lap eight // day 271 (open) // IT'S PARTY TIME

[amphibian]

Who: EVERYBODY
Open: Open
When: 271
Where: In the empty space around the monument!
What:

PARTY MINGLE GO
Format: DO AS YOU PLEASE AND FOLLOW YOUR HEART
Warnings: If anything comes up, put it in the subject lines!


[As everyone wakes up bright and early this morning, it isn't going to be hard to miss what's changed in the empty space around the monument Just in case, though, signs with indicating arrows line the campground where the Bastion's newest guests are staying, reading, in Ura, "This way to the party!"—wait, party?

Oh yes. Anyone Aoi had managed to grab the day before ought to be prepared for this. A great big banner stretched on two poles over the monument reads "Welcome to the Bastion!", written in Ura again; there's a little variation between the handwriting, since Zanya wrote some and Zahi wrote others.

Every last piece of the area that can have something hanging from it does: Zuko's lanterns hang off all the nearby trees, and her streamers, mostly red and sometimes gold, line absolutely everything, including but not limited to all the chairs and tables Ryu got together and helped arrange. Other things you're apt to find everywhere: flowers. Between the Psiioniic, the Disciple, Ghaleon, and Crona, there are more flowers than anyone could ever figure out what to do with. Aoi's best has been done, though: garlands are hung up around furniture, tied around tree trunks, woven through branches, strung between the branches of adjacent trees, wrapped 'round the monument, and so on and so on. A lot of care has been put into making sure they look good instead of just being thrown every which-way.

A few mismatched vases sitting on the tables have some flowers sticking out of them, too—perhaps exactly enough in each to make a flower crown, hmm? There are no party hats, so some improvising will have to be done.

There's all manner of tasty treats placed on all the tables, of course: a platter of picked donuts is to be expected, given Aoi's hand in all this (and thanks to Naegi, there are plenty to go around and they're arranged almost elaborately), but Rin, Zia, and Mirielle have provided all manner of homemade goodies that aren't just Aoi's favorite desserts. Bon's made a cake that Aoi has proudly placed in the center of one round table and surrounded with the rest of the desserts.

Instead of food, one table has a chalkboard propped up on it instead, with a box of colorful chalk beside it. Aoi's already written a small message in the corner—Thank you, everyone! with a smiley face beside it—and doodled a couple of flowers around the edges. The board's five feet long and there's plenty of chalk to go around, so there's certainly room for collaborating on something!

Not far from all the food sits the enormous stack of Legos Aoi purchased at Ibuki's suggestion. Legos. Please keep your shoes on, for the love of god. Some of them have already been arranged to form half the outside of a floor and a chunk of wall up to Aoi's chest so everyone has an idea of what's supposed to be done with things, but there are more than enough to start new projects. On the other side of the monument, closer to the collection of shop buildings than the gazebo, the soccer nets Otoha and Takamura built out of Skyway scraps have been set up (flowers have been woven in and out of the netting, of course). Aoi's brought out not one, but two of the soccer balls given to her during the festival, just in case of a soccer ball malfunction or if the game gets big enough that everyone decides rules are for losers and the only way to play soccer is with multiple things to kick. In the absence of paint, Aoi has decided to use more streamers as field markers.

At the gazebo not far off (naturally, it's covered in streamers and flowers as well), there's a set of speakers and an amplifier ready for use—Ibuki's, of course, and the little note Aoi's written that reads "For Ibuki-chan!" (with the wrong characters for her name, but points for effort) confirms it. Her equipment from Colin has all been set up, too: the spotlights on the top and bottom of the gazebo will shine in all sorts of colors when Ibuki turns them on, and there are some additional bits and pieces to the sound system to help make everything that much noisier. Aside from hanging decor, the space in front of the gazebo has been left empty so that there's enough room to dance!

To the side of the gazebo and just behind it is the unreasonably long rope Shing somehow managed to scrounge up. Like absolutely everything else, it has a chain of flowers wrapped around it. A streamer's been tied around the very center of it in a bow, and hopefully that makes its intended purpose as a tool of tug-of-war obvious enough.

If Aoi has anything to say about it, this is going to be the best goddamn welcome party ever.

Enjoy the festivities!]

Comments

Re: OTA please bug him too kthx

[twinked_witch]

[Have a redheaded, green-dressed woman walking up towards N... And being careful to not step on or trip over any of the Pokemon. Megaera has apparently decided to try and meet more new people today, and the fellow with several very smart animal minions or friends or something seems like a good choice to try talking to.]

Ah, hello.

[unwrittenformula]

[At least Altaria because mun is dumb and wrote Swablu earlier and Zoroark are big enough to not be stepped on. N hadn't expected anyone new to approach him, but he does his best to try not to be rude.] ... hello.

[twinked_witch]

[Megaera smiled a bit, pausing for a second before speaking...]

Hello. Figured I'd speak to a few new people, while I was here and all...

[unwrittenformula]

[You picked the wrong person to have a conversation with then! N shot Zoroark a Look, but said nothing to the large fox Pokemon.] I've been here a while. [... yup.]

[twinked_witch]

... Not entirely so much.

[Megaera glanced towards N's Pokemon associates.]

Lively bunch, these fellows. Your friends, I presume?

[unwrittenformula]

Yes. They're my friends. [He gestured to each of them, giving their names.] Zoroark, Altaria, Woobat and Darumaka.

[twinked_witch]

[Megaera observed each...]

With how precisely Darumaka moves, I'm going to presume you can communicate with them on a higher level than most human-animal communication?

[unwrittenformula]

Maka~! I have the ability to communicate with Pokemon, yes. It's a rare gift in my world.

[twinked_witch]

Where I'm from, speaking with animals as a whole is... Really rare natively. I hear some druids have a spell for it, but it's only good for like six minutes. Some wizards have familiars and can talk to them - sometimes, the familiar can even talk to other humans, as in it can speak in Common - but that's a single example.

Plus, the animals back home don't seem to be nearly as intelligent as your Pokemon are. Which makes being able to really communicate with them a lot cooler, in my opinion.

Different worlds, different abilities, though.

[unwrittenformula]

Of course. [N wasn't so arrogant as to expect his situation to be completely unique, or for such an ability to be present in many other places.] Intelligence is relative. Just because a creature cannot communicate in a way you're familiar with doesn't mean that they lack intelligence.

[twinked_witch]

Conversations with dogs tend to be... Less than proving of their intelligence, let's put it that way.

[unwrittenformula]

Maybe you're just not speaking to them right.

[N not everything is a Pokemon.]

[twinked_witch]

No, in this case it's actually a fairly measurable phenomona. Dogs don't exactly philosophize over much more than where their next bone comes from...

[unwrittenformula]

Are you speaking from experience and fact? Or merely speculation?

[twinked_witch]

Research and data. A Wizard can trust nothing less, especially when there's too much world for one to observe entirely on their own. We've got standardized measures for things like capacity for complex learning versus empathy and force of personality. Dogs tend to be a fair bit better than humans in empathy on average, but their ability to learn is extremely limited compared to the same baseline.

Of course, there are exceptions - Awakening can make them as smart as, or smarter than humans. Animals who become wizard's familiars immediately gain quite a bit of intellect, and moreso as the wizard gains more power.

[unwrittenformula]

[All of that gets a raised eyebrow. N would be more than happy to discuss the finer points of this, but...]

... I thought Wizards were adept in magic, not research and data.

[twinked_witch]

You're thinking Sorcerers. They're naturally adept with magic, so they can manipulate a modest number of spells better than Wizards can. Or Warmages, who learn a specific art that makes them really good at explosion magic but useless elsewhere.

Wizards have to learn by research, observation, and data... Especially if we're trying to create entirely new spells. Which we often are. As a result, we tend to be fairly good at applying that mindset elsewhere.

[unwrittenformula]

The wizards from your world sound far closer to scientists from mine. Then again magic isn't prominent in humans as it is. Pokemon are the ones that possess true power, and they are born naturally adept and capable of learning as they grow.

[twinked_witch]

This produces very different interactions, presumably. If the Pokemon are ultimately the true masters of the environment...

[unwrittenformula]

There are Legendary Pokemon that have been credited with the creation of entire continents, possibly the entire known world. "Masters of the environment" is practically an understatement.

[twinked_witch]

Point established. So, yeah. Way different from my world. I mean, there's dragons where I'm from, but they're kind of... Obvious.

[unwrittenformula]

Obvious how?

[twinked_witch]

Even a fairly young one's the size of a horse. An old one... Uh...

[She looks around as if judging which building to compare against.]

[unwrittenformula]

... Paarthunax?

[That would be a good example since he already is a dragon. And massive at that.]

[twinked_witch]

Much bigger, potentially.