Room 207, Monday Early Evening

[pulseof_life]

It was the sort of day where, while there was nothing really to do in her room, she had not particularly felt like leaving it and her one concession to being social was to leave her door open as she sat on her floor, back against the side of her bed and dug her paints out from her pockets.

They were not for painting pictures, she had no talent for that, but rather they were for repainting her beaded accessories as the colors tended to fade.

It wasn’t the most exciting of work to be engrossed in but it was pleasing all the same and Yeul had never been one to seek out excitement anyway.

Perhaps she’d fetch a cup of tea in a bit? Yeul mulled over that as she carefully recolored a blue bead.

[Door & post open!]

Comments

[fewer_explosions]

"I am still getting acquainted with it," Liara confessed. She made her way through the doorway. "Not that we do not have an equal variety of food and beverages, as you have experienced..."

[pulseof_life]

"But it's different from what you're used to," she said, nodding as she followed. "It was something of an adjustment for myself as well and my world is not so different as yours is from here."

[fewer_explosions]

"Have you found many strange foods since you came here?" Liara wondered. "Or are they all similar?"

[pulseof_life]

"There are many that are similar. It is more what they are made of that is the difference. Most of what I ate at home would be considered what they call 'organic' food here."

Yeul shrugged slightly. "If I had lived in Academia, it would probably not be as different but I did not live in a city so what we ate was what we could hunt."

Well, what Caius could hunt. Also: monster meat.

[fewer_explosions]

Liara nodded thoughtfully. "My people have not been hunters as such for thousands of years," she admitted, slipping into the common room. "I have never had a meal that wasn't prepared and processed."

[pulseof_life]

"Most of my world is much closer to that," she shared. "There are very few of us who live primarily off what we hunt these days, though more than there used to be."

[fewer_explosions]

"Because most of them are in your floating city, correct?" Liara asked, scurrying around for some tea bags. "Would you like some tea?"

[pulseof_life]

Yeul was in no rush and so hung back a bit.

"Please," she said, "and no, the floating city fell two hundred years ago. Most of the people live in Academia, which is built around the pillar that keeps the remnants of the abandoned city from falling."

Which really did not seem like the smartest of ideas.

"Right now, everyone is working on building the next floating city."

[fewer_explosions]

"You did tell me that," Liara said, abashed. She found the tea bags and picked the simplest kind - that would be the least dangerous. "I am sorry. My memory appears to be failing on me. Has no one considered building settlements elsewhere?"

[pulseof_life]

"There are small settlements elsewhere," Yeul said, smiling slightly. "But I think the time for moving away from the pillar would have been back when it had all first happened and at that time, people could not do it because they had no idea of what was on the world they were forced to make a new home on."

She shook her head. "Before Cocoon fell, there was very little contact between it and the main land of Pulse. And the little contact there was between them was violent."

[fewer_explosions]

"I suppose fear does inspire most species to be conservative," Liara said, as she grabbed for the water cooler.

[pulseof_life]

"They were sheltered people," Yeul said gently. "And they had lost their homes, their livelihoods, their government and their gods in a very short period of time. After all that, they found themselves stuck on a planet that they knew only from nightmare stories and ancient history. It is not surprising that they clung to what was left that was familiar."

[fewer_explosions]

"That is what I meant," Liara clarified, though at least it didn't sound like she had offended Yeul. "Fear, changed environments... that inspires conservatism. Care. It is based in old instincts."

[pulseof_life]

Yeul was hard to offend.

"Perhaps so," she said agreeably. "I do not think anyone thought about it, which also bears that out."

[fewer_explosions]

"It would have seemed sensible to them, most likely on a level they could not put into words," Liara mused. "However, decisions taken in fear do not always work well in the long term."

[fewer_explosions]

"It would have seemed sensible to them, most likely on a level they could not put into words," Liara mused. "However, decisions taken in fear do not always work well in the long term."

[pulseof_life]

“No,” Yeul said softly. “Not all of their decisions will turn out to be good ones.”

She was rather uniquely situated to know just how badly it could all turn out however.

“Right now, it works rather well for them. If someone brought up moving they would not be listened to.”

[fewer_explosions]

"You seem to have considered the idea," Liara mused.

She poured hot water into two mugs.

[pulseof_life]

"I consider many things," Yeul said, smiling slightly.

It was the truth but not all of it.

"Might I ask a question? Another one, I mean."

[fewer_explosions]

"Of course," Liara said easily.

[pulseof_life]

“What do you, and by extension your people, think of gods?”

Perhaps it was her conversation with Rapunzel that had her asking. Yeul examined the thought and decided it would serve as a reason as well as any.

[fewer_explosions]

"My people used to worship the Goddess Athame, who descended from the heavens to teach us," Liara said, neatly depositing a tea bag in each cup. "But of recent times..." Which was to say the past few thousand years or so... "We have broadened our perspective. We believe that there is a spirit in every thing. All is one. We are all part of a greater whole."

[pulseof_life]

"And all have equal power?" she asked curiously. "Or, perhaps, more accurately: all have equal worth?"

Yeul paused then asked, "What happened to the Goddess Athame?"

[fewer_explosions]

"Essentially, yes," Liara said. "We are all aspects of the same collective, and thus we all contribute an equal amount."

She walked towards Yeul with cups in hand. "Nothing happened to her," she said. "In fact, out of all the religions practiced by my ancestors, hers is the strongest old one that still remains. But when we spread out across the galaxy, and we found out that we could meld with any species... well, it changes your concept of the self. I imagine our concept of god went with it."

[pulseof_life]

"Concept of god," she echoed. "Not a reality?"