2021-05-22: Never Look a Gift Vampire in the Mouth: Difference between revisions

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  • Log: Never Look a Gift Vampire in the Mouth
  • Cast: Xander Lovell, Riley Arwell, Erzebet Lefanu
  • Where: Luca - Port District
  • Date: May 22, 2021
  • Summary: Riley has committed the grave crime of forgetting his best friend's birthday. Luckily, someone is available to provide advice to fix the problem.

==========================<* Luca - Port District *>==========================

Luca is the largest port and second-largest city in Spira, located the southern tip of the archipelago's largest island. Its location as the central port for Spira's surrounding islands has turned Luca into a thriving economic hub; Besaid, Kilika, and a dozen smaller islands all send their goods to Luca for sale, and even the Al Bhed are known to trade here from time to time.

The port district is an immense, bustling area. The largest port in Luca brings in ships from across Spira -- from small fishing ships from Besaid to Al Bhed salvage ships to large sailing vessels from Bevelle -- and a massive market to match. A large seawall keeps the waters at bay, with piers extending out past the seawall into the water.

Luca remains as active as ever in the wake of the Guard occupation. Commerce must go on, and with the Guard controlling as far south as Kilika, the city is busy. Althenans, however, keep a close watch; Guard can be seen everywhere, and some rebuilt buildings are in styles seen on Glenwood and Meribus, instead of Spira.
<Pose Tracker> Xander Lovell has posed.

While it isn't the 'living it up' Riley may have been aiming for, Xander does take a moment to insist on shopping for possible ingredients with a bit of their extra money while they're here. Because leave it to Xander to ruin moments of a perfectly good vacation with pragmatism, sticking his attention to supplies and ignoring all of the markets offerings of other trinkets and souvenirs.

"Maybe I can reverse engineer some of these curatives..." he murmurs, looking over some of Spira's offerings of basic antidotes. He uncorks on to give a whiff, grimacing. Not a fan, it seems.

...But it's what they have to work with. Xander sighs and makes his modest purchase with some basic potions concluded before returning to browsing.

"It doesn't seem like they brew their own. Can't even ask questions..."

He is mostly talking at Riley more than to him with his frustrated mutterings while he organizes his bag. "I hope I don't look up and see that you've already wandered off."

<Pose Tracker> Riley Arwell has posed.

Xander may be determined to do practical shopping, but while Xander murmurs at him regarding alchemical concerns, Riley is idly scanning the other nearby shops in case they do pass something more fun. Xander's birthday is soon, right? He should try to slip away and pick up a gift while they're here in civilization. What... day... is it now, anyway? He's going to need to figure out how to convert Spira time if he doesn't want to miss it. Let's see, when they set out, it was in about a week, and it's probably been...

Way... over... a week.

OH NO. OH NOOOO HE MISSED XANDER'S BIRTHDAY. PROBABLY WHILE XANDER WAS HALF DEAD OF THORNS IN HIS LUNGS, STOICALLY PRETENDING HE DIDN'T CARE AS HIS SPECIAL DAY WENT UNMARKED...

"Oh no! Xander! My poor, precious Xander!!" Suddenly Riley is squishing Xander's face in his hands, giving him a look of tragedy. They are in public. Riley seems not to care.

"Xander, you have been so brave in the face of this terrible betrayal at the hands of the person who should be looking out for you the most..."

<Pose Tracker> Erzebet Lefanu has posed.

 
The markets contain a range of people, often in eccentric dress. One of these people's eccentric dress is:

* A big straw hat - like, big enough that it could be an amateur umbrella, and indeed it has some gauzy fabric that drape veilishly over the brim
* A white fur coat that has been cut down to a bolero jacket size, but remains furry
* A yellow bikini under it
* Chunky straw-and-smoked-glass sunglasses over another, normal pair of glasses
* A 22-inch-long cigarette holder, currently oriented towards the ground as if dowsing for Lucarock
* Open toe heels

Erzebet Mara Lefanu looks ridiculous, but in Spira, she only looks kind of ridiculous. She had been eyeing the medicine table and was perhaps three arms' length away from Xander when Riley immediately remembers what day it is, was, or will be, and Erzebet looks upwards, as if startled awake. She shifts sooner when she hears 'terrible betrayal', as if hoping to hear or oversee something, and reaches up to take off her sunglasses, revealing her ordinary glasses.

<Pose Tracker> Xander Lovell has posed.

This is worse than wandering off.

Xander is, helplessly, squished. In! Public!! It may well be this indignity (and a SQUISHED FACE) that keeps him from his usual paranoia and sensitive to the possibility of being watched.

...That and Erzebet is, indeed, only kind of weird by Spira standards, especially for Xander, for whom everything weird has blurred together into Weird Normalcy.

He sighs out his annoyance, his voice already exhausted: "What did you do this time?"

<Pose Tracker> Riley Arwell has posed.

"I forgot your birthday," comes the mournful confession.

"You weren't even going to mention it, were you? You were just going to go on like nothing was wrong... like you hadn't been robbed of your birthday... but it's obvious... the pain in your... eye."

It seems they have drawn a small audience, a woman who is strangely dressed even by the standards of their unfamiliar surroundings. Riley turns to this onlooker plaintively. Since he has hold of Xander's face, he also turns Xander toward her.

"Even you can see the pain in his eye, can't you?"

<Pose Tracker> Erzebet Lefanu has posed.

 
"*gasp*" Erzebet says at the confession from Riley. The camp-as-hell holder gets taken out of her hand and held to the side, almost jabbing a passing chocobo in the eye and making it flinch. There is no disaster, yet, but it was a near thing.

Erzebet tucks the sunglasses into her top.

She looks at Xander.

"Well, you're pressing on his orbital bone a little with your face-rubbing, darling," Erzebet says to Riley. "Why did I call you darling? You look like a darling, I guess." Back to Xander, she says, "You should claim his life now, if you want. This is a mortal failure. I always hold it against people who miss my birthday."

<Pose Tracker> Xander Lovell has posed.

"It isn't anywhere near my birthday yet--" But Xander pauses, and then his eyes wander as he searches his thoughts, mentally trying to calculate the days. It was -- wait. It had been about a year since then -- they had that conversation already. But his sense of time is still...

For a brief moment his head is manipulated toward Erzebet, there might not be pain, but there is a certain emptiness before the fury of a cat getting a bath alights within Xander as he tries to pry Riley off of him.

"Don't drag other people into this!"

Xander's fit pauses because calling out the pressure on his orbital bone, specifically, is somehow one of those things that catches Xander's attention. ...Her suggestion is taken and evidently considered as he casts a new glare at Riley.

"I might claim it if he doesn't let go of me."

<Pose Tracker> Riley Arwell has posed.

It isn't anywhere near my birthday yet--

There's a faint look of surprise as Riley realizes Xander genuinely lost track of the time, too. Maybe even moreso, given the... everything. That's all the more reason Riley should have been paying attention to things like that on his behalf, though....

Erzebet suggests Riley is putting pressure on Xander's orbital bone, and Xander demands he let go.

Riley releases Xander at last. He looks at Erzebet with a sigh. "He already claimed it for my last mortal failure. He just hasn't gotten around to taking it yet."

<Pose Tracker> Erzebet Lefanu has posed.

 
Erzebet considers this, and one of her glasses' lenses gleams orange for a moment for no clear reason. It's enough of a sort of 'wipe' that it might just be a cloud. Her other hand goes on her hip.

"Oh, I know the feeling. I have all sorts of people I've loved (and I can tell there is a deep reserve of affection here) who have completely, lethally betrayed me. BUT," she continues as she looks at Riley, "there IS a route to resolving this problem... material goods."

<Pose Tracker> Xander Lovell has posed.

Freed at last. Xander sucks in a long breath and tries to will his flushed complexion back to pale.

"This isn't the first birthday of mine you missed. It's pointless getting worked up over it now."

Unfortunately, Erzebet's comments do nothing to help Xander chase away the heat in his cheeks. A deep reserve of affection. "What."

Wait, also, how is she so casual about being betrayed? Hold on --

Then she makes her suggestion, and Xander looks from her to Riley and back again.

"What."

Don't encourage him...!

<Pose Tracker> Riley Arwell has posed.

This isn't the first birthday of mine you missed.

Ouch. Right, those three years they were apart... "That just makes it even worse...! And what if it's the last chance!"

He blinks slowly as Erzebet commiserates not just with the text of the mortal failure thing, but with the literal unspoken meaning behind it. ...He did leave it unspoken, right? For a moment he's unsure. That was awfully specific. And why is she saying things like that, who is this person...?

"I see you... understand." Strangely thoroughly. There's a cautious squint. "A gift is a start, but shouldn't there be more...?"

<Pose Tracker> Erzebet Lefanu has posed.

 
"What what," Erzebet answers Xander, taking a long drag off the holder and exhaling into the slipstream of the marketplace as her arms fold loosely.

The last chance?

Erzebet seems troubled, or melancholy, at what Riley says, looking at Xander again with new eyes. She seems to be considering something, and the thought is troubling her, before she leans forwards. "Well, it has to be a highly specific gift, a personal gift, something that shows you know him, that you understand him. It must come from the heart, you know? Selfless, proof of your willingness to sacrifice, to pay attention. The easy part is, as long as you *try*, it will kind of work."

To Xander, she says, "As for your part, you do usually get expected to accept such things with grace when they come with real sympathetic esteem. Let me tell you as a free-roaming stranger, though, that you have some real spirit here. I can tell the blood's up; this isn't a selfish attitude!"

"Because that's the worst, isn't it, when they're not really addressing YOU, they're addressing their own interior feelings which happen to include you as a signpost," Erzebet says to Erzebet, but aloud quite clearly. "They talk to you and then they don't talk to you and then they act like it is your fault that you didn't notice what they were doing, or they imply oh, it could have been different, if ONLY you had the powers of telepathy and prescience and also were willing to DO everything FOR me -"

oh no! a bitter person!

<Pose Tracker> Xander Lovell has posed.

And what if it's the last chance!

Again, he does not see Erzebet inspecting him for answers because his attention snaps entirely to Riley. Xander grabs his arm suddenly, fingers sinking in. "It's not going to be the last."

He can say that with as much conviction as he wants, but it doesn't change the reality of their situation.

"This isn't important," he mutters, but it's quite likely lost in Erzebert's heartfelt advice. Xander goes silent, arms crossed while he looks away -- only to suddenly flinch to attention when she turns some to him.

"Uh. R-right." Successfully instructed?!

But Xander's shock gives way to a grimace of sympathy. Bitter people unite...!

"...I'm going to go with you don't owe them any flavor of grace after all that."

<Pose Tracker> Riley Arwell has posed.

Erzebet, free-roaming stranger though she is, delivers what seems like a deeply thought out set of specifications for how to get back into Xander's good graces. Riley considers it as seriously as though she were a noted expert on the topic. "I have a gift in mind that should fit the bill for some of that. I don't know about the sacrifice part, though..."

It's not going to be the last.

Riley looks back uneasily at the intense reassurance. Xander's determination is what got them this far. And it's probably important to his coping strategy to believe things like that when he says them. But another whole year is a lot to take for granted in their situation. "Well, we have to go back and make a big deal retroactively, just in case."

Ezrebet seems to veer off into recounting a grievance that is probably not about birthdays. "...Are you also looking for advice on a specific situation?" They pulled her into their business, they might as well reciprocate.

<Pose Tracker> Erzebet Lefanu has posed.

 
Erzebet considers matters.

"To be honest," she says, "yes, I am, a little. I had someone I went to school with who I cared about very much, and when I brought her into something wonderful, she looked around and... well..."

"Ohhh, you both have your own problems," Erzebet says, with a somewhat crooked, or over-flat, smile. "Are you just now in Luca, though? I've come here for vacations - what -" She counts on her fingertips, "FOUR times at this point, I know all the good little shops that survived the brutal internicene theological conflict!"

<Pose Tracker> Xander Lovell has posed.

"Don't do the sacrifice part," Xander says to Riley. Then, with a small fluster: "Wait, none of this is necessary at all!"

But his grip relents, and he looks away, voice softer for it. "...But. Fine. Do whatever you want." Such gestures and indulgences are Riley's own method of coping, no matter how much Xander wants to crush the sentiment of just in case under his heel.

"Everyone's got their own problems," Xander says to Erzebet. "It's fine to go off about your school friend thinking what you had to offer wasn't good enough and expecting you to come up with something else entirely or whatever. Though if she couldn't work up the nerve to tell you everything to your face, maybe it's all a misunderstanding."

Xander's listening, but he's not sure how the pieces he's picking up connect yet. As always, temptation leads him to fill in the gaps with some projection.

<Pose Tracker> Riley Arwell has posed.

Don't do the sacrifice part.

"Instead of a sacrifice, how about... a song?" He was working on one anyway, when he thought Xander's birthday was coming up soon instead of already past... A song and a new dagger ought to show he's been paying attention. Although he wishes he'd been paying enough attention to figure out where Xander keeps all the other daggers. But all relationships need a few mysteries.

Ohhh, you both have your own problems.

Riley lifts up his hands in a gesture of request. "If you only tell us half of it, we'll be left trying to make up the rest on our own after you leave..."

He is rather impressed that Xander is willing to give advice without the other half of the story, though. Riley tends to think that Xander cares more about other people's feelings than he likes to admit...

<Pose Tracker> Erzebet Lefanu has posed.

 
"I'm a woman of mystery, I'm into that kind of thing," Erzebet answers Riley.

Is that what dressing like you went fishing in the back of the festival supply house means? That you're a woman of mystery?

"Mostly I'm just conflicted," she says to Xander. "On the one hand I want to ignore her completely and on the other hand I want to reconcile, and on the other, other hand, I want to rip out her throat and suck the hot blood from her body as she shrivels in an anoxic agony. You know what I mean?"

"You sing?" she asks Riley.

<Pose Tracker> Xander Lovell has posed.

Dressing like she went fishing in the back of the festival supply house certainly adds a lot of questions. And what are mysteries but questions?

Xander settles with Riley's offer. "I wouldn't hate a song," he says, with only the absence of harsh edges in his tone to convey what an understatement that is.

Erzebet continues on, and Xander gives her his attention. "I do, at least a little. Maybe not as far as wanting to ignore him completely..."

Wait, but the other thing--?!

"...But it's more likely you'll regret not trying to reconcile most of the three." He gives a vague gesture. "You can always fall back on the throat thing later."

<Pose Tracker> Riley Arwell has posed.

I wouldn't hate a song. Somewhere along the line, Riley decided that was Xander for 'I'd love that,' and he smiles warmly.

I'm a woman of mystery, I'm into that kind of thing.

"In that case, I'll be sure to come up with something extra weird for you," Riley promises. That becomes all the more true when she mentions ripping someone's throat out. One of the 'delights' of the curse of the Fangs is that those sorts of images come into their head all the time on their own as a way of trying to nudge them to kill. Riley can usually screen them out in the early stages. But with the unexpected, colorful description, Riley finds himself picturing it vividly enough that he has to grip himself by the elbows to keep from some reflexive act of violence.

He glances at Xander. "She's a real person, right? There's no chance we're both hallucinating her at the same time?"

He shakes his head, to clear it. "Errr, yes, I do sing!"

<Pose Tracker> Erzebet Lefanu has posed.

 
"Mm. Maybe," Erzebet says. She points the cigarette from earlier at Xander, though, and says, "But if I am TRULY upset and hurt, would I not have cause to simply... cut it out of my heart, and let the wound regenerate? Leaving aside the throat thing, obviously."

To Riley she beams. "Wonderful! I"ll look forward to it. Though, I guess I'm inviting myself to your party already, how rude of me!"

"I'm absolutely real," Erzebet says, holding out her hand. "Here, feel." (Her hand feels like a normal hand, although she is palpably cool to the touch and has surprising muscle tone.) "I'm Erzebet. If you're both hard up I'd be glad to treat you to lunch, but that's unfortunately as far as the mysterious lady of mystery budget can extend this afternoon."

<Pose Tracker> Xander Lovell has posed.

"You would, especially if she won't meet you half way," Xander asks of heart cutting. "But if you're willing to go that far... what have you got to lose giving her what for about it to see if she will first?"

Xander catches Riley's reaction to the gruesome description. He reaches out, squeezing his arm, but not without inward guilt. Riley has more... resistance. More revulsion. Xander lets himself sink into it, and maybe that leaves it less sudden for him to have to push against.

There's no chance we're both hallucinating her at the same time?

"That's... not impossible," he's forced to admit, hissing it in a lower voice than Riley asked him with. If they share dreams, why not waking hallucinations? "But I don't think --"

She offers her hand, and Xander does not take her offer to touch it.

"No, that's -- that's okay." He intends to mean both things, but he lives in a world where Riley's responses to such offers are what controls his fate.

<Pose Tracker> Riley Arwell has posed.

Riley gives Xander a quick grateful glance at the small gesture of reassurance when he finds himself dealing with the spike of bloodlust.

He pokes at Erzebet's hand, wonderingly. She does seem to be real. So it's just a coincidence then that she keeps bringing up things that, er, resonate?

Though, I guess I'm inviting myself to your party already, how rude of me!

"...For once, I think I will refrain from torturing Xander and not sing his song in front of anyone else." Beside that, he's not sure he's finished with all the lyrics, yet. "But I'd be happy to sing something else for you over lunch." They met someone weird, Xander, of course he wants to keep her! "I'm Riley, and this is Xander. I also think you should reconcile, by the way, but I'm admittedly filling in the details in a way that makes the villain someone like me."