See I was on the verge of breaking down. Sometimes silence can seem so loud

[blazetodefine]

[OOC: Over a year ago, I made a post with all 14 of my characters that almost reached 925 comments. I only have 8 characters now, but lets see how far that goes. :D Feel free to tag in. Multiple times with one character or with multiple chars. It's open for forever. And I know there have been a lot of posts lately but I haven't made one in over a

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THIS IS AN AWESOME ASPIRATION. *supports it*

[sophicsulphur]

Iris is looking for a snack to eat while she gets some studying done. The big fridges in the Kashtta's kitchen usually have something, so that's where she's going. Maybe she'll find an apple, or some grapes.

Instead, she finds... a man with ten glass pots lined up in front of him, and a determined aura about him. A vivid, determined aura: he's an angel. But for once, she brushes that off. She's more interested in what he's doing with all that glassware.

"Oh, hey!" she says, upon seeing the setup. "...You wouldn't happen to be an alchemist, would you? I don't usually see so much glassware in one place, except when it's us." She laughs a little at the dig at herself, though she actually means the question quite seriously.

Why thank you. :D

[despite_myrage]

Robin pauses when she enters the kitchen. He looks at her with a look that seems to say, Have you lost your mind?

It's not that he is inconsiderate of wanderers. He's... dating one after all, but he has never imagined a world where making coffee is not an ordinary part of one's day. It honestly can't be helped.

"I am not... an alchemist," Robin tells her though he has heard of them. "I'm making coffee. No one around here seems to know how to make a proper pot, and I'm honestly tired of seeing all the pour attempts that show up on the counter whenever I'm around."

Robin Rice is rather particular about his coffee. Let it be known by the world over.

[sophicsulphur]

"Oh!" she says, her smile only growing bigger. She's used to the have you lost your mind look, and it doesn't really faze her. That was the typical response back in her world, too.

"Um, can I see how it's done, too? Because I have a job working in a coffee shop pretty soon, but I'm really not all that used to coffee, or anything. So it'd be good for my job if I could get a better handle on how you make it."

She didn't really think twice about taking the job without knowing the first thing about coffee. Making things out of other things mixed together is pretty much her life. But still, any recipe can improve with a little focus and dedication.

[despite_myrage]

Robin Rice is quite accustomed to giving that look to people. It's best that it doesn't faze her, because it's likely that he'll give it to her several more times. He's British, and he's a bit of a snob, especially when it comes to coffee.

"You can," he says to her. "But it's highly unlikely that you'll make it as well as I can."

Of course, it doesn't matter how well she can make it. Robin will always believe that his coffee is the very best.

"I cannot tell you the exact secret to how I make coffee, but I can show you how to make it as close as humanly possible."

The narration facepalms. Repeatedly.

Robin begins to show her the first step of making coffee, followed by the second step.

[sophicsulphur]

Iris doesn't say anything, when faced with the arrogance. She just smiles along, and watches. She's convinced that she'll be able to make pretty good coffee, because making things is what she does, and if it's not as good as his, well, she accepts that. No student ever surpassed the master in one day.

And he does seem to be setting himself up as the master, here. Which is fine, by her. Someone has to be, and if he is, then he is.

She hmms and I sees her way quietly through his demonstration, idly turning over in her mind the moments where she might be able to add a little something here, use a touch of magic to speed up the process there.... Oh, yes, coffee-making is quite compatible with alchemy, it seems.

[despite_myrage]

It's only when he finishes that he addresses her again as a person. Unfortunately, it doesn't matter how well someone else can make coffee, how perfectly they can follow his every instruction. Robin Rice will always believe that his coffee is superior to anyone else's.

It can't be helped.

"Now coffee is more of a learned tasted than anything else. You can't simply drop into it without some help," he informs her. "Most people like to put cream and sugar in theirs as few people like it plain, and it's a matter of deciding what works best for you... or what works best for the person you're serving coffee to."

He pauses then as he realizes that introductions often come before lessons. Robin stretches a hand out to the wanderer.

"I'm Robin Rice," He says, and he doesn't like to admit that he's an angel so he doesn't. He pours out two cups of coffee instead.

[sophicsulphur]

She nods, again, taking in his lesson quite placidly. Cream and sugar sound good to her. To be honest, the scent of coffee on its own has never enticed her that much: it's a little bitter, and she'll tolerate bitter when it's a remedy, but she really prefers something milder and sweeter to taste.

When he offers his hand, she gives him hers, and shakes, warmly. Her hand - actually, her whole arm - is almost completely covered in old scars and burns, but if she's shy about that, it doesn't show.

"Iris Fortner," she says, with a smile. She already knows what he is, but she isn't inclined to pry. For one thing, she'd like to get all the way through a lesson on something for once without getting wrapped up in the species of the person next to her. She takes a glance at her cup of coffee. "So is this ready to drink?"

[despite_myrage]

"It's nice to meet you," Robin manages, and it's surprising, how easy it is to manage those words and how sincere they are. There was a time in his life that he couldn't stand to be around wanderers, when he had no desire to meet a single one. They are what's tearing this universe apart after all, whether they meant to or not, and he'd been taught to not treat them with the same respect as fellow angels.

Now, he could care less about the universe. His caring remains entirely with one person, and then it's spread to the rest, to everyone. He isn't following Romana anymore. Everything has changed. He's living for himself, and he cares about wanderers too.

He raises an eyebrow at the question and then laughs softly. "Have you had any coffee before?" Robin pulls out a container of sugar and a container of cream. "You might want to add those if you haven't. It can be a bit... strong without them. From my own experience, I'd say you need at least four tablespoons of sugar and three of cream." If not more.

[sophicsulphur]

If she knew how he'd once felt about Wanderers, she might flinch a little. It's entirely too close to CLF rhetoric to be something she'd be comfortable with. But she's also forgiveness-minded, first and foremost, and she could easily forgive someone for having felt that way in the past, and having come around.

As it is, though, he's being perfectly kind, and she can't begin to suspect what history might have led up to his being able to make that one, simple statement. It feels genuine. There's no reason to look beyond that. "Same here," she says, and means it. Meeting new people is always a joy, and she gets to learn something into the bargain.

The coffee does smell strong, and his suggestion sounds good. "I admit I haven't," she says, adding in the cream and sugar as per his suggested numbers - and maybe a little extra, because she does like things sweet. She's had hot chocolate, courtesy of Millie, but that wasn't really the same, although it did make her sugar-buzzed. "I know it's a herbal preparation that makes you feel more

[despite_myrage]

Robin feels the need to narratively insist that he's never been anything like the CLF. He used to hate all people, and he had reasons for hating all of them, and it simply became easier to lump them all into groups. If they remained at a distance from them, he couldn't hurt them. It's part of being an angel of vengeance and denying that side of himself.

It is genuine. For decades, he said that statement because he had to, it was expected of him. He was the assistant to a First, a vengeance angel, and he should be grateful to meet anyone at all so he pretended to be. It took a long time for the sincerity to come into effect

[sophicsulphur]

The narration understands. Iris is just too green to Chicago to really know what to do with the complex political situation that seems to underpin everything here, and is inclined to recoil from those who have an outright distaste for Wanderers. In a way, she's doing her own bit of lumping people into groups, here. But she'd probably understand, too, if he explained it all carefully. Not that he's going to

[despite_myrage]

No, he is not going to. Robin is smart enough to not bring up how much of a dick he used to be to everyone he runs into.

He is surprisingly not easily offended when it comes to that matter in coffee-serving. Nearly everyone that he's made coffee for requires something in it other than coffee. Few take their coffee straight which is just fine.

Robin smiles back at her approving smile, not that he's at all surprised that she approves. He can be easily offended when it comes to coffee. Thankfully, she is not offending him at the moment.

"Oh, it's definitely useful, but far from anything that alters the course of things entirely," he says, pouring a cup for himself. The narration fears how much he's had to drink since he started this, but caffeine has little effect over him. "It can be addicting essentially. People will go through withdrawal if they haven't had their 'proper' amount for the day. They get used to the caffeine and need more to have the same effect over them as it did before."

[sophicsulphur]

"I see," she says, having managed to take another long drink of coffee before considering the implications of his words. She does think that sounds a little dangerous, actually, but she thinks it's wiser not to push that particular point with him: coffee seems like his pet topic, and she knows how she gets if someone suggests that her particular passions might be doing more harm than good. Besides, plenty of things can be addictive in a good way, like magic. It's a discipline that urges one to move forward with it once they've begun, but with good reason. The world needs those able to understand the subtle realms.

Perhaps coffee is like that, too, though she admits she can't imagine how. Still, she thinks she'd trust anything that Millie was selling to people, so it can't be that bad. Someone like her couldn't possibly mean any harm.

"...Will I get addicted?" She's already finished half her cup, because honestly, with all the cream and sugar, it's pretty good.

[despite_myrage]

Coffee is a passion for him, but it certainly isn't anything that he'd get angry about. There was a time in his life when he would have. There was a time in his life when anger was much easier and safer to feel than any other emotion, and he had walls built around him, because no one should ever be allowed to get close to an angel of vengeance. The time has passed. He's older, more mature.

It's strange to have a conversation with a stranger by his own choice and not limit the conversation to a handful of unmeaningful topics. It's strange that he's been doing it so much over this past year.

Robin smiles a little, and then he shakes his head as he moves to clean out one of the pots that's empty. "No, you shouldn't get addicted after one cup, and caffeine addiction isn't very bad at all. Most people never become addicted to caffeine too severely, and the withdrawal is generally only a headache. There are much worse addictions in this universe."

[sophicsulphur]

She nods at that, significantly relieved. "That's good. I was worried I'd got myself into something for a moment there," she says. With renewed confidence, she drinks up the last of her coffee so that he can have the cup for cleaning. "But I didn't think Millie would really want to make anything that hurt people."

She's thinking again about how she might be able to put this to use in her alchemy. Maybe if coffee were purified, she could make it so that it didn't have those problematic qualities, but still gave you a buzz. She spends a moment metaphysically poking around in the dregs of one of the coffee pots, just to see what she can do with the substance. Maybe just a little tweak of the way the energy flows here, and here....

A loud poof erupts from the pot, a cloud of vapour escaping into the air.

"Oops," she says, sheepishly. "Sorry if that startled you."

[despite_myrage]

"Got yourself into... what?" Robin looks back at her, rather confused that she'd... Well, if she came from a world without coffee, he guesses she could think it was anything at all. "No, there's nothing that really hurts anyone when it comes to caffeine addiction though they don't recommend grand amounts of it for pregnant women or people with heart conditions."

He has had an energy drink before, never again. It tastes like what he assumes cleaning fluid would taste like. Robin Rice will be staying with coffee, for the rest of his life, how ever long that might be.

Robin does jump at the poof. He does not approve of people messing with coffee. "What in--" He watches the cloud as it flies into the air. "What are you doing?"