. Doubly concerning that Lydia just casually called one of them the Lord of Calamity.
"I didn't poison you!" he agrees happily. It /did/ all taste like tea, so he has nothing to deny in that regard. "Lydia was a very good sport about eating it," he assures them.
Riesenlied tries again to include Ivan in her declaration of proudness and he blinks at her again, looking to Lydia like she can help him interpret such a thing. What does it mean...?
"You do seem like you're good parents," Ivan tries to affirm, though he doesn't know if he has much authority to add on the matter, having only met Riesenlied a couple of times and Noeline just this once. But Lydia seems pleased with them...? And there is a warmth that is obvious to a newcomer.
"You seem... kind..."
Voices pipe up from behind a barrel, and Ivan seems to somehow become even more tense with alarm.
"...they've been here all along?!"
<Pose Tracker> Noeline has posed.
"And what's wrong with bringing a good tea along?" grumbles Noeline to their daughter, because while she's done her best to pitch in on board the Fereshte she's still the sort of person who isn't all that great at cooking herself, but very good when it comes to lounging in a chair with a cup and saucer. It just sort of comes naturally to her.
She's quick to rest a hand on Riesenlied's back to allay her fears. "You're perfectly fine. You're not overdoing it at all," she promises in support with a warm smile. Sure, she's biased, but she's going to say it anyway. "If you're happy, it's perfectly fine to show it however you'd like."
She's about to say more - but something tugs her attention back towards their guest, and she studies Ivan's responses to each of them in a contemplative silence. "Ah... I see," she mutters to herself as she glances at her map and traces the line with a finger. It makes her think of the past, and a very different Hyadean scout taking her first steps into the world.
"To be clear," she notes with a wry smile as she looks back up, recognizing that Ivan might have the sort of outlook where teasing might work a bit /too/ well. "That was only meant as a joke - and a bit of a poor one, so my apologies. Lydia trusts you, and that's enough for me. And-- well, this isn't a tribunal or anything," she chuckles. "If you'd like to sit down, feel free. Come to think of it, do you know much about the two of us?"
She doesn't look surprised as Janey and Mikaia get called out, but she does grin plesantly. "Well, that just sort of tends to happen."
<Pose Tracker> Lydia Seren has posed.
"Though I guess if it was poison it might /not/ work on me." Lydia admits. "I don't really know what works on me or not anymore. Ugh. I don't want to think about that. Ugghhh why do I think about things I don't want to think about and then can't stop thinking about theeem..."
Riesenlied asks if she's overdoing it. Lydia's eyes widen and she shakes her head and waggles her hands rapidly. "Oh! Nononono, you're not! No!! It's just, um, nice to see actually! It's cool. Just, like, noticeable. But good noticeable! Like a cool haircut...???"
She sweats frantically.
"Yeah Janey and Mikaia, remember?" Lydia pauses. "I did mention Janey and Mikaia right?" She frowns thoughtfully but then they speak up and she looks towards the barrel and hollers at them, "Heeey! Why do you two always keep hiding all the time! It's okay! Come out! Ivan should meetcha!"
She looks back to Noeline and asides, "It's okay, food that someone else makes you tastes better than food you have to make yourself. Every time."
She hesitates a bit as if to add more like but she ends up not going there.
"It's more that it all tasted like tea, I don't mind tea. I have nothing against tea. You can't prove that I do!"
She lets out a relieved breath when Noeline confirms it isn't a tribunal. "It isn't? Okay. Cool. Cool. No trial, Ivan. You're off the hook."
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.
Riesenlied does have this inner instinct that just wants to mom Ivan when he expresses his lack of self-confidence, since she does reflect on how she -- and Noeline! -- used to be so long ago. A quiet Hyadean scout who was harshly bullied and eventually drifted away from the Photosphere... and a Tainted who wasn't welcome anywhere who didn't have much semblance of a personality and just latched onto whatever people wanted her to be.
She smiles as she thinks of Nasrin within her for a moment.
"Thank you," Riesenlied speaks gently to Ivan. "I don't want to be too overbearing or anything..." but Noeline reassures that she's not overdoing it, even on a slightly different topic.
Then--
- BOMF*
Two kids roll out:
The younger one (about 10-ish years human age) looks to be a crow-like beastgirl with a tiny pair of black bird wings behind her back and a shoulder-length cut of black hair. She's well-groomed and doesn't like to get dirty, it seems. "Owww...!" she whines. "Janey, you're jostling too much..."
"Ehehe, the gig's up, huh?" speaks Janey, the taller, older one (about 14 or so; mid-teens). A girl with... no obvious beastgirl traits, with gray hair and no less than two band-aids on her face or arms at any one time, and much more wirey and scrappy as she bobbles on up and pulls the younger girl up.
"What's up! I'm Janey and this is Mikaia, but I like to call her Micky!" she beams with a toothy grin.
Mikaia quietly sneaks behind Janey to murmur more quietly, "It's nice to meet you..."
"We're the kids! Lydia's our older sis, she's been treatin' you radical, right??" she cackles. "Radical like her skates!"
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.
"I ... sort of understood it was a joke," Ivan replies to Noeline, not entirely convincingly. He may be the kind of person who would confess to not being good enough at the slightest provocation, even knowing it was a joke. Perhaps that's just what happened...
Noeline notes that there's potentially a bit of an information disparity, since Ivan may not know as much about them as they know about him.
"I know a little about Riesenlied," Ivan says. "I'm not sure I know very much about you..." Unless he was told and forgot! Was he told and forgot about Janey and Mikaia??
He looks to Lydia as she stresses about potentially being irrelevant to poisons. "I ate it too, so it's probably just that it didn't taste good, not that it was poison that didn't work on you..." he doesn't know if that will be particularly reassuring, but...
"You don't seem overbearing..." Ivan says, although his bafflement at her overtures of mom-ing have suggested otherwise. It's not that he takes offense, so much as that it doesn't compute.
But then...CHILDREN EMERGE! Or, well, a child and more of a teenager. Ivan greets them solemnly. "Hello, nice to meet you both. Lydia... has been treating me radical, yes."
<Pose Tracker> Noeline has posed.
"Tell that to my last attempt," Noeline pouts back at Lydia. "They had to escort me out of the galley through the smoke." She's probably exaggerating, but she knows she can deadpan at their daughter any time. Besides, she's already slipping from their seat, giving Riesenlied a fond glance before she places a hand on Lydia's shoulder. "Relax. It's alright," she offers gently, even if she pairs that with a light chuckle. "Of course we'd be happy for the two of you."
"You know, you two are going to grow out of that barrel at some point and get stuck," she sighs without skipping a beat as the pair pop out, pausing as she checks that Mikaia's wings are alright. "This is Ivan, Lydia's boyfriend. Be nice to him, won't you?" she adds, completely glossing over the way in which she steals Riesenlied's line for her own use.
She draws back towards her partner, sitting back down with her but reserving some space just in case Mikaia wants a bit of mom time. There's a brief shared moment over their link, as she offers some reassurance - and then looks up to Ivan with a quick nod. "Still, I thought I should say it more clearly, just in case. I've got a habit of teasing a little too hard, at times."
"As for myself, ah... I suppose you'd call me a bit of a historian, in as much as I enjoy histoy and do a lot of people-watching. And I adore reading books. Especially some very bad ones," she adds with a chuckle, thinking it might be best to not place herself on some kind of pedestal in front of Ivan. "The rest is-- kind of a long story, I suppose. And very Filgaian, besides."
<Pose Tracker> Lydia Seren has posed.
Lydia's entire face goes silver and it looks like it might burst from embarrassment. Oh no... Have the tables turned. Have her sisters betrayed her and are now humbling her before Ivan's very eyes?!
"O..of course I've been radical to Ivan. Mostly. Probably? I try to be! I do my best. I'm sorry if I haven't been completely rad, Ivan, and I'll do my best to be the raddest Lydia I can be."
She keeps, honestly, expecting Ivan to say something like 'oh i'm not really her boyfriend, i'm more her... boy-friend' and honestly the idea of a boyfriend is still kind of unusual to lydia who usually crushes on girls actually. Though there was Shane and all but she never asked and ahhhhh!
"Oh yeah that's true. And it wasn't like it was bad. Just...unique!" She smiles pleasantly. "Unless I guess you tested it on yourself beforehand and you built up some kind of immunity... but it didn't taste like poison either. But I guess poison isn't supposed to taste 'like' poison in the first place."
She mulls on this for a bit before shaking her head to clear it.
She glances back over to Riesenlied and then Noeline who is telling her t relax.
She exhales briefly. "Cool. I mean. I wish I had a 'relax' setting, haha, but I'll do my best. Eheh..."
She looks back over to Ivan. "Oh that's right--Noeline is super into dime novels. Which are pretty similar to the books you enjoyed reading! Maybe Noeline has some books she can lend ya!"
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.
Mikaia quietly nods to Ivan and says, "Nice to meet you..." and, maybe, just maybe, she kind of shares a sense of sympathy with the more quiet man who's exuding the same slightly introvert vibes. She kind of has her own more extrovert half in the form of Janey, like Ivan does Lydia--
"Yeah? Of course you have been!" Janey cackles as she gives a thumbs up to Lydia. "That's my Lyds!" A pause, as she walks over to give Lydia a big hug! Janey hug!
"It's kinda noisy and rambunctious around here sometimes, but everyone's got spirit," Janey muses. "I hope you'll enjoy bein' around the Outreach!"
When Ivan says he doesn't quite know about Noeline, though, and Noeline starts explaining...
"Noeline is my smarter and stronger half," Riesenlied begins, perhaps not even realising she's well in place to cause a meltdown for Noeline with the extremely invigorated mood she's in right now!! "We've known each other for... well, quite a very long time now, but we only started our relationship with each other a few years ago."
She giggles as she leans in for another smooch (Mikaia instinctively goes 'uwa' and covers her eyes, though you can see her peeking...). "I've relied on her a lot to help me organise the Outreach to be the haven it is now... and, of course, she's also--"
She clings tighter, smiling wider and more warmly. "My knight."
Then Lydia mentions novels. Riesenlied's horns steam a little as she thinks of past incidents. Wiggle-wiggle, wiggle-wiggle...
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.
Ivan... smiles a little at Noeline stealing Riesenlied's line! They have been unmissably fond and affectionate towards one another throughout, but something about that particular exchange charms him with some phantom nostalgia for family dynamics known only in speculation. She provides him with a little more context about who she is, and he blinks, waiting... "That sounded so normal," he replies, suspiciously. "Does the long story have all the shocking stuff in it?"
He assumes there is shocking stuff. Isn't it a requirement in this family?
He seems a little more comfortable in general now, at least for the moment, able to take a moment to enjoy Lydia's vow to be the most rad Lydia possible. "I was wondering if it was even possible for you to be more radical, but maybe I will find out," he answers.
Janey advises him:
/It's kinda noisy and rambunctious around here sometimes, but everyone's got spirit/
"Ah, yes, that does seem to be true..." he agrees, quietly.
Lydia mentions, too, that Noeline might have similar taste in books to his own. "Do you like adventure novels?" he asks.
Riesenlied tells him more about her relationship with Noeline. Ivan nods, a little wide-eyed, before there is some more smooching, and he isn't quite sure what to do then so he follows Mikaia's lead in a more discreet manner, shading his eyes briefly as if the kiss were a bright light.
"It seems like it's very good that you found one another," he says.
<Pose Tracker> Noeline has posed.
With a chuckle, Noeline tilts her head to Lydia's rather off-hand comment about her own settings, accepting it for what it is. Mostly: "Well, maybe you can just chalk that up to being Riesenlied's daughter, after all," she allows herself at least one more tongue-in-cheek moment, even if it's laced with fondness.
She's taken a little by surprise at the sheer swell of praise from Riesenlied, blinking in slow confusion before looking off to one side as a blush spreads across her cheeks. There's a moment that might be something like preening, but it's paired with the way she naturally draws back towards Riesenlied, not fully trusting herself to speak until she's received and processed that kiss.
"... you're just as strong, just in a different way," she mumbles afterwards, steaming quietly. "If it weren't for your hopes to lift me--..." She trails off partially out of bashfulness, but also because she can let her feelings positively glow over their link instead. Still, she does add, at the end: "... you know I'm glad to be."
Buoyed by that, she draws a breath in and out and tries to pretend like her cheeks aren't a fairly solid red. Ivan's question is blunt enough to draw a burst of laughter from her and another flashing grin - but she tamps down her first instinct to fire back a joke. "... yes, it does," she confirms seriously, but with a smile. "We've come a long way, but we've gotten a lot better at looking forwards and not back."
She doesn't linger on the topic, though. It's not the right sort of time. Instead, her eyes flash with amusement as she hums to herself. "/Well/. I have most of The Tower of Sands around here somewhere, the collected works of Williamson, and a good deal besides. If it's popular, I've probably at least nosed through it in a bookstore."
(Privately, she glances at Riesenlied's wiggle, and reminds herself: 'oh gods don't bury him in all the vampire romance novels')
<Pose Tracker> Lydia Seren has posed.
Lydia Seren catches Janey and spins her around, "Janey Hug!" She shouts turning metacontext into PURE CANON!? She does two full spins before setting her down. Even Lydia is probably honestly less extrovert than Janey here but Janey honestly easily drags out the most outgoing parts of Lydia.
"Janey has like triple the average Waysider spirit though so watch out, okay?" Lydia asides to Ivan.
She sticks out her tongue again as Riesenlied mentions that Noeline is her 'smarter and stronger half'. "Uhhh, you're plenty strong'n'smart, mom. You just have a different skill tree. It's all good."
Wait what is a skill tree? Don't ask Lydia. It's just a weird byproduct of being around working designs translations.. Honest.
Lydia has some sympathy for that phantom nostalgia. That might be why Lydia has been dragging him here as often as she has. A way of saying he's welcome here. Lydia knows as well as anyone sometimes the family you find is the family you get even if the family you should have had is always a bit of a phantom itself.
"Oh yeah she totes does." She tells Ivan excitedly. She seems pretty enthusiastic at the idea off Ivan reading more books for some unknown reason. Well maybe it isn't so unknown.
"And... I'll try to be... haha..." Lydia manages, embarrassed, like she isn't quite sure she really can be despite her own words. Though that isn't really so much an indication that she thinks she's too radical just, you know, usual self doubt.
"Yesssss....!" That doesn't stop her about being enthusiastic about Ivan readinng Noeline's books!
<Pose Tracker> Riesenlied has posed.
The long story...
Riesenlied does nod a little more timidly to Ivan, saying, "We've... been through a lot," and maybe that's the most she can cope with right now because she doesn't want to dwell on the most difficult things about their shared, checkered past.
She flushes a little as Noeline says she's just as strong, and indeed it's through the link that she can share with that emotion right now. "Hehe... I know. I'm glad to be your strength."
She smiles a bit on the topic of books and thinks to share more of Noeline's library with herself, since the idea of reading with each other sounds fun.
And then--
"Janey Hug!" Janey chimes as Lydia catches her and laughs. "That's right. That's a level of Waysideness that's normal for the Lord of Calamity...!"
She's kind of channeling her inner Marivel there.
A pause, as she cheekily goes, "Also, hey, whoa, you can't suggest novels without adding my actual namesake, the Calamity Jane series!"
Even as she settles down, though, Janey does understand the sense of nostalgia -- and that's why she savours her time here so much.
<Pose Tracker> Ivan has posed.
Ivan whispers to Lydia: "You don't really have to worry about being more radical. I don't actually know what it means for someone to be radical."
<Pose Tracker> Lydia Seren has posed.
Lydia Seren lets out a relieved sigh, giving Ivan a sneaky hand squeeze because he's been through enough today. Also it's fun to be a bit sneaky about it sometimes.