The full seasonal event can be read here! Below are the main seasonal items for quick reference:
1. A thread reacting to the season's weather in some ways.
2. A thread in the part of the city your character doesn't live in!
3. A thread relating to your vocation.
Of The Season
Quote
"Tell Dr. Nate that Gale sent you, and he still owes me for the mushrooms. Except that it takes you a while to reach the clinic, and by the time you do your fever is spiking, and so instead of the requisite message you instead tell the poor soul who greets you that 'A gale'a m'shrooms sent me cus'a my hands.'" - Zephyr in Oh help me, please doctor, I'm damaged
i was raised as a scorpion, being pulled by the moon in high tide that's why i'm broken, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah
The place in particular that Sunjata’s staying thanks to Nate pulling some strings, isn’t that far from the clinic at all. Enough so that he feels comfortable enough trying to get some air. After all, he knows he’s supposed to be hidden away in the room most (if not all) of the day, but lately it’s been stuffy and too quiet and he can only be left alone with his thoughts for so long.
It rains, it’s likely night time though Sunjata can’t tell much with the way the Plates shadow everything down here, using the neon lights as a guide for light these days. He’s gotten paler with the amount of time spent down here now, but at least with Drenak upon them, he’s bundled up, short shaved hair growing out, and facial hair that hasn’t been shaved in quite some time – though it doesn’t matter with how it’s covered up by a mask, doing his best to prevent himself from catching the illness that’s been going around.
So far so good, at least, as he sits on a half broken chair in the alley, a new journal on his leg that he scratches down some notes in, mostly for the small makeshift map he’s been trying to make to keep himself from getting too lost. It’s a picture that doesn’t seem out of place for the wayward Drenchers that wander through on a short cut somewhere else.
Adam was getting on with the closest thing to a routine he had, wandering about the Neon Alleys in the morning via the rooftops, checking out the streets below and the people within them, keeping an eye out for anything suspect. This morning was quiet (they had been, recently. Probably the plague, or whatever the fuck that had been all about) and he had already almost come back to Nate's clinic to pick up some supplies before the rest of the day when he saw Jata.
He lingered for a moment on the ledge he was stood on, looking down at the notebook and the top of Jata's head (thank fuck he'd gotten the dorky ass gavel out). After some unknown calculation had been made, he clicked his lips and began to climb down, swinging off a windowsill and bouncing off the opposite wall, showing off just a little.
"Hey, uh...I forgot what your super cool code name is. Whatever. You." He pointed at Jata, though the smile on his face made it clear he wasn't really all that mad. "Aren't you meant to be inside?"
i was raised as a scorpion, being pulled by the moon in high tide that's why i'm broken, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah
He isn’t doing anything suspicious, and so it surprises him when the movement above him causes him to snap the book shut. It’s a map, there’s nothing about it that shouldn’t be seen, but he supposes that old habits die hard. At the very least, though, the other man is familiar, and he watches the lanky man swing off the windowsill to bounce off the opposite wall and land on his feet, impressed. Though, he doesn’t know enough about Adam yet to realize that perhaps he should hide his expressions lest the other man let it get to his head.
He is impressed, and he lets it show when he tilts his head and finds the smile the other man offers reflected in his own, dull freckled and stubbled face. “Spider.” He greets Adam, unable to remember what his own code name was but remembering Adam’s when he hadn’t known the dj’s name. His smile falters though with the follow up question and he tucks the pen’s clip into the cover of the book, nodding with a small awkward shrug. “I’m always supposed to be inside.” He says with a slightly annoyed sigh before remembering himself and covering it up, scratching at his cheek when he regards the other man again.
“I just needed some air. It gets stuffy.” Especially in there, all day, day after day. "What are you doing? Not spying on me, I hope." He can already hear Nate's complaints as clear as day in the back of his mind.
"Ooh, what's that? Some high class Plates porno?" Adam asked the second he saw the book being slammed shut, unable to resist the comment.
He did notice Sunjata's smile and with no evidence to the contrary, assumed it was indeed because he was so impressed with the parkour Adam had just pulled off. His pride deflated a little as he remembered the nickname he'd been given, though. "Yeah, I still don't know how I feel about that one. Spiders are like...kinda gross and creepy." Not the vibe he was going for.
Sunjata sounded a bit arsey about staying inside and Adam was about to remind him about the whole 'your dad would murder us all' thing, when it seemed he mellowed. "Stuffy's better'n dead, but I guess a bit won't hurt as long as you're quiet." There wasn't anyone around and while a close friend would recognise Sunjata, from a distance he looked suitably different nowadays.
"Me? I'm just..." He leaned against the wall and picked at some long-flaked off paint. "Wandering, I guess. Looking to see if anything is going on. Nothing is, course. The days just drag like fuck nowadays; I don't think this lockdown is ever gonna end."
i was raised as a scorpion, being pulled by the moon in high tide that's why i'm broken, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah
The second the question leaves Adam’s lips, Sunjata’s already flushing slightly on his pale cheeks, along the tips of his ears, exhaling a surprised laugh. “It absolutely isn’t.” Though at this point he wonders which would be more embarrassing, if it were what Adam thought it was or the truth of it being a map to keep him from looking too much like a Plater stuck amongst the Drench.
But the smile remains regardless, thankful to have company that actually knows him and not the undercover version he’s become as of late. “Eh, I don’t think they are.” He offers, even if yet again it would bolster Adam’s ego. “They’re smart and resourceful hunters.” The young Bratena shrugs, before he has to answer why he’s outside in the first place.
At the very least, it doesn’t sound like Adam’s spying on him, and that loosens a tight breath of relief from his shoulders as he leans back against the little seat and watches as he picks at some flaked off paint. “Quiet as a mouse.” He agrees initially, before drawing silent once again to listen. It’s a sentiment he gets, after all – it had been one of the most difficult things to get used to down here.
“I barely know what time it is down here.” With the darkness surrounding them, he was lost. “Heard a rumor that the tram broke down.” He starts to say, pausing and watching Adam to see if he’d heard anything else.
"Disappointing. I wanna see your gold dildos, or whatever you got up there." Adam paused for a second, then laughed to himself. "Heh. Up there, like on the Plates, but also up there, like up your ass." Clearly quite pleased with himself, the delighted smirk would not fade for quite a few minutes.
Sunjata did indeed boost his ego with the spider comment, Adam feeling himself warming to the nickname. While it was hardly accurate at the moment, his workload being lighter than his new namesake, it felt nice.
The paint crumbled against his fingertips and he idly looked at it, rubbing it into the skin on his thumb (lead poisoning was fun). When Sunjata mentioned the tram, he looked sideways at him for a long moment, then shrugged and admitted: "I've heard some shit. Nothing confirmed, but I think it might be a lil more complicated than 'broken down'. Still, I'm not gonna get excited it's gonna lead anywhere, you know?" No point being disappointed again.
"Hey, Jata..." He began, almost as soon as he'd finished his last sentence. "Y'know the thing between me and Nate about you...it's nothing personal."
i was raised as a scorpion, being pulled by the moon in high tide that's why i'm broken, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah
As Adam continues, Sunjata reddens further for the moment, keeping the book tightly shut despite having no need to, he reaches up to rub at the stubble growing on his face, huffing a sound that could be close enough to an awkward laugh. “Can’t say I’ve seen any gold ones up there.” Either way, up on the Plates or up his ass. With his barren room back in the Bratena Manor, there was no chance Sunjata would be able to hide anything like that anyway.
But relief from the awkward conversation blooms when he explains about spiders and boosts Adam’s ego in one go, before he mentions the rumor he’s heard, carefully watching the other man for any extra bit of information given. After all, it isn’t like Sunjata’s going to go investigate. He’s not looking for a death sentence. “Yeah, I know.” He agrees, wanting to do the same but still having that curiosity in the back of his mind of what if.
He perks up, however, when Adam speaks again and uses a nickname, giving the DJ his whole undivided attention, brows pinching as he tries to think about what thing there was. Was it what happened when Nate had taken him here from trying to slip away into the night? Or was it something else? “What do you mean?” He asks, trying to clarify his confusion whilst simultaneously trying to keep his stomach from wanting to flip with the potential abandonment issues that Adam may or may not have intentionally struck.
If Adam were as wealth as most people in the Plates, he knew he'd have golden dildos as far as the eye could see, as well as fun statues and servants who only existed to dance for his amusement. Parties every night, too, and a scribe to make songs about his epic orgies. Why didn't the Arbiter do any of that? Money was wasted on the wealthy.
He'd thought that the animosity between him and Nate, their 'talk' and the problems surrounding Sunjata staying had all been rather obvious - apparently not; Adam instantly regretted mentioning it at all, but now the cat was out of the bag. He sighed and flopped against the wall, hands going into his pockets.
"Y'didn't notice...? I guess you were kinda fucked up, when Nate first brought ya. Look - it's just - uhhh." Thrown off and not sure how to continue, Adam looked up to the morning sky just visible in a crack beyond the Plates. "I'm a bit...uncomfortable with Nate deciding t'look after you without asking me. Cos what he does, I do. And you're a big risk, Jata. You gotta know that."
i was raised as a scorpion, being pulled by the moon in high tide that's why i'm broken, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah
He is about to indulge Adam with the fact that he’s sure not all of them are, but that he was certainly from a family that didn’t talk anything about it other than how to have the most viable heir. And from that? Him being allowed a dildo? Absolutely not on the table.
Luckily, or perhaps unluckily, there was the confusion over the issue between Nate and Adam and himself, and his brows pinch as he regards the spindly man. “Oh, yeah, that.” He murmurs, relieved to know nothing else had happened.
He doesn’t look at Adam, instead focusing on the book still closed in his hands, running his fingers along the worn spine. “No, I know. And like I said, I can go at any time.” He pauses, because that certainly doesn’t relieve any stress Adam might have. “I don’t know how much you know about my family, but I’m kind of used to being where I’m not wanted.” It comes out so easily that he thinks nothing of it as he continues. “I am also good at staying out of the way.” A casual shrug. “But I am not going back up there.” There’s so much determination in his voice that his stubbornness shows when he finally does lift his head to look at Adam.
“I honestly think my father would prefer to kill me before letting me rot away in the prison.” Because that’s his only option going back up. Prison, or death. “He’s beat me for far less.” A casual shrug that certainly shouldn’t be as casual as it is, only aiming to prove the point Shaju would do whatever it took to make sure the ‘lesson’ stuck.
Adam blew out a big puff of air as he widened his eyes, not sure how to respond to all of the trauma Sunjata casually laid out upon his lap. How did you even respond to all that? If it were anyone else, he'd think Sunjata were trying to intentionally make him feel guilty, but he didn't think the Plater had that in him.
"I..know more about your family than you'd think." After all, it had been his job to know for a long time. "Enough t'know how fucked up it is. I'm not mad at you for wanting to get out."
He couldn't tell Sunjata to leave, not when he'd landed with people who treated him well for the first time in his life. Adam and Nate were dysfunctional, poor and fueled by far too many suspicious substances, but they were at the core good people. Unlike Shaju and the others who had set up Sunjata's life on the Plates.
Adam started picking at a new bit of flaking paint. "We just...I just wish Nate had given me some more time to work something out. That's what I do, I work stuff out. But you're just here, all of a sudden, and I dunno how far the Enforcers are already in lookin' for you..."
