EVENT ★ GONE FISHIN'

[futurologists]

Thanks to your help, repairs to the flood wall are complete. The Nalawi are still largely without their Gifts, so they are thankful -- without the aid of ALASTAIR recruits, they would have surely drowned or been eaten by sea monsters. Despite the barely averted disaster, the residents of Komo have decided to go along with their lives as planned, perhaps to bolster morale instead of giving into despair. By chance, their annual fishing contest is scheduled for today! As honored guests, recruits are invited to participate. FISHING CONTEST Dugout canoes are provided for all participants, patterns that suggest fish scales burned into the wooden sides. Curiously, no fishing rods are offered; if a recruit requests one, they will be given a strange look, but the harbormaster will acquiesce. Due to the rough seas, the passage between Komo and the other islands is still inaccessible. Contestants are reminded to stay behind the reefs or venture east toward open ocean for their quarry. It’s only when the contest begins that the quarry in question is actually announced . . . Sharks. You are fishing sharks. And, judging by the lack of equipment (or the puny fishing rod you requested), you’re expected to do this by hand. The tiny deer people don’t seem bothered by this predicament at all: the goal is to catch the biggest shark, by length and poundage. Better not embarrass yourself in front of the locals. GET PUMPED Mettaton has announced over the jewelry that he will be hosting a celebration in tandem with the fishing contest, in order to help the native Nalawi and the ALASTAIR recruits get to know each other better. This includes singing, dancing, and all sorts of different performances -- and, of course, reporting on the actual fishing. If you aren’t the fishing type or maybe you just need a break from chasing sharks around, this is a good chance to bust a move and show your teammates how you can get down -- or just sit back and watch! It’s bound to be entertaining one way or another. Plot for the stage here! Olivia will be the final performer in the showcase. Anyone who witnesses her dancing may feel themselves super-charged by the spectacle . . . with possibly unexpected results! Characters may feel even more determined to win the fishing contest, or perhaps they’ll take this surge of optimism to help rebuild some of Komo’s destroyed buildings before the day winds down into night. THE FEAST After the fishing contest, the sharks will be collected and prepared. Grilled shark, fried shark, shark caviar, and shark jerky from the results of last year’s contest. There are fruits and vegetables and breads available as well, but if you want some protein, you’d better go native. During the feast, some of the Nalawi perform dances and song. The subjects range from their goddess Nalanni to love songs. Want to show off your talents again? Now’s the time! Or, if you’d prefer to step away from the excitement, the beach is quiet and empty, and the baths are unoccupied since the whole of Komo is at the gathering. As the feast winds down, the Nalawi will pass around their very potent alcohol for a toast to Komo’s health. Someone shouts, interrupting, wondering what good that will do if Nalanni has abandoned them. Concerned murmuring fills the gathering, spoiling the mood. ALASTAIR recruits may attempt to put them at ease -- otherwise, the feast will disperse on a sour note. OOC INFO If you would like your character to win the fishing contest, please sign up below. You must thread out fishing in order to participate in the drawing. There will be only one winner, decided by RNG. The winner will be contacted on April 1st. The prize is a necklace of shark’s teeth, which has a one-use spell that will make all sharks in a one mile radius sleep for 30 seconds. <b>PLAYER:</b> Name <b>CHARACTER:</b> Name <b>USERNAME:</b> <user name=username>

Comments

[winces]

[ more names that mean nothing to her, but she can empathize, at least, with the depth of meaning they seem to hold for achilles himself. she can sense it in his words, the way his tone inflects over each syllable. ]

I would love to see it one day, [ she says, and means it. for olivia, there is fewer delights than witnessing and experiencing a new dance.

but speaking of dancing...

she glances about, taking in the festivities continuing on around them. music still wafts in the air, and though it is a distant thing, as if it were nothing more than a second thought, it still clung to the sky like a mist that hasn't quite settled yet. she bites down on her lip, stifling a daring smile.

she stands a moment later, moving to present herself right before him. the skirt of her wrap is a bit too short for a proper curtsy, but she manages one with a flourish of her hands anyway, and though she dips her head before him once more, there is a lighter air about it this time. almost playful. ]

May I have this dance, my Lord?

[heelies]

[While poised in her curtsy she stays, Achilles takes her hand and tugs it closer that he may press his lips to it: the gesture is not necessarily one ripe with romantic intent, but one furnished from respect. Paired with the way he looks at her, however, the double entendre cannot be missed. Perhaps he pushes her boundaries too far, and his luck along with it, but the moment has swept him up.]

Such would bring me great pleasure, lovely-haired Olivia.

[So speaking, the son of Peleus stands. He has not released her hand.]

Long has it been since the days of my youth when last I danced hand in hand with a flowering girl in revelry such that might honor Dionysus. How strange it seems that we as fully ripened man and woman might together dance as if the dew of childhood clings to us still, but such must too be the custom of this land, for I see many a pair engaged thus.

[winces]

[ she loses a bit of her nerve when he presses his lips to her knuckles, recalling all too easily where those lips had been just moments prior. she glances away a bit hastily, nearly missing the way his eyes warm when they look up at her, and for a moment she seems to hesitate or reconsider.

it's not a moment that lasts long, however, nerves wrung away with a few bites to her bottom lip. she turns back to him soon enough, lips spreading into a smile that borders on playful. ]

In my world, art knows no age.

[ by his hand she leads him a little further towards the center of the festivities. close enough that the music hums in their ears, but far enough away that they are still afforded some measure of privacy. quite gently, she takes his hands and shows him where they should rest: one in her hand, the other right over the curve of her hip. when her other slides over his shoulder, she begins to lead him through the first few steps that they will wind up repeating to some variation for the duration of the song. it is not an overly complicated dance, nor is it any one dance at all — instead it is a quilted pattern of dances she's picked up from her travels, flowing seamlessly into each other. never once does she break her gaze from him, exuding the same sort of easy confidence and magnetism that she had had up on stage. ]

[heelies]

[In his era, dance is more ritual than art - but it is true that there ripples fierce beauty through the movements meant to honor the gods or bring glory to men.

So too is it true that the act of courting a woman is woven through with ritual.

Thus, Achilles follows with his footfall eager, and his eyes crackle with delight as she guides his hands to her body, then her hands to his: before they have even begun, the curves of their limbs stitch together a sort of intimacy that it not found in the dances he knows. At first the steps are foreign underneath his feet, and like a calf faltering on its spindly legs he shadows her movements. Soon, though, his nimble feet find the rhythm of the dance, just as his fingers fall upon the precise notes of the lyre to strike harmony. Once he can watch Olivia more than the path tapped by their feet, he lifts a grin to her.]

Tell me, do I a suitable partner make?

[Held aloft in dance as she is, she belongs as does the sun in the vault of the sky: in full radiance at last when above the veil of clouds it rises.]

[winces]

[ he is quick to learn, and for that she is pleasantly surprised. she shouldn't be, really. she knows full well now how to read a body; how to assess how each one's capabilities and strengths, and even in a man as large in height and width as achilles bore the grace of a lithe performer, simply waiting to be coaxed out.

and yet up till now, she has only come to know him as a warrior and a king — two roles that possess a different sort of grace. and that, for all his beautifully woven words, she had not quite yet wrapped her mind around the fact that he is an artist as well — that his body creates and conveys just as intricately and delicately as his stories do. that when he holds her in his arms like this, she feels like another word he bends and weaves into meaning. ]

More than suitable, my Lord. [ it is certainly not in olivia's nature to bring someone down, but every word she says is laced with sincerity. she needn't sugarcoat something already so sweet. ]

You're quite exceptional.

[ in more ways than one, she thinks. but she supposes he already knows that. ]

[heelies]

Then indeed we match well.

[Achilles has grown used to the way that others sway before him, as the grass bobs and bows to the wind: certainly he has met with stones upon whose hard edges he meets resistance, but these are exceptions. That subtle, supple bend feels natural to the point where he does not notice the effect he wields over others, in the same way he does not notice the breaths he takes or the beat of his own heart. It is rare then for him to feel the pull of another as he does now with Olivia dancing in his arms. As the incipient shoots of a plant which break through the shell of its seed and climb upward through the soil without knowing why, so too does he yearn for her.

And so their dance continues, as two celestial bodies caught in one another's orbit.]

What next will you show me then?

[He is a man mesmerized by her every movement, a man insatiable.]

[winces]

[ by now, she has grown accustomed to achilles' words of flattery. not so much that they do not still prompt a warm blush across her cheeks, of course, but enough that she has come to accept them as just that — flattery.

still, she cannot help but agree with his words just now, despite how sincerely he might have meant them; she has danced with many partners in her life, but the sturdy elegance with which his warrior's athleticism offers matches her lithe grace quite well. even a novice would be able to tell.

bolstered by his deftness, she does not hesitate to transition them into a dramatic dip just as the music nearby tapers into its last few quiet notes; slowly she pitches herself backward where she is steadied by the placement of his hand. despite having the strength in her legs to keep her upright even in such a position, olivia allows her trust in him to do the work for her, loosening some of the tension in her body so that she might bend back even further, her hair already pooling along the floor. her eyes close, and her head tips back, the smooth line of her throat completing the graceful arch of her back, and for a few seconds she remains like that, basking in the warmth of a dance well done.

when her eyes open, she is back again in the present, her heart stuttering to keep up with the pace of her breaths. there is a wide, brilliant smile on her lips, eyes shining like they had after her performance earlier that day. strange how she can so completely lose herself in a single moment. ]

What else is there to see?

[heelies]

[What she does not understand is that he does not speak words unless they carry the truth: what sounds to her like flattery as thin as a threadbare cloak is to him honesty unadorned.

Achilles lets her guide him through the dance, but her skill and subtlety is such that an onlooker would never guess that he himself is not the one leading. They are fluid, and as inextricable as the water from two different tributaries which flow into the same stream and thus become one body. He has always been a fast learner, and when she dives into the dip at the song's conclusion, his strength is ready to support her. The rise and fall of his chest is more pronounced now than moments ago when upon the bench they sat. In this moment he remains suspended with her, his eyes following the elegant lines of her body and committing to memory her geography as well as this air-light, sun-burnished feeling which embraces them.

Then she purposes to straighten once more, and he tugs her upright: his arm remains around her waist, his hand upon her hip. Just as he had matched her in step, he now matches her in smile, for she is at the peak of her beauty when bathed in the afterglow of a dance.]

Shall we delight in a walk around the feast? Have you had your fill, fair Olivia? Or perhaps along the shore some quiet is to be found in which we might share conversation.

[winces]

[ standing there in his gentle almost-embrace, olivia finds herself unwilling to step away from it. true, she had been the one to ask if he had wanted something more, something else, and he had only been kind enough to comply. but with the firelight flickering against his features like this, making an already bright smile feel ten times warmer... she's sure anyone would feel reluctant to break the trance of the moment.

that is not to say, however, that the options he provides are unappealing. before long, she finds herself warming up to the idea, her imagination already blazing miles ahead of her. ]

Conversation sounds nice, [ she finally chooses, taking a step back to let a hand lay light against his own, fingertips a butterfly kiss against a palm. with a gentle tug, she's leading him once more in another dance, this one taking them towards the coast, further and further away from wandering eyes. ]