Light 'em up

[starcharter]

Characters: EVERYBODY
Date: sundown on November 29th to sunrise on November 30th
Location: A plaza in Earth
Situation: The population of Keeliai could use a little warmth. So Chekov set stuff on fire and invited everyone over.
Warnings/Rating: None, but please put something in your comment header if necessary.

On Wednesday, everyone received the following audio message (and text attachments in English and Russian) from (1) Pavel Chekov in their inboxes:

“Hello. I would like to invite you to a bonfire in Earth sector on Friday at sundown. Please feel free to bring friends.”


A plaza in Earth sector is buzzing with activity-- most of it from one young man. He spends the day lugging folding tables and pushing wheelbarrows of supplies into the plaza. As the day wears on, several entrepreneurial kedan set up stands. By sundown, the plaza is lit up with three large, roaring bonfires. Most of the ice and snow has melted away, leaving a few patches here and there in the furthest corners of the plaza. One patch a bit away from the fires is completely devoid of snow and ice-- it's a sort of dance floor or performance area. Some music is playing out of one of the upper windows of the buildings overlooking the plaza. It's varies from quick and frenzied to slow and soothing. Of course, anyone is welcome to claim the floor to perform a magic show or do a little singing of their own.

There's a hodgepodge of various folding tables set with the essentials: raw vegetables, the closest equivalent of marshmallows Chekov could find (next to the chocolate and graham cracker substitutes), and sausages. There are skewers and tongs lying around should anyone need them. He also brought a few jugs of water, which are refilled periodically. It's not much, but it's the best he could do with a limited budget and not a lot of time. The kedan have taken the opportunity to sell what Chekov couldn't bring-- hot beverages and food, blankets, scarves and gloves, and several other simple wares.

It's not a grand setup, but there are roaring bonfires, food, and good company.


(Posting this slightly early because of Thanksgiving chaos. Let me know if you have any questions)

Comments

[jondrette]

They know nothing, when they call Paris that. I have lived there near ten years, and never felt love.

[solo_patria]

Or they do not know EVERYTHING, at least. An ideal of the better parts of it, perhaps. They seem to have built upon the ideals since we were present in that world, but surely not the true meaning of such, you are correct. Not for everyone.

[jondrette]

They know of beautiful cakes and puffy gowns and the Sun King. [She slides her eyes shut.] How I should love to live in the world they imagine!

[solo_patria]

And a monstrosity of a tower they had built later.

[Yeah. Enjolras is not terribly impressed by what he's gleaned about THAT structure. It seems wrong to place such a construction into Paris, really.]

So many live in their fantasies. It is quite sad to think, really.

[jondrette]

Is it?

Fantasies let me live as long as I did.

[solo_patria]

That those who have the means to improve things for everyone would waste their time in keeping or maintaining such fantasies instead of seeing the people cared for and assured, yes.

There is little wrong in fantasies themselves, I suppose, so long as those with the means to truly help the world manage that as well.

[jondrette]

But the people here who were not there. [That made total sense. She takes a sip of her mulled wine.]

Did you have imagination as a child?

[solo_patria]

Then it worries me, past a certain age, if they maintain a fantasy and believe it as the full truth. A fantasy can do many things but it must not cover reality to the point it is ignored and others suffer.

[Had he had one, really? Enjolras considers a moment.]

In part, I suppose I did. I read a good deal of things. It was easy to see myself within those worlds for a while.

[jondrette]

[She looks at the ground, taking a few large sips of her wine. The mulled wine is strong, and she's thankful for it. Squaring her shoulders, she swallows.]

But you lost it. For there was nothing for you to believe otherwise. To protect yourself from.

[solo_patria]

I did, that is true enough.

[And Enjolras is nodding a little there.]

I was luckier than most in that regard, that I had nothing to worry me and did not need protection. Imagination itself is no wrong, I only...when it blinds people, it worries me. In your case, it protected and quite possibly kept you alive. But in the case of someone rich who uses it to escape the reality of the poor or suffering...that is where I must draw the line.

[jondrette]

Oh. Then I took offense where you meant none.

[solo_patria]

Indeed I did not mean it. Nor do I want to disparage entirely...perhaps another way to put this. A blind imagination that can hurt others is the problem, really. Not fantasies in and of themselves.

[jondrette]

Yes. That is far more apt, I find. But then imagination becomes denial and willful ignorance.

[solo_patria]

Yes so it does. It is simply...Well, we must be careful to inspire the imagination, I suppose. To the better purposes perhaps.

...After all. there was a time that I wished to be a pirate and we can well imagine how well hanging on to that would have been.

[jondrette]

Perhaps, perhaps.

[She laughs into her wine.] A pirate! With a peg-leg and a hook for a hand! You have the hair for a pirate. yet I fear you would be a Robin Hood of the high seas!

Your Amis would be your crew!

[solo_patria]

That WAS rather the way of it. [Enjolras's grin is sheepish there,at best.]

Stirring up treason and rebellion or...well, then, it was more in the way of not being forced into...whatever the dread task of the day was. Mostly my mother's ideas of clothing back then, I think. Pirates, after all, would not have had to wear such things. Or comb their hair.

[jondrette]

And now it becomes both. I must tell you it is a wonderful thing to own a comb and to use it so freely. [She can run her fingers through her hair!]

[solo_patria]

So it is. [As if Enjolras knows a damned thing about that, even today, by the looks of his hair. But still, in theory...]

It IS funny. Here, where one might well become a pirate, given where we are, I cannot say I've retained the desire.

[jondrette]

I could brush your hair for you. [She says, reaching out to touch his blond locks.] Such beautiful hair you have. I could plait it for you. To keep it out of your face.

But that would not make you a pirate. Though we are in luck, as you do not wish to be one any longer!

[solo_patria]

[It IS a bit unruly at the moment, held back simply with the barrette that the bit of stone Enjolras had found had turned into, and not the braid he usually tugs it into. The need to be severe with it had lessened for whatever reason today.

Still. Enjolras does not really appreciate having his hair touched like this. He's used to it enough, he supposes, because it did happen in Paris, mostly with women who he did not know well, and Eponine IS a friend now, but still. He IS flinching at that touch, even as he tries to act as if all is fine.]

Well, it should be well enough for now. A bit windy to bother. But ah...thank you, I suppose?

[Awkward.]

[jondrette]

[She withdraws.]

You do not like it.

[solo_patria]

I...

[Enjolras blinks a little, at that. Had he really made it so clear as all of that? He typically TRIED to make it something a bit more polite than that, even though she's obviously speaking the truth.]

...It is no bearing on you, of course. Or on many.

[jondrette]

No, no, of course it isn't.

[but there's a bitterness that makes her think it is personal.]

I shall let you be.

[solo_patria]

I...hardly.

Very few people...

[And he's sighing, and just shaking his head a bit.]

I AM sorry, if that is any help?

[jondrette]

Nothing to be sorry for. [She's just feeling particularly sensitive, and it's hard not to take such things personally.]