Welcome to Gaia! ::

And there was, actually, someone quite nearby - but not anyone threatening.

Joy, having actually gotten a full day of sleep - something she had not allowed herself in quite some time - was enjoying the weather and doing a bit of her experimental "get your Order stink on a place" efforts to see if it yielded any fruit. But she, too, was suddenly aware that she was not alone - not because of any GPS or magical signature radar, but because she saw the ghostly figure in the shade of the tree line quite suddenly, the Valencyian having stepped out very near her.

She took a moment to register what she was seeing, now having been exposed enough to run down the list of possibilities.

"Oh," she called out, in as friendly a voice as she could muster as she approached. "Hello. Scared the hell out of me for a second there," she added cheerfully. "I didn't know you guys wandered around in the trees at night too, but maybe it's some sort of Destiny City brainrot that gets us all."

She looked vaguely startled at the way the stranger was speaking. She had somehow internalized the idea that Rhysi's cadence was a species-wide affectation and not simply a Rhysi-specific one. The conversation with Lyndin suddenly loomed much less ominous in her mind.

"Oh," she said, and she suddenly beamed with delight, dimples appearing in each cheek, as she stuck out a hand. Which she hadn't been going to do, until the gloves went away. "It's nice to be surprised sometimes, if the surprise isn't - like - a big cosmic demon creature or something." She hesitated. Introducing herself was still, after all this time, a little complicated to herself. "My name is Joy - Joyeuse Garde - Knight of Earth," she added, visibly uncomfortable with distributing the title but feeling, on the whole, that it might be polite given the circumstances. "I've met Rhysi - do you know her? I'm sorry; it's rude, maybe, to assume you all know each other - and she seemed like more of a geologist than a botanist."

"It's a good goal," said Joy, with a smile that was a little gentler, a little grimmer. "Saving the world. Your own world. I think a lot of us - those senshi from space, and knights, especially - I think we're all out here trying to save our own worlds. It must be comforting to know you've got your team at your back, all working away at the same thing from different angles."

She hesitated. "I'm also glad you guys were around to help us save ours, a while back." It was more than she'd said to Rhysi, and it came closer to being a statement of gratitude than it had with Almadel, although it still wasn't quite gratitude and landed as more of a neutral observation. And then, with a return of dimples: "I imagine it does get to be a bit much." She thought of Rhysi and her eccentric singing and almost laughed. "No wonder you seized a chance for a nice quiet walk in the woods. And here I am, interrupting it. I should move on and let you enjoy the peace. I hope your harvest was good," she added.

"Oh," she said again, with pleasure. Receiving random gifts from strangers was exactly the sort of thing that Joy felt ought to happen to her on a regular basis, if the world had any kind of justice in it at all: homages in general to her grandeur fitted into her worldview. "How lovely. Thank you. I love strawberries."

She basked in the pleasure of letting the stranger continue her diligent work as she spoke. "I'm surprised," she remarked. "Not about the strawberries - about the shield, I mean. I know we never communicate anything to each other, but I figured it'd be different for y'all. Like - more military. Debriefs and things. But I guess every military has its classified technology too."

She wrinkled her nose, her expression of pleasure at the unexpected treat being as delicious as hoped for giving way to one of disgust, not for the strawberry, but for what she was hearing.

"Everyone's allergic to sharing information, apparently," she said drily. "I'm surprised to hear it. But I'll keep it in mind. I've been waiting to speak to your Commodore, but maybe I'll prepare myself in case he's feeling even more secretive to me than he is to his own troops."

She polished off the second strawberry with relish. "Thank you for the gift," she said, with the graciousness of a queen acknowledging a mandatory homage. "Wasn't expecting to meet anyone, let alone get free food at it. Sometimes the surprises really are nice."