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Joy, due to her daily professional life, had a certain stringent paranoia about exchanging sensitive information over any kind of device - let alone a magic ring that even now she did not entirely trust.

It occurred to her that she did not know if Grieve could read, nor if the ring could somehow magically account for this. This meant an even more complicated negotiation of competing desires, until she yielded to what seemed like the surest method of dispatching the information readily. It had been less than an hour since she'd casually slipped out of that hellish alley and then bolted hell for leather out of there, and although she'd physically caught her breath, she was distinctly frazzled in the message she dispatched - she wasn't even sure how - to Grieve, her voice clipped and quick.

“Met a big ******** guy in an alley. Thought he was a youma at first. He's looking for you with the world's shittiest wanted posters. Real drama queen. Got his name - Retribution -” this felt like enough without sacrificing her irrationally cautious standards of communication “- and he told me he's looking for you and another Earth knight. Lied and told him I didn't know you or her. Gave me something to give you. Please hit me up because I don't want him chasing after me for an update and I have no idea if this thing is ******** bugged or something, you know what I mean?”

It occurred to her that Grieve might not actually know what she meant. Ah, well. She then, almost in a hissed whisper, rattled off some places and times she could be found, including for the next two hours if Grieve was in a hurry although she left it open ended and offered to meet her, if that didn't work.

She wanted this to be over and done with. Having the thing on her person was unnerving, and she somewhat resented Grieve, blameless though she was in this single respect (and possibly nothing else) for dragging her into what sounded very much like personal drama. So she didn't hesitate to sweeten the deal: “Make it quick and I'll feed you,” she finished.

She was off-kilter enough to reflect that she had been a brand new page when she'd met Grieve - useless and fumbling. She didn't feel much like a Knight at the best of times, and certainly didn't right now. Something of that first meeting still shadowed her, and made her still instinctively consider Grieve as some vague and looming threat.

Whether it was that inherent personal softness or simply that pesky Earth knight honor, there were in fact nachos - not just any nachos, but a selection of nachos, guacamole and all, and also a few White Claws and a bag of churros.

She was eating out of the latter like it had personally offended herself and her family - perhaps the only destruction these soft knights were cut out for was demolishing baked goods - and pointed at the rest of the bags in lieu of a greeting.

"You can carry a message to Hy-Brasil too," she said, speaking freely enough since she'd chosen to have this little get-together as out in the open as possible. "I don't think I made a good impression on her when we met," she explained grimly.

Which had, of course, been less than half a year ago, but felt like an eternity. And looked it, probably - Joy herself no longer wielding a little scrap of ribbon but with a scarlet bullwhip coiled up and tucked into her belt, looking less damsel and more queen, if a queen ever turned away from a half-eaten churro to belch demurely over a can of White Claw.

She held up two fingers to address both points, putting them down as she went. Dropping the index finger first and leaving the middle one up was not strictly necessary, but was enjoyable.

“One, I agree with you, especially because there's bosomy damsels painted on every ******** surface of the place and the men are apparently just there to play lutes at them and bring them deer to eat, but I don't wanna give the Code credit for anything and I especially don't wanna blame my tits for me being in this mess, so let's pretend I don't agree with you.” She polished off the churro, talking with her mouth full. She couldn't imagine that Grieve, of all people, would care.

“And second, I don't want to hear it, no, but I reckon I probably should. Knowledge is power, or whatever. But first - he said something about telling Hy-Brasil that Heliodore’s husband said hi,” she recited, “and he gave me this and said if you thought about wanting to see him, it'd work for it.” As she spoke, she procured the pin from subspace and held it out, adding hastily: “But I'm pretty sure he wants to murder you, so maybe don't do that.”

"Is this entire city just gay polygamists?" she demanded, but it was an afterthought, really - a buying of time while she wrinkled her nose and considered the situation, seltzer suspended forgotten a few inches from her mouth.

"Why didn't they just kill him?" she asked bluntly, apparently fully of Grieve's opinion in this respect. "Or is there - like - a ******** magical crime scene investigation unit? But in that case kidnapping him is stupid too. s**t or get off the pot, you know?"

This was, in fact, most of what kept her from resorting to what was a tried and true Garde standby as much as bosomy damsels were - namely, sticking a sword in a problem before it could be a problem to begin with. "I didn't ask for this so I'm not going to prison for it, but if you're gonna kidnap someone you've clearly decided you're fine with risking it." She said this with some of that aloof condescension that came naturally to her, as if she were gazing down into an arena from her box in the stands and preparing to deliver the thumbs down.

“Why wouldn't I be?” she asked vaguely, apparently distracted by something Grieve had said. She made an equally vague gesture at her intact and unbloodied body.

Her eyes and voice snapped back into focus in the same moment. “If they're gonna try it'd be nice if they were less inept, but why are they?” This, briskly, with an almost schoolmarm disapproval. “If I have a duty it's not to go out of my way to participate in this farce. If it was real then - God, or whatever it is -” this, unfortunately, had the tenor of the old Garde as well, as cosmic metaphors went “- would give us real weapons instead of toys.” She irritably waggled the end of her whip. “Doesn't even break skin. Fake, fake, fake, right up until the death is real. Dust a couple youma, intervene in a starseed yanking, clock out and get some mimosas on the beach. Instead you get a thousand years of people playing sacrificial hardass and ******** it up the whole way.”

This was rapidly escaping being anything but a rant. She was worked up about something, or possibly everything. “So what about you?” She added, vaguely accusatory. “Are you gonna let yourself get dragged in with this ******** drama and killed miserable too? Is that your existence?”

She stuck out her tongue to blow a halfhearted raspberry, in the childish way of someone who wants to argue but realizes there's no point.

“Well. Crash on the Garde for a week, if you want, but not if you're gonna tell anyone about it or bring any drama with you.” She had scarcely said it before she regretted it, but it was too late now, and she stubbornly plowed ahead, somewhat bolstered by the idea that Grieve would probably not find the prospect very attractive. “Do some yardwork while you're there and make yourself useful,” she added.

Notably, she did not extend her offer to providing martial support for what she clearly felt was Grieve courting a violent death. If she was gonna run around telling new senshi and knights that she wasn't a hero, she shouldn't undermine herself now by trying to be one, even if avoiding it made her inwardly squirm a bit. She reached for another churro, and brandished it at Grieve like an angry teacher waggling a ruler. “He claimed he didn't wanna kill you, but he sure as hell was salivating over the idea that he might, so I don't believe him. Whatever you did to him got him real worked up. So don't tell him I know you, thanks.”

“Lucky you,” she said grimly. “The Garde left me some frilly ribbons and a couple of gold scarves.” And a many-headed terrifying dog, but she wasn't in the mood to give the title any credit, and therefore passed it over.

“And -” but before she could proceed to whatever disparaging language she was about to use to describe Gouvernail, she was interrupted by being buzzed somewhat insistently by a little ball of light, which she irritably waved away, wrinkling her nose up like she'd been assaulted by a bug. “- and whatever that damn thing is,” she finished. “Won't leave me the hell alone lately. Anyway. Good luck,” she said, attempting to drop back into a conversational tone and addressing Grieve around a mouthful of churro. “If you got anything else I need to hear, lemme know. Otherwise I don't wanna talk shop or Bullshit anymore, so pick something lighthearted or we're gonna have one hell of a one-sided conversation about Mistress Isabelle Brooks while you finish those nachos.”