[OPEN] The Joy of Painting

[backwordscompatible]

Characters: Zatanna Zatara | Midii Une | Aya + OPEN
Date: mid-october
Location: Earth Sector
Situation: Pottery Painting!
Warnings/Rating: things might get a little messy....


ZATANNA

[The 19-year-old Mistress of Magic...was not much of an artist. Although, in her defense, she had never claimed to be. Performance was quite different from paintbrushes, and while her sleight of hand was superb, well...]

[Still, she managed about as well as anyone who's last art project involved allowing a former boyfriend to smear her in body paint so she would turn visible again (long story): after about a half hour, she came away with a few simple, yet seasonally appropriate designs on the bowls she's gathered.]

[She also looked quite proud of herself as she held up one of them.]

Maybe I should use these when I decorate the Welcome Center.


MIDII

[A month shy of her 16th birthday, and Midii had already found herself a present. A teapot. Simple, personal, and something she knew she would get a lot of use out of.]

[It was said the custom was meant to be a social event, and yet she still sat a bit aways from the rest of the group. Several small cups of paint scattered around her. A few drops of every color, in fact, and a small, thin brush she'd used to paint dozens of little hearts all over its surface.]

[One for each friend or otherwise familiar face she'd lost. Not just in Keelai, but...before.]

I wonder...if I should make any cups to match.


AYA

[For her contribution for this most interesting cultural tradition, Aya painted...a green turtle. Because of course she did. She was dressed no differently than ever, unaffected by the cooling temperatures, with the only subtle alteration in her appearance being a...small streak of green on the side of her helmet. Darker than the shade of her construct skin.]

I do hope I have completed the process accurately.

While I have knitted articles of clothing before, I have seldom done anything of this nature in the past.

Comments

Midii?

[ruinsprofessor]

[Raine isn't really attending the group, so to speak; but she comes home this way when she walks, and the colors and the activity draw her attention. She lingers by the groups of people near Midii for a little while, curious, before finally spotting the girl she's familiar with and coming over to say hello.]

If you drink tea, you'd use the cups, wouldn't you?

[She's assuming here that Midii wouldn't paint a teapot she didn't have a use for.]

[A smile.]

Hello, Midii. It's been a little while.

[unetrustworthy]

[She recognized Raine almost immediately. Though it had been a while, the older girls' impression had made a lasting effect in her mind. The healing. Midii had spent years being wary of magic, but there was something about Raine's gift that had been...comforting. Sort of.]

[Which was why she offered a genuine smile in return.]

Hello. It has.

[And then, returning to the tea pot...]

I have a cup at home I use. It's not decorated, but it is large enough. And...I don't know if I can recreate the pattern I made here.

[ruinsprofessor]

How have you been?

[Since she's apparently more or less welcome, Raine takes a seat near Midii, looking at the painted teapot a bit more closely.]

It can be nice to have a variety of teacups, and you have the opportunity. If you're not sure you can recreate the pattern exactly, why not something that coordinates rather than matching precisely?

[unetrustworthy]

I've been alright.

[A vague answer, yes, but Raine's question had been pretty vague too. The kind that Midii normally heard from the local shop owners whenever she reported for work; in those instances, simple replies were best so they could get to the point faster.]

How would I coordinate something if it's not the same pattern, though?

[She had a couple ideas of her own, but creativity had never been her strong suit...and she wanted to hear Raine's idea(s).]

Zatanna

[commandandcontrol]

Zatanna! You're still here too!

[ Sonja had seen Sheena's announcement on the console, and decided to drop by the earth to see how things were going.

She wasn't blown away by Zatanna's art skills but they were still very cute.]

Festive!

Zatanna

[backwordscompatible]

Uh...yes?

[She offered a half smile at the compliment, pleased with her own work. But her ego was momentarily overshadowed by confusion. As to...who this person was and how they recognized her. Somebody who'd come into the Welcome Center a while back? She did encounter a lot of faces after all...]

[commandandcontrol]

[ Oh, wow, okay so she just totally didn't remember her.

That was simultaneously like... relieving, because she made a terrible impression last time.

And also cripplingly terrible because wow she forgot even after that terrible impression? Like what would she have had to do, exactly? Was she so unremarkable, she was almost offended. ]

Um, hi. Hello.

I'm Sonja.

[ To be fair, she was a few years older now... ]

[backwordscompatible]

[Sonja...]

[With that, her eyes went wide.]

Wait, you're--?

[Surprise melted away into sheepishness, shoulders slumping.]

Sorry. It's...been a while. [About a year, by her calendar. Quite possibly...more, by Sonja's, if she was remembering the same girl.] When did you get back?

Zatanna

[purrns]

[Adrien has spent plenty of time here already, painting pots, helping the locals. But he's also aware that he should do a little as Chat, too. After all, a hero has to have a good public face, and if he can make them think they're getting even more footfall, all the better. Help the people, and so on.

His own contributions could be called 'if Picasso was having some kind of seizure', but it's the thought that counts, right? He has flecks of paint all over his outfit (he hopes it comes off later, or Plagg would never let him hear the end of it) but he looks proud about his monstrosity all the same. ]

Ooooooh spooky~ You going all out with the decorations?

[backwordscompatible]

I usually do.

[It didn't surprise her in the least to encounter Chat. Or his...ode to surrealistic pottery, with evidence of added flourish to his uniform.]

Halloween's one of my favorite holidays, witch jokes aside. And before you start--yes, I've heard them all, and yes...I've dressed up as one before.

[purrns]

[HE IS AN ARTIST.

(He really isn't) ]

Awww, just go and rip all the witch puns from my claws before I can use a single one. So cruel.

But hey, if you're gonna own a thing, you might as well really own it.

[backwordscompatible]

Says the guy wearing cat ears.

[Not that she was judging. She was SO not from a world where she could judge something like that.]

Midii - gonna hit both of them try to stop me

[purrns]

[Adrien's spent a lot of his free time here, wanting to aid the natives as much as he can. He's not the best artist in the world, but he's trying. He's at least a little more delicate at is as Adrien than as Chat.

It's still kind of hard to see what it is. It's red with black spots, though. ]

Those look pretty awesome, Midii. You could make a really nice set out of them.

hdu

[unetrustworthy]

[The harder it was to see, the more curious Midii was. Enough that, for a brief time, the black-spotted red object actually held her attention more than Adrien himself.]

[Until she remembered that he was talking to her.]

Hmm? [Oh. Right. A compliment.] ...thank you.

I wasn't even thinking of that at the time. I just...wanted to try painting something. And hearts are an easy shape to make.

[It was the truth. Not the whole truth, but the less sentimental part of her decisions.]

can't stop won't stop

[purrns]

They are.

Hey, if you make a lot of them, you could always sell them on valentines day, I bet plenty of people would get them as a gift for someone they loved.

[He would absolutely get Marinette one. ]

[unetrustworthy]

I don't celebrate Valentine's Day.

[...although, if it weren't for that, she would have been forced to admit he had a pretty good idea. So good that there would be other shops around the city with the same idea.]

Midii

[isochrone]

[ Elizabeth is definitely in her element here. The whole social ceramics thing might be new (really, the whole social anything for her was new) but painting, on the other hand, was something she was quite good at. Still life became easy, when you couldn't leave the set of rooms you'd known for your entire life.

So she's carrying a half-finished vase with birds and flowers on it, and settles down in Midii's proximity and overhears the last part. ]

Oh, yours is very cute! You should definitely make cups to match it.

[unetrustworthy]

[Midii glanced up and saw a face she did not immediately recognize. Still...the young woman approached with a compliment and...very interesting piece of artwork all her own. One that Midii could not help admire.]

Thank you.

Yours is...amazing. Did you paint those all yourself?

[isochrone]

I did, yes.

[ Elizabeth is hardly used to having her things praised, and blushes a little. ]

Thank you. Yes, I did... still life is a hobby of mine.

[ Basically everything was a hobby of hers. ]

Aya?

[denyamenti]

[ Bakura is returning one of the painted objects that he and Pepper had done the day before, waiting his turn to bring the pot back to the shop where it was to be completed. Seeing the turtle Aya had finished, and also the streak of green paint, he held out one of the (relatively) clean clothes that were scattered around for cleaning up messes. ]

I don't think it's possible to do it wrong, unless you broke it.

[looksfine]

[First things first. Aya accepted the offered cloth, using it to wipe away residual unnecessary splotches of paint.]

Thank you.

[There wasn't much, but Aya did locate a few spots on her arm, where she inadvertently brushed against wet paint.]

While you are correct that the composition of these objects are comprised of highly delicate materials, susceptible to cracking if mishandled or struck with a measurable force...I was very careful. [That said...] Have you painted any clay items yet?

[denyamenti]

[ Bakura doesn't look impressed by the highly formal type of speech, but... she is a robot. He wondered, briefly, whether she and Kaiba had ever met when Kaiba was on the turtle, and if the CEO had insulted her by claiming his own inventions would have been superior.

He held up a mug with a geometric-like pattern in response to her question. ]

Returning it to be finished off.

Zatanna

[lasergrenades]

[Pepper is spending what seems to be as much free time as possible painting a variety of ceramics, although she doesn't keep most of them. A few are meant to be gifts, and the rest are just fun. When she spots Zatanna, she of course goes to say hello, sporting a grin.]

Ooh, nice. Very spooky. Might have to explain what Halloween is to the kedan, though, or you might get some weird looks, [she teased.] Definitely good for the Welcome Center, though. I hope you're planning on filling them with candy.

[backwordscompatible]

[Zatanna sent the girl a Look, as if the answer should have been the most obvious.]

What else do you fill them with? [She chuckled, putting her artwork back down so they all lined up in a row.] ...then again, maybe not all of them. The more candy that ends up getting leftover, the more I'll end up eating myself. And that would be a problem.

[lasergrenades]

[Pepper laughed in turn, sitting on the bench next to Zatanna.]

You can always give it to Tony; his metabolism is super amped-up and will probably never come down. Lucky him, huh? I don't suppose you've found anything like candy corn in Keeliai,

[Zatanna has been here a while, so Pepper was guessing she'd probably know or have some idea.]