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Sunny

Jack had stood frozen in indecision for a long time after Chauvet had fled, feeling like she'd missed her chance to follow, not wanting to get in the way of the other woman after she'd run after their mutual friend. Which in hindsight felt silly, but the with every passing moment the window for action narrowed forget and further until it felt as if it had closed completely and Jack was left feeling awful and little superfluous.

She wasn't sure how long she stood there after. Long enough for awaiter to offer her a glad of champagne, which seemed to snap her out of her own head and neck into the moment. With a murmur of thanks she accepted a glass made her way towards a row of artifacts.

Luck would leave her not waiting terribly long for her friend to reappear, and Jack moved through the gathering crowd to be at the front to listen. The page still looked upset, but calmer now. Stronger, in a way, and one she started talking, deviating from traditions of wonders to give her own thoughts and feeling voice, jack could see why.

A soft, proud smile blossomed on dark lips as she listened and she was grinning as a spectral figure throw something to the tall redhead. A fasp followed the split and the slight, and a barely contained cheer followed that as Chauvet moved from page to squire. *And God, she looked beautiful!*

At the end of it Jack didn't bother to hold back. Instead she was rushing forward to throw her arms around the taller woman's neck, and planting a kiss on the now-squire's mouth. Well, she had asked. "Congratulations!" It was a little breathless with joy for her friend's rise in rank, and maybe a few other things. "And happy birthday."

Nessy

Pendour smiled just a little bit when the girl said she’d met a few knights. It was the kind of smile that felt all coy and mysterious, like it was just a hint of her identity, even though she kneels that she was decked in Neptune symbols from head to heel.

She was given her own hints to go on in turn. Homeworld meant senshi, and not the broken kind. “I love places like this,” she said, smile going bigger. “I’ve been learning everything I can about them, seeing all the ones I can.” She took a moment to look further at the walls, the starry ceiling, the people swirling around who barely looked like shades at all, now.

She was, of course, oblivious to the one that targeted her, absorbed in other deatsils like she was, and lacking a proper amount of peripheral vision. Any malicious spirits would find that her skirts were made of thick, finely woven silk, that resisted tearing well enough. The netting would tear off easily enough, though.

“They can get all fixed up with a little hard work, but I don’t know if this one is all the way,” she tilted her head, “real.” She hadn’t had too much champagne, but she’d seen the way things had started shifting and coming out of nowhere when she’d tasted it.

Then they were cut off by Chauvet’s speech, and the light of her upgrade. Then the clock was striking- where had the time gone?

“I think I should go,” she murmured, still trying to be a little bit mysterious as she felt the pull of the magic. She didn’t mind, really, if any of her wonder’s art had ended up here. She turned, instead, towards the portal, aiming to leave as silently as she had come.

Exit Pendour

Captain

Sissy was so far gone, she'd barely reacted to him being an absolute terror and using her bosom as a bongo - however gently he'd done it. Captain delicately put his nose against her cheek and licked. "Whatever you say, dollface." Smokestack looked bored and annoyed at his companions, and the excitable dame looked...well...excitable. And like she really wanted to hold him. "Why hello there sweetness~"

Captain huffed into his ride's ear, laughing, "Gonna go getchur groove back, Stella?" The Mauvian stretched and rose from Narcissa's shoulders and hopped to the pedestal he'd been directed to by the Red Prince, sniffing at the object briefly before picking it up and tossing it into subspace with a nimble flip. Even inebriated, all the training he'd been put through meant that his acrobatics were solid save for a small wobble on the landing, and a champagne-scented burp.

After he played hide-the-relic, Captain sat up and looked pleased, grooming himself and tucking tail neatly around feet while he surveyed In Step and Sissy further. "Hey sweetness, how 'bout you hand me that trinket too? It looks like it ought to be in Mauvian hands, not mouldering away on some rock in space, yeah?" Captain put on his most charming 'I'm a helpful and good kitty' expression.

"I'm Captain, by the way. And don't worry about the pizza, it wasn't great."

Jägerin

It honestly shouldn't have taken her as long as it did to figure out what it was he had in mind. Her only excuse--and it was a pretty damn good excuse--was the shock and delight of just getting to be in his presence again. It shouldn't' have been possible, but he was here. She felt his hand on her arm and voice sliding around her like warm silk.

He'd always been distracting to her, why should death have changed that.

And why shouldn't he have wanted to cause a little chaos?

She watched on as he managed to separate a few stripes of mesh netting from the train of another woman's long dress and her silver eyes slid between fabric and the champagne dubiously. If it were vodka, perhaps, but she had her doubts the bubbly had a high enough proof to hold a flame at all, let alone through a fall.

But they'd see soon enough, one way or another. Though if it did work, if it did light like he wanted...

Jägerin glanced back through the crowd towards the place their hostesses had been arguing. It wasn't anything that'd concerned her or the man she was with so she hadn't paid the confrontation much mind, but the sound of a smack across the face is pretty distinctive, and the shorter of the two had disappeared shortly thereafter, mid rant.

She wasn't sure what she would do if he disappeared before she got to say good bye, again. It was a chance she couldn't let just slip through her fingers.

Chauvet

She still couldn't quite believe it. In spite of everything, something had clicked about the wonder, about the lifetimes contained within and the way she remembered the ones who mattered most. It had been a gambit, to say she would undo the work Genevieve did to carve out a history from tokens and artifacts, but something about it had resonated with the wonder. It wasn't Genevieve's way at all...but it still worked. Chauvet deserved to be here after all.

She finished the last of her champagne toast in time to get rushed by Jack, tossing the glass aside with just enough time to lift the lithe girl into her arms for a spin. The champagne had her feeling a little dizzy, but the kiss had her feeling dizzier by far in all the best ways. "Thanks," she laughed, starting to turn pink across the bridge of her nose. "Pffft, and here I thought no one was going to call me on it. Best birthday gift a girl could ask for."

Chauvet Squire didn't wait to think about the implications--she leaned Jack back and kissed her in return, soft and sweet and dizzying.

Blackbird

That smirk. That damned smirk. It stole the breath from Blackbird's lungs.

It took Amon's voice to bring her back to the moment they'd been sharing, and softly she startled, feeling a chill take her. "...As much as I can be, this time," she responded, still distracted, still low. Her brow furrowed under the feather trappings on her face.

"There's something I have to do." Blackbird started to bring his hands up to kiss, but she paused short, shaking her head. "But when I get back, I think we'll have much to talk about." She didn't know the Amon of this time, nor the Giza, but maybe they could have enough time to fill in the gaps before the magic faded.

That was a problem for later--for now, she let his hands fall after one final squeeze and broke into the crowds. Blackbird hobbled at first, fighting the impulse of the limb, but she found there was a certain pliant nature to the structure, if only she minded it enough to find the places where the pistons bent. Halfway across the gallery, she broke into a jog, which was a strangeness and a thrill all its own--her mind was just as certain that she would never run as it was that she could do nothing else. It was neither the somber pace of a general or the fluid sprint of a windrider, but it got her across the room all the same, and compared to anything she'd done in recent years it felt like flying.

She stumbled to a stop just shy of the Reaper's space, strangled by a sudden fear, an artifact of this time and the things it had done to them both. And then she shook it off and grabbed for his arm to pull him around, more afraid to see him disappear than to worry about the repercussions of something as little as a touch.

"Did you think there was somewhere you could go where I wouldn't catch up someday?" He looked leaner than she remembered, but she blinked and was alarmed by the softness of his smile. A part of her knew it was insubordinate, but still she did not let go. She fought with her emotions, and it wrinkled her nose in an expression she made across lifetimes when she was at odds with something. "Do you have any idea how much you were missed?"

Somewhere along the way tears had gathered in her eyes. Blackbird didn't hide from it.

Mistress Material, should I even ask what that dress is made of...?

Lucyal