Davesprite (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
mrcreamsicles) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
snowblindrpg2017-08-02 01:28 am
mrcreamsicles) wrote in snowblindrpg2017-08-02 01:28 am
[log] too corvid to be a carrier pigeon [closed]
Characters: Davesprite, Billy, and Dorian
Location: Building 48
Date: Night 265
Summary: Davesprite has a delivery for Billy, and also Dorian is there.
Warnings: Discussion of torture and imprisonment, facial scars resulting from that. Other/specific warnings will be noted as necessary
48: The only doors in this single-story house are the front door and the bathroom; all other doorways are separated by faded green and yellow curtain beads. Even the bedroom gets this treatment, and it's the same for the living room and kitchen. The beads seem to be made of glass; moving through the house is a bit of a noisy affair. The bead curtain leading into the living room has been torn down, with half of the strings now scattered on the floor and some of the beads shattered, leaving a small mess of glass. The sharp bits of broken glass have been swept to one side, out of the way of anyone walking. Small, finger-sized slits have been cut into the couch. "ALPHONSE ELRIC, MAMI TOMOE, FREYA CRESCENT, GREED, EDWARD ELRIC, STEPHANIE BROWN, DAY FORTY THREE, TRAVELLING NORTH-EAST." has been written on one of the walls. "ALPHONSE ELRIC, STEPHANIE BROWN, EDWARD ELRIC, GREED, DAY SIXTY-SIX, TRAVELLING NORTH-WEST. DEAR FORMER RESIDENT, WE ARE FRIENDS, PLEASE DO NOT FEEL YOU NEED TO HIDE FROM US. CONTACT LELRIC." has been written on the walls. "ALFIE SOLOMONS, 1922. Camden Town, London, England, UK, Europe, Earth. Day 133, January 23" is carved onto a wall.
Location: Building 48
Date: Night 265
Summary: Davesprite has a delivery for Billy, and also Dorian is there.
Warnings: Discussion of torture and imprisonment, facial scars resulting from that. Other/specific warnings will be noted as necessary
48: The only doors in this single-story house are the front door and the bathroom; all other doorways are separated by faded green and yellow curtain beads. Even the bedroom gets this treatment, and it's the same for the living room and kitchen. The beads seem to be made of glass; moving through the house is a bit of a noisy affair. The bead curtain leading into the living room has been torn down, with half of the strings now scattered on the floor and some of the beads shattered, leaving a small mess of glass. The sharp bits of broken glass have been swept to one side, out of the way of anyone walking. Small, finger-sized slits have been cut into the couch. "ALPHONSE ELRIC, MAMI TOMOE, FREYA CRESCENT, GREED, EDWARD ELRIC, STEPHANIE BROWN, DAY FORTY THREE, TRAVELLING NORTH-EAST." has been written on one of the walls. "ALPHONSE ELRIC, STEPHANIE BROWN, EDWARD ELRIC, GREED, DAY SIXTY-SIX, TRAVELLING NORTH-WEST. DEAR FORMER RESIDENT, WE ARE FRIENDS, PLEASE DO NOT FEEL YOU NEED TO HIDE FROM US. CONTACT LELRIC." has been written on the walls. "ALFIE SOLOMONS, 1922. Camden Town, London, England, UK, Europe, Earth. Day 133, January 23" is carved onto a wall.
no subject
[He announces his presence with a knock and then a caw once the door is open.]
Special delivery. 'Sup?
[He's dressed ridiculously, and a weird orange bird dude besides. But if neither of them happen to be there yet, or else later after first meetings, Davesprite will settle in somewhere to read a book dug from his backpack. It's a crappy romance novel. Karkat is the one to blame for that.]
no subject
Well, you're memorable. Hello, Dorian of House Pavus.
[He bows and sets his pack down and sits beside it, leaning against a wall away from the glass.]
no subject
Oh hey, you already know me. I'm Davesprite. Slim Shady, remember?
[So went the dumb joke, anyway. He shuffles a little closer and holds out a hand for a handshake, if Dorian will take it. Though his skin there is rough with birdlike scales and his nails are more like claws, he'll be careful to do no harm with it.]
Are you always this formal about everything?
[The bow, the "House Pavus" styling, the serah title from before...]
no subject
[Dorian returns the handshake uncertainly. Not a common gesture in his part of the world. He doesn't comment on the non-human biology.]
And yes? For the most part? Interminable hours of rhetoric classes tend to have that effect.
[He could try to stop but what next? Turning peasant?]
no subject
[The quotes are practically audible, enhanced by an eyebrow lifted above the rim of his sunglasses, though he stops short of miming them with his fingers. He does take his hand back post-shake, though. He doesn't mind Dorian's unfamiliarity so much.]
So, what, are you some kind of fancy noble dude where you come from? I just figured you for, like, something more fantasy-oriented given the other types I've run into. Has your world got elves? It's like that if it's got elves.
no subject
[He was a member of a body of mages similar to a Roman Senate.]
What about yours?
[The interest behind that question was genuine.]
no subject
[He flashes a thumbs up.]
Guess I don't got much room to calling anyone else fantasy when I'm looking like somebody shaped a bird man out of orange juice and forgot to put the legs on it, though. To make a long story short, I used to be totally human, but got melded with a crow later for reasons. The color and the tail are part of the process. We didn't have elves, dwarves, or goblins. Didn't really have magic either? Not until, like, later. My sister used it but not until this game started that ended the world and transported us off the planet to some other part of reality, and from there it all gets massively complicated. We did have trolls, though, except they were aliens from another universe, and dragons only existed for them but not us.
You want to tell me how magic works in your world?
no subject
Practice, practice, practice, and mathematics. And then more practice.
We're adjacent to a non-physical plane we call the Fade. Energy flows between the physical realm and the Fade. Everyone but dwarves has some level of connection to the Fade. Mages are those whose connection is strong enough to channel the energy we find there to our own purposes. From there, it's a matter of learning how to make the energy do what one wants.
no subject
[He lifts an eyebrow.]
As far as I know, all my sister did was alchemize some knitting needles and a wizard statue together. I don't know anything else about how she got it to work. Sounds boring, though, having to do math about it.
no subject
[It's not necessary to understand the math behind Thedosian magic in order to cast it. But knowing the math gives the magic more kick. Understanding how the spell is put together and why it does what it does lets the mage power it better. Dorian is a huge nerd.]
Alchemy is separate where I'm from. And I'm curious, a statue of a wizard or a statue that happens to be a wizard or...?
no subject
[It makes him nostalgic, really. He hasn't seen Rose or her house in years.]
Alchemy isn't really a magic thing in my universe, either. It's technology that basically combines things together to make new stuff.
no subject
[Dorian is really curious and frowning as he tries to picture that.]
It's also more explosive where I'm from.
no subject
Nah, but you could probably make that too. She made needlewands, which are basically just knitting needles but now you can cast spells with them. But if you want to talk explosive, she was real good at blowing things up.
What did magic and alchemy do in your world, then?
no subject
Wands, though. We don't use those very often. Larger foci are more efficient for our magic. Which can do a great many things. I focused my studies on the interaction between the Fade and the physical plane.
[He's his world's equivalent of a theoretical physicist.]
And setting things on fire. But others focus on healing or cold or entropy or throwing objects about. Any number of things, really.
Later! For book times.
He can't sleep.
Well, maybe he could if he tried. He doesn't want to try just yet, because - just because, he tells himself. Because he's not tired. Because there's a lot to do, like stumble over orange bird-men, which is what Billy's doing right now.
He stops, awkwardly, in the door. ]
-Oh. Hey.
no subject
[For what it's worth, he appreciates the warning the glass beads give him, and he looks up to see Billy's approach—and the scars marking his face. He winces before he can catch himself.]
[He has scars of his own, of course, but they sit mostly hidden behind the lenses of his sunglasses. He's still wearing them indoors even at this hour; common sense is for chumps, and the discomforting reminder of the lenses once grafted to his skin is worth putting up with if no one has to see sign of what was done to him. The worse things sit hidden beneath his clothes.]
Hey, man. You want your thing now?
[He sets his bookmark in place and reaches for his bag.]
no subject
He looks sideways, speculative, but doesn't ask about the sunglasses. ]
-Yeah. That'd be great.
[ For lack of anything emotional to talk about, Billy tilts his head to get a glimpse of Davesprite's book cover. ]
no subject
[It doesn't take Davesprite too long to fetch the right SD card out of his things. He zips the relevant pocket, then hands it over.]
Here. No need to hand it back, it's just the one-use kind.
[And that won't take but a moment to do, so.]
You down to chat any? So long as we're both not sleeping yet.
[Which seems to be the thing. He can't blame him after everything.]
no subject
[ Billy plugs the card in right away, but he trusts Davesprite enough that he doesn't need to investigate it right now. Instead he's relaxing a little - as much as he has since everything in the industrial zone - and tilting his head. ]
Yeah, sure. What's up?
no subject
[His gaze wanders sideways out at the room in general, and his fingers curl against the floor at his sides.]
We talked a little about your fiancé back in the cells. You mind if I ask more about that?
[Which is still kind of out of the blue.]
No biggie if you don't want to. Just, y'know, being engaged to an alien and all is kind of intriguing.
no subject
-Yeah, sure. Seems like it should be old hat for you, though.
[ What with the being an orange bird guy and... Karkat, existing. ]
What part of it?
no subject
[His feathers fluff up. Old hat for him? How is engagement to an alien old hat? Surely he doesn't think...?]
Jesus, no. No, look. Karkat's my friend. We're not...
[Not together, except they kind of are, and how is he supposed to ask about how human-alien relationships work if he denies it wholesale? But it's still not that kind of thing.]
We're not engaged. We're not going to be engaged. It's different. Marrying guys wasn't even legal on my Earth yet, let alone going for alien dudes. He's the one who wanted me to ask how that all works.
no subject
It's good that he doesn't, that would be bad. ]
Dude, I meant because he's your friend and he's an alien. I didn't think you were dating, calm down.
[ He pauses, giving a appraising look. ]
Is this - are you going to be weird about the gay thing?
no subject
[His feathers lay back smooth, he swallows, and he pretends with all his might that he was not just two centimeters from flipping out. It's fine. Billy probably wouldn't care even if it was like that, right?]
I'm chill.
[He's trying.]
I'm not going to give you shit for that. My sister's got her own alien girlfriend back in our world from what I've been told, and Karkat's whole species is so bi by default they don't even name the concept of being otherwise. If I do blunder into jackass territory by accident, then go ahead and call me on it.
no subject
He keeps staring for a moment, wariness clear on his face, before he makes a conscious effort to relax and sighs a little. ]
-Sorry. Guess I'm a little defensive about it. There's been some progress but... not enough.
no subject
[He nods a little to what he says, looks away, and lets out a sigh of his own.]
It's not you, it's...
[Nerves prick through his chest like needles.]
Karkat and I are... We're not like that, but it's an alien thing. Keep it quiet, aight? Enough people around here make assumptions about us without us saying dick about it, so when you said shit that way, I thought you were jumping on the bandwagon.
[He shrugs roughly. His head is turned partly toward him, but his gaze is still off to the side somewhere.]
Karkat could tell you how their whole romance thing works; they've got four kinds with different feelings and purposes to it. But that's—he wanted to ask because what if he gets to dating a human that way, how that works. And I got curious too because... even if it's not the kind where anybody gets married, he's still an alien, you know?
[The tips of his ears and what part of his cheeks is visible around the shades have turned a brighter yellow, and he tries valiantly to pretend no such thing is happening. It's harder to hide when his blood glows beneath his skin.]