2020-03-01: Flowers Can't Grow Well Without Sunlight
- Log: Flowers Can't Grow Well Without Sunlight
- Cast: Avril Vent Fleur, Ashley Winchester
- Where: Valeria Chateau - Ground Floor
- Date: March 1, 2020
- Summary: With her Gear finished with repairs at the Chateau, Avril returns there only to encounter Ashley once again; an offer is made (more than one, in fact) between the two who seem to share a certain burden in common. Takes place ICly a few days after Passionate Rhythm.
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.
It has been some time since the incident in front of the Chateau -- since the Skadi had suffered heavy damage.
Since she had let that power out.
Since she had once again been horrified at that part of herself and everything it spoke for.
After her own recovery following the event -- after speaking with Yue -- she had sought temporary shelter in Meria Boule while the Gear was under repairs, sending a message out to her friends to explain what had happened, in brief.
She had left out the detail about another awakening. Some things are best left for face-to-face explanations.
Even if she, again, is not certain what to say. She had felt again that sense of herself, just as she had relayed to them after other similar incidents.
If she should wake up all the way, what will happen?
She had already wondered about that, considered her choices.
Vowed to continue on this path nonetheless. She must seek Johnny Appleseed. That is, herself.
She continues too on the path leading up to the chateau now, pausing a moment to gaze up at the building. This is where ARMs...
It's funny. Even when she had first come out through these doors upon leaving the first time, she had felt like she had seen this place before. Even now, the sense is a strong one.
"I wonder... what it might mean," she asks, of the building itself. "Have I seen you, or twin to you? Or is it all merely my own fancy?"
<Pose Tracker> Ashley Winchester has posed.
There are a lot of things in this great big world that Ashley Winchester has very little context for. It seems like up until recently, he had been living a somewhat cloistered existence in this little neck of Aquvy. Meria had always been his home, though ever since he was a child he had dreamed big dreams of travelling the world, righting wrongs and punching evil-doers in the face.
More so when he was younger, certainly, but it'd be a lie if he said he didn't still nurse some of those dreams from time to time. He never would have imagined that his path would have led him here- to being a member of a (shady) paramilitary special forces unit in the employ of a(n even shadier) wealthy nobleman and philanthropist.
It... Hasn't always been the kind of thing he imagined Hero Work was supposed to be.
It wasn't until very recently that Ashley learned that there were actual demons in the world, that the Blaze of Disaster wasn't just a myth, that Lord Blazer was real and was now renting apartment space in his brain. He'd never met Avril Vent Fleur or her mysterious alternate personality until a few days ago, and his only memorable interaction with her was limited to a brief and terrifying encounter with the power she called into the world.
Some people would be understandably suspicious of such a person. They'd call her Ice Queen and fear her for her power. But...
Ashley Winchester has recently become painfully aware of just how awful it can feel to be feared for a power you didn't ask for.
"Hey," a voice calls from behind, potentially breaking the reverie Avril has fallen into. "You're the one who was in that gear, weren't you? From the other day?" Ashley asks as he unlimbers a backpack filled with... Sealed pastry containers. He cracks one open, and the scent of fried, glazed dough and delicate yeast-raised bread begins wafting through the air. "I wanted to thank you. I don't know what we would have had to do if someone didn't stop that Veruni's gear from going out of control. Here," he offers a glazed croissant, "On the house."
<Pose Tracker> Ashley Winchester has posed.
There are a lot of things in this great big world that Ashley Winchester has very little context for. It seems like up until recently, he had been living a somewhat cloistered existence in this little neck of Aquvy. Meria had always been his home, though ever since he was a child he had dreamed big dreams of travelling the world, righting wrongs and punching evil-doers in the face.
More so when he was younger, certainly, but it'd be a lie if he said he didn't still nurse some of those dreams from time to time. He never would have imagined that his path would have led him here- to being a member of a (shady) paramilitary special forces unit in the employ of a(n even shadier) wealthy nobleman and philanthropist.
It... Hasn't always been the kind of thing he imagined Hero Work was supposed to be.
It wasn't until very recently that Ashley learned that there were actual demons in the world, that the Blaze of Disaster wasn't just a myth, that Lord Blazer was real and was now renting apartment space in his brain. He'd only briefly met Avril Vent Fleur once, months ago, in a snowstorm on Filgaia's moon. As strange as that might sound, it wasn't necessarily *her* that left the biggest impression on him. Rather, that dubious honor belongs to Avril's mysterious alternate personality, whose only memorable interaction with Ashley was limited to a brief and terrifying encounter with the power she called into the world.
Some people would be understandably suspicious of such a person. They'd call her Ice Queen and fear her for her power. But...
Ashley Winchester has recently become painfully aware of just how awful it can feel to be feared for a power you didn't ask for.
"Hey," a voice calls from behind, potentially breaking the reverie Avril has fallen into. "You're the one who was in that gear, weren't you? From the other day?" Ashley asks as he unlimbers a backpack filled with... Sealed pastry containers. He cracks one open, and the scent of fried, glazed dough and delicate yeast-raised bread begins wafting through the air. "I wanted to thank you. I don't know what we would have had to do if someone didn't stop that Veruni's gear from going out of control. Here," he offers a glazed croissant, "On the house."
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.
"Ah...?"
She turns, and as she turns, she can't help but flinch at the sight of him.
To look at him, he's a young man. He's as innocuous as anyone could be -- baker and soldier both, yes, but perhaps baker before the soldier -- in this line of work.
But some primal part of her recoils. Some primal part of her feels as if it is raging, a howling blizzard at a distance, as if beyond the still carefully closed door...
And she slowly raises one gloved hand to cover her mouth.
Only to then shake her head. "...Ashley, was it not? We met, in Spira." She pauses, silent. "...I am sorry for my reaction just now. You looked for a moment like..."
She pauses again.
"...Like someone I knew."
Like someone she knew who she didn't have a good relationship with, to judge by that reaction.
But that must be it, she's decided.
(the fact that he sort of does look like Janus if you squint is a fact that will remain... unremarked upon)
"...You are correct, however. That... was me." Her hands clasp in front of her now, her head slightly bowed. She had brought it to heel that time, but every time, it feels like she's in control right up until the moment she isn't, anymore.
"I am glad that I was able to have provided such assistance," she says, nonetheless, because what else can she say to him that won't make her look like a monster or otherwise?
"And I thank you and your organization for the assistance with my Gear. I had thought that it would be difficult to relocate it to the Thames for repairs, but it seems that effort shall not be necessary. I understand that soon it shall be-- ah?"
Again, there is surprise; she gingerly reaches out to take the croissant, gazing up at him, her eyes wide.
"...Oh. Thank you, Ashley."
<Pose Tracker> Ashley Winchester has posed.
It wasn't the first time Ashley has had someone look at him like he's the spawn of Valmar itself. He knows that can't possibly be right, though, on account of having met Valmar's closest relative, and he's pretty sure that he wouldn't look anywhere near as good in heels. "Ah--" The Musketeer hesitates, "Oh, it's alright. I won't bite. I uh, I know people say I look like some Janus guy? There's a lot of bad blood there, I guess. Don't worry about it, I can't blame anyone else for having an unfortunate face."
At least she didn't have to bring it up. He did that all by himself! Janus isn't nearly as kind-faced as this guy, though. Maybe they were just... seperated at birth, or something...?
"Don't mention it. Avril, right?" Ashley chuckles as his croissant is received. Pastries always work to break the ice... Metaphorically, (probably) not literally. "I'm sure the gearheads at the chateau appreciate having a machine like yours around. That was some... incredible stuff you did at the end, there. I wasn't sure exactly what was going on, but it's probably the result of some pretty high-tech stuff, huh?"
It's not. Ashley doesn't know. He's just trying to be nice and make conversation is all! "I don't have anything quite like that, myself. I mean-- if I had to, there's something I could have done, but... Between you and me, I'm really glad that I didn't have to."
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.
It's her turn to blink, when he brings up Janus.
"Oh... yes, now I do see," she says, sadly never much one for tact (where are Rebecca or Dean when you need them?!). "The resemblance between the two of you is... striking, once one thinks about it." At least that means it's not obvious from the get-go...?
Someone ought to really explain to her that she can't just say things like this to people...
"However, you have the kinder face," she adds, after gazing at him for a long, possibly uncomfortable moment. "That man... did not have eyes like yours."
Not in the slightest. These eyes are the sort of eyes that draw you in -- gentle eyes, that seem to bear the weight of the world, somehow.
She shivers involuntarily, as the metaphorical door within her heart rattles under the weight of the storm at the gates, again.
"Yes, that is right. I met both you and Eleanor in Spira, before everything happened." Or rather, before the rest of everything happened, and they'd ended up here in Aquvy again. "She was at that battle as well. It was good to fight alongside her. She is... I hope that she is well, now."
Which is when he compliments her about her fighting -- and the 'device' that she had oh-so-clearly used.
"Ah..."
She hesitates, visibly; she looks up at him in the split-second after almost as if she were about to inquire... and then simply nods. "Yes. It is only a modified Aveh Gear, but it is augmented with some special equipment. ...I hope that the blade did not cause much damage."
When she'd dropped it, that is.
He then says...
"Oh, I see... so you do not have a Gear?"
There is something about the way in which he said it. She looks at him, really looks at him.
"Then you must have been one of the ones involved in the ground engagement. I heard that there was a disturbance there, as well. ...I am glad. There are things with which that a Gear cannot assist."
<Pose Tracker> Ashley Winchester has posed.
"Ahahaha, I'll take that as a compliment," a 'kinder face' indeed, though admittedly it isn't hard to look kinder than Janus Cascade. It's not the kind of face you would ever want to find on a battlefield. This kind of face is the kind that is so often found on the victims of bloody warfare, and rarely ever on its heroes. "It sounds like he was a pretty rough guy. Nobody I've talked to have ever had much nice to say about him."
It's kind of sad, thinking about it. Did Janus ever feel like he missed out on something, being so alone in the world...?
"She's doing alright! We've been a bit, uh. Concerned about a few things lately." Like a fellow ARMS member being abducted by some ultra-shady science guy, for example, "But otherwise I think we're doing alright. It's been a while though, hasn't it? Glad to see that you were able to make it back alright."
The alternative is being stranded on the moon with the apocalyptic doomwhale. Ashley really isn't sure which is the worse prospect.
"If your sword did any damage, it probably prevented several times worse. LIke I said, don't worry about it-- ah." Gears. Right. Ashley shakes his head. "No, I don't. I'm not even sure where to begin trying to pilot one, really! But between you and me, I don't think the Veruni we were engaged with had any idea what was going to happen with that gear on their side, either. Things got really bad really quickly towards the end there."
And they could have been... Potentially much, much worse, if certain somebodies weren't around to stop the situation from deteriorating.
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.
The first (and last) time that Avril met Janus Cascade, it was an occurance where he and his men had betrayed her and Dean to collect on her bounty, an event that was only stopped by the sudden emergence of Avril's power and the timely arrival of Rebecca.
Suffice to say, her opinion of the man is not... great.
But whatever vague resemblance Ashley has to him -- enough that she only can see it now that it's mentioned -- she can see that the resemblance is only skin deep.
Nevertheless, though... what is this feeling?
"Oh... I see. I do hope that matters resolve for her soon," Avril says, closing her eyes briefly. Even if Eleanor had looked at her a touch strangely, that one time...
Someday, she might be a little sorry about the headaches she's been giving the other girl.
"Thank you, all the same, Ashley. I was able to reunite with my friends and we arrived here safely." After passing through a strange place with none other than Yue, that is.
"I do worry about what has happened in Spira. I hope that everything will be alright." Between Sin and Althena's forces, though...
"It is strange," she remarks, on the topic of Gears. "Until I encountered Skadi, I had not been aware that I was capable of piloting one. Perhaps that is what they might call being a natural. Is that the correct phrase?" she asks Ashley, before the conversation turns towards Yue's predicament.
"...No. I do not. What was done to her and why..." She folds her arms over her chest, bowing her head a moment. "If I could remember, perhaps I would understand it. ...But I do not, now."
She is silent a moment, then lifts her head to look at him.
"...Forgive me. I have spoken only in roundabout, so let me make it plain: I, too, am a Veruni, but until recently I knew it not. I fear her situation and others may be my responsibility. I am... struggling to do what I am able, though I remember aught of the situation."
<Pose Tracker> Ashley Winchester has posed.
Hilariously, the very first time Ashley had any real contact with the greater drifter community was when a certain FEI FONG WONG thought that he was some kind of amnesiac Janus Cascade trying to weasel his way into their good graces. Have you ever seen Ashley and Janus in the same place at the same time? No!? Then perhaps... There is a conspiracy afoot...!
Probably not, though. They're different people! Just, maybe antimatter doppelgangers of one-another.
For his part, Ashley doesn't seem perturbed by Avril's presence, or that of the Ice Queen inside her. Maybe Lord Blazer just isn't aware enough to notice? Maybe that wanton force of destruction just doesn't care? Or maybe it doesn't recognize her power, so occupied as it is with the OTHER force that has taken up residence in Ashley's soul.
"I do too," Ashley sighs, thoughts turning briefly toward Xiumei's present crisis. What could they even do about that whole situation...? Right now, apparently just 'stew worriedly at it.' "It sounds like you've had a better time of things overall than we have, though. I'm glad, you seemed a little out of it the last time we met, so I was a bit worried, you know?"
"A natural, huh?" Ashley nods. "That's the phrase, yeah. I'd always thought you needed special training to use them properly, or at least a license--"
She's a Veruni.
The conversation hitches. This is when most (caricatures of) people would either run shrieking to the hills or drop to their knees in terrified veneration. Ashley just smiles and nods, "That so? So you're suffering from... Amnesia, or something like that? I'm sorry, that must be awful."
Ashley seems okay with it??
Clearly dealing with Irving Vold Valeria has taught him that humans can be much bigger assholes than Veruni ever could.
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.
It could be thus -- perhaps Janus took a significant knock to the head and has since renounced his evil ways and-- (no)
The fact of the matter is that while they have some physical traits in common, if you stood them next to each other they might at best look like distant cousins. Even their body types aren't precisely the same -- one honed by years of enduring the worst the wastes have to offer, the other through a stint of the soldier's life; the end result is at best similar but hardly the same.
"It was under difficult circumstances, the last we met," Avril replies, shaking her head slightly. "And if I am being truthful... there was a personal matter with which I needed to attend." Which may be putting it lightly: she had begun to realize the weight of what it could mean to regain her memories and face down her past fully -- of the actions and events and consequences of what it means to be the Veruni Queen. And while it is hardly a matter in the far distance behind where she now walks...
The pain of it, bit by bit, has eased somewhat.
There is for a moment the expected lull.
Aside from the brief air of wariness about her, though, there's little sense that she expected him to run away, screaming, or anything of the sort.
"Yes. To be precise... I still recall little, though I have learned who I am."
To be completely accurate, she remembers nothing.
Except, no That isn't quite right. She has a flash of a memory of awakening in a cold place, of her entire perspective narrowing to take in a pair of even colder eyes.
Even now, the thought of it that man is enough to make her shiver. Eyes that want nothing, that wish nothing, except for...
She gazes at Ashley again, regarding him as if attempting to pinpoint something or another about him.
No, it isn't just his resemblance to a certain other. There's... something else.
<Pose Tracker> Ashley Winchester has posed.
Also Ashley is just a little bit pudgier here and there. Especially when he smiles. His cheeks have dimples! This is entirely because of a life spent learning and living inside of Meria's most famous bakery (in its neighborhood, at least). Perhaps he's gotten a little more weighty in recent months in particular, as it seems a certain MARINA IRINGTON has seen fit to supplement his diet with many, many delicious treats.
Ashley can't put himself in danger if he's too full to fight... Right...!?
He'll be sure to come back to her if she sends him along with a taste that'll strum the heartstrings and tug at the homesickness, right!?!?
(He'd come home regardless. Ashley Winchester has a long-standing promise to uphold.)
"I can understand that," Ashley answers with an expression that suggests that he definitely thinks he can sympathize with what Avril is going through... Or at least, he's offering his condolences out of the sheer, animal empathy that underlies all human relationships. "Last time wasn't the best for us, either. I was dealing with..." Ashley's expression darkens for just a fraction of a second, enough to be passed off as the abortive beginnings of what would have become a wistful sigh, or perhaps just a bit of gas, "Something personal. Plus being chased down by Odessa and escaping the whale. It wasn't the best day."
Honestly, there are many ways that day could have been so, so much better. Not least of them because he'd been forced to remember... certain things, then.
So has Avril, it seems.
"...Yeah," Ashley's shoulders slump as he sets himself down onto a slab of rock next to the Chateau's approach. "I learned... A bit about what I am, too. Then, I mean." He shakes his head, trying not to conjure to mind those awful memories. The cold, desperate struggle for survival. The feeling of becoming something inhuman for the very first time. The touch of the alien shadow falling across his soul...
...And something else. Something warm and bright...
But he was trying not to remember. He fails, of course, because that's what happens when you try to not remember something. "At least we have that, huh? That we know something more about ourselves. Even if it isn't the nicest thing..."
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.
Technically speaking, her descent into that particular sort of horrifying realization about herself (the most recent of such, that is) had started weeks and weeks before, at the last stand in Luca.
But grappling with a warzone, alone, as the sense of the need to be somewhere urgently had again gripped her, had piled more fuel onto the fire.
And that wasn't taking into account what had been after -- once she had joined those falling into the ice.
Had trekked the length of the shrine beneath the lake with her fellow Veruni.
"Then it seems that it had indeed been a mutually poor day for us," she answers, ducking her head in a slight nod. "...Nevertheless, I am glad that I had been able to meet with you both, then. Eleanor had seemed to be in poor condition. I am glad that I was able to assist her." There is a pause. "That, and that drinking chocolate helped me, I think. I am not certain where I would have been had we not crossed paths."
She would have entered the shrine below in far worse a mental state than she had, for starters.
But she blinks, again aware of the presence that can only just be felt (or can it? or is she only imagining things? or is it deja vu, once more?) about the young man.
"About what you are?" she echoes, tilting her head to one side quizzically.
She, perhaps notably, has not yet opted to remark that technically she is the ruling authority of the Veruni.
Partially because of that all-important 'technically'.
Without her memories, she might as well not be the queen at all.
<Pose Tracker> Ashley Winchester has posed.
Ashley, too, had travelled that strange submarine shrine that had somehow been submerged beneath Macalania temple. How it had gone undetected for so long, he doesn't know. Had it been undetected? Or had the local priesthood seen fit to never tell anyone of its presence there...?
"You can say that again," Ashley answers with a sardonic, dull-eyed chuckle. "But... Yeah, I'm glad you ran into us, then. The way you were walking around out there in the cold all alone... It got me worried, you know? What if you had run into Sin in that state?" It could have been awful!! But maybe not in the way Ashley would expect. Maybe it would have been awful in the same way that throwing Lord Blazer at the doom whale could have been. "Oh, that reminds me though! Since we're back in Aquvy, you should really swing by the Irington Bakery, back in Meria. We don't just sell pastries, you know! If you liked that hot chocolate, you'll definitely love what we sell at the bakery."
'We' he says. Apparently Ashley works at a bakery?
In addition to being a soldier!?!?
"I'm glad you were around to help Eleanor, too. Honestly, we all needed a bit of... Kindness, then, I think. After everything that had happened, and with everything that was about to happen..." Ashley shakes his head, again trying to banish those memories from his head. He can't. They repeat again. It's something he'll just have to learn to deal with.
But then Avril asks something... Important. Something that makes Ashley pause thoughtfully. It takes him a moment to form the right words, then: "...What would you do, if you found out that you had... Something inside. Something that you always knew was kind of... dark. But you never knew just how dark-- and then all of a sudden, you discover that it was responsible for something unimaginably horrible? And, worse, that you have to learn to use that darkness, and that everything would be even more awful if you didn't?"
"Asking for a friend," Ashley says, lying in the most obvious 'don't think I'm crazy, please' sort of way imaginable.
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.
On that, perhaps it might remain a mystery -- there is little way now to be certain what was known.
She knows only that she had undergone a descent into the dark and the cold--
It had been unpleasantly familar, in a way she has yet to fully fathom.
"I felt as if... I had been searching for someone," she says, her gaze distant a moment. "But perhaps... I may have found them?" She cants her head just a little bit to the left, as if to think the matter over. "I have often wondered if I might have some deeper connection to the Ley," she explains, the best way she's found to cover her sense at times that 'something will happen' or 'that there is somewhere she must be'. "At times it seems my intuition steers me right, yet at others it falters. ...I am thankful it was able to steer me true that day."
That she found people she could help and not, say, had an encounter with Sin that may have proved her worst suspicions about herself true.
Particularly in that state, then.
Instead, she'd had some very good hot chocolate!
"Oh, I see. Then, you also work there?"
Avril just takes it in stride because even though she has gained much necessary knowledge in her travels about the nature and ways of the world--
'Is in ARMS, a soldier, and also works at a bakery' seems plausible enough to her. Maybe it's even how things work, around here.
"I shall remember to do so, then. If you have any more of the 'hot chocolate', I believe that my friends might also wish to try it."
Again: a casualty of having to learn several things and mores and customs herself, as if she had never been exposed to them before.
Which is, spoiler, because she had not.
"Yes. She seems to be a kind person," Avril remarks, of Eleanor. Even if every time she looks at Eleanor, it seems like Eleanor is trying not to look at her very hard.
But the topic diverts after this point, veering off towards the burden that Ashley bears in his heart.
Of this, he voices some, Avril's own gaze growing steadily downcast the more he goes on. It's no absolute mirror -- she has the sense nearly that the power within her is perhaps something she must not touch -- but the parallels are stark.
"I think..." Avril hazards at last, beginning slowly.
"I think that I would understand what it was that your friend had been going through."
<Pose Tracker> Ashley Winchester has posed.
"The Ley, huh...?" Ashley asks-- though from the tone of his voice, he's not quite sure what 'ley' actually is. "I think I've heard Lilka and Marivel mention it once or twice, but I'm not all that familiar with it, myself. Seems like I'm having to pick up a whole lot of stuff pretty quickly, these days." Stuff like 'THE BLAZE OF DESTRUCTION IS REAL' and also 'Reploids like to eat pastries????'
Ashley's world has been turned thoroughly on its head this past year.
"I do!" He says of the bakery. "I also live there. The Iringtons have taken care of me since I was a boy, and I picked up the family business during my time there. But Marina's honestly a better baker than I am." He speaks fondly of home, with notes of warmth and nostalgia powering through his own self-inflicted dreariness. "We've got all kinds of things. Hot chocolate is definitely on the menu, but we carry a whole bunch of different coffees and teas, too. Just let me know when you're bringing your friends around, and I'll be sure to be on hand to make things up special."
Ashley doesn't care much that Avril's social norms are WEIRD AND ALIEN. He was just on the moon! Alien is normal now! Also, he might have just won over a few new regulars, and ultimately the bottom line is more important than a little conversational discomfort.
But the discussion shifts away from comfortable topics soon enough. Ashley has just suggested he might in fact be a crazy person, but... Somehow, Avril is able to sympathize? The Musketeer smiles sadly and turns his face toward the sky, "Is that so...? Well, I'll be sure to tell my friend just that. And if you ever want to talk about that thing you both understand, you just let me know. I think maybe we might be able to help each other."
(Ashley... Is really bad at lying.)
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.
She appears to consider his confusion regarding the nature of the 'Ley' seriously enough. "Hm... I suppose you might compare it to the power of a Shaman, though it appears my own is hardly as reliable. I suppose it might be some sort of intuitive understanding, then?" Though Shamans don't usually have intuitive insights of quite this nature, do they... and for that matter, if she's a Veruni with this power, that would make her some sort of outright anomaly--
But then, Ashley might not know this much. Yet.
"It is... I suppose you might term it the power of the world itself. It seems that I am able to tap into this force, somehow."
In a way that even she is not entirely conscious of.
"Oh, so I see... then, it is much like Rebecca's family and Dean?" She smiles a little -- almost fondly. "She seems to be someone important to you," Avril remarks, perhaps picking up on the emotion that tinges his words, whether he knows it or not.
"Then, that is precisely what I shall do," she says, brightening properly for the first time in the last few days (since the manifestation she'd had and the rest of it at the Chateau). "I believe we all might need something 'special' soon."
Her awareness of social norms might be a bit 'off' by most peoples' standards but even she well understands the value of just having a good time, with friends.
And some good food.
(Especially some good sweets.)
But, alas, such happier subjects don't last -- Avril has to ask the difficult question and she gets quite the difficult answer.
One that resonates.
"Yes... if they would care to speak of it more, sometime..."
She bows her head a moment, as if to reflect on this very subject.
"...Perhaps, then, we might do ourselves both some good."
(It's an open question if she can tell if he's lying or not, though...)
<Pose Tracker> Ashley Winchester has posed.
Ashley is a simple man, relatively speaking. As simple as a person with LITERAL SATAN sealed up inside his mind and soul can possibly be. He was raised in the Granasian tradition, with all the guilt-tripping and brainwashing that involves, which means...
"Shamans... Those are the people that worship those Guardian things, right?" Ashley asks, apparently THAT in the dark about how this whole 'magic' thing works. "Huh, well... I'll take your word for it, then! Heheh." Ashley might have to learn how the world's lifeblood pumps through its veins at some point, but that day is NOT TODAY.
(That day is in the far future, when they need to go activate the RAYPOINTS...!)
"I'm guessing Dean and Rebecca are those friends you mentioned, then...?" Ashley asks with a genuine smile. "I'm glad that you've got people you can rely on, too. A home to go back to is... Really important, you know? Flowers can't grow well without sunlight. It's just the same for people." The analogy, clumsy though it may be, is communicated with an abundance of warmth, "Marina's... We've been together since we were kids, you know? She means a lot to me."
(MARINA IRINGTON SINCERELY WISHES ASHLEY WOULD FIGURE OUT WHAT THAT ACTUALLY MEANS)
"Good, I'll look forward to it. We'll stock some fresh cocoa, just for you guys," Ashley says, as the topic rebounds this way and that, but finally settles into a more relaxed, if still somewhat somber tone. "You let me know about when would be a good time for that other thing, too."
<Pose Tracker> Avril Vent Fleur has posed.
"Yes," Avril answers, on the topic of Shamans.
She has... not had much experience with the Granasian tradition -- most of those she has met with have favored more Guardianist leanings. This may become very much evident, very soon.
The subject of home -- and friends -- at least is a happier topic in an otherwise less-than-happy-tinted conversation between the two of them.
"A place to go back to... a home..."
Where is her home, now? Wayside, perhaps? Capo Bronco?
"Yes... without the sun, there are no flowers. But, let us not forget: not only the sun, but the rain, and the embrace of the soil. A flower needs many things in order to bloom brightly," Avril says, "And the same is true for people."
A home, friends and...
What else but a dream?
"I will," she speaks, to that promise.
To both of them.