video; un: x; 12/21 (during the Solstice)

[apogeal]

[The video opens onto a long shot of singing people dancing around the base of a huge tree. Naked singing people! Not all of them, but many of them, though some are wearing white robes instead of going totally nude. That's right, it's the majestic and emotional climax of the Nicnevin Solstice tradition, apparently being liveblogged by someone who is not participating in the naked musical antics.

The shot holds for a few solid moments, and then the phone camera swings around to a large, muscular man sitting a short distance from the action, under a tree, also naked—except for the black wrap tying up most of his hair. It takes him a second to steady the camera and aim it well at his face, but only a second. He actually seems to be decent at working this thing.

He says:]

So, this is "magic"? I want to understand. This ritual is more than a symbolic gesture of bonding? Is there proof? Or is this simply what people accept?

And if there really is more here than symbolism, how have they done this to us?

[His body jerks in a tiny shiver against the cold—boy does it look cold out there, but he's trying hard not to show it, and with that little tell, he turns off the camera with a flicker of annoyance. Cold!]

Comments

[apogeal]

And how are you doing that?

[This tone is kind of hedging its bets on whether it's mocking her or not, because she could actually be doing something somehow. He doesn't fucking know! All of this is ludicrous!]

I don't know how it started, either. Context is sorely lacking. You see why I might be confused.

[fujimaru]

They usually give people like us a crash course in the stuff that's going on. But all the rituals and stuff? I think that's just a kind of "learn as you go." I'm not the exposition friend, unfortunately.

[ She's the friend who's fishing out a partially-melted marshmallow out of her drink to eat it. ]

I figure if any of my friends come back frostbitten, I'll make them cocoa. Or coffee, if they want that instead.

[apogeal]

[Dammit, he's hungry. He curls his lip a tiny bit at the little bit of fluff, because even that looks appetizing, but that's all he's (not) going to say about that!]

So I had gathered. Little of this was explained in a way I found satisfactory. I can at least prove my own "magic" with my own hands, but this ritual? Why believe in it? I had hoped someone could give me an answer to that.

[fujimaru]

I think you'd be better off asking someone who actually lives here... or maybe one of the people who go to the school? I dunno. Why is any belief important? If they think it'll do something positive, what harm will that do?

[ Is that getting too serious? Maybe. Time to deflect by drinking more cocoa. ]

[apogeal]

The harm is in complacency. If we take actions we only believe will work, based on faith, we see no need to strive for the truth of what will really better our situation.

[This time, the curl of his lip is a small, chilly smile, as brisk as the night air out here tonight.]

Of course, what they do with their time matters not to me. It's my own I'm concerned with.

[fujimaru]

It sounds like you're a little concerned...

[ Ultimately, though, it's not her business (yet? yet; maybe if they become friends it will be). Ritsuka shrugs, unworried. ]

Most of the people native to this world don't seem to have their heads in the clouds. Not any worse than people you'd meet anywhere else. So I think it's pretty safe to let them have their fun with the snow. I don't get it, but not everything's gotta be for me.

[apogeal]

As I said, I'm hardly concerned if they're wasting their time.

[He waves his hand. Pshaw! Like he cares about what the humans . . . okay, not all humans, not by a longshot. The mortals? He's one now too . . . the population is doing. But:]

What I'm looking for is information. If these are nothing but cultural bonding activities, I have no reason to bother with them. If they have a real effect, I do. I think that's quite simple.

[fujimaru]

What if it's delayed? Because they're doing something now, it'll matter later? A, what's it called--the butterfly effect? A butterfly flaps its wings, and on the other side of the world, a hurricane appears because of it?

[ That's the right thing, isn't it? Ritsuka's knowledge is such a strange patchwork at this point; half the time, she doesn't know if what she knows are real things she's read or learned, or things that she's intuited and cobbled together from lectures. ]

But even if they're "just" cultural bonding activities, what's wrong with that? Who wants to be alone all the time?