WELCOME PARTY

MUSIC DOES YOUR CHARACTER CONTRIBUTE MUSIC? FIND/SET UP THE SOUND SYSTEM? SING? PLAY AN INSTRUMENT? THERE'S A SECTION FOR THAT.

ETC. YOU KNOW WHAT TO DO. GET IN THE COMMENTS! 5/5 INTERACTIONS COUNT AS AC, SO MAKE SOME LINES!

IT'S A PARTY! With the influx of so many new residents, both to Derleth and the Void, Glinda decided to throw a small celebration so people could get to know each other. It’s nothing too extravagant and there’s no specific dress code. Wouldn’t want anyone to feel out of place! But Glinda, with the help of some of the others who have been at Derleth a while, did add some special touches to give everyone a sense of hope. See? Not everything in the Void is doom and gloom! Twinkling lights, sparkling decorations, the scent of summer flowers, and best of all—no cannibals, scavengers, or cloud monsters!

Prompts CONTRIBUTIONS

What did you bring to the party? Was it something you found on campus, or did you go out into the Void to find something special? Remember the idea is not to use precious reserves for this event, but to be creative.

STYLE

Did you dress for a party or come as you are? Either is fine. You want to set up a pinterest board for your characters Junkyard fashion choices, link to a few pictures, or just write a description, you absolutely can. No AC cost if their clothing for the night comes from Derleath's theater costume department and is returned later.

DANCE FLOOR

There's a modest pavillion set up on The Green with a sign that says, "only dancing beyond this point." Looks like someone set up an enchantment to encourage dancing on it, even if you're the sort of person that normally wouldn't. Kinda annoying that the dance floor takes up the most open space and some may be tempted to try and cut across it...

CHALLENGE

Which character gets the most unique social interactions in this IC/OOC event? Count them up at the end and see who comes home with the most bragging rights. Who knows, maybe this is the start of a beautiful friendship?

EVENT STARTS SATURDAY EVENING & THROUGH THE NIGHT. WHO'S STILL PARTYING BY MORNING?

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Sylvie

ragevariant
2025-02-23 03:57 am UTC (link)

Sylvie arrived about an hour or so into the party with Spock [forthcoming log v soon]. She is in her usual attire though it's pretty banged up and dusty from crash landing into the Void. Those who knew her in Chicken Legs would be able to recognize her pretty easily since she was typically in that same outfit unless she changed for situational outings. The bottom of her cloak is torn from where she ripped a piece off to help Spock temporarily patch up his head wound. She might be seen holding her side when she thinks no one is looking.

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Re: Sylvie

lokivariant
2025-02-23 11:01 am UTC (link)

Sylvie?

Loki saw her from across the Green. The glamour that masked the sky above the party flickered, momentarily displaying the afternoon sun that was normally above the campus. Then Loki shook himself out of his surprised stupor and the sky shuttered back to the illusion Loki had been maintaining to give the event a more evening-esque vibe.

It couldn't be her.

But it was. It was Sylvie. Was she alone? Was Mobius with her? O.B.? B-15? Casey?

He pushed through the crowd, deliberately avoiding the dance floor around the pavilion in order to make his way to her. His heart pounded in his chest while his mind still tried to convince him that she was really there. He wanted to call out to her, but the words caught in his throat. Then he was in front of her. There was an instinctive urge to pull her into a hug. But before he allowed his instinct to take over, he remembered that this was the Void. And there were a lot of Lokis in the Void.

But there had only ever been one Sylvie...

Loki smiled. "You're here."

Then he saw the way she held her side and his smile was replaced by a frown. "You're hurt."

ragevariant
2025-02-23 04:04 pm UTC (link)

Sylvie had no idea what she and Spock had walked into. They'd separated for the time being but she kept a distant eye on him to make sure he didn't keel over. What.. was all this? They'd stepped through a hidden force field of some sort and wound up in a party? It was better than waiting around to find out what had been trailing the two of them because Spock, no matter what he said, was not in combat condition and while Sylvie was confident she could hold her own even with her healing injury, she didn't want to put that confidence to practice since she didn't know what they were up against.

Looking around, she thought some faces looked familiar. Others did not. Was this some gathering for those who'd crashed like she and Spock to intermingle with others? Did they live here? Did they crash too? Would she and Spock be welcome or was this a temporary reprieve? ...It was weird thinking in terms of her and someone else's well-being for once.

And then she saw him.

Coming toward her.

Why was he smiling at her like that? He'd never looked at her like that before. "I'm not," she said, defensively and stubbornly lowered her arm. "What are you doing here? How did you even get here? Did you--" Something was off. He looked exactly the same but entirely different. His eyes. His eyes carried a completely different weighted burden within them. Where was his Glorious Purpose?

"Loki?"

lokivariant
2025-02-23 06:23 pm UTC (link)

“Yes, you are. You’re holding your—“ Loki cut himself off. He knew how stubborn Sylvie could be. And she was probably still angry with him over what happened in the citadel. He didn’t want to set her off again. He thought he’d made the right choice when they were fighting. He thought he’d gotten to her. Thought he’d reached her. But then she pushed him through the time door and—

Loki clearly wasn’t the kind of person who could reach someone emotionally. Well, maybe if anger or hatred was the emotion, he could. He was definitely good at bringing that out in people. But truly connecting with them on a deeper plane? Sylvie wasn’t the only proof that he was a failure on that account.

But that was all in the past. The distant past for him. It had felt like forever since he’d seen her.

“Look, Sylvie. I know we didn’t get off on the right foot the first time around. I understand why you did what you did. I want you to know that I’m sorry if you felt like I wasn’t on your side. I still don’t entirely agree with what happened, but I should have listened to you better.” Loki pursed his lips. That’s not what he’d planned on saying. He had over a hundred years to think of how he’d approach her and Mobius and all of the others. It was all meticulously played out in his mind. Now he was stumbling over himself, speaking almost a mile a minute, and she was looking at him like she thought he was someone else.

“The time door. It sent me back to the TVA, but everything was different and then I was slipping through time and Mobius was—“ Loki paused. “Wait. How did you get here?”

ragevariant
2025-02-23 07:05 pm UTC (link)

Where were the daggers? Where were the horns, the extravagant Asgardian wardrobe? They were at a party. He ought to be head-to-toe God of Mischief, Prince of Asgard, beacon of hope, savior of the citizens, blahblahblah. She barely recognized him.

At first she even wondered if he'd mistaken her for someone else. When she would pull up her file on her TemPad, and span through other variants, there was never anyone who looked like her. That didn't mean they didn't exist, though. It just meant they'd never been caught. But then he addressed her by her name, and that told her he did know her. Otherwise, how would he know her name? It still felt weird to hear someone address her out loud.

When he started apologizing to her about how things had gone down between them she found herself even more confused. Their entire journey together in Chicken Legs had been nothing but discourse and fighting up until they sort of begrudgingly found common ground and an understanding in Mamom but she wouldn't have trusted it or called it iron clad. She certainly wouldn't think he'd apologize for anything that led to it. But she had told him how to escape and maybe he'd figured out how to do it and it led him here. Where was here?

"I don't know how I got here," she said, warily. "There was a storm that ripped that damn chicken house apart, I fell through something and woke up here on the ground." After she apparently landed on some wreckage and cracked her ribs on one side. Thankfully the pain was gradually subsiding more and more which meant the healing process was under way and it probably wouldn't be bothersome for too much longer.

She paused. Had he said he'd been through a time door? And to the TVA? "The TVA? They came for you like I told you they would, you doughnut. Did they prune your Kaiju Kingdom too? What do you mean, slipping through time? What did you do?"

lokivariant
2025-02-23 08:01 pm UTC (link)

The chicken house?

Loki hadn’t expected her to say that. Granted, he didn’t know what he expected her to say, but being part of the group of people who supposedly arrived from some strange chicken cottage was not on that list.

And for the first moment since he saw her, he actually worried that she wasn’t his Sylvie. Well, not his his. But the Sylvie he’d come to know after he, too, had escaped the TVA. The Sylvie who sat with him on Lamentis, waiting to die. The Sylvie who rescued him in the Void. The Sylvie who taught him how to manifest his powers in even greater ways than he’d ever imagined. The Sylvie who—

He blinked. “What did I do? What do you mean what did I do? I tried to help you! That’s why I’m here at all. I was trying to get back to you. Trying to return to the citadel or track you in time. I didn’t do anything! I—“

Loki paused. “What is this kaiju nonsense people keep bringing up to me?! I don’t even know what a kaiju is!”

ragevariant
2025-02-23 09:53 pm UTC (link)

Well, they were certainly bickering the way she had with the Loki she knew before. Maybe it was him, maybe it wasn't. There was no way he could know her and not be ~~her Loki~~ the Loki she knew. It was just impossible. So what was he talking about?

"You wanted to help me?" She asked. "You were.. trying to find me?" She took a step back, nervous. It was hard to believe that he was being honest. Why would he want to help her? The whole reason she hadn't wanted to tell him how to hide from the TVA was because she was afraid he'd link up with them and tell them how to catch her. Was that what happened? It didn't feel that way. He was looking at her as though he was pleading with her to remember something else, something he'd been desperately trying to get to. Her? Why?

The party atmosphere felt wrong for this. She didn't even know what this was and she didn't even know where she was. It was getting overwhelming all at once and she was not the best equipped to handle that ever, let alone right now. Too bad Spock hadn't been able to teach her any sort of calming techniques before they arrived. She was overstimulated and had no idea how to express that beyond blowing energy out of her palms to clear her way to escape. She couldn't exactly do that, but she did give off the energy of some feral animal looking ready to bolt.

She ignored his question about the Kaiju for now. She'd tell him all about it at some point but right now she was trying to put the whole picture of what was going on together without all the pieces of the puzzle and it was freaking her out. "I don't know what's going on," she managed to say. "If you knew I was here, does the TVA know too? Will they try to come for me?"

lokivariant
2025-02-24 08:29 am UTC (link)

"Wait." Loki held up his hands in an almost surrender-like motion. "Hold up. Let's reel this back a second."

You're not crazy, Loki. You've been here an awfully long time, but you're not crazy. You were in the citadel. Sylvie kicked you through the time door. You ended up in the TVA. But time actually existed in the TVA. Only nobody knew it. Not even Mobius. You met O.B. You were slipping. Slipping through time. Then Sylvie was in the elevator and—

"The last time I saw you, you were in the elevator at the TVA. You were prying open the doors because the power had gone out and..." Loki cut himself off. Then he looked at her. Really looked at her.

It was the hair. He only saw her for a split second, but the hair was different.

Okay, but Lokis change their appearances all the time. It doesn't mean she...

"This is the Void. We've been here before. Both of us. Together. We fought Alioth. We journeyed to the Citadel at the End of Time. We found He Who Remains. You don't remember that?" Loki paused. "What do you remember?"

ragevariant
2025-02-24 09:28 pm UTC (link)

Sylvie found herself growing more and more confused. The more he spoke, the less she understood. It sounded like he was describing a whole other version of her but that just didn't sound right. She didn't even think she could cause herself to split into another Variant.

His recounting of events sounded like the two of them had been through a lot. And if he'd been looking for her, they had to have formed some sort of alliance but that was absurd. She hadn't gone through any of that with him. Unless when she got caught up in Chicken legs, it really did cause her to split into a Variant of herself somehow, and the Sylvie he was talking about had gone through all of that. But she didn't think it worked that way.

Her head was starting to hurt as much as she imagined Spock's was hurting at the moment and she didn't even have a head injury. "I don't know!" She snapped, frustrated and overwhelmed by what he was telling her. "I haven't been at the TVA in centuries, since I escaped the first time and I don't know what the Void is. I've been trying for months to go back where I was before I got stuck in that goddamn hut so that I can get back to work on burning the TVA to the ground. If my stupid TemPad hadn't lost power I'd have done it by now. I was so close. I nearly had everything I needed. I--"

Thinking about it was getting her upset; all her adrenaline from crash landing and immediately starting out on a journey to safety was wearing off and reality was really hitting her that she was stuck somewhere again. Now she was standing in front of someone who claimed to know her, to have spent significant time with her, apparently been someone important enough to her that he was trying to find her after somehow losing her? Was that not the sort of connection she'd been lacking and longing for her entire life?

"Are you from my future? That shouldn't be possible. I don't-- I don't have have a timeline, but there's no other me. And you knew my name." Her heart was pounding so hard she could hear her pulse in her ears.

lokivariant
2025-02-26 09:51 am UTC (link)

Oh.

Loki felt like a damn fool. Why had he not considered the possibility that if he did find one of his friends that they wouldn't be from the same timeline as him? Over a hundred years he'd spent in the Void and he just assumed that if he found Sylvie that she would be from the moment he last saw her. It was stupid, egocentric thinking. And he cursed himself for being so damn narrow minded.

No, not narrow minded. Single focused.

He kept thinking about how he had to get back to the TVA. He never stopped to think about the TVA coming to him. Sylvie didn't know him. She hadn't met him yet. Which meant that if Mobius showed up, the same might also be true.

Loki tried to hide the heartbreak and despair from his features, but while he might have been good at steeling his face, his eyes gave away his truth.

Loki! Truth! Imagine that!

"Maybe it's best if we..." Start over? Forget what happened? Ignore the past? Go our separate ways? Loki hid his disappointment behind an awkward laugh. "You know, I never really know what the best protocol is when you run into someone you know who doesn't know you. Mostly because it hasn't really happened yet. I mean, it did. At the TVA when I was time slipping and people hadn't met me yet and then I was going back and forth and—"

Loki took a deep breath and exhaled. "Maybe we should just forget that we may or may not know each other and start fresh."

He placed a hand over his heart. "Loki. Variant L1130 if you want to be bureaucratic about it."

ragevariant
2025-02-26 03:12 pm UTC (link)

Whatever he'd gone through had made him very different than the Loki she knew in Chicken Legs. Appearance wise, they looked a lot alike but that seemed to be where it ended. They were different people, just like she was a different person. She could understand and accept that relatively easily. That had pretty much summed up her entire existence the last several centuries.

Him referring to his Variant label had her frowning, though. She hadn't looked at her file in ages but she could see it glaring at her. Variant L1190. Laufeydottir, Loki. She could recall the haunting photo of a child with large, frightened eyes locked behind an ice fortress in her memory along with whatever the hell she'd done to make them take her. Sylvie had no idea and that file was worthless. The charges listed were blank other than a tacky red stamp in big letters that read REDACTED.

"Sylvie," she said, then paused a moment as she thought over her next question. "Before you forget you knew me.. Did we trust each other? ..Can we..?" Such a thing sounded impossible to her but she'd started gradually opening herself up to the idea. She thought of Spock; if there was anyone she trusted, it was him. In Loki's rambling to her just now, he'd talked of them fighting together, not fighting each other. They'd been on some sort of journey so before he forgot and dismissed all of that, she needed to know if there was hope that they might work toward building.. whatever that was. Or if she needed to regard him the way she did everyone else who was new to her and be on the defensive.

lokivariant
2025-02-26 07:57 pm UTC (link)

Did they trust each other?

That was a good question. Loki trusted her. He truly believed that they were on the same page. That she had decided to give up her quest for revenge for the betterment of the multiverse. But then she shoved him through the time door. And Loki didn't know where that had left them. He didn't even know where it had left her. Until he saw her prying open the doors of that elevator at the TVA he assumed she was still trapped in the Citadel at the End of Time.

The citadel he hadn't managed to return to even though he was in the Void for a century. Because he couldn't do it without her.

"I'd like to think we were beginning to trust each other," Loki said after a thoughtful pause. "But it was complicated."

Of course, it was complicated. They were Lokis. Everything was always complicated with them.

"Look, I don't expect you to believe me. I don't even expect you to trust me. I certainly wouldn't if I were you. In fact I didn't the first time we met." Loki chewed on his lower lip. "The universe has done you wrong. Hell, it's done all of us wrong. But you in particular ... what happened wasn't fair and it wasn't right. And I'm sorry you had to go through that. I never really got to say that to you. Well, I did, but you had a sword at my throat so I don't think you were really listening."

His lips curled in a crooked smile. "What I mean to say is, I'm not your enemy here. I only want you to be ... happy."

ragevariant
2025-02-26 11:19 pm UTC (link)

Complicated. That was a word she knew well. The idea of putting her trust into anyone, but especially Loki felt weighted with complications. The Loki she knew, they'd tried killing each other before they settled into just antagonizing the shit out of each other instead. She hadn't trusted him but she did feel they'd.. maybe.. kinda.. had some sort of understanding in the end before they parted ways. She'd told him how to escape the TVA, anyway. So what was to say that this Loki wasn't telling her the truth. If it was some sort of scheme she really couldn't think of what the end goal would be. ...Unless he was helping the TVA, which was still a possibility. She couldn't just dismiss it.

Something about his eyes made her feel like maybe he was telling the truth. It wasn't enough for her to actually trust him but maybe she believed him. Her eyes averted to the side as he brought up what had been done to her, to her life. So then, he knew about that, too.

Her frown finally smoothed out into a more neutral expression as she considered his words. Not necessarily the wanting her to be happy part, but just before it. "My sword at your throat? Well, now I might actually believe you," she said. A small concession but part of her kind of wanted to believe he was telling her the truth. "That sounds like me."

She had a lot of other questions, but she wouldn't be able to start fresh with him if she asked them. He wouldn't be her enemy, but did that make them allies? "I mean, I'm not going to draw my sword now, but... It's not out of the realm of possibility if you piss me off. Alright?"

lokivariant
2025-03-03 08:33 am UTC (link)

Loki did his best to hide his disappointment. He really wanted Sylvie to remember him. Then again, considering the way things had ended, maybe this was for the best. Maybe this was an opportunity for them to start anew without the drama and destruction of the TVA and He Who Remains standing between them. Maybe this was how they actually met each other on even terms.

Well, relatively even terms considering he knew more than she did. But the Void was a strange place and stranger things had happened. There was no telling what might befall her memory. Or his for that matter.

He'd seen it happen in others before.

Loki's shoulders relaxed considerably when her frown drew into a more neutral hold. "You definitely have a habit of trying to slice and dice your way through your problems. You're not alone in that! But sometimes a little diplomacy can go a long way. Also blood is so fickle to get out of Asgardian leather."

Loki smiled. Not a grin or a smirk. But a lopsided, hopeful smile.

Then he held up his hands in mock defeat. "Me? Piss someone off? Never."

[ooc: sorry this week got away from me!!]

ragevariant
2025-03-03 03:33 pm UTC (link)

Her brow arched. Diplomacy. When did she ever have time for that? Survival mode didn't afford such luxuries but he certainly sounded like him to suggest it. Diplomacy. It almost had her laughing as she thought about how much the Loki she knew tried to spread diplomacy over the inhabitants of Chicken Legs with his flowery network speeches. She wondered if the Kaiju took to it, too. Diplomacy. She finally did scoff about it, but it was kind of about as close to the sound of a laugh as she'd given in.. a while.

Although he sounded familiar, the Loki standing in front of her was so different. Sylvie felt compelled to draw her sword and start a fight just to see what he'd do but at the same time, she just.. kind of wanted to believe everything he said. Her instincts and her fragile inklings of hope were warring with each other in her head and it was very, very confusing. All the while she was just standing there surrounded by music and people having a good time who were none the wiser.

"You're jesting me," she said. Sylvie had not really figured out what this place was all about yet but she had a feeling with such a wide collective of individuals around it seemed like they were all stuck. Which meant she was in the same position she was before. She was never going to get out without fixing her TemPad. More delays in her mission. It was hard not to feel hopeless about that but the rage in her wouldn't let her give up. She'd find a way to fix it and leave. Spock said he might be able to help her. That was a good place to start. And maybe Loki fit into that equation somehow too. Probably.

"But to your point, I am showing diplomacy by having this conversation," she said, and there was a little hint of teasing in her tone while she mulled over what she was going to do. It would be stupid of her to leave and try to fix her TemPad herself, so she guessed she was staying. What did staying entail, though? "Hypothetically, if I were to stick around, where would I stay?"

lokivariant
2025-03-07 12:52 pm UTC (link)

"Right. Of course, you are. How could I forget that tempered patience of yours? It's practically saintly." It was meant as a joke, but after Loki said the words he almost regretted them. He didn't want to get off on a bad start, but it was hard with Lokis. The divide between them was both vast and small. And he had a different image of her in his mind. One that had grown with their time together. And she--

Well, he was no one to her.

No Lamentis. No Void. No Citadel at the End of Time.

When he looked at her he saw the face in the lift at the TVA, but it wasn't her. Not now. Not yet.

Maybe never.

Loki withheld the urge to sigh. He would figure this out. He would make this right. This was just another bump in the road. He could handle bumps. He'd dealt with them before.

His lips curled in a half smile.

"Butler Hall." He motioned to a building not far from the Green. "You can choose any available room. The view out the window is different based on evens and odds so, you know, maybe check that out first before you officially settle in."

Loki paused. "Assuming you plan on staying, that is. But we are one of the few places in the Void with running water. In case you need an extra push one way or the other."

ragevariant
2025-03-08 06:17 pm UTC (link)

It was especially weird for her to be around someone who knew her. Being reunited with the people she'd met in Chicken Legs who remembered her was strange enough, but she at least remembered Spock. Sylvie had gone for centuries having no one know who she was. Addressing her by name was even stranger. Not in a bad way. Once she had time to kind of just sit with all of this it might actually make her feel good. It was just unlike anything she could remember ever feeling.

Having someone know her was foreign and not something she really knew what to do with right now. The Loki standing in front of her now felt familiar enough with her to make a comment about her patience in a teasing way. Had he not known her name on sight, she would've called him a liar but that was proof, wasn't it? They'd apparently been through a great deal together. Sylvie could not put that weight on her shoulders and .. part of her maybe felt a little bad that he had to shoulder the burden of knowledge alone but she couldn't do anything about it. Except maybe not cut him off or try to kill him.

"Mmhmm," she made a sound of acknowledgement. Yes. Running water was a luxury she sometimes had to go without> "You sure know how to entice a person." She wasn't going to leave until she at least let Spock look at her TemPad. "I'll stay. ...And, maybe you can show me how things work around here."

lokivariant
2025-03-11 08:14 am UTC (link)

Loki's smile was brimming by the time Sylvie responded. Had it worked? Had he broken through that thick Sylvie-coated shell of hers? Was this the first step in rekindling what he'd messed up?

No. Not rekindling. She doesn't know you. She doesn't remember you.

Right. Of course. That was a problem. But also not a problem! Loki just wanted her to be safe. And here she was! Safe as safe could be.

As long as she stayed in Derleth, that is. As long as she didn't leave. So Loki had to make sure he was extra careful not to upset her. He wasn't going to lose his friends again.

Never again.

"Yes! I mean ... Of course. I'd be glad to show you around. Anything. Just give us a chance. That's all I ask."

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