the leaper's end

Surely he could rest a bit? There were only a few chapters left. He didn’t catch himself reading the same sentence all over again for a few minutes now. Another enormous yawn, and Elliot decided to rest the book across his face for a bit. It was a bit heavy, but blocked out the gentle light perfectly. Not a few seconds later, he was already asleep.

First that fellow on the bus, and now this boy...

His shoulders are not nearly as nice as she had once perceived, but his hands are still calloused, skilled, and of some interest.

Remarkable really how gummy heated glass can be. It stretches and bunches and balls and flops over in such a languid fashion that it seems far more like a lazy creature from the deep ocean than nothing more than silica, soda ash, and limestone melted together. This he tools skillfully as it cools, seeking to work it as though he were some glass taffy puller.

"Well, of course," comes a curiously sheepish admission, "I would want want you to buy something. I'm just a humble artist, after all. I've got to lure in any prospective customer I can, hm? Just talk and talk until I've got a handful of your money on this side of the bench after you've finally made a purchase, before you even know you're making it. Because every single person who comes into the shop might leave thinking that they've made the difference in this artist's life, that he can pay his bills and put dinner on the table tonight, and it's then that person realizes this artist can do those things because they gave him the means to do so... and so, I benefit from receiving your patronage and you leave satisfied with the feeling that you've done someone in the world a favor..."

How quickly his expression and tone changes as he trails off! If one could look a subtle sort of devil, perhaps that would be name enough for the quietly scheming look he gives her.

God, how he hated such needless showmanship. Ironic, admittedly, as he put on his own dramatic performances nearly every day of his life, but at least the onlookers never reached that great a number. Honestly; making a show of something that could just as well be created

How much time is wasted by these poor people? How many times has someone found themselves watching this charlatan take eons to create a single piece when he could finish up much quicker without all of the attention? Even though it took him longer this way, it was hardly art. It was trite entertainment. Break imagined the pieces created “on stage” were less detailed than the others as well.

Grassy gaze flicks up towards the stranger's face, and some unspoken consideration seizes the corners of his mouth and curls them into a smile with invisible hands. Honeyed words drip from his own lips, Break, and so the taste of your saccharined comments does not bother him. For buried deep beneath each resin'd layer of sweetness the core may very well be rotten, and there may yet be bitterness secret to all but himself.

"Well, I am a crafter of things, so I would think that of myself, yes."

A fair brow quirks at Break's observations, and it gives the amusement purchase enough to keep a handhold on the blonde's smile.

Idle chatter falls in drops from his lips as he studies her over his craft, from the safety of his bench across the table. That pleasant distance between himself and others, that no man's land of niceties and propriety, is a pretty little thing indeed and not a one he would wish to be free from. When trying to grasp at the unknown, when seeking to feel it out -- whatever it might be, of course -- one always requires some space to move, to maneuver, to keep oneself safe.

"Impress you? And why would I want to do that?"

Miranda flutters her way over to him, her long dress trailing behind her, and her heals clicking sharply on the studio floor. She sits, and it is graceful and impatience all wrapped into one red package with a bow.

"Indeed I would. Please proceed with your-" she pauses, not even sure what sort of store she has found herself in. The proprietor, with his well balanced shoulders, and his smile that is a polite lie, was far more interesting. "-art." She finishes as a poor place holder for whatever it is this man does that callouses his fingers, and makes her heel itch as if there is something sharp suddenly stuck in it.

Reveille may very well be home and comfort to countless curious folk, and yet to find a woman quite as colorful as she could be nothing short of a stroke of luck. Whether or not that fortune be kind or amiss he cannot yet tell, but to riddle it out would always be his favorite moves of the game. The woman with red hair seats herself across from him, a powerful presence moving to join her where she rests. That sort of straight-forward approach a man like the glassmith can appreciate; for one so committed to tracing arcs and skirting the subject, he needs find some supplement with which to counter her unsettlingly direct gaze.

"Are y'interested in glass, miss? Or did y'come in on a whim?"

Tendrils of sweat-slick hair plaster themselves to his forehead, only encouraged to move by the insistent back of his hand, and even then, they discover some other similarly ridiculous pattern with which to hold themselves. 

Either way, this deserved some investigation. I’d like to say he pushed himself into the store in a nice, careful sort of way as he normally did, but his intrigue and utter lack of a better way to spend his time avoided him from doing so. At least no one fell over. But alas, no matter how close he assumed he was to the source of these people’s amazement, nothing seemed worth the small crowd of people.

All he could make out was the figure of who he presumed was the cause of the commotion, moving some sort of equipment around as he, well. As he did whatever it was that he was doing. And the smell in this place… well, it certainly wasn’t anything he was used to.

Take, for instance, the youth just to the front and left of him. Tall. Lanky. Not a strong build. Dusting of freckles. Crooked nose. Unfortunate spectacles. In severe need of a haircut. Nervous eyes darting about as though he were a caged rodent but always returning to gaze at the tools resting upon the workbench. He, like so many others in the shop, would be held seemingly entranced by those pretty little trinkets hanging in the window, and their flashes of rich color twinkling in the sunlight were far more beacons than kitschy novelties.

And he, sitting among them, might hide in plain sight.

Broken from his reverie by a comment from the crowd, the glassmith hazards a quick glance away from the molten glass and towards some curious patron... and, of course, by curious he meant more the fellow's appearance than any sort of glint of interest in his eye--

Red. Red. That red. And yet, not that red.

Oswald opens his eyes. The streets of Reveille are familiar as always, if too bright in their reflection of the morning sun. He sighs and slips his hands from the pages of his book. 

When he looks up, someone is watching him. No—someone has been watching him—or perhaps glancing at the map tacked to the back—yet it seems natural, an extension of a dream where anything can be. Oswald narrows his eyes. Still, the figure is indistinct, and it’s too early to reach for his glasses. 

Nostalgia is that sentimentality for rays of past sunshine, glimmering with the fondness of one's own memories. What be the name, then, for that which one cannot recall? The word slips away and drags easily a smile from the corner of his mouth, spilling forth as straw from a scarecrow.

There is a new shop, or perhaps it is proper to say that it is simply new to her, for Miranda isn’t sure how long it has been open. Isn’t sure if she has simply been passing it by for a long time now.

Regardless, she is a woman who appreciates the fine, frivolous things that money can buy, so a shop she has not visited is simply unacceptable, and must be amended.

What sort of name should he put to its particular shade, its weight, its texture -- all of which things, up to and extending infinitely beyond this moment, go yet unknown. No fire rekindles itself in his impassive eyes; the spark for which he searches will not ignite.

He would not call it beautiful. beautiful. It is not that red--.

(Although, the suggestion of something stable, something staying... would it be so unwelcome?)

Grassy eyes fall upon some dark and brooding figure slumbering on the furthest seat -- dark and brooding if only because that seems the appropriate way to characterize him.

(But why?)

Congratulations, Jay. You’ve been accepted for the role of Jack Vessalius. Please send us an ask from your Jack blog within 48 hours.

Mod Geta invited Ryoku to look over your application. She feels like Jack’s sense of hollowness is more compounded on this application than anything else, which is good for him. But it’s interesting to see him motivated in the sense that he owns his own shop, without really having a drive for it. She thinks it will be very interesting to see what sort of drives he develops in the RP -if any- and where they will take him. Mod Geta enjoys the idea of Jack being a glass blower, as it’s truly a beautiful craft just as music box making he does in canon. We look forward to seeing you on our dash.