And Let Us Gather 'Round [ Video + Action ]

[universal_charm]

Who: Kirk and The Fine People of the Fleet
Broadcast: Yes
Action: On the Iskaulit, Specifically at the Melting Pot - Note: After the Broadcast
When: After they start heading away from the system

Video
<sub>[ Kirk appears on the screen, and probably like many people he looks tired and a bit beaten up. Scratches not yet healed on his face, one even covered with a bandage on his cheek, that sort of drawn look around his eyes after all the sleepless nights and the battles and general horridness. A little to pale, perhaps.

Even so, he gives as warm a smile as he can as he begins to speak. ]</sub>

For those of you who might not know, I come from a world called Earth - or at least, one of the versions represented here. On my world, in the country I hail from, we celebrate something known as Thanksgiving roughly around this time of year if I've done my calculations correct. Some people call it Friendsgiving, but it's all the same really.

Essentially, it's a time to a give thanks for the good things in your life, your friends, and your family. In the spirit of that, I've arranged for a gathering at the Melting Pot - a thank you to Jarvis for that. Everyone who wishes to come is welcome.

I just thought we all could use a day, a place, to be together and to just enjoy each other. So I hope to see you there.

Action: The Melting Pot
<sub>[ The restaurant is set up to allow as much mingling as possible when people arrive - places to sit, of course, but there's gentle music playing for those who might want to dance and just to give some atmosphere (but not loud enough to stop conversation at all). Food and drink is laid out - things to nibble on rather than the usual feasts associated with a Thanksgiving. Not particularly ideal, but it's what could be managed. Unless, of course, anyone decided to bring something else to add to the spread.

Not a fancy party, to be sure, but it's warm and inviting, which is what Kirk had hoped for. A place for them all to come together and enjoy each other and just be glad they were all there and if not quite completely whole, then, well, able to be there. ]

[ooc: Open mingle! Feel free to create your own starters and do as you like - tis a warm Friendsgiving party for the Fleet! ]</sub>

Comments

[candothat]

Not so easy. This is the last of what I have. [He shoots the more-empty-than-not bottle that he's been carrying around a sad look.] If I'm remembering correctly, there was a time when it was easy to be happy sober. What happened to that?

[passingthrough]

[She gives him a tighter hug.] Mysterious overlord abduction times three in your case? [Fell in love with a girl who was busy being in love with other people the whole time?]

[candothat]

Oh. Yes, maybe. [While he is never going to say no to more hugging, he isn't particularly sad about the elusiveness of sober happiness.] Or maybe not. My father told me that there is a direct relationship between life experience and unhappiness... usually a positive one.

[passingthrough]

Positive as in they both increase or positive as in a good thing?

[candothat]

Positive relationship. Both increase. But yes, being abducted to other universes is upsetting and all of us have at least one good reason to be miserable.

[passingthrough]

Sure, but... We all have at least one good reason to not be miserable.

[candothat]

[He pauses to consider the validity of this statement.] That is true, I think. Also the purpose of this holiday--to find things to not be miserable about.

[passingthrough]

I've never thought of it like that, but yes. That's kind of the deal. Are you miserable, Pavel?

[candothat]

Mm, I was. Did I tell you that I killed one of the Vierizi? [He did not.]

[passingthrough]

You did not. [And there's a moment because a girl who has killed so many needs a moment to realize not everyone spend their formative years fighting and killing for survival and protection of the human race.] Was that the first time...?

[candothat]

It was, yes. [He shrugs and takes a good long drink.] I realize this is unimpressive. Nearly everyone here has needed to kill, and your world... probably it's inescapable there.

[passingthrough]

Hey, no, it's not about being impressive or... It's a big deal. Of course it is. [He's not wrong. It's pretty inescapable there unless you'd rather be dead. But she remembers her first time. It's awful.] How are you doing?

[candothat]

I'm fine, fine. It seems like less of a big deal than it did. [Tomorrow will definitely involve being less fine and possibly more of things being a big deal.] How are you doing?

[passingthrough]

Nope, come on. Don't act like I'm the one who has really been through something here. No deflecting.

[candothat]

You were also on the ground, you have really been through something as well. [Although the fact that she is not on her way to drinking herself unconscious does seem to imply that she is coping a bit more skillfully.]

[passingthrough]

Sure, but more than half my crew has powers. We crashed next to village of non-cannibals. Chuuya softened our landing with his gravity manipulation powers. We didn't really run into any trouble we didn't go looking for.

[candothat]

Ah. Okay, maybe your experience was different. [Can't really argue when his crew spent most of the month getting lightly maimed.] We did have Fenris. He was very... [what's the word] ...murderous. And Hawke and Anders chose to decorate the ship with corpses, which almost certainly repelled the Vierizi as much as it repelled me.

[passingthrough]

They...what? Do you want to sit down? [Maybe find a corner just for them or something?]

[candothat]

That would be a good idea, probably. [He is pretty drunk. It's not even the fun kind of drunk anymore.] Fenris and I fought not so long ago. Verbally, of course, I would never fight him physically. He thinks there is no room for kindness or sentimentality.

[passingthrough]

Good. Definitely don't fight him physically. [Putting a hand on Chekov's back and leading him over to a couple of chairs a little further away from the others.]

I guess one person's kindness and sentimentality is another person's need to stay sane and human decency. [She's killed before even brutally when necessary, but she always tried to be...efficient. There was seldom time to stick around and bury the bodies, but she didn't mutilate them either. That reminds her more of Tyki which is more than a little unsettling.]

[candothat]

I do have keen survival instincts, Kitty. [Debatable, really. Chairs are good though. Safe.]

Then you think it is reasonable to be upset by bodies attached to the hull of the ship? [Just looking for validation here. Kirk didn't seem terribly fussed about it.]

[passingthrough]

Of course you do. [A little placating since he's drunk.]

I'm a little upset just hearing about it. The Vierezi may have had no respect for our lives. We may have had to take some of theirs. But it doesn't mean we should devalue them like that. You start doing that and you become just like them.

[candothat]

Yes, that is what I told Fenris--that we can be better than them. Killing, fine, I understand the necessity of that, [even if he's not really okay with it] but the rest... and that Fenris and Hawke and Anders were all unbothered...

[He trails off into incoherence. You know what he means.]

[passingthrough]

[She nods, and it is troubling, but she doesn't know their side of it or why they did it or how they acted in the wake of doing it and while that might seem trivial those can be the differences that really inform what kind of person it came from.]

In fairness to them... I don't know a lot about their world, but sometimes you have to adjust to things no one should ever have to adjust to for survival.

[candothat]

You are from such a world. Many people I have known were, and all but one of them stopped doing terrible things once they realized that it was unnecessary. Or maybe this was necessary, I don't know, I have been told that the people in my world and from my time are naive and weak in many ways and maybe that is true... although I think that Kirk wasn't very disturbed, not by this or when I killed the person who attacked him, so perhaps Hawke and Anders and Fenris are all clever tacticians who did the most correct thing and I'm as foolishly naive as Fenris believes.