abraxaslogs | [ open ] HAPPY BIRTHDAY AMERICA (not you abraxas)

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[ open ] HAPPY BIRTHDAY AMERICA (not you abraxas)

Who: Julie + Dean + open
When: July 4
Where: Julie's club in the Horizon
What: June sucked, it's time to party patriotically 🇺🇸 Dean's invite here 🇺🇸 no, the Americans don't care that it's not America, they're doing it anyway (just like real life)

[ Approaching Julie's club on this particular day, you can tell from the outside that something is going on. The pink neon has been swapped for red, white and blue, the pink carpet and velvet ropes changed to the good ol' stars and stripes. The front doors are wreathed in an enormous and very patriotic balloon arch, and they're wide open. American flags hang across the walls of the entranceway, and the music is what most Americans would recognize as July 4th standards.

Inside, Julie has obviously been incredibly hard at work, and the club has undergone its most massive changes to date. The entire first floor has been modified -- where there was once a dance floor and seating, there is now an Olympic-sized in-ground pool, dotted with a variety of American themed floats and balls. The glittering quartz flooring is all gone, now replaced with lush lawn grass, and sensible concrete wrapped around the pool itself. At one end, a truly enormous inflatable water slide can send you flying down from fifty feet in the air, just to land with a splash in the water.

How has she managed that height? Well, where there's ordinarily a roof, there is now only open sky, blue and picturesque with puffy white clouds lazily floating by. The sun is bright but never too hot, and incapable of burning anyone's skin. The only thing between the sky and the building are dozens of red, white and blue decorations, strung from the balconies to overhang the pool.

Don't worry if you weren't exactly prepared for a pool party! Julie, queen of not only parties but also wardrobes, has helpfully converted the warehouse part of the building for this very problem. Racks and racks of bathing suits and beach towels are available for use, with every conceivable style up for grabs. Trunks, one-pieces, string bikinis, banana hammocks, she's got it all! While many match the red, white and blue theme, all types of colors and patterns are present. Grab a towel from a stack, hop in one of the striped changing cabanas, then get to swimming. Don't forget your red, white or blue flip-flops and sunglasses!

Hungry? Well, Dean has you covered. On the lawn, Julie has provided him with a wet dream-inducing grill and every imaginable kind of meat to cook on it. Also in this section are tables and tables full of snacks, desserts and drinks, along with the full bar that is always present. The bartender, Steven, is always ready to make anything you could want. (He is dressed in what is best described as "Sexy Uncle Sam" -- in that it's a star-spangled wrestling singlet, a glittery red white and blue bow tie, an Uncle Sam hat and a small, fake white beard.) Plenty of picnic tables are present to eat at.

As the afternoon passes, the sky will gradually darken until it's black and clear, with a wide expanse of stars, the way Julie remembers seeing night from the empty prairies of Kansas. Between Dean and Julie, there is no shortage of fireworks; as proud Americans raised in places where there's little else to do, they are experts at blowing shit up in creative ways. The tables disappear and are replaced with blankets on the grass, meant to be laid on and shared. An incredible fireworks show rounds the night out, and only once the sky is calm again are people expected to leave.

Or pass out. Getting completely wasted is also an Independence Day tradition. ]

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[ Geralt rests his arms on the railing beside her. The light show is loud to him, but it bothers him less in the Horizon than it would in the real world. His ears don't ring in here. Jaskier was right: it is a hell of a display. Pretty. There's something at once simple and captivating about colours bursting in the sky. ]

Mm. [ He sounds equally contemplative. Is he enjoying the night? He is. As much as he favours his solitude, he can't deny familiar company. That's what many of the Summoned are to him now. Familiar company. Friends. It doesn't change what happened, but maybe it makes things a little more bearable. What else is there to do except continue with their lives?

Besides, the strange interlinking of their dreams may have passed, but it isn't as though the images that haunted him long before the Singularity interfered are replaced by green fields and warm sunlight. He still has the same nightmares. They're just no longer interrupted by another presence.

And he needn't worry about waking up dying. (For now.) Which is nice. He prefers not to have spontaneous holes form in his body while asleep. It's disruptive. ]

In the Blue Mountains back home, the night sky would light up in colour. [ He used to sit and watch as a boy. ] But it wasn't like this.

[ She's not sure that any of them have stopped having the nightmares; she sure hasn't. It's just that now, she doesn't feel them chasing her into the waking world, marking her, following her. The only option they have is to shove it down and keep carrying on.

Julie thinks about this for a moment, what he saw, then her face breaks into a wide smile. She remembers pictures and videos online. Another thing she would never get the chance to see in real life, not that it was really a goal of hers. It still would have meant something to her. ]

Polar lights. We had 'em too. People would spend their whole lives savin' money for a trip to see 'em. The best places to watch were isolated and far from where most folks actually lived. [ There's so little that their worlds share, it feels nice to have something. ] In my world, there's so much manmade light that most people can't see many stars. But where I'm from, we were so far from the cities that we could just go out in the fields or on the prairie to see the Milky Way. Like lookin' into space itself.

[ Their whole lives? Geralt glances over, curious. It's never occurred to him that there are places far away where the lights can't be seen without extensive travel. The view is brightest up in the mountains, but his entire continent sits north. Even those at its southernmost end needn't go far to glimpse what Julie calls the polar lights.

Manmade lights drowning out the stars, though. He's glimpsed these vast cities in dreams and memories, but the images still feel distant. Like looking at a painting. The more he learns, the clearer it becomes that Julie's experience growing up with horses and open fields under the stars is not common in her world. Strange to realize when it's so typical in his. ]

Can't imagine living without ever seeing the stars. [ How would you even navigate at night? Solely by compass and map? ] They were the first things we learned to travel by.

[ Based on the time they looked at a globe together, he should be aware that Julie's world seemed to simply contain way more land than his, and Julie herself from a country so vast that she had never seen the ocean before Abraxas. She assumed that it would be harder to see stars even in the Continent's larger cities than atop a mountain or deep in the forest, but then again, maybe she's wrong.

She leans against his shoulder slightly, to twist herself into a better position to look directly up. With a thought, what's left of the fireworks clears from view, though she's isolating this to within the bubble. The sky this reveals is dark, black mottled with purple and the bright, fluid ribbon of the Milky Way. ]

Us too. If you're somewhere dark and clear enough, you can still do it. The north star is the brightest star in the sky. You just need to know which constellations you need to follow. [ Julie herself really only knows how to find the north star, but she'd known plenty of people who could navigate based on the sky. Boy Scout, 4H shit. ] In my time, we have satellites in space, these big computers, basically. They orbit the earth and can communicate with our computers on the ground, to tell us exactly where we are and where to go.

[ What appears above is familiar to him—more than what's in Abraxas' sky. Last thing he ever expected was a need to learn another world's constellations. Then the Singularity pulled him through.

He does not know what a satellite is nor a computer. Julie gets a thoughtful, if utterly bemused, Huh as he peers up at the sky. Dean had, in fact, shown him something of the sort once—a map on his phone—but Geralt does not yet connect this to what she's telling him.

Still. The implications are interesting: that they share the same stars. For him, that says more than sharing the same animals and flowers. ]

I went to space once. Through someone's memories. [ It'd been unique. Extremely fucking bright. Geralt can't say he enjoyed much about it apart from the view, but he'll never be comfortable in a place so devoid of...life. Filled at best with artifices. Those carefully shaped and planted trees, each one identical with not a twig out of place—off-putting as all hell. ] Not sure I'd do it again.

Edited 2022-07-18 16:52 (UTC)

[ She doesn't make an effort to further explain satellites or computers. Theoretically, she could probably make some semblance of a functioning GPS within the Horizon, but that also seems like a lot of unnecessary work for someone who apparently can't even get lost here. She has no need for GPS or maps at all, not here. And even if she did, it really wouldn't be worth the trouble of trying to explain it to a man who thinks rubber erasers are a revelation.

The thought of Geralt in a space environment makes her chuckle, because somehow it's the only setting she can think of even more inappropriate for him than the modern domains. At least in her club or Dean's bar, a black shirt and pants looks more or less normal. But her perception of space living is significantly more futuristic in style. She assumes that he was not provided with a metallic jumpsuit. ]

You've been to space more'n me, then. More'n most people from my world. In our time, space livin' is just a pipe dream. There's a handful of astronauts -- that's like, space explorers, kinda? -- but even they don't live up there forever. Maybe a few months at most. But we haven't even been able to send people further away than the moon yet.

[ Geralt is absolutely content taking these modern creations at face value. He doesn't need to know what powers the motorbike that Nadine showed him. The thing moves somehow, and he can accept that.

He tilts his head, studying the sky. Slowly, it begins to shift. A colourful array of greens and purples shimmers in a gentle ripple across it. It isn't real, but it's as close as one comes. He's watched the auroras all his life. ]

It's only a theory in ours. [ Academics exploring how it may be possible to leave the world without using a gateway. Find any spheres which may remain. He understands now they all still remain—that they were never swallowed up by the Conjunction, that someone of Elder Blood can open the path—but he's one of a small handful who knows. ] Without portals as an option, some believe we can cross the expanse between worlds using just...a transport.

[ Sounds as if a few other worlds have accomplished exactly that. It's curious knowing that somewhere else, they actually did it. ]

What did they find on the moon? [ Probably nothing of note, he presumes, or Julie would have mentioned it. His expression turns amused. ] Not a man with his thornbush?

[ The aurora appears and Julie goes quiet for a moment, watching it. It's something that's somehow both new and familiar at the same time, after so many years of seeing pictures and footage. But at the same time, she's never seen anything like it, not for real, and she can only gaze in amazement for that beat. Her head falls against his shoulder, her attention split. ]

We've only been able to do it for about sixty years. It took hundreds of years and all kinda technology before we could make it happen. Even in my time, it was still a really big deal. [ She chuckles a little, trying to imagine how the world would have developed with magic and portals. ] Sometimes I think it's good that my world didn't have magic. It forced us to invent stuff, push boundaries. If people could portal, we never woulda come up with all the transportation that lead to rocket ships. When things ain't broken, you don't try to improve 'em.

[ But his question makes her snort. ] No man, human or little and green. No cheese. Nothin' but rocks. The moon is just a big ol' empty chunk of rock up there, caught in the Earth's orbit. I think it used to have volcanoes and lakes, like billions of years ago, but it's all dead now.

[ As her head lands on his shoulder, he tilts up to watch, too. Doesn't matter if he's seen it hundreds of times. There aren't a lot of things he just gets to sit and enjoy. He shifts his weight so she can rest more comfortably against him. ] Mm. Different paths.

[ Curious to consider. If Chaos hadn't landed on the Continent, if the elves hadn't passed down their knowledge, where would they be? Perhaps about the same, with an alternate way of doing things. People have always adapted to what they're given. And they always strive for the same ambitions.

Cheese draws a faint smile out of him. Her people, too? He supposes it's an obvious joke, given the appearance of the moon. Green people is a more baffling concept that he decides not to ask after right now. (Why would they be green?)

Speaking of transport. Spaceships are a bit much for him, but: ] I did enjoy the motorbike Nadine showed me.

[ Her arm absently winds around his as she watches the lights in the sky. They're more hypnotic than fireworks could ever hope for, silent and serpentine instead of loud and produced. It's not that she thinks magic is necessarily bad or good, but she can see why it would lead to stagnation -- if you can maintain all the fires magically, use magic to keep them clean and safe, then your need to develop electric lights plummets. If you can portal around, you'll never develop vehicles of increasing complexity, leading to something that can break through the Earth's atmosphere.

In some ways, she thinks it's best that she didn't learn to rely on her magic. Even as her capabilities grow, her instincts still drive her to do most things without magic.

When he says Nadine showed him a motorbike, she actually has to digest that for a second before she breaks into a wide smile and looks at him. The visual clearly entertains her. ] No shit, Nadine put you on a bike? She didn't even tell me. Little bit more of a ride than Roach, huh?

[ She's warm next to him. He switches his drink to his other hand as her arm links with his. The lights remind him he's not seen any in a while. Not since he set foot in this world. At least the Horizon grants a piece of what they've all left behind. Besides, it isn't bad, showing Julie something in return. Share something from his world that isn't full of horrors.

He lingers on the matter of magic for another moment until she smiles at him. He laughs, a quiet huff. Mm. Something like that. ] A bit.

[ The glow in his eyes suggests he's a hell of a lot keener on the experience than his muted answer lets on. It'd surprised even him, how much he liked it.

He studies her, curious. He never knows what new thing to him is commonplace to her. ] You? Have you been?

You liked it. [ Her tone is sing-song, teasing. His eyes speak volumes where his mouth doesn't, and Julie laughs, entertained. Honestly, it makes perfect sense, she doesn't know why she never thought of it herself. ] She kit you out right for it? I knew she can ride but I didn't know she picked it back up.

[ She takes a swig from her bottle as she nods. ] Oh, sure. Motorcycles are real popular where I'm from, even with folks who can't really afford it. I had people in my family who rode. [ Several of those people also happened to belong to violent motorcycle gangs -- Julie is just from that kind of stock. ] It's been years, though.

Edited 2022-07-26 03:36 (UTC)

[ He looks over at Julie. It's nice to hear her laugh again, and her amusement brings a small smile to his lips.

A second passes before he gathers what she means by kit. He tilts his head. With a shrug that suggests he has little thought on the item Nadine gave him, he produces the tinted glasses that he'd received. Offers it to Julie for her to take. He's kept them in the same drawer as his wolf ears, forgotten until now. Just hasn't been any reason to wear them.

He peers over the railing at those who remain milling about below. Years, hm? They can fix that. ]

Nadine offered lessons. So perhaps some time, if you're bored.

[ He plans on taking Nadine up on her suggestion soon. It isn't as though he has much occupying his time right now. Besides, he suspects Nadine could use the distraction, too. ]

[ It actually takes Julie a second to put together what he's holding out to her. Not only does the object in his hands seem wildly out-of-place there, she had really been expecting, you know, the bare minimum of a jacket. Geralt is a Witcher, he's not made of rubber. It doesn't matter that it's the Horizon, it's a matter of principle.

She takes the sunglasses with an unimpressed snort and roll of her eyes. ] Fuckin' seriously, Nadine? I swear to -- I promise she should know better. [ Her voice lowers as she mutters to herself. ] Fuckin' boomer bullshit, like I'm gonna let him walk around lookin' like someone's little league coach on Facebook, she's outta her damn mind...

[ Sunglasses still in hand, she lets go of his arm and absently walks over to one of the chaise lounges, where strips of black leather have begun arranging and rearranging themselves in line with her thoughts. After a moment, the designs seem to settle into finality: proper leather chaps and a motorcycle jacket, which bears the symbol from his medallion in silver-grey embroidery on the back. The sunglasses have morphed into metal-rimmed aviators. She picks up the jacket and holds it at arms' length, looking over it before she decides she's satisfied. ]

Here. Bikes are a culture, you gotta have the gear.

[ Geralt's changed outfits perhaps three times in a century. He's a creature of habit and old comforts. His only contact with fashion is when Jaskier shows him some new doublet or other, which Geralt acknowledges maybe half the time at best. It means he mostly just watches and waits as Julie mumble to herself while she rectifies whatever wrong she's identified in Nadine's choices. The difference in shape is minimal to him—they're glasses—but Julie seems pleased.

He takes the jacket from her, one eyebrow raised in intrigue. Hm. The embroidered medallion is more than his typical—not a difficult threshold to reach considering his typical is plain fucking black—but Geralt isn't resistant to other appearances. He simply doesn't give enough of a shit to make these changes on his own. Lately though, between Julie and Jaskier, he's acquired almost something of a wardrobe inside and outside the Horizon.

Almost. If one squints. He's a work in progress. ]

And what culture is that?

[ This entire thing is novel to him, in large part because he expected the bike itself to be all there is to it. Apparently not. ]

Biker culture, duh.

[ Really, this has almost nothing to do with Geralt and his opinions. Julie actually could not give a fuck what he thinks. It's more that she feels slighted that Nadine believes Julie would allow any man of hers to wear those glasses. She would not. For as outlandishly stupid as he enjoyed dressing, Julie had smacked down Lloyd's choices several times over their history together, and that was with her incentive to just accommodate what he wanted, no matter how dumb.

She has pride, for god's sake. And also eyes. Eyes that would have to look at those glasses. She refuses. ]

It's like, a whole thing. Big groups of people come together, go on rides, shit like that. There's a big festival once a year that they all go to. [ She leaves out the part where a lot of biker groups are just straight up criminal gangs. ] Leather's a big deal 'cause you gotta wear the right clothes to protect yourself. You fall off a bike goin' sixty in cotton, you're gonna get your skin ripped straight off.

[ Geralt seems to take her explanation as it is without bothering with more questions. It answers enough. Not as if he'll ever encounter this supposed culture in the Horizon. Only one person other than Nadine has approached him on a motorbike and, well. Mm.

Dante is Dante. ]

I'll make do without the social frills.

[ Mostly, this gives him something to do that isn't training or hunting or solving yet another fucking problem on his hands. Perhaps that's the real reason he's taken such an interest.

He flips the reformed glasses idly in his hands before putting it aside. He may care little about clothes for himself so long as he doesn't look downright absurd, but on Julie? He knows what he likes to see, and that's apparent when he cocks his head at her. ] And if I invite you on a ride, will you be in similar gear?

[ No, Julie doesn't expect many bikers to show up here either, but some things just have to be done in the proper way. This is one of them.

She actually thinks Geralt would quite like most (most being a very important keyword) bikers, given their penchant for hovering at the fringes of society and dogged individualism, but she doesn't believe anyone is aiming to summon a group of Hells Angels, so she only snorts a little, rolling her eyes.

With a slight wave of her hand, the clothes disappear -- he'll find them waiting for him at Kaer Morhen -- and she laughs at his question as she comes closer to him. ]

Well, I do like my skin where it is. [ Reaching up, she wraps her arms around his neck. ] You lookin' for a fashion show?

[ Julie steps closer, arms around him, and he rests his hands on her hips. There's a moment where he just studies her, eyes lingering on her lips before he answers. ]

Are you offering?

[ Perhaps he is. And perhaps he's looking for something to do with her where they can leave behind some of the horrors they've seen. Even he can't always resist the temptation of using the Horizon as an escape. Though deep down, if he truly thinks about it, it isn't much different than the way he used to abandon the towns and villages for the solitude of the woods—whether he needed to or not.

Maybe he's always preferred to be in places that are a little apart from the world itself. ]

[ The corners of her mouth curve up under his gaze, and she tilts her head playfully to one side, feigning thoughtfulness. ] Mm, I might could be convinced. I have that whole big closet and practically no one to see any of it, seems like a waste.

[ She's joking, but it is a Problem, in her mind. She used to go through several outfits a day when she was in Vegas. What is the point of having such a magnificent wardrobe when no one is looking at it? Other than using all of her fashion-challenged friends as dress-up dolls. Which she does, frequently.

Her fingertips dip under his collar, behind his neck, her nails dragging lightly over his skin. ] You never brought back your present, neither.

I'm convincing. [ Deadpan, and deliberately not convincing at all.

He's only one person, but he's willing to be a someone to see her extensive wardrobe. Both for when she puts the clothes on and when she takes them off. Her hand slides under his shirt, against his skin, and he steps closer to her. He makes a soft noise, a little rueful. ]

Couldn't find the right time. [ Shit kept happening afterwards, one thing after another: memories, losses, more memories. More fucking losses. Nightmares. And he tends to find her in the world outside ever since she joined him in Cadens. But he's not forgotten.

He hooks his finger gently around the wyvern tooth necklace she wears. ] I will. [ Soon. It's a promise. ] Be sure you have an outfit for it.

Oh, the most convincing. Definitely. [ She smiles even through her facetiously serious agreement. Debate team champ, Geralt of Rivia.

Her stomach flutters when he touches her necklace. It's the one thing she never changes in the Horizon -- it was never really a conscious choice. She just put it on and then never took it back off. If she can ever figure out how to take things back to the real world with her, it would be the first.

Craning her neck up, she leans into him, her eyes dark and half-closed. ] And what should I be wearin' now?

[ He likes seeing it on her every time. It's a quiet, unspoken thing—the way it tends to be between them. Like how he shows up to her parties despite him typically not being one for large, loud gatherings. He doesn't mind when it's her.

A good question. His answer is not near imaginative, but he gives it anyway—a quirk to his lips that says he knows he's predictable. ] A little less.

[ He closes the distance; tilts her chin up to kiss her. The green and blue sky still shines above them, casting a gentle glow. ]

[ Her hand tangles in the hair at the nape of his neck when he kisses her, her eyelids falling closed. She has to rise onto the balls of her feet to fully reach him; it isn’t exactly unique, given their height disparity, but she likes it.

The whole thing, the lights in the sky, would be almost tritely romantic if it had been planned. But Julie really had not expected this exact path of events, so it doesn’t feel like a scene. She likes that, too —- she’s spent so much of her life setting up perfectly manipulated scenarios to get what she wants. It’s a welcome change.

Breaking away just enough to catch a breath, she looks at him through her eyelashes, reaches for his hand. ] Come inside and we’ll figure out how much less.

[ The lights make him miss home—how could he not?—and for all that he knows it isn't welcoming, that it's broken and torn, there are pieces of it he thinks she might like to see. Or at least find amusing. Perhaps another time, he might be reminded of something else to show her.

For the moment, he's no longer thinking about a continent from another sphere. She takes his hand; he lets her, following her through the doors. The space inside is pink and full of florals as it always is. He sets the bottle he's been drinking from on the nearest surface—

And then his hands are on her hips again, his back pressed against the wall. ]

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