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 Posted: Sat Nov 16, 2013 12:10 pm
>Did you forget? Don't forget.
>You promised this weekend okay? Don't forget.
>Seriously Chester don't forget, you promised.
No matter how often she was assured that the agreed on date to go to Luxor was not forgotten, Zia's paranoia wouldn't allow herself to leave poor Chester the ******** alone. Texts came sporadically throughout the week, especially when she was bored in class or at the gym and with increased frequency after her meeting with her ex.
And even with such a solid day and time agreed on over and over again, it didn't stop her from flying through the door of his office an hour early. "Okay, I'm here! Ready?!"
Jeans, boots, over stuffed messenger bag. It was archaeology time, ********. Would it be hot? Cold? Were they seriously going to see a pyramid? Would there be hieroglyphs? The meticulous way she had dressed and loaded down her usually sparsely packed bag implied she had been pondering on this for a while. A long while. Her downtime throughout the week had been spent hovering over her iPad doing frantic searches and lost in her own mind over the possibilities, especially when one prepared for a trip and didn't end up jumping on the train in the heat of a moment.
It was an easy distraction from the butterflies in her stomach at having an excuse to bother Chester. Her frequent and often selfish attempts to manipulate his focus to her usually needed some sort of justified excuse in her mind for some reason. It could never be because she just coveted his time.
"Come on, let's go! You didn't forget, did you?"
Like it was possible for anyone who came in close proximity to forget.
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Posted: Sat Nov 16, 2013 12:41 pm
Chester sometimes wondered why he had a personal phone, as only one person ever contacted him through it, and that was relentlessly. His work phone was a different thing, and he accepted it when it was busy or when it was quiet because it was based on what projects he had going on, or what employees needed his attention. His personal phone was for his friends, as few as they were.
Only Zia really made use of it, especially the text feature.
Chester looked up from his phone, which he had just been checking to read one of her many messages, when she came flying into his office. He watched her with his usual, bland expression but there was a bit of a glimmer in his eyes.
He held up his phone to her, to show the message he had been looking at, and his response to it.
>You didn't forget, did you?
> Did not forget.
"I suppose we should go," he said, and he even smiled a bit, at her unending excitement. It was a bit infectious, though he was more nervous than anything else. "Unless you think you've forgotten something..."
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Posted: Sat Nov 16, 2013 3:10 pm
"I don't know, I hope not, I've been thinking about this the whole time. Constantly," Zia tried not to let her excitement manifest in too many embarrassing, physical motions, but her arms jerked in almost a flap before she confirmed that she didn't forget her phone.
"Yes! I mean-- wait," She glanced at the phone and laughed sheepishly, trying to figure out how she had managed to not realize her constant prodding may have been bordering on concerning excess.
"I know it's early, sorry... I just... I want to do this with you!"
After a week of dating fails, party fails, friendship fails, and actually throwing a hard enough fit she dropped hot coffee all over her legs, easy fun with Chester had become almost a craving.
And still, the thought of finally getting as far out into the solar system as Pluto seemed to suck all the oxygen out of her lungs as she grinned and ran around to latch onto his arm.
"Yes! Yes, let's go!"
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Posted: Mon Nov 18, 2013 2:06 pm
Chester smiled and nodded his head. He got up and powered up, into his Squire form. He was getting more used to the new belts and the bigger glove, though he had still not used his magic. He looked at her and hoped for a moment that he would be able to take them back to the Wonder like he said he would.
He knew what he was supposed to do, it was just not something he had practiced before.
With her clinging to him, at least he knew he would not lose her in the travel, however it worked. He closed his eyes, finding himself calm, as was required. He wondered if it was because she was there. He was supposed to be where he felt the most at home, after all, for this travel thing to really work. He kept that thought in his head as he recited the words he had never planned to memorize, that had just appeared in his head.
And it was just that easy to suddenly be taken across space, to another planet, to a realm he had never seen before, and had no idea could really exist. They appeared on a sandy expanse with nothing immediately visible but dunes of silvery sand, though when one leaned close they would see speckles of different colors amongst the grains.
This was Luxor. At least, the outer dunes of it.
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Posted: Mon Nov 18, 2013 4:40 pm
Zia wasn't sure why homeworld travel always make her tightly shut her eyes, but it took her a moment after that feeling of being pulled away to finally open them.
The ground suddenly seemed softer underfoot and as her wide eyes took in their surroundings, the buzzing feeling of excited butterflies shifted to a quick and dramatic sensation of her stomach jumping into her chest.
She didn't know what she was expecting. Maybe she intuitively expected busy ruins by now or her brain had assumed that Pluto being small meant everyone was crowded in together, but seeing the expanse of the dunes and the gorgeous, alien sand, she felt like she would fall over if she wasn't so tightly attached to Luxor's arm.
She drew in one excited breath and held it for the longest time as she absorbed and processed it all.
And then in one quick shot, she let him go and darted forward, turning on her heel hard enough to kick up a wave of sand in her wake. Zia was not a good archeologist.
"Holy crap, do you see this?!" She shouted once she was facing him again, arms gesticulating wildly. "This is amazing!" And they were only on some sand dunes so far. She turned and started half running, half stumbling down, expecting him to catch up.
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Posted: Mon Nov 18, 2013 5:45 pm
Luxor looked around in wonder and surprise, having expected something like what he'd seen when he went to Pompeii. This was not the same by any means, though he supposed Earth had vastly different areas on it, but still.
He looked at her as she bounced away from him all of a sudden, his arm starting to tingle as he was freed. He was surprised by that, realizing that she had been clinging to him tightly enough to put his arm to sleep. He had not really minded it very much.
"Oh, wait!"
He moved to follow her, walking first but then running so he could catch up with her. The sand was sturdy enough but still slid under their feet as they moved up the slope. Once they reached the crest and looked down into the sandy valley, they would see the ancient structure at its center. It was built of some sort of stone, the same silver as the sand, shimmering in the dimness. That was when Luxor noticed that there was no real light from the sky, but rather from the glimmering stones in the sand. Everything seemed to emit a dim glow, just enough to keep the area visible.
The structure was not massive, though it certainly wasn't small, and a tunnel was visible moving out of the back of it, straight into a large dune behind it. Where it went could not be seen, as the dune was far too tall.
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Posted: Mon Nov 18, 2013 6:13 pm
Zia had to stop her frantic run to get over the valley to stare again, and even bring her hands up to her mouth as she wailed and bounced on her feet.
"Oh, god, Chester, it's gorgeous," She whined. Why was she whining? This was a question she actually stopped and mentally asked herself and ended up verbally answering in a bitter and embarrassed mumble under her breath. 'I don't ******** know.'
"What's this made of, do you think?" She asked, giving the sand under her boot a little bit of a kick and looking out ahead at the structure. Her urge to run after it and see everything it had to offer came in direct conflict with the contentment that came from just staring at it for a while, and the eery and novel way the light was produced on the sand.
"You know, for a guy who hardly ever smiles, you got kind of a super pretty, vactiony romantic spot as your destined wonder, dude."
Maybe the universe just demanded he always ended up in entertainment.
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Posted: Wed Nov 20, 2013 12:59 pm
Luxor smiled and watched her, her excitement for it making him feel a bit more excited as well. It was interesting, seeing this world that bore his name. Or rather, he supposed, that he bore the name of. He wondered about this past of his, and was growing more and more interested in exploring and learning.
He looked down at the sand, shaking his head thoughtfully at the strange colors and the larger flecks of color. It was not like sand he had ever seen before.
"It seems my Wonder is far more interesting than I am."
He looked around and then started to move toward the structure, wanting to see it a lot more than he had before. He even found himself trotting toward it, though not running. It was not a very tall structure, just one story, but he could see that the tunnel led somewhere deeper into the sand. He stopped at the archway, crumbled as it was, peering inside, but it was too dark to see much. He didn't enter, looking over at her to see if she wanted to follow.
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Posted: Wed Nov 20, 2013 7:44 pm
"Watch it, Thunder from Down Under, that's starting to sound dangerously like self depreciation," Zia snarked and did a double take to realize he had moved forward towards the structure ahead and ended up scrambling to catch up.
Sand underfoot was not good stopping surface so she didn't even try, and instead, built up speed in her run until she could jump on his back, slinging her arms over his shoulders and legs outstretched under his arms.
"Don't insult my tastes. I think you're plenty interesting, you know," She said, mashing the side of her face against his. It probably would've been less awkward and more obvious what she was doing if she was actually in cat form. Which she was not. Plus he had a face plate there. "I would still think you were interesting even if you didn't have a knight title or a wonder."
But if definitely made things easier.
She pointed one arm stiffly ahead. "Let's go see what's in here!"
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Posted: Fri Nov 22, 2013 12:31 am
Luxor shrugged his shoulders, hearing her voice somewhere behind him. He felt he was just an even, aware sort of fellow, whether it was self deprecation or not. He was not harder on himself than he deserved, and he knew that he could be seen as very dry and boring, as he had heard some of his employees saying as much. Before they apologized profusely when they spotted him and ran away as fast possible.
Then he felt her leap onto his back, and he stopped. He was not easily surprised, and even when he was he hid it well enough. He caught her legs, bending his arms around them so she could essentially sit against his arms, and so he could support her.
"I'll believe you," he said, to reassure her. He could do nothing but, really, and with her hanging off his shoulders and so close to him, he was having a hard time thinking of whatever it was they had been talking about. But he was sure she was right about it, or whatever. She was very close to him at the moment.
Nodding, he obediently moved into the dark structure. As they crossed the threshold, hieroglyphic images on the walls began to glow and almost hum, spreading light just a foot or so before them with each step he took. It revealed an empty space, with cracked walls and some benches, presumably. A rest area, maybe, but not a place meant for lingering long. There was a tunnel, just as Luxor had thought, though he had no idea how deep it would go into the sand, or where they would end up.
He started down it, and the hieroglyphs continued to light up. They glowed different colors, like the flecks in the sand that had been emitting light before. They were like proximity lights, reacting to the two visitors despite being so long dormant.
The walk was long, but eventually they reached a split in the tunnel, glyphs glowing and seemingly labeling each of the three roads, but Luxor couldn't decipher any of the images for their meanings.
"Left, right, or middle?" he asked mildly.
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Posted: Fri Nov 22, 2013 6:25 am
Zia was way too accustomed to being humored, carried, and accommodated. She thought nothing of forcing Luxor to carry her around on his back. He was big enough!
The glowing hieroglyphs nearly gave her a total neural meltdown, though. "Aaaah!" She pushed her arms on his shoulders as she looked over his head, trying not to completely flail in excitement. "Oh god, what is that? Bioluminescence? No, that would've degraded over the years. Maybe. Holy s**t," Suddenly she was hugging the top of his head in a failure of an attempt to contain herself. "It's motion activated. And still works. Oh my god oh my god."
So far she hadn't seen anything quite so visually engaging on the other wonders she visited. This was her attempt at downplaying her reaction.
"Um! I don't know! It's your wonder, do you remember anything?" She asked, poking at his skin under this faceplate, which was probably getting more use protecting him from her than it had from enemies. "If not.... maybe down the middle?"
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Posted: Fri Nov 22, 2013 11:18 am
Luxor let her push and pull and grab at him as she saw fit, closing one of his eyes as she hung on to his head and feeling glad, at least, that they were alone. It would be a strange sight for anyone to see the stoic, muscular knight being climbed all over like a jungle gym.
He was fascinated by the stones and the glyphs, and the way everything glowed, but he could fairly admit that he was distracted just a little bit. He had to make sure not to drop her, as that would surely ruin her enthusiasm.
"This is really beautiful, and I wonder how it works... after so long, you'd think it wouldn't." It wasn't like the glyphs were like, glow in the dark stickers. They didn't get any light in here from the sun, so how could they then glow? He was not sure, and it would be interesting to try and suss out, though maybe at another time. For now, he tried to think if he remembered anything about this particular tunnel system, but nothing came to him immediately.
"Middle it is." He moved forward, holding on to her, and the glyphs continued to light up, shifting in color until they were glowing in fainter, deeper colors like reds and purples. They stopped glowing soon after that, fading into black and then nothing for a few feet, until a bright opening grew in the distance and they reached the end of the tunnel, stepping into a fully lit, ornate and beautiful room. Everything was carved from silver stone and gold metals, as well as larger versions of the flecks of colored stone in the sand outside. Farmed or natural, Luxor did not immediately remember, but he did feel a strange sense of familiarity to the room itself.
"I've been here before, I think," he said, looking around slowly. The room was laid out as a grand entryway of sorts, though any fabrics or wooden decorations must have decayed away by now. Just the stone and metal remained, but it still carried a very opulent and beautiful look to it. This was not just someone's home, but perhaps a mansion, or the equivalent to a castle.
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Posted: Fri Nov 22, 2013 4:45 pm
To say the entire spectacle overwhelmed Zia was an understatement. Where before her enthusiastic excitement over the spectacle resulted in spastic, borderline abuse of her escort, he was suddenly spared any further meltdowns. She must've seemed incredibly distant, as her legs hung limp and her hands behaved, resting peacefully in either side of his neck.
After a long moment of silence, she kicked slightly with a quick, "Let me down."
Once on her own two feet, she took a few careful steps, fingers resting on her lips as her wide eyes looked over the opulent environment in silent awe.
Everything was a curiosity, but having it all laid out in this grand scale was insane. Her mind seemed to have overloaded until it halted completly, and then all she could do was just stare. There were so many questions, but the sheer amount of answers she wanted seemed to be unimportant by the scale of everything together.
After what seemed like an eternity of silent staring, eyes locked on the wall, she finally spoke up with, "It's so beautiful it almost makes me want to cry..."
And then she turned to look at him directly, "Do you remember something?"
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Posted: Mon Nov 25, 2013 12:02 am
He moved to put her down when she ordered him to, like a well trained horse reacting to the kicks and words of its master. He turned to look at her, watching her curiously and wondering about her silence. She seemed to be taking everything in, even more so than he was. He was distracted by watching her, for the most part, though he was very interested in his past. This world was amazing, but he felt more connected to it because she was there.
He wondered if she didn't like what she was seeing, worrying that she might have expected more. His expression was bland and calm, as it always was, but the longer the silence stretched the more insecure he became about things. He was very worried that he was just not measuring up for her, that she was disappointed.
When she asked him if he remembered anything, though, his brain seemed to kick into gear. He looked around, and his vision grew a bit hazy. He saw a young man in the middle of the vast room, lifting his arms and gesturing around the ornate and beautiful area, and there were the shadows of hundreds of faces gathered, cheering and laughing.
"There was some sort of gathering, a celebration of some sort, here. I can remember being here before... It seemed very... happy." Which was not something he was very used to, if he were honest. He hid things like that.
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Posted: Mon Nov 25, 2013 6:38 pm
"So you're reincarnated," Zia stated and smiled, but there was something clearly disingenuous about the way it didn't reach her eyes. For someone who usually poured emotion into everything she did, it seemed awkward and out of place in her range of expression, and notably twisted in a strange flavor of bitterness.
She was happy for him, and the history he had. Really. She was just also jealous and selfish and bitter about her own lacking place in ******** you people and your grand destiny and historical foundations, seriously guys. Which was probably an incredibly unfair mindset since she had practically dragged his a** here in the first place.
She fumbled with her necklace pendant, her one piece of history she had to steal from Alfheim and looked at her sneakers.
"I'm glad it's a happy memory," She said, doing her best to sound sincere. "Do you know what they were celebrating?"
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