Open RP: Mel with the worry-stick in the library

[totallyluminous]

The fact they have saved the world really ought to be a cause for celebration. A party in the Great Hall or something. None of them got injured, since there was no big brawl between the forces of good and evil, nothing that would look especially awesome in an action movie, just an angel in hand-painted basketball boots entreating a Navajo girl to

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[totallyluminous]

Mel quirks a small smile. Wise, in her predicament? Maia won't like it, not at all. She wants a fight, but she knows she won't win.

'All I know is that the magic drains some measure of power from demons here,' she informs him. 'But when Reub--'

Mel stops, thoughts rushing back to how they--Lola and Mel--found the third of their trio badly beaten in Elizabethan England. The 50/50 situation had meant that, officially, all cosmic personnel had to withdraw. They were meant to be on a research trip, but maybe they had an inkling they were matching the Opposition's efforts. Brice was the original cosmic outlaw at that point--what did he care for rules? He'd slipped in through the cracks and Heaven had to stop him getting a hold on anything.

And he'd come to blows with Reuben. That's not even the right word. He'd annihilated him. His visible injuries were terrible--there was barely honey-coloured skin not covered in blood--but the real damage was deep down. He was barely an angel anymore.

Mel bites her lip and looks down, suppressing a shudder. 'Maia's circumstances mean that getting caught would be--worse than they would be if they caught an angel.' She looks up, and adds, 'You're her friend, right? If she starts talking about another daytrip, try and distract her.'

That's all she regrets, really, out of saving the world. Maia's in danger. There's been a change of heart. 'Not really due anything. I was just...' I just did my job. I just got lucky. Cody did most of it. 'I'm happy it's done.'

[fiercefluffy]

Octavian shrugs. "She does what she likes. If she wants to risk her life with a shopping trip off-campus or what have you, I see no point in speaking against it."

Suicide is a noble and time-honored option for the defeated.

"What would they be catching, though, if they caught her?" That's what he really wants to know. There's been some discussion on this point, none of it conclusive. If Melanie has anything to do with what Maia is -- well, it's worth investigating.

[totallyluminous]

She looks confused for a second. A cold? Depending on how sexy she feels, herpes?

'Yeah. She thinks her friends'll give her easy ride is what I'm worried about.' Mel leans back in her chair, pinging a silver bangle against her wrist. 'But I don't get what you mean. 'What would they be catching?' Maia's a demon...'

[fiercefluffy]

Octavian looks a bit irritated. He wouldn't put it past Melanie Beeby to play dumb, but he also wouldn't be surprised at flat-out cluelessness here. Either way, now he has to Explain Things.

There are times when Octavian enjoys Explaining Things. Usually that's when the audience is Julius Caesar (i.e., positive, capable of appreciating Octavian's devastating intellect; though the reward is sometimes not what Octavian would like), or perhaps someone along the lines of Cicero (i.e., negative, given to underestimating Octavian; with that sort of person, Octavian very much enjoys showing them just how far they've underestimated him). Then there are times when Explaining Things is just a chore. This is one of those times.

"Is she really a demon? She's been pulling her punches since she got here. Even she can't say exactly why. A demon would be more efficient. Unless she's been sabotaged in some way ...?"

[totallyluminous]

Mel starts a bit. Jesus. Her banishment of Maia in Egypt must have had a knock-on effect. And crap, now he's going to think she did something on purpose from her reaction.

'She's definitely a demon.' It's possible for demons to turn good--in theory--but Mel's only ever heard of an angel going bad before, not the other way around. 'She uses Dark vibes. I've worked wi--I've met her before.' She duped me. 'She was a demon then and she's the same now.'

Except...perhaps not entirely the same.

'Isn't there a teeny speck of divine Light inside you that absolutely longs to go to my school and hang out with my friends and yes, wake up smelling lilacs. The same part which longs to let the hate go forever so you can let in the lo--'

'Don't you dare!' Maia was literally blocking her ears. 'Don't you EVER say the L-word to me!'

Maybe she can stand to hear it, now. Mel looks at Michael's office, lost in thought.

[fiercefluffy]

Octavian only looks more irritated. "I'm sure she's been happy to let you go on believing she is purely a demon. I'm sure she's wanted to believe it herself. It doesn't seem an accurate description, though, does it?" He follows Mel's gaze. Michael's office, yes. Where Maia said she'd inquire -- an assertion that in itself had surprised Octavian. Why would she ask an archangel for anything, if she were demon entire?

[totallyluminous]

Mel rubs her head, and twitches her nose. 'Okay.' She looks across at Octavian. 'Sit down. I think our perception of 'demon' might differ a bit.'

She sits up straighter, and delivers it like she would an oral report for Mr. Allbright. 'There are about a gazillion types of demon, but they basically divide into demon-demon and human-demon. I don't know which one Maia is, but I do know that if you were human and died to become either angel or demon, you tend to have a lot less certainty about what you're doing. You still keep human habits. If you ignore that part of yourself, you go a bit loopy.'

Hello, Mel of book two. How's tricks?

'I'm guessing she's just experiencing doubts here. Normally we do our thing and move on--both sets of people. She attacks mostly new applicants. It's harder when you get to know people, to behave either totally angel or demon here.' I think that's why she couldn't kill Brice. And it's certainly why I've started to realise I can't fix everyone here.

[fiercefluffy]

Sit down? With Mel? Does he have to? Ah, the things he does for friendship. Torturing people in sewers (for Vorenus); hiring gladiatorial lawyers (for Pullo); and now this. He sits, and does not even permit himself a long-suffering sigh.

"She's explained to me what her cosmogony would term a demon, yes," he says, when Melanie has finished her attempt at explication. "It falls short of justifying what she is and what she's done, or what she's failed to do. Do you have any theories as to why a human-born demon might completely forget his or her human life?"

[totallyluminous]

The 'life' she fed Mel in Egypt was a pack of lies, but Mel assumed she remembered it, God. This is new. She looks startled again. 'Sorry, she doesn't remember it?'

Could this be a Hell-trick? Make her forget her whole life and send her out so she won't feel guilt? They can do that to memories; Brice did that to Dom, Mel can remember defending him against Maturin. So they won't feel any pain is one thing, not totally right, but wiping memories for a quick warrior is quite another.

'The only one I can think of is if her bosses did it. Only, stuck in some place long-term, with nothing to occupy your attention...feelings you had before you died might surface. Has she spoken to Michael?'

Octavian, you have now taken the place of Indigo; stuffy, thinks he's better than everyone, sneers at happy-go-lucky people and knowledgeable. Nix on the fancying her, though. (She doesn't know about Maia and Octavian.)

[fiercefluffy]

"If she has talked to Michael, she hasn't said anything to me about it." Not as though he's seen much of her since they got back from their extracurricular trip, anyway. She might have spoken with Michael. She might not. She might have thought better of it.

"And no, I haven't spoken with him either." That just seems like a Bad Idea in so very many ways.

[totallyluminous]

Mel chews on her lip a little more, readying it to be tender and sore tonight. She looks worried. Regretting you were a bitch to someone who didn't know who they were, even if they were a bitch first?

'She won't have.' He would have mentioned it just now if so. 'You could, you know.' He wouldn't try anything angelic to make you relax; tea and biscuits are more his thing. However, the eyes blazing with cosmic intelligence might frighten him. They certainly do her.

'She needs to. He's the highest authority we've got on this. If she's forgotten who she is...' Wow, that's like cosmic amnesia-bad. Is it possible Maia's been as badly played as she was in the Caribbean? Mel shivers a moment, and then asks, 'Not to be rude, but...how do you know all this?' Maia, getting that close to someone?

[fiercefluffy]

Octavian gives Mel a look just short of withering oh-please. "Grueling interrogation. Who else does she have to talk to?"

[totallyluminous]

Mel gives one back, like 'Who's got the most cosmic mojo here? That's right, bitch.' Being around Brice makes you capable of that.

'Last time I tried to talk to her she tried to kill me. I think...I know someone who might.' If Brice stops whiling away whispering in corners, OH HELLO OTHER PROBLEM COME TO COLLIDE. Headache, headache, go away, come again another day. 'Well. I don't know if she'd speak to him, but he'll understand what's going through her head.'

So will Michael, mind. But just as Mel was Brice's ticket to salvation, maybe Brice is Maia's. Yeah, Mel doesn't think for a second Maia can pass up paradise.

[fiercefluffy]

Imagine that cosmic mojo is ice cream. Now imagine that Octavian is lactose-intolerant. Yeah, not too impressed.

"She might not, actually. She's rather allergic to doing anything that's good for her. Or anything that isn't dreadfully ill-advised." He says this not without a faint note of fondness. "Who did you have in mind?"

[totallyluminous]

The case stands he knows very little of Heaven and Hell and she...well, she knows marginally more. Besides, who hasn't wanted to bitch-slap a Roman emperor once in a while?

Ooooh, ding. Mel may be an angel, but she can still sense that fondness. Maybe it's safe for Maia to be left alone in a room with Brice, then. She clears her throat. 'My--boyfriend, actually. Brice. He was...he Fell, and then...climbed back up, I guess.'

[fiercefluffy]

Melanie has a what? (For one thing, the term boyfriend doesn't quite translate, to Octavian. In a semantic sense, sure, he understands what is meant. It's the nuance that doesn't work for him. It's like a coy euphemism that purposely doesn't succeed at being euphemistic. This has nothing to do with Mel's delivery of the word, which is unobjectionably matter-of-fact. It has to do with Octavian's aesthetic preferences as applied to language. Boyfriend is the kind of word his mother would probably use for Marc Antony, if she spoke modern English. It's gross.)

He decides it's something between a lover and a coveted object, and leaves the notion alone for now. Gods have playthings; why shouldn't angels? It's just ... this is Melanie Beeby. Melanie and that sort of thing don't mix, in Octavian's mind. She's too goody-goody to enjoy a good roll in the hay, surely?

"Your boyfriend. I see. I recall something about that, actually, now that you mention it. Only wasn't he an angel all along?"