(mostly open) oh this love would kill me

[entreats]

Who: Ange, Ruby, and you!
What: Ruby and Ange's wedding, and all their CR is invited!
When: Late October
Where: The rebuilt Clockhouse

Content Warnings: Semi-irresponsible weapon usage.




Sometime around the beginning of October invitations would have started to be sent out to the various people in Trench Ange and Ruby know - announcing the two girls' wedding at the end of the month.

When the day itself comes, people will find the location - the newly rebuilt Clockhouse, which some of the invitees may have helped rebuild in the first place - tastefully decorated. Some of the house's stranger features have been covered up by decorations in red and gold, mostly taking on the shapes of roses and butterflies all over the place.

Comments

[hauntedsavior]

Sorry, you don't think it would make my whole human life way easier if I could tap into magic like this?

[she is not sure if amusing beatrice is the best thing in the world to do, generally, but she'll take it here.]

I mean, your magic probably could've made this whole transformation of mine a little less painful, just for starters. [she waves her matte-black hand.]

[manyone]

Eh? Your transformation? I didn't know you'd undergone one. What sort of transformation?

[ Well now you've gone and opened the floodgates, Anna. ]

[hauntedsavior]

[oh, good.]

Oh yeah, dude. I'm a cyborg. [she unbuttons the top two buttons of her shirt and loosens her tie, and underneath the collar is a black seam that runs along her neck in a line.] Wasn't born this way, but... well, you're not the only one who's got a bunch of weird magic in her life, I guess.

[she looks at beatrice expectantly with her tie hanging looser around her neck and her shirt a little more open than it had been.]

I know you have questions.

[manyone]

A...cyborg?

[ That's a new word for Beatrice. She leans forward a little more to get a better look at the seam. Huh.]

That's a sort of artificial person, right? I never read much science fiction...Battler would know more I'm sure.

[hauntedsavior]

Yep. So, like, there's robots, which could be sentient but generally don't look like humans. There's androids, which are sentient and do look like humans. And then there's cyborgs [and she waves her matte black hand to indicate herself] which is a combination of machine and man. It sounds like science fiction, but it's absolutely science fact.

Not that any of it stopped this place. I didn't have blood for a while until I showed up here, so I guess life, uh, finds a way.

[manyone]

That's magic for you. It can do just about anything--even give you your blood back!

[ She nods along with the explanation, as if it makes any sense to her whatsoever. ]

So you have little bits of you that are flesh and little bits that are metal?

[hauntedsavior]

More like most of me is the metal bits. Everything from the neck down, and my head's the last original piece of me left.

[she could make that sound a little less worrying, but she chooses not to.]

But you spend enough time living in a little catbox of your own, no doubt some weird shit's gonna happen, right? Like, I don't know, maybe your neighbor wakes up with pink hair and a cape that they didn't have before, or maybe the whole city gets sealed off from the rest of the world by a giant invisible dome. Normal stuff.

[manyone]

What a strange box you must have found yourself in! And then to find yourself here... one wonders if this is simply a home for lost game pieces. Kihi!

[ She seems amused by that thought, at the very least. ]

[hauntedsavior]

Maybe life's nothing but a mixed up board game with a bunch of lost pieces running into each other.

[she tilts her head like she thinks she has a point, but she might just be talking totally out of her ass.]

All of us coming from places with different rules, ending up in this overgrown Mouse Trap and getting into Trouble with everyone Scrabbling to make a new life—without even a "Sorry!". [she raises her glass.] It's Ludo-cris.

[manyone]

Perhaps it is! We're all part of a story, one way or another!

[ Fortunately for Anna, Beatrice knows these are board games and so the joke doesn't fly over her pretty golden head like so many other pop culture references. There's a faint snort, a burst of cackling giggles. ]

Ludo-cris. Kihihi! Oh, yes. Perfect.

[ She grins, wide and toothy and excited. ]

I wonder what stories we'll find ourselves in next? This on ehas had it's happy ending, but then... stories don't really end in the nice, neat ways we wish they would, do they? They keep going, even when the characters think they should stop.

[hauntedsavior]

[see, that's a hell of a way to put it. this time, she does carefully consider what it is that beatrice is saying.]

I was pretty sure my story was at an end, too, you know? I had a solid, like, two years where everything was smooth, all the dust was settled, and I was just wandering around my city like nothing had ever happened. I mean, hell, I saw what my own future looked like, and it didn't have anything to do with the blood town where all the blood lives.

[but she's not keen on elaborating past that for the moment. even though she really could.]

Guess it just proves that there's no end to the kinds of surprises life will throw at you as long as you keep on living it.

[manyone]

Very true. I'm not used to surprises! It's rather nice to be able to be surprised again, after what feels like a thousand years of waiting for the same thing to happen all over again...

[ Beatrice grins. ]

Nothing to do but keep going, hm?

[hauntedsavior]

That's all there is. You keep moving forward, and maybe your little sister gets married and you meet the golden witch that she's told you so much about.

[a sly look. but she really hasn't heard much about beatrice—just that ange is... not fond of her. in several ways. she's about to deliver the most backhanded compliment she's ever delivered, and she might not even realize she's doing it.]

You know, Beatrice, I was worried you'd be more of a bitch, but you're really not that bad.

[manyone]

Ohhhh?

[ That grin grows, and grows. And grows. It's a terrible, inhuman thing that looks as if it might split her face in two if it grows any further. ]

I can be worse. I can be so, so much worse if that's what you really want, dearest little sister~.

[ Ange is her little sister now, and if Anna is Ange's sister then, well... she's also Beato's. ]

[hauntedsavior]

[anna very much tries to no-sell it, but she can't. the grin is almost inhuman and she can't stop watching. her eye goes wide and her stomach sinks just a little bit, and in a small voice, she finally says,]

No, I think I'm good. [she clears her throat to get herself back to normal.] Jesus. All right, maybe I see what Ange is getting at. Just don't get yourself killed by scheming bigger than your ass can handle, o mighty golden witch.

[manyone]

[ Kihihihihi! Beatrice cackles and her face settles a little into something that approaches humanity again. ]

I'm the eternal Golden Witch, dear sister. You don't have to worry about me.