Welcome to Gaia! ::

The most exciting part of the enlisted ranks seemed so far to be the lack of needing a gym membership to become Ray Ewry and Peter Parker combined. It made getting past boarded lower floors into the city's dystopic abandoned buildings easier and she'd taken to bringing a small backpack with a camera in it in case she had need of an impromptu shoot, a great angle, or some found art.

And it meant one could find art. Derelicts had a habit of attracting taggers mostly and in rare, glorious instances, actual graffiti artists. It was so close to installation art in a way, certainly large scale and bold.

Practicing her cricket from building to building, she hadn't expected, still, a full portrait. The click of her heels was only the moment of her landing on the level with the piece, looking at the painted woman with interest long before her eyes trailed to the varied browns of living hair and limbs, Schörl finally blinked.

She didn't immediately approach, keeping the distance of the edge to the wall between them while she called over confidently, "Yours?"

A senshi then...and so she knew a little better how to define the odd feel so close...the tangible aura. True auras. It gave credence to all those lessons of 氣 during meditations.

"Come un raggio di sole hai illuminato la mia vita!*"

"Bella donna...who beautifies the eyes....seduces the souls of men and women with her dark wiles. How you paint the world should enchant the senses with all the promises of the Fates."

"But......you mistake, with this beautiful woman. She is not bold enough, not glorified enough.. You betray your love for her. Here you have a whole canvas, but you make your piece so small. Why this wall, so hidden...so uncelebrated..? You should be doing this on the side of this whole building."



*like a ray of light you have brightened my life.

"Ah, I hear words truth, and that is good. But I hear words there that are very bad. You consider yourself an artist?"

She was blushing at a single instance of compliment, admitted this was her first. This was a delicat point of time. Painfully delicate. Like the Medici who took Michelangelo in, who corrected his proportion and the studio and the boy destroyed it in a fit, it was important how the corrections and critique were given with the tempermental kind. Done right they would soar. Schorl gave the girl the time to answer, but she could guess the answers.

She knew the succession she would ask to encourage it be the girls own realisations. "Paint covers paint, right?"

"And what is the statement you have with this? Is it made so small?"

if plan is to use the whole canvas anyway, and paint covers paint, then you can repaint over screwups and need not fear them. They are process, the are learning. They are not barriers

'mostly just my parents' She was young, ever so young and tender, then. But rumor was the same for most of the Senshi. The extended youth of the modern era making it no more easy for them to adapt to the ideals of war, no doubt. But in midst of war here was also a creative stroke.

"Ambition is excellent in art. So is being realistic, and knowing your level, and what you are capable of reaching and-" she punctuated the words by crossing the steps and slapping her palm against a section of unpainted wall, "grasping."

"Your queen..." Lieutenant Schörl turned most of her attention to what was complete and staring back at them both. No black bursts, dark colors, no energetic freak out. It was the first aura she'd felt other than the Negaverse itself. It didn't leave many options, still, among the possibilities. But wasn't that one titled a princess? Weren't they all pretty pretty princesses?

"This might be one of the first thank-you's to a monarch involving graffiti as portraiture. But that isn't bad. Different is good."

"Still...you are too modest with it. It is Graffiti, bella, it is private yes, but it is public still. Whether of not true isn't the point, but I have an anecdote for you. Banksy was abroad and painting on the West Bank barrier. An old Palestinian man came up to him and said it was beautiful. Banksy thanked the man, but the man held up his hand and said , 'We don't want it to be beautiful, we hate this wall. Go home.'.....graffiti is public. If what you paint is altered by others...that is how it should be. It is Graffiti. It is alive. It is in public space and part of public identity. It is your art and your idea only to begin, and then it grows. It should flourish from its idea and become a thing in the minds of all who look at it. But you must make it bold enough, large enough, and beautiful enough for that to begin with. To give this idea of thanks to this woman into the mind of all who see it. "

"This is a sketch. Like the masters made before the real thing. Let it be just that. Let it be here, start again. Start again tonight with your paint on the whole side over there and do not fear mistake or people making changes later. "

"What if they do? Sit over it like an egg then, but that isn't what art is meant for, nor artists, unless you want to go back on your earlier statement. Think, girl. What is it when a person creates day in and day out but shows it to no one? Therapy. Not art. Just therapy. Just a hobby. "

White mooners used as a perjorative....yes, this was one of those strange senshi. The ones with the eyeballs and the mirrors that there was cursory brief about. Allies not meant to be attacked.

"The child and the maiden and the crone. The child cannot stand to let the bird from their hand. Selfish she holds onto it until it starves or suffocates. The maiden cages the bird, that it will only sing for her. It sings only one song. The wise old woman leaves the birds to the trees, learns their songs and sings with them. Lo', they come to her hand and the music and wonder they wrought together! See, see girl."

"Do not be a child. Not unless-"

And Schörl's lips spread slow into a wide smile, "Strategically. Is it well known what she looks like, your queen? Would she be recognized by many that they would see it and think to deface it? Or just a few choice ....important people? Bait to the mouse and wait as cat for them. To paint and deface, their backs must be turned, must they not? What then? Where will you be? You could be waiting and have yourself a pretty time, deadly fate. Atropos belladonna."

"Capture, maim, kill, repurpose. Any are possible, if you think the lure could really work. Why fear the defacement instead of making use of it?"

And can all queens not also be the devil? We are all become the Arverni, the Iceni, the Gauls. We are Sparta. We fight superior forces and firepower, what disrespect is it that you find in lionization? Demonization? To every monarch that rules is both the Right Hand of the Sun and the Left Hand of Darkness.

"You have your paint here now. You have a lookout. What more do you need? " Schörl gave a flourish, "I will watch while you paint."

"Between the two of us, I expect would shouldn't have much trouble. "

"Four years Buonarroti stood and turned his face and brush to God, a halved house and wars interrupted before the work was finished...but...As you will, if it makes you nervous, Bella. I am no master over you or your Muse."

"Schörl. I have a prepaid no contract, if you would like. I keep odd, long hours, so don't worry about politeness conventions and all that 'after 10' business. "

She pulled it out from inside her waistcoat, navigated to the info screen and offered it over, " By all means."