"Once Upon a Time..."

[Ninmast]

Worried that he might be strangling it, Devon lifted it up carefully between his hands and smiled at it. "You're so cute! I hope I can find some way to keep you around!"

[zandyne]

The platter moved with a sharp clank of offense and Roslin wilted at the language and visibly covered her face with her hands, some of her tentacles were even mimicking the action.

Queen Ivan gave a curt laugh at Veritas's remark, with raised a wine glass that hadn't been there before and dramatically...drank from it. When he finished wetting his throat, he slammed the glass down so hard it burst into shards, some of which did cut into him but he ignored. "If it so pleases you that it be like that, so it will be done!"

At that, a shadow-hand reached out from under Veritas's intended chair and smacked the living hell out of the platter, worse than any pimp would inflict on an unruly ho. When it was done, the ink-hand politely lifted the silver lid and revealed....a delicious looking cut of T-Bone steak that was actually not sentient as food should be.

The pot pie golem gurgled in confusion at the declaration, probably torn between continuing its feeble assault and considering retiring from a life of food rogue-dom and settling down with the stranger.

Queen Ivan meanwhile, pulled up another wine glass that wasn't there earlier, and definitely one that wasn't a magically restored version of the one he'd previously broken as it still lay in a broken heap by his elbow.

[Ninmast]

Devon held it close again, though more gently to avoid harming it as he turned to Roslin. "What does he eat? Does he have a name? Is there some way to keep him from rotting?"

[TrueBlue©]

Veritas observed the vigorous pimp-slapping with grim satisfaction. More than likely, she'd inflicted the same punishment on her Gangsta Guardians many times. She glanced up, though, chancing to catch Roslin near tears.

"Uh, we cool, tennacle-gurl. It aint you. We cool. Chill, gurl." Veritas plopped down in her chair, slouching as though she lacked a spine entirely. She picked the steak up in her left hand like some kind of trophy, settling her elbow on the table and disregarding the juice that ran down her azure forearm. "So uh. Queen Ivan, right? Why we here, Queen Ivan?"

[zandyne]

Roslin straightened up at being addressed by a guest, "Why thank ya pumpkin!" And at Devon's question she coursied politely, "He don't eat much at all. As for how ta keep 'im alive, well it has ta do with this here Castle."

Ivan tossed the new glass of wine over his shoulder, intertwined his fingers and used them as a rest for his chin.

"Well let's see, how to phrase this...OK basically you all have been thrown here in order to decide who will be...." he chose his next words carefully, "my adviser and co-owner of the Checker Kingdom. Only one of you will get this revered position, the rest of you will simply be here for a good time."

His platter shook and he properly leaned back in his chair and drop kicked it.

"So how about it?"

[Ninmast]

"Co-owner of a kingdom?" Devon retorted with a scowl. "What you really mean is you fancy yourself the star of The Bachelor."

[Toriji]

"So you want one of us to be your King?" Selena said as crumbs fell from her mouth. She was hungry and continued to eat the weeping dessert snake. "Do we get a scepter or sumthin'?"

[zandyne]

"Not really Plum Fairy, though I'm sure if there was a record for jumping to conclusions, you'd have it," he countered too-straightly for it to be a casual response, "Selena has the righter idea, though the title of 'King' is reserved for one person...so you'll really just be co-Queen." He lifted up his own platter, and lo and behold it was just a stack of buttered toast which he promptly helped himself to.

"Besides," he spoke through noisy chews, "becoming co-Queen is a completely mutual thing, I nominate you, and if you accept the nomination you get to be co-Queen. Simple as that, I won't be forcing anyone's hand," he moved his hand in a sweeping motion, "I'm a goddamn gentlemen after all, not some guy who was so bored to tears he couldn't even bring himself to jack off and instead contracted a demon to summon random people to participate in some twisted game of Mafia-Survivor-Blind-Date for his own amusement."

He started licking the butter from his fingers as he shrugged nonchalantly, "You get what I mean."

Ivan halted his preening, "Oh, and you can totally have a scepter if you want, you'll be co-Queen so you can pretty much do anything you want in the Checker Kingdom, short of you know, killing someone I guess, and even that is pretty negligible if you know what to do."

[EJP]

*Mahoro got very upset at her pancake monster hitting her. Quickly she stabbed the monster with a fork, pinning it down. While the monster was pinned down on her plate, she cut off it's head with a knife, shortly followed by the rest of its limbs.*

Mahoro: "OY! Can I get a bottle of syrup please. I like my pancakes drowning in syrup."

*Mahoro acted like she was completely ignoring the conversation that was going on. In truth she heard every bit of it and started to think all kinds of wild thoughts, all of which ended with El Wray loosing all sexual interest in her. These ideas caused her to started to cut up and stab what was left of the pancake monsters, as if she was torturing it.*

[zandyne]

A pair of Roslin's tentacles moved over to Mahoro and presented a very mundane bottle of Mrs. Butterworth's Syrup like it were wine.

[Ninmast]

"How can you two be so mean?" Devon asked of Mahoro and Selena. "They're so cute, but you're eating them alive! That's so horrible!" He sheltered his own golem against his chest as if to protect it from the sight.

[zandyne]

Chef Roslin had a tear beading in her eye as Devon declared that, "Why that's s'o beautifo'!" and daintily wiped away that drop with one of her spare appendages as she held her hands to her chest in true maiden-like fashion.

The magician chuckled to himself as he swished the fourth unique wine glass, "What a luxurious sense of mercy you have, Plum Fairy, but I warn you now, in the Checker Kingdom, such a thing is unamusing foolishness.

"The Eastern people have a saying, something like 'The weak feed the strong.' In the West, people merely chop out that elegance and call it 'Might is right.' now I do declare, you should stop playing with your food and eat it already. They are mere playthings, not fodder for philosophy."

He chuckled lowly, "You're supposed to having fun here after all, so spare the ethics."

Were his eyes any color but pitch black, they would have glinted with evil intent, but as they were not, the dark hand that emerged from under the shadow of Devon's chair was so swift and cruel, that it punched the pot pie golem out of his hands with a magnificent set of knuckles.

The pot pie golem squawked loudly, with joy at freedom or affront at being struck wasn't known, but it decided to self-destruct upon coming in contact with the floor.

Without missing a beat, Ivan clapped his hands and two male servants leapt out from what previously only appeared to be dish cabinet props, "Jack, Skull Queen, clean up that mess."

The one with a goofy expression and dressed like what a leprechaun would if they were hearty miners instead of Irish midgets, saluted and happily went about the task. The other who had a thin skull mask slung to the side of his head and dressed in the weirdest asylum coat ever, and looked too old, tired and cranky for the chore, did as he was told while muttering vicious death threats.

Queen Ivan flashed a smile that would make lawyers and politicians feel violated, "Now, what were we talking about again?"

(Sorry Nin, but the golem had to die. c_c)

[EJP]

*Mahoro didn't notice the tentacles or the "very mundane bottle of Mrs. Butterworth's Syrup" at first. She was still busy cutting up the pancake monsters. When she did notice the bottle of syrup that was now within reaching distance, a strange scene played in her mind. This scene was of all the girls from other worlds, minus Mahoro and adding Queen Ivan, doing the Hare Hare Yukai dance. All of the girls looked very anime like. The dance was being lead by Kagetsuki in the middle who looked more Moe then all the rest. Strange music was playing during this day dream until El Wray's voice called out to Mahoro.*

El Wray: Seriously, you're day dreaming of this when you have pancakes in front of you? Time to wake up Mahoro!

*El Wray entered this strange scene going on in Mahoro's head. He was holding a double barreled sawed off shotgun in his right hand and was walking casually as if he wasn't holding the gun. He pointed the sawed off shotgun at the group of dancing people and fired both barrels at them. Mahoro quickly came back to reality where she found herself holding the bottle of syrup and staring at Kagetsuki. She quickly looked away from Kagetsuki and instead started to drown her pancakes with syrup.*

(I saw a trailers for the anime The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya a few days ago a scene similar to this keeps playing out in my head with the same music from the trailers. Anyway, I thought this random day dream was better than Mahoro just pouring syrup on her pancakes. Sorry if you think its a bit too random or get confused by it.)

[Ninmast]

There was only a moment in time for Devon to gasp in horror.

The next moment, he jumped up so suddenly that the chair clattered back several feet behind him as he shouted, throwing his hand out toward Ivan as white energy flared around the blonde.

"MEGIDOLAON!!!"

The sudden, rage-filled strike of severe non-elemental magic would explode around the host, quite possibly blowing everyone else away from the table at this range and destroying the fourth wine glass in the process.

[zandyne]

The wine glass was the first thing to explode and spray shards and red alcohol on Ivan's person as the energy collected. He clicked his tongue in disappointment at his shirt being stained.

All the idle-minded guests would, for an instant as quick as a blink, feel as if they were plunged into the most bitingly cold water ever, see only black and hear only a whimpering muffle of the resulting blast of Devon's outrage. The next moment, the entire dining room looked like a hyperactive blind kid took a chainsaw to it.

Only the people and the chairs everyone currently sat at were intact. For some reason Queen Ivan had blood dripping down the side of his face, which was amazing in on itself as that was all that was really bleeding despite the 315 that quietly popped up over his head.

"Now that was interesting," he commented with a hint of obscure perversion as he confirmed the blood with his fingers. He got up from his seat, or what was left of it, clapped his hands together and rubbed them, "Well then, since the main course is clearly done now, does anyone want second helpings or dessert?"

(If anyone wants to know what Ivan did, he merely put up shadow-shields for anyone who decided not to actively protect themselves against the attack; the shadows came from the chairs obviously. And for anyone who wants to know details, the servants were protected by Ivan's personal shadow.)