Winter Worries

Event Info: Winter Solstice Event

Event Sign-Up: Page 1, Post Number 26

-Capital Crocus outskirts, early afternoon-

Wearing her white Steel Matron t-shirt under her white camouflage winter jacket and a black skirt with black bike shorts and white tennis shoes, Victoria strode into the outskirts of Capital Crocus with her hands in her pockets to keep them warm. She disliked this city so much that words could not adequately express the intensity of her animosity for the capital. Well, words that were not four and five-letter obscenities, anyway. Victoria had plenty of those for her birthplace. Beneath the glitz and glamor of a capital city was filth and decay beyond measure, a city so consumed with rot that it was a wonder that it did not collapse on itself.

Sure, the rich threw around money to build yet another immaculately sculpted and designed park or yet another fancy mega-mansion when last year's mega-mansion failed to impress the neighbors, but where was the substance? Where was something that would make a person proud to live in Capital Crocus? All Victoria saw was superficial charm that concealed a lot of abuse and injustice, the same kind of "charm" the palace of Haraka's people had once the West Fiore Trading Company mage exposed the cost in materials and lives the elaborate structure took to build.

Victoria put her growing misanthropy aside long enough to put on a happy face for the benefit of people who did not expect a mage of her power to be in the area. Chances were that they were probably staring at her mismatched outfit and pitying the poor brunette for being unable to afford an outfit that matched. Whatever. When one was a mage of her power level, one could wear almost anything one pleased. No one called out Samira Nassar or Serilda Sinclair for their clothing choices because no one with any sense wanted to piss off a Goddess of Ishgar.

Victoria found a convenient wooden bench and claimed it for her own. The brunette found herself questioning why she was even here but remembered why. She was here for one reason and one reason only... Sarah Stone. She was here to enjoy the Winter Solstice festivities with the redhead, a mage with whom she had taken a couple of jobs with over the past month or so. Were it not for Sarah, Victoria would not even be here right now.

The brunette sat on the bench and waited for her red-haired colleague to show up.

She hated this place.

[Post Word Count: 412]
[Victoria's Word Count: 412/1,500]

It was getting close to a certain holiday, in Fiore, and Sarah had found herself wearing an outfit that she normally wouldn't be caught dead in. But, she was doing this for two reasons. The first was to show that she could be festive, and the second was because she wanted to impress a certain someone. That particular someone was Victoria Sheridan, a guildmate that she had gone on a couple of jobs with, and started to develop some feelings for.  The outfit was a red fleece dress, with white material in certain areas, to make it look like a feminine Santa suit, and she wore a matching hat with a white tuft at the top of it. She found Victoria brooding on a bench and decided to try her best to sneak up on her.

Granted, it was tough to be sneaky in an outfit like the one she was wearing. She received some cat calls along the way, but did her best to ignore them as she made her way over to her friend. "You don't seem all that jolly for someone who has a day off." Sarah pouted a little as she sat on the bench, and immediately regretted doing so, as her rear felt much colder than the rest of her. "Sorry if I'm late, I just wanted to look nice for you, is all. Didn't mean to keep you waiting."

It was nice to get some time away from work where they could hang out without it turning into a job, like with the mall. She smiled a bit before she shivered a little. She didn't understand how other women could sit down outside in an outfit like this. It was practically a torture device, but she would put up with it just for Victoria. "So...um...thanks for this, really. You didn't have to...but I appreciate you showing up. Was there anything specific that you wanted to do? There's a lot of different stuff we could participate in."

Sarah had a few thoughts about what she might excel in already, one thing of course being the frozen shirt contest, but she wanted Victoria's input as well, since she had invited her out for a reason. "Or, maybe we could go inside and warm up for a bit? I mean, if you want. We could always do that later, of course." Sarah was getting a bit nervous, since she didn't really know much about interacting with people outside of work, or outside of a fight. "I mean, well...um...sorry, the cold is messing with my head a little."

WC: 430
TWC: 842/1500

Victoria was starting to wonder if Sarah got lost on the way to Capital Crocus when she spotted her guildmate in a red outfit that was eye-catching. It was also appropriate for the occasion and looked good on the redhead, but Victoria was hesitant to say so because Sarah was self-conscious about how she looked. The pair had to jump through flaming hoops to get the segment of the mall security footage of Sarah wearing a dress to conveniently disappear, and the dress was not even a particularly scandalous one. Sarah just hated wearing dresses and Victoria could not blame her. The brunette had forgotten the last time she had worn a dress, but it was safe to say the last time was well over ten years ago, if not longer.

"Hey Sarah, I like that outfit on you. I mean it." Victoria blurted out before she realized what she was saying. The brunette blushed and tried to pass the change in color off as something caused by exposure to the cold, but she doubted that she was fooling her guildmate. If she kept doing this Sarah would think that Victoria was hitting on her... not that the former would mind. Over the past month or so Sarah had been dropping some pretty heavy hints that she was interested in being more than just friends with Victoria.

"What I wanted to participate in? Oh yeah, there was a build-a-snowman contest. Then there was a snowball war where we get to shoot snowballs at other people and melt our snowmen with heat grenades that only affect snow." Victoria replied to Sarah's inquiry. Of course the brunette would want to participate in a contest that involved fighting other people. That kind of game played to her strength as a better-than-average marksman with over two years of experience in the field. She knew that Sarah was always up for a fight, but maybe today the redhead did not want to fight. Maybe she wanted a break from that kind of thing since she did it so often during the course of her career as a Sabertooth mage.

"But if you don't want to do those things there's plenty of other stuff to do." Victoria quickly added.

[Post Word Count: 373]
[Victoria's Word Count: 785/1,500]

"Well, so long as we stick together, I don't mind doing that stuff with you. Although, I did want to try that hot chocolate tasting, and maybe some Ice skating, i mean, if you're up for that. I kind of thought it could be nice for us to skate together. It's fine if you don't want to, though, really." Sarah was blushing again, and couldn't come up with a reason as to why, but instead came up with an idea.

"Oh, what if we do that other stuff first, then finish up with the Ice skating?" She smiled, happy to have strung the ideas together before she ran off towards where the snowman contest was being held. Sarah herself wasn't too good at building things, but snowmen were simple. She called out over her shoulder. "Last one there has to buy the other drinks for a week."

She was giggling lightly. She hadn't had this much fun in a while, and she was genuinely happy to spend time with a friend like Victoria. She only hoped that what she would want to say later wouldn't ruin that friendship. Still, there was fun to be had, and she didn't want to worry too much and ruin the whole event for herself. Building a snowman wasn't something Sarah was used to, but at least she could cut loose later during the snowball fight. A song nearly came to mind when Sarah considered helping Victoria build a snowman, but as much as Sarah liked singing, she didn't feel like leading a song and dance number in this situation.

Instead, she just wanted to enjoy her time with Victoria. The two had only been on a couple of jobs together, so they didn't really know one another too well. But, Sarah was certainly infatuated with her guildmate, to say the least. She was willing to take the time to get to know her better, but at the same time, she worried that due to their line of work, something might happen to her before she got the chance to express herself appropriately. Still, she wasn't quite ready to share what was on her mind just yet.

When she arrived at the location where the snowmen were being built, she was surprised by how much snow was still on the ground. Still, it didn't seem like there was much of a rush. She wanted to be certain that she built her snowman correctly, and didn't want there to be too much time for error, so she figured she would take her time, work slowly, and try to make the snowman as well as she could. If she had rushed the thing could easily have fallen apart. Of course, she had only just started rolling the base, but she was still considering any possible errors that could be made in the process of building the snowman. She felt that it was nice to be able to spend time with a friend like this, outside of work.

WC: 500
Personal WC: 930/1,500

"Ice skating? Eh, why not? It'd probably be fun if I can stay on my feet long enough to go around the rink a time or two. Good thing I can heal myself." Victoria replied to Sarah's inquiry about going ice skating after they had finished building a snowman and finished participating in the snowball fight. Ice skating seemed like fun, but since the brunette had never been ice skating before she was sure to pick up a lot of bumps and bruises from falling down a lot. It was a good thing she knew healing magic because she would need it to heal herself... and anyone else who was unsteady on their feet. Being able to heal other people tended to make one a lot of friends.

"The hot chocolate tasting also seems like a good idea. It's low-impact and not much can go wrong with it... aside from burns that I can heal with the snap of a finger. It's also fun for the whole family." Victoria added when she remembered the hot chocolate tasting was a thing too. She was kind of hoping that there would be a holiday event like a bar crawl with appropriate holiday drinks like peppermint schnapps or Albino Gander vodka, but this was a family event and alcohol clashed with the family-themed activities. Besides, not everything in Victoria's life had to involve fighting, alcohol, or fighting and alcohol. Maybe she could hit up a bar later and get some peppermint schnapps.

Victoria walked along with Sarah and took a few sideways glances at the redhead's attire. In comparison to Victoria's mish-mash of white camo jacket and a black skirt, Sarah's outfit looked festive and was appropriate for the occasion. Despite her professed disinterest in fashion, the redhead knew how to pick an outfit that could turn heads without being revealing. To avoid any further awkwardness Victoria focused straight ahead and looked towards the snowmen building area.

When Victoria arrived at the area for building snowmen, it was fairly busy with families and boyfriend/girlfriend pairings building snowmen for the fun of it and for the snowball fight. She found herself an unoccupied area to claim as her own and took it before someone else could, then began to gather up snow for a base. The base had to be wide to support the weight of the other body parts, but thankfully there was enough snow to make the base to the required width and thickness. Maybe Sarah could help her build a snowman... nah. Victoria had this.

After some effort and careful eyeball estimations Victoria rolled the base and patted it into a rough round shape that would do the trick. Now it was time to build the body proper. Victoria located a nearby patch of snow and harvested some for the body. Again she would need to be careful because this was her first snowman and a rush job would only mean that it collapsed on her and made all her work be for nothing.

[Post Word Count: 504]
[Victoria's Word Count: 1,289/1,500]