[ open ] This is Halloween, everybody make a scene

[princessvegas]

Julie has always thrown a good party. It was true in Kansas, it was true in Vegas, and it's true in the Horizon. And last year's party had been a smashing success by Julie's standards.

At that time.

See, the thing is, back then, Julie didn't understand exactly what she was capable of doing with the Horizon's powers. She had, without meaning to, limited herself to things that already made sense in the world she had previously known. But that's not the world she lives in anymore, and after a year of learning, she's ready to actually throw a Horizon-worthy party.


I | WAIT
For the vast majority of the Summoned, this will be the first time they've ever seen the pink neon that illuminates the edges of Julie's club go dark. The pink carpet and pink velvet ropes are gone; the big double doors are closed and locked. Those with keen eyes might notice that the door handles, normally in the shape of rising clouds of butterflies, are now swarms of bats. There is a small sign on a stand at the door.

All around the building, there's the loud, ominous sound of a grandfather clock's swinging pendulum, ticking toward an unknown time (well, it is known, as Julie sent out invitations). The wood of the doors bears long, ragged scratches, as if claws have been dragged down them. Thick fog gradually surrounds the building -- while not thick enough to obscure vision, it is nonetheless ominous and haunting.

The clock chimes nine o'clock; the sound is deafening. There is a long, pregnant pause, and just when it seems like nothing is going to happen, there is a sudden screech from above. An enormous, bulbous spider crawls atop the roof as if from the back, its body and legs so large and long that they span the building's width. It gives another great shriek as it leers down from the roof, fangs dripping, but it doesn't reach down from its perch. It remains above the crowd, menacingly.

At the same time, the doors burst open in an almost explosive manner, and the pounding music begins to pour out from within. More fog floats out of the foyer, carrying obscured green and orange light. The party has started.


II | CREEP
Walking through the front door, there are many details to be noticed, enough that it's easy to overlook most of them. The mist is a heavy blanket across the ground, thinning out for visibility only around waist-height. Where last year the theme was set in a barren forest, this year appears to be set in a massive, abandoned Victorian mansion. While the club maintains its normal shape from the outside, the inside is transformed to mimic long, winding hallways and spiraling staircases that seem to lead nowhere. The roof is high, in cathedral arches, and the fireplaces are dark. The walls and mantles bear various pieces of decoration: eerie black-and-white portraits in filthy frames, cracked vases full of dead flowers, jagged and broken sconces. Everything is covered in a vast, dusty coat of cobwebs, and the entire main hall must be traversed to reach the music that streams through the air.

Ignore the movements in the corner of your eyes. And be careful not to graze the walls -- lest you discover that the black pattern on the dark wallpaper is less of a pattern and more of an infestation.

Along the way, one might be inclined to open one of the many doors that line the halls and see what's inside. There are any number of strange scenes to find -- those familiar enough may recognize the haunting figures as Julie's clubgoers in costume. Interacting may have... unintended consequences.

Make it through the maze of haunted rooms and revolving doors, and you'll be rewarded by finding the ballroom.

III | PARTY
True to Julie form, the ballroom is fully decked out for only the wildest of parties. Spiderwebs stretch across the vaulted ceilings and between pillars, with lights hanging from their gossamer threads. Candles help illuminate by floating near the ceiling and around tables.

The bar, swapped for heavy Gothic design, is manned by Steven, as always. Despite being dressed as a white-eyed demon, he is as helpful as ever, and happy to make you whatever drink your heart desires. Two long tables flank the bar -- one boasts a huge variety of spooky snacks and bowls of candies, amongst other, more classic party dishes. The other holds vast quantities of... other goodies, should one be tempted to participate: bowls of pre-rolled joints and various pills, silver platters with small mountains of cocaine atop them, and even tiny canisters of whippits, for those with low tolerance. Be careful not to confuse the regular candies with their cannabis-infused counterparts.

The dance floor is large and lit in purple, orange and green. The music is loud enough to dance to, but not so loud that conversation is impossible. The resident partiers that weren't used to play roles in the scary scenes congregate here, in a wide assortment of random sexy costumes.

Hopefully, you've arrived in time to see Julie's grand entrance.

Comments

[princessvegas]

All she can do is laugh at the idea that a cowboy is a 'more sexy gunslinger'. If anything, she would be inclined to say the reverse, but she understands what he's getting at. "Remind me some other time, I'll show you some westerns. That's what we call movies 'bout cowboys and all that. You'll be a Clint Eastwood man, not John Wayne," she says confidently, already planning a movie night in her mind.

The crowd mills around them, and she pulls him by the hand toward one of the tables. Steven helpfully swings by within a moment to drop off new drinks for them, then disappears back to the perpetually busy bar.

"Um, I don't think anyone can really help." Her nose wrinkles. She appreciates the sentiment, but it's not the same as a real party. She alone is controlling every aspect of this space, from the appearance to the behavior of her partiers to the very active elements of her costume, and she's doing it only with her mind. With her connection to the Singularity. "It's just... I dunno. It's me. All of this, it's me. I don't know how to explain it, not really."

Jesper doesn't know the full extent of what she can do, of how this is all something different than the rest of the Horizon. Julie barely understands it, is constantly mystified by it. By the way that the Horizon just works for her.

[itookashot]

"Oh good, because the third costume is mostly made up. It's still sexy though." Of course, it's on him, everything is sexy on him, or so he thinks. Jesper loves learning about their modern things like movies and music though, so he'll enjoy the appeal of them. He will probably do impressions of Clint Eastwood afterward, all narrowed eyes and confidence. Maybe he'll get a cowboy hat too, a little wider than his jaunty hats.

Jesper goes with her without argument, glad as always to get some special Julie time. If she is taking a little time to talk with him, it means he did something right, or maybe she could use a break herself. He smiles at Steven and winks, taking the drink.

"It's more of your special connection to the Singularity, right? Few better ways to use it than putting on a celebration." Jesper had a great time at her 4th of July party although he didn't know the theme for that either. Costume parties are universal though. She has told him before how connected she is to this place and the Singularity, so he chalks it up to all of that. And he'll never get it because he doesn't even have a mild connection to the Horizon. Nothing more special than anyone else.

"I hope you let yourself rest after this though, Julie. I'm sure it's been a lot." Understatement. And he's not just talking about the party. He's talking about everything.

[princessvegas]

"Well, now I'm excited to see what you put together." It's said half-laughing. She somewhat doubts his ability to correctly interpret the very distinct cowboy look, which only means that a sexy version of the already bastardized costume will be even funnier than the impressions.

Nodding, she takes a drink and glances out into the crowd. "Yeah, somethin' like that, I guess. I don't really know how it all works," she comments lightly. Too lightly, for something that big, but it's the truth. Julie doesn't know how her connection works, why she can do these things that other people can't, without even trying. Even when she didn't know who she was. She can't explain how she's even doing everything she is right now, other than that she just is doing it. And in the grand scheme of things, it seems almost wasteful to use it for parties and sparkly dresses and little animals, but what else can she do? She hasn't worked out a way to take any of this back into the real world. At least she can distract herself with it all.

"I'll probably sleep a lot tomorrow. That was what happened last year. I slept through literal fuckin' zombies, so." She's only talking about the party. There's no amount of rest that will help her with everything else she's been through. If anything, rest might make it worse -- it's been a week, and her dreams are still of just the colors and noise that the blob transferred to her in their single stroke of contact.

[itookashot]

Jesper shifts the Julie-pink wig on his head so that the strands fall less in his face, but they do have that kind of hilarious unnatural curl to them that also happened with the Geralt wig. It's intentionally silly solely to amuse other people. He lifts his drink afterward and nods as she talks, as always aware that she can do things no one else here can. But that she doesn't know why or how.

"I suppose as long as it does work, yeah? And doesn't break that beautiful brain of yours." It would be a concern for most people, no doubt, who don't have the type of brain power that she does. Jesper knows for certain he could never do most of this. He is bright and imaginative but not in a big sweeping way like when Julie or Sam create events for people. He probably could if need be, but why bother when he can attend their events and help out while doing so?

Jesper glances over at her and reaches over to snag her hand, running his thumb along her knuckles gently. He was a bit of a mess during the thing they all went through recently, out of his mind really, so he hasn't had much of a chance to catch up with anything. And maybe that's what people prefer, considering no one came out of this unscathed. He's avoided talking about it on purpose, but he is still glad they are both out of it alive, at least.

"Maybe you should go on another vacation. Aquila's still got the beaches. I haven't been there yet, but maybe some time. I bet I could make excellent shell necklaces." She has a whole lot of his jewelry by now so she knows how easy it would be. Perhaps vacation, much like parties, seems like a silly thing to waste energy on at this point, but Jesper's always been a believer in distractions being worthwhile.

[princessvegas]

Julie doesn't think she has a particularly special mind. If anything, what she excels at is not useful. It's entertaining, maybe, but not important. And she often feels like much of what she does come up with is not really hers to claim -- she comes from a world where images are of no shortage. Television, movies, artists, they make the impossible come to life, give her a template to apply any idea she has over. And she has no reason to believe that no one else can do the same, make these parties and spaces and spectacles. Maybe, for whatever reason, she can do it more easily, automatically, but everyone else has made mountains. New York City skylines. Castles.

But then why could she make that sweater for Rhy? Trapped in separate dimensions, communicating in distant echoes. He hadn't been able to do it for himself, but she could. Why doesn't anyone else have people like hers, why doesn't anyone else have a Steven? What is Steven?

She tends to leave things alone when they're working. She doesn't like to rattle cages that don't need it.

"I don't want to go alone." It comes out automatically, almost mechanically, in response to the idea that she go on vacation, and her tone makes it clear that she means she doesn't want to be alone. But in the next beat, she shakes her head slightly, takes a drink. "I mean, I talked about goin' with... anyway, who knows if that'll shake out. I'll go with you, though. When you have a few weeks."

[itookashot]

Jesper thinks Julie is one of the smartest people he's ever met. Maybe not the way some of the scientists are, or the tech geniuses, and neither is he in those spheres either. He's got street smarts and so does she, and he feels like street smarts go a lot farther when it comes to staying alive. And that's what they're doing here, every day. Staying alive, whether it's from a war or gods or whatever else. Whatever connection she has to this place, it's for good reasons. He wouldn't blame the Singularity for thinking she's special, he agrees. But it's not that simple, that much he also knows.

"Hey." Jesper squeezes her hand. "You'll never be alone when I'm around." He can't promise that he'll be here forever, none of them can, but he is confident that it won't change. Julie stole a piece of his heart the first time they met, and he loves her without hesitation. Family is never about blood to him.

"We'll go and I'll make you so many shell things you'll hate the very sight of them." Jesper is actually assuming there are shells, he's not usually a beach person. He is from a port city but it always smells of fish and ships, not of the sea. "You deserve a break." Kaz and Inej would probably understand if he needs a break too, after what went down. Things are tense between all of them.

"Or we'll go wherever you want. We can run off into the sunset."

[princessvegas]

Unfortunately, Julie came from a background that disagreed greatly and told her she was dumb and useless. She was a pretty girl who asked too many questions -- the world told her early that she was better off turning her brain off. The truth is, Julie had become so disengaged by the end of her childhood that she's not sure she had ever acted at full capacity before Captain Trips. But her shock and confusion at the Singularity's connection to her stems far more from the fact that her world had no magic of its own. Why would the Singularity bond with someone who comes from that far away? Who died without ever knowing this world existed?

She thinks that's the part that makes it so difficult to wrap her mind around. How can a twist of fate or destiny, like being special or chosen or whatever, only be given to someone after they died?

He squeezes her hand and she smiles at him, but there's something sorrowful about it. As if she maybe has never been able to truly convince herself that people can mean it, that she won't always be the least important person around. It's hard to reconcile feeling important when you lose everything you've ever known. When your entire history has been more or less wiped away. She loves him so much, but she doesn't expect to be his priority.

She squeezes his hand back anyway and laughs a little.

"How many things can you make outta shells?" Julie can only imagine a few, but then again, she had literally never seen the ocean or fresh shells before this year, so her idea of what they could be used for is basically nonexistent. Jewelry and mermaid bras? Her nose wrinkles a little -- she wishes there was anywhere to go other than Aquila. Libertas is gone, Nocwich is old hat, and everywhere else was over the borders. Julie likes a little light treason as much as anyone, but it does seem like a bit too much trouble for a vacation.

"One thing I miss about my world is how many different places there were to visit. And anyone could travel mostly anywhere, long as they could afford it." She can't help lightly scoffing, "So, of course, that means I never got to go anywhere back then."

[itookashot]

The truth is Jesper actually has book smarts, he got into a prestigious school on scholarship before he wasted his chance and ran off to the streets instead. He could have been something more, and that is what his father hoped for him, to rise to something greater than a farmer or a Grisha soldier. But it wasn't him. Street smarts matter far more to him, he's met far too many book smart students who were incredibly ignorant of the real world. Pigeons, all of them, ripe for plucking. Not Julie. She's savvy, sharp, she sees the world around her and survives in it. He'd be shocked to know how deeply she's been underestimated her whole life. It seems so obvious, who she is, in his eyes.

But he does see that sorrow and that at least he understands. She's not the only one in his life that has trouble accepting what people say as true. Burned one too many times to trust easily. That is why Jesper reiterates to her as frequently as possible his genuine love and devotion to her, or shows her in the ways that he can.

"I love you and would love to go on a vacation with you," he says, doing just that, and lifts her hand to kiss the knuckles. Jesper's someone who has an open heart but a cool head. He's never afraid to love, for good or for bad.

As for the shells, well, he considers. "No idea, but I bet I could do every bit of jewelry. A crown, that would be fun. You can be princess of the beach." Jesper's only limitation is his imagination when it comes to his abilities. He can morph the shells into anything. "I'll make you a throne out of them to sit in." He grins at her. What she says nest also makes him think.

"It wasn't really in the cards for me to travel. Too many places one wrong move and I end up dead or forced into the army, sold out one way or another. I'm good at hiding my abilities, but there's always a risk." It didn't stop Jesper from doing it for jobs, but he really did stay close to Ketterdam, where he built a reputation as someone not to fuck with, and also kept his abilities a secret. It was very unlikely anyone would go against him and the Crows in that city.

"Ketterdam was better than all the rest, though. It had a lot of life. Our cities and towns were pretty boring compared to here, honestly. Lower technology."

[princessvegas]

The biggest issue had always been that Julie simply didn't fit in where she came from. She was too loud, too headstrong, wanted too much. Her hometown had been tiny and rural, the kind of place that hated anything outside of its norm. And she had always been so young and so poor that getting out had been impossible before the world went belly-up. But she's been told enough times that she's all the wrong things, the bad things, that she's come to believe it; while she doesn't necessarily believe she's stupid, she's bought the line that her looks are the most valuable tool she has. That the only thing people will really want her for is the most fleeting, surface-level part of herself. So she trained herself to use her appearance like a weapon, as an in so that she can manipulate her way to everything else she wants.

Truth be told, she would not feel so strongly that she cannot be important if Jesper didn't have his other friends from home. It's not that she begrudges him them being here, so much as she feels a miserable sense of jealousy over the fact that others have love carrying across universes for them. Julie doesn't have that; even Nadine was brought from their world before they ever met. All Julie has is a constant feeling of loneliness, of anxiety that some day, all the people she has come to love here will remember they have other priorities and they abandon her. Because of everything she has gone through, she looks at Kaz and Inej when she passes them downstairs and she sees competition. Competition that she knows she cannot win against.

"Like a mermaid," she laughs, not having much reference for any other being that might wear a shell crown. Still, there's some delight at the idea of sitting on a shell throne and overlooking the ocean like Poseidon. "In Aquila, they do a lot of henna, y'know. Some lady did my hands and feet when I met her on the beach one morning. It's really nice."

Her head tilts to one side. It's hard for her to imagine what Ketterdam must be like -- though she had never traveled, she had known what other places looked like, what they had. And because her only experience with truly low technology has been in Abraxas, so the only pictures she can summon in her mind are Nott and the Cities.

"The country I came from was so big, you could travel thousands of miles and still not get where you were tryin' to go. Most people never left the US, just 'cause it was so expensive. We were far from most other countries. Vegas is the only place I ever went."

[itookashot]

It is true that Jesper is extremely tight with Inej and Kaz to the point where sometimes when they're together it seems like they're one entity. They have a certain way of moving or talking that comes from years of trust and experience as a trio. Jesper's just never really seen his love for people in any boxes though, in terms of the where or when or how much. He'd say that his love for Julie, his love for Mat, his love for Nadine, they're all very special because not only is it a choice, but it's a star-crossed situation. None of them should have met, they're from other worlds, and it means every moment here is important.

He doesn't give much thought to returning. He's not sure he would go back, given a choice. It's not that he hated his world, although it had a whole lot of fear in the back of his mind at all times. His father is the only thing he misses, but he knows he's fine and happy back there, with another Jesper. He wouldn't give up his family here. He wouldn't give up her. But he would understand her feelings, if he knew.

Instead they just have this, finding each other over and over again, sometimes in laughter and sometimes in pain, and always able to sit down and talk. Whether it's her terrified of her demons or him wearing her as a costume. "That sounds marvelous. Despite living in a port town, we didn't do beaches, really. There are some elsewhere, but it's very city-centric. No swimming either, it'd frankly be rather disgusting just around Ketterdam. There are probably bodies weighted down there."

Out into the sea, it's probably beautiful and just fine, but this is a messy port city with all kinds of questionable things coming in and out. It does suit the Crows though. Always a little messy and criminal. But you wouldn't want to jump in that water, at least not for fun. He's been in it before and while it's not poison, he definitely needed to wash off after. The reference to bodies is true. Lots of murders in Ketterdam too. It's probably a little bit New York and a little bit London, in comparison.

"I think I'd either want to go on a worldwide trip just to see everything, or I'd think it was too much and huddle down in one spot where everything made sense." Listen his wandering spirit does exist and he likes the idea of adventures far away, but he never did leave Ketterdam once he got there. And he never left the farm while he was required to be there, before his father let him go.

"Your world does seem so ... bright though. Between what I've seen from you and Sam, and even Dean with his tavern with big televisions, it seems very big. Not just in size but in technology, money, power." The televisions alone seem so wild to him! He has one in his Horizon now.

[princessvegas]

She has, unfortunately, become trapped in a worldview where everything is a finite resource, including love and acceptance. If she doesn't take it all for herself, then someone else will take it and there will be nothing left for her. Logically, she knows that's not how it works, that people can love endlessly, but on a base, animal level, she has been taught that she has to take in order to survive. And her own experience can't contradict it, because there is no one left from her life to act as an example. Everyone she has is from her time here, so none of them will ever have the special bond with her that they share with each other.

At night, if she lets it, it taunts her. That her new family will never choose her because she's the odd one out. It's just her and Nadine left, and that's not an equivalent at all. So she tries not to think about it.

With a wave of her hand, a glowing map of her world appears on the tabletop, like the map she always knew. Some of it isn't exactly correct -- the borders on countries outside of North America are definitely questionable -- but it's close enough. The United States, with all fifty states outlined individually, lights brighter than the rest.

"This is where I'm from," she says, tapping a nail to Kansas. Her hand slides over the map to where Vermont and New Hampshire are (she is not sure which is which), and she taps there next. "And here's where Nadine's from. Same country. And this is Las Vegas." A third tap, back across the map, past the first. The three places highlight themselves in pink, white and red, to stand out. "My town to Vegas was about fifteen hundred miles or so."

And she says nothing of the rest of the map, sprawling and separated with oceans.

[itookashot]

Jesper leans over the map when it is made in front of him. They had a conversation about the size of her world before, but never with a visual aid, so it's very exciting and intriguing. It does seem very, very large. And this is just her country. It feels so much bigger than that. He wonders what the population is like, their areas probably couldn't compare. The way life is, it can't get the same huge numbers.

"Fifteen hundred miles," he echoes. You would think on a map it would seem smaller in scale, but it doesn't. He wonders if he would like it there. Probably, if he came like this, wide-eyed and fascinated, new to all the things that seem simple. But if he was born there, probably not. If he went through what Julie did, definitely not. This place is a harbor. Smaller, maybe, and very complicated in itself, but a place where lost souls were thrown together.

"I can't think that big. This is mine." Instead of a map though, because it would be small in comparison and not give the details, Jesper makes his own little screen. And after a map of sorts it's as if they're watching the trailer of a movie. Water, ships, bridges, towers, clocktowers and long streets of shops, but it's all in darkness. The way he sees it, when they come alive. It is almost like they are running through the streets lined with stone and the high sweeping archaic but beautiful buildings. From the poor workman districts to the beautiful and classic, it still has a life about it, no matter what time. Lights everywhere, glowing in the dark. Sweeping past the Crow Club and the noise and laughter from within, to the fighting pits, and back to a sight from the rooftops. It is so clear in his mind and thus in front of them, and looking at it, he does feels ad, just a little. Maybe he misses it slightly more than he thinks. It is definitely smaller in scale, packed into tall buildings and skinny roads, but very alive.

"I'd show you the farm I grew up on, but it's boring. You see one, you see them all." Jesper used to be embarrassed to admit he grew up on one, it didn't fit his persona or reputation well, but now he thinks it's rather funny and embraces it. So what if he is. He came to Ketterdam and made something of himself. Just not the something his father wanted.

[princessvegas]

Her smile is fond, nostalgic. Like she's gained enough distance that she can see certain quirks from both sides. "Yeah, and that wasn't even considered a long trip," she snorts. "Fifteen hundred miles was maybe a week-long road trip, if there were two people to drive. A day and a half each way's drive. Ish. Took me about two months to walk it."

It's hard for her to say whether she liked it. When she lived there, she'd never known there was anything else out there, and she comes from the worst possible outcome, so there's nothing worth going back to. And she can't rightly say whether she would go back to a version of her world that avoided Captain Trips -- her life had also been pretty shitty them. But she loved her world enough to miss it now, for it to make Abraxas seem small and hopelessly backward.

Sometimes she wonders if she should miss it more, if she's terrible for not. So she doesn't think about her world more than she needs to.

Julie, being incredibly high, immediately becomes as absorbed in his images as if it really was a movie, like she's in a theater. Ketterdam is somehow both foreign and familiar at once; while she has never seen anything remotely near it herself, it reminds her of television, of movies, of pictures. Things set in indeterminate European cities before people numbered in the millions. It's fascinating.

"The last thing I ever need to see again is a farm," she says, though the response takes a minute to break through her trance. "I'm from farm country. They all look the same after the hundredth."

[itookashot]

"I can't believe that's all just one country. I'm fairly certain walking across Novyi Zem would take shorter than that." That's where he is from, although it would probably be a boring but pretty walk too. Farmland as far as the eye can see. They didn't have cars so he has a feeling it would be an even shorter journey that way. Maybe it's better not to be so large though. They're spread out more in a population too. Their issues don't stem from overpopulation, it's continual war.

"Inej's people, the Suli, are nomads, they travel everywhere. She may have traveled that far before, if she hadn't been snatched." Jesper doesn't ask her much about all the places they'd been before, as being separated from her family was an ongoing pain spot. And then she came here as soon as she had them back, it was almost cruel in a way. "I'd like to drive one of your vehicles though. I've driven a carriage and a tank." The tank was particularly fun!

"Yeah, absolutely, you wouldn't be able to tell my Da's farm from all the rest of them. He used to always assume I'd come back, even with the fancy education I was supposed to have." Colm may have thought if Jesper made something of himself they'd sell it or Jesper could just have multiple properties. He doesn't know how far his father envisioned for him.

He glances over to her, curious. "Have you ever met anyone who actually turned out the way their parents wanted them to? I feel like all the people I've ever known are either orphans, taken from their parents, or were big disappointments." Such as him.

[princessvegas]

"I mean, the US is a real big country, even by our world's standards," she clarifies. "If it helps, think of it more like fifty little countries that banded to together to have one government over all of 'em. Each state is different from the others, and there wasn't always fifty. Started with thirteen, then got bigger'n bigger over about 200 years. Nadine's from one of the original thirteen."

She glances over when he mentions Inej -- they live in the same building, so of course they're vaguely aware of each other, but they've only ever had about one and a half conversations. And the one was a bit contentious. Between that and her jealousy, Julie can't say she's a fan, but she doesn't actively hate the woman or anything like that. Nevertheless, she raises her eyebrows, mildly interested. "Really, she's a gypsy? That's what we called 'em. Had real bad reputations. I never met a gypsy before."

But the tank brings a smile to her face. "No shit? Who the fuck has a tank 'round here? That's wild," she laughs, her mental image of Jesper popping out of the top of a tank in a helmet adding to the hilarity. "I'll show you some cars some time. You can pick which ones you wanna try, there's tons of different ones. You'd be sexy as hell in a Lambo. Or maybe like, a Maserti. You're a sports car man."

Allowing the map to fade gently, she scoffs, rolling her eyes. "Sweetpea, everyone I've ever known was a fuckin' disappointment to their parents in some way. If your parents care at all, you'll let 'em down somehow, at some point."

[itookashot]

"It's like the Free Cities then, but on a much larger scale." Free Cities is made up of a few cities that govern themselves and have representatives, etc. The seeing them as separate countries does make sense, and they're all on top of each other too which must be insane.

"Could be they're similar. They're very interesting people and incredible entertainers, they have their own religion and culture, but people treat them like shit. I think it's mostly uncertainty on how people can enjoy their lives being permanent wanderers." Jesper is a straight shooter, if he thought they had a bad reputation, he would say so, even with Inej as his friend. As far as he can tell it's a whole lot of strange prejudices. "Unfortunately there aren't good protections for them, so when she was taken by slavers overseas, there wasn't really much they could do."

Kaz found her parents and reunited them recently, but it was a terrible situation in every conceivable way. "She's an incredible acrobat, a tight rope walker, maybe you'll get to see some time. That's what her family did." Jesper knows that the two of them don't really engage for one reason or another, but maybe a part of him hopes that could change. He loves them both so much.

She laughs about the tank and so does he, that is actually a great story. "It was back home. The Fjerdans, our enemies, are absolutely the worst heinous psychopaths out there, but they can make technology so well. We broke into their ice court to steal someone from right under the military's nose, and on the way out, stole a tank and literally burst open the wall to flee." Jesper grins ear-to-ear, it's a fun story. Yes there's madness involved and no small amount of violence, but how many times do you get a chance to steal a tank and wreck a castle? Good times.

"My dad's a good sort, he means well. I suppose in a way we were both disappointments to each other, but it could've gone worse."

[princessvegas]

"Yeah, sorta. Just better organized and bigger. And 'cause it was all one country, there was free travel between the states, and it was easier to transport food and stuff around." There were, of course, many differences between the Cities and her USA, but the Free Cities has been the most familiar place she's wound up in Abraxas -- that's why it makes her so nervous to live there. There's too much that's too similar. She keeps waiting for them to slip up and destroy all life with their ego.

She nods sympathetically, takes a drink. "My whole country was pretty much built on slaves. We didn't have 'em in my time, it was close to two hundred years since they outlawed it. But there was a war over it, and the country almost ended. I don't know. My world was real big and advanced, but people hatin' other people for the color of their skin, or their religion or who they like to fuck or whatever else... those were problems we'd had for thousands and thousands of years."

And Julie might be a terrible person, but she was never a racist. She knew plenty of people who were, and she probably has some fucked up perceptions from living in white Midwestern hell, but she had always thought it was disgusting to be a racist. There was a whole rainbow of dicks out there, and she was interested in all of them.

Her eyebrows raise as she listens to his story. How can there be tanks in his world but cars are still a mystery? It feels like inventing space travel before even conceiving of airplanes. It's still a good story, though. "Make me sound borin'," she says lightly. "I never had the chance to steal anythin' that good. Most I ever got was a joyride in a souped-up Caddy my cousin was supposed to drive to Tulsa."

For a moment, she's quiet. Thinks about her own parents. She can barely recall them past the enormity of her final memories; them lying dead, side by side in bed, swollen and pale and already beginning to rot in the summer heat. How, in the end, all she could do was walk away from the house because she wasn't strong enough to move them into the grave she dug.

"I think my parents wanted me to be... less like them. Or at least better. But I don't think they ever believed I was."

[itookashot]

"If only that part was the same. I am used to living in a city where it's easy to get anything. I miss all my connections too, I was a man about town in Ketterdam, big fish in a small pond." To be fair, Jesper does fairly well for himself in Cadens too, he's hardly ignored here. He has a good business, merchants don't utterly despise him, he knows a lot about everyone in his area. He's the info guy, it's his natural instinct to be popular wherever he goes.

"Slavery is typically frowned upon, so they call it indentured servitude once you get to Ketterdam, but it's the same thing. Inej was sold to the Menagerie ... where pretty women are held regardless of age." The implication should be clear. Jesper doesn't often speak about it with her because obviously it's such a harsh subject. But Inej came out of it with a big heart despite all that, she's the strongest person he knows. "Kaz bought her contract and that's how she came to us." It's also why the three of them are so close. Their protective urges over one another are specific and made from trauma. "Back home though she recently became a pirate who specifically goes after slave ships, so at least there's that."

He thinks it is probably the sanest thing she could have done once given the freedom and power to make her own life. Rescuing slaves and changing the entire industry. People will soon be afraid to bring slaves anywhere near the area. Which is exactly how it should be. "As for wars made for that, we're going through one where the tank people are fighting in no small part to murder every one of my kind that exists. They want us extinct. Seems like people are terrible no matter where you go. But not all of them." There's them, after all. Not too terrible.

"Maybe I'll make the tank in the Horizon when we're feeling like making things we want to smash or drive over." That could be really fun, and since it's in a safe space, just good to get it all out. With her parents though he nods, he kind of gets that. Only his dad did believe in him. He was lucky that way.

"Not sure my mother would've approved of me becoming a criminal, but I do think she would have approved of me following my heart no matter what places that led. Hard to say though, she died when I was six."

[princessvegas]

"You're still the biggest fish to me," she teases gently, pinching his cheek. She actually thinks it's not a great idea for any of the Summoned to make a name for themselves in this world, that they should all blend in and just get by. Attention from the public, from the merchant class, from the city guards, it all leads to attention from the government. And that scares Julie. She doesn't want eyes on the people she cares about, and especially not on herself. It's bad enough that they're already easy targets, but with it turning out that some of them have a special connection with the Singularity... she can't help but think of Relena.

The Summoned will never be people to those who bring them here. They're resources to be used, at best.

"Yeah, we had the 'exterminate a whole race' war, too. More than one throughout history, I suppose, but about fifty years before I was born, there was a war that was so big, practically every country had a stake in it. World War 2. My country was on the right side of history for that one. We got to be the good guys." Kind of. Even Julie knows it was more complicated than that, but she can't currently be assed to think about that or recall anything other than America, fuck yeah!.

She's quiet for a minute after he says his mom died. Julie almost never talks about her parents, not in detail. But she is realizing at this moment that it's getting hard to remember anything except those final days. She doesn't want her past to slip through her fingers; it's already been completely erased except in her memories. If she loses those, then it's like it all happened for nothing.

"My parents died on the same day," she finally says before draining the rest of her glass. "I'm sure they thought of me as a let-down."

[itookashot]

Jesper laughs and puts his hand over his heart. Over the dress he's wearing that was intentionally mirrored after her look. "Aw, thank you. I can swim with the best of them with your support." Even if the hunters wouldn't let him work with them in the start. They probably would now that he's proven his competence, but it turns out he is fine for now, making things and surviving day to day.

The truth is he doesn't really want that much attention either. He makes his trinkets and he volunteers for things when they come up, but that is more to get himself out there and lose his hyper energy. Jesper is a career criminal, and despite the fact Ketterdam mostly was run by criminals and they all knew it, it was all within reason. Reputations were one thing, getting the attention of the authorities were another. He is content with where he is in terms of Cadens. Getting famous would just get all the eyes.

"Wow, a world war, with America only being one giant country, that must have been huge." It's good to hear though that her country was on the side of not-genocide. "The Fjerdans are real bastards. No one is really going to help fight them off though, which is a bad idea, considering I doubt they'd stop at conquering one other country." Jesper is positive that as long as Grisha exist, they will try to kill them, in any place they're born. Ravka is the obvious first step.

He knows bringing up parents can be a tense conversation. It used to be for him. He used to feel grief just thinking about his mother. Opening his mouth and putting words to her only happened after he relived memories and had others come along with. It hurt because she was beautiful and wonderful and maybe most people think good things about their dead parents when they are six, but he still thinks it's true. Julie doesn't sound like she had the same experience.

"I'm sorry you had to go through that." Both parents at the same time. He knows some bad shit went down in her world, she's told him bits and pieces. "They were wrong if they thought that. You're Julie, you're the best."

[princessvegas]

"America had the biggest, strongest, richest military in the world," she says. "We fought a lotta wars, and most of 'em were pretty bullshit on our part. But World War 2 was the last time any battles were fought on our turf. But we didn't need war. Everythin' was shit in our world anyway. And then countries sort of stopped existin'."

It gives her an odd feeling, talking about the pros and cons of her home. She knows that, in the grand scheme of things, Americans in her time had it better than basically anyone else ever. Only a few countries were better off. And that American propaganda machine had been working on her since she was a toddler; she was taught a lifetime of national exceptionalism, that she was lucky enough to be from the greatest culture in the history of humanity. Having all of that undone in the blink of an eye was hard, and now she is separated from it forever, so she wants to love it. Love the only place she ever knew until Abraxas.

She shakes her head a little, folding her hands together. "Nah, they were right. To them, I was a let-down. But I never would have wanted to be what woulda made 'em proud. That was never me. The only thing we ever both wanted for me was to not worry about money, and the only way that happened for me was for money to stop existin' for a while."

If society hadn't fallen apart, she doesn't know that she'd even be here. She thinks she would probably still be back in Kansas.

[itookashot]

"Your country is just constantly fascinating to hear about. Sam and Dean and some of the others lived in America, but in different versions of them, right?" Meaning structure is the same, apparently main parts of them are the same, but what happened to her world hadn't happened everywhere. Jesper does think it's interesting that multiple versions of her America exist, but it also sounds extraordinary in the way she explains it.

"Technically there's a second version of mine, one in which I was friends with a Saint. I didn't get to learn much about it because she left. Alina Starkov." She was hot too. He liked her, she had fire. Nothing like the Alina he's heard about in the stories though. It was strange to be shaken by someone who was basically a fairytale, but fun too. It's the only time he's seen that though. He wonders how many more there are.

He's not going to argue with her, she knows her parents better, if that's what they wanted, that's what they wanted. He nods in understanding. Parents can want all kinds of things for their children, but they can't actually live their lives for them. "I feel like I'd miss money, I love money." It's important here, as it always is. Who is he without money? Would he still collect it in the apocalypse? Possibly. "Money and merchants are what ran my life before this. What exactly did you trade instead of coin?"

[princessvegas]

"Sorta. I mean, it gets real weird tryin' to figure it out, 'cause some of us, everythin' was the same until one specific time. Some of us always had somethin' different, like magic or demons or whatever, but a lot of big stuff matched up real close. Like Sam and Dean, their worlds had the same cultures and basic history as mine, but then the differences made huge changes in the timeline. Like, for Sam and Wanda and everyone else from their world, they had magic and superheroes and aliens and shit, like a comic book. And for them, all of that lead to the blink-y thing they talk about, where half the universe just disappeared." She almost wants to make a chalkboard to better illustrate where the timelines branch. "For them, that happened in the year 2018. Then they all came back to life a few years later. In my world, it was 2020 when Trips got out. 99% of people and animals died, or somethin' like that. But our folks ain't comin' back."

It's confusing and it's hard, and it makes her furious sometimes. That there's a universe where these things can just be undone. That they get reset buttons, and she never will. There's no justice. In their world, they got the satisfaction, they got to kill the bad guy, didn't they? And no vengeful God rained fire down on them for just trying to survive.

Fuck that old witch in Boulder.

"We didn't need money anymore. Money is just paper and metal. In my time, it usually wasn't even that, it was just numbers in a computer somewhere. We needed supplies, food and water and stuff. And in Vegas, we had everythin'. Vegas was one of the richest places in the world 'fore the superflu. Think of all the most expensive food and liquor and everythin' else you can dream of. Whatever it is, the nicest, best version. That's what Vegas was, all the time, and they had enough of it for millions of people at a time. People travelled the world to visit Vegas. In the end, all that stuff was just sittin' there, and there were only a few thousand of us. Only a few hundred of us had permission to take whatever we wanted whenever we wanted it, but everyone else got their stuff without money too. They just had jobs and didn't get to go pick it out themselves." She mimes pointing at multiple invisible items. "But me, I got to be a princess, basically. I'd just choose clothes and shoes and everythin' else I wanted, and I could have it. Stuff that, before, woulda cost thousands and thousands of dollars. I'd drink two thousand dollar champagne for breakfast. Oh, two thousand dollars there is like... mm, a hundred gold? Hundred fifty? Somethin' like that."

[itookashot]

Jesper listens to her explaining the differences in their worlds and yet somehow similar landscapes, in terms of country and all, and the names of the states, he's heard plenty of them. Some of it was explained to him at the 4th of July party too, when he just rolled with the red, white and blue motif, and learned about America. He does remember hearing about the blink, but didn't know how many people died all at once.

"Half a universe? And they could just snap it back? Fuck. Not sure I've heard of anyone getting a redo like that." Not that is downplays the trauma of whatever happened, he knows that there was a gap of time in-between, half the universe still did die. "I know Wanda and Sam got screwed over by it, but still." Imagine being able to reverse the worst thing that ever happened. It must have been something wild.

And he knows that Julie's world definitely didn't get that, so he would see that as something kind of rude. Unfair. The universe is unfair though. Some things can't be reversed.

"Ahhhh okay that makes sense. The things you need to survive matter more than the coins." Jesper would probably have adapted to that easily too, even if he missed the coins that became his entire life. He's good at surviving, always has been. He smiles at her. "Princess Julie. Milady." He playfully bows toward her. He'd curtsey but he'd have to get up and maybe will fall over on his platform shoes. "Do you ever miss that part of it? Not the rest."

[princessvegas]

"Yeah, but it's not the same," she says, and her voice is low, steady. She doesn't want to minimize what her friends went through, but it simply isn't the same. The people they lost for those years simply stopped existing. They didn't slowly die in their beds, gasping for breath, surrounded by their other family members doing the same. They never saw bloated, rotting corpses of infants in the crib, of dozens of people in churches who died begging for help from a God who didn't give a shit about them. Those who survived the snap weren't left standing amongst the dead, helpless and alone and with questionable access to supplies. Half the population gone is so much less than almost all.

Every time she's told her story to someone from Sam's world, they immediately shut the fuck up. Julie and Nadine are forever doomed to always win a "worst world" competition.

The pain of having recently been isolated again begins to register again, at the periphery of her consciousness. Without noticing, her face has completely fallen. She could swear she hears that roaring chaos again, like an echo in her head.

Without Steven's intervention, or any movement from Julie, her glass entirely refills, and she throws the entire thing back in a short chug. "I miss that part every fuckin' day," she responds as she swallows. "This, this place is like that. 'Cept with less people, and I didn't put in some of the more extreme stuff. The whole casino, the fight pit. I like it better without that stuff anyway. But this is how I lived, for those months."