Welcome to Gaia! ::

Encke had honestly been delighted to receive a message from Methone, interrupting his usual patrol.

To him, the other transcendent had been charming at least, an absolute darling at most. The idea of meeting back up with her brought a grin to his face. The idea of meeting up with her and heading to his comet perhaps made him doubly happy. Her asteroid had been wonderful and he could see why she loved it so much. His comet was the star of his show, though, and he wanted to show it to everyone who was willing. There was a brief moment where he considered if Richard was sufficiently distracted that night with dance competition planning; perhaps he wouldn't notice if Encke was significantly late on his return.

He decided that it would be alright, and he tapped back a message to Methone confirming that he would be there as soon as he could.

And as soon as he could was just a little sooner than before, considering that the Eternal upgrade had come with an unexpected further speed boost. He was already naturally fast as a civilian; as a senshi, he felt like he moved at blistering speeds. Sometimes, he wondered how he didn't end up injuring himself in the process. Encke supposed it had something to do with the whole superpowered thing.

He did have the thought when he was coming upon Methone's now equally as powerful aura that perhaps he should have mentioned the upgrade in his text.

... Nah, this would be more fun.

When she whistled at him, Encke couldn't help showing off a bit, standard jog shifting into something more like a model strut towards her. His ego of his youth may have long melted away for varying reasons, there were still moments where it snuck up on him.

Being whistled at and touched was definitely one way to prompt it.

He seemed to settle down once he reached her, though he still couldn't help a bit of a flex when she reached out to touch him. Encke looked good like this, and he knew it. He also felt good like this. The power rushing through him, the connection to his comet, the strength and agility he felt when he moved; honestly, Encke hadn't felt better in his entire life, and he especially hadn't felt this good since he was first awoken to the world underneath the surface so many years ago.

"A haircut?" asked Encke, playing at thoughtfulness, glancing upwards and reaching upwards to flick at a strand of hair. "Nah, I don't think that's it..."

With a smirk, his eyes flickered back down to her.

"I seem to have brightened up a bit, though. Pretty sure my presence could light up a room by itself."

That was admittedly literal. Not only did he have the transcendence markings of last stage, along with a couple new ones, there were also various glowing strips on his uniform. It hadn't been so obvious when Julienne first gave him access to this form, considering it was daytime, but at later times like this, he was basically a beacon in the dark, even beyond his aura. It seemed fitting, considering his comet...

Methone's responses were only feeding into his remarks, and there was an almost wild grin on his face when he replied, "I think I'm just as hot as my sphere."

It took a moment for him to realize that that was probably more confident than he had sounded in ... a while. Except maybe to Richard. At certain times... Heh. The hints of smugness didn't quite leave his features, but he did relax a little bit once Methone seemed to rest against him. The feeling of someone else against him grounded him a bit, at least, and he pulled his head out of clouds he barely still had access to.

"But seriously, thank you," responded Encke, with a laugh, as she moved to inspect his hands and the rest of him. He wiggled his fingers, still amused by the light trails they seemed to leave behind in the air. "I like the compliments! But this Eternal thing, I think it's been a long time coming." Way too long. He was twenty-six now. When had that happened? He first got an inkling of this madness almost ten years ago.

Almost frightening honestly.

... He wasn't going to let himself think too hard on that.

"It does feel really good. Really powerful. My abilities are," he paused, trying to think of a way to describe them, before giving up with the unfortunately vague description of, "something else, now. Powerful. I don't envy the people I need to use them on. And I feel faster, stronger, honestly better..."

His brain jumped as it was prone to do to another topic she had mentioned as he looked down at his fingers, adding, "And the new markings are nice. I mean, I had the finger ones before, but," he laughed. "I'm not sure why my comet chose to give me all the markings, honestly, but from my memories, I know my people had bioluminescence. Like on the fingers. Toes too. Also eyes, actually. Might be related?"

Encke laughed merrily. "Maybe I should practice my Baywatch run."

He was fairly sure all actors did a joking Baywatch run at some point. He just needed to find himself a pair of red beach shorts and one of those weird long board things lifeguards were always running with. What were those called, anyway? They clearly weren't just longboards because those were a type of surfboard, not something you strap someone too--

Tucking that away to actually look up later, Encke's eyes wandered back down to Methone. He had gathered that visiting his comet came a lot easier now, but he still grinned at the confirmation of it. "I love that, really. Nice to be able to go almost about as often as I want." Once every three days or so? It wasn't literally every day, but so far as he could tell, it was more often than he had gotten a chance to before. His connection with his comet could grow stronger. He could restore it further. The memories that kept circling around his head when he went could come in a higher frequency--

"Stars are special on their own," remarked Encke, with a wink of his own, before grabbing onto her hand and pulling out his phone. "Using one of my visits this week, coming up!"

In a few moments, the two of them were no longer on Earth, instead barreling somewhere in the Sol System. He was fairly sure that Encke's Comet was well into the point in its orbit where it was barreling away from the Inner Solar System, the planet they were familiar with most innately millions of light years away. The stars in the sky, therefore, besides being obviously more abundant due to a lack of significant light pollution, were definitely also in different positions. They were also ... moving, just subtly, though easily noticeable if one looked up for just a few moments. Encke's Comet was as fast moving as the man who was the senshi of it, and it showed.

"Try not to stare too much at the sky at first," offered Encke, with a laugh. "It can be a little disorienting..."

Fortunately, his planet had the good sense to drop them near the fountain area. It was nice to see water actively running from it, now, instead of just it being an empty marble thing. The plants around it had gone from just blooming to flourishing, and the amount of bulbous glowing plants around lended the area some light even without any obvious sources nearby.

There were definitely light sources in the distance, though. Down the repairs paths that led away from the fountain were several buildings, many with spires reaching up to the sky. Quite a few of them seemed to be lit up from the inside with no obvious source. That was likely the electricity he was referring to.

"This area's gotten grassier as of late. It looked nice before, but it's like a whole park now." Encke laughed. "Perfect place for a picnic."

Encke couldn't help a quiet snicker when she commented on his comet moving. On one hand, of course it was. They were in space, orbiting the sun, flying in oblong circles only three and a half years long.

On the other hand, it was wild to actually see. And it also kind of reinforced just how face Encke's Comet actually moved...

"Isn't it? I'll admit the first time I noticed it I got a little dizzy." He laughed, looking back up to the sky. By now, he was used to it. He had been seeing its motion for years, which had been plenty of time for it to become nothing more than background for him. Encke was still conscious of how strange it was, though, considering it took time lapses to really notice the star movement through the sky on Earth...

He gave her a few moments to look around his comet, take in what she wanted to see. She seemed fascinated by it, and it drew a grin to his face -- at least, one wider than the one he was already wearing. He was proud of all he had done for his home comet, and he was also proud of his home comet in general. Hearing someone else love his comet, hearing someone else love space in the same way he did... It always brought a grin to his face, no matter if it was because it was the first time they were seeing space or the first time they were seeing his space. (Or maybe the twentieth, but he admittedly hadn't gotten to invite anyone that often yet...)

"Thanks," beamed Encke, turning his attention to the fountain for a moment. He reached down to play in the water for a moment, because honestly, the existence of running water still delighted him. His comet had seemed so barren for years, except for the ice he'd occasionally come across.

"I've done a lot of work on this place," offered Encke, tearing his eyes away from the fountain to look towards the largest building in the distance, the one he knew the best. "I've repaired a lot of the paths, though you can still see some of the cracks," unfortunately, but he wasn't exactly a miracle worker, "cleaned up the insides of some of these places, gotten the electricity back on. And my comet's helped too. By growing these plants and running water and all... this." He gestured widely around them when he said 'this.'

Encke was honestly going to show her his comet anyway, but her childlike enthusiasm only brought more enthusiasm to do it out of Encke. He grinned widely when she said she wanted to see it all, and it perhaps cracked even wider when she suggested she wanted to touch it all.

"Of course! That's what we came up here for, right?" said Encke, with a wink, though they had technically come up here for a nice little picnic. She had showed him her world, and now it was time to show her his.

He beckoned to her with the hand that wasn't damp from the water, before advancing ahead on one of the paths, heading to a different area in the city and leaving the grassy area around the fountain behind.

This path had clearly been put back together and repaired to the extent that Encke was capable of. While there were still obvious cracks, and pieces that clearly had gotten broken off at some point that were at a distance from other pieces, cement had been used to glue a lot of the pieces back together. Off in the distance there were a couple tools Encke had left to the side of the path; he noted those with a snort at his own forgetfulness and snatched them up as they passed.

The buildings in the city likely seemed a bit taller up close, the spires perhaps a little more intimidating. There were no skyscrapers, but even quite a few of the one-floored buildings twisted into spires instead of having simple flat roofs.

Some of them had oblong ovals towards the top, reminiscent of a Tesla coil.

Through the air, on occasion, a spark of lightning would spark from one building to another.

Eventually, he stopped, much closer to the nearly palatial building he was most familiar with. He didn't enter that building necessarily, letting Methone take a look around at everything in the area. The biggest path led to the biggest building, but there were a couple smaller paths branching off in different directions. "Feel free to look around! The lightning stays up there, don't worry about that."

Methone needn't worry--taken status or not, Encke still had a naturally flirty tendency. "Touch my comet, touch me?" teased Encke in turn, winking back at her. It felt a little cheesy, but...

He glanced over the area, grinning proudly as Methone looked around, touching the path, looking up at the sky, taking in the lightning and the scenery in general. Encke could tell she was fascinated, and it thrilled him. "The paths? Yeah, I did those myself," explained Encke, taking on an oddly proud stance. "I noticed how wrecked the paths seemed and I decided I wanted to take some effort to fix things. So I bought some cement and got to work." He glanced down the path in front of him, what was left of it behind him...

"It took a long time, considering it's just me, but I'm really proud of it, eh? It looks more like it did before. I've made fixes like that everywhere, actually. Brought a vacuum up a while ago, so I vacuum inside some of the buildings..."

He was definitely babbling, his brain reminded him. Encke offered a sheepish smile down at Methone as she looped her arm in his.

"This is definitely the main city. There seems to be other settlements but everything leads to here. I usually land in this area too. I don't think this comet is super big or anything, but it seems well connected."

His memories told him that basically everyone descended on the main city during the day.

"The lightning is definitely part of the electricity transfer. But it routes from the building in front of us," at this, he gestured at the palatial building, "from deep in the ground. That's the governmental seat, or was, I think. Around us, more government things, a couple residences, businesses I think," he squinted, admittedly not totally sure. "I suspect the water running is connected to the electricity somehow, because it started working when I got the power back on, but I'm not sure yet..."

Encke had some theories, though. There was cometary ice...