action & prose; open; ☀/☾

[keystorm]

Who: Aqua; OPEN.
What: After exploring the city and dealing with some major frustration, Aqua finds herself at the beach at the end of a very, very, very disappointing third day in the City of Dreams. She's been at this constantly. Hasn't even returned to the house yet.
Where: Some quieter section of the beach.
When: Late in the day,

Comments

*___*! /clings them both.

[keystorm]

Admittedly, the sight of an enormous, unidentified winged beast caught Aqua's attention before the comparatively unassuming young lady had. In fact, it had given her quite a start from a distance; It wasn't surprising that the thought crossed her mind that it might have been preparing to actually attack the masked girl whom it was following, but ...

... It didn't take very long at all to put that assumption away. She was by no means particularly biased toward or well-taught in the mannerisms of fauna, but it became relatively obvious that its gestures were nonaggressive

[keystorm]

Taking in a deep breath (that was probably just a little more obvious than she anticipated it would be), and sparing one more moment to gawk openly at... Valefor, she nodded and dragged her gaze back to Yuna.

Sort of an odd thought struck her, and without warning. The two were... oddly alike, weren't they? Not in appearance, obviously, but once that initial wave of panic had passed on... there was a similar, sad sort of light that they had in common. She almost felt as though she was intruding to take note of it... and immediately shook it off. Old habits.

As it seemed... a bit insincere to greet someone for the first time from behind a mask, Aqua scanned the horizons of the beach momentarily -- empty, it would seem -- before carefully slipping her mask off, tucking it under an arm.

"Yuna... Valefor. It's nice to meet you both. Just... sorry it had to be under these circumstances."

She seemed to hesitate for a moment, watching Yuna's motions carefully as she stroked the creature. One had to wonder what Valefor was like in a foul

[endsoftheearth]

He couldn't believe the world around him was one of dreams. It felt so real. The need to breath, the taste of food and drink, the soreness that tugged at his legs as he continued to walk, pushing forward endlessly through the streets. Time had passed, daylight had sunk into night and night had birthed dawn anew several times already

[keystorm]

What struck her first was a little hard to determine: the slow, comforting warmth that faintly illuminated the left fold of her sash or the soft sound of footfalls in the sand. The setting sun on her back had served as the perfect disguise for the sensation of a glowing Wayfinder, causing a moment of pause before the realization of the magical item's shift.

The motion of drawing the trinket from the fabric loop, gasping, and spinning around toward the source of the sound was as singular as it was fluid, not giving her very much time to think of who it might be -- it could have been either lost boy with a piece of the five-pointed charm. Though she certainly didn't consciously mean to, for that split second before she could catch herself, Aqua felt that rising joy at the feeling of familiarity...

"Terra." There it was. The fleeting smile, genuine in its affinity, palpable even from behind a mask. Taking a half-step forward, her rigid stance dissolved; One hand gripped the blue Wayfinder whilst the other twisted its chain in anxious

[endsoftheearth]

"Aqua

[keystorm]

Her joy was deteriorating at an alarming rate as the emotional focus shifted from 'so glad to see you' to 'wait, what about the hell that just broke loose'... and she wasn't going out of her way to hide it, either. Even the uncertain smile was gradually being eaten away at the seams as she, too, instinctively slowed to a stop at the usual distance, taking stock of his gestures.

Unfortunately (or fortunately, depending on how one looked at it), the segment of Darkness attached to Terra's doubt was lost on Aqua, who was waging a valiant battle against an internal tempest of her own.

Vanitas... and Xehanort. She turned her face away slightly at the very vivid recollection of the searingly hot blade against her back, followed by... nothing. It was a severely uncomfortable thought... one that Terra could probably do without.

"I'm fine. Don't worry." Here, she paused for a beat, wanting desperately to continue on, assuring him that everything would be fine as well. Probably too soon to make a promise like that

SLOW MOTION BAYWATCH RUN /shot

[keystorm]

"... Ven?"

For just a split second, Aqua's rationale chalked up the sudden appearance of the youngest portion of their trio to being... a hallucination, perhaps? Some misgiving sound of the waves mimicking a familiar voice, which was possible, though... No amount of rationalization or self control would have been able to keep Aqua from turning around to see for herself, eager to believe --

-- That there he was.

The young woman literally lost her footing for a moment in the wet sand as a wave rushed her ankles from behind, though the lack of grace wasn't due to the force of the wave. It was the sheer shock factor, which was quickly overpowered by unabridged joy. Regaining her wavering balance, the Master darted toward him, weapon thoughtlessly disappearing with a flash.

"Ven! When did --" Oof, never mind that stumble.
"-- When did you get here?!"