Young Writers Society

As Boris and Damascus walked off together, James slowly turned to Maahes and Vala.

"Didn't expect to see them here," he commented quietly. "But in any case, it seems now we just have to wait for the next 'puzzle.' Or murder, with the way this evening seems to be going."

"Hopefully it won't be another murder," Vala said, looking around the rest of the ballroom. "I think Rendra wants to keep things varied, so we should probably be prepared for another gruesome puzzle."

Maahes sorrowfully nodded in agreement, only to stop when he saw the way that Vala was suddenly looking at James and him. She seemed to be getting an eye, and not knowing what that idea was made him admittedly a bit worried. "We still have some time before the next puzzle," she slowly pointed out.

"We do," Maahes confirmed. "But why does that-"

"Time that we need to spend doing something," Vala continued, her gaze drifting over to the disappearing figures of Boris and Damascus. "And I think I know what we could do." She glanced back at Maahes and James. "You should go join them."

"But I barely know them," Maahes argued.

"Not you," Vala corrected. She gestured at both of them. "The plural you. As in you and James. Damascus and Boris are dancing. Why shouldn't you two? It's not like you see each other much."

He frowned. "You'd be alone."

"I can mingle," she reassured him. "Remember, I'm not as socially awkward as you are." She gave him a playful nudge on the shoulder, and then suddenly disappeared into the crowd.

He slowly looked back over at James.

Damacus' brows raised and the corners of his mouth twisted up in a smile. He hadn't been expecting an invitation to dance, but was pleased nonetheless. Really, what had he been expecting? To dance a polka by himself?

"It's been centuries." He chuckled. "You'll have to reteach me." With a nod for Boris to follow, he walked across the ballroom to request the music, his shoes seeming to tap an enthusiastic rhythm already.

James watched as Vala fled into the crowd after dropping the suggestion that they should dance. He pursed his lips in slight distaste at the idea, even though there really wasn't much they could do in the waiting before Rendra and Kartiel dropped another puzzle or murder on them to solve. Part of him wanted to follow either of the gods around, simply to understand their captors and try to figure out what they were doing, but a part of him had a feeling that even if he did so, they wouldn't let on anything useful. They'd been clever enough to bring them all there and get them in their own unique getups. They would probably be clever enough to keep their secrets secret. They had, anyway, convinced him for a moment that there had been a real murder.

Though it was a tough line to tread. A real, physical body was still utterly destroyed in the process.

With all of that in mind, he figured he'd have to do something in the meantime, and since he never really knew when he would see his friend Maahes again, it really wasn't a terrible idea to just do something together, since he had to admit he was terrible at small-talk once it got past a superficial acquaintance level of knowledge.

So he took Maahes's curious look as a question and chose to answer it with an action. He grabbed Maahes's hand and started leading him out to the ballroom dancefloor. As he started to weave through the crowd, he looked back at Maahes with a little shrug.

"You know how to dance?" he asked.

As James started to lead him out onto the ballroom dance floor, Maahes looked down at the hand that had grabbed onto his own. It had been awhile since he had been in a situation like this, but he still remembered what it was like. "I do know how to dance," he confirmed. It might have fallen out of favor during his last handful of decades on Earth, but he had been around for a very long time and had possessed large sums of money throughout it - dances were nothing new to him.

"I'm guessing you do, too?" he hesitantly asked.

James nodded as they came to the edge of the dancing crowd in the middle of the room.

"It's pretty normal where I come from. Dancing happens a lot at large gatherings, so I know a few that would be appropriate for this setting. Does a simple ballroom dance sound alright?"

"I'm a god," Kartiel said. "When I'm in a body that isn't my own, I get around dying by going to a new one. But when I'm in my actual body, my soul automatically kicks in and heals my wounds. Speaking of which..." He glanced down at his outfit, muttered a spell underneath his breath, and the blood immediately disappeared from sight.


"That sounds good to me," Maahes agreed, giving him a small smile.

James mirrored the small smile and nodded, leading Maahes onto the dance floor and holding out his hand with Maahes's before putting his other behind Maahes's back. He didn't know if Maahes was used to leading or following, but he hoped he could follow as he took the first step.

"Pretty cool powers to have," Raiden said, cropping up near Kartiel.
"Isn't a bit...troublesome to switch bodies every time you die, though? Like, then you've gotta keep a stash of bodies you can run to, and so on and so forth." Raiden scratched at his face. He didn't actually seem to notice that he had been drawn on.

We bowed to each other, to signify the beginning of the dance. Damascus' bow was a little delayed, as though he'd forgotten that custom, through the centuries. I smiled at that.

It was unthinkable, that he should go so long apart from those he loved, but I was glad that I could be the one to bring him back to the world of the living.
Alright, that was far from my doing, but I was glad to be the one to reacquaint him with the dancefloor, at least.

We joined hands, I placed Damascus' free hand on my shoulder, and gently supported his back with mine.

"Do you remember the waltz? The polka is like that, but with more energy, more gallop. It's fairly simple, I'm sure you'll get the hang of it before long.

Just... step, close, step, half turn, step, close step, half turn, there we go..."

The tempo had started off a little slow, to ease in, but it was clear that it'd pick up to two-four time in a few bars.

"You're doing splendid! It'll get faster soon, and there'll be lots of twirling involved, I'm sure you'll do just fine."

We must have been a sight, me leading a dance with a partner who was taller than I was. If we were to try any underarm twirls while I was in the lead...
I decided not to risk any.

Damascus' brow furrowed in concentration as he avoided stepping on Boris' toes during the first few steps. It was rather difficult, considering the fact that he refused to look down at his own feet. He felt much more lost on the rhythm than he had expected himself to, but had a deep aversion to letting Boris know this.

So, keeping his chin up, he had to make do with glancing over his partner's shoulder every so often to follow what the other dancing couples were doing. Soon enough, with Boris' steady instruction and encouragement, he found himself easing into the steps and the music itself, so that when the tempo picked up he was much more capable of not sending himself tripping.

"Oh! This is splendid!" He laughed in delight as the galloping steps came into play with the increased tempo of the music- and, of course, all of the twirling.

Very quickly, however, he realized that most of the parts where Boris would have to spin him would pose as a problem, and remedied this by instead dropping his hand and giving a clipped little turn on his heel.

As Boris led him through the breezy twirls, he found his feet feeling lighter. Almost unable to resist, he let out a laugh with every dizzying spin- sometimes it was a chuckle in the back of his throat, and sometimes it was a loud exhalation.

"Boris, Boris..." he glanced down during a round of rocking steps, his eyes twinkling. "Do you remember what the finale of this number is? Whichever the case, we must make it dramatic." With this, he let slip nothing less of a face-scrunching wink.

He was used to leading, but following really wasn't all that difficult - he just had to let James control the direction that their dance went, and he would just follow through with it.


"I don't do it every time," Kartiel said, keeping his back to Raiden as he poured himself a drink. "It's only when I'm in a body that isn't my own."

James took them with the flow of the already rotating crowd, finding himself easily fall into the simple movements of the dance. His eye caught Boris and Damascus in the crowd, and he took note of it... subconsciously steering them away from where the two danced.

And it was at about that moment that he realized he didn't know how to actually hold a conversation with Maahes if it wasn't related at least remotely to their situation or their state of mind. That, and he didn't know much about Maahes, in reality.

It was fair to say that it was due to the strange and unlikely circumstances that they kept meeting up, but it made it difficult to figure out how to start up a conversation, and he found himself at a loss. So he simply tried to just... enjoy the dance.

"I see."
And with that, Raiden subtly slipped him a Lego figurine of Han Solo.
"Found this in my pocket. Thought it might be yours."
He disappeared into the crowd.

---

A few moments later, he cropped up near the dance floor, watching everyone with disinterested eyes.
If I were 15 again, I might've joined this with some...impeccable moves of my own. But that might disrupt everyone, and everyone looks like they're having some fun, so I think I'll just watch. he thought, the sounds of his mind nearly drowned out by his slurping of the juice box.

A tad too distracted by the dancers to catch Kartiel's response, Taber grinned. The pairs of dancers making their way across the ballroom looked so elegant and energetic with their twirls and precise footsteps.

Whirling around, Taber grabbed Kartiel's hand. "We should dance!" he said "Everyone else is doing it, and it looks like a lot of fun!"