Can you do the cranberry sauce?

[gleamed]

Who: Everybody! Everybody!
What: The Big Feast!
When: Thursday, November 27
Where: The Battle Dome
Summary: The whole village is invited for a giant celebratory feast at the Battle Dome! Food, festivities, and fun for all. As a side note, Rapunzel would have posted to the journal about this a few days ago to invite everyone and ask for help, so if you want to handwave your character volunteering/talking to her about it, that's perfectly fine!
Rating: T for Tryptophan


Thanks to the help of Luceti's wonderful residents, the feast was ready more or less on time. The Battle Dome had been programmed to look like an old-fashioned great hall, table wall to wall and covered with all sorts of dishes. You want mashed potatoes and gravy? There are mountains. Yams? Got you covered, bro. Baked bean casserole? Naturally! And since Rapunzel is still sort of new to this holiday to herself, some more unusual dishes may have shown up as well. She tried. And don't forget dessert! There's almost as many desserts as regular dishes, from pies to cakes to breads to pudding, so hopefully you saved some room! To drink, there's a variety of punch, spiced pumpkin drinks, and ciders with a hard option for those so inclined.

The hall has been decorated with all sorts of festive touches that the decorating team put up, completing the pleasant harvest-themed atmosphere. So take a seat, eat all you can, enjoy the music and try not to fall asleep too early!

Comments

[misterbrief]

As if I would be a little hellion myself. [He harrumphs. The link is still open, he felt that!]

I was never as stupid as I imagine they were when they were younger.

[windandrain]

I said nothing of the sort.

[She did.]

But I'd never call you stupid.

[misterbrief]

Uh huh. [He replies grouchily.]

Like I believe that. [He does. And his tail, since his arm is currently being hung onto, wraps up behind her and curls around her hip, pulling her into him again. He's finally relaxed. Not freaking out. He even might be able to fully enjoy spending time with her instead of slamming himself with doubts and questions.

Maybe she's right, maybe this love thing can be shared.]

[windandrain]

Eee!

[She squeaks slightly when she feels his tail pull him into her, but releases his arm and wraps it around his waist right back. As they walk, she leans her head against his shoulder, and...on a whim, her free hand moves down to his tail and gently strokes it.

Love comes in many forms, she's learned, and this...this is something she knows she can share, something important.]

[misterbrief]

[Now that his arm is free, it goes up and wraps around her and his hand rests on her shoulder. Because well...she will get sick out in the cold. And his tail being pet is nice. Who would have ever thought.]

I'm not sure if I'll ever really get used to this.

[It might take five hundred years.]

[windandrain]

[She snuggles up against him further, continuing to pat the tail as gently as she can. His words draw a small sigh from her, breath misting in the chilly night air, and nods as best she can.]

I know what you mean.

[Love is never something easy to adjust to, she's beginning to realize.]

[misterbrief]

What's with you and Yuuna anyhow? [Allowing each other to see other people like this. It still kind of blows his mind a little.]

[windandrain]

[She blinks, a little confusion floating up through the bond, but she understands after a moment.]

We're immortal, dear. Truly and completely so. We have an eternity to spend together. And we've more than enough love to include other people in our lives. In a practical sense, it's to keep our interest in one another fresh, it stops us from falling into routines or getting bored. [She slows her pace, more languid and looks over at him.] And think about it. One person has but one lifetime's worth of love to give. But an immortal? We have an infinite number of lifetimes worth to give.

We realized early on that there's no reason to keep each other chained like that. She loves me and I love her and we always will. We know that, deep down in our very core. Two souls joined together, forever. So why even try to deny that we might fall for someone else in a different way? What you and I have is different than what she and I have. No less special, but it's not the same.

No other love can diminish what we have, dearest, because what Yuuna and I have is different. The same for you and Bulma. If anything, loving other people will only help you learn to love more deeply. That's how she and I came to our understanding. The more love you have, the greater your capacity for it becomes, meaning more all around. For you, for me, for Yuuna and Bulma.

That's why we have our agreement. So we can be happier with one another and make the world a lighter place.

[misterbrief]

[He's almost sorry he asked, in a sense. Just flinging around the L-Word like it's going out of style. Uuuughghhh. All that talk makes him a little sick to his stomach. He can barely put the L-Word once into a sentence let alone how many times she's said it in that explanation. He kind of hopes, now that he will no longer age, that he'll never, ever think like that. Loving a whole bunch of other people, what is that. This is bad enough, and he's already having enough problems digesting it.

But, the explanation helps a little bit, only because he too, if he played his cards right, would live for an eternity. Or until she kicked him out the door, so to speak.]

I guess that makes sense. [For you, he thinks. He kicks the ground a little, his face scrunching up. Thinking on it makes him a little upset. Not with Saori, but with himself- is this one of his first lessons of being partially immortal? It already sucks...]

[windandrain]

[She looks at him, studying his reaction carefully. She wouldn’t care to be thought of as some sort of fickle girl who wears her heart on her sleeve, nor someone unfaithful to the people she cares for, and the feeling coming from the bond is just that. This, to her, is nothing to sneer at. It’s a core part of her, immortal or no. Love is something she feels quite strongly about. It’s the most powerful force in the universe, and that’s no fairy tale. It may sound like something stepping out of a storybook to most people, but that doesn’t mean there’s no validity to the notions such tales contain. Love had changed her, love had transformed him, and it’d done so much more in others.]

It’s something that’ll make more sense in time, dearest.

[She solemnly looks at him, fingers curling around his in a show of support. She’ll be there to help him make sense of it all as it happened, too. And she won’t cast him aside as easily as she might some others. The depth of her commitment to feelings is quite vast, and the fact that he’s as powerful a mortal as she’s ever likely to find makes it even less likely that she’d find someone else, in a practical sense. She doesn’t even think on that consciously, though, so it’s unlikely he’d get even a glimmer of that. That’s the spirit thinking, and it’s as strange and alien as ever.]

And time is something we have no lack of. It’s not like either one of us is going anywhere, [A beat, and her smile returns.] unless you’d like to go exploring again.

[misterbrief]

[The idea that he's got all the time in the world now won't sink in for a while, doubting that he'll understand. He's not sure he even wants to understand, because it would be easier to ignore it like he has been doing. Or to write it off and make assumptions that one of them will go home and it'l be like it never happened. There's no light at the end of the tunnel yet to this world, so he doesn't even know if they even figure out how to send people home that he'd ever see her again.

She has so much faith in the two of them and he doesn't get that.

And as much as he tries not to think about it, it eats at him. Everything always eats at him.

He had a week or so to think about this. So what, he finally came up with, so what if I do care a lot about her. Nothing will change. And now, he's got her cuddled up against him in the cold. Finding that he was wrong, it did change- and he still isn't sure what to do.]

I don't know what to do.

[He'll say it, he knows he can say at least that much.]

One day I had a normal family with a dull Earthling life and now this.

[windandrain]

[She has so much faith because she is a being offaith. She'd always been pious, even as a human she truly believed in the fates and in the gods. That hadn't changed, and he should know that. There's a light at the end of every tunnel, a silver lining everywhere, and while she has her moments of pessimism, she is a bright eyed dreamer most of the time.

She laughs, pulling him tighter against her and continuing to rub his tail.]

You don't have to do anything at all. Just...be. That's all it takes.

[Because nothing's really changed in her mind except that they've admitted how they feel.]

I know that probably isn't the easiest thing to hear, but honestly what else can we do? Because I don't know what to do either. I'm just...doing what I know to do, and trying to accept it myself.

[Because it's no less confusing for her, believe you me. Love never is, and while she's accepted that she loves him...she isn't really sure what to do with that feeling either.]

[misterbrief]

[Patting his tail like that is relaxing, and she manages to get him just right right when she pulls him in, nuzzling her. Stupid tail, maybe it was a bad idea to get it back, it's obviously doing more harm to him than good.]

[Just be. She's right, that's not the easiest thing, and it's still not easy to go along with everything. On one end, it's pretty nice having her lean up against him (in private) and be affectionate, on the other, Bulma. It always comes back around to that thought. It's somewhat comforting, in its own way, that she's confused just like him. It's hard because he doesn't have that agreement with Bulma. He doesn't even think that way, and being told it's okay...he shakes his head to clear it before he really muddles up his thoughts. Immortals think differently. He has a mortal mindset. Maybe he should...just try to think more like an immortal. Would that even help...?

He'd already tried shoving what he felt for her back down. It didn't work. Maybe it's because he knows better now to lie to himself about stuff like this, especially with how far it got him last time he did something like that.]

[He's not sure what to say now, but a strange mix of worry, contentment, and confusion bubble to the surface through the link of the crystal. It would be difficult, and he'd feel like this for a while, but for now he's just going to stand here and try to let his mind clear so he can at least accompany her back to the party.]

[windandrain]

[In all honesty, she feels the same way. Confusion, anxiety, happiness and befuddlement are all floating through her head at the same time. She's worried about how things will change, she's not sure really how to manage, and she feels like he's asking her to lead him. She'd be happy to, if she had a clue on how to lead herself, but she doesn't. Yuuna's the one more comfortable with expressing feelings and such, not her. She can...better than Vegeta, but matters of the heart are never easy, so she just goes with the flow instead of trying to think too hard.

It'd worked well so far, even with him. And that made her happy, but...being unsure was never something she liked. So she chose to focus on other things. Like his tail, and making him feel more content.]

Do you...want to go back to the party, or go somewhere else?

[An odd question, but perhaps important.]

[misterbrief]

...

[Does he really want to go back to the party

That answer is pretty obvious to him.]

Somewhere else. I don't care where.

[windandrain]

[Her feet leave the ground, little clouds forming beneath hers and his and carrying them off, towards the ocean.]

Alright. Somewhere quiet. I've had enough crowds for one night myself.

[misterbrief]

Ah-! [He wasn't ready to get lifted up by a cloud, usually he does his own lifting, teetering a little bit to get his balance.]

Quiet? Where?

[windandrain]

The beach, I think. Nobody but us will be out there, and I think I feel a winter storm coming on. The warm kind.

[The kind with lightning.]

[misterbrief]

A warm winter storm. [He's never heard of one of those before.]

I'll see it when I believe it.

[windandrain]

[She'd try and explain weather patterns but fuck it.]

Alright. Let's go then.

[Woosh! towards the beach! When they get there, it looks like an ordinary winter storm is brewing off the coast, distant rain and dark clouds obscuring the moon.]

[misterbrief]

Did you make that happen, or did that happen all on its own.

[He would figure that a goddess of storms might be responsible for this.]

[windandrain]

That's natural, I didn't have any hand in it.

[This one, anyway.]

[misterbrief]

[That's a good enough answer for him, staring out and watching the clouds form into a storm. He doesn't feel like talking anymore, wanting to enjoy the quiet, still holding her to him

Just be. He's not sure if he can do that. He might have to even if he thinks he can't.

Guess he'll try it.]

[windandrain]

[Just be. That's something she's grown adept at in her lifetime, and as hard as she thinks the future might be its a thing she'll attempt to do.

For now, though, she's content to hold him close and watch the storm in silence. What needs be said before the beauty of a thunderstorm? All she does is call up a warm front, making the cold clash with the warm, intensifying it into a violent symphony of lightning and wind, giving them a little bit of a show.]

[misterbrief]

[That was pretty cool. The lightning dancing in the sky like that is a lot better than watching fireworks, in his opinion. And he knows she probably had a hand in that, making it look as astounding as it does now. He'll show his appreciation of it by squeezing her shoulder, smiling as he continues to view the show.]