https://tinyurl.com/ufdk43p

[magnetite_plz]

A trail of strange, unidentifiable red petals winds through the plaza this cold day in the Nexus. Not a heap of them, but enough small bits of brilliant red to pop out amid the snow and dreary ground to leave a distinct marking of something or someone passing through.

The trail leads anyone following it to Nike, currently brushing more of those petals out of her impossibly long golden tresses, her brow furrowed in concentration. It's more of an emotion than her countenance normally belies. She startles to see anyone approaching her and drops her hands from her hair quickly. Scrambles for a long piece of red and white cloth she's got folded into her pack.

"Apologies. I did have queries for the populace today." Her fingers grip and cinch the fabric between them, slowly working their ways down the length of the cloth. She fidgets with it while she addresses anyone who will listen.

"Why do people choose partners based on mere attraction? Out of dozens of qualifying attributes, why should something so unimportant have a disproportionate weight to the equation? The choice could be made based on compatibility of skills, or a mutually sought after goal or..." Nike trails off and with a sudden forceful flick of her wrist bunches up the fabric in her hands to flop against her thighs in clear frustration. The demon clearly does not understand and it's eating at her.

"Why do you do this?"

Comments

[sweetcandygirl]

Harley hums to herself as she picks up red petals off the ground, sticking them in her pockets of her bright yellow jumpsuit. She at first doesn't even notice Nike... and had reached up to collect a petal out of Nike's golden tresses, when the other woman reacts to the approach. Snapping some awareness into Harley herself.

"Ya mean choosing someone for just good looks? Law of nature. Good looks sells. The peacock with the brightest feathers is chosen first."

Harley leans in to stage whisper. "It sucks. Honestly. But you catch someone's eye first... and then worry about the rest later."

[skeksisheretic]

skekGra's surprised when he hears the stranger's question. Granted, he doesn't know much about other species' perspective of love or romance, especially since his own species isn't known for that kind of thing. Romantic relationships are almost completely unknown among Skeksis. They are at heart too selfish for it. skekGra's romantic attachment to urGoh was unheard of.

Mystics aren't much better, aesthetics to a fault. They have goodness and selflessness to spare, but in his and urGoh's experience most of them have almost none of the passion that allows relationships like what Nike is describing. They aren't go-getters.

"I didn't choose urGoh because of his looks," he says. It was the same for urGoh, honestly. He's vain, vanity comes naturally for Skeksis, but even skekGra has to admit that his feathers are more dull than they once were and he isn't as agile as he used to be. His secondary arms are unusable. Still, he likes the way he is, and he's still a fair sight healthier than most of his withered kind. "He didn't choose me for mine. The planet Thra itself wanted us to be one again, Mystic and Skeksis."

[rockandrollvampire]

Petals laid out in a way that say come follow me are a hard thing for someone as nosy and bored as Toby to completely ignore. He follows the trail until he comes upon Nike fussing with her fabric, an eyebrow arched at her curiously. She doesn't seem quite as "normal" as many of the others he's bumped into in the Nexus, and her question strikes him as one that's curiously not mortal in nature. It gives the vampire a moment of pause before he finds an answer for her.

"Unless a person is wearing a sign, I've no way of knowing about all their other fine qualities." He chuckles at her frustration. It's kind of adorable, if he's being honest. "But humans don't tend to settle purely for looks. They start there, yeah, but if there's enough dissonance between both parties, they're unlikely to stay together. Fight often enough with someone and staying gets hard."

He thinks about that for a moment longer, then adds, "A person being want you need doesn't necessarily make them what you want. The heart's a fickle thing and it doesn't give a damn about how good or bad a person is for you." A couple hundred years of experience and observation has made that abundantly clear to him.

[legendary_titan]

Saint had spotted the petals during a stroll through the plaza; the red catching his eye against the white of the snow. The towering Titan had no idea what to expect when he found the source, but he wasn't expecting the petals to be drifting from a lovely woman's hair.

His helmeted head tilts as he spots her, and shifts as he noticed the red and white cloth on her lap. He caught a glimpse of a familiar symbol before she bunched it in her lap. The woman's question caught him off guard a moment or two, before he sat down next to her at a polite conversational distance so he wouldn't be looming over her.

"Hmm. I think it just depends on the person." He said after a moment, deep accented voice contemplative. "Not everyone gets drawn to another based on looks alone." He rubbed a gloved finger at the bottom edge of his helmet. "Err...are you referring to strictly romantic pairings or...ah...friends. Team-mates?" His r's rolled pleasantly as he spoke. He wasn't really an expert on romantic relationships but he would help answer her curiosity however he could.

[chiaro_oscuro]

"You know, it's different for different situations. Attraction's something that can be caused by all kinds of things. Physical appearances are one thing, shared interests or goals are another. With other people, it's more...complicated."

A young man in dark clothing observes the stranger curiously, listening to her question. The trail of red petals wasn't hard to follow, especially in the white snow, and while Ben Solo usually tries to stay inconspicuous in the Plaza the mystery was too tempting. Ben had followed the petals to their source, and he has several questions of his own that he doesn't begin to ask. It's the Nexus. He's learning to go along with its more bizarre qualities, and he assumes the trail is one of those.

"Complicated is a good word for it, actually. Relationships and people." He's intrigued. One of the unspoken questions Ben has is what that unfamiliar symbol he caught a glimpse of on the woman's cloth meant. That isn't connected to her question, though, and not his business anyway, so he doesn't ask her about it. "I'm hardly a person who should be offering you romantic advice, if that's what's on your mind. But I can tell you it's more complex than mere attraction, as you put it."

you get the splaining icon, Nike

[tryingitall]

Balthazar has to stop and take a second glance at anyone who seems to be angelic in the Nexus. He's met some very good friends that way, and also Lucifer, who is more than a good friend. And at this point, it's more than legitimate for him to take an interest in anyone who might be part of his partner's cadre of fallen angels, or a celestial being that might oppose them. His name is his title, Baal-Sarra-Usur, may the lord protect the king.

All that aside, it's quite a pretty picture, this winged lady with rose petals and tumbling golden hair, and there's a painter in his head that notices visual poetry.

"Oh, darling," he says with a grimace, walking over to her with hands in his pockets. The pet name seems to be a speech affectation, not an attempt to flirt. "You're asking a very non-specific question and I'm afraid you're going to find most of the answers unsatisfying."

It's the kind of thing Castiel would muse aloud about, though. "Now that I'm up close, you don't feel like an angel as I know it...but some sort of related spirit-being, I think? Biologically based people like humans, they have a drive to reproduce. Cultural norms and personal tastes and experiences get mixed in, but in the end there's a little voice in the back of their monkey-brains whispering hey, those look like good genes to mix up with yours."

"For some reason, that seems to be the case even if they've made a conscious decision not to reproduce, or if they're attracted to the same sex and therefore are highly unlikely to create offspring through boinking. It's very primal. I wouldn't understand it at all, except I've seen the world through human eyes, if only briefly."

"There's more to romantic bonds than physical attraction, of course. And there's more to physical attraction than visual stimuli, actually: pheromones, body language, vocalizations...it's all terribly complicated. But they have to start somewhere."


[what is love?]

[higginbottom]

Esther's been feeling a bit better lately, so she's out for a walk, her long legs moving quickly through the cold air. She's wrapped up in a burgundy coat with a little white hat to keep her head warm. The red petals catch her eye as she passes by, and she follows their trail towards a woman asking a question that she's not so sure how to answer.

"I think we're all pretty dumb sometimes, truthfully."

There, Nike. You get a cynical answer.

[making_sacrifices]

Princess Allura is a bit caught off-guard with such a question, but she thinks about it.

"Attraction might just be the first step to making the choice. It's what would make me notice a man, I suppose? I mean - hm, it's hard to put into words. And it's not really important to me, currently."

[seekerofheart]

Isa, when apparently spoken to, replies,

"I don't think I've ever been attracted, and, depending on what the word 'partner' means in this question, I've chosen my partner differently. Based on our mutual past, and our mutual goals. Hopefully our mutual future. We fought for it."

Hmmm... He wonders. He might've. Spoken not quite on the subject? Ah.

"But perhaps I've misunderstood the question. Is this about 'love'? If so, I may have completely misunderstood it."

[rekindledtitan]

Oh. Oh no, Nike. Blaze comes in here after a Crucible match to find you like this and now she's realizing there's yet another thing she never thought of having a Talk about. The poor angel looks so troubled by the whole thing, the Titan can't but feel a guilty pang. Even if she's not really sure what's got her team-mate's feathers in a fluster.

She approaches more slowly than usual, hesitating rather than lift a hand and call out to Nike. Catches enough of a previous conversation to know what she's asking about.

"Well, uh..." She sounds uncharacteristically sheepish, speaking up. Damn, but this isn't a subject she's best fit to talk about. Nor is Ghost going to be any help: he's backed off to look at her in the way he does when he's very happy to sit and watch, thank you Guardian. Still. She knows some things. "You've got to start with something, right? Got to be something that sparks your interest. You know, something that makes you think you want 'I want to be around them."

[ididntasktogetmade]

What the heck is with all these flower petals? At first glance it looks like a blood trail, bright crimson against the snow, but blood doesn't flutter in the breeze and it certainly doesn't smell anything like this. Rocket can't help but follow, curious to see what's at the end of the trail, not really sure what to expect.

Questions about choosing partners isn't exactly what he'd had in mind, but... sure. This is the Nexus.

"Depends on what you mean by attraction. Some folk pick their partners based on how they look, but sometimes that's more about just sex than stickin' around." Blunt honesty, thy name is Rocket. "I know a guy who ended up with his wife because he thought her not dancing was a huge turn-on."

[hesperussword]

Beelzebub was a little drunk and more than a little curious about the trail of red petals. They lead him straight to a woman who he only notices when she speaks. Drunken, he's startled by both her presence and even more so by her questions. He's immediately anxious about the topic at hand.

"I don't know, and I don't understand it." The truth is this angel is probably just as confused about the topic as she is, and he's drinking on top of it. He stops to stare at the person asking and then finally shrugs. "I didn't."

And then the angel gets a grin that should, by all accounts, have a blush if it wasn't for the flush of his cheeks from drink. "...He is Gerval and a fellow honorable warrior."