#axema

The mansion is in a state that it honestly has not been in since the introduction of its new tenants, a state of silence.  People are resting, many heads rest against their pillows and finally catch their 40 winks of sleep.  It can almost be peaceful and relaxing for once, especially so with how quiet activity has been as of lately.  At least until the silence is broken by a calm, narrative voice.

“You four have been invited to the underground palace of the dwarven king, despite little to no experience with the surface dwellers, the architecture is ornate and detailed.  Symbols are carved into the pillars of unknown origin, most claim it was a remnant of the first dwarven king’s reign, and a beautifully constructed fountain drawing from their underground reservoir to add to the royal presentation of this palace.”  The light-blue skinned woman began to set the scene for the rest of the beings at the table, “You are escorted by an entourage of guards towards the stout king, his beard messy with food previously eaten.  His eyes fixed into a glare, and his dwarven jowls quiver as he speaks.”

Before her, a group of four listen intently as she paints the scene they find themselves in.  A look of awe upon the face of a purple-hued and horned tiefling as each and every word sinks into her head, a wide grin of glee adorned on the smaller, red-headed halfling that sat next to her, the mass hulking figure of the former ifrit guardsmen that sat between them and the last red-headed, musclebound woman who both leaned in closely to listen to every single word.  The blue-skinned machinesmith continued, this time doing her best to impersonate dwarven royalty.

“Do ye all know why aye summoned ya here?”  Her voice acting clearly could use some work.

“My character quickly steps forth, ‘Oh Underking, ruler of this beautiful underground city, we have heard the rumors of a halt in the advances of your kingdom underground!’”  The response was quick from the Tiefling, “She then gestures to herself, making this as grandiose as possible! ‘I will gladly take it upon myself to seek what advances we could acquire and help to benefit us in our humble mining kingdom!’”

“Wow, good job Lucyle, you’re uhh, pretty good!”  The muscular woman commends her tiefling friend.

“Mina, no, shhh, we’re supposed to be in character!”  Lucyle responds in a scolding manner.

“Alright, alright… I’m speaking out of character here!  Lucyle you did a good job!” Mina responds again with praise.

Lucyle quickly buries her face into her hand, already growing tired of the innocent praise.

“Natalia, c'mon, tell her she’s gotta stay in character!”  Asking like a child to their mother when their sibling so much as touches their stuff.

Natalia couldn’t help but smile, it was nice enough that Lucyle had stepped down as Game Master for her to take over and let her tell her own story and see how her new friends would handle it.  Nicer when she realized how deeply invested they had already gotten into the story, especially whenever she began to narrate a coming addition to the story.

“Lucyle, I don’t mind Mina offering commendations occasionally.  She’s not interrupting the story.”  She chuckled lightly, shaking her head from side to side at Lucyle’s antics.

“Mah guy saunters on over, bowin’ before the elven king and says, ‘Howdy, royalty, I’mma let y’all know that the same goes here for me.  I wanna help y’all deal with yer water issues.  It ain’t like I got much else to do ‘round here anyhow.’”  She could use a bit of work on her in-character details, it was always hard for her to let go of the way she spoke.

“Calsira! Are you even TRYING?!”  Lucyle would practically tug on her horns.

“Hey! I ain’t flirtin’ with him this time, ain’t I?”  Calsira crossed her arms over her chest.  “I’ve been gettin’ better ‘bout roleplayin’ my guy.”

Lucyle manages to mutter out an “I guess” before she relents and lets her continue with the roleplay.  A huff before a massive pout covers her face.

Mina, finding this amusing, nudges the Ifrit next to her.

“Hey, check it out.” She quips, barely managing to stifle her chuckle.  “She’s all pouty now, Axema.”

Axema tries not to laugh himself but, she just looks so ridiculous with how hard this power pout is.  The ifrit ends up laughing himself as he covers his mouth with one of his massive hands.  Natalia, who sat across the table from him, couldn’t help but smile.  Axema’s smiles were always contagious with her.

“Man, I wish we could get Moriko or Joey in this at least.  I’m sure they’d have REALLY good characters.”  Another remark from Mina.

“Maybe next time we can hog tie them into this game too!”  Calsira then winks in Mina’s direction, “I’ll make sure to get the rope if y’all know what I mean.”

A heavy, hard player’s manual is thrown right at her with no effort needed whatsoever.  Calsira almost crumpling under the weight of the book after letting out a loud, and short grunt.

“HEY!”  She flails around on the ground, trying to push the book off of her with what little breath she still has.

“I’m not letting you be that flirtatious without consequences.”  Mina crosses her arms, slightly annoyed, “Moriko is a pure maiden… who happens to have vermin as her besties.  Maybe that’s why she still associates with you.”

Axema can’t help but laugh again, even if that joke was a little mean, Calsira has been egging her on too much.

“Axema!” Natalia responds in a serious tone, the anchor to his outbursts such as these.

“Erm, sorry.” Axema quickly tries to compose himself, his cheeks flushed in embarrassment as he rubs the back of his head.

Natalia only nods to his statement, as Mina now shifts her joking to her best friend.

“Ooooh, got yourself in the dog house now, buddy.”  Mina snickers, she enjoys it too much when others get in trouble.

Lucyle’s mood lightens slightly as she sees the chemistry between Natalia and Axema, a child-like smile spreading.  She couldn’t lie about not shipping them super hard, even if it was weird that she shipped her friends.  At the very least, they were super cute.

“Can we get back to our game now?  I really want to hear the rest of the story Natalia’s got for us.” No longer upset, she hopes they can at the very least continue.

“Of course, is everyone ready?”  Natalia asks the group before her.

“Yes!”  They all say in unison, clearly excited for the story she has set for them.

Valentine's Day, what a wonderful opportunity for those in the mansion to give gifts to each other on the basis that “Oh the school kids do it, we can too.”  An excuse to share their love for each other, even if it's just leaning towards platonic love.  An excuse for Mina and Axema to pace around in the garden, wondering what they could give as gifts for their crushes at the time.  What better way to figure it out than pacing and bouncing ideas off of each other.

“What about stuffed animals?”  The muscular woman started things off with a simple idea.

“No, no, Mina, Natalia would be disappointed in a stuffed animal.  That or she wouldn't understand it, we have to make something, that way it comes from the heart.”  Quipped the taller, and broader, Ifrit man, his hair up in flames as always.  As he said the name, “Natalia,” his hair flared a bit brighter.  It was an almost regular occurrence, so it did not startle Mina in the slightest.

“Ah, crap, you're right.  But I can't make anything, I got these hands that were meant for crushing skulls!  These things trying to be delicate is like… a bull in a china shop!”

Hearing Mina's words caused Axema's hair to dim slightly, she had a point about not only her hands but his own as well.  How could such hands, that are made for destruction, be used to create something?  Perhaps he was wrong, perhaps they couldn't make something and the personal aspect of it all lost in store bought brands.  No!  It can't be this way, there has to be another solution.

“Mina! We can't give up like that, we have to keep trying there will always be something we can do!”  His voice rang throughout the garden, and possibly multiple corners of the mansion as well.  He forgot to use his inside voice again.

Yet, he was met with silence.  Had he struck a nerve with Mina?  Did he say the wrong thing to one of his best friends?  Does he need to apologize?!  He didn't mean to hurt her feelings, as he opened his mouth to apologize he was met with her booming voice.

“You're RIGHT!  We can do it!  To hell with our strong, crushing hands!” Mina was thoroughly convinced now, which wasn't hard to do at all. One could probably convince her to eat literal garbage if worded the right way, “And I got just the idea!”

“An idea?  Tell me, Mina, what is it?”  Axema paused, looking down at his friend.

“We MAKE HOMEMADE CHOCOLATES FOR THEM!  Trust me, they do it in Japan all the time.  Those weird Japanese cartoons at least did it.  And cartoons are like, really accurate aren't they?”  Again, not the brightest bulb in the shed.

“Homemade chocolates?  That has enough sweetness to it that it could work alongside flowers as a gift… yet not too difficult for our hands to make.”  The ifrit raised his hand to his chin, deep in thought about this, weighing his options out in his head.

“And it's Japanese!  Moriko would love it!  At least I think she will, oh shit, what if I offend her by doing this?  WAIT, I CAN'T DO THIS! IT'S CHOCOLATE, SHE'S A FOX PERSON, AAAAARGH!”  The barbarian woman tugs at her hair in frustration, how could she be so stupid?

“Why not just make white chocolate?  It's not really chocolate.”  A much gentler voiced squeezed its way through the louder duo.  A soft hint of a french accent sprinkled over her words, who else could it be but the resident grandma, Juliet?  At least by the age standards, that's what she was.  Physically, she looked to be an ambiguously twenty year old woman, in reality she was a millennium old vampire, who has yet to catch up to the current age of words.

“Granny?! Oh, gods, how much of that did you catch?”  Mina's eyes shut tightly, one eye slowly opening to see the vampire walk into the garden to join them.

“Just enough to know what you two are planning to do.  And I think it's a crackerjack idea, chocolates are fun to make, and are fun to receive, my friends.”  A fanged smile spreads across her face, teaching how to make desserts was always something she enjoyed doing.

“I agree!”  The ifrit blared, his hair flaring up once more.

“Alright, okay, white chocolate, not real chocolate, got it,”  Mina mumbled to herself before another question was raised in the, rather thick, skull of hers.  “But what about if we mess up?  They'll HATE us for it.”

The ifrit's head raced with bad outcomes, oh no, he had never thought about a bad outcome with the chocolates!  What if they mistake salt for sugar?  What if the chocolate is too bitter?!  What if NATALIA DIDN'T LIKE CHOCOLATE?

“MINA'S RIGHT, THEY WILL HATE US FOR BAD CHOCOLATE!  WHY HAVE I NEVER CONSIDERED THIS?!”  His skull was just as dense as Mina's, his intelligence at times dampened by his wisdom.

No need to fear, though, Grandma Juliet always has an answer for these sorts of situations.  She wasn't one to come ill-prepared after all, she didn't want them thinking this way about, well, anything.

“Mina, Axema, please stop for a moment and think for a second.  I want you both to try and imagine Moriko and Natalia in a situation where they hate you over chocolate.”

As they both paused to think about it, it did seem kind of silly.  Their crushes getting angry at them over something as little as messing up a chocolate recipe.  They should do this more often, it makes things less confusing and more reasonable. If only they could find the time to do it.

“Besides, if anything, we'll just put them in the freezer and I promise to you they'll be perfect.  Nothing could disappoint someone you care about if you put the time and effort into doing it.”  While that's not entirely true, Juliet knew these two needed some positive encouragement.  After all, centuries upon centuries of learning helped her realize that long ago.

The both of them knew Juliet was right, why would they think that their crushes would hate them over this?  They knew that in the end, they would, at least, appreciate the effort these two put into getting out of their comfort zones.

“I can't wait to see the look on Moriko's face when she sees this.  Hah, did you know that sometimes when she blushes, it seeps through her fur?  It's so cute seeing her turn bright red in her true form...” Mina slipped into a daydream about her kitsune crush, someone stop her before it's too late.

“Maybe I'll get to see Natalia smile when I give her this.”  Axema's hair flared MUCH brighter than before after that, causing Juliet to jump back startled by its suddenness.

“Well I-I'm glad you two are now very much behind this.  Please, follow me, I'm sure we'll be able to quickly prepare your gifts before they come back home.  It's simple enough to follow, I can teach you both at once.”  If only Juliet knew what that entailed.

The two muscleheads looked at each other for a moment, before they turned back to Juliet.

“YES, that's perfect!  Thank you!”  The both yelled in unison, which caused Juliet's ears to ring slightly.  She almost forgot that something like that could still happen, was she really going on that much in the years?

As soon as the image came on screen, as soon as the chair that did not seem to fit with the strange setting appeared, he knew what was going to happen.  He knew that she was going to appear, there was something in him that just wanted to punch the projector to escape from her torment.  He knew she was going to appear, he knew it was mere seconds before she'd appear on the screen.  Before it would take Joey and Moriko both to pull him away from the room in an effort to stop the meeting from going belly side up.  Then it happened, then the monster that has utterly ruined his life from his first day meeting her appeared on screen, stretching her lips out to smile wide in an effort to unnerve her.

“I'm going to kill her, monster, devil, witch!”  The insults began to fire in his head, already fuming at the sight of her.

He remembered each and everything she had done to him and seeing her again only reopened old wounds.  She forced him to kill his friends, his old comrades, his brothers in arms, all while inside him forcing his body to move.  Forcing him, to say things he would never think of saying, forcing him to be banished from the realm he called home. Then, to further damage him, she took away most of his intelligence, making him a bumbling idiot.  She made him believe his name was “George,” and she made his life hell.  There she was, speaking, saying words in that voice that made him want to shatter bones.

“Don't ever go near my friends,”  He thought to himself, “Don't you dare touch them!  Don't do to them what you did to me, if I so much as catch you near them, you're dead.  If you try to so much as take what I have away from me again, I will make you sorry.”

He didn't notice he was grinding his teeth at this point in his frustration.  He didn't notice that the room had gone considerably hotter, he didn't notice his hands balling into tight fists.  The formal robes he had on would mean nothing the second his anger takes over, ruining one of the only things he had from his old home.  The home she took him away from.  The home she forced him out of.  The position he finds himself in, the way the elf keeps talking down to his friend, the position Natalia found herself forced into in the underground.  There were so many things she was responsible for.

With how consumed in anger he had gotten, he didn't realize his hair had flared up into a massive flame.  At this point, it would cause the ceiling to catch fire, the entire building would burn down due to his anger and he didn't even know it.

“I am tired of you ruining my life, monster, and I-”  He was interrupted.

A hand had gently placed itself atop one of his fists, and he had been thrown off course.  It didn't happen immediately, the calming effect that is.

“I don't want you to do to her what you did to me.”  His inner voice, though still angry, was beginning to lose its steam.

Gradually, his hair began to lose it's vigor, beginning to settle down as he looked down to see who it was.  He was so blinded by his arrogance, he didn't notice Natalia get up out of her chair.  She was back first against the wall, her hand atop his fist, and it seems like she noticed his anger and tried quickly to defuse it.

“I don't want...”  He was slowly losing track of what he was angry about, he was not expecting her to do this at all.

His hair was now back to its normal flame, his cheeks flushed pink, his face blushing brightly.  His teeth slowly coming to halt, no longer grinding up against the other, his fists not as tight as they were when he first saw the monster. His gaze turning from the screen over towards the “smaller” samsaran, as his eyes widened upon seeing her.  Even in his intelligence deficient state, he saw her as he did now.  A flower, a flower that grew in the darkness that was the horrors around him.  A flower that somehow kept herself well away from the choking roots of the weeds, finding enough nourishment to survive and growing in this corrupted plane.