EVENT: That Stuff Never Winds Up in a Pocket, Honest (July 2023)

[citycenter]

THAT STUFF NEVER WINDS UP IN A POCKET, HONEST.

THE THINGS I GAVE YOU. » THE BANK — INTRODUCTORY NOTES District 2 is open, bringing with it access to new and interesting locations—including the city's main bank branch. The bank is a large building with a stone exterior, wrought iron grating on the windows, and large, heavy metal doors that take surprisingly little effort to open, their hinges silent and well-oiled. Early in the day on July 19, characters in the vicinity of the bank will hear first a low, metallic creaking sound from inside the building, like metal straining against metal. This is followed by the sharper noise of locks disengaging, and then the large, heavy doors on the front of the building swing open slightly, enough to let a person through. Directly inside the doors is the bank lobby, and beyond that is the main banking floor, with elegant marble flooring and dimly lit chandeliers. It would appear that this was once the main commercial bank of the city, although it is now completely empty, with no tellers behind the counters and no cash in any of the drawers. You may rifle through the tills and filing cabinets to your heart's content, but similar to the files in City Hall, there is no useful information to be found—all the papers are blank, or are empty forms without any personally identifying information. There are no monetary devices to be found either; this is, after all, not a city that operates on a cash system, so there are no coins or paper bills in any of the tills or, indeed, anywhere within the bank. What you might be able to find, though, is a rack of delicate, burnished brass keys on a wall toward the back of the main banking hall. Each of these keys is attached to a stamped metal keychain bearing a name on one side and a number on the other. Some of these may be names you recognize, and some of them may not, but they are all names belonging to current residents of the city, and each key corresponds to a safety deposit box within the vault at the back of the building. Can you remember what you stored in that box for safekeeping? Maybe you had better go find out. At the back of the main banking hall is a vault secured with a large circular metal door. The door is currently unlocked and propped open; it can be closed, but cannot be locked (intentionally, anyway) from either the inside or the outside. The vault contains row upon row of safety deposit boxes, each locked. Participating characters who are in possession of a key can open their own safety deposit box, but it is not currently possible to force open any safety deposit box that does not belong to them. After August 1, players will be able to use their safety deposit boxes to store their own belongings, and break-ins will become possible with prior player permission and appropriate consequences. Below sections detail the safety deposit boxes for both choose-your-own-adventure players and randomized players! Please see the randomized matches for this event HERE. JUMP TO TOP ↑ | ↓ JUMP TO COMMENTS IT'S TRUE, PEOPLE TAKE THINGS BUT RARELY. » SAFETY DEPOSIT BOXES — A SELF-GUIDED TOUR For some of you, getting into your safety deposit box is quite straightforward. You take your key from the rack behind the teller's counter and make your way back through the building and into the vault. It's cool inside, the temperature well-regulated and the air dry. On the walls are rows upon rows of safety deposit boxes, and it may take you a moment to find the one that corresponds to the number stamped on your key. Does that number mean anything to you? It may, or it may not. When you find your box, it takes very little effort to open it. A slide of your key, a quick turn, and the safety deposit box's door springs open to reveal the metal container within. You remove the metal box from the wall and bring it over to the table in the center of the room, clearly placed there for this express purpose. Maybe there are others around, or maybe you're alone. Do you remember yet, what it was you put in here? Well, there's no time like the present to check. You open the safety deposit box to find—something that shouldn't be there. It's yours, that much you're sure of, but you didn't bring it with you to the city. You reach into the box to pick it up, and the surge of memory is immediate, sending your mind back to your strongest memory associated with the item in your hand. Then the vault door swings shut, trapping you inside with whoever else has the misfortune of sharing the vault with you right now. No matter what force you try, the door won't open again. There doesn't appear to even be a mechanism that unlocks the door from the inside, and from within several feet of metal and stone, no one on the outside will be able to hear you shout. It seems hopeless—how long can anyone last, trapped in a place like this? Should you turn back to the open safety deposit box, you might notice a slip of paper resting on the bottom. The paper looks aged, like it's been in the box for quite some time, and in printed text it reads: "Nothing is yours. It is to use. It is to share. If you will not share it, you cannot use it." Maybe it means you should let another hold the item you've retrieved from the box… or maybe it means you should share the weight of memory. Try to interpret the meaning in whatever way you can. But should you decide to unburden yourself, and share with someone else the weight of the item you're holding in your hands, you may find that there's a means of escape after all. Once you free yourself from the vault, for the next several days you find yourself feeling rather honest, like you may not be able to stop yourself from confessing the truth about the item you now carry… Characters who wish to participate in the event, but who do not wish to randomize the contents of their safety deposit boxes, can open their safety deposit boxes to find an emotionally significant item belonging to the character—player's choice as to what the item is. The only guidelines are that it should be small enough to fit reasonably in a pocket and may not have any magical or weapon properties. Similarly, players are able to choose the memories associated with the items in the safety deposit boxes. The vault door will remain closed until the characters in the vault explain to each other the significance of their items and the memory associated with them, at which point it the vault mechanisms will disengage and the door will swing open as if it had never closed to begin with. However, for the four days following the event, characters who carry their safety deposit box item on their person will feel oddly compelled to tell other characters about its significance and meaning. JUMP TO TOP ↑ | ↓ JUMP TO COMMENTS A CRASH-SITE IS SACRED, WE'RE FAITHFUL. » SAFETY DEPOSIT BOXES — A JOINT VENTURE For others of you, the contents of the safety deposit box may be considerably more disconcerting. You also take your safety deposit box key from the rack behind the bank teller's counter and make your way back through the building and into the vault. It's cool inside, the temperature well-regulated and the air dry. On the walls are rows upon rows of safety deposit boxes, and it may take you a moment to find the one that corresponds to the number stamped on your key. Does that number mean anything to you? It may, or it may not. When you find your box, it takes very little effort to open it. A slide of your key, a quick turn, and the safety deposit box's door springs open to reveal the metal container within. You remove the metal box from the wall and bring it over to the table in the center of the room, clearly placed there for this express purpose. Maybe there are others around, or maybe you're alone. Do you remember yet, what it was you put in here? Well, there's no time like the present to check. You open the safety deposit box to find—wait, what is that? It certainly doesn't belong to you. Tucked inside the safety deposit box alongside the item is a slip of paper with another name on it, as well as a cryptic message: "Nothing is yours. It is to use. It is to share. If you will not share it, you cannot use it." The item isn't yours, but it does appear to belong to another resident of the city. Maybe your safety deposit boxes somehow got mixed up? It seems like it would be a good idea to find this person and return their property to them. Whether you encounter the owner of the item in the vault or elsewhere in the city, when it comes time to hand the item over, two things happen. One—the doors are locked tight, refusing to allow either you or the item's owner out until you both understand what the item is and what it means to the other. To unburden your heart is the only way to free yourself. And two—as the owner of the item explains its significance, you find yourself oddly captivated, resonating strongly with whatever emotion the item's owner most closely associates with it. You may not be able to see the memory that the other person describes, but you can certainly feel the emotions they felt—after all, the easiest way to unburden oneself is to share the load with another. Isn't that right? Once you free yourself from your enthralled state, and once you have your own belongings returned to you, for the next several days you find yourself feeling rather honest, like you may not be able to stop yourself from confessing the truth about the item you now carry… Characters who opted to randomize the contents of their safety deposit box during the plotting post, or who plotted a joint experience with another character, will open their safety deposit boxes to find a small, non-magical but emotionally significant item belonging to another player character in the city. They will need to find the owner of that item and return it to them—this can either be inside the bank vault or in another location within the city. Regardless of where the meeting takes place, the character holding the item will find themselves unable to leave until the character who owns the item explains its significance; as they do, the holder of the item will find themselves swept up in the emotional highs and lows of the memories associated with that item, allowing them to share all of the feelings, regrets, joys, griefs, and rages that the owner experiences in the telling. Additionally, for the four days following the event, characters who carry their safety deposit box item on their person will feel oddly compelled to tell other characters about its significance and meaning. JUMP TO TOP ↑ | ↓ JUMP TO COMMENTS WILDCARD. The city is by no means small, and there are plenty of things for you to see. There's no rush in exploring, so feel free to take your time looking around and peering into various nooks and crannies and alleyways—and don't worry, you're not very likely to find anything peering back. If none of the above prompts appeal, feel free to check out the Locations and Maps pages and write your own freestyle prompt using one or many of the available locations. This month's event headers come from "The Things" and "The Gatherer," two poems by Brendan Constantine. The text of the paper slip comes from Ursula K. LeGuin's The Dispossessed. JUMP TO TOP ↑

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Comments

[unrequite]

[ Once Midnight's letter is returned, he will very willingly carry it around with him! The locations below are just suggestions, feel free to make up your own or pm me for your own starter! ]

a. Walking

[ If one hasn't made specific plans with Midnight (and people rarely do seem to make plans here — understandable, still disappointing), the only real way to catch him on any given day is to look outside and spot him going somewhere. Or coming back from something. He spends several hours in the day at City Hall, but it looks like if he's not occupied at the gym or poking around restaurants in the area, he's walking very briskly somewhere.

He does smile easily if he spots someone he knows, though. And his letter is sticking out of his pocket... ]

Fancy running into you here. Did you miss me?

b. Park Bench

[ The weather in this city is so mild that one could be forgiven the temptation to take a nap in some sunny spot in the park. As long as the eerie feeling of being watched, like, constantly doesn't stop you, why not, right?

This appears to be Midnight's motivation here, except he is laying down on this bench as though he had never experienced the concept of "sleep" before and was working off a vague impression of needing to be horizontal for the process. He's... either face down or sideways. It counts as both from this angle, honestly. His entire face is smushed into the seat as though he tripped and fell face first into the seat and just never bothered to get up. His legs are splayed out and in the path. It honestly looks like he bellyflopped and somehow didn't sustain any personal injury.

Did... did he pass out here after yet another bout of drunkenness? Either way, he does look a bit silly. Wake him up, save his dignity. Or, uh, tie his hair into pigtails. Either one works. Just... just don't take the letter. He really, really would like to keep it safe. ]

c. Bank

[ He got here pretty late. He's in no rush, so it'll be quite easy to run into him staring at a jar of sugar in mild confusion. He has his hand terminal in his other hand, staring at the names in the common directory... ]

I wonder if this person bakes...?

d. Wildcard

i'm very uncreative please just run over him with a shopping cart. Will match both action brackets and prose!

@thelastb1

[unrequite]

[ After the debacle with the ball pit, Midnight is trying to make sure that wherever his next handoff happens, it doesn't trap him with someone who clearly would like to be away from the situation. Less because he doesn't want to calm another person down — he has patience for days — and more because he doesn't like the idea of someone else being trapped anywhere with him. Doesn't sit right with him, honestly.

So he agreed to meet R0-GR at the park, but he did completely fail to remember to buy something to drink today — no time to eat, just too busy — so he stops by a small convenience store just at the edge of the park, not far from the promised meeting place, to pick up a bottle of water. There's no way his recipient is going to just randomly walk in literally the two minutes he needs to run in, get his water, and run back out. No chance at all of getting trapped in this convenience store. Right? ]

sorry this took so long

[thelastb1]

[It might be unlikely that Roger would happen to walk in during the brief window where Midnight is getting the drink. But it might be unlikelier still that he would be already there.

A sleep-deprived robot, unusual as that kind of status may be for a machine, sits behind the counter in the store, pouring fluid from a container of motor oil into a large glass. Then Midnight walks in, bringing a feeling that Roger has forgotten something.]

Who are you? ... were we supposed to meet now?

only if you forgive me for taking an age first

[unrequite]

[ "Were we supposed to meet now?" Midnight pauses, then closes his eyes as he hears a slight click as the door locks shut behind him. He turns slightly to try the handle as he responds, not expecting much. (He is correct in this. The door does not budge.) ]

I'm... Midnight. I'd assume you're the individual whose jar of sugar I have.

[ Even if he does seem to be pouring himself a tall glass of motor oil. Hey, Midnight won't judge. There are AI-driven robots all over his landship. He is pretty used to their idiosyncrasies!

Anyway, he turns back, digs around in his pocket, and pulls the jar from his pocket, walking over to the counter to where the rather sleepy robot still stands. ]

As to when we were supposed to meet, I think we've both managed to arrive early, so now's a good time as any.

@zewu-jun

[unrequite]

[ In his search for a suitable restaurant, Midnight's somehow made his way to this one. One of them, anyway; he'd spent so much of his first couple days inebriated that it feels a bit like even the most sober encounters had a slight unreality to them. As though he met people who were part of the city itself.

But this one... He made sure to remember something here. He looks around, walking among the empty aisles, until he reaches a booth that seems rather familiar... He was here with someone else, wasn't he?

He sits down at one. He's not sure if it's the right one, but it's enough to bring an impression back. Tall, unyielding. He remembers his feet leaving the ground. Was he flying...? ]

[zewu_jun]

[ When the bank opened up, Lan Xichen naturally wanted to see what it was about. He was raised in a noble clan who used storehouses and who had never heard of the idea of storing their wealth with another entity. Family treasures were kept hidden within the grounds and remained secret because only the closest family members knew of them. He's not sure what to make of the lockboxes, but he's curious.

The mysterious letter and cryptic note only confuses him, but since he has met Midnight, Lan Xichen decides that it is his duty to return whatever the message is to its owner. He first tries some apartments, but not knowing where Midnight might actually be staying, Xichen can't pick out what kind of place he would like. In the end he turns to his last resort: the restaurant he had first taken Midnight to when they met. He has a stroke of good fortune it seems, because he catches sight of the familiar form--this time upright--and hurries over. ]

So you are here! I thought you might have left the city. Or found some other place to sleep. I just hoped it was not on a street.

[unrequite]

[ Midnight stares at this stranger for a moment, both curious and a little bemused, but he's perplexed for only a moment. He may not remember much from that one blurry night, but he'd remembered his determination to remember something. The face... His face blurs with many others he'd met at the latter end of his inebriation, but the voice, the personality... Those stayed. He can question his instinct to trust this easily later.

Besides, the stranger isn't unpleasant to look at. Midnight puts a hand in his pocket and smiles. He's not above flirting with a stranger. If he's familiar with Midnight already, he's perfectly aware he's already has made a pass at him, even if he doesn't remember it. ]

No, no. Still quite here. Set up in one of the flats, even. [ He lowers his gaze, voice going soft and thoughtful. He's not questioning the reality of the situation at all, but he's not connecting enough of the dots to know how to act, so he's keeping a polite distance for now. ] So we've met, then. Would you happen to remember the occasion? I'm afraid I've forgotten most of it.

b!

[fussiest]

[ it's day two again. somehow, day four is almost like a nostalgic rejoinder in the back of his head, an echo of days that say 'oh, you summer child, now you know that i wasn't so bad, was i?'. it's the knowledge that kaveh has managed to live through a day four not two scant days ago that makes the day two that much more something to resent. you don't walk out from a war deciding that the papercut is no longer something to be wary of. perhaps it isn't top of mind, but the body remembers things in degrees of comparison. what made day four miserable was the uncertainty of it ever ending. what makes day two miserable is kaveh is once again lucid just enough to know that he is both not quite himself, and too much himself. day two has kaveh's mind akin to a slippery bar of soap, the quality of which is ready to slip out from between his fingers at any given provocation. kaveh had, in fact, been provoked.

the provocateur: the shards weigh in his pocket as if stone. kaveh feels like a well. you tossed stones into wells to observe their ripples, or to listen for the sound of splashing water in the end. you did that as a child because these things made you curious. but nobody ever thought of the well. the well didn't very much like being filled up with rocks. it didn't very much like having its insides ripple. it didn't very much like having to make a noise. today's kaveh has wrung out to dry; day twos were like that. the insomnia strips him of several, crucial layers between himself and himself, that welling of distaste that reminds kaveh that he himself is so much, too much, and hardly someone he would want to be his own companion. but you couldn't peel yourself from your own flesh, just as kaveh couldn't physically let go of the proverbial and literal pieces - and so here is kaveh, wondering what it's like to roll down that grassy knoll and lay face-down at the bottom of it and maybe have the dirt wash out some of that distaste from his mouth.

but it's already been a long day. he sits in order to consider his own proposal. kaveh's weight has already settled along the corner of the bench he has permitted himself because that's quite honestly all the space that he is worth right now - only to look down after a long, solid moment to realise there is a pair of feet next to him. kaveh thinks, oh - someone's died. the reflexive thought comes at a clip along the slippery-soap of his consciousness, spirals into the mental image of trains and that of a young lady walking off of it with the wayward confidence of a mote of sunlight at dusk, and before he knows it, kaveh's got a hand wrapped around the ankle before he remembers that you need a wrist to feel a pulse.

instinctively, kaveh's hand squeezes. he then lets go just long enough to look at his own hand. had the skin felt warm or cool? clammy or corpse-dead? day two has him questioning his own reality. perhaps he hadn't felt anything at all, or perhaps kaveh hadn't been trying.

so it follows: kaveh's hand dips down once more, to give than ankle another, convincing squeeze. ]

YOU MOTHERTRUCKER YOU DIDN'T POST A TOP LEVEL I'M REPORTING U TO THE FBI

[unrequite]

[ Midnight wakes very suddenly with that second squeeze. The first one squeeze stretched out in his too-tired hyper-delirium, a grip on his ankle that lasted forever —

"Yoru, come down from the tree, you'll fall, you'll fall", but it's the grip on his ankle that will make him fall, and fall, hitting every branch down, crash bang crack, taking his pursuer with him, and he didn't want to, he didn't mean to hurt them, but if they don't let go they'll fall and fall and land with him on a bed of jagged needle black stone below, they'll breathe fire and stone and blood and curse his name, and they'll die and burn and no one will miss them and that will be on his head and he can't, not anymore, it was too hard the first time, he can't do this again — ]

What? Oh.

[ He rubs a palm into his eye, really digs into the socket, grinning hard. He doesn't know where he is, but he hit something hard and unforgiving in his fall and he's still alive. That's something. That's always something.

... He peers down at the owner of the hand on his foot. Oh! He brightens. ]

Well, that's you. How goes it?

THIS IS HOW WINNERS ARE MADE HAHAHAHAHAHAHA

[fussiest]

[ midnight sits up from where he is attached to the ankle. day two's kaveh looks. ]

That's me. It goes like a rock in a well. What? [ the final word is tacked on past the instinct of something numbed, a rise in intonation that follows the rise in kaveh's eyebrows. kaveh stares like he can't quite comprehend how his actions have led himself to this very point in time when someone's come back from the dead. kaveh's hand gives midnight's ankle a third, very surprised squeeze, and then leaves his hand there when his brain has finally caught up to the slippery slide of his consciousness far, far away. ]

Oh! [ oh! kaveh leans in. the line of his body quavers like words. ] You're alive. Goodness, I thought you were a corpse. Or at least, well, dead, though I suppose there aren't many words that describe a dead person that isn't just corpse. But I wasn't really thinking the word corpse. 'Dead' was as far as that thought managed to get. [ ... the spiral of his thoughts stall. ] Wait, what are you doing here, Midnight?

a.

[indwelt]

[ Does a person really need to make plans with a person when they live in the same building and occasionally pass by each other on the way to the grocery store or on the way back from an afternoon run? No, and it makes it all the more of a nice surprise when you run into them elsewhere around the city.

It's lunchtime and he's heading towards a chicken wing joint (because sometimes the craving for unhealthy fried food just hits, even when you're 82), but as always when he spies a familiar face his footsteps slow and he straightens a little, a matching smile on his face. ]

You're always a welcome sight, Midnight. [ Both literally and metaphorically. ] Have you had lunch already?

[unrequite]

Ah... No, I haven't.

[ Welt has been a pleasure of an acquaintance, easygoing and a wonderful conversationalist, but this is the first time Midnight's run into Welt at noon or evening. This is deliberate, although not directed at Welt. He just... gets busy. Plenty to do. Midnight's very good at finding plenty to do.

Still, Midnight's not at all opposed to the interruption. He likes people quite a bit. It's just... not exactly not what he planned. ]

Why? Were you going out to eat?

[indwelt]

I was planning on getting a sandwich from the convenience store, but it's always more enjoyable to have a meal with a friend.

[ Unless.....? ]

But if you're busy, we can find a different time.

[ It's not as though they don't have near endless time on their hands and an easy proximity to each other by simply living in the same area. (But also: and then we ended the thread after two comments.) ]

B b/c i'm uncreative with ideas too but they gotta chat over letters and this amused me

[codenametesla]

[Half of the time, over the past few days since Don Quixote's death, she finds herself walking around the city just to stay awake, and for something to do to avoid thinking. Coffee is also often required.

Which is how Althea happens across Midnight absolutely splayed out on a bench, and she slows to a stop, squinting for a few moments as if trying to see if he's really there or if she's somehow fallen asleep while walking.

But no, it looks like it really is Midnight, and she certainly doesn't feel asleep or else the nightmares would start again. The letter catches her attention too, mostly because she has her own burning a hole in her pocket, but she wouldn't dream of trying to take it or read it.

Instead, she carefully climbs up onto the back of the bench, so that she's sitting facing the 'correct' way, but up on top, legs stretched out in a way that meant she wasn't touching Midnight's legs, unless she specifically tried to.

And eventually she did try to, nudging his knee with the toe of her shoe.]

Half-naked rockstar says what?

[unrequite]

[ Midnight can relate with having nightmares. He's currently having one, actually, but less City related than the average. It's one of those feverish, jangled nonsense movies that comes with having too much sun and not enough sleep. Fire, blood. Concrete. Eyes.

But the nice part about these dreams is that it's fairly easy to wake up from them. Because they're not real. Of course they're not. ]

Hm? What?

[ Gottem.

He blinks hard, pushes off from his awkward position on the bench, and stares up at the direction of the voice, staring blankly until it clicks that he is looking at a person. Oh! Miss Althea. He grins. (He also has a red line on his face where the beams of the bench was pressing against it. It's silly. He's a silly, silly man.) ]

What a pleasant surprise. What brings you here, Miss Althea?

[codenametesla]

[Oh man, he got got so hard, hell yeah.

She couldn't help the little tired chuckle of amusement from her perch on the back of the bench, shifting her legs so that he could properly get up without bumping into her, and gives a little wave when he greets her.]

Was walking after getting coffee, saw you sleeping here, figured I'd check on you. Too much sun can be bad for the skin, you know?

[Sure, she doesn't want to sleep, and has a million excuses lined up to try and avoid it as long as possible, but when it comes down to it, she was still worried about him, especially face down like he was. She's had time to think about their last conversation and come to terms with it, and knew he didn't deserve to be treated any differently just because of something that was happening in her home.]

Why are you passed out here?

d! gym buddies wildcard

[centile]

[going to the gym is one of the things mob enjoys most about his day. it's a nice routine, normal, helps him focus on achievable, little things instead of how daunting the whole situation was.

not to mention he gets to see midnight if it's in the mornings, offering a little wave and usually going over to say hello, talk about Gym Buddy things. today is one of those morning sessions, everything the same as he comes in to put is gym bag down and stretch.

the only difference being when he roots around for a bottle of water in his bag out comes quite the book, one he doesn't notice fell as he finally manages his bottle of water.

and if midnight is nearby? he will lift his head to offer a little smile.] Good morning.

[unrequite]

[ Midnight is nearby, and will happily interrupt his workout to wave. He's usually a bit too willing to sweep others into his workouts, so to have someone who is quite willing to participate of their own free will every now and then is enough to curb that particular habit of his. ]

Ah, Mob, you dropped something.

[ He gets up from his lateral press and scoops it up on his way to Mob, looking at the cover a bit curiously. Wait... a book? With words? He flips it open to the center. ]

Is... This can't be from here, could it?

[centile]

[mob perks a bit in his very mob way- aka subdued but there. gym was better with workout buddies, especially midnight. oh, the very stupid book though.]

Oh, no, that's from my home. [he walks over. if midnight skims the text it seems to be talking about an adult psychic trying to kidnap a boy named ritsu. the writing isn't very good, it's clearly a blunt amateur.] Did you go to the bank? It's what was in my lockbox.

[well, someone else had it but still.] Master Reigen thought we should write a book about some stuff that happened, but he decided not to try to publish it in the end.

b.

[mollymocks]

[ Molly has seen many things, in his short (known) lifetime. All sorts of people in all sorts of states in all sorts of places. So a body draped across a public bench is not entirely out of the question, but it is unusual enough that it catches his attention. There are a lot of reasons one might find themselves face down on public property, and that collection of possibilities are what finally drag him over to investigate.

He does, briefly, miss his swords. They're excellent for poking, if you're careful about it.

Still, once he gets close enough he can see the body is at least breathing, so that's one option down. It does not at all prevent Molly from getting close enough to hover. ]

Hello! [ So cheerful. ] Are you dead?

Re: b.

[unrequite]

[ An arm comes up, with a bit too much alacrity for a man apparently dead to the world, and shoves the source of the voice away. Yes, this probably means that, if he ends up catching this interloper, it will probably be in the face, but Midnight's focusing on efficiency, not comfort.

It will also surprise him greatly to have hit anything in real life at all — he was dreaming, that question rang very loudly in his head, and it was definitely not spoken by anyone alive — so it is with alarm and no little surprise that he rolls onto his side and stare at whoever he just swiped blankly. (He does have red imprints of the bench planks pressed into his face. Comedy!) ]

You're purple.

[ ... At least it's not, like, specifically accusatory, but it also escapes him like it's the most obvious fact to point out, which probably sounds a bit pointed anyway. ]

[mollymocks]

[ He huffs a little at being suddenly shoved away, but really he probably had that coming so Molly can't be too upset about it. He does one better and takes another step back as the figure rolls himself over, just to be on the safe side in case that reaction wasn't a fluke. It doesn't mean he's lost his grin for even a moment, even as one amused eyebrow lifts upwards. ]

I am indeed. [ And he holds out his very purple arms as if to prove it, offset as it is by the riot of colors that stretch across his skin and are patterned throughout his clothes. Clearly not trying to hide, by any stretch of the imagination. ]

Anything else you'd like to tell me about myself? I love a good compliment.

[ Obviously it would only be compliments. Who wouldn't want to compliment him? ]

a + wildcard?? idk they're at the gym

[cashewlater]

[ working out is not only important for his work, it's also a great way to blow off steam - and so here cyno is, charging away on a treadmill, sweat sticking his shorts to his legs, his hair pulled back into a tail to keep it from clinging to his neck and shoulders. he's going pretty hard.

but then someone passes him, with an envelope sticking out of their pocket - an envelope that soon slips free and flutters to the ground.

cyno stops immediately, slowing the treadmill so he can hop off. jelly legs. weird. ]

You dropped something.

hell yeah. also sorry about the wait mr general sir august has been a bitch so far

[unrequite]

[ Long haired jocks, unite. Midnight's own hair is pulled into a long tail, which swishes around as he looks back at the envelope, then with a bit of good humored dismay as he sees the stranger pause his routine. ]

Thank you, please don't stop on my account. It's just a letter from my mother, nothing to concern yourself about.

[ Midnight says that, then frowns as he walks back to where the envelope landed, his fingers coming up to brush his lips. Midnight is an open book when prompted, but he absolutely does not volunteer information about himself out of the blue. Not that easily. Certainly not about his family. ]

no worries friend i am Also Slow

[cashewlater]

[ cyno is quick to shake his head, using the heel of his hand to shove sweat-damp hair from his eyes. ]

It's no trouble, really.

[ it's not like he couldn't work out any time he wanted to, in this place; meeting new people was far more interesting. tilting his head like a curious dog, cyno looks from the man's face, to the letter, and back to his face again. ]

Something wrong?