Editing Nobledark Imperium Writing (section)

==Happy New Year==

<div class="toccolours mw-collapsible mw-collapsed" style="100%">

The drinks had been plentiful and that wasn’t the problem unless it was. Everyone seemed to be having a good time, a fun time. Music and drunken flailing charitably called dancing, the people from different sites and Vaults and even off-worlders and outsiders come to visit (after being extensively checked of course). The main hall of Admin-Site Prime had never been so alive. And away from the heart of it all sat Legienstrausse in her own little bubble of self-generating, alcohol fuelled, misery. Nobody had asked her to dance, nobody had commented on her pretty dress, barely anybody had even said hello to her.

She saw them, they though that she couldn’t see them but even with only two eyes she had extremely good peripheral vision. A new face, an outsider or someone new enough not to know what she was would approach her only to be carefully intercepted by one of her jailers who would whisper into their ear. Over the happy, happy music she couldn’t hear what it was exactly they were whispering. They would not be told the truth, not the whole truth.

<div class="mw-collapsible-content">

The alcohol helped. It wasn’t making her happier but it was making the misery feel more distant. She was through nearly eight bottles of Rakia and the night was still young. After a fashion. Ganymede was tidally locked to Jupiter with an orbit of a hundred and seventy two hours and if she could remember that then it was time to start on another bottle. Which she did. Or at least intended to. A hand grasped her own firmly but not ungentle. She could have sworn that she saw no one approach, and she would have. But then he did have a knack for moving in unexpected directions.

The hairless done of his head gleamed like a twisted halo in the lights and his stupid clown coat, horizontal stripes on the inside, vertical on the outside and both in badly matching colours, hanging from his coat hanger and deckchairs body like the wings of a badly assembled angel. Was there genuine concern in those eyes? It was hard to tell. He was either a man who could hide and mimic emotions well or bounced around far more than a man should and still be capable of doing the job he did.

What was he? It irked her something fierce that all knew exactly what she was, knew enough certainly to be frightened at any rate, but nobody ever stopped to ask what the ever loving fuck he was. He ran the place, or at least the day to day running of part of it. Gods know he answered to people, strange shadowy people that she did not know of and probably never would, and whom she suspected probably didn’t know about each other. But who and what was he? He was insane, clearly he was insane and she had seen far too much to believe otherwise, but he held a job that required a level professionalism and competence well above what the teeming masses were typically capable of.

She looked up into those dark grey eyes and saw nothing reflected back. Not a lack of anything to reflect but a nothingness so complete that it fell away to some unseen terrible horizon and she didn’t know if those were his eyes or her eyes reflected in them.

“Legi, you shouldn’t do this to yourself.” He said concern etched in every line framing those fathomless eyes.

“I shouldn’t a lot of things, but here we are.” She replied up ending the bottle and managing to suck down half it’s contents before he more firmly pulled it away from her.

Slipping himself under half-heartedly resisting arm she carefully guided her out of the main hall, though not before she managed to split her other arm into four grasping tentacles and each grab more bottles from the table on the way out.

“What was all that about Legi?” His voice was not unkind, but when she felt less than kind she couldn’t believe that it was anything but an act. He didn’t give a damn, he wouldn’t be her jailer if he did. But maybe he did and that was more terrifying to her, maybe he did and she was pushing away the only person mad enough to care about her.

“Nobody wanted to dance” She slurred, the alcohol, several times terminal levels for a normal human, was finally starting to kick in. “Not one person, I put on my prettiest dress and not one person wanted to dance.” In truth she was technically naked, the dress was her own skin reshaped and pigmented into looking like what was in fashion in the Jovian Orbitals; Pale blue and light grey, hugging on the torso and sleeves but loose and flowing from the waist down. Broad belts with big buckles were in fashion again this year. The colours in the dress were starting to run together and blur as she lost concentration.

“I’ve seen you try to dance Legi, you may have dodged a bullet on this one”

“Fuck you old man, you can’t talk”

“Yes, dear, I absolutely can. I have danced with Harlequins and they take that shit seriously.” She was starting to stumble more now and although he wouldn’t mention it to her she was a lot heavier than she looked.

“I just wanted one dance. Would you dance with me?” She mumbled through half closed eyes “I could try and take it as seriously as you like”

“No” The Inquisitor replied as they staggered around down the corridors that became tunnels. Mad as he was the idea of trying to waltz with an inebriated organic weapon of mass destruction was not something even he, Mad Dog Draco, was crazy enough to attempt.

She would be sober in the mourning; thankfully her unique properties seemed to minimize hangovers. Hopefully she wouldn’t remember much of tonight. He though an invitation to a new years party would have made her feel batter. It was not one of his better ideas. Next year maybe they could curl up on a couch with some chocolates and watch a film or something. Or maybe he could try and find another method of escaping their jailers for another little adventure.

He would have to be careful, he knew, his sponsors and superiors were getting more adept at finding and shutting down his escape tunnels. If it carried on like this in a few hundred years they would have trapped him here with all the other dangerous curiosities.

</div>
</div>