2023-04-28: A Most Ingenious Paradox

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<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.

Hooboy a lot happened. While time doesn't really have meaning in the Memory Maze--relative to the point of time where everybody fell into the Memory Maze it has been a few... 'time' since you've come in.

Marivel comes barreling on over towards you with an expression of one who feels like she's hearding cats, her eyes are filled with ... trepidation? Trepidation. She's not terrified, but she is certainly worried and concerned. She is pulling Ashley Winchester along by his arm, her own limb enlongated and larger than looks natural to aid her grip. She does not trust this weird stranger.

Indeed, aside from Eleanor, you're all pretty much weird strangers to her.

Once she catches up to Eleanor and Josie, she half shoves half throws Ashley out in front of her, eyes narrowed into slits.

"I don't know who you people are," Marivel says, stressed enough that she doesn't even make exception for Eleanor though there is a distinct possibility that this meeting is actually happening before their first meeting. Her shoulders are tense. She looks maybe inches away from starting an actual fight. She hasn't needed her lvl 99 max level ultimate gear from the prequel in a very long 'time' by her countenance but even if she hadn't lost them between games--there is one in particular here that she'd be worried about anyway.

"What are you doing here? If you're here to hurt Anastasia, I'll make you regret it. If you're here for revenge..." She looks at Ashley.

"Then I'll end you myself. I can smell him on you. Lord Blazer."

She steadies her hands and takes a breath because she actually isn't sure if she can do that. But she is going to act like she can. 

<Pose Tracker> Ashley Winchester has posed.

By subjective time, it was only a few hours ago, maybe even less, that Ashley Winchester unleashed the full might of Lord Blazer upon the sky fortress, Heimdall Gazzo. He thought that it would have been the end of him. The end of all of them. But somehow, impossibly, he's... alive.

They're all alive.

And... somewhere that is most certainly neither the Heimdall Gazzo, nor Granasian Heaven. He wasn't sure if he was getting in, what with the primordial demon infesting his soul, but there was no way Eleanor was going to Granasian Heck, and she's here, so.

Logic!

...But then, where is this? Why was... the Sword Magess here? Marivel was here as well--

"Oh." Ashley says, as if he'd suddenly been struck by a bolt of realization. "Ohhh. It's the dot in the i. That's where we must be. This is... The Time of Promi-se!?"

He is seized! Grabbed by a grumpy Marivel who is ruthlessly exploiting her shapeshifting power even more than usual! "H-hey, wait, I--" am being pulled along because he doesn't want a vampire ripping his arm out of its socket. Soon, he's chucked right at the others, bodily! And the accusations that are being leveled at him...!

"..." he rises slowly, standing to turn to the little vampire. Silently, he approaches. One step, then another. Then another. Stalking forward as if he can smell the trepidation roiling off of her like some kind of beast-- some kind of... demon!?

Beat.

That's-- that's a donut he's pulled out of his pack.

"I'm not Lord Blazer," Ashley says, gently. "My name is Ashley Winchester, a baker. And in another time and place, you really like the taste of my donuts. It's nice to finally meet you, Marivel Armitage." 

<Pose Tracker> Josephine Lovelace has posed.

    Her intention had been to go and find the boys, as she'd put it -- having left them behind when wanderlust (of a sort) had overtaken the urgency of rest. Josie had come across Eleanor in her meanderings through the ruins, and from there, they'd had a talk that had sorted out most of the immediacies of this place, such as whenwherewhat it was and who else they were likely (certain, if time has its say) to meet within.

    Nothing like a good old fashioned paradox. Lucky for her -- and them -- Eleanor's practiced in that regard...

    The boys, as it were, aren't alone when they catch up to them -- or, well, catch up to Ashley.

    "Well, here's a pretty mess," Josie remarks after a moment more of contemplation of the scene before them.

    "He's harmless," Josie says, lips splitting in a wide grin as she regards a Marivel she hasn't yet met. "Trust me. I'm probably the most dangerous person here...!" 

<Pose Tracker> Brad Evans has posed.

Brad is too much of an engineer for this shit.

Ever since awakening not in, for instance, Valhalla, or the Heaven of Swords, or the Hell of Those Who Steal Valor, but a weird blank void of marble floors and marble columns and a vague sense of disconnect from things like direction or time, Brad has, for the most part, been scratching his head and trying to make sense of this.

We've found his limit, kids: Brad Evans gets fully agitated when he's not at least somewhat sure if he's in three-dimensional space.

Which is why he is squatted down next to a pillar, scribbling calculations into an old notebook he produced from Somewhere. "No," he grunts. "If that were right all the circles would have gaps in them, what?"

He looks up when Marivel barges in and acts like... kind of like Lilka when she's got that boyfriend of hers around, actually. Except she's throwing Ashley around. He scratches his deep black hair with a sausage-thick finger, then looks up to Ashley, who is pronouncing the Time Game.

He blinks twice.

"...I feel like I missed a few staff meetings, what?" 

<Pose Tracker> Eleanor Klein has posed.

Eleanor walks along with Josie on the way back from where she'd gone off into the sandy pillars to relax.

Eleanor would be touched by Ashley's reasoning, if she could read his mind. It's a very sweet thougt!

...But Eleanor realized in the moments before Ashley's final blast, thanks to all Marivel had told her, that this was not so hopeless after all, that all was as it was meant to be. There is still a great deal of worry contained within the young elf, but there is also a certain serenity in her. This is...

The Time of Promise.

But ah, there's Marivel. "Hm," Eleanor says first, when Marivel says that she doesn't make a distinction, "Have we not met yet, then?" she wonders. "Well, that's all right."

She brightens. She is not afraid of Marivel in the moment, though she has a healthy caution of an agitated Crimson Noble. But Brad, is... "It's fine," Eleanor says. "This kind of thing is sort of one of my areas of expertise."

"My name is Eleanor," the blonde introduces herself--she decides not to give all the details just yet, because Marivel didn't know all of them when she met her, and it might be more of a paradox to introduce too much new information. "We are," well, mostly, "Your friends from the future, subjective to the time you've experienced." She smells faintly of gunpowder and cigarette smoke, overpowering the pleasant scents of her usual, but she has an unmistakable aura to the mystically sensitive--that of Light and a strange serenity... as well as the whiff of one who meddles in Time.

However, she looks pretty rough; broken magical rings, tattered attire.

She continues though, "The reason you smell Lord Blazer in Ashley is that you put him there, in the future, in a gambit to save our world from..." Pause. "Something. You didn't tell me that part. Or exactly how Lord Blazer was sealed in Ashley, for that matter, but I know you had something to do with it."

"Regardless!" Eleanor is... very friendly. "The point is, we're not here to harm you or Anastasia. We were drawn here because..."

Pause. "Actually I'm not certain of that either, but I'm glad it happened instead of our dying, certainly."

Then she looks to Brad, "See? It's all very simple." She smiles. "This is Brad Evans and Josephine Lovelace, by the way." 

<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.

This Marivel isn't an experienced Time TRaveler yet, indeed-even though she doesn't look a day younger, she FEELS a lot younger than the Marivel you know. Her eyes don't exactly come across as 'fresh' but they don't have that long look of an immortal being that Marivel always carried with her no matter how she tried to avoid it. This Marivel is actually, for her people, about the equivalent of a teenager. A Drifter a few years into their journey.

Josie claims to be the most dangerous person here. Marivel is thrilled to hear this. She smiles. Instead of two fangs, she is now showing off a mouthful of them. While Marivel typically employs this kind of chicanery to try to spook people in the present, there's a distinct sense that the Marivel of the now would be absolutely thrilled to get into a fight with Josie right here and now to see just who is the most dangerous person here.

"Reeeally? There's no real light here, I could go ~~all out~~. You wanna tussle?" There is a feral, inhuman element to that grin. Even this Marivel hasn't completely been socialized and poisoned by humanity just yet. Some part of her just...isn't. And never was. She hasn't gotten at good at imitating personhood just yet.

But she is still surprised by Brad's appearance. "Well damn, look at that guy! He's got arms like half the size of my body. Okay I admit I'd be happy to have a guy like that on my team. He looks like he could hurt a Lord Blazer but I don't 'need' anyone. I'm perfectly happy to finish the job on my own."

She looks to Eleanor again, frowning as she mentions friends from the future. It's a downright scowl by the time she mentions that SHE put Lord Blazer inside of him. That monstrous grin fades away entirely as does anything resembling warmth from her body. She is as still as a statue, her eyes as cold as corpses.

"Don't lie about that sort of thing," She says. "Lord Blazer destroyed my family. My people. I would never inflict him upon the world again." Her eyes narrow. "Don't insult me again."

Marivel will probably be very apologetic about this later. Eleanor assures her they aren't here to hurt Anastasia (marivel could care less about herself). She seems almost as confused about the Time Travel talk as Brad. "Only Time Loops I made were during the big fight... Doing a larger time loop than like a minute is something only an insane person would do, if they even could."

Whatever reason Marivel had for 'putting' Lord Blazer into Ashley...it hasn't happened yet.

"...But Ana says I should give you a chance so..."

She focuses on AShley. While he is absolutely correct that this is the Time of Promise, Marivel is clueless about the dot of the eye like what he's even talking about there, the 'Time of Promise' makes her hesitate but--no she doesn't recognize the term either. Though she will remember it.

Ashley withdraws a doughnut.

This effectively disarms Marivel because this is the most insane thing that's happened to her--maybe in her whole life. It's so insane of a thing to do that it has had the effect of calming Marivel down because she was given information she doesn't know how to process.

She takes the donut. She turns it around in her hand. "I don't eat food." Marivel says, turning the treat in her hands for a moment.

"But..." She says, waving her hand over the doughnut and she pulls a strange blue light out from it.

"...The love of a woman baked in..." She murmurs to herself. This strikes a chord with her. "...Her name...is Marina?"

She closes her hands around the light, absorbing it. She hands the doughnut back to Ashley but--

--it just won't quite be as good. It's missing that secret ingredient now.

"...Lord Blazer doesn't have anything like that with him." Marivel says to Ashley. "...Alright. I won't eat you." She frowns. "I'm Marivel Armitage, but my True Name--"

BGM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WteWH0mx9gM&list=PLRW80bBvVD3VzTdVNE_pjMC4S-PJefbxb

She cuts herself off firmly. "I don't understand these stories you're mentioning, but I'm alone. And though I'm alone, I'm going to protect Filgaia. I don't need anything. And you don't need to say this stuff just because I'm from Hell. I have the one I need."

It might occur to Ashley that... He doesn't actually know the promise he made to Marivel.

Marivel never told him. 

<Pose Tracker> Ashley Winchester has posed.

There's something about this Marivel-- something that makes her come off as... young. Inexperienced. The kind of Marivel who hears about an opportunity to prove her mettle and goes running off half-cocked and guns blazing. The kind of Marivel who puts action before words and half the time falls over her own butt trying to make a difference. The kind of Marivel...

...With delightfully squishable cheeks.

...

Her sharp teeth being on full display may be all that keeps Ashley from losing fingers. For now.

Marivel did do something to put Lord Blazer inside Ashley. They still don't know what that was all about, it's true. But this Marivel had nothing to do with that. "Ahaha, I'm not sure I'm harmless, but... I definitely won't hurt anyone here. Or... anywhere else, if I can avoid it." He scratches awkwardly at the back of his head. He wishes he could tell Brad what was going on here, but Eleanor seems to have a better handle on things. Still, he can... help?

Or at least close a loop.

"It's... time. You know?" Ashley explains, gesticulating badly. "Time. It... doesn't look like a line, or a loop. It's... Jeremy Bearimy. And there's a dot in the i, you know? If you write it out in cursive? We're in that dot, right now. Cut off from normal time. I think? That's what 'our' Marivel would probably say." How else do you explain being in the same time-space as a babby Mari and the Granas-blessed Sword Magess?

"You eat a lot of our food," he says with another smile. "You really like coming around the bakery, in my time. I--" She pulls out... something. Something blue and gentle. Ashley's jaw clicks shut. "...Yeah. Marina is... The one that I love," he says, quietly, tenderly. "...She's the one who I need to get back to. I promised her I would. Even from this pocket in time."

Lord Blazer doesn't have anything like that. "Because I'm not Lord Blazer. Like I said, my name is Ashley. And..."

She wants to fight alone?

That's... not right.

His smile falters, then fades into something a little more knowing. Finally, is it his turn to be the one who Knows Things...? "...I care about Filgaia, too. It's a wonderful place. Somewhere that has so many stories left to tell. I... Want to protect it. We all do. You're not alone, Marivel. Even if you try to walk off on your own, I'll catch up with you and we'll walk side-by-side. No matter what..."

"You'll never be alone. So let's do everything we can to protect this world together?" 

<Pose Tracker> Josephine Lovelace has posed.

    Well, that's a lot of teeth. Fleetingly, Josie glances Eleanor's way, as if to quietly (with eyebrows raised) inquire about this approach's specific wisdom.

    But she's got this well enough in hand, she figures. "Love to, kiddo," she says, gamely, noting in passing that Brad has also caught up to the party they're collecting here. "But I've only just come back 'round from a nasty wound. What would li'l Nora here say if went I got myself wounded and she had to patch me up, again? I think I'd rather pass on that, eh?"

    Eleanor probably would be unimpressed, so it's not even a lie.

    "But that's 'bout the long and short of it. We're from your future -- Filgaia's future. And you're... well, it ain't like we can say this is 'past' or 'future' or anything at all, yeah? That's the kicker, right... this place is everywhere and nowhere all in one package!"

    With a doughnut, and a few words, Ashley makes greater strides than she or others ever could. Though--

    Youth breeds a certain sort of recklessness.
    So does age, Josie reflects privately. But so it goes.

    "Listen to the kid," she says, jerking her head towards Ashley as she lights up a fresh cigarette and takes a long drag. "Maybe you've been here mostly on your own and all. But that business with the demon lord... weren't like you were fighting him alone then, yeah? So there's no need to fight alone now. Or in the future, or past, or whatever you wanna call this mess! Point is..."

    Josie shrugs, broadly. "Kids like you gotta learn by doin', right, but it also falls to adults like us to make sure you ain't doin' the wrong thing. Or bitin' off more than you can chew. Or suffering, alone." 

<Pose Tracker> Brad Evans has posed.

Brad's appearance is shocking to many, on account of how he's the size of a refrigerator.

"I'll trust you on that," Brad grunts at Eleanor, putting his things back in his pockets and levering his bulk to his feet.

Marivel...His eyes track across her. Yes, indeed, he can feel that immaturity. This isn't a fool of a greenhorn, but she still has energy that she had lost long, long before he met her. He considers her maybe too long, but she's got too much energy to focus on a brick of a man watching her, so he should be fine. He eventually sticks his hands in his pockets and sighs, looking to Eleanor and then back to Ashley taming Marivel with the power of donuts. ...he's seen her do this trick and it's still kind of weird.

For the moment, he listens, but even still, his brows furrow as she emphasizes her plan to fight alone. That she must, and can, and should, and will. "All wrong," he says, to himself, but maybe not quietly enough.

Ashley expresses his opinion on that. Brad's mouth turns up in a subtle grin. Yeah, that's more like it. 

<Pose Tracker> Eleanor Klein has posed.

Eleanor, as it happens, is more an expert in theory than in actually interacting with the past. She's done it before, but it's tricky, and it would appear that she did not quite strike the right balance here. She frowns a little. "I wouldn't--" Pause. "...Of course."

She won't press on that one. Marivel may be apologetic later, but, "...Well," Eleanor says, "I'm not saying I established this time loop..." She pauses. Hrm.

Ana at least says to 'give them a chance', so there's that. Eleanor is contemplative for the next few moments, reconsidering her approach. Luckily, Ashley is there to calm Marivel. To be kind to her, in a way that Eleanor missed in her focus on the intellectual challenges at hand, in her familiarity with the current Marivel...

No, this younger, past Marivel is far more delicate, isn't she? She must do it on her own. It is heartbreaking, really. It makes Eleanor want to give her a hug.

But more to the point, "Please don't fight," Eleanor says. "I did just finish healing Josie here. It would be dreadful." But Marivel wants to fight! Hmmm. No sunlight here, but...

Maybe best not to mention the part that Eleanor has Light at her fingertips.

"Well, don't worry about the stories," ELeanor says. "Ashley is right. We all care. We all want to help. Filgaia is our world, too."

A pause. "...Brad is very reliable," she says. "And you can rely on him." She stops, and is unsure what to say, really. All the same, "...I have my own promises to keep," she says cryptically. "....You, too, are a daughter of Filgaia, Marivel Armitage. Always remember that."

She glances to Brad, and gives an apologetic look. "...It would seem I have a few things to learn about meddling in time, after all..." 

<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.

Marivel is still deadpan about time travel bullshit. "Your Marivel sounds like she lost her marbles. We're not ...some DOT on the eye on an incredibly dumb name, we're simply trapped near the event horizon of a black hole which filters time and memory while being cut off from...the normal progression... of..."

Marivel looks horrified as Ashley's explanation of Jeremy Bearimy starts to make sense to her. "Stop that," She says. "Stop doing the knowing things that are going to happen before they happen schtick. Do you have any idea how annoying that is? How would you like it if I showed up acting like some kind of obnoxious know-it-all while cheating at cause and effect."

She's already getting a headache and she's not physiologically equipped for headaches.

She looks to Josephine. She seems a little dissapointed at the lakc of tussle but seems to accept her reasoning for it. "Well, it wouldn't be any fun if you weren't at your best." Marivel admits. "...Wait, are you..."

She frowns, recalling something. "Are you ... Eleanor's secret crush?"

She grins again. "Heh, nice try Ana...!"

She doesn't even argue against the 'kiddo'. By her own reckoning she is one even if by years she is still the oldest in the room. That isn't how Marivel judges age, either now or in the future. SOME things are still consistent.

She isn't dwelling too much on Brad mostly because he isn't talking as much but she does sympathize with him because she weants to sigh too because this is a lot of stimulation all at once for her. Even when she was in Ana's party, she was the loner of the group. She had to be pulled into things. Nobody is pulling her now, she is having to tread water on unfamiliar oceans. But his silence means that when he does speak, her eyes snap to him--daring.

The hurt of that day is still fresh with her too. It hasn't scarred over yet. Touching it still sends sparks through her. It'll be a long time before Lunar rips that scar back open.

"Is it?" She says. He is being quiet but in a way that makes him seem reliable.

She doesn't know of Eleanor's capabilities. She seems to be a powerful sorceress of some stripe who can break a rule here and there but she certainly doesn't know she has Light magic. If anything she thinks she's some kind of Time Mage but she is starting to believe their story which tells her that for some reason she didn't just infuse someone with Lord Blazer--she befriended the host in some way? It seems unbelievable. It won't be unbelievable to her in a moment. Eleanor backing down doesn't make her feel good at all. Maybe she was too harsh, she thinks to herself. "...Never been good with people," She admits sourly. "Hands like these aren't fit for holding."

But even she needed one hand to hold it. "...It would be dreadful? ... Okay, if it would be dreadful we won't fight." Like she's not really sure what to do and is taking a cue from her. Humans are hard, if it wasn't for Ana she'd try to avoid these people...

"...He does seem reliable," She admits on the matter of Brad. "...Yeah, after I lost everything Filgaia finally accepted me."

She allows a faint smirk. "But some people accepted me before Filgaia, you know? It doesn't taste quite right, knowing the cost. Maybe it would've been better if I was never accepted by Filgaia. Maybe it was foolish to seek something that was never ours... Even on a world full of exiles. Did...Kamui...Althena... Yue...Gami...?" She almost mentions Lumen but she knows that by these guys' time, not even the coolest of timelines would have a still living LUmen in it. The htought of it makes her feel a little...off.

She will interogate that later. "I'm sure you'll become a master of meddling..." She ultimately tells Eleanor. "In time."

She can still joke. But she looks back to Ashley then.

He isn't Lord Blazer. Marivel murmurs, "A host that receives such love... I know normal humans can do incredible and terrible things... Maybe beyond my current imagination."

She thinks on Marina. And the one he needs to get back to. This gets Marivel tender for a moment.

"We'll get you back." She says. "You shouldn't leave behind people you love, Ashley. Not even for the world. Love carries a sword so we can fight for it."

Ashley then says them. The words that will spark a five thousand year plan, a Pact that is still a part of Marivel until your time. Her support to ARMS, her friendship with all of you--because of those words--supported by Ashley's friends who were willing to face down a madman with him.

But the spark doesn't light in just this moment. Humanity is a slow-acting poison. She listens. And it sticks with her.

You'll never be alone

Marivel's mother told her that right before she was gone forever. "...Luceid's gonna hate me." She mutters.

But she does seem to relax after those words. "...I'll think about it." She says. "Ashley Winchester." 

<Pose Tracker> Ashley Winchester has posed.

"Oh, is that what's going on...?" Ashley smiles cryptically. Or rather, it might come across as cryptic. He won't deny that there's a significant part of him that's absolutely reveling in the opportunity to finally-- FINALLY-- seeing the shoe on the other foot. This is how it feels, Marivel...! But then he realizes:

Oh.

This is why she did it, isn't it? Oh wow, the cycle of cryptic brain-bending revenge is a terrifying and tangled one.

"Sorry," he admits at last. "Ahaha, I think it's just the best way to communicate it. How time works, that is." AND THUS ASHLEY SEALS HIS FATE.

Brad IS very reliable. That is a fact. The man is a mountain of meat and is about as stable and stoic as one could possibly be. He is the bedrock upon which so much of what they do is built.

Also he fixes things when they break. That's extremely useful to have around.

'Hands like these aren't fit for holding.'

"That's not true at all," Ashley insists, reaching out as if to take one-- or both-- of those hands. "These hands... Bring us all together. They hold Kamui and build a room for her in their home. They repair Gami and brought her back to life. They make family wherever they were able, even among people separated by space and time. And they build amazing things that I'm sure we haven't even began to scratch the surface of. Who wouldn't want to hold hands like these, with all the things they'll do someday?"

Even if some of those things include 'shoving satan into his soul.'

...But Ashley Winchester is never one to hold much of a grudge after a good punch to the face, as the saying goes.

(There is no saying that goes that way.)

"...I know you'll help us get us home," Ashley adds, offering a grateful smile. "Don't worry, Luceid super hates me, too. So you'll be in good company. But just the same... We won't leave Ana behind, either. I don't know if we can bring her back with us now, but if we can get here and out, then..."

Surely.

Surely there must be hope. Somehow.

"Thinking about it is all that I think we could ask for," says, finally. "Thanks a lot, Marivel." 

<Pose Tracker> Brad Evans has posed.

Dying from The Explosion Ever and then actually not dying is a lot of stimulation. Brad knows, because this is the third time.

Might be why he's approaching this one somewhat analytically, at that. With things settling out into a shape he can sort of grasp, he is able to set his hands to his pockets.

"I am, yes," Brad affirms to Eleanor's praise of his character, with a completely straight face.

Still. it's Ashley who consoles and helps calm this more youthful Marivel. The woman he's known, with a girl's face and a heart worn to its leaden core by time, reveals the simple fragility on which she built herself. Someday she'll know his secrets, but he can't particularly talk about that to this one. He says, "Alright. If that's the plan, then--"

He stops.

"Then I still don't know the plan," he admits.

Brad remains too much of an engineer for this shit. 

<Pose Tracker> Josephine Lovelace has posed.

    "Sure enough," Josie remarks, as if in response to Marivel saying it wouldn't be much fun if Josie weren't at her best. "The bastard we tangled with almost did us in, but thanks to the little lady there, we're all... well, we're talkin' and walkin', and that's good enough for me! But I daresay you'd have a poor time of it, fightin' me in this state. Why, I doubt I'd make it your while, even, and that's 'fore we get Nora there involved!"

    'Please don't fight', Eleanor asks of the two of them. Josie remarks on that not at all and simply glances at Eleanor sidelong and winks.

    This may be a poorly timed wink, as things go.

    "...Huh," Josie says at last.

    She pauses for a moment.

    "So that's how it looks to you? You've sure been on your lonesome here a while, huh? Outside Anastasia, anyhow. Don't you worry or none, soon as not, you'll be outta here and..." She gestures, vaguely, with her cigarette.

    "...Doin'... normal people things. Again."

    Anastacia isn't coming with. She's already figured that part out, based on what's been said here and now -- and what Eleanor said before.

    And... there's the stories, at that. The Sword Magess died saving the world -- or rather, she'd vanished and was never seen again.

    Anastacia can't leave.

    Be that as it may, though, that's not a thing Josie will voice aloud. Not here and now.

    "...I figure the plan's goin' through the maze," she says to Brad with a lopsided grin. "Here, ain't you ever wanted to explore an abomination of space 'n time? It'll be my first, pretty sure!" 

<Pose Tracker> Eleanor Klein has posed.

'Only' a black hole's event horizon. Maybe Marivel lost her marbles a long time ago...

As to how they'd like it, "Do you really want to know?"

'Stop it'. Eleanor laughs, merrily. It's the most relieved she's been since she got here, really. And it only lasts a moment. But it's nice. Still... Is she--

"No," Eleanor says simply. "You'll have to do better than that to get one over on Anastaasia," she answers, amused.

"It would be dreadful," she reiterates. "Very."

Filgaia... and the cost. Mm... "...I don't think I should answer your questions about the future," ELeanor says apologetically. "I'm sorry. But I promise that you'll see it for yourself." A pause. "...Though I suppose a little hope doesn't hurt," she admits, regarding Ashley. She can't exactly stop him from talking, and frankly, he's doing great. So she's not going to!
Meddling... In time. Eleanor smiles. "Clever," she comments. "There's that sense of humor I enjoy."

Ashley, though... What he says is kind, and good. But Eleanor knows that Anastasia doesn't leave, yet. How can she say that, though...? SHe'll have to talk to her.

"We have a lot of promises to keep," she says instead, and then--Brad doesn't know the plan.

Normal people things...

"Yes," Eleanor says to Josie. "That's the plan. And it... will be fascinating from an academic perspective," she admits. "I believe we're going to need help, though. ...Perhaps we should go and find Anastasia?" 

<Pose Tracker> Marivel Armitage has posed.

"Well," Marivel says hesitantly as Brad asks what the plan is. She hesitates longer than she normally does. "I guess we'll...show you the way back? I don't know if it'll work though." She brightens. "Maybe it'll just kill ya!" It's a totally empty 'threat'. "...It probably won't kill you. I mean, if you're right that some future me kept with you all this time I doubt she'd do it just to watch you fuck off and die here."

"...Maybe Ana can go back home sometime too." She doesn't spare a thought for herself. If she can go back herself.

But those words from AShley. They stick with her. It hits her like a splash of alcohol on a wound. But can she trust it?

Maybe she'll find out with more observation. He might not even know the full extent of what he's said to her. Maybe he certainly doesn't.

I'll catch up with you and we'll walk side-by-side. No matter what...

Is that what this is?

You'll never be alone.

Like her mother promised. To protect Filgaia together.

...It's all she ever wanted. But in the end...

She only protected it with Ana. And that wasn't enough. She paid the price.

He seems like a nice guy. She doesn't want him to pay that price.

"...Don't ever forget you have someone to go back to." She says curtly. "...Someone who makes donuts like that for you, if you let them down I'll devour you."

But Ashley takes those hands. Gami is okay... Kamui is...

....She never told them how much they meant to her. It'd be nice if she could. "...It's strange... Though I helped build her... I didn't really... I told Lumen she couldn't just make someone just to be a hero, you know--but I didn't think I'd--"

Somehow this guy keeps getting her close to baring her neck at her. She grimaces. She's not the one who bares her neck, she's the one who sinks her fangs into one.

BGM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZzzBmRkrpj0

She can feel Marina's love in those hands. It reaches even there. Can just one person's love contain Lord Blazer?

And he's saying these things to her despite what he claims she'll do to him.

"...You're weird," Marivel admits. "...Really? They hate you?"

She mulls on that for a moment. "...Honestly you seem to me like a guy they'd like."

They even offer ot help Ana. It sounds too sweet to be true.

But she has time to think about it. So she'll think about it, and then she'll ask Ashley if he really does want to seal the fate he has already sealed himself with. Humans can be pretty amazing, she always said. They have a knack for finding their way around Fate for good or ill.

She gets a feeling that Josie is making fun of her there and she immediately betrays herself by pouting and is mad at herself for pouting. It's super embarrassing! And this gets a faint blue blush to appear on her face.

Yeah, Marivel gets a lot of revenge for this 'day' doesn't she?

"...Didn't say I was coming with yet." She grumps instead. Leaving here because she believes in hope is one thing, leaving Anastasia here ALONE with nothing but memories--that's harder for her to commit to.

"First time for everything." She tells Josie. "I guess I'll check up with you after you get out of the maze and we can do the scrap then."

Eleanor confirms that Josie ISN'T the SECRET crush. "Dammit." She mutters.

Eleanor tells her she shouldn't answer her questions about the future. Marivel will remember to be pretty sparse on important details thanks to her well timed advice here.

But now she's sore about not knowing future things that she's not supposed to know yet and thus being stuck with future things she IS supposed to know about, which isn't really nearly as fun.

"Dammit." She repeats.

BGM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p5FYVuWMfBE&ab_channel=jaykh.

"...Promises to keep huh..." Marivel murmurs. "Okay."

She exhales. "You're talking a lot about 'Promises' today. But we've got all the time in the universe to decide whether or not you're the sort to keep promises right?"

She nods. "Yeah, lets get to Ana. She might not be much of a swordswoman, but her plans usually work out."

And so she'll lead them back to Ana.

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