[b]Mirror[/b]

Valentina de Alcard gives you a cool stare. Definitely royalty, not a woman accustomed to being told that she’ll get three quarters of what she wants. But you did beat her, and you can tell she’s leaning into the station that deserves, so she’s ready to be the follower tonight. She didn’t stop you when you took her hand, and she lets that purr of your reverberate through her own body before nodding, once.  

“Alright m’lady, you granted me my boon as the loser. So tonight, your wish is my command. Lead me where you will.” She brushes her other hand to smooth her skirt, lets it ruffle down to the midnight base and faces you with her full chest to let you lead the way.

And gosh, where did she get the old speaking style? You’re pretty sure that isn’t how most TCers talk. They’re supposed to be all mining folks or flashy dumb pilots who you beat up with their own arrogance. Maybe this is just how everyone from Alcard talks? Or maybe she’s just got a thing, or she thinks this is how to address a Hybrasilian. Or her conqueror. Lots of options.

Of course, she doesn’t leave you hanging, she’s already starting the friendly chatter. “...would prefer they get the young designers out faster, they’re always impractical, don’t you think m’lady? I’m here primarily for the ball gowns from Prime Couture, though I admit some interest in what Linterna Brilliante premiers since it might serve both of us in piloting and they’re always so known for their forward thinking. I don’t mean to dismiss the need to find talent, far from it, but I think they would be better served premiering for specialists, experts with an eye for talent who can help them improve. Premiering for all of us will subject them to such extensive criticism for just a handful of well-received pieces.”

Admittedly, the designer out there now showing a neural mesh enhanced suit jacket is a bit over the top. The assisted handstand and cartwheel was stiff but even if it had gone perfectly a lot of designers would have said it was a bit much. But after that model, the next one is a young designer who’s trying to integrate drone technology into the dress. Actually, could they have modeled it after your mecha somehow? It’s not as sophisticated as the nine tails by any means, but the whole design up there is a woman in a fairly plain platinum dress with shoulder straps but with a set of five small drones painted in metallic lapis lazuli who are wheeling about the dress to join in formation, creating in turn a sash, a scarf, a hood, a drape, and then a shining multipart necklace. Their whirring motion creates constant blue-tinted light playing across the platinum surface so that it almost looks like she’s part of a river current of some sort. 

De Alcard is looking too, though she may well be less moved than you perhaps? What’s next for her? 

***

[b]Solarel[/b]

Her callsign was Crescent. She piloted an average size Hybrasil Mecha, a little under 10 meters tall with long legs and narrow rounded shoulders framing the cockpit in the head. Her primary weaponry had been missiles set onto a back-mounted launcher that came over those narrow shoulders, mounted above the crystal fire drive, making her mecha look top-heavy. Since her hands were free, she carried a spear as well, but it had been the missiles that had made you approach as you did, fleeing juuust ahead of the missile chase and even taking a glancing blow from a detonation to lure her into chasing you so you could set up the shot. 

You could also tell from the Mecha aesthetics that her call sign referred to a phase of a moon, but not which one. She’d painted it a deep green with a bright yellow crescent upon it like the shape moons took when angled around a planet such that only a partial amount of sunlight could reflect on their surface. 

You didn’t know she was a tiger before, nothing about her suit or her bearing had been that specific, but looking at her build and stance now, that sort of overpowering direct style of blowing the opponent up before they could do anything did seem in keeping with her personal movements. 

She’s rapidly crossed the distance to where you fell and she uses her build to pick you up. Well, she’s not tall enough to actually get your feet off the floor, but she’s grabbed you by the collar and she’s holding your upper body weight. She knows something about Zaldariens too, can you feel the way she’s pressing with her paws, putting the force into your metallic skin with such subtlety? She can tell what she’s doing, the kind of energy she’s giving you and it seems like she’s enjoying the game of understanding what it does to you, no fear there. 

If you had to guess, yes she’s recovered from her wound and it’s a credit to Hybrasilian tech or to Crescent’s mental fortitude. You can also guess that she has not forgotten the time she careened into six separate asteroids before getting her momentum under control and the fact that she doesn’t seem all that angry is giving you vibes somewhere between flirting and rivalry. They’re not particularly far apart. 

There’s also a sense that she’s…testing something? You know that sort of feeling. Whatever it is, she’s making this feel good, in fact is she?! …yeah, yes she’s doing something with her paw muscles, really subtle, like she’s twitching in a pattern. It’s not directly rhythmic, something irregular, but it’s there, a subtle flexing of the muscle in a complex time signature, repeating around once every 14 motions followed by a variation, and a part of your brain is now wholly dedicated to following that pattern and completely puzzling it out. It’s hard to even notice that she’s dragging you to a booth just past the bar. 

[Crescent defines a vulnerability in Solarel to her touch. She’s also spending her string immediately to offer an XP if you let her drag you away from the bar.]

***

[b]Isabelle
[/b]
“Thrilling isn’t it?” Despite all the Lozano siblings being together, Emidio Paz knew how to slip into an opening to talk to someone in a group. It even helped to look a little tired. That was the key, actually, to look well-dressed but just a bit tired and overworked. It had that perfect combination to the rich and powerful of being non-threatening (because they could tell your clothes were good enough you weren’t there to ask for money) but also sympathetic. A person could feel that urge to clink glasses and toast tired arms to the unceasing rat race with a kindred spirit. 

And so, Isabelle, you find yourself next to a man in a good quality but slightly wrinkled suit taking notes on a stylus. He grins, runs a hand through hair that’s just long enough to show he needs a haircut and across the two days of stubble he hasn’t shaved and then flips his stylus back out. It’s a lot more interesting than the terrifying woman tasked with organizing the event. No shade on her, Lucille Toldeo has that look of a woman who’s been around the block, put most of that block onto her thighs, and in the intervening years managed to learn how to command everyone around her with her eyes. It’s just, the way she greets you is that you’re a check mark and now that she’s done the politeness that check mark has been done and there’s other things to do and you know better than to get between a woman like that and her lists. 

“Excellent match today” he says, a simple compliment that nevertheless tells you he knows who you are and given how newly arrived he looks that he’s a man who could catch up on the news quickly. He glances then to the stage. The first fashion line is starting from the up and comers. They’re showing something pretty intriguing, a suit that incorporates a similar neural mesh fiber to the mechas within the lining. The model is showing it off, demonstrating how it can help her move. It’s a bit thick, this is obviously a prototype and the assisted handstand looks more awkward than it needed to because of how stiff the coat is, but it’s still impressive and she disembarks the stage with a flourish assisted by the flaring cuffs of the pants. 

“Bet you could pull that off” he jokes, and he looks at your dress and smiles and tells you without any words that you’re a very beautiful woman. “So are you thinking sponsorships? A new clothing line maybe, pushed by the premier of the great house Lozano?”

It’s disarming, it’s friendly, you’re already sharing a drink and it just makes you want to answer. So, are you?

[Refusing to honestly answer the question requires a defy disaster roll]

***

[b]Dolly[/b]

Those whispers are loud as thunder, aren’t they, dear sweet Dolly? They’re the whispers of smart Hybrasilians who know how to get into places, and those whispers are going to follow them from here. Will it be that Dolly is making a bad name for them, an errant priestess? That this is what it is to be under the sway of a goddess? Will they laugh and snigger behind your back? Oh the thought of it is so embarrassing, the rumors will be endless. Jade doesn’t care though, no of course not, you’re hers first and foremost and if you want the others to think better of you, you’ll just need to be more poised, more sure, no matter where Jades touch comes to rest upon you. Especially not there!

Angela is blushing though. “You’ve got to have a game” she stammers, sounding far more uncertain. All that back and forth you’ve had, the sudden stops, the flusters and blushes has thrown her. A blush is rising in her own cheeks. She doesn’t know what to make of this attention, but she’s understanding that it is attention and she’s starting to think that you like her, that maybe you want to be close and you’re lurching about is a struggle with your own feelings. 

Well, of course that’s what she’ll think when she has time to sit down and write this all in her diary along with her drawings of the next barn owl (a name that she is absolutely not giving up and also how dare you look at her diary!). But in the moment, it’s confusing and odd and she doesn’t quite understand why she likes it anyway, why that feeling of being in over her head is coming over her and her cheeks are getting brighter and brighter with her rosy blood. 

“E-everybody has a game, you’re not just, I mean, not that you’d, but you did all those things, those taunts, aya what is all this huh, you tell me!” She’s stepping back and forth without realizing, setting the train of her dress swish-swishing along the floor, the sparkles catching your eye so tantalizingly. Her hand is still right up against your face and the smell of her nerves is strong enough that your sensitive little nose can catch it. It’s a lot to have a strong woman holding herself right in your face and forgetting about it all at once! 

The music is starting down below, the first few dresses from the young designers starting to be on display. You might feel a kinship to them if you can ever pay attention. But you’re busy!

Do you see what Jade saw, this woman who could move so well, so beautifully and cutely and embarrassedly all at once that she deserves your praise, or do you see something different in this moment, Dolly?