BOTH. Memes are good for short threads, but I am guilty of missing them a lot because I don’t like one liners in my RP Tracker, otherwise I can’t find my para length ones in the huge pool of messing about :3 I do v much like them though.
Plots are good too though, I like being able to think ahead :O
Penny has been gone two weeks now, and the edge of awkwardness between Chuami and Xu is as keen as it was on day one. She’s getting tired of it. Xu has a reputation for being intimidating, and she had never paid attention to that before; now though, now, for some reason, she was… wary of her? And why? Because Penny wasn’t there to act as a buffer between them? For Hyne’s sake, they had seen each other naked.
For starters.
So, that morning, she had decided to do something about it. And that was how she found herself in the Garden cafeteria that lunchtime, lounging across one of the tables as if she hadn’t snuck in on a contractor’s permit she made at home or something.
Xu didn’t often stay here to eat, but Chu was hoping she would pass through for her afternoon coffee refill between… whatever it was Xu did when she wasn’t making cadets go unnecessary at the knees. She wasn’t even sure Xu would come here, maybe she’d take a walk into town, maybe she– ah, no. There she is. As Xu came nearer, Chuami called out to her.
She flips through the menu, realizes she’s going to be eating a lot of veggies on this trip if behemoth steaks are going to be the best recommendation that she is going to get, and tosses it to Chuami in favor of flopping back against the pillows.
At least the bed is comfortable.
“I should have taken Penny’s advice and packed some food for myself, but you’ve gotten me a little concerned about what they’d do to a block of tofu.”
There are a few granola bars, some snacks, a pack of trail mix, in her pack, if things get dire.
“Please tell me at least the agencies are capable of rustling up a bottle of wine.”
“Tofu?” Chuami scoffs in reply, “Tofu is hippie food. You’re not in Bevelle now, you know. You’ll eat what Cid eats – a sahagin curry with a couple of naan bread on the side.”
She breaks off into a laugh as she realises that, without really meaning for it to happen, her voice had gotten steadily more blunt and harsh until it finally became a pretty good Cid impression.
“Wine, though? Yes, we do wine. Some of it might be a bit cactusy, but that’s all part of its charm. Or we could ask if they’ve imported anything from Guadosalam lately. That’s actually really good. Want me to go see?”
“I did, too, when they told me I’d be on maintenance medication forever,” she agrees with a brief smile. “Sometimes I make Kadowaki do the dosage if I’m at Garden to see Pen, just so I don’t have to deal with it.”
Her blouse is rescued from the bathroom counter, neatly folded and tucked into her duffel in exchange for a soft-worn t-shirt and sweatpants. She sits, right leg tucked under left, and reaches for the menu on the nightstand.
“No one comes here? I wonder what that means for the standard of their room service, then. I’m starving.”
Chuami snorts. It’s easy to forget, sometimes, that Xu isn’t from here, and her equivalent of the Spiran travel agency is probably a little more… refined.
“It’s okay.” she shrugs, carelessly digging through her bag. “If you like behemoth steaks. We’re good at a lot, the Al Bhed, but we’re not so great at cooking. The oven it’s all made in is probably first class, though.”
She finds what she’s looking for – an old shirt that looks like it might have been her brother’s once – and pulls her dress over her head in one practiced swipe before pulling the shirt on instead.
“My dad used to say we have lead-lined stomachs, and that makes it okay. Buuut, Bevelle’s at the other end of here. It’s a real place, with restaurants.”
“The question is, do you have a better idea?” she shoots back over her shoulder. She has to let go of the chain links with one hand to do so, and as she looks back and down, searching for Xu’s face in the dark, it occurs to her that maybe any idea would be a better idea.
“Alright, don’t answer that. But we’re already halfway in now, right? Penny has to be somewhere. Do you speak enough Estharan to pretend to be a lost tourist if we get caught?”
“What thing?” she asks, even as she’s capping and dispensing the syringe in a biohazard bag. “Oh. Meds.”
Doesn’t Chu know about this? Or has Xu never mentioned it? She can’t remember right now, and so doesn’t really bother, waving her hand dismissively after she drops the bio bag into the room’s trash can.
“Any luck on the coffee front?”
“Uhh…? Oh. Yeah… Sorry. I heard Penny mention it once, but I assumed it was a pill for some reason. Needles, ugh.”
She sits down heavily on the edge of the bed again, watching Xu thoughtfully. Penny had mentioned it before, but the reality of seeing someone stick one of those things in themselves was a little different to just hearing the word “meds”. Ugh.
“No, sorry. I guess they’d have that kinda thing at tourist spots, Moonflow has a way better coffee machine, but this place… yeah, no one comes here.”
She doesn’t say we’re insane to do it, but it’s implied.
Does burritoez count as weird???? Because… it’s a married lesbian couple and a dead woman? That’s pretty weird, right? I’m totally not just shoehorning it in because I haven’t reminded people it exists in a while HEHEHEH
One night stand
Hmmmm… there was that thing with Zack…
I’m not really sure tbh! … I’m winding it out in my mind to include all characters, including ones I’ve never had muse interactions with, and I’m coming back with Vanille. Figures.
“Yeah.” There’s a pound of ground beans, because if there is one thing she cannot be convinced about of Spira, it is the quality of their coffee. She removes her medical kit and tosses Chuami the bag beneath.
“See if there’s any way we can get a real coffee maker in here; I don’t think I have the patience to deal with a single-cup brewer.”
She abandons Chu to her coffee pursuit, crossing to the bathroom and shedding her blouse to better see. A pinch of skin, the cap pulled off a faintly-glowing syringe of synthetic esuna, and she empties the contents into her system.
There. Better.
Chuami’s hands come up to catch the bag, but she’s tired and slow off the mark; it hits her on the shoulder and falls onto the floor and she leans down to grab it, laughing as she does.
“You’re the boss.”
She stands up and gives Xu an overly stiff salute that she likes to pull out now and then.
When she returns to their room, it’s with bad news on the coffee maker front; but that’s quickly forgotten.
sovereignarchive 