[Open] Underground Meetings Literally Underground

[concealingeyes]

Date & Time: WAY BACKDATED to February 15th with Morning / Afternoon / Evening options
Location: The catacombs which look cool if you forgot (cool is important)
Characters: Kido, Kano and anyone who wants to stop by for a gang meeting! You're free to assume your character was spoken to if you want, too. Handwaving the recruiting is cool with us. Or your character can just happen across them?? Whatever works!
Summary: Kido and Kano have been recruiting for their gang, the Mekakushi Dan, and now is the meeting. Feel free to mingle! Become a gang family.
NOTE! They would also inform characters to stick around for the evening meeting if they want to hear something more serious.
Warnings: Uhmmm none that I can think of!



Morning Option:
[The morning is the most relaxed. Kido and Kano have a lot of work to do when it comes to cleaning up the catacombs! Of course, they had to pick a larger area not too far in, away from the sewer areas so it isn't as damp and gross. It's still cold, though. They put up arrows so no one would get lost even though it doesn't take much to find the area.

There aren't chairs or anything like that to sit in but bricks and old rocks are being cleaned up to make sitting space. Also, there's soda and various snacks sitting on a particularly large rock.

Come help if you want and possibly get some early information out of them!]

Afternoon Option:
[After running around, chatting with all the newcomers Kano's decided to speak up. Now's an excellent time to get down to business! He's hopped onto one of the rocks to elevate himself (being short is hard) and shouts:]

Hey, hey! [He waves his hand rapidly in the air.] Ah, first--thanks for coming, everyone! We wouldn't have known what to do with all these snacks if you guys didn't show up.

I'm kidding, I'm kidding! But really, we appreciate your interest. Let me explain what we plan to do!

When most of us arrived we were a little overwhelmed. I knew I was. Being dropped into another world is a pretty heavy experience, right? Some of us weren't sure where to go or who to turn to! It's a very disheartening way to begin a new life. [Kano snaps his fingers.] So! We, the Mekakushi Dan, will help those new transports!

Whether it's through food or clothes or even umbrellas, we'll lend them a helping hand and show them that we care. We'll be the welcoming committee that Exsilium doesn't have, the newbies' unofficial family! With your help, we'll help them settle in and ease into their lives here.

We're open to ideas, so if you have any... feel free to shout them out!

Evening Option:
[By the time things wind down and it's getting dark, Kido steps up. She's perfectly at ease with this part of things. When she speaks, it's in her usual gruff but serious tone.]

...I don't know how much you guys know about the Initiative but they aren't praiseworthy. It's a war, so no one is clean, but they haven't treated us the best. It isn't just this. I've been looking into the network and past posts. I'm not going to tell you what to think or how to act towards them, though.

[She shoves her hands into her hoodie pocket.] What I'm saying is that I'm putting us first. We need to keep an eye on anyone that might threaten us, that might use us or hurt us. So, if you want to help with that or you're interested in looking closer at these Initiative people and the ones they're fighting, we'd appreciate the help.

It's your call. If you only want to be part of the community help, that's fine. But you know at least what Kano and I are going to be doing. We'll keep you updated if you want, too. We're going to keep you guys safe as best as we can from anything.

Comments

[moirailcompass]

[Slow blink...and then a nod. She's glad she has yet to bring up not really giving a damn about it either. That is to say she is curious about what happens, if only to know that the others are okay but really? She is so done with SGRUB and all these time shenanigans. She's glad to know she's not alone]

I won't tell anyone, and if it's worth anything I don't especially care fur it either. [And not just because she has no part in it]

[speakveryclearly]

That's why I came here. Kido's rhetoric...

I'm not the troll who did those things and don't want to be. It's too awful a possibility to allow within my personal experience. And you agreeing-- [ha ha ha] makes me glad to know there's at least one reasonable troll within our ranks.

[moirailcompass]

This can be our little secret then. I just had a pleasant talk with Kano today, is all.

[She smiles and gives Kanaya a wink]

I can understand that. [More than she can say] All these different times and having to deal with them and what others did or didn't do--it really wears you out having to deal with it all.

[speakveryclearly]

And you can never stop dealing with it either. [HUFF.] Even when the events in question are seasons behind.

[moirailcompass]

I know right? And even if you do resolve things once all that could be erased with the way people keep coming and going from places like these! [Oh my god. She really does understand.] Then here comes another one and it's back to square one!

[speakveryclearly]

At this point I'm just in denial about the possibility of any more replacements occurring at all. It's such a long hard battle to get anything understood!

[IT'S HARD

BEING A CRAU AND GROWING UP

IT IS HARD AND **NEPETA UNDERSTANDS**]

[moirailcompass]

[She exhales, nodding a little] Sometimes I wonder if that's not the best way. Or to just...purrtend to be furom a completely diffurent timeline entirely.

[A pause and then she shakes her head] No, I know that's not good but it was really tempting when I furst got here. Especially since most everyone just goes on assuming things will be the same as ever.

[Which was rude.]

[speakveryclearly]

I don't know about you, but nothing hurts me more than that assumption.

[Getting bleak.] I know I'm doomed and what I do is meaningless. It'd be nice if both of those things were acknowledged and not just the second.

[moirailcompass]

[D:]

Wha-huh? [See. Nepeta recalls that Kanaya told her she came from elsewhere, so she isn't all that surprised she doesn't really know what she's referring to but she's not letting anyone say what they do is meaningless]

Kanaya, I don't know what you are refurring to, but if you are doing to it must hold some value to you. And if it does, then that's all it takes to have meaning, no matter what anyone else says.

[speakveryclearly]

You--you really think that? [Having grown morose, she lifts her eyes back up.]

I just... know that deep down no matter how hard I try to be a good person -- in the timeline that matters the most to everyone else, I'm a moral failure.

[moirailcompass]

I do. [And wow, has everyone really been giving her that hard a time about it? Maybe Nepeta is just riding on the emotions that come from getting this out for the first time, and finding someone to bitch about it with, but she can't help but become a little angry]

And if you want my honest opinion? The whole concept of an alpha timeline is...well. Well. Well it's bullshit! [God she's glad Equius wasn't around to hear that]

The whole idea that there is a single timeline out of the billions and billions of timelines out there that is suppose to be 'the one' is absolutely ridiculous. It completely disregards countless lives and countless worlds into something 'insignificant' made only to cater in some way to the alpha timeline, when they aren't at all! Everyone Kanaya and every Nepeta and every whoever out there is an important person, a unique person, and to relegate them as nothing but failures to this supposedly supreme and overruling timeline is so. SO. AAUGH!

[Caaaaaaaaaalm down, Nepeta]

If the others are giving you crap for not caring about it then screw them! How do they even know that they are part of the alpha timeline when the tiniest, most microscopic detail can constitute their history as yet another timeline? It's absolutely ridiculous.

You may not be the Kanaya I grew up with, so I can't judge you based on anything that has happened outside of Exsilium but in the time I've been here you've been nothing but kind, helpful, and fun to talk to so yea! Screw them, Kanaya. You are a good person and essentially they are doing sucky things in making you feel that way.

[speakveryclearly]

[The whole speech hits her like a punch to the gut. It actually probably outnumbers the total words she has ever heard from Nepeta in her entire undeath up until this point, combined. And overall Kanaya is overwhelmed by how much the other troll's words feel RIGHT. They're the rationale she's used all along, that's been shot down by every troll who's ever heard it except Gamzee. Sure, the others entertained her denials politely enough when they came up, and Roxy had only secondhand information on the disasters Kanaya had missed in the first place - but when she began to really argue the alpha incarnation wasn't her? Suddenly that wasn't funny to them anymore.]

You're right. Do you know that, Nepeta? I've had to live in denial of that for over four seasons now, but - you're - right. Anyone who doesn't accept basic logic about our abductions here disrupting the damned alpha timeline's flow, starting right now, is no longer worthy of my attention!

[Her arms are spread wide, fists clenched, every exposed part of her body flickering brightly, but the mouth on her angered face isn't quite warped into a grimace, her solace taken in Nepeta keeping it quirked up crookedly halfway into a friendly smile.]

[moirailcompass]

[In all her life Nepeta had never let out a rant like that. It felt so damn good to let it all out, it felt so damn good to make someone feel better, and it felt so damn good to have someone agree with her. It's good to see Kanaya smiling again and her own face takes on a goofy grin.]

You tell them, Kanaya, you are your own person and you don't have to live up to anyone's expectations but your own!

[Contrary to what some might think, Nepeta did not pass out physical affection left and right. That was usually reserved for Equius and Vriska only but at this moment she just felt so cathartic and happy that she couldn't help it--she gave Kanaya a hug]

I never thought there'd be someone who'd understand or agree yet there you've been all along, if I had only actually bothered to speak up.

[speakveryclearly]

[The embrace catches her by surprise. Kanaya is also very conservative about such expressions; each one is a distinct memory. The last time was in fact over four and a half months ago - underneath the hot hands of the human girl who broke her spade. And then the transient grasp on Feferi, an apparition. It goes on backwards like that, spaced weeks and weeks apart. Backwards and backwards and backwards until she's cold and alone in the veil, pushing away a troll she loved once without knowing that would be all she saw of her for over half a sweep, waiting to get verdiburned to double death by the Demon - something that still might very well come to pass in their precious alpha timeline.

She puts her arms around Nepeta and takes (not pulling) fistfuls of her long conditioned hair. It is a beautiful echo of the Disciple and Dolorosa. Everything is greenbloods and nothing hurts. This close Kanaya can feel and smell her olive pumpbiscuit; beating unanswered by her own dead ribcage.]

We don't have to go back and remember fates that aren't ours and never see each other again. We're alive here; or at least you are, but I mean our eyes aren't white here. There's a future for us that we'll discover by existing and not being told.

[moirailcompass]

[It's really, really good to hear her say that. Up until this moment, Nepeta had too shared a bit of guilt over how she wanted to completely put the past behind her and forget about SGRUB and all they had experienced.]

You're right. [She hugs Kanaya a little tighter, as if she's an anchor and lets out a heavy sigh, upending a heavy weight from her shoulders.]

You're absolutely right. It'll be what we make of it. [Between this and her conversation with Disciple, bit by bit Nepeta is growing happier with her life. There are still uncertainties, that anxiety and depression still comes back to bite her, but for the first time since that day she saw her moirail die Nepeta is finally beginning to feel like she can overcome it. Her face is a little hot but she closes her eyes and feels the tears recede.]

Thank you, Kanaya. [And since she can't help but feel by her tone that there is still something being unsaid, she speaks again] If you ever need someone to just listen, let me know and I'll be there.

[speakveryclearly]

[Depression - oh, god, a ghost that haunts Kanaya always threatening to become like Troll Bella Swan in New Moons. She's been there. She isn't going back. Every bit of joy in her life is a light with which to stave off the monster Hive of Foliage style. She's alone and has been for so long and it's slowly she's realizing that doesn't mean she has nobody with her.]

Thank you, Nepeta. [The stress isn't quite as pointed the tacky "no thank you" but it's that inflection order rather than a bland repetition.]

For having faith in me, and in you, and in all of us, and in - everything. It's what we need to get by and go forward.

[On the grounds that it's been four tags, this is when she lets go.]

I will, I swear - go to you whenever this interdimensional song and dance is too much. And you can do likewise.