genessia | [Action | Closed] Motorized mayhem

Trahearne did his best to touch it as little as possible while pushing what little of the pelt he'd pulled out back into the pillow. Sure it had to be far weirder for Tannusen but it was still pretty weird for him. If he hadn't spent so much time around the fae he'd think he was crazy for that story. He was crazy, just not for that story alone.

"I'm not quite sure how to respond to that," he admitted. Did one offer condolences? Or be pleased they had their old skin back. That was really weird.

"A valid response, in itself," Tannusen closed the big bodypillow's zipper back up, mostly out of habit. "As for how I know this one is mine, the markings are identical. The head... has the skull sewed back into it, I should note, and glass eyes. A little creepy, honestly, but would empty sockets be any better? Who knows. Anyway, if we pulled that part out and I changed shape, you'd see the markings match perfectly. They're just larger and surrounded in white, this time. A tiger's markings are even more unique than a human's fingerprint."

Edited 2017-02-13 21:51 (UTC)

"Mmm." That explanation wasn't that much easier to reply to. No explanation made it any less strange. He'd just have to adjust to weird things like that adding to the never ending pile of weird things to-be-used-to.

He sipped his coffee to give himself another moment to think.

"It's not magical or anything like it? I'm curious, would anyone but you know it's anything but a regular pelt?" To Trahearne, it looked like a regular pelt. A very big regular pelt.

"Nope, it's just a regular pelt and skull. It has sentimental meaning to me, but that's it. When we die, whatever form we happen to be in at the time becomes completely mundane, mortal." Tannusen also took a sip of his drink, eyeing the big lumpy 'pillow' thoughtfully. "It does have a ton of magical potential, because of the symbolism attached to it, but that's it."

Then, with an amused snort.

"Don't worry, I don't intend to put it on display in the apartment. Even if I could keep the little cats away from it, looking at it for too long is weird for me, too."

Trahearne laughed lightly and looked over at the bike, wherever it happened to wander to now. Having that thing roaming in their tiny apartment would be troublesome. That reminder him-

"I wanted to ask, Tannusen," he said, looking back to the fae. "Would you be willing to entertain the idea of finding a larger place to stay? I don't need much room myself but we have the means to move somewhere with another room. It would give us more room for Jethro as well and any odd displays you may or may not want to put on the wall."

Also room for a lot more books.

Jethro had indeed moved, it was now on the sidewalk and quite a bit closer to the two. Even if one expected such behavior, it could be pretty strange.

"Yeah? Fine, how about up there," Tannusen pointed at one of the fancier buildings nearby. "Bet they have a penthouse."

It was a joke, but...

"If you think that's best." The joke went right over his head. Whoosh. Trahearne only had a vague idea what a penthouse was and, between the two of them, they had enough money for just about any apartment.

"I was going to ask you to find something for us, as you know more about this than I do."

Between the two of them, they had enough income for a bloody McMansion of a house if they wanted one. Houses were a lot easier to start thinking of as territory, however, and Tannusen wasn't quite ready for more of that again. Velvet Lust was plenty.

"Well, I was kidding, but now that you've gone and ruined it I guess we have to take the penthouse."

"That's your own fault!" Trahearne said with a laugh. "However will you bear living in comfort and luxury? I'm sure it will pale in comparison to the floor of your club. You're free to sleep on the floor all you wish but you'll at least have a proper bed. And, hopefully, a place for Jethro."

Trahearne had just accepted calling the bike by its name, it was easier.

Tannusen just smirked into his tea and took a drink. And then, "Would you like to actually meet him?"

Uh oh, something was up when Tannusen smirked like that. He knew there was something strange about that bike! More than it moving by itself. He expected that pout of anything Tannusen owned.

"I should, shouldn't I? I'll be living with him." It was better to know what he was dealing with.

"Mm-hm, you should," Tannusen agreed, and then Enchanted him with a drop of Glamour.

The tiger changed as he always did when this happened, sclera turning black and markings appearing; clothing shifting to his chimerical appearance. So did the world around them, cars going down the street turning into clockwork machines and brightly-colored insects, buildings becoming paper or intricate stone or even mushrooms or candy, all depending on what went on inside. A gryphon-shaped cloud high overhead turned into an actual gryphon, swooping away over the tops of buildings with a distant scream that no one else around them could hear.

And, of course, there was Jethro. The bike had vanished, and what stood in its place was a very tall, very nearly incomprehensibly-pretty creature. A kirin, blue and silver, glittering in the sun.

Trahearne blinked rapidly, willing himself to adjust gracefully to the sudden change. This wasn't the first time he'd been enchanted, or the tenth. Tannusen enjoyed that trick. Exposure only made it slightly less strange, however.

He looked up, over Jethro, at first. Not on purpose, there was just so much to take in all at once. When he did look to the kirin he stared, stunned. It was beautiful. If Tannusen told him it has just stepped from the Dream, he'd believe him. Jethro had that unreal quality and a beauty that his mind couldn't quite understand in a way he'd only seen in the Dream of Dreams.

He mouthed "wow" and continued to stare.

The fact that this was how Tannusen experienced everything at all times was... well. It was no wonder Fae from his world were known to be varying degrees of mad, was it? He didn't need his tragic backstory to be unhinged, though it certainly didn't help matters.

"Mm-hm," Tannusen repeated, amused.

Jethro stared back, and blinked slowly before stepping closer and... attempting to steal Trahearne's coffee cup. If successful, the legendary chimera would grab the lip of the cup between very sharp, pointy teeth and tug it away.

Edited 2017-02-16 03:10 (UTC)

The kirin was successful! Trahearne was too stunned by the beauty of the creature to stop Jethro from stealing his coffee. It even freed up his hand, so he reached out, nearly touching Jethro before he remembered himself and withdrew his hand.

"Amazing," he said, awed. "How?"

How is he like that? How did you get such a mount? Just, how?

Jethro was distracted enough with his prize to not even notice the reaching hand. The kirin tipped his head up and back until he could chug the disposable cup's remaining contents. Somehow, even that managed to look majestic.

"How? You'll have to be more specific," Tannusen chuckled, propping his chin up in one gloved hand as he watched Trahearne's reaction. It was always fun, seeing someone's first glimpse of the kirin.

Trahearne set his hands on the table, rubbing the back of one with the thumb of the other. His eyes were still fixed on the kirin. If he tried, he could look away, but he didn't want to yet. Jethro was both beautiful and fascinating, Trahearne knew what a kirin was, mostly from illustrations. That was nothing to what was before him now.

"How did he come to be your, uh, mount? Why is he like this? I have seen very little like him and nothing quite so enthralling to look at."

Jethro finished with the cup and politely set it back onto the table. The rim was punctured... a lot. There were very long, very pointy teeth inside that pretty face. He stepped a little closer and sniffed delicately at Trahearne's headleaves.

"Well, he's a chimera," Tannusen lifted his head off his hand and took a sip of his tea, "they can transcend the usual levels of beauty, just like the sidhe can. As for how he came to be, he was made for me in the Dreaming. The motorcycle existed before he was made, but now it's his mortal form. An anchor, of a sorts. And a radiation suit against banality... just like the human body I was born into."

Trahearne didn't duck away from the sniffing. If Jethro meant him any harm, he'd know it for sure. His hands twitched. He really wanted to know if the kirin felt as unreal as it looked.

"The Dreaming, what a fitting name for anything that produces something like this." It was weird at first, accepting that he had more in common with a fae than any of the humans that lived here. The more he found out about Tannusen and his reality, the more it made sense.

"It looks like a creature for the Dream, though rarely can such beings step outside the Dream as I know it." And even then, the white stag wasn't nearly like this. "What do you mean, he was made for you?"

Jethro bumped the side of his head with his nose. Come on, plant man. Just ask, already!

"He was built for me by a nocker village. Same village that did my teeth, in fact," Tannusen continued to watch their interaction with some amusement. "He's a one-of-a-kind, you don't find many chimera like Jethro even in the high courts of the sidhe, and no kirin that I know of. There's probably natural ones, of course, but they're in the Deep Dreaming if so."

Oh fine! Trahearne raised a hand but kept it a safe distance from the chimera's long neck.

"May I?" he asked Jethro. Not Tannusen, he was pretty sure the kirin could answer for itself.

"I'd say it's a pity that more can't see him as he truly is, yet I'd worry no one would be able to look away." It was a struggle for Trahearne. "How is such a thing 'built'? He is a construct?"

The kirin chose to push his nose into said raised hand, instead of answering aloud.

"He's a forged chimera," Tannu explained while this was going on, "only nockers can make them. The sturdiest, strongest type of chimera. How it's done... I couldn't tell you, nockers don't share that information. They're another type of fae, like pooka. I know a lot of it in Jethro's case involved the dreams and glamour invested in the bike's original form."

Trahearne very carefully stroked the snout bumped into his hand. It didn't feel near as weird and overwhelming as it looked, which was a relief. It was enough that his eyes couldn't quite make sense of it.

"Fascinating. You must've done something of note for them to forge something so incredible for you. A creature like this exists on Tyria, but not near so stunning to look at." Someone would've mentioned if they were, right?

Jethro was covered in fine, smooth scales, even his nose had delicate little pebble-like scales. But he was warm, and felt like a living, breathing creature.

"A year and a day of personally guarding the whole village," Tannusen rattled off the price he'd paid, "including killing a manticore terrorizing the region. Securing them a new steel supply, and coercing the local nobles into leaving the village alone as an independent territory. Also, every penny I could scrape up, a great deal of dross, and... a minor Oath sworn to the Mayor."

That last one was a bigger deal than all the rest combined.

"That and they'd already known me for years." A chimera like Jethro was really not something one acquired casually.

Edited 2017-02-19 02:04 (UTC)

Jethro felt more like a living, breathing creature than Trahearne did, there wasn't much warmth to his hands except what remained from holding the coffee before the kirin snatched it. He didn't seem to mind cold, planty hands touching his face, so no harm done. Trahearne tried to pats Jethro's long, graceful neck.

"So he was a well earned prize? I'm quite impressed, for many reasons." He tried to figure out how he'd been sitting on the back of the bike when the real back of the kirin was much higher. That quickly threatened to give him a headache so he stopped.

[Action | Closed] Motorized mayhem

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