girl you're so reginal plastron

"Mx. Cirufe, head Liceor in the Sirius army...what in the Qlu system was that?"

Seren doesn't do dressing down. Seren doesn't get dressed down - or wear a swimsuit, either, let alone a bikini. They feel odd even engaging this twinge of what might be called jealousy as appearing on any more conventional individual, twisting up from beneath their halo to act tricksily and not-quite-baldly devilish. But it is what it is.

L, lovely L, won't stop going on about how lovely Elma is. And she's beautiful, absolutely! She's otherworldly, magical and finally fit to all the pomp and ceremony of Secretary Nagi's strangely veiled entreaties. That's not the problem.

The problem is that ci's swooning about it.

But enough with the emphasis. Seren has to know that they're not being desserted over any old revelation of a true xeno form.

They have to know that. Right?

In response, L cocks cir head. No nosist reply, plea of innocence.

"...I just thought that was really weird. You getting all googoo-gaga over Elma."

L lays a pair of fingers to chin, humming. "You were not pleased to see Elma's delightful true form? We thought she was astonishing, ravishing, breathgiving!"

If Seren could reach the back of L's head, they would smack it, and firmly. Instead, they have to settle for raggedly pummeling cim in the abs for a few seconds. Mentally, of course, because that would be mean to their favorite person, to beat cim up.

Wouldn't it?

Seren takes a breath of their own. Sighs. "I know you thought that, L. You said it out loud for everyone to hear, right in the middle of the Lifehold. Which is why I thought it was weird. Not what you thought, necessarily, but...how you said it."

As if there aren't universes full of more important things to stew about than this, right now. How about the flooded database washing out the archived data of the entire human race, which means most of L's quirky lexicon?

Seren, never having had a fleshly body, isn't too personally upset about the current state of humanity's existence. It's hard for them to be. They can, sort of, rationalize what the loss must mean, and how they have to get to grips with moving forward, but that's something people like Elma and Nagi are much, much better equipped to handle.

They're much more frightened of what will happen if L doesn't get to learn every last idiom that's ever existed, and apply it improperly in step, in style, in sequence; in consequence, and so on.

Oh, it's such a scary thought. In general, the statement from Chausson that they'll begin to finally, actually, take hold of a newfound life on Mira is one that bears repeating, because it's cast into relief just how itinerant they all still were. And if humanity puts down roots on Mira, roots that involve settlements outside of the crashed space ship, then L won't be leaving for a long, long time, right?

But what if Elma gets into another stasis pod and flies off for another galaxy, to chase Goetia and rip her tentacles out by hand? Would L follow? Would L's wanderings take cim that far afield of cir destined partner?

Destiny. Whose definition? Pure happenstance, and a person too baffling to be truly ingratiated with anyone else who could easily be called normal.

It's really possible that, were it not for their convenient, automatic, wholly reasonable conscription into a paramilitary organization, most BLADEs wouldn't work too hard to dig up dirt in a lava-covered hellscape, or scrape dung off the walls of an ant colony. Seren tries to be curious, but no one is as curious as L.

L might leave. L probably will.

And if that were to be true, then why wouldn't Seren simply...follow?

Because, if it's something about this planet, Seren has to wonder what will happen to the bit-flipped accidental-on-purpose mimeosome, not to mention all the other ones carefully and secretly stored by some sort of autonomous hand, back on that beautiful idea of Earth. They're really not so confident that their powers, however potent and peppy, can equal the joint might of two blue and purple stony-horned souls.

Oh, don't go where I can't follow, my friend. Don't follow Elma where I can't go.

It burns our cold-blooded heart to see Seren so upset, so unsteady and unsure. We believe in their potential absolutely, of course...

We have not met a braver, brighter, spunkier human in all our travels. Never mind that we couldn't have, before the White Whale landed, after all.

But, we confess that humans are fickle. They are prone to fits of fancy and flights of temper. Had they wings, they would surely earn them, and live on a prayer.

We are not temperamental. We may be changeable, we may say things that confuse and surprise, but we are not like this. Not quite so.

(Seldom, Seren has spoken of righteous anger, and of our lack - of their own, as well. Often, Seren has bounced back, and then again "gotta bounce"-d.)

It is not Elma's body that has enchanted us, nor the curve of her face. It is the pure beauty and essence of a being that bears herself and her soul so gracefully.

Seren is like this, to us. Seren's handsomeness, their charm, their radiance and resplendency! All are due to their incomparable wit and zeal.

We know that if we were to lay eyes upon Seren's own true form, which is a star somewhat like a white dwarf that has long been winked away to supernovas by the nudge of the Samaarian attack, we would not be able to witness it without crying out.

Of course we would tell them so, but even we...we have limits, to our earnestness. We have trepidation, where human customs are concerned.

We can learn so much from the archives. We can thirst for knowledge in a manner that can never be quenched nor trapped, and this is acceptable. Perhaps it is even encouraged. We do try to be duly encouraging, and set the dial tone.

But we cannot be human. Indeed, we do not wish to become so. We do not wish to be merely acceptable.

Who of this tenacious race - like rats, does one say? - would be left to accept us, should we venture onward to another world away?

No. No, this is not how it will be.

We wish to be as nonhuman, if not to say inhuman, as Elma, and also as Seren.

We wish to be only ourselves. We wish to be the odd ones out, together.