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[ it takes him a moment to do the math once he's back on the plane. the memories come flooding back, and with them the realization that it's been six months since he was here last. nothing much has happened back in his own reality, just the passage of time and the steady daily grind, but now that he's back here, it almost seems like nothing has changed at all.

except, of course, for the addition of the small dragon currently curled about his shoulders, her sharp eyes darting around to take in the whole of everything she can. ( and trying to pick out anything shiny that she might be able to pick up and claim for herself. ) a … "gift", so to speak, wrought from his closeness of one eithan paine that he's slowly getting used to – in the form of acclimating himself to finding paperclips and thumbtacks and pretty much anything shiny in his apartment all over the floor at any given time.

( thanks, eithan. where the hell are you so you can actually meet this little shit of a dragon. at least you only got cloves showing up for you on your end … )

he finds himself wandering around the beach, a familiar place that he remembers visiting one of the last times he was here. he ends up sitting in the sand as he brings out a cigarette, lights it, blows a couple of smoke rings that aednat perks up to nip at as they fade away. ]

Wonder if anything's changed while I was gone …?

[ well. there's water here, for one thing. something that he notices immediately, and subsequently wonders if it's a coincidence or or something has happened to bring it back. as far as he knows? there's never been anything here save for a stretch of sand.

huh. ]

… Okay, I wonder if anything else has changed while I was gone.

[ aednat chirps at him, her head tilted to the side, as if to say you expect me to know? come on, human … ]

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[It's been a while. Eithan had smoked the last of those cloves a while back, and when they stopped randomly appearing, he... wondered what that meant. It worried him, but with no leads to follow and no way of knowing, he couldn't really do anything but wonder if everything was okay. Not like he knows the finer workings of the Plane, maybe those have everything to do with it - or maybe nothing at all. It just means that Eithan has spent a little longer with each of his visits to the Plane - to look for him, wondering if he just happened to keep missing him or... something.

But... here he is. What a relief...!]

You missed everything goin' to shit at least once. But what else is new, right?

[Hey, Darren. Have a redhead with an unlit cigarette between his fingers, standing in the sand beside you, grinning.]

How long 's it been?

[ oh. hi.

he smiles up at the redhead, probably a little more pleased to see him than he has a right to – but they're friends, after all, and he can be glad to see a friend, right? ]

Sounds about right … dunno if I'm glad or sorry I missed it. Maybe I'll just have to make up for lost time.

[ meanwhile, the dragon on his shoulders is peering up at eithan with a small measure of interest. new human! do you have anything shiny? will you let her have it if you do? are you that kind of nice human? ]

Six months, or thereabout. Nothing's changed for me back home so it doesn't really matter. [ pause, and he takes a pull from his cigarette. ] How've you been?

[That smile just makes his light up a little bit more - he's incredibly happy to see him again, more than he probably even realizes himself. He plops down in the sands beside him and lights his own cigarette with a tiny flame in the palm of his hand.]

In this case? Be glad. [He shudders a bit.] It was like a kid's game gone really fuckin' wrong.

[He takes a drag from that cigarette, while he watches the dragon on his friend's shoulders. He wonders for a moment if he has any coins in his pocket - dragons like coins, right? Especially the newer ones?]

Six months... [He gives a low whistle.] Could you like... not come here, or somethin'? [It's not accusatory at all, he's legit curious - he's never heart of anyone who's left for so long and then come back again.

And let's not focus on him just yet!] Aaand is that lizard on your shoulder why you were readin' about dragons in the library a while back?

[ it's good to know that he still has a friend that he can find in this place. if he'd suddenly been able to come back here again, and eithan hadn't been anywhere around, well … he might not have bothered coming back at all, whether he had the ability or not.

anyway. moving right on past that. ] Well now I kinda wanna know. You'll have to catch me up one of these days.

[ on his shoulders, aednat perks up a little bit more once the redhead is settled next to them, craning her neck and making a series of little chirps in his general direction. who are you? what can you give me? don't you dare be holding out on the shiny things, mister!

darren sighs, though it comes out sounding a bit like a tired laugh. ] Nah, I couldn't. But I completely forgot about the Plane during all that time, so I didn't realize that I was missing something. And then … suddenly I could come back. [ and then he remembered everything, too.

he shrugs, and now his attention is turned back to aednat, and he's grinning a bit sheepishly. ] Yep. Thought I'd bring her with me, just on the off-chance I came back to a destroyed apartment if I didn't. Her name's Aednat.

[ as if on cue, the little thing chirps a bit more loudly. yep! that's me! now seriously where's the shiny stuff? ]

[Maybe one day, Eithan'll get that he can actually be that significant in the eyes of others. Until then... he'll just continue to be floored if any thoughts like that manage to reach him.]

Heh. Anytime, man. We've got all the time in the world here, after all. Right?

[He pauses. If he forgot, but now he's back...] Wow. ... Shit. So your memories just kinda all came back at once? [... "Includin' findin' me dead?" But he doesn't let that show on his face.]

Aednat... [Eithan watches her closely, grinning... He takes another drag before reaching into the inside of his coat, and he removes a bronze-colored coin, roughly the size of a bottlecap. He holds it up for her, turns it over a few times before holding it out for her to take, if she actually wants it.] She's pretty. I can definitely see her tearin' a place apart, though. [He laughs a little.] Man... makes me want one, though! I bet we'd get in all kinds of trouble...

[ well, you just wait and see. one of these days, he might just manage to convince you that you're important to someone. ( even if he never gets around to telling you how important you are to him. )

he smiles as he takes another pull from his cigarette and flicks the ashes into the sand. ] Guess we do, huh?

[ he pauses a bit of his own at that, because they're still kind of coming back to him, and –

finding him dead.

all of a sudden it's clear as day in the forefront of his mind, how he'd felt at that first sight of him there, and if he takes a second to answer, it's only because he's trying to make sure his voice doesn't shake when he opens his mouth. ] Yeah, kinda like a blur. All at once. It's a little disorienting. I'll probably end up with a headache.

[ and you're okay, now, aren't you?

his attention is taken away from the flood of memories coming back to him when eithan takes out the coin and aednat perks up something fierce, the dragon version of a meerkat as she cranes her neck even further in the redhead's direction. she offers up a couple of cursory chirps before she gingerly takes the coin from his fingers and snakes down from darren's shoulders to huddle in the nearby sand, picking at its edges and nosing at it as though it's the most wonderful thing she's ever seen.

and darren just laughs. ] You don't need any more reasons to get into trouble, from what I remember. [ he's smiling again, though it's a bit softer than before. ] F'you got one, though, we could let them roam around together. She could use some company that isn't me, I think. I frustrate her sometimes.

[ only because he teases her with thumbtacks and doesn't let her have them right away when she tries to nip them from his fingers.

darren, you're awful. ] Maybe she'd stop unrolling the aluminum foil all over my apartment …

[A slight fog starts to set in, through which Loki emerges onto the beach. He vaguely remembers this human from his quiet observations of the people here, but the dragon is surprising. Reminds him of the young warrior with a much larger dragon named Toothless.

It briefly bothers him to remember. Many of the people he's met and spoken with haven't returned in some time. He even misses the company of a few (not that he'll ever admit it openly.) If this were any other place, Loki would blame them for their own disappearances--but he knows better. ~~So he only puts part of the blame on them. After all, they must have done something to deserve to be sent back to their own realms to stay~~.]

What a beautiful creature you have there, my young friend. Is he from your realm, or perhaps, a native of this one?

Just a headache? That might be the lucky way out, man.

[Yeah. He's okay now. He's pretty sure.

He watches her take the coin, grins at her reaction and shakes his head as she begins her poking, prodding and investigating. He has a feeling he's never gonna see that coin again, at this rate. Ah well, consider it a present from technically your home-world, Aednat.]

I dunno what you're talkin' about. [This is his innocent face. His very srs innocent face. Look at how innocent he is. ... ... Yeah that lasts about three seconds before he's grinning like the demon he is.] No, you're right. I set enough shit on fire on my own, I don't need a dragon's help, fun as that would be. Besides, pretty sure Valerie wouldn't agree to it. Especially if it rolled aluminum foil everywhere. [snicker!] How'd she even get into that, huh?

[A pause, as he pulls on his cigarette again, and considers...] Bet Fang would get along with a dragon, though. ... Huh. That's somethin' to think about.

Maybe. We'll see how bad it gets.

[ well. as long as he's pretty sure. darren doesn't need to go through that whole freakout all over again – despite the sting of pain it brings to the middle of his chest when he thinks about it. he wonders, vaguely, what it would have been like to have retained these memories during the time that he hadn't been able to come to the plane. how much more it would have hurt, not knowing for sure if eithan really was okay.

ugh … best not to think about it. it seems like he's just setting himself up for something to hurt more than it should.

and yeahno, you're definitely not getting that coin back. anything willingly given to this little firecracker is lost to the void – also known as her nest of shiny things. he knows full well that she'll keep tabs on that thing until they get back to his apartment, and then she'll slink off to place it in the perfect spot.

and then she'll curl up in said nest of shiny things and glare at him if he tries to come near it.

he rolls his eyes at that comment, not even taking that offered expression of innocence at face-value – har – as he flicks more ash onto the sand. the name he gives is unfamiliar, and thus piques his interest. which means he's going to have to ask about it. ] Valerie? You've never mentioned her before. What, does she have a thing against dragons?

[ another pause, and he briefly looks over at aednat and her coin. ] Always nice to have someone to bother. [ it's offered absently, kind of as an afterthought. ] She has to get bored while I'm at work, and I'm thinking that might be why she trashes the place. She's … ennhhh. Adventurous. Any place she thinks she can fit into, she'll try. Which means the cabinet with the foil.

[ headshake … ]

[It's probably a good thing Eithan doesn't have ready access to her nest of shiny things, because he'd probably move things around, just to agitate her. He does the same thing to the bones and toys that Fang hides inside or buries in the garden, after all. It's just fun to watch him try and track it back down, puzzled all the while.

He always gives them back, though. Just because it makes him so happy. He'd do that for Aednat, too.

He blinks, surprised to find that he really hasn't mentioned Val to him before. Used to be he all but gushed about the woman whenever he thought about her.]

I haven't? Weird... Yeah, Valerie's my fiancee.

[He smiles, but while it's certainly sincere, it looks more like he's speaking of a memory instead of something real. It's been a while since he's even been able to slow down enough to really think about, well... them. As a couple. And there's some intuitive part of him that's telling him something about that is amiss right now... but he doesn't understand, and isn't even really consiously aware of it. And he doesn't think he wants to figure it out right this second, so! He moves on. Or at least, he'll try to.]

And it's not that she's got a thing against dragons, she's just... not much of an animal person at all. [Snort!] I think maybe she's had a pet fish. Maybe. And someone in her family might be really into plants? [shrug!] But nah, no animals.

[He nods at the explanation of the foil-unfurling... snickers and shakes his head too.] Destructively bored, huh? Hmmm... Can you think of anything shiny that can like... perpetually move around the place? See if that keeps her busy?

[ ~~loki why you gotta creep around on all this fog … oh wait. you're a creeper. noted!~~

he's never met loki – not before, when he'd had little interaction with anyone that wasn't eithan – and the sound of his voice before he realizes there's someone else there with him catches him off-guard. he starts slightly, which has aednat picking her head up to peer over one of his shoulders at the man as he approaches, chirping a contemplative sort of sound.

darren blinks, and taps some ash into the sand. ]

We definitely don't have these where I'm from. She's Eithan's fault. [ an exclamation that draws a curious stare from his dragon, as though she'd understood everything he'd said. beg your pardon, human, but i'm no one's fault. something like that. ] Might want to hide anything shiny you have before she finds it, and you never see it again.

[ eithan … you're mean. you're not allowed anywhere near her nest of shiny things if you ever make a trip to his reality. not because he doesn't necessarily want her to be upset – but messing with her nest of shiny things will have her in such a right state that she won't settle down until she's torn the whole of his apartment asunder, and if she does? you're cleaning it up.

so. unless you want to do any of that …

and. oh. so you've got a fiancee, huh? ( one would think the fact that you haven't mentioned her before now would tell you something, but that's none of his business, so he's just going to avert his gaze for a tiny moment as he takes another drag from his cigarette, holds the smoke in a little longer than he normally would. ] Fiancee … man. [ he shakes his head a little bit incredulously. ] Congrats, then, I guess? I can't even imagine having one of those at my age. Or at all, really, I guess.

[ honey, don't ramble. because you're about to start.

and he's moving right along with the other half of the conversation, because somehow, focusing on this ridiculous dragon keeps his mind off of the strange twinge in the middle of his chest that he would really, really rather not think about. ]

I bet I could think of something if I really put my mind to it. I've tried giving her balled-up bits of the stuff, but she loses them under the fridge. [ sigh, dragon. ]

Edited (H T M L SDFLKHG) 2014-05-03 01:51 (UTC)

[No, no. He'll behave himself. Sheesh. No need to get so worked up...

He's distracted, for a moment. Seems like all he can do while he tries to keep his own thoughts from getting too convoluted too quickly is to stare at the end of his cigarette, watch the tiny trail of smoke rise from it as it slowly burns. But he does smile appropriately at Darren's answer, nods once.]

Heh, thanks. [He shrugs.] And... yeah. I guess it's pretty young, for somethin' not arranged. That's what everyone's been tellin' me, anyway. [He snickers.] But with the way shit's happenin', I... I dunno. I thought it'd be right to propose.

[Because there's still that very large part of him that thinks he's not coming out of this alive. So he should make her happy while he can, right?

... And that got really heavy, really fast, so he tries to shove it out of mind. Honestly, if it had been anyone other than Darren, he probably wouldn't have even let that much slip in the first place. He pulls on the end of his cigarette - harshly, even, and longer than usual. He expels it all at once, and then it's his turn to latch onto the drift in topics, thank you!]

Ooh - here's an idea. [He manages half of a lopsided grin, with a hint of that typical mishievousness.] Put a ball of foil on a string, hang it from a door or somethin'. Surely that can't get her in too much trouble, right?

[ he just has a really, really fussy dragon. apparently. ( thanks for that, by the way. has he thanked you for that, yet? )

he stares at the end of his own cigarette a bit longer, ultimately casts a sidelong glance in the redhead's direction. you don't really tend to hear about proposing being the right thing to do unless there's something else going on behind it, but he figures that it really isn't any of his business – and thus doesn't pursue that train of thought for very long. ] If it's what you wanna do, why not, right?

[ there's that twinge in the middle of his chest again. nngh. he'd really like for it to stop, and while he doesn't want to think about the implication its presence brings, it only serves to make it all the more prominent.

which means he is going to very discreetly ignore any further comments on the subject. he's happy for him, he really is – because friends are happy for other friends when things like this get mentioned, aren't they? it's just … the right thing to be.

he finishes his cigarette, flicks it away into the sand and leans back on his elbows, eyes scanning the surface of the water beyond their stretch of beach. it's still odd that it's there … but it looks peaceful enough. aednat is still occupied with her coin, oblivious to anything and everything else around her, which means she'll remain pleasantly placated until further notice. ]

Now there's an idea – I'll try that when we go back home. Maybe the next time I come home from work I won't have such a mess to clean up. [ he manages a half-smile of his own. ] It's worth a shot, anyway.

[Loki looks down at the gold accents on his outfit, as well as the crescent set upon his chest.] She will have a very difficult time getting anything from my person. Everything is secured quite well, but should it put your mind at ease, I will change my clothing.

[But as he doesn't truly feel like doing that, he instead conjures a shiny thing in the distance (that's conveniently closer to the water) that glints and shimmer quite spectacularly. The star light must have hit it just right...] I gather you are from...Midgard? [He closes his eyes and holds a hand up.] My apologies, I mean "Earth." I am still unused to using that name.

[ he just shakes his head at that. ] If you're sure nothing'll go anywhere, then don't bother. She'll just get huffy and give up, eventually. [ meanwhile, aforementioned dragon is still peering with visible interest in those gold accents, though she doesn't make any move to try anything with them.

good girl, aednat. don't do anything to unintentionally upset the asgardian.

though when he summons that shiny thing, her head snaps up and her eyes are immediately trained in its direction, though she still makes no move toward it. something that puts him at ease, because while he still doesn't know why the water has miraculously appeared, considering this place, he isn't entirely sure he trusts it. still, she's staring and staring, and shifting rather anxiously on his shoulder. ] I am, yeah. Cambridge, Massachusetts more specifically. [ a beat, and his dragon tries to make a break for the shiny thing, but he manages to keep her in place for the moment. ]

Somethin' tells me you're not. If you're calling it Midgard … [ wait a second. ]

… Sorry, but what's your name?

[He smiles, but thinks that he will not give the dragon much of a chance if it tries. So it's a good thing he's already working on a distraction... A second shiny thing appears right near the first one, twinkling rather fiercely.]

Indeed, I am not. I am Loki of Asgard. [He continues to wear a pleasant expression as he bows slightly, all the while not breaking eye contact with the young human.] What shall I call your pet and yourself?

[ aednat makes a tiny little dragon-noise that he's sure would equate to there's a thing and i want it!! when that second sparkly thing appears, and she edges closer to the curved end of his shoulder, ready to take off in its direction at the drop of a hat. darren peers at her out of the corner of his eye, golden eyes narrowed as though to convey to her please don't go anywhere.

and she still listens, for the moment. even if she does give a small huff that emerges in the form of a puff of smoke directed at the back of his ear.

… loki. as in – ] The god Loki? [ well. he's sure stranger things have happened in this place, so you know what? he's just going to roll with it. ] She's Aednat, I'm Darren. I didn't have her the first time I started coming here … I kind of owe that to a friend. [ thanks, eithan. ] We don't have dragons where I'm from.

[The two shiny things start to move now, closer and closer to the water's edge. Simply twinkling isn't enough to draw the dragon away, it seems.]

[Loki smiles warmly, then inclines his head.] At your service, young Darren. I gather you found your creature here thanks to the Plane of Astral? They do not exist in my version of Midgard.

[ with the shinies beginning to move about as they are, they draw aednat's attention infinitely closer – and subsequently further away from the fact that darren wants to keep her right where she is. she fidgets for a moment at his shoulder, and in a sudden rush of movement clambers down from her perch and makes her way toward the water's edge.

darren keeps her in his peripheral vision, still wary of the water that hadn't been there previously, but doesn't make a move to retrieve her just yet.

to the question, he answers rather distractedly – ] Yeah. She's technically from Eithan's reality. Showed up in my apartment one day acting like she owned the place.

[Loki catches this movement out of the corner of his eye but says and does nothing. Into the water the shinies slowly go but they do not awaken the beast in the water.]

Ah yes. Something similar occurred in my private chambers. A..."vidscreen", I believe the instructions said its name was, was hung upon my chamber wall. The device is noisy when it's on.

[But it has been interesting. The sport of Grifball has fascinated him.]

[ that beast had better not wake up and try to eat his dragon. he's going to be pretty upset if it does.

not that he knows about the beast in the water. he just knows that water hadn't been there before and is, as a result, a source of great speculation for him right now.

he does find it in him to laugh at that, though. ] Oh, like a TV? We've got those … not that I watch much of anything on it.

[ he'd probably be interested by grifball, though. who knows. ]

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why do you have to use that face on me constantly slkhg

Because~ (But really, I haven't bought him an account so he's stuck with these >.> )

pff, same reason darren is stuck with the ones he is. le sigh.

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