Scene #9223: The Nightcrawler Crawls at Night pt 4

Owner	Pose
Madeleine Cadrasteia	BONNEVILLE SALT FLATS, NEVADA, UNITED STATES Madeleine spends a while digging strange instruments out the back of the van, variously scanning and sampling and prodding nightcrawlers with her myriad cryptozoology doodads. Eventually, as the sun begins to set over the salt flats, something amazing begins to happen. The ground comes alive, almost, as this migration cycle's crop of infant nightcrawlers (after fifteen years lying dormant under the salt crust) begin to emerge. They're more colorful than their parents, ranging from pink to powder blue to yellow to minty green, reminiscent of those colored marshmallows you might see at a grocery store. And they're not even an inch tall! Squirming their way out of their little burrows, hundreds and then thousands of the baby nightcrawlers crawl up the legs of their adult kin, some of whom crouch or lie flat on the ground to make the ascent easier. And, when the very last of their children are 'all aboard', the nightcrawlers begin to move. They jog past the van en masse, picking up speed as they start the long journey back west, across desert and mountain toward California again. Tomorrow, the elites will follow - but for now, Madeleine explains, "It's time to hit the hay. I've got a motel waiting for us in West Wendover. That's on the Nevada side, so y'all can at least get a drink if you want." The drive back to the motel is uneventful (though, what isn't compared to alien abductions?), and the night is peaceful (or at least free of outside disturbances). In the morning it's time to get back on the road, into the deserts of Nevada. "Why don'tcha sit up front this time, Shinmyoumaru?" Madeleine suggests, "so's you can have a better view." That's not really her reason for offering, as becomes quickly apparent. Instead, Maddie's been planning since yesterday to gently grill the Inchling about danmaku: "How does it work, projecting your soul like that? Can people who aren't from Gensokyo learn? What about people with, you know... unusual souls?" She's clearly been thinking about it since she witnessed Shinmyoumaru's danmaku yesterday. Meanwhile, the back seats have a new addition - Maddie found a magnetic "Trouble" board game in the trunk of the van, complete with Pop-o-Matic dice container. Who's game? And for those who aren't, what's your pastime of choice?
White	White spends a while considering whether she should do something petty and silly, like put a bandana on one of the nightcrawlers just for fun. She spends so long considering it that the convenient opportunity passes by, and she moves on without acting on the impulse. It's practice, you see. One must fight their desires to be strong!! ... Or something like that. It's not until the people she's watching them with start to move on as well that she actually shifts posture enough to seem awake and attentive again, but people are probably catching on by now to her quirks, so it's not as mysterious when she sits perfectly still with her eyes closed for minutes at a time. The night goes fairly similar for her as it did last time; she vanishes multiple times only to reappear in silence, having taken the opportunity to blip out for minutes at a time and handle minor tasks (like bringing back a small tub of ice cream, it turns out) and repeatedly rolling a d100 on whether she's going to scare the hell out of someone in the middle of the night in the process. Back in the van the next morning, White seems somehow more perplexed by the Trouble board than by the nightcrawlers, going by how she keeps idly clicking the die-roller periodically. She's never seen this kind of board game accessory before, so it's a novelty to her. She's still content to occupy herself with making stuffed animals, but if someone tries to rope her into playing she absorbs the instructions through her eyelids at record pace. She takes her turns fairly quickly, even when she's not actively looking at the board, so maybe that makes her a good seat-filler for the game? It might be a bit uncomfortable too though.
Ozhira	The miracle of life plays itself out in the story of sapient sweatpants; one Nightcrawler does not find itself covered in young, though. It swivels at the hips, glancing from side to side, and then sort of-- spontaneously sprouts a few dozen colorful little hangers-on. As the herd starts to move again, this mystery crawler lags behind. When the group speeds up to a jog, the budding one stops by the van-- liquifies into a red sludge-- and rearranges itself into Ozhira's humanlike disguise with a black tie. They sit down next to the Ozhira who had been here the whole time; the one with the red tie that had been helping with the equipment. The black-tie Ozhira seems quite content with themself. When nobody is looking, there's a little schlorp sound and then there is only one Ozhira. Don't worry about it. They're fairly helpful in packing the van back up and take their spot in the far back seat, spending most of the drive not seeming to understand board games. Instead, the beast spends their time staring at it. And if nobody else is playing the Trouble board; Ozhira can be heard popping the little Pop-O-Matic occasionally. Pop-chunk-rattle. > "What about people with, you know... unusual souls?" Ozhira glances up towards the front seats with a little, "Hmm?"
Calvin Nash	Calvin occupies himself with Trouble. As it turns out, the game is more entertaining for Chernobog than it is for him; namely because even escaping the starter area is down to the whims of fate. If either of them knew that the game was based on another called 'Frustration,' they'd surely agree it's a more appropriate name. Calvin indulges Chernobog in another game after his first--but that's all he can stand. The polite reasoning he gives, if asked, is that he wants to give someone else a chance to play. From then on, he occupies himself with conversation. "How long you been making stuffed animals like that, Ms. White?"
Shinmyoumaru Sukuna	Shinmyoumaru has no measurements to take but she is not adverse to helping Madeleine with hers if asked. Other than that she seems delighted by the tiny nightcrawlers. "They're so many colours!" She assumed they'd be duller, like the adults - small things are often very good at hiding, after all. She briefly debated seeing if she could get one of the little ones into her bowl, but Shinmyoumaru realized she has no knowledge of how to take care of a baby nightcrawler, so she does not. Plus, that probably counts as poaching, and after she already yelled at the aliens for it... ...well, Shinmyoumaru is occasionally a hypocrite but it's not going to be over stealing a tiny cryptid. (Also, Shinmyoumaru does get spooked by White just showing up once in the middle of the night. 'Warn me first!' is her response to that. She is willing to be bribed to complain less with some of the ice cream though.) Shinmyoumaru usually does not get to ride up front because, at four feet tall, it is convenient to put her in a row that might otherwise be crowded by having three 'normal'-sized people in it. So she definitely takes the opportunity to accept when it's given to her and is thus buckled in up front. This means she does not really get to look at the Trouble board, but she looks around every time someone pops the dice... orb... thing. And she's being talked to about danmaku, which is both near and dear to her and not something that seems to be very interesting to most people outside Gensokyo, so she doesn't get to talk about it much. Point to Madeleine there. After the first excitement wears off, she tries to answer questions: "Oh, it's not... It doesn't matter what kind of soul you have, I think!" Shinmyoumaru pauses for a moment to consider, swinging her feet absently, then: "It's more about personal expression! Like any art comes from the heart, right? It's a way to show that, and your emotions, and your determination." A beat, then: "And beat them up, sometimes. Power is important too! If they're not putting themselves on the line and neither are you, is it really a battle at all...? It's beautiful because it's deadly! It lets you show people even the smallest can't be underestimated!" "I've seen lots of people with 'unusual souls' do it. Youkai do it too, and oni, and fairies, and deities, and people from Hell... well I haven't seen any of those but I've heard about it." Shinmyoumaru counts them off on her fingers. "Why, do you want a lesson?" Her tone is not quite teasing.
White	White notices Ozhira doing much like she was, toying with the popping dice gizmo before the game is actually being played, and after a bit of this she quietly asks a question without making eye contact (or the facsimile of it through closed eyes). She's even quieter than normal, as if she's trying to actually whisper below her usual murmur-tone, giving away that it's a half-assedly kept secret. She can mime the idea of caring about what other people want to hide, but... It's too inconvenient to get close enough to whisper right into an ear. "Do your... Parallels ever act up?" White, the all seeing, has some bad personal experiences with having multiple of herself around after all. Later when Calvin asks about her handicrafts, White pauses to think for a moment, making a noise that doesn't quite come out as a proper hum. "... A few weeks. I used to make clothes for my..." She stops harder, and her brow furrows slightly like she can't find the right word. "... Nieces. They aren't with me though."
Angela	Neither Solace or Ceri have unusual souls don't you worry about that. Solace is a little weird, Ceri is a little normal until you realize she is also a little weird. Ceri is thinking about how she stabbed aliens to rescue cryptids today. She has been thinking about that for a while because this is, somehow, maybe the strangest thing she's done before. And that's something she's dwelling on because she's done plenty of weird things. Solace is cleaning her axe with a rag. She is trying to subtly steal the Pop-o-matic. She's not going to steal it mid-game of course but she is keeping her eyes open for the opportunity. She doesn't need a board game, but she thinks her kids would like having some kind of funny little toy. She doesn't seem to really 'get' the board game either, but Ceri is coaching her through it since she knows how board games work. Some part of Ceri doesn't want to make it back home. She has a feeling that she's going to be returning to something terrible. She is correct, of course, and not just because The Black silence is going to thrash slice and bash her apart and then toss her into a lobby as an example because he's losing his mind. She doesn't know about that! But there's going to be blackouts and horror and though she doesn't know what form it's going to take, precisely, she knows she's going to dislike it. "Ah yeah." she says, half paying attention to the world around her. "You make scarves too, don't you?"
Ivy Carrow	Ivy watches the baby nightcrawlers climb up the others, enraptured. "I wonder why they're so colorful..." "Do they find their parents or relatives in the swarm, you think? If they don't make it, due the kids just die?" She mused, morbidly. "Or would any adult nightcrawler do?" She joins in Trouble, but largely, he mind appears to be elsewhere...Because, well, she won't stop talking. "I've never witnessed a migration before! It just doesn't come up, you know? We explore, we establish a beachhead, and we maintain our presence, but we don't worry about conservation much." "It's fascinating. Someplace that looks like you've seen every detail, and you still haven't. After fifteen, or fifty, or a hundred years, suddenly you see something completely new, in the world you thought you knew--Oh." Ivy frowned as White sent one of her pieces back to the start. "You got me again...How do you do that without even looking?"
White	White nods at Ceri, a very simple answer to a simple question. "Yes." When she manages to hassle Ivy in the boardgame, she catches herself about to say two different things at the same time, both equally inane-sounding, and instead substitutes with a small, vaguely smug upturn of her nose. Eventually she winds her way back to Ceri, slowly adding "Someone else made a scarf from my silk first. So that was one of the first things I made, too."
Ozhira	> "Do your... parallels ever act up?" The creature's attention shifts from the front seat's explanation of colorful bullet patterns to White's closed-eyed face, "Parallels?" It takes them a moment to make the connection, "No." The shake of the head is performative; though not as performative as the act of 'looking', "We are Ozhira." Glancing down, they lift up a hand to look at their own palm, "Our song is countless voices, all singing as one chorus. We do not, divide, long enough for the cadence to change." After a moment, the beast lifts their shoulders in a little shrug, "If we were separated longer; maybe. But. We would never forget, that we are Ozhira. We do not think a fight would happen." Glancing up, Ozhira adds, "We only merge once again. Compare our songs, and grow." Ivy asks if the crytids could identify their own parents. To this, Ozhira's eyes close, "We do not doubt they can." When their eyes open again, they're looking out the window at the passing scenery, "No, young were left behind. So. Even if some big ones-- were lost. Others must have..." The hesitation is longer than normal, until they settle on the word, "Adopted."
Madeleine Cadrasteia	"Do they find their parents or relatives in the swarm, you think?" "Well, you may have noticed but the parents weren't exactly checking which babies were crawling on who, just that everyone was all-aboard," Madeleine explains. "Ozhira's got the right of it - even if some don't end up on their parents, they'll either find their way to mom or dad on the ride back to California while everyone's sleeping, or get adopted as a foundling. But once they get back to the coastal forests the family units are pretty set. It's an interesting reproductive strategy! Sorta shuffling a few kids around here and there." Shinmyoumaru: "I've seen lots of people with 'unusual souls' do it. Youkai do it too, and oni, and fairies, and deities, and people from Hell..." "Well, I-I'm not any of those, really," Madeleine admits, a little sheepishly. "I'm from... outside all that, I guess? Or at least not all that. A different paradigm, y'know? But if it's about personal expression..." Madeleine pauses, wondering internally if she's person enough for personal expression. Maybe on her good days... "Why, do you want a lesson?" "I..." Maddie wasn't thinking this far ahead. Often 'it's an expression of your soul' means, to an Excrucian, 'you are a flawed and broken thing and some things Are Not Meant For Your Like'. "I think so, yeah. I know you probably can't teach it on the go like this, and I probably shouldn't try while driving, but what would a lesson look like?" Ivy: "It's fascinating. Someplace that looks like you've seen every detail, and you still haven't. After fifteen, or fifty, or a hundred years, suddenly you see something completely new, in the world you thought you knew." "Yeah! There's really a sense of, not everyplace's rhythms all run on the calendar year, y'know? Like, oak trees produce a ton of acorns every few years. If they made that many every year, squirrels and other critters would just grow in number and eat 'em all. But every few years, they call it a 'mast year', and there might be a few more squirrels the next year but the population goes back down with the acorn yields. And you'd never know just by spending a single year in the same woods!"
Calvin Nash	"Your nieces? That's real cute," Calvin says with a smile. "I bet they're gonna love them stuffed animals." "How many nieces you got? You come from a big family?" He glances out the window to watch the scenery pass. "I'm an only child. Always wondered what it woulda been like to have brothers 'n sisters." We explore, we establish a beachhead, and we maintain our presence, but we don't worry about conservation much. "Well, every so often I gotta. And lemme tell you, them dipshits on that ridge are lucky they didn't start a damn incident," Calvin grumpily asserts. "Lookin' for a quick buck." He'd let those 'dipshits' know it, too, along with the classic 'if I see you out here again you've had it.'
White	White feels oddly pensive about Ozhira's answer, mostly showing in a brief thinning of her lips as her expression makes the proverbial walk up to a frown without quite committing. "It would be good if you didn't have that in common with me." she adds, vaguely like she's dancing around the more direct explanation. It feels to her a little like warning a younger person about bad habits and wondering if she needs to give them a birds-and-bees style talk about self-propogation, but she's not bold enough to go for it. Then, she moves on. It's a little uncomfortable even to pretend to be responsible for someone else's multitude-of-selves. Calvin, at that moment, is a bit of a trap. He's a normal guy, asking normal questions. It's easier to say something baffling, under those conditions. She nods slightly at first, and answers "Four." to the first question, then seems to hesitate like she's misspoken somehow. "Or more... those four are sisters..." she starts, but Calvin asking more generally about a big family makes her look up for some reason as if she's being overcome by the mental image of her own family tree for the first time. "... Very... Big, yes. My... Siblings were feral little monsters. I like my Nieces much better. Ael, Sael, Riel, and Fiel." If she's lucky, maybe nobody will notice that she was being literal about her siblings.
Shinmyoumaru Sukuna	What WOULD a danmaku lesson look like? Shinmyoumaru's brow furrows. "I don't know! I'd have to think about that," she admits. "I did it on my own. And I can't ask... hmm..." She's thinking now. "But maybe I'll figure it out. Not while you're driving though! It definitely would take all your attention." She isn't just listening to Madeleine either. "I don't have a big family," she says, from up front. "There's not that many inchlings at all, really... but for the Sukunas it's just me these days." Shinmyoumaru swings her feet again. "I bet they'd expect me to get married," she adds, "though maybe in a few years. Princesses have to, it's not like you can just... let the line end." Shinmyoumaru is definitely not getting involved in the talk about self-propogation. Nieces are safer. "They all have -el names! Is that a thing in your family? Are you actually White...el?" Shinmyoumaru considers that. "Shiroel. Shirel. That one sounds like an actual name though I wouldn't know how to write it formally." A pause, and then she asks Ivy, "What would you do if a migration went through your beachhead? They go to the beach, right? And you like ley lines as much as they do. It could happen."
Calvin Nash	"Yep," says Calvin, interpreting 'feral little monsters' in the figurative sense. "Lots of people I know with brothers and sisters say that sorta thing." He pats his knee idly. "Sometimes there's still bad blood even when they're grown." "Hell," he says, "There's two brothers I know, both of 'em grown--their daddy was doin' a little spring cleaning one year. The way them two carried on over who got the damn carnival glass plates, you'd figure they'd have to get old Rofocale down from Libertalia to figure it out." So, no, Calvin didn't figure she was being literal. Princesses have to, it's not like you can just... let the line end. "Well, you got a while before you gotta start worryin' about that," he says. "Just don't take no advice from Sarracenia and you'll be fine."
Angela	Ceri gives a small nod to White. Nieces, she thinks quietly. Family. She sighs, looking over to Solace who doesn't seem to notice or be sympathetic. She leans back into her chair. Cute names for the nieces, she thinks. "My siblings were monsters too." She says. "For the most part. I'm not particularly fond of the family I came from, but that might as well be a lifetime ago." ''It's not like you can just... let the line end.'' Ceri lets out a long sigh at that, slouching in her chair further.
Ozhira	> "Ozhira's got the right of it . . ." The Beast manages to look a little smug, having connected those dots. Their conclusion isn't quite accurate, but close enough for them. > "It would be good if you didn't have that in common with me." The smugness flits off of Ozhira's expression as quickly as it appeared, their gaze returning to White with a curious bird-like chirping sound and a tilt of their head. After a moment of just watching her face, the creature dips their head briefly, "We will, be careful."
White	White looks vaguely in Shinmyoumaru's direction, and shakes her head. "Just White. Only the Demon Lord calls me Shiro-chan." she confesses. To those paying attention to how what she says is translated, it might stand out that she jumps between English, Japanese, and a different, third language depending on who she's responding to. Even in Japanese, she says her name as "White" in the English manner rather than Shiro. "My nieces were named as a set. The Demon Lord didn't want me naming them myself. So she was in a hurry. Her name is Ariel, though... I tried not to poke fun." Back to Calvin, White gives him one of the more stiff nods she's given anyone, trying to let his misunderstanding slide easily by without question for now. She then looks upward again ponderously at the roof of the van, and seems to be responding to Shinmyoumaru but sort of just talking aloud to anyone listening, rather than actually giving her an answer. "... That reminds me. I thought it might be funny... To introduce Miss Sarracenia to someone. He's a dragon. I'm not sure that I know any small magical people, beside goblins though." She then lowers her gaze back onto Shinmyoumaru, and if it's meant to be an apologetic look, it's a pretty lousy one.
Ivy Carrow	"Well, every so often I gotta. And lemme tell you, them dipshits on that ridge are lucky they didn't start a damn incident," "And we appreciate your hard work!" Ivy said, piling on, immediately. "Local experts are vital in to the health of a settlement, you know! Some gate managers, they'll try to swarm in. It's not enough to control one end--they need both, and they see local govermnent and management as opposition instead of partners." "Mind you, there's some we work with who are a bit of a headache," Ivy waved off her own concern. "But we love Ossabaw. Some of your runners actually take their leave in your little community, you know? I think it reminds them of home without the...drama." "What would you do if a migration went through your beachhead? They go to the beach, right?" Ivy chuckled. "It's not a literal beach! A beachhead is like a foothold, a shelter; it's what we call a proper Warprunner outpost." But that doesn't really answer the question. "Well...We weren't here first, right? It can be a hassle to get out of the way, but it's easier for us..." Ivy frowned. "We try not to put our outposts directly onto important landlarks like that, though. I can't just wave my hand and make it like it used to be. So we just have to work with it. Like those cannons that some dams have that shoot salmon who are migrating to mate upstream..." Another dice roll in, and once more, all four of Ivy's pieces were forced back home--this time, after nearly reaching the home stretch. "I've no luck today..."
Madeleine Cadrasteia	Shinmyoumaru: "Not while you're driving though! It definitely would take all your attention." Madeleine seems just the least bit let down, like part of her had been expecting to hear "actually, you CAN learn danmaku in the car!". "That'd be good, yeah. I've never done like, art lessons before or whatever, so I don't know how good I am at the whole 'creative expression' thing. Certainly I could never be a painter, heh." A thoughtful pause. "And you mentioned uh, spellcards? Are those actual cards you have to carry around? Heh, card-carrying danmaku expert..." Calvin: "And lemme tell you, them dipshits on that ridge are lucky they didn't start a damn incident. Lookin' for a quick buck." "I know, right? Wish I'd got their license plate number," Maddie grumbles. "You didn't happen to write it down, Ivy? I mean, good on ya for making sure that guy was okay, but still. There's situations where a slap on the wrist is called for." "Say, Ivy," Madeleine adds after a lull, "Got any more of those Red Vines?" Ivy, you know darn well there's only Twizzlers. Maddie already ate the whole pack of Red Vines she picked up at the gas station in Gabbs.
Ivy Carrow	"There's situations where a slap on the wrist is called for." "Honestly, I thought a shot to the chest was slap on the wrist enough. They were terrified." Maybe that's just a an excuse for the fact that... "No, I didn't really get one. And even if I did, this is an America, you know? Those kinds of guns are legal here. I don't know if we'd be able to make any charges stick..." "...You ate all the Red Vines! And I'm not going to teleport in and out of a moving car to get you more." But she was smiling. "But, tell you what, next time we pull over, I'll get some real quick."
Shinmyoumaru Sukuna	"And you mentioned uh, spellcards? Are those actual cards you have to carry around? Heh, card-carrying danmaku expert..." "Those are, um..." How does she explain this to someone who doesn't even understand danmaku yet? "They used to be a dueling system," Shinmyoumaru explains. "Or that's what I was told... so people did write them out, sometimes, or draw them. Since they're patterns, a lot of the time... But most people are a little more informal about it! It's just, a practiced move, or a spell. A secret technique!" "Just don't take no advice from Sarracenia and you'll be fine." Shinmyoumaru makes a face. As for White, Shinmyoumaru speaks Japanese but she picks up on the differences. Even if she did call her 'Shirel' that once, she's not going to do it again if it's close to someone's special nickname. "Oh," she says, followed by: "Wait, you get to name your nieces? Nobody ever asks me to name anyone." "It's not a literal beach! A beachhead is like a foothold, a shelter; it's what we call a proper Warprunner outpost." "I know that!" Shinmyoumaru huffs. "But that doesn't mean you wouldn't be interested in a ley line too, and that's what this road they were going along was following, right? Everybody likes those. Well, it doesn't mean as much to me, I guess..."
Angela	Ceri looks towards Ivy thoughtfully, "Hey." She says. "You set up Warpgates all the time, right? Can you repair them too?" She still doesn't really get the various depths of Warpgate that are out there. Solace is using this moment to sneak away that little dice popper, while Madeleine is thinking about red vines. Solace doesn't need to swipe it, but she has not seen such a treasure before. It's for the children, she tells herself. "...That is too bad. No more red vines...." Solace is responsible for this for sure she fed HOW many to White?
Ivy Carrow	"Not exactly...But we can replace a broken one pretty easily, if someone's okay with the fact it runs on our tech." She turned her gaze from the depressing state of the board to Ceri. "Why do you ask?"
Calvin Nash	I thought it might be funny... To introduce Miss Sarracenia to someone. He's a dragon. Chernobog: Very humorous. One doesn't 'introduce' that one. Chernobog: 'Inflict upon,' more like. Calvin checks his COMP and snorts. Some of your runners actually take their leave in your little community, you know? "Yes ma'am, I do," says Calvin proudly. "They're good people, them runners." Then, "...The drama's there if you go lookin' for it. People live near each other long enough, you gonna have little spats and disagreements 'n whatnot. Every once in a blue moon we gotta push something back from the shore." "But that kind's preferable to gettin' eaten or shot or held up. I'm proud of what my mama 'n 'em built. Proud to put in the work to keep it standing, make it a little better every day." "Maybe when things're safer out in the in-betweens, on the border, towards the big cities, then people can visit more than just the little spots we managed to carve out." I don't know if we'd be able to make any charges stick... "It wouldn't be for us to make no charges stick anyway," he says. "All any of us could do is let the government know. Not that I figure they'd be thrilled to know what those folks were up to. I'm with Ivy, though. I'd be real surprised if they were there next year."
Madeleine Cadrasteia	Ivy: "...You ate all the Red Vines!" "...Are you sure?" Maddie says, a little plaintively. Then, immediately placated by the promise of more later: "Okay!" Yay! Shinmyoumaru: "Well, it doesn't mean as much to me, I guess..." "I wonder if there's ley-lines in Gensokyo," Madeleine wonders aloud. "There's gotta be, right? As long as there's a consistent geography..." Solace picks her moment well - Maddie and Ivy are talking Red Vines, Shinmyoumaru's in the front seat and can't see over the headrest, Calvin's on his COMP, Ceri is gearing up to ask Ivy a question about work. In a moment the little dice-popper is safely squirreled away. And she might have even done it without anyone noticing! Except possibly White... Calvin: "All any of us could do is let the government know." "And I will be letting them know! Part of the point of this job was about giving local authorities the info they need to make sure next time goes smoothly without the MCRD having to send the 'big guns', so to speak." That's y'all. Y'all are the big guns.
Shinmyoumaru Sukuna	The only way Shinmyoumaru is likely to notice the popper is missing is if she stops hearing it for a while. "Aw, no more Red Vines?" Shinmyoumaru would have eaten them too; alas, there is none left. Except... "I think I have something," she says, starting to check her sleeves. She tends to tuck things up there in miniature. "I wonder if there's ley-lines in Gensokyo..." "Of course there are! We have all sorts of things." Shinmyoumaru sounds defensive. "I just don't use any magic that uses them for much. But Gensokyo is the place where the things that are forgotten outside come. And there are lots of people who don't think about ley lines anymore out there... or so I'm told. The only Outside World I've ever been to is - " She waves her arm out the window. "The multiverse! And it's really exciting, isn't it? YOu have everything here, and I want to see all of it! Or at least a lot of it," Shinmyoumaru adds, because 'all of it' might take a while. A beat. "That means your worlds too," she adds, twisting to look back into the seats. "I mean, I've been to theirs," Ceri and Solace, "but not the others, really. Well, I went to Ivy's castle once." Or at least the part of it that she brought to Shinmyoumaru, which isn't quite the same. "Oh, here it is!" Shinmyoumaru finally finds what she's looking for up her sleeve and starts tugging out a 'sharing size' bag of Skittles. It's basically just sugar...
White	White quietly hums. "That world... Is a little dangerous to visit right now. But sometime." she says to Shinmyoumaru, about her own home. "... I wasn't supposed to name my nieces. But, maybe I could name the planet myself. Nobody is here to stop me."
Angela	''But we can replace a broken one pretty easily.'' "Hm... Probably nothing, but if there's a reason a new Warpgate would be needed, it's good to know there's an option." Solace eventually takes the bait, though, and turns to White. "Why not...name nieces?" She asks hoarsely. "Is there something bad about that? Or is it just ... culture?"
Calvin Nash	Part of the point of this job was about giving local authorities the info they need to make sure next time goes smoothly without the MCRD having to send the 'big guns', so to speak. "Well." Calvin taps out a few commands on his COMP. A spool of paper trails out of the heavy wrist-computer to the staccato whine of a minature dot matrix printer. Calvin tears off the sheet and leans forward in his seat to offer it to Madeleine. "There you go." He'd taken it down post-chew-out (of course he had) not hoping for much, but he does kind of like the funny little guys.
White	White looks at Solace, or moreso stares through her eyelids for a slightly overlong moment in deciding how specific to be. "There's a Skill-... A 'power' where I'm from, called Naming. If you use it, and name something, you can gain control of it. I think I had that Skill, so it was a little bit of a... Bad look." She sounds like she's quoting someone, when she says that last part.
Madeleine Cadrasteia	Calvin hands the paper up to Maddeleine, who glances at it (drive safer, Maddie!) and sets it on the dash for later. "Oh, you got it! Shouldn't be surprised, really, you're the sorta guy." Does she mean Calvin feels like a cop? "Diligent, I mean." Oh, okay. "Shoulda been asking you and not just Ivy, my bad! This'll make the report a lot smoother, I hope." "I think I had that Skill, so it was a little bit of a... Bad look." "You think? You mean you've never tried naming something?" Shinmyoumaru brings out the Skittles. Maddie holds out one hand for a palmful, then retracts it as if flinching away. She slowly raises a hand again and says, "Can you pick out some of the green ones? Just one color at a time, sorry. Thanks in advance."
White	White's jaw clenches slightly in what might have been a pout if she'd tried even 10% harder to puff her cheek out. "When I had Skills, I didn't have any belongings for a long time. And I lived alone mostly. Now... I don't have Skills anymore. And I don't know the principle the Skill operated from. I can't recreate it from scratch." She sounds a little annoyed by that fact, really. "... Wrath knows how it works better than I do. He named himself with it, and he names all of the things he makes."
Calvin Nash	Diligent, I mean. "Lemme tell ya somethin," says Calvin, with the kind of tone that says he's going to say it whether he's given permission or not. "There's two things that piss me off. That's goin' back and doin' somethin' over after I already done it," he says, lifting his index, "And workin' on my day off," he further announces, lifting the middle for 'second'. "A lotta times, them two things are the same." "You gotta keep a separation between work and life, and you shouldn't never mix 'em. Otherwise people think they can start askin' you to work on your off day. Or, worse, they start thinkin' they can't depend on you when you're workin'. You wanna do that, and avoid doin' the same thing twice, you get 'diligent.'"
Angela	Ah, so it's like parenting, Ceri thinks on the matter of Naming. I don't get it, Solace thinks, but she says, "Children are raised by the village." Solace says. "The parents are but one 'Namer' and in the end, the choice is theirs." Ceri gives Solace a perplexed look but remains quiet.