oh, we dance in misery

[headandhand]

WHO: Open to all Dualizens!
WHAT: the Plague Memorial Masked Ball
WHERE: the Mayor's Mansion (central Dualis)
WHEN: the evening of November 16
WARNINGS: Visuals/discussion of disease and death in the setting. Anything else, please use appropriate warnings!

At 8 p.m. sharp, the lights inside and around the Mayor's Mansion turn up, and the doors are opened to the crowds that begin to trickle inside. All entrances are manned by Iterations, and all party-goers are scanned for both proper attire (formal and masked, mandatory) and weapons (absolutely forbidden) before being allowed entry.

Once inside, attendees are greeted to a spectacle of warmth and light and lavish decorations, all themed in white accented with gold and violet. Venture into the ballroom, and you'll see intricately carved ice sculptures in various representations of death, all laden with garlands of marigolds and violet chrysanthemums. At one end of the room, a rotating cast of musicians plays soft music in differing arrangements of strings and piano. Long tables at the other end of the ballroom are piled high with punch fountains and platters of delicious party foods, and a few bar stations serve beverages of the more adult variety to those of age.

Outside the main ballroom are seven smaller rooms, for more intimate conversations and quiet recovery from the main gala (or just skulking like a brooding weirdo, if that's your thing). Six of the rooms are decorated in monochrome blue, purple, green, orange, white, or violet, and the seventh room is pitch black with red accents.

Throughout the night, the mayor herself winds in and out of the crowds, shadowed by a pair of bodyguards. She is all smiles, greeting people with a friendly handshake and effusive words of thanks for attending the ball, but she never stays in one place long enough for a true conversation. This is a celebration of life and a remembrance of the dead, after all - not the time or place for talks of business or politics.

Enjoy yourselves tonight, everyone! And remember - death eventually comes for everyone.

Comments

[firacrux]

It's nice to know she still cares about him enough to ask for a kiss, even if it's "just kidding". Somehow he doesn't think so, and eyes her for a time, expression unreadable. Should he make this worse? He should totally make this worse. "That's too bad, I was thinking about doing it anyway." He offered lightly, still watching her out of the corner of his eye.

Seifer's a jackass news at eleven.

He finally cracks a grin. "A dance with you's payment enough, c'mon." He offered her his hand. Of course he was really just playing with her, not about to demand payment for a dance that's silly. He only regrets he never got to do this for real back home.

Still too much heartache there, better not to think about it. "You guys still got that little yellow glowing one?" He kinda wants the cyclops cat.

[etherealsage]

Rinoa paused rather abruptly when he continued and she was ever thankful for her mask to hide the way flush spread right across her features. He was joking. He had to be. Maybe. The weight upon her heart, invisible to everyone except her (or so she thought), grew. She didn't hate the idea of it and that made her feel worse.

She dared a look over to him, as subtle as she could muster, and when he offered his hand it took her a moment before she placed her hand in his. She'd never danced with him, but she'd wanted to for a couple of years at least. If she knew anything about the passage of time, anyway. Did something... remain between them? She couldn't help but wonder.

"That's charitable of you," she teased him as she drew closer to him. "Just because it's me, I assume." Although when he asked her about the cats, she offered him a nod. "Yeah. That I know of. Thinking about taking the little baby home? They could all use one. You could take them all and roll around in cats. That sounds like fun."

[firacrux]

She'll never know. Seifer's not saying one way or the other. Although there is a bit of a linger, a hesitance in his tone, that might just hint that there's more going on under that bravado than he's letting on. It being so brief, however, it'd be far too easy to miss.

If only she knew he'd never really moved on. Had to let go, didn't mean he moved on.

His only response to her assumption is a faint smirk. Oh, there's so much more, but he's not answering. She'll just have to sit on it and wonder. Instead he'll distract her by pulling her along to draw her into a dance. Which, having been trained and being the stubborn perfectionist he is, he's probably not terrible at. "Don't tempt me. I'll end up fillin' the warehouse with 'em." Cats, everywhere.

[etherealsage]

The whole moment is a curious one. Rinoa had already spent so much time thinking and considering. The truth was that her ambivalence had her contemplating even before she had ever arrived in the city. But that she didn't have anyone she felt it... really right to speak with about it, she'd only ever held onto it. That was something else, truly. To be surrounded by people she called friends, only to feel that she couldn't speak with them in earnest.

Maybe she had always been lonely. Maybe that never ended, even when they had reassured her that she was one of them. Because she really wasn't. Seifer was more one of them than she ever would be. Than she ever had been.

Thankfully, he did divert her attention. He took her into his grasp, proper as it was, and she couldn't help wondering when he'd learned. Why he had, actually. Maybe he liked dancing, or maybe he'd wanted to in the past. He brought her back to cats and she grinned. "I could think or far worse things to happen there," Rinoa replied. "But then they'd get into everything. No one would ever get anything done. Or everything would get destroyed. They aren't just cats, after all. It's not like it'd be the same as a bunch of Angelos in the warehouse."

[firacrux]

If only Seifer knew what she was going through. He'd simply assumed that she'd integrate with ease, she seemed like the type to find herself a place no matter where she was. Social, friendly, well liked... it never would occur to him that she'd struggle to fit in. Maybe they had more in common than he realized. After all, without Raijin and Fujin, and with Nida being less involved these days, Seifer's found himself quite lonely as well. Who do you talk to when you're terrible at forming close relationships?

Then again if she'd spoken her concerns he'd insist that she was far more a part of the group than he ever had been. He'd not been a part of them since the orphanage a lifetime ago. Tossed away and forgotten. Rinoa had far more right to be there than he ever did.

But, the good news was they weren't talking about that. They're going to dance and enjoy themselves in this death celebration. As for the question about why he knew how to dance? She could ask. Simple answer was like Squall, he was trained. Unlike Squall, he practiced more. Takes everything to the serious extreme. "They'd have to be sectioned off, can't have them getting into dangerous places." Like the forge or the rest of the machinery. Sounds like it'd be a real hassle.

"You're right. It's a dumb idea."

[etherealsage]

"I didn't say it was dumb," she corrected him. She'd never tell someone any idea they had was 'dumb,' because that was just a horrid thing to say. On the contrary, she always wanted to encourage. If she could be realistic in tandem. Sometimes realism didn't allow for that and as much as she wanted to with her head in the clouds, it wasn't going to happen. For a multitude of reasons.

"Just that we might have a lot to cat-proof if you really decide to adopt a bunch of them. I mean, in the end, if we can take care of them, that's what matters, right?"

Which basically meant if they couldn't, then the obvious answer was not to go crazy with power and adopt every alien cat that crossed their path. She was certain Seifer could take care of at least two before it became a handful for him, though. Yet it sounded like he had one that his sights were set on. Leave it to him to pick a special one that likely not many were interested in.

Something about the prettiest things could sometimes come in the most ugly of packages.