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A Fish Out of Water


He didn't do parties.

He didn't even know how to party. He'd never been invited, so he'd never attended and he had no idea what he was even doing there, if he was being frankly honest.

Idling by one of the walls, Fish Out of Water shifted his weight from one foot to the other as he stared off at the growing number of people gathering for this little... whatever it was that was going on. He'd gotten the invitation and been curious enough about it, curious enough to touch it and then bam, here he was...not that he'd had anything really appropriate to wear to a party of this magnitude to begin with.

Uncertainty left him feeling vulnerable and he hated feeling vulnerable, so he did what he did best and remained quiet, choosing to watch the others instead of participating himself.

Nessy

She liked the masks, she decided. They were lovely, mysterious, something right out of a fairytale, but there was something else, something about the way they made people blank slates, all about what they said instead of what uniforms they were wearing.

The mysterious lady turned out to be nice about things, at least about Pendour’s wandering. She smiled, and before she knew it there was someone else, someone in the most beautiful dress she’d ever seen, something between the a forest creature and a starry creature. Pendour might have stared a little bit.

“Bonsoir,” she said. Party chatter wasn’t her specialty but she could try. “I’m penguin,” she said, and then frowned because it came out wrong. “Oh, no. Um, Nessy is fine.” She might as well embrace her nickname.

That was when goosebumps prickled over her skin, and she caught the hint of laugh and turned to see if she could see where it was coming from, just for a second. She was more curious than worried when she didn’t see anything. She knew about magic. She knew about knights.

“I wonder if there are ghosts here,” she murmured, even softer. “There are in places like this, sometimes.”

The Iridescent Doe (Hyperborea)

Hyperborea smiled at the two other ladies. "I am Hypo Berries." She said covering covering her mouth with her hand a look of surprise on her face before her eyebrows knitted together.

Then she let out a chuckle. "There seems to be some magic about." She said offhandedly. It seemed a strange feature for a wonder, to prevent someone from speaking their true name but very well if that was the rules of this place. "It seems we aren't meant give our real names."

"You can call me the iridescent doe." She said thinking up a nickname on the spot.

"It's certainly possible," Hyperborea said with a nod to 'Nessy' "Our host would probably know for certain. Speaking of I wonder where they are? This Chauvet Page. Do either of you know them?" Hyperborea said looking over the crowd below.

Mistress Material (Sedna)

This young woman reminded her of Nembus, and she found the correlation between the two making her soften towards...Penguin...? Ah. Nessy. "I'd say it's possible." She murmured in reply to the question about ghosts. Especially at knight wonders where descendants could be waiting for their successors to come.

A pale brow rose as the other woman seemed to stumble over her name as well, and then---"Ah." Well. That made sense, and it actually put Sedna a bit more at ease. Apparently there was magic in play to help preserve identities. "You can call me Miss for the evening." She said in a simple introduction, and while she did actually know Chauvet, she didn't get the chance to comment as their attention was requested by...perhaps one of those ghosts Nessy had mentioned.

With the announcement, she inclined her head to her current companions and shifted to the railing, looking down below at the proceedings. She felt a jolt of excitement as she did recognize Chauvet---event clothed as she was. There was no mistaking that voice---as dour as it was. Actually recognizing someone at this, especially who she had even made the journey for in the first place, motivated her to move.

As they were invited to move to the gallery, she turned back to Nessy and Doe. "Ladies." She dipped her head to them again. "I'm going to move into the gallery for now. Perhaps I'll see you around soon, hm?"

She didn't wait for a reply, and started to move down the stairs, however, someone out of the corner of her eye caught her attention. Sedna glanced up as she continued down the stairs, and just---that one up there still, she looked really familiar---except. Well. She was driven to catch up with Chauvet---who she knew for certain.

[ Exit to the Gallery ]

Meadow
Maybe her skulking had gone a little too far in the stealthy direction, because nobody had seen her and come over to interact, which Meadow found distinctly displeasing -- she was playing hard-to-get, people found that appealing, right? Admittedly, she was kind of sitting near the walls like a little goblin, which never did good things for her interaction prospects --

Before she could get too trapped in that little thought spiral, there was a little ghost girl (little? no, the chick had to be around her age, and Meadow was hardly little as far as her self-vision was concerned) directing everyone to the Foyer, so -- off she went.

[exit to Foyer]

Cabbages

Cabbages had gone upstairs looking for bad sound equipment, but mostly what she found was that she severely disliked stairs. Breathing a little more difficult than she would have liked in the skin-tight bodice of her dress, and it made it difficult to appreciate the beauty of the round window or the marvel of being in space. Mostly, she wanted to peel out of her outfit and relax in pajamas, but unfortunately there wasn't much to peel out of--there were silky leaf like things covering the important parts of her torso with some support that pushed everything into place, but not a zipper in sight.

At least she looked great. That's what mattered, right? Some boy had called her resplendent. When had Ella Barnett ever been called that? That was perhaps part of the reason she'd been so eager to go looking for speakers and wires and tech--these were all things that made sense, when boys were just confusing and made her feel fluttery in ways that weren't unlike the lightheaded feeling she got when she climbed stairs.

She made it all the way up the top of the stairs before she tripped on one of the loose leaves of her dress, stumbling forward. Even the magic of the masquerade couldn't save her from being a klutz--

Cabbages

This was it. This was the end of Cabbage Girl and her secret identity Ella Barnett. She was going to hit the tile so hard that she clipped through the floor and just slipped into oblivion, never to be heard from again. Oh yeah, Cabbages? She died of embarrassment on the stairwell. It was tragic, people would say, if people remembered her. She wasn't even convinced they would, all things considered.

Resigned, she waited for the feeling of hitting the ground but never made impact, instead getting scooped up by a sturdy pair of arms dressed in navy. She found herself drowning in blue eyes, blinking slowly up at her rescuer, and then he spoke and the flutters were back with a vengeance. She wasn't--did she count as a Cinderella? Did he really mean her?

She lingered in his space for a moment, even when he righted her, folding her hand into his like it was meant to be there. "I--wow--um--" Bold of you to assume I run anywhere, she thought, but her brain seemed to no longer want to connect to her mouth. Only when he pulled away did she realize how close he'd been, and in the absence of him holding her she held her hands together to simulate the feeling.

"...I--beg your pardon, actually, for tripping up in your space," she said sheepishly, touching a green rose that had been woven into her hair. "I think I owe you my life, Mr...Goldfish...?"