Let's get the party started!

[poor_unlucky_girl]

Who: Everyone including YOU
What: Pride month celebration!
Where: Mess hall
When: First weekend of June, after the brain quest.
Warnings/Notes: Probably alcohol, language, might lead to sexy stuff

Ah yes, Jennifer is in pure delight. Back in her day, this wasn't a thing and now not only she, who will romanticize everything, gets to celebrate love, she gets to witness people be happy as they celebrate with her. She waves happily at whoever enters and nods towards all the available material.

There is indeed lots of booze, which one wouldn't expect from Jennifer but hey, Price helped. There's rainbow cake, and biscuits with the flags on it. Before everyone arrives she innocently asks one of the staff members in the kitchen if she can eat a lesbian one. There's a box with pins and facepaints. Some people are sporting funny or sexy costumes. She is wears her usual hairdo, but decorates it with a rose, paired with a simple white dress. She drinks her tea and is happy, and just a little bit too clueless of what can happen during these kinds of celebrations...

Comments

[greyerrant]

"For what it is worth, I do not believe this should cause concern." He hopes. He doesn't know how all this works. He's been concerned, so he is taking Guts' advice on things. He will start walking down the hall, and address her once she follows.

"I just wanted first of all to say how much I enjoy spending time with you, even if we both are often quiet in our shared spaces." He will look her in the eyes, waiting to gauge her reaction, not hesitating out of fear, but simply to get an idea of how much of a live grenade of emotions he's about to throw at her.

[zerg_rush]

A major part of getting away with something is acting like you're not trying to get away with something, so Kerrigan waltzes out with her possibly contraband cookies like of course it's fine, and is rewarded with the stupid victory of a plate of baked goods.

It's taking everything she's got not to simply grab the details out of Loken's thoughts, but he hates that and it's not an emergency, so she just meets his gaze with what she hopes is a politely curious expression. He'd better appreciate her restraint.

Then, he finally starts explaining, and whatever she'd expected, it wasn't that.

"...Oh," she says, her face going blank in her surprise before she laughs softly and the set of her shoulders relaxes. Until the moment the relief hits, Kerrigan hadn't realized how much she'd been braced to hear something terrible. "I'm used to people giving me bad news when they get weird about it."

[greyerrant]

Loken smiles down. "Well, perhaps it is bad, Kerrigan. You see, I like you in a way I have not thought of anyone before, at least not quite in this way. I find that I like you as a prospective romantic partner and.. well I was wondering if we could try physical affection,if that sort of thing is mutual. If not I will understand, of course."

After all the disappointments he's been through getting shot down by a cute redheaded psyker wouldn't even register next to say, getting a cathedral caved in on you by a Titan. Still, his heart is beating a little fast. Damn traitor heart.

[zerg_rush]

Kerrigan looked surprised before. She looks poleaxed now. A lot of little things over the past few months suddenly form a pattern she would be kicking herself for not noticing, if her brain were working right now. Some telepath you are, Sarah.

He deserves an answer, but of the jumble of thoughts wrestling for dominance in her head, the one that wins and makes it to her mouth is: "You're not gay?"

Good job, Kerrigan.

[greyerrant]

Now it's Garviel's turn to look poleaxed. "No. I mean... well, I hadn't considered it. All such things are unknown to astartes. I mean, no well.. what I'm trying to say is we don't engage in any such bonding normally but these are special circumstances. And you are special."

He frowns. "This is far more difficult than launching a drop-assault or organizing a battle company. I am making a mess of it, aren't i?"

[zerg_rush]

"What? No! No, you're fine. You surprised me, is all. I thought you were going to ask a favor you needed a psychic for. That's usually why people pull me aside." Kerrigan has no idea how depressing a declaration she's just made, and she keeps talking in a hasty attempt to reassure him. Hurting his feelings is the last thing she wants to do, she realizes, and that's not usually something she has a problem with.

"I just— When I have a conversation, most of the time I cheat with telepathy," she confesses with a rueful half-smile, "because I'm not any good with people. But you hate that, so I've been trying not to read your mind."

Kerrigan takes a deep breath. Every time she lets someone past her armor, something terrible happens, deaths and betrayals and old wounds reopening—but Garviel has already come through those fires, on a larger scale than she'd ever imagined possible, and it neither destroyed him nor made a monster of him. The idea he sees anything in her is baffling, and a little frightening.

"I wouldn't do that for just anybody." She doesn't know whether she's being tremendously brave or tremendously selfish when she reaches out to take his hand. "You should probably start calling me Sarah."

[greyerrant]

Garviel would have argued betrayal had done both to him, at one point or another, but he came back due to the loyalty and steadfastness of those who cared for him, but he doesn't know her decisionmaking to argue the point. He just nods, and grips her hand gently, saying, "Sarah, then." He's quiet after that, just standing there holding her hand. For the moment, and maybe for a little while longer, that's enough for him.

[zerg_rush]

Sarah feels a lot like when you look at a picture of two faces and they suddenly become a vase, or when a mundane dream takes a turn for the impossible and some part of you realizes what's happening is ridiculous...and yet somehow Garviel manages to be standing there radiating a contentment she can feel without trying. Absurd.

She's still smiling, though.

"How long have you been sitting on this?" she asks, hoping they haven't been at the center of a betting pool. Sarah's reasonably sure she would have picked that up from someone, at least.

[greyerrant]

"A few months, honestly. I wanted to talk to you about it a bit when we got ah... paired up but there were other problems to be dealt with. Guts and Dan helped me understand things."

He shrugs his shoulders. "It took a while to parse that my body and psycho-conditioning weren't doing what they normally did, and then I had to decide what to do about it."

He looks her in the eyes, "Maybe being happy, if only for a little while, isn't completely forbidden."

[zerg_rush]

When Garviel says "months," Sarah's eyes get wide. She mutters something under her breath about being the worst telepath in the galaxy, but she lets him keep talking.

"You might have bet on the wrong horse." Her smile gets wistful. "I've never had much luck with being happy." Coming from most people her age, that would sound ridiculous, but most people her age haven't had lives nearly as eventful as hers.

[greyerrant]

"I would venture very few people are lucky. But if we fight for it we might find a little time, yet."
He puts his not held hand on her shoulder, drawing her closer to hold her in a way that is far more intended as comforting than strictly romantic. He is still kinda clueless about this.

[zerg_rush]

"You saw New Gettysburg." Sarah shifts her grip on Garviel's hand and rests her cheek against his chest, listening to the strange sound of his two hearts beating.

"I shouldn't even be alive. All this—" she gestures slightly with her cookie plate hand to suggest the entire world "—is just some kind of cosmic accounting error." Maudlin? Nah. She chuckles, almost smug. "Might as well take advantage of it."

[greyerrant]

"I did." He nods, taking advantage as best he can, which means quietly holding her close for a while. It feels nice, that's more than he's typically had for most of his life. No death or glory, vengeance or brutality. Just affection between two people who've been hammered a little too much by life.

"Do you ah... have any suggestions?"

He is the MOST clueless.