Isabela, begrudgingly bundled against the cold, swept into the shop, eager both for the warmth and for the ability to strip away the constricting fabric that she hated so much. Her skin needed to breathe -- surely, the weather would realise that and come around to warming up. In the midst of untangling herself, she stumbled, managing an uncharacteristically ungraceful fall into a window display. Unfortunately, righting herself proved a bit difficult, what with the sudden mistletoe overhead.
She grumbled, another un-Isabela response to the prospect of kisses, and tried to pull herself free of her coat as she waited to be rescued.
"Looking a bit off-kilter there, Rivaini," joked Varric, having already been inside the shop to pick up a Satinalia gift for Ellana since they were going to see about throwing her a quiet 'cards & drinks' party to celebrate her birth. And the holiday. He put the gift-wrapped package in his pack and threw it over his shoulder before approaching the doomed pirate queen. "A smarter man would wonder if you do this kind of thing to yourself."
“I promise I’d never put myself in a position to require kissing while wearing this much clothing,” she said, offering a relieved grin at the sight of him. “I’ve fallen, and now I’m stuck. I deserve a bit of grumpiness, don’t I?”
"You? Never. Dulls your shine," retorted Varric, offering her his hand to help her up. "Need me to dial-a-hero for you?" He smirked at the idea of scrolling through the address book on his tablet and selecting a name at random, but it's not like Isabela had a dearth of people to choose from.
“Nothing dulls my shine, don’t be silly. I’m a shimmering jewel always,” she responded, taking his hand when it was offered and pulling herself to her feet. It was a struggle, given the confines of the mistletoe’s capturing of her, but she managed it. “Nope, just kiss me and set me free, won’t you?” She said it nonchalantly, but the grin gave away the mischief.
"Sure thing." Varric tilted his head to show that she'd need to bend down if she wanted a kiss from someone shorter than she was. Mistletoe wasn't fair for dwarves, that's all he could really say about it. Once Isabela was within reach, he leaned over to give her a peck on the cheek.
“Watch me forever gloat about that time I got a kiss from Varric Tethras, accomplished author,” Isabela said, righting herself after the kiss and stepping free of her previous prison. “I’ll see you soon, my darling. Thank you for your help!”
"Give me a pen and I'll sign your cheek, Rivaini," he quipped, chuckling at her now that she was freed. "Happy shopping." With one last grin, Varric trudged back out into the cold weather, just a bit more shopping to take care of before he called it a day.
Jason & Fray
For the third time in as many days, Jason was returning from the beach after another unsuccessful attempt to call out to Tempest. He could feel the air currents and the beginnings of a storm, so he knew his gifts would work as well here as any other place he'd been. Just no Tempest. Maybe even elementals required being brought in through whatever brought him here. He politely waved to people as he passed them, kind of relishing being considered kind of normal here.
Fray, meanwhile, had been stuck for about half an hour now, and she was beginning to feel a little anxious and desperate. The idea of entrapping people into kissing her just to escape the mistletoe was a frustrating one for her, who was so bad at social interaction, but she’d tried a few techniques to draw people over. At this point, she was close to asking for help on the network. Then she saw a newly familiar face, and steeled herself to call out to him before doing so. “Jason? Is that right?”
Hearing someone call his name brought him quickly out of his reverie to look around for the source, when he saw Fray not too far from where he was standing, but being as he was near the beach in winter, he couldn't for the life of him imagine what would bring her out here. Curiosity got the best of him and he jogged over, pulling his gladius from the scabbard at his back in case it was necessary to fight something off. "Fray? Is everything all right?"
“No,” she grumbled. “Stupid Atlantis and it’s dumb magic. It’s like I can’t escape it! One minute, it’s magical shape-shifting or weird gifts or drinks or whatever. Then I can hear voices? Which is mostly just annoying. And the missions! I don’t even get to go on those, not that I’d want to because who wants to be a puppy.” She breathed finally, getting the venting out of her system before pointing overhead. “Can you stab it to death?”
"Tried that before," he answered, resheathing his golden sword. Most of what she'd said confirmed the things that Reyna had told him about, the rest he had to guess came from similar experiences. It seemed this place was full of surprises for the people that lived here, which made him imagine the war they talked about had to be pretty serious for them to put up with it. "Puppies are adorable, but I wouldn't want to be one. I can help you out of this, though? If you want?"
Fray spent a lot of her time completely ignorant of how things worked or what they meant, so latching instead to the magic of it all and her rampant jealousy over that fact made it a lot easier to bear. His offer made her brow furrow a little, because this was yet another thing she didn’t entirely understand, but she nodded. “Okay, yes. Please help me, I’ve been stuck here for like half an hour.”
"Sucks. I'm sorry," he answered and tried to figure out how best to do this. He didn't know her any better than the last person he'd encountered in this situation and it felt kind of like taking advantage. So, lacking any better guidance in the whole matter and not really being coached that other, more chaste, kisses would work, he leaned forward to give Fray a quick kiss on the lips and followed it with an apologetic smile.
“It does,” she grumbled back. She wasn’t really sure what the quick fix would actually be, but she probably wouldn’t have guessed it to be a kiss. As a result, his actions were a little surprising. Not in a bad way, because they freed her, but she did blink a little in the aftermath of the little peck. She was still a moment, then tried moving, a relieved smile in her (blushing) face as she stepped from the place she’d been stuck. “Oh, thank you.”
"You're welcome. I can walk with you back to the city proper, in case it happens again?" he offered, worried that if she'd already spent half an hour out here without help, he didn't want it to happen again. So they turned towards Atlantis and began the long walk back. Question was, would he ever get used to this?
Marceline & Isaac
It’d been an eventful few weeks, truthfully. Isaac felt like he’d been launched forward and caught by surprise -- he had whiplash, really. Allison had arrived, in the height of health and still herself. They’d been clinging to one another in an unusual way, and it’d been working. And then Oliver had arrived, and that proposed something new altogether. It’d been… a lot. But he was doing okay, under the circumstances. Isaac had taken a break from grocery shopping and Christmas wrapping to visit the gym, needing to burn off a little anxiety through cardio. Again grateful for the indoor track on these cold days, he had headphones in and was tuning out the world as he ran -- until of course, he stopped so suddenly on a dime that he’d have fallen flat on his face if not for magic. Cursing, he looked up, and then he shook his head. “What sort of bullshit…” he muttered. Mistletoe appearing in the middle of a run was some real Lahey Luck in action.
Meanwhile, Marceline was in the middle of her own laps with her headphones on and her hair braided, lost in thought of what it'd mean for Kyna to be heading back to their time while others of them stayed here. What if Sherum left? What if Helena left? Astrid? Eve? Sam? It was like her heart was being ripped in two but that was Atlantis, wasn't it. She almost barrelled into the person stopped in the middle of the track, but she whipped to the side just in time thanks to honed reflexes and started to maybe curse (a bit) at them for where they stopped but she laughed instead. "Oh man, that's bullshit," she offered, pulling off her headphones.
He turned an embarrassed, annoyed smile to the woman he’d stopped in front of, lifting his hands in surrender. “I’m so sorry,” he said, shaking his head. “Just my luck, I think. Better step back a bit so you don’t get caught in it too. Seriously, there ought to be some rules about places that are off-limits.” He was glad he didn’t end up splayed out on the ground, at least, but this was still plenty embarrassing.
"Don't worry about it," answered Marceline. She stepped back over to him quickly and gave him a kiss on the nose before he could think too much about it. "Voila, you're free! Do something important with your second chance on life." She grinned and slipped her headphones back on with a wink. Then, it was back to running.
Scott & Eve
The Ugly Sweater party had been a lot of fun. It was actually the only really social thing Scott had done since he got here and it was good to make new friends. It was especially good to harass Sara, though he was glad she'd found a 'peaceful truce' (as she called it) with Reyes. And, as if on cue for chuckling about catching Evie Frye under mistletoe, he rounded a corner and found himself unable to progress. Pursing his lips for a second, he put his hands into the pockets of his coat and nodded. "I deserved that."
Eve, meanwhile, had largely avoided being caught by mistletoe thus far. She wasn’t sure how she’d managed that, as it hadn’t been a concerted effort on her part, but she’d been fortunate. She had some books under her arm, ever the researcher even when out of her usual time and place, but she was paying just enough attention that she caught sight of the man who definitely appeared to be stuck. “Hi there,” she offered, grinning. “You alright?”
"Emotionally, I'm great," answered Scott. "Physically, not so much," he noted, giving a soft shrug of his shoulders while still keeping his hands warm in his pockets. He nodded towards her books and caught a glimpse of at least one spine. "What're you researching?" Research, planning, preparing - those were the hallmarks of a Scott Ryder.
She offered a wince at that, but she still smiled a friendly smile. “I mean, that’s probably relatable,” she said. “This, specifically, is space medicine. I’m not sure which world it’s from, but I’m trying to take advantage of Atlantis in this time before I return to my own.” She reached her free hand to him. “I’m Eve Covey-Kavinsky. Did the mistletoe get you?”
"Yep, hence the physical discomfort," responded Scott, glancing up above him and just out of reach. He pulled a hand from his coat to shake her hand and continued. "Scott Ryder. I'm from space. Technically. And I've been under the care of space doctors, if that's a thing. So I guess that counts as space medicine. How's your evening, Eve Covey-Kavinsky?"
“Look at us, with our ironic meeting! You, a patient of space doctors. Me, a doctor studying space medicine. This was a fated encounter,” she said, laughing. “It’s fine. Nothing spectacular. Would you like some help to free yourself from the bonds of mistletoe nonsense?”
He relaxed a bit when she asked. "Yes, please. I didn't want to presume. I can carry your books at thanks or something? Maybe a hot drink to keep the cold off? Leave you alone so you can study in peace?" There were so many people here and being constantly forced to interact with them in personal ways was kind of having a bit of a frizz on his weird mix of introversion and extroversion.
“Oh, you won’t owe me a thing. It’s a simple enough thing,” she said, and took a few steps forward. Eve wasn’t particularly tall, so she placed a hand lightly on his shoulder, rising on her toes to offer a quick kiss to his lips before stepping back. “That ought to do it, I think. Try moving, just in case?”
Scott took a few steps experimentally to confirm he was indeed free. "You're a hero, Eve Covey-Kavinsky." With a smile and a wave, hero and victim were able to continue on their separate journeys.
Athos & Isabela
Isabela had been spending a lot more time at the homes of others since the arrival of the children and other visitors. None of her children were staying with her, after all, and she was very determined to spend as much time with them as possible. There was no telling how long they’d be in Atlantis, after all, at least in this timeline.
It did make wrapping gifts a fair bit easier, though, and she was in the middle of doing that in her living room at present. Isabela had never wrapped a gift before, in truth -- she had videos saved on her tablet to give her instruction, and one was playing at present as she folded the paper around the small box, applying entirely too much tape in the process.
Athos tapped on the doorway as he walked in, then sat a small glass of a dark brandy on the table next to Isabela before kneeling down on the floor next to her. "I find that wrapping gifts for others can often lead to needing a drink, if you're the type who isn't happy until the wrapping looks like it did in your mind before you started."
Isabela offered a grin at the sight of him, which turned to gratitude as he offered the drink and knelt beside her. “I’m not nearly that picky, or that much of a perfectionist, I’m just horribly inexperienced,” she said, and gestured to the very messy stack. Each gift was covered, to be certain, but definitely not prettily. “Our artist son will surely notice, but I’m relying on the fact that he’s too nice to say anything negative about my wrapping skills.”
"You'd be relying on fact, I'm sure." Athos set down his own glass and moved to help her cut and arrange a bit of paper, his own OCD-esque nature doing mental measurements and lining things up as best as he could by eyeballing it. "Like all things, I imagine it gets better with practice."
Isabela watched him affectionately as he helped her, taking a sip from her glass, the warmth of the alcohol flooding through her. “Watching you measure and cut should not be this enjoyable, monsieur perfectionist,” she said, grinning. “Thank the Maker you came along to save poor Liam from a crumpled mess of tape and paper.” The fire nearby was starting to wane, crackling into embers, so she set her cup aside and pulled herself forward on her knees to put fresh logs in it and stoke it back up to flame. It was then that Atlantis chose to strike, because of course it did, and she became aware of the mistletoe that sprouted from the mantle-piece above her head where she knelt on the hearth. Sighing, she turned over her shoulder. “Looks like I may need your help elsewhere too, love.”
Athos placed a last bit of tape on the package he was working on and glanced over at Isabela as she was working the hearth, so he had actually seen the mistletoe spring into being. In honesty, he thought it seemed a bit contrived for it to show up in people's houses - someone could get easily stuck in the bath and have to be rescued while in a state of undress. "If I hadn't seen it with my own eyes, I might've thought you planned that," he noted, smirking across at her before moving over beside her. "Not that I'd complain, this seems like the perfect place to enjoy the moment."
“What, you don’t think I’m capable of controlling wild Atlantis magic too?” she teased, grinning as he joined her. “It certainly is. Of all the mistletoe kisses I’ve had to endure so far, this is definitely the one I’d plan if I could’ve,” she added, setting aside the metal poker and settling her arms around his neck. “Better make it a good one, Athos. This is exactly the right setting.”
"It honestly wouldn't surprise me, but I worry that you'd have a mob at your door if that was the case." Instead of making some extremely extravagant gesture, however, Athos just made sure he was seated close enough to her to share both the fire's warmth for himself and his own with her before giving her a soft smile while he caressed her cheek. Liam was fantastic proof of what the two of them could do, but even discounting their son, he knew how far he'd go for this woman. When he pressed his lips to hers, he could only hope she could feel that through his kiss.