come_sailaway | 10th Contraption: Mawwiage

Entry tags:

10th Contraption: Mawwiage

Who: John Watson, Johnny Summer, and César Salazar with Rich Goranski, Fio, and Honoria Crabb AND YOU Oh god why are weddings like this
What: The throuple getting married by... the Captain?!
When: December 11th at 7pm
Where: John's
Warnings: I believe in us! But for now, nothing.

SEATING

John's has been transformed, the seating up front rearranged in rows towards the center dias with an aisle down the middle, the piano moved off to one side. The buffet for later can be seen off to the other. Decorations taken from Spirit Halloween appear here and there–flowers taken from cavalera flower crowns, sun and moon candlestick holders from the tarot collection, festively colored tablecloths draped down the walls like curtains or banners. A sign near the entrance says "seat yourself", although the front row on one side is reserved with a ribbon across the backs.

What can't be seen is who is officiating. Or the husbands, but at least that part makes sense. The dais is empty.

THE CEREMONY

As one of the few traditions in this wedding, music announces the start of the ceremony. Rich strolls in first, trying to look professional even if he’s clearly shaking a bit as he holds the small pillow with the rings laid on it. At least he’s dressed quite smartly, Johnny ensuring his red suit is wrinkle free and his cuff links are set in place. Fio, in a winged black dress and flowery headdress, follows after the ring bearer, adorning the path with paper petals as she moves along.

The first husband to be down the aisle is none other than Johnny, in a smart charcoal grey suit with a goldenrod pocketsquare, gold jewelry, and a wreath of orange blossoms on his head; and accompanied by Honoria Crabb in her perfectly tailored black tuxedo, worn with black gloves and a white bow tie. Watson and César take up the rear, arms linked together. César is wearing an equally fancy suitcoat with his tie held in place with a ruby and silver tie pin, and Watson is wearing an officer’s dress uniform, with the sword and without the helmet, and also his good cane. All three husbands-to-be are wearing green carnation boutonnières.

AFTER PARTY

It's time to eat, dance, and party!

The seating has been rearranged for sitting at tables around the "dance" floor. Food from Windjammer has been placed on some tables for a buffet. There’s a selection of fancy cheeses and crackers, sushi, premade sandwiches, and salad with dressings on the side. For dessert, to one side there’s a table with cupcakes, cookies, and chocolates arranged in a heart. On the bar are a couple bowls of punch (including one explicitly labeled as non-alcoholic) made by Johnny ahead of time, because he's been forbidden to bartend his own wedding, much to his deep chagrin.

There’s a space set just off the dancefloor for musicians who wish to perform, the usual John’s piano (bribed into behaving with a whole pan of beef brisket from the buffet) off to one side.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"Gideon!" Erin's excited call starts a good ten feet away and her voice continues as she approaches, a spring in her step. "Gideon my love, my darling, O Gideon, Patron Saint of Gains, She Who Flexes, Gideon O flame of my heart, give me chocolate or I will eat it out of your fingers I swear to god."

Unspoken: where have you been??

"Erin!" Gideon beams as she sees someone she knows, eagerly playing along. "My beloved, blissful beauty, oh knife-wielding whimsical wench! You shouldn't offer to eat anything from my fingers or I might hold you to it!"

She scoops some of the remaining heart onto a plate to present to Erin, leaning against the table as she does so. "I keep missing you at the bar! Who else is going to help make sure I end up in the right cabin when I can't see straight?"

Erin takes the chocolate with a wide grin. She had, before, observed to Bash that queers across realities on this ship seem to share the same three jokes, but.

Well, she really can't help herself.

"Gideon, if you're seeing straight something has gone terribly wrong!"

This done Erin moves to stand next to the jacked lass so that she can gesture at the dance floor. "Speaking of, surprised you're not out there. Look, right there -" Erin directs Gideon's attention towards Crabb " - that there's Crabb, my fierce flower. Dance cards with her are a rare treasure, though you might have to reach deep into your soul and find your one extremely polite brain cell. She's not used to being this hot. Yet."

That gets a laugh out of Gideon, before her attention's drawn to the dancing. It takes a moment to spot Crabb, but Gideon nods in approval. "Nicely done! Gotta enjoy her while you can, because as soon as she meets me, it's all over Erin. All your women will be mine. But it's fine, I'm generous, I can share."

But uh... she pops a chocolate in her mouth and mentions casually as she can. "Don't know a damn thing about dancing. Didn't have much of that on the Ninth. I've got great footwork elsewhere but that's still a mystery to me."

Now, it must be made clear. Erin doesn't know that Palamedes and Gideon are friends. But based on her talks with both they're from the same culture, and if Erin knows anything about noble houses it's that they're addicted to dick-measuring contests.

And so:

"Guess I'll have to tell Mister Sextus that the great champion of the Ninth was undone by the prospect of learning a new skill." Erin sighs dramatically. "Alas. And with a friend nearby who might teach too."

Gideon just grins at Erin. "My sweet, my rose, my most wonderful pain in the ass, if you're the one offering me dancing lessons, I'll take them right now. But otherwise, I'm not going out there to make my first introduction to your smoking hot girlfriend be me stepping on both her feet and then shoulder-checking the newly wed throuple. How am I supposed to spirit her away from you then?"

She reaches for a cupcake and points at Erin with her other hand. "I'll tell you what though, I'd love to see ol' SexPal out there tearing up a rug. Whatever the Sixth considers dancing, I want to see it from a safe distance."

Congratulations Gideon Nav, you've thrown Erin off her game. She hears that nickname and covers her mouth; it's not enough.

Nowhere near enough.

Erin's gotta grab the table for support as she dies laughing, helplessly crying 'SexPal??' every time she has enough air to form words.

Gideon just beams, glad that she's saved Mister Sextus' nickname for just the right moment. You can't just deploy a gem like that one off the bat. You have to wait for the right moment and then strike.

Erin's dying throes give Gideon plenty of time to eat her cupcake while Erin can barely breathe through it. She waits for Erin's to be on the edge of recovering so she doesn't end up responsible for her first death via jokes. "I got stuck with a vow of silence so I spent the first weeks making games to amuse myself. All the other nicknames sucked but that one was perfect in every way."

"I can - god - I can see it in my mind's eye, y'all just, you just, you roll into a strip club and there he is reading a book, tossing money on stage without looking up, and by the time y'all leave the dancers and bouncers have unionized 'cause one chatted him up -"

Erin tries to focus on breathing.

Well THAT gets a honking laugh out of Gideon and it's her turn to lose her composure for a bit. He would, wouldn't he? She can see it just as Erin can, Pal with book cracked, legs crossed, and barely dressed ladies all sitting on either side just chatting about the power of a union or whatever.

"He would!" She just laughs, rocking back on her heels. "Fuck, he would, and he'd have talked two of 'em into going through necro training because it's all about manipulating dead stiffs and they're used to manipulating live stiffies!"

"I've been to a show like that!" Erin's howling with laughter again. "A goth burlesque show where the lasses were all sexy witches! They said 'rise my minions' and everything!"

Help, she's caught in the loop!

"Oh shit really?" Gideon has been having fun with Erin so far but this is something she's got to hear (and wishes she could go to). "You know, if they had burlesque here I'd have no complaints at all! Even if it was goth burlesque, so long as it wasn't full of the nuns from back home. Once they took the tops off, all those saggy old crones would be a tripping hazard!"

"God, so, okay, so, here's, okay, I dunno if your porn mags had burlesque in 'em but honest to god it's a different experience from like a usual strip club, not least because burlesque clubs tend to have better unions. Like. So. They were - here's -"

Erin waves a hand helplessly and does her best to just breathe. Gideon is dangerously fucking hilarious.

After a solid minute and a half of holding her hand up. "Okay so, right, the whole theme was dark seductresses, so their act was a mix of stage magic and - wait, you come from a world with actual necromancers. Stage magic is sleight of hand, right, it's not like supernatural or magic-magic, it's about presentation and deception, so they're out here going like, 'behold the rewards of service to darkness' and waving these wands and BAM! Clothes explode off 'em."

"Right right right, yeah, stage magic, we've got that!" Though it's mostly used when the bone magicians are all fucked up and the cavs bring out some slight of hand or shock and awe to keep their enemies distracted long enough to bomb from orbit or something. It's not in a lot of the stories but it shows up in a few.

What hasn't shown up is the idea of using slight of hand to explode clothes off someone and that just gets a big rolling laugh out of Gideon, utterly delighted and kind of disappointed that others aren't doing that. "Oh my god, fantastic! I don't have many reasons to get naked myself but if I could make my clothes blow off of me, then I'd do it all the time. That would be my #1 seduction technique."

And she strikes a pose, pointing two fingerguns at Erin. "Nice to meet you, BAM, muscle city! It'd get 'em every time!"

"You make 'em so they tear away, basically! Velcro helps, we don't have a lot of that here, but if we ever get a tailor -"

Erin pauses. Imagines Gideon pulling that trick.

"...Well I'd actually be in danger at that point, the mental image I've got going is in fact hot as fuck."

That just gets an reeeeeal big grin out of Gideon as she flexes both arms and shamelessly flirts with Erin. "Oh yeah? Then I guess we should tell the Captain to get us a tailor, because I'm not the only thing getting ripped!"

If she could pop the seams on this shirt right now, she would be the coolest person in the whole universe. But despite her flexing, the shirt doesn't rip even a little bit.

"How do you make the cheese work." Erin laughs and shakes her head. "One of these days you're gonna make a lucky lass experience what it's like to laugh while she gets off and she's gonna be blue in the face."

Gideon shrugs. Damned if she knows, but it works and that's enough right? She leans on the table, popping another chocolate in her mouth. "We both better hope I don't asphyxiate her like that, because that's a terrible first on-ship murder to have under my belt. Can't even brag about killing someone during sex if they choked laughing!"

"Can you imagine the talk after? 'Hey if anyone asks can you say you're into choking and I fucked it up '?"

Gideon cackles, barely managing to keep from choking on her food. "'Tell them I sat on your face and suffocated you but don't tell them I made a bone pun!'" She shakes her head, shoulders still heaving as she laughs. "SexPal would never let me live it down, fucking never."

"He might if you - oh wait the necro space future isn't homophobic." Erin pauses. "...Damn it that's a whole class of jokes I can't tell you 'cause they won't land. Fuck me running."

Gideon snorts. "Oh yeah that's been fun to piece together in reverse. Sounds like I got lucky ending up here instead of a bunch of other places. Too bad about the jokes, but hey, if it helps any, there's a whole class of necromancy related jokes that just don't land with anybody else here. Except the boning jokes, thank god they're good everywhere."

"Dead on arrival," Erin sighs, theatrically. "Good thing you've got Palamedes to raise them with."

(...DID WE JUST -)

Well that gets a snort out of Gideon and another double fingergun in Erin's direction. "EEEYYY!"

She's going to have to lay some of these on Palamedes later, especially since he seems to be drinking like it's the end of the world over there.

"Alright, I've got a stage to get back on, but one thing reaaaaaallll quick."

Erin directs Gideon's attention to Ruby out on the dance floor in her floofy dress. "That's Ruby Rose, who adopted me as her older sister here recently. Loves jokes, and engineering, and fairy tales. Cheese ain't her style but I bet she'd love to learn about how y'all fight in the Ninth."

Still very cheerful: "That said, if you hurt her feelings I'll fly you from the top deck like a sail and if you're very sorry about it I'll even kill you first. Seem fair?"

10th Contraption: Mawwiage

Re: After Party OTA

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)

(no subject)