Masquerade Mingle

[thespaceopera]

[The night has finally come--the Gravity Rush is nearly upon us! What normally serves as a large performance hall has been gutted, emptied of its boring furniture and rigged up into a fantastical mismatch of technology and old culture. No matter where you go tonight, you're encouraged to move around, dance, play games, whatever helps you sleep in late tomorrow morning.

If you aren't one for scurrying around a ballroom all night, there's always plenty of people-watching to do. After all, so many people are wearing extravagant costumes and elaborate masks. How can you even tell who is who? Get lost in a crowd of sequins, chatter with a sun and a moon, or try to beat the guy in the monster-mask at a game of cards. Meet your friends or make some new ones--this masquerade party has begun!]


[[ooc: All sections are up now, have fun! A related ooc post is HERE for any questions or plotting you'd like to do.]]

Comments

[girlverine]

[Laura's taste in clothing rarely met with expectations. She'd have dressed pretty goth all the time if it wasn't such a chore.]

[Nightingale did get a small smile from her though, because honestly, if this was supposed to be a date that was...the right thing to do. And she seemed nice enough. But the question just earned a shrug.]

I am watching.

[experiencepoints]

[Nightingale completely misreads the smile, though, taking it at face value. That's a good sign, right? She really should have gotten more advice about this sort of thing.]

See anything interesting?

[girlverine]

[Laura turned her attention back to the crowd, considering it for another few minutes.]

Infiltrating this gathering would not be difficult, if it were necessary. Everyone is eclectic enough that no one would stand out.

[She says this quietly, casually, as if it is clearly something she has had to do before.]

[experiencepoints]

[That gets a small laugh out of her.]

Might be hard to get just the right level of tacky to be inconspicuous, though. Too normal and you'd stand out in a different way.

[girlverine]

It is just a matter of careful preparation. The specific details of a crowd would not matter, most people would only notice a significant difference from themselves.

[experiencepoints]

Yeah, that's true... But I'm not sure why anyone would need to infiltrate a masquerade party.

[girlverine]

There are many reasons. Though espionage or assassination would be the primary ones.

Large, complicated social gatherings make accomplishing things like that easy, because security is rarely capable of handling the crowd.

[experiencepoints]

... That must be one of those weird differences in worlds. Where I'm from, at least some of the guests here would probably be ridiculously strong. Enough that security isn't really a problem to think of.

[girlverine]

Strength is rarely an obstacle if someone is determined to kill you.

[It was a factor, but that wasn't the same thing. At least, not for her. And she shifted a bit, suddenly realizing this was taking a darker turn than she meant it to.]

[experiencepoints]

[Yeah, this is getting darker. Nightingale understands how it must feel to talk to her sometimes. Still... She can turn this around, right? Not make it an obvious subject change, but turn it back to lighter subjects.]

Probably helps that in my world, killing doesn't stick. It's a temporary inconvenience more than anything else. That was a pretty weird thing to get used to when I found out other worlds weren't like that.

[girlverine]

[People had a tendency to come back to life in her world as well, but 'killing doesn't stick' wasn't right. For most people, it did.]

That is...I don't know. It is not like that on my world. When you kill someone, they remain dead.

[She said this with such certainty. Probably because she was basically a serial killer.]

[experiencepoints]

[She shrugs. She's become used to this conversation.]

The only ones capable of killing someone permanently in my world are the gods, and people killed the last of those off centuries ago. It's a good thing, too. If we didn't have save points, the entire profession of adventurer would be insane.

[girlverine]

...Save points?

[Congratulations, Nightingale, you have completely baffled Laura.]

[experiencepoints]

Oh, uh... The things that revived us. A special type of crystal formation. You used one, you got killed later, you get resurrected at the save point you used.

Really useful, but you get pretty sick of seeing them sometimes.

[girlverine]

Oh. [She had no reference point for video games to make the comparison, sadly.]

It sounds...impossible.

[experiencepoints]

[That's a good thing, honestly, that comparison tends to make her mad. Even if her world literally does run on video game logic.]

An interdimensional kidnapping reality TV show in space sounds pretty impossible too, and yet...

[girlverine]

This isn't the first time I've heard of that, though.

[Yes, she almost sounds amused.]

Other X-men have been taken to a place called...Mojoverse. Another dimension that was reality television.

[experiencepoints]

There's more than one place like this?! Why?

[girlverine]

If there is really a multiverse...everywhere you can think of presumably exists somewhere.

[Oh oops sometimes she's a nerd.]

[experiencepoints]

... I guess so.

[She just sighs, defeated.]

And it's not even the weirdest other world I've seen, honestly.

[girlverine]

...You have been to other worlds?

[experiencepoints]

Yeah. Well, sort of indirectly? This is actually my second interdimensional shithole. I was pulled directly from my last one to the Fleet.

But back there, at the castle, we sort of... ended up seeing each other's memories. A lot. So, I've never been to worlds besides my own, the castle, and the Fleet, but I have memories of other peoples' worlds too, even if they're not my memories.

[girlverine]

[Well that was...complicated.]

This is my first time.

[It was almost a joke?]

[experiencepoints]

Honestly, as far as the interdimensional prisons go, this one is actually a pretty good one to get stuck in. It's a lot nicer here than the castle was, even if I miss my team.

Have you been here long?

[girlverine]

A few weeks. I arrived with another from my world, but she has left.

[And Logan too. Laura supposed she should have expected that.]