voidtreckerexpress | Catnapping

Entry tags:

spark [crau]

Catnapping - OTA

Who: Spark and whomever
Where: All around the train
When: After the mission, before the platform
What: Spark being introspective while trying to pretend he's still just... Spark
Warnings: Angst, possible violence mentions.

Spark often claimed that he slept through missions to explain why he was absent from them, so he was free to have Gar or Privateer Pirate show up. But this time he actually had slept. He'd been sleeping a lot since that world with the fake lives, that one that felt so much like a storm from Nautilus.

But he was....

Lonely. That was it. He was lonely.

He was more settled now than he had been after the fish world, but he was still barely eating and avoiding people. Or had been. He just...

He wished Adrien would show up here. Or The Doctor would know who he was. Rose. Nino. Connie. Nita. Kirika. Dominic. Greg. Donovan. Luna. He'd even take Jacob or Gabriel at this point, though each had their issues. Of course if he was bothering with wishing... Quilt.

He shook himself and walked through the train, looking for someone who needed a cat to snuggle with, or tell their problems to. Or a friendly face from Nautilus, since none from his real home or Paris were here...

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Oddly, the library felt almost familiar. But then that could be because of how many people from Nautilus spent time there. Leia and Clef. He could catch a whiff of Link too. And... Still faint scents of Nita. But just now there were too many people around for what he wanted to ask, so he jumped up onto her lap to wait until he had her attention.

Spark wouldn't be waiting long. Hopping into her lap got her attention fairly easily and she smiled down at him, marking her place in her book and setting it aside before greeting him with a gentle stroke. "Hello, Spark," she said. "Something on your mind? Or just looking for a comfortable place to nap?" She suspected the former, since she had noticed his lack of appetite, but he was a cat at the end of the day. A comfortable lap to nap on was likely an end in itself under the right circumstances.

"Too many people to nap here," he said, trying to bluff and sound like his usual self.

"From what I've seen, cats can nap just about anywhere if they have a mind to," Leia said. So he did have something on his mind then. When he was ready to share it, she was ready to listen. For now, she simply treated him to more gentle stroking, figuring it would be relaxing for both of them.

"Yeah, but you humans have it rougher. I suppose if you wanted to nap, I could curl up with you in a quiet car or something..."

Manipulative little cat.

Manipulative indeed. But for a good cause. "I don't particularly need a nap," she said. "But a place to read undisturbed for awhile would be nice. How about you go and stake out a room for us? I'll get a fresh cup of tea or two and meet you there." Two, just in case Gar would be making an appearance.

He nodded and hopped down. "I guess I could do that for you," he said before sauntering off. She'd find him, apparently she was good at that.

With Spark off her lap, Leia stood up, taking her book with her. She headed first to the kitchen to refill her tea and get a second one for Spark. Or herself, if he felt like staying a cat. She then headed to the Quiet car, keeping an eye out for a certain orange cat either in or just outside of one of the rooms.

He was curled up on the seat of one, the door left open, pretending to be asleep. His ear flicked as she came closer, as if she'd need that motion to draw her attention.

She didn't, but it was appreciated nonetheless. Plus it was kind of cute, if she were being honest, though she likely wouldn't mention that to Spark. She entered the room and closed the door behind her, cutting off the sounds of the rest of the train before sitting down next to Spark and setting the two teas and her book on the table.

"Alright, Spark, we're all clear," she said. "You can stop pretending now."

He sat up and stretched, buying himself time to get the nerve up to ask the question.

"Was it real?" No wait, "Were they real?"

"On the false Diagad, you mean?", Leia said. "The people were real. Some of the animals too, I think. And while the memories Chaos imposed on us might have been false, the emotions and connections we felt because of them were very real. That part is always real."

"So they were really there? The ones that woke up and remembered things... were they really there?" he asked. The point seemed important to him. Very. "Were they actually there, or did we just think they were because we wanted them to be?"

He was asking as if he desperately needed to know the truth, to know what he could believe in.

"They were really there," Leia confirmed. "The Force doesn't lie. I could feel them. I helped some of them get home. They were very real."

He shifted into Gar. "I spoke to some people from Paris while we were there... after they woke up and remembered," he whispered, looking down into his hands.

Leia shifted over slightly to allow him more room to change. "I spoke to a few of them too, though only one of them after he woke up," she said. "Gabriel was as charming as ever" Which was to say, about as charming as a brick.

"What did you all talk about?", she asked gently.

"You... you spoke to da.... to Gabriel?" he said, startled.

"On the local network, yes," Leia said. "I explained the situation to him, and he complained about being interdimensionally kidnapped again, which to be fair, is a reasonable complaint. Before I disconnected I told him to keep his head down and try not to cause trouble, for his sake and Adrien's."

Figuring that explaining exactly what she'd meant by that would be a bad idea just then, she added, "I didn't expect that he would, mind you, but with his sort of personality, it's better to be safe than sorry." Because whatever else might be the case about him, he was absolutely the sort who would apply his usual attitude to a crazed chaos entity if he felt it warranted.

"I... avoided him once everyone started remembering. Though to be fair... I avoid him a lot," he admitted looking down at his hands.

No, that was not what he needed to talk about. Focus, Gar. He took a deep breath then looked at her again.

"Did you see Chat Noir while you were there? I did. Got to talk to him for a while..." he said, trying to figure out how to say what he needed to say. What he had been given permission to say.

"Not exactly," Leia said. "I did see Plagg, though he looked like a house cat at the time, and I returned him to Adrien. If I'm not mistaken, I think Adrien was also in the class I taught too. I didn't spend a great deal of time talking to him in the few days we were there though, and there wasn't time to seek them out again once we remembered ourselves and the illusion began to fall apart." She didn't directly mention that she already knew exactly who Chat Noir was, but the descriptions of her interactions all but said it anyway.

"What did you two talk about?" She sipped her tea, and moved the second cup so that it was more directly in front of Gar. Long talks were nearly always easier with tea.

"You... you met PLAGG?!" he asked, sitting straight up. "What do you mean at the time? What did you think he was supposed to look like?" How much did she already know? He needed to know!

"I say at the time because I was still under the influence of the illusion when I met him," Leia said. "So anything that didn't fit the illusion- like, say, a kwami- was glossed over. To me, he looked like a black housecat just then, albeit one with unusual powers."

"As for what he's supposed to look like... Adrien and I accidentally shared memories during one particular storm, and the one I saw included Plagg. He apparently wasn't in the best shape at the time, but to me, he looked like a small, black doll with vaguely feline features who happened to be alive."

"And before you ask, no, that's not how I found out Adrien's secret. Under most circumstances, being powerfully Force-sensitive gives one a bit of an unfair advantage when it comes to seeing past illusions. It is possible to temporarily overcome that- as the business with the false Diagad proved-, but it's still more than enough to negate whatever glamour effect the Miraculous transformations provide, at least in person. So the first time I met Chat Noir, I wondered why Adrien was wearing a cat suit." And also why he was sleeping on a bush, but that wasn't really relevant to the discussion at hand.

"Really it's a good thing they have those glamours though. Otherwise I highly doubt anyone who actually knows them would be fooled. Ladybug's costume was especially bad about that; without magical help, a little domino mask barely even qualifies as a disguise."

Give him a moment to process that shock. That... That she's known all along. All of it.

Because then it will occour to him...

"Then... Then you know who Papillon is?! We can stop him?!" Why didn't she tell them sooner? When they had all been there together and could have DONE SOMETHING ABOUT IT. "You're ascended. Everything else can wait, we have to go to Paris! We can save everyone!"

Leia held up a hand for a moment, a gesture of calm to give herself room to speak. "Unfortunately there are a few problems with that plan," she said. "First of all, that particular Force ability only works in person. Unlike the other Miraculous wielders, I never met Papillion face to face, so I wasn't able to discern his identity with the Force." Careful wording so that she wouldn't be caught in a lie when the eventual conversation about Papillion did happen. A certain point of view indeed.

"Second, I'm not Ascended. Our overall Bending power may have been greatly enhanced when Nautilus released us all, but that didn't mean we were given all the additional abilities that come with specific levels of Ascension. I don't have any more way of willingly leaving this dimension than anyone else here does."

"And third, even if I were ascended, popping into that particular version of Paris and using powers completely out of its context to settle a personal grudge is just asking for trouble. Even here, I'm careful of how much Bending I use; we don't know what affect excessive use of Bending might have outside the context of and unconnected to Nautilus, and I don't want to risk causing a Flaw. The train itself only interferes when a particular world can't handle a crisis on their own, and as much as I dislike the necessity of them being involved to begin with, I believe that Adrien and his friends are quite capable of handling him."

"Besides..." She took a sip of her tea. "If I were to go to that version of Paris, there would be far too many other things I'd be tempted to change. And a few of those changes would almost certainly trigger a Flaw."

"Link is Ascended! We'll get him to take us. We'll pick up Miranda and Donovan first. If anyone can stop a flaw, it is Miranda." Or Dominic before he lost his powers. "Then we can fix everything in Paris so Adrien and them can live safely!" And... then maybe Adrien could come back with them onto the train?

Re: Closed to Leia

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Kinda handwaving the end of that convo. X3

Re: Kinda handwaving the end of that convo. X3

Re: Kinda handwaving the end of that convo. X3

Re: Kinda handwaving the end of that convo. X3

Re: Kinda handwaving the end of that convo. X3

Re: Kinda handwaving the end of that convo. X3

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