closedish to cool guys having chill day

[megatheorem]

Who: a bunch of funky friends invited by Viktor and Palamedes*
What: Having a Party in a field with Fireworks
When: the second week-ish in May
Where: (the field outside of) Pal and Viktor's bunker in Gaze

Content Warnings: alcohol and teens drinking it, irresponsible use of explosives, see threads for anything else that comes up

*If you have friendly CR with Palamedes please feel free to handwave that he mentioned this happening, also if your character has CR with a Pal Friend (a pal^2) who would invite them along, he's broadly allowing this. It's not a formal affair in the slightest lmaooo

--

afternoon/evening.

Earlier in the morning on the day of The Fireworks Field Party (tm), Palamedes makes sure to send a quick location ping to anyone who's never been to the Sixth bunker (also tm) before, because it is, indeed, just in a field somewhere in Gaze. The treeline is comfortably distant from the door to said bunker, which is the only real indication anything is out here besides a few "big rocks" that he names, in his message, as landmarks.

As an afterthought, he has set up a little trail of mason jars containing glowing mushrooms to lead the way to The Field, helpfully. The Field is what it sounds like: a dang field, just slightly ominous in the Gaze fashion, although besides the usual somebody's-watching feeling, it's grassy and spacious for kitschy lawn games. Among the things Palamedes has provided (upon recommendation of a shopkeeper, so like, do not perceive his choices, they were made for him) include:

1. Just a load of blankets, big cozy ones dutifully spread out for chilling on, on the ground.

2. Throwing game Crossbones, definitely chosen because of the bones (they are wooden sticks), and just kind of left sitting there waiting because your host does not know how to play physical games.

3. beanbag horseshoes because it rocks

4. Just, like, a specific blanket that has pencils and blank paper sitting on it... This is a free station, no one will question what art happens here.

Harrow has also provided bone chairs for alternate seating, which are precisely what they sound like.

Eventually, the field will also feature a snack table, which is a community effort, and a booze table, which is slightly supervised in the way that your esteemed host(s) will not permit booze and cherry bombs at the same time.

And, because it's an open field in Trench, there is also a table where emergency incense is waiting. Wandering too far from the space immediately around the bunker (which, it's a big space, you'd have to go far) will eventually lead you to blood wards on the ground, on the trunks of a few trees, etc. Don't touch these. Don't be gross.


the fucken fireworks.

It's fireworks. Once it's dark, there are even more glowing mushroom jars and homemade alchemy glowsticks from Waver to be passed around, somehow, and at least some of the little beanbags glow in the dark, ooh!! Viktor has provided cherry bombs to be used with at least a little caution, for god's sake. There are also some slightly larger fireworks in much shorter supply, from a shop, that will be closely guarded until someone with pyrotechnics talent convinces Palamedes they deserve one. Godspeed.

Broadly: this is a fireworks party (tm) for individual wee ones you can throw around on your own, with only a brief smattering of the big ones that light up the whole sky above the field. It's a chill time for cool buds, fire safety is encouraged, so is vibing on the blankets and enjoying a nice evening.

At various times, local dope musician Anna Amarande will be providing some light musical entertainment, for vibes.


the bunker i guess.

The party is not in here, but for reference:
-it's locked via numpad and neither of these stickbug nerds are giving out the code but they'll open the door if asked... you don't have to leave the place to go to the bathroom lmf
-it's a bunker. it's one room and a bathroom in the back. it's full of disorganized nerd stuff and an oversized moon orb and pal's mean omen, rocky the cool rat (harpy eagle), who will aggressively flap at anyone with sticky fingers until they leave
-the code is 69420 so if you're super funny like gideon you COULD guess it

Comments

[peripheries]

Why would you stay away? He cares for you. He doesn’t want to see you harmed. Or hurt you. That’s another reason why you should be more careful. Seeing you like that was difficult for him.

[Kaworu is genuinely clearly baffled by this. He’d only wanted Lazarus to consider his bond with Paul and how his mistakes could harm him. Lazarus leaving would only hurt Paul further and that’s the last thing he wants.]

[hearthebell]

[This is something that a lot of humans, especially humans like L, would comprehend. The fact that Kaworu is no such being comes rushing back at the angel's confused words, and L's fortress crumbles a little. He can be like stone, truly, hard and unforgiving and cold, but when he's confronted by something innocent or childlike, he struggles to maintain the front.]

Sometimes staying away is the best way to care for someone.

[If you're rotten and awful and plan to trespass against God again, especially.]

What he still needs from me can be done at a distance, and... maybe it's better, so. I've made my peace with it already.

[So you see, the prideful part of him implicitly insists, you didn't have to say anything at all.]

[peripheries]

Not Paul. He's not that kind of human. He wants people close. He wants to care for them where he can touch them.

[A huff. He doesn't understand. Surely Lazarus cares for Paul, why can't he see this? Perhaps a case of humans being lost in their own minds, only able to see their own reality, instead of that of those around them. It's curious... that beings that are always with others struggle to understand them.]

He wouldn't want you to just leave.

[hearthebell]

[Kaworu doesn't know who he is talking to, not really, the same way that no one really knows who "Lazarus Sauveterre" actually is. And it's through no fault of his, because L does everything he can to deflect and divert attention from what made him sensitive, numb and hungry in ways that other humans are not.

Paul understands it a little, he thinks. Paul's drawn parallels to the mentats in his own world that have helped to frame the specific kind of person who sits in a padded box of a room with a computer solving problems, instead of being "always around others."]

I can't leave if I was never really there. He doesn't have to worry, and neither do you, I suppose.

[Only one person has reason to worry, he thinks, and hopefully he's far from that man's thoughts, written off as a thief put in his place.]

[peripheries]

[Kaworu cocks his head, silver strands falling over his face and red eyes tracing folded body posture as he looks over Lazarus, trying to understand what he means. The world for Kaworu is much more simple than it is for the man in front of him and it's hard for him to trace all these calculations.]

If there's a version of you in people's memories than you were here in some fashion. You always exist in two parts, you as yourself, and the one seen by others. And they'll carry that you with them.

[hearthebell]

[L's no angel, nor does he properly behave or feel like a human most of the time. He's currently wearing the face of something very devil-like.]

I'm glad he'll remember and carry my memory with him, truly. That's the right version to keep close, if you want to keep him safe.

[There's a false god to take down, after all, with an entire fleet of lapdogs.]

Was there anything else, Kaworu?

[peripheries]

You're... not supposed to leave!

[It comes out in a huff. A childish exclamation, with clenched fists and a stomp of a sneakered heel on the ground. This isn't what he wanted. He didn't want him to go away. He only wanted Lazarus to be more careful. That way he could stay close. That way things would be easier, better...]

[hearthebell]

I don't know what I'm "supposed to" do; I've never been in a situation like this before.

[While L is technically the adult caught up in all of this, there are so many ways he's not more mature than Kaworu or Paul, might in fact actually lag behind. His attempts to adhere to logic only make it more broken, worse.]

I believe that it would have gone differently, if he wanted something different. We all believe something... that's how we all get by. If you're an angel, you know something about that, right?

[peripheries]

I'm not that kind of angel. That sort of angel is made up by humanity to give weight to their beliefs.

[So... what does he believe? He's never been in a situation like this before either. He's never cared so deeply for someone that he would intervene to protect them, nor has he ever tried to talk to someone in a serious way to change their behavior. He's flying completely blind.]

But... I believe that humans are confusing. They believe things and feel things but don't know how to convey them to others. So sometimes they say the wrong thing, sometimes they say nothing at all, sometimes they say the opposite of what they really mean. If things always went the way they wanted, humanity wouldn't struggle with trying to understand each other.

[hearthebell]

[He avoids Kaworu's gaze. He never believed in real angels... but he never believed in real Shinigami, either, until one took his life. Maybe a part of him is always on the lookout for the supernatural and the divine, now, in case something real should again swoop in.

Just not God, Himself.]

Let me tell you something about humans.

Love and fear compel everything they do. It's not really much more complicated than rats running to food, or from a fire... humans will run towards or away away from things in the service of not feeling all kinds of physical and emotional pain.

What you find confusing is when people seem to choose pain, or reject comfort... but it's in service of the same principles. It means that somewhere there's less comfort and worse pain.

[peripheries]

No, that is the one thing that I was always taught and knew about humans. That is why my creators believed in the Human Instrumentality Project, to spare humans from that fate of fearing pain and desiring pleasure.

[They had discussed that before. And Lazarus had not had the response to it that nearly everyone else had. And Kaworu sees why.]

But since living with humans, I have come to understand how much they complicate things despite their intentions. They overthink their actions even if they know what their heart wants. Or they don't know how to act on their heart and so do nothing, to avoid causing pain in confusion. Above all, they desire connection but sometimes don't know how to find it.

...Paul overthinks and takes on burdens but he doesn't want to lose anyone. That includes you.

[hearthebell]

Of course your understanding of it has changed... you've come to know people who think of you as more than just "anyone."

[A part of him knows that Kaworu probably didn't mean it that way, but it's an open wound. Hearing that Paul doesn't want to lose anyone comes across as broad strokes, including the cherished but anonymous lost sheep as well as the hidden wolves.]

We Bonded in the first place because he knows I see some things he doesn't, and respond with his best interests as my first priority. I need you to at least try to believe that I work to spare him greater pain, in spite of your desire to make him happy.

[peripheries]

Is this really the only way it can be done?

[This isn't the outcome he wanted. He had hoped that things could be mended if only Lazarus tried to be safer. Then there wouldn't be the sense of doubt and uncertainty clouding over everything. He does believe that Lazarus is doing what he is doing out of a sense of duty to Paul, but does it have to cause them such misery? Must they keep suffering like this?]

[hearthebell]

There's never an only way that things can be done, but... it might be the best way, for now.

[Paul and Kaworu both spend most of their time in the territory of his enemy, as his friends, students, perhaps even disciples. It's personal, practically by design, the the Emperor is "home" to Paul when L has seen the snow of fallout and washed it from his hair, seen the journal, seen the way flesh and bone are just playthings in his hands to be mended or broken according to his whims.

He knows murderers better than he's ever known family, friends, or lovers. He's come to see aspects of all three in murderers, because humans run like rats to comfort, and now Paul follows a murderer like a father.]

Focus on being his comfort, in the meantime. I'll focus on his safety. Between the two of us, I truly believe it'll work itself out eventually.