cartographie | inbox for golden peacock

Sure! We can make a date of it.

Just as a heads' up, though, my birthday gift only works on me. I'm guessing you don't really get in trouble at your rank though, do you?

I'm in, name the day.

Not really. Nothing I can't talk my way out of, at least.

Well, we could ring in the new year with a break-in. That seems like the kind of thing Rinne-senpai would do to celebrate. But they also say there's no time like the present, so if you'd rather do it sooner, we could just go tomorrow!

And that's good. Sounds like we have skills in common, which should make us an even better duo! 😊

[He, too, is good at talking his way out of trouble. He's done it a few times in the resort!]

Tomorrow it is. I'll have that envelope for you to hang onto.

Don't read it.

Got it. Then I'll see you tomorrow! 👋😊

[He'll be there right on time.

They agree to rendezvous in the lobby. "Next to the giant tacky gold statue of two birds kissing" is what Hiyori suggests as their meeting place. He brings his birthday gift as promised, but he's wearing a trenchcoat over it: one with deep pockets that can fit the envelope she's bringing. Because the coat obscures most of his outfit, no staff members are staring slack-jawed in helpless desire at him yet.

They will be in a minute, though. All he has to do is unbutton it!

He smiles when he catches sight of her, waving a hand in greeting.]

Why, if it isn't Agent Orange~♪

[... yep. He thought it'd be fun to use silly spy nicknames during their break-in!]

Ready to go on a treasure hunt?

Agent Orange? [ She has no frame of reference, but Nami smirks anyway. It sounds mysterious and cool, and way more above board than Cat Burglar, a more familiar title from back home.

Leaning up away from the wall, Nami looks over the trench coat he's opted to cover himself with, her eyebrows raising dubiously before she hands over a plain envelope with Rinne's name printed on the front. ]

Hopefully you never have to give it to him. [ And with the terrible business of owning her feelings even a little out of the way, Nami can focus on what really matters – treasure. ]

Always. I'm a pirate. [ She answers, matter-of-fact as ever, save for the glint in her eye that's brightening up her expression and hinging on mischievous.

It's been a while since she's had a heist job, after all. ]

Come on, if you're ready to work your magic, let's get out of here. [ Nami adjusts the strap of her satchel, already doing a mental inventory of the location of the lockpicks concealed on her person. ]

[He nods cheerfully.]

I thought that could be your spy nickname! Spies usually have those in the movies. And they often speak in code to each other. For example, "The fox is in the henhouse!" That's a classic spy phrase.

[But enough of that silliness.

It really does feel like they're in a spy movie when she passes over the envelope and he slips it into his pocket. Rather than government secrets or other classified information, however, he knows there's something even more precious inside: a woman's feelings for the person she loves. (Or one of the people, anyway. He's not sure how many spouses Nami might have had.) He gives a small, faintly sad smile when she says she hopes he never has to give it to Rinne, and he chimes back:]

Mhm~♪ This is just a back-up plan. It's normal for spies like us to have those.

[Someday, he hopes she's able to tell Rinne her true feelings in-person. That would be the ideal happy ending. But he also knows there are no happy endings guaranteed here, in this place where no one he knows has gotten out yet. That's why he's entrusting his final wishes with Loki. Why he told Baizhu to look for his stuff in the storage room if he disappears, and told Leona to look after Jun...

He's happy not to think about all that right now, though. On with the treasure hunt!

He smiles more broadly when she says she's a pirate—truly the perfect heist partner!—and moves away from the statue.]

Great! Then it's "Mission Start"! ♪

[And off he strolls through the lobby, towards the doors that will lead to the storage room.

They pass the main desk on the way, where a concierge sits and a bellhop stands at the ready. Both swivel their heads towards them, eyes on the Queen. One of them opens their mouth: "Is there anything I can get you, Miss Nami?" Hiyori is barely a blip on their radar in comparison; not a true low-rank worthy of being spit on or ignored, but he hardly leaves an impression next to her.

That's about to change.]

We're not here to be pampered, actually.

[He addresses the staff himself, causing their eyes to flicker over: there might be the faintest hint of reproach in their gazes, for speaking on behalf of the Queen when he's not even a face card. But then his hands, already working on the buttons of his trenchcoat, finish their job, pulling it open dramatically, and their expressions change at once.

Their eyebrows lift. Their jaws unhinge. Cheeks suffuse with red, eyes become wide and sparkly. Hiyori Tomoe just went from being a pauper unfit to talk on behalf of the Queen to the most dazzling guest they've ever seen.]

We're here to take a stroll in that storage room! Just a fun little evening walk~♪ That shouldn't be a problem, should it?

[He waits, speaking cheerfully. No rebuttal comes out of their mouths; they're just gaping, until one of them breathes out, "So... S-So handsome..."]

Yep, didn't think so! ♪

[He turns to Nami with a smirk, trenchcoat now draped over his shoulder. Underneath he's wearing a fancy embroidered suit, and if she has an eye for detail, she might just notice that the stitching looks faintly reminiscent of the type of embroidery Jin Mingming wears. But he doesn't call anymore attention to it, nodding towards those double doors at the back of the room.]

See? Thanks to my seduction power, this should be a cinch...♪ I'm not sure we'll need all the tools you brought. But if there's anything inside that's locked away in a safe, maybe then they'll come in useful. Anyway, let's go! ♪

[ Circumstance saw fit to make it so that Nami knew Hiyori well enough to trust him more than she trusts mosts of the folks at the resort, despite not knowing too much about him. She gets the career as an idol, the way he worries about his counterpart, and the fact that he shirks and bristles when things get too crass and lewd, but she wouldn't say she's a vault of Hiyori Tomoe knowledge.

And she certainly never, ever expected him to handle a situation with so much hustle and swagger.

In fact she has to make an effort not let so much as a smirk cross her face as he pulls off his coat and woos the resort staff standing between them and the store room she's been itching to look through since learning of its existence. When the staff back off, she can finally look up at him, visibly impressed as she shakes her head in surprise. ]

Holy– [ Shit, she stops herself from saying. ] That is a good suit.

[ A criminal's dream, even, and it's the practical uses a look like that might have that draws her gaze to sweep over him, taking in the details although failing to catch the significance of the embroidery. More than a handful of questions pop up in her mind, but instead, she tears her eyes away and shoots a pointed glance down the hall, finally letting herself smirk when he brings up her tools. ]

I wouldn't complain. It's been a while since I got to crack a safe. [ No sense letting her talents get rustier if the opportunity presents itself within the room they're heading towards, her hand already reaching out to pull the handle on the door to usher them both inside.

And it's a very impressive sight in there, rows of shelves piled high with labeled bins, each teeming with intriguing odds and ends, some more valuable-looking than others. ]

So is your suit magic, or something? [ Now that they're away from the staff, she has no problem prying, determined to multitask as she veers off to the nearest shelf to start rifling through things and reading over the names on them. ]

[He beams back at her.]

Isn't it? ♪

[He can explain where he got that suit from in a minute. For now, he's focused on entering the storage room. She says she wouldn't mind getting the chance to crack open a safe, and says:]

Spoken like a true spy! ♪

[Then steps inside ahead of her when she holds open the door.]

Why, thank you~♪

[It's safer for him to go first, he figures; if there are any guards milling around near the entrance, hopefully they'll be too busy going ga-ga over the sight of him in his suit to notice her slink in after him. But in a stroke of luck, there is no security hanging around at the moment, and so they're free to look around.

It's the same old storage room as last time. Shelf after shelf stocked with a mixture of hotel supplies and what appear to be guests' personal items. He spent a lot of time poking around the place in November, searching for two items of Rinne's that Reign and Keita had wanted back, and he discovered all sorts of things in the process... including varieties of sex toys he hadn't known existed. There are a lot of those in here.

He steps in between two shelves while she rifles around, keeping his voice just above a stage whisper.]

Seems that way! I'm not sure what sort of enchantment it was, though. You'd have to ask Jin Mingming—she's the one who gifted it to me for my birthday. And she even threw in a matching one for Jun-kun ♪ Though his doesn't seem to have quite the same effect as mine. It's hard to outshine me, I guess.

How'd you get Jin Mingming to like you that much? I drink at her bar all the time.

[ Maybe that was why. Between the two of them, Hiyori's definitely more upstanding than Nami could ever hope to be. Still, a connection like that is enviable, and even though she's extremely into the idea of digging through this storage room, the idea of what someone that prominent among the resort staff has going on is intriguing on another level. Thankfully, the idea of finding things belonging to Rinne, or anyone else who's turned to stone not yet crossing her mind. ]

I bet she's got a lot to say about this place.

[ Looking over her shoulder at Hiyori, Nami doesn't bother to mask the curiosity on her face, her shrewd blue eyes sizing him up in the low light. The suit is very distracting, and she catches her gaze drifting back to take in the garment rather than the guy wearing it more than once, but that doesn't let it slow her snooping at all.

Still, better not to seem obviously prying. Nami has the sense to look back at the bin she's going through before she speaks up again, not bothering to keep her question coy. ]

Did she tell you anything good?

With my dazzling charm, of course~♪

[A cop-out answer, said with a wink. Before he admits:]

I think she might've felt sorry for us, given our situation here. So I thought perhaps she made us those suits to cheer us up. But then it turned out mine was enchanted, and then I wasn't sure what to think.

[Is there a mystery she wants him to solve? Something hidden that she wants him to uncover...? Is it remotely possible that maybe, just maybe, she thinks he can help untangle the secret behind this place, or gather ammo against the House? The longer he's trapped here, the more he worries they're all doomed—that there is no way out, other than winning that 52 game (and that's if the game isn't rigged). That they'll all turn to statues before they can complete their decks, anyway.

But he hasn't given up all hope. If Jin Mingming did enchant that suit in hopes that he'd accomplish something, then he wants to accomplish it. Even if the only thing it's helped him do so far is get Rinne's stuff back from the storage room, that's still something worthwhile.

At any rate, he tells Nami with a smile:]

I'm sure you'd look good in her embroidery, too. But as for why she didn't make you something, perhaps she thought you didn't need it to snoop around. You're already a pirate, after all~♪

[One who can pick locks, at that.

He'd be curious to hear what Nami did get for her birthday, but he doesn't ask, since it's clear her mind is elsewhere. Her interest isn't well-disguised; as a performer, he's sensitive to other people's gazes. Not that he's bothered by her question, or by the curious look in her eyes. He doesn't mind if she wants to get information out of him—he's happy to share. They are partners in crime for the night, after all.

She can look into the bin, which has (what else?) sex toys inside. He'll look at her as he explains what the proprietress told him back then.]

Depends on what you'd call "good." She did confirm it's not just sex this place runs on. "What the resort takes from us is our fate," she said—apparently meeting people from different worlds, who we wouldn't have met otherwise, and being intimate with them changes our "fate." She also said people who are destined for great things in life have more fate to give than those who aren't—like an emperor who runs a country versus a servant who's destined to die young. That was her example, anyway.

[There's more, but he gives her a moment to process.]

Yeah, I'd call that good. [ Which is more than she can say for the bin of toys she peers inside before walking away from with a faint scowl on her face, even as she internally mulls over every detail. ]

So the fact that I've been stuck here for so long just confirms I've got a lot of stuff to do when I get back home?

[ She tries for another bin, this time pulling out an antique metal lighter, which she flicks the flint on to see if it lights, before holding the flame up to better look over at Hiyori through the dimly lit space. ]

And all this sex is changing my fate?

[ This is all good to know, but, this is how she processes. Dryly pouring over the issue, using sarcasm to pull on the threads of the issue, looking for a way in – or at least a way to wrap her head around this and figure out what this really means for her and everyone else here. ]

Anything else that might send me into a philosophical crisis?

I guess that's one way to look at it. Perhaps it means you will make that map of the world. Or you and your crew will discover a centuries-old treasure! ♪

[His words are frivolous as usual, but the gears in his head are turning. He hadn't quite thought about it like that before; to him, what Jin Mingming said about some people having "more fate to give" than others explained why the resort is populated by bigwigs. Royals, gods, big-name warriors, government officials, celebrities... people with extraordinary powers. There aren't a whole lot of normal folks around. Which made him think the House purposefully kidnaps people who are destined to make a difference in the world. And that pantheon could include Nami, couldn't it? Perhaps her whole crew is destined to make history, which would explain why several of them have turned up here.

But does all of that explain why some people stick around longer than others? Are the people who are destined for less great things always the ones who disappear first...?

That does map eerily well onto what's happened with everyone from ES. He and Jun are part of the "Big Three," while Crazy:B enjoys only a fraction of their popularity. Leo, meanwhile, is a famous composer, which might explain why he's gone nowhere. Still, he isn't sure that explains everything.

He gives a small jolt when Nami flicks on the lighter, eyes drawn to the bright flame. Is she going to try to burn something? He doesn't think so, but...!]

Er... not that I know of... actually, there is one thing, but it pretty much just confirmed something that was already obvious.

[But first:]

Careful where you hold that flame, alright? This stuff may be waterproof, but I don't think it's flame-resistant.

[He says while standing over another bin of brightly-colored toys. One vibrating dildo, still in the packaging, advertises itself as being "great for water play!"]

inbox for golden peacock

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to action?

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lmao change of plans nami is here to be a problem for another month

Nice 🎉

i am so sorry, feel free to ignore bc it's been 100 years

No worries!

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