fairynuff | TEST DRIVE MEME

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TEST DRIVE MEME

Considering apping to EACHDRAIDH? Why not give the setting a test run here!

OPTIONAL SCENARIOS

01. ARRIVING IN THE DRABWURLD.
The Seelie and Unseelie courts welcome you with mirthful revelry and hearty food. After you have been briefed on your purpose here, you will find an endless feast and a night filled with entertainment to placate your concerns. Mingle with new arrivals, sneak down the castle halls and make sure your eyes are always on your glass; fairies and imps have no bias when it comes to tricks!

02. THE STATION.
Looking for a little slice of home? The Station gives you all that and more. Take advantage of the wifi, have a cup of fairy-brewed coffee (the one they didn't spit in) or sit back and relax on the patio. You can even move your things into one of the available rooms!

03. WILDCARD.
Your own scenario! Explore the Drabwurld or simply take advantage of your Locket!

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[ Many are gathered, some folk Legolas can recognise with a touch more ease than others. His eyes see a lot, yet in this strange new world he can't quite let himself be reckless and assume that all he sees is all there is to all those unfamiliar faces about him.

The elves of Middle-Earth are not too subtle with their... otherness, if you will, radiant with what seems an inner light in their pale skin and pale golden hair (at least in the case of this one particular Sindar) and standing tall and proud, graceful and ethereal; it seems like not much, compared to the subtly upswept tip of an ear that always easily gives away the descent of the individual, yet it speaks on its own all too well.

Or it tended to, back in Middle-Earth.

Legolas catches a curious sight with the corner of his eye. He turns towards the slight commotion and remains focused on it curiously. There, this man apologising to one of the fairies: something oddly familiar about him, yet all the rest, dress and manner, wholly unfamiliar.

With startling ease, much learned among the many thick and dense branches of the forest of Mirkwood - it is the same, for the branches would often move with the whispers of wind, Legolas weaves through the crowd, following where he saw the curious man disappear. There, this hall, and there he is walking farther along and away from the celebrations.

On the stone floor, his step is silent, perhaps only the soft fabric of his robes shushes quietly with the motions, with each swift stride, yet one wholly unhurried. Long legs simply carry him swiftly. ]

Are the celebrations not to your liking?

[ He asks once within an earshot, once he hopes he won't startle or frighten the stranger. Still a couple steps left before he can confirm for himself just what exactly it was that drew his attention in the first place. ]

[ For his own part, Ned is tall. Fortunately for him, the ceilings here seem to be fairly accommodating, so when he leaps an impressive height further into the air, he is saved from hitting his head. The voice to his right...or left... (he's not sure now, having done a complete 360 in the least graceful of ways) takes him by surprise, suffice to say, and when he faces the source his own expression bears strong resemblance to a fish in its bowl. Blub. Blub. Blub?

Not exactly. But close.

Even from a soft yard or so away, this stranger is striking, carries with him a presence Ned will not call good or bad so much as something he cannot ignore. He has the fleeting thought: nice hair. It reminds him of the television commercials. He has, by now, edged into full-on rudeness by not replying and this catches up to him the way his whole arrival seems to keep doing so: abruptly.

He shakes his head...only to contradictorily nod it. Ah... ]

It's not...I don't... [ use your grown up words Ned for god's sake! he clears his throat, starts over, ] ...Sorry, what are they celebrating?

[ Oh one other thing... ]

And also I, I think I'm here by mistake...

[ Seriously though. He means: whose dream is this and where is the emergency exit. He swears some distance beyond the blond in front of him that he saw something with wings and it wasn't a butterfly.

Of course all this being flabbergasted is rich coming from the man who can bring people back from the dead.

This will occur to Ned later. You know, the way it usually does. ]

[ How to startle an elf in a couple of easy step: 1-) jump upon being approached, 2-) whirl and spin trying to locate the source of the voice, 3-) stare, apparently. For this man's reaction sure does make Legolas stop in his tracks, almost makes him take a step back and simply stare in return with eyes wide and not quite frightened, but surprised. His head cocked now, expression confused and not threatening in the slightest - at least he had left his weapons behind in a place promised safe - as if approaching a wild beast instead of a... he figures one of the Men.

And for a moment it all startles and distracts him from what drew him away from the celebrations in the first place. ]

I do believe it us our arrival that is being celebrated. For with us we bring hope for their world, do we not? A hope for peace, rather than war and darkness.

[ His voice calm, in a tone that he has known to be soothing for many mortals in the past. ]

Mistakes, I do not believe have been made. It is too grave a matter to allow such, but I am aware that many have been brought here against their wills.

[ And Legolas speaks with obvious apology, still watching the stranger curiously. It dawns on him slowly, very slowly for differences there are many, yet the lines of the face are familiar, awfully so (it might have been something like ninety years since they had last seen each other, but Legolas is the last person on Arda to forget a beloved face of his only family), the cheeks, the jaw, the eyebrows, the voice is similar enough as well though not speaking in the same cadence, not in the slightest calm the way Thranduil always is... ]

[ Definitely should have been paying more attention. That staring from before? Recommencing in three, two, one...ah there we go. They must make an odd picture, one stranger staring at another with all the focus of someone who doesn't quite know what he was expecting but got rather the opposite of what that probably was. At least at first.

When he speaks again however, Ned is facing him and so less inclined to try to hit the ceiling with his skull. Instead he reprises his fish-out-of-water rendition: mouth open, close, open, close. War? Those Seelie people said something about that, now that he thinks of it, but really he has always felt this way about orientations of any kind: the first experience is the worst because he can't focus. Of course he can't remember what they said to him. Part of his consciousness has the sense (or lack thereof) to be indignant, but this person (?) is not the target for his unhappiness.

In fact, he seems rather nice. Also calm.

Ned hones in on that, and while he does not literally feed off of it, it reminds him of his own general practice he had only moments before committed himself to: relax. Things will make sense. Somehow. Keep your head on straight. I am Ned. I bake pies and wake the dead. I am Ned.

He blinks for the umpteenth time and then rubs at his eyes with the heels of his hands. Something about that gesture helps further instill his old calmness and when he lowers his hands to his sides his expression is much softer, at ease for the time being. Not quite a switch, but a decision is a decision. Panic when it makes sense and right now it doesn't. ]

You don't need to be sorry.

[ Without the stranger having said it explicitly, it was clear enough in his tone and if nothing else, Ned has no intention of making undeserving parties apologize to him. The change in Ned has a subtlety to it, the way reverting to one's everyday self tends to contain: like shoulders slipping down out of a hunch or a breath releasing. His smile still seems ruffled but less anxious, less wild animal looking to bolt. ]

[ The more relaxed manner in which this stranger responds is a relief, even if it comes with an odd delay in which Legolas did grow steadily more concerned. But all that is wiped clear when it seems Legolas' own sense of calm has the desired effect. He smiles then, with ease keeping the dissonance between the familiarity and the unfamiliarity far in the back of his mind; the differences, in the end, outweigh the familiarities. No point in letting his own concerns shine through when he's trying to soothe another's.

Still, though, even the height is right and Legolas has to look up, nearly half a head shorter; the width of the shoulders, as well, though the many, many years of battles and fighting are lacking from the posture.

It bothers him none that the response refers barely to his words, but rather to his tone. Legolas shakes his head, hair a silky spill across his shoulders and back. Pale gold, smooth and pliable. ]

I may not be responsible for you being here, but my heart goes out to you and all those who have not answered the summons out of their own volition.

[ He pauses, briefly, his smile twitches a little, taking up a sheepish quality and he ducks his head in a polite incline. ]

But... there is one thing I must apologise for and I beg for forgiveness for startling you the way I did. There has been something familiar about you of which I have caught but a glimpse and it is what drew me to you.

[ Because Ned is Ned, half his feelings may be found in his little motions: the almost urgent way his hands keep reinstating themselves in his pockets, the draw of his brows in small twitches of reaction, and of course the quirk of his mouth often halfway both directions to a smile and a question mark. ]

Well that's...that's really kind of you. [ He means it, ducks his head for a second just wondering to himself how many are here of their own accord and what it means for anyone who isn't. Ned doesn't like overly much interaction, much less confrontation, much much less fights. War -- just the word -- makes him dizzy. Wake up, is a phrase he keeps telling himself between breaths but it's not working. When he glances at him again, it's thoughtful, the trace anxiety from before just a ripple across his surface, if still inevitably there. ] Not necessary, but kind.

[ And Ned has always appreciated kindness even if he did not always recognize it right away. Absently, his hands escape his pockets and he folds his arms across his chest instead, palms under his elbows.

Closer to a smile now, he doesn't think anything of it that he has to look a bit down because his whole life beyond puberty has long since had him accustomed to this. It isn't even a passing consideration that the blond has a specific reason for speaking to him outside of a generous friendliness.

Well, it isn't until he says it is. Ned tips his head further to the side. ]

Huh? [ Articulate. He never claimed to be. Lucky for him. ] I mean, you don't...I'm just jumpy, [ his laugh confirms it, those bottled nerves near palpable in the up-down of his voice. ] So it's not your fault -- if anything it's mine, but...'familiar'?

How?

[ For all his height, the quizzical pinch of his brows has always lent Ned a strangely puppy-dog reminiscent look. Not that he knows, and not that he'd appreciate the comparison especially, but suffice to say his clueless stare does what most ignorance does: drags a few years off quite neatly. ]

[ It's curious, the variety of emotions pass across the stranger's features and all the little motions that speak through the body language; all different, all distinct, all so full of life and quite endearing in truth. It seems he is easy to read like a book and young, so young like many children of the Men though with his bearing resembling that of a Hobbit, or at least some of the Hobbits Legolas knew.

It is, in truth, quite endearing.

At the question he raises a hand, absently without a threat to the gesture and his knuckles are a barely there brush across a high cheekbone, like a touch of butterfly wings, fluttering and fleeting. ]

Your features, but only in the way of the Men. It is not enough to make a mistake, but it is a curiosity nonetheless.

[ His own feelings easily bleed into his expression, much like Ned's, though not so much into his body language. Legolas remains relaxed, but his eyes say what there is to say: they speak of love and adoration, bright in the dimly lit hall. ]

You resemble, if by a fraction only [ Though quite enough to be recognisable and his gaze grows distant now with a light flutter of eyelashes, as if searching his memory - long and vast as it is - for the time that has passed. ] someone I have not seen in... ninety years now, perhaps, it is hard to keep count of years when there is no need for it. It would be a lie to say that it is not a soothing sight, despite all.

But... no matter. [ He ought not daydream right in this moment, lose himself in memories fond and heartwarming and Legolas gathers himself once more without much fuss, reminding himself of manners. ] I am Legolas, son of Thranduil of the Woodland Realm. I may be in a situation similar to yours, but whatever help I can offer, I will gladly do so.

[ One of two things tends to happen when someone tries to touch Ned in any way: he beats a hasty retreat or he freezes into a statue. In this case, it's the latter, but even at that it's not as severe as it ordinarily is. Chalk it up to the nonthreatening and -- in a sense -- barely-there nature to the contact; chalk it up to how Ned cannot possibly miss the flicker of emotion present here. He doesn't move until the other reaches the part about ninety years. Then he has to blink. Still, he holds his silence, listening as the blond continues.

All this time there has been a certain quality of....Ned isn't certain of the word he wants. Elegance? Not quite it, though also not inaccurate. Formality? No. And yes. Ah...something grand? Is it too much to call it that? Then again, is it too much to believe all of this in the first place?

Note to self: you wake the dead. You wake the dead.

It's this near-third persuasion that cements his decision now to at least give this whole experience the benefit of the doubt. When he himself is a creature of unlikely ability, it seems only fair.

And the company he's kept so far has been nice besides.

Smile still there, it bears a more confounded look than before even as he returns the courtesy, ]

Nice to meet you. I'm Ned.

[ He feels silly and he can't explain why, so he hurries on, ] And thanks. I....I'm not sure why they called me. Honestly.

I'm a pie maker but...if I can ever help you...I mean, I will.

[ He has the sense that Legolas' words come in on some sort of age-old decibel that belongs only in stories, but standing here he is quite real. Distinct features. Ned won't forget or mistake anyone else for him, certainly. And he cannot shake the immediate and somehow striking sense of memory and...dare he say it...love expressed just moments before.

Just who does he remind him of? Why is it a soothing resemblance? Did you lose someone?

A dozen questions for a couple of answers. Like you do.

On a less soft-hearted note though, that too reminds him to ask even as he realizes it might be very rude: ] But...wait -- sorry you said... ninety years?

[ Ned's face says what he bites his tongue over: You look younger than I am though!!!! He'll have to get used to that one. ]

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TEST DRIVE MEME

eheheheh cute things clearly- my apologies, couldn't help myself

ahahfedsjlefkwsd no apologies pls this is so great /)_(\ <3

JUMPY DAD LOOKALIKE HAHA Ned you precious dork, this is amazing

ahkfesdj im enjoying it so much ;-; lmfff lego YOUR FACE LMFDSLJSF;LS

sdkjh HAHA I AM GLAD!! man, he'll like Ned once he stops weirding him out so much lmfdsfj

mklsdklnefds SOB SORRY LEGOLAS 8< ned is such a spaz hahaldsd

never be sorry!! it's cute :> and Legolas is quite patient! also legit not flirting...

jlskdf <3 <3 baw legolas ;-; your dad love cries deeply