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(event) WAY DOWN WE GO

EVENT LOG: WAY DOWN WE GO

AUGUST 14TH - 24TH

 ►  THE BASICS

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 ►  MOD NOTES

This log is a general dump for all log threads pertaining to August's Way Down We Go event - and in lieu of the lack of catch-all for August, you can feel free to do non-event log threads here as well! Go ahead and utilize vestigenet for any event-related network posts you'd like to make.
The main chunk of the event takes place between the IC dates August 17th (reveal of the hatch) and August 22nd (the latest the spelunkers can be freed before they drown). No rush leaping on this event post, since I know most folks are honestly still plotting about it.
All event information can be found on the July Event Infopost!
Please take special care in this event to label your top-levels with identifying information such as the IC date, any prompts specifically pertaining to event roles (spelunker, rescue efforts, etc), and/or 'non-event' for any non-event prompts you may include. Just trying to keep things organized!
I'm going to help solidify the plotting efforts over the next few days to help make sure everyone's on the same page, but none of it will be set in stone just in case latecomers want in too. If you want in, chime in on the spelunkers, rescue efforts, or support roles top-levels as applicable!
Any questions can be directed to this top-level or, for a quicker response, to Trace on discord/plurk.

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Gilia stirs at the voice, with a startled yelp like she has been caught with her hands on sweet bread. Pulling herself half up from where she had resolved herself to sleep for the night.

"Oh - oh I am sorry. I did not mean to put my feet in the water."

As if that is something she needs to apologize for. "I hope I did not disturb you."

The startled yelp stops him short in his tracks, hands lifting palm-out to show that he's not carrying a knife or something (though the thumb of one still curls around his flute). He opens his mouth to apologize for startling her, but she seems to beat him to it, apologizing for.... getting wet?

His brow knits in faint bemusement, but then she follows up with something quite a bit easier to answer. He shakes his head, hands dropping down to his sides now. "Not disturbed, no. I saw a fire, thought I might investigate." A beat, and then the slightest tilt of his head. "You've just arrived, am I right?" If not for her prevailing jumpiness, he wouldn't discount the possibility that someone was just in the mood for a campfire, but adding to that the fact that she's clearly ill at ease?

...Wei Ying realizes now that he should perhaps consider not standing aimlessly at the edge of the firelight, so he also tacks on, "Ah, would you mind if I sit?"

Gilia nods in answer to his question, pressing her lips together as she listens. "Not a half day ago, I think. I was walking with my siblings - and now..."

She has been told that she is alone here from them. Though that is very uncharitable, she is hardly alone without any company at all, she knows. But alone in the matter that is of most importance to her - she is far from her duties, her people, her position.

His request, of course, is met with a most serious nod, as she raises up. Hospitality is of most importance, that is the rule her mother had always insisted upon. Gilia clears a spot for him, "please, I would be glad of your company."

She can't offer him much. The leftovers of the fish she had caught earlier that she had set aside for later, and no - well no physical cup.

Instead, she goes about making him one. The phial of water she keeps at her side is to her - all tools to her as she curls her wrist, and lifts it up to float in the air. Water could, after all, be as hard or soft as she needed it to be. So she forms him a goblet out of it, a water goblet made out of water for him to drink from since she cannot give him a cup. That in turn, she reaches for the lake water to fill. Swirling it around the air to clean it. It takes tremendous control, to make the cup of water in the shape of one hand and clean the water with the other - but she is not Daughter Sea for nothing. To know water, to be water, it is birth-right.

That she presents to him to drink from. "I hope this serves. It is clean, and safe to drink."

The welcoming and clearing of a spot earns a grin, and he's moving to sink down crosslegged in the space she so courteously cleared. Quite honestly, the fact that his company is welcome at all is more than enough - this isn't her home, she isn't expected to host in any shape or form - and for that reason, he watches what she's doing (is that water floating?) with unabashed intrigue and no idea that it might somehow be on his behalf.

Wei Ying is well and truly fascinated by the time she offers the cup out to him, and for a moment he thinks she's just trying to show him until she offers her words as well. A flicker of surprise crosses his face, a 'oh, no, you don't have to-' forming and dying on his lips. After she's done all that, how could he refuse?

And so he reaches out a hand, accepting the fancy cup as carefully as if it might dissolve into water the moment she lets go of it, but no - it's still a cup. He exhales a laugh-breath of wonder, holding it between him and the fire for a moment to watch the firelight reflect through the crystalline surface. "This is- amazing. You're fantastically talented." Surely she already knows that, but he's saying it anyway before he finally brings the marvel of magic to his lips to take a sip from it.

Gilia is not a creature of vanity or pride, but there is no denying that she is pleased with his praise, her smile swelling like an inner light that sweeps across her features in a broad smile that illuminates before she schools her face more sensibly. Gilia, for the love of the Sea-Father, keep that to yourself. They don't need to know that you are so agreeable.

"I do my best, as well any does. But, I am glad it amuses, sir. Please, enjoy it, it will not fall apart until you tell me you are done."

She has learned to hold it for some hours, now, the fine control was something she was well suited to. To focus and direct her entire self into something.

"But if you will permit me some admission to my dedication, it is a skill I have worked very hard at. Would you like something to eat? I have little enough leftover from my own dinner, but certainly enough for another meal."

Even as Wei Ying eyes the goblet, the shift in the woman's expression is clear in his peripheral, and his eyes flicker over at once to take in the radiance of that smile, lips pressing together to keep from grinning stupidly himself. Then the smile is gone, schooled away to something quite a bit less lively - a tragedy, quite honestly. He'll have to figure out a way to make it come back sometime.

In the meantime, he drinks from the goblet again, not wishing to ask her to hold its form for too terribly long. His lips curl at the corners when she concedes, admitting even the slightest bit of pride in this skill she has put so much effort forth to learn, because she should be proud of it. He certainly would, were he able to do such a thing. Her offer for food, however, earns a shake of his head. "Ah, no, thank you - I've plenty of food back at the cabin." It occurs to him now, brow knitting faintly, to ask, "You aren't staying out here, are you?"

She looks around the small camp site, the plates and bowls she has fashioned out of the water for herself to keep her sustained. The simply meal. It wasn't a sustainable way to live, but she could hardly ask for anything else.

"Well, I..." She keeps her eyes downturned, "... I am afraid I must, as I knew little else how to proceed. I could hardly take someone else's house without an invitation."

"Are they all full up?" He wouldn't know, quite honestly. He hasn't scouted the cabins since they selected their own, aside from the one trip he made to scavenge unspoiled food from the empty ones nearly a month ago now.

He takes another drink from the goblet to empty it, considering asking if, were he to hold it over his mouth, it would turn to more water still (as a neat trick, not because he's still thirsty)... But this matter of her sleeping out here in the dirt is much more pressing, and Wei Wuxian straightens up a bit with the importance of it. "Nope, that won't be happening. If you don't mind sharing house with a bunch of mostly well-mannered young men, you've got a room waiting for you back at my cabin."

Oh, but it seems to occur to him now, and he lifts his hands so they meet in front of him, fingers overlapping. In this manner he bows just slightly, a more proper and respectful greeting than the first one he offered, and says, "My name is Wei Wuxian. Can we pretend I remembered my manners and introduced myself before I offered a place to stay?"

"Oh, I am not sure. I did not approach, that seemed so dreadfully illmannered of me - I could never impose on anyone else like that... to do so would be a poor reflection of myself and my family."

But as he corrects her, she just looks more confused, what - he wants to. "Oh please, no I could not ever - " then there are introductions and at least... that makes it easier. She breathes out slowly, evenly. Pressing her lips together and bows her head, lowering her upper body with it. "I am Gilia. Gilia St. Loe, of the Isle St. Loe, Second Child, First Daughter."

Gilia St. Loe, Second Child, First Daughter. Straightforward enough. Not even Wei Ying and his often godawful memory can botch that one.

"Well, Lady Gilia St. Loe, I meant as I said - you have a room waiting, if you'll accept it. Otherwise, I suppose I'll just sleep out here by the water as well. I don't mind it one bit." All of which is to say that he's not leaving her to fend for herself in this place, even if 'fend for herself' right now mostly just means against her own thoughts, fears, and prevailing loneliness.

He has her caught, so utterly, a trap of her own manners, she cannot let him stay out here, not for her sake - which she strongly suspects he is, since he said he had a hearth of his own to return to. She looks pained a moment, like a rabbit that has just found out it's in a trap, a surely pathetic look of which set of manners am I supposed to follow?'

"Would... would you not prefer to return to your own lodgings?"

The question gets a hum, and - "I certainly would. That's why I'm hoping you'll agree to come with me." While normally he would be quite a bit more sensitive to her obvious courtesy-driven plight, doing so at the moment would leave her out here alone and he's not about to allow that unless she outright demands it.

"I... I am sure... it is not that I do not wish to - you should not deprive yourself on my account."

It's been a very, very long day. It has left her... frazzled, to say the least, and it's finally starting to chip. She can't stand much more of this.

"... I could not... be so bold but... I would be obliged if you..."

"It's settled, then." He's grinning again, very much pleased by the concession however hard-won and stumbling it may have been. Now he offers back the goblet, empty of water to drink. "We can sit here as long as you'd like, I love a good campfire - but whenever you're ready, it would be my honor to show you the cabin."

"I..." She feels so caught. Oh, what has she done? Imposing on this man.

"... I suppose I should not keep you any longer out here. Perhaps now?"

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(event) WAY DOWN WE GO

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this is so short forgive me

hushes your face

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