[OTA] Space dementia in your eyes.

[semper_serviam]

New Year's Day was the same every year, really. For one night everyone seemed to have forgotten their limits when it came to drinking the night before and the Castle stirred late in the morning, groggy and hung over

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[piquedbutler]

It's a New Year. It's a Fresh Start. He's always liked that feeling, everything getting Reset to zeros.

This year... might be a little Trickier.

Because this year he'll be 25. That's quite possibly the Half Way Point, certainly a Deadline. It's got him just a little Distracted as he whisks into the kitchen, sets a tray into a Three's hands for Washing and turns to the Two he sometimes calls Father. Not that anyone would Notice from his continued calm bland.

Except, perhaps, an equally calm bland Chives.

"Is milord the King's lunch quite ready?"

[semper_serviam]

There's always a hundred things going on in the kitchen but Iollan is keeping track of every single one. Every task, every person doing every task, and of course, by extension, every intruder who wasn't doing something Iollan was keeping track of.

"Two minutes." Not tardy, but On Time. Iollan had been in and out of the kitchen too often to see to any specific meal from start through to finish, so in the New Year hungover spirit, everything was running on time today rather than early.

"How is the Castle?" he asked. Hopefully a little more awake and lucid by now, considering it was lunchtime.

[piquedbutler]

It's amazing, really, being allowed a few moments of watching Iollan Work. The sort of thing that fuels a younger generation of Chives toward more proper Efficiency.

On Time is a more than acceptable response, even if it does gives Declán Two Minutes of waiting to contend with.

"...as expected." The Spades weren't overly rowdy in their celebration, but that didn't make them deep and thorough in their ability to give themselves hangovers. "Beginning to properly run again. I trust the kitchen staff are keeping?"

Up to Standards, of course.

[semper_serviam]

'Beginning to properly run again' was much more to Iollan's liking than 'still attempting to burn down their Castle because of sparklers that hadn't been put out properly' or other stupid things that young people do to put the lives of everyone around them in jeopardy.

"We seem to have lost two Twos and a Three." But it was for the better that they rested than to have three bumbling kitchen hands not at their best tempting self-harm through fire, knives, hot water and other such hazards.

"Perhaps you could locate them after lunch. If you've the time."

[oneirophiliac]

Annie isn't hungover, but she's still wandering in during that segment between breakfast having been served and lunch still being prepared. Usually she makes her own breakfast, so it's a small surprise to have her coming in instead.

At least she's made herself marginally presentable today?

[semper_serviam]

He acknowledged her presence with a short glance in her direction. Coordinating a meal for an entire Castle should have his undivided attention. And yet he seemed quite capable of handling small disruptions to the otherwise seamless flow in the kitchen.

"Good morning, Miss," he finally greeted once he was done slicing up what looked like components of a salad.

She was a rare sighting among these parts. But not an unwelcome one, nonetheless. Especially given how much time the butler was spending with her.

"Can I prepare you some brunch?"

[oneirophiliac]

"M- Good morning, Mr Chives, sir." She couldn't help the sir despite their difference in ranks; it'd been ingrained since childhood. No matter how she actually felt about the man, it always slipped out.

"Just something light'd be good. I can do myself a sandwich no problem." Which he'd probably not allow her to make herself, but it was worth a try.

[semper_serviam]

He gave her a sidelong glance. Do herself a sandwich. Really. Iollan thinks not. Not in his kitchen, at least. Partly because he had an almost obsessive need to be In Control of everything that went on here, and partly because he would like to do something for her.

Though not of course in any way different from how he served any other Spade.

"What would you like in it, m'lady?" he asked as he sliced some bread that had been baked freshly this morning.

[sharperseason]

Honestly, she didn't really get it. The partying thing. So many adults doing supposedly adult things proceeding to get themselves blindingly drunk and do some not-so-adult things, then waking up late and spending the entire next day staggering around bleary-eyed and trying to put together the pieces of the night before. She'd been up at midnight, of course, forced into attending a party at her parents' sides, forced to play the good daughter before escaping just after twelve to spend the early hours of the new year in the courtyard contemplating.

And despite all that, Tobi is still up and bright-eyed at eight, ducking into the kitchens for a quick breakfast before she heads out. Both parents won't even be up for another two hours. Plenty of time to grab some toast and orange juice and vanish before they could find her.

[semper_serviam]

You would expect the adults to be More Sensible than their offspring - a teenager, no less - and yet. Here she was, bright and early in the morning, not looking in the least bit hung over. Iollan was Pleased, even if, like most other emotions, it didn't show on his face.

"Are you certain I can't get you anything else, Miss Viljoen?" Surely a girl burned through more energy than bread and orange juice could provide.

[sharperseason]

'Sensible' and 'adults' were rarely two words Tobi would put together, herself. Way too much of what she saw them doing defied sense entirely. Why drink so much you'll be miserable the next day, for instance, let alone have to mop up the messes you made in your impaired state? Much better to keep a clear mind. Yet another thing most peers her age disagreed with, apparently.

Orange juice in one hand and toast in the other, she hovers out of the general paths of the kitchen staff, being careful not to get in the way. She likes the business of the kitchen, but learned not to be standing anywhere important very quickly. His question gets a brief headshake, followed by an eloquent shrug.

"Don't want to be a bother, sir. Just getting an early breakfast before everyone else wakes up."

[semper_serviam]

"They will not be up for a while yet, Miss." Unfortunately. The amount of breakfast served today had been abysmally low. Many Spades had either refused to wake up for it or had spent the night outside of their Castle.

"Can I offer you a seat, at least?" No proper dining table and chairs here, but there were tall stools stowed away under two of the counters that would not place her in the path of too many kitchen hands. Surely that was a better option than standing around trying to eat In Peace.

She was welcome to stay, by extension. The kitchen was big enough to accommodate all of them.

[eucre]

Someone who isn't very hungover or hungry at all is peeking into the kitchen anyway, slipping in past the ovens and stoves to hide half behind a fridge and watch the others. She's searching for Declán so intently, she doesn't realize that Iollan's in the room at all. Which... is probably a mistake.

[semper_serviam]

She wasn't doing a very good job of hiding. Certainly wasn't staying out of the way with people excusing themselves every time they opened that fridge.

Recognising her face made him pause. Just a hesitation in the surety of his steps to indicate that something was off-kilter. It was less a clumsy fool tripping over the cymbals and causing a ruckus. More a sudden, abrupt wrong note played on a finely tuned instrument in the middle of a solo that wrecked the entire piece.

But the orchestra continues to play on. The kitchen continues to move around the man and the girl whom he does not acknowledge as his daughter.

"Can I help you, Miss."

[eucre]

She jumps when he speaks, turns to face him abruptly. A full range of emotions passes over her face - shock, fear, hesitance - before settling on a mildly affronted look. A stubbornness that she doesn't know she possesses rises up in her throat, comes out in a sharp word: "Felicia."

Her name. One of her names. The first name that comes to mind, anyway. "Not Miss."

[semper_serviam]

Iollan raised one eyebrow. He was Not Amused. He looked her in the eyes, and he might be even more cold and distant towards her as he was to some unacquainted Spade he knew neither the name nor rank of.

She was not a Chives and she was not a Spade. Therefore she fell outside the boundaries of what and whom he ought to care for.

"I stand corrected, Felicia." Now would she answer his question?

[acethatmatters]

Julien was not one to engage in drunken debauchery and even when he went to get drunk he tended to do so in privacy. So he's down in the kitchen at his customary time, raising an eyebrow at the mess being put to rights.

"I suppose I ought come back later."

[semper_serviam]

That's what happens when Iollan isn't here All The Time, and it gave him more reason not to feel inclined to leave. Nothing Good ever came of a kitchen trying to run itself.

"Not at all, m'lord Ace." Having the Ace of Spades in the kitchen would only serve to make nervous Twos and Threes get their act together.

"Do stay. Your meal is being prepared as we speak."

[acethatmatters]

Julien shoots a glance over at the nervous Twos and Threes who are supposedly preparing food before looking, somewhat skeptically, back at Iollan.

"If you insist, of course." And he will settle down in his customary chair at one of the tables. "I don't imagine there is some tea already, is there?"

[semper_serviam]

"Of course, sir." There was always tea in this kitchen. Tea and food and sometimes coffee, though there weren't many Chiveses who acknowledged the existence of coffee.

Iollan didn't prepare tea very often - Declán had more or less taken over that role - but it was not something that one easily forgot. There was already a warmed empty pot ready to go and a fresh pot was brewed for the Ace.

Tea was served in a cup and saucer. How splendid it was, to have and to serve a Proper Ace at a Proper Time In The Morning who didn't engage in New Year Foolishness - or at least, not to excess.