starlightcafe | New, and a bit alarming, who'd have ever thought that this could be?

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New, and a bit alarming, who'd have ever thought that this could be?

Lexi's first crush had come when she was about eleven, and had ended before she was twelve. Webby's interest in her and her family, though unnerving, had been flattering - and she was nice to Lexi. That went a long way to a kid who'd barely had friends outside of family prior to that. But, ultimately, it had been a passing infatuation with someone who she wasn't suited for, and who wasn't suited for her.

There had been other people in her teenage years - crushes and relationships alike - with all kinds of people, and plenty of meaningless flirtations in addition to those. For a while, she'd thought that was what she'd been doing with Gobo - flirting harmlessly. It was certainly fun, but he was, well, Gobo. It clearly didn't mean anything.

Right? The thing was, she found herself thinking about Gobo a lot, even when they weren't together. Notable experiences left her eager to tell him, and she often wondered if he'd like this or that thing... He was becoming a big part of her life. That was still a bit scary to Lexi with anyone, but in this case? Doubly so.

At least she knew who to go to when it came to any sort of strange thing like this. And she knew Louie was in town for a bit, so off to Donald's place she headed.

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Lexi perked right up at that. "Man, you know, I bet you're right! Louie might even know something about it; we should ask him."

He sat up a bit better and nodded.

"Yeah! You said he was here, right? Why don't we ask him right now?"

"Yeah, sure thing!" She kissed his cheek before standing up, at which point she offered him her hand. Look, she was no proper lady, and no romantic either, but this was new. Exciting. Thrilling. She could be a bit of a goofball.

He looked at her hand a moment, then took it with a bright smile, going inside with her.

This indeed was new and exciting, and not just the idea of the question they were asking.

Inside, Louie busied himself in the kitchen, totally trying to make it look like he hadn't been spying on them the whole time.

Hearing the sliding door open and close he leaned around to look, then smiled warmly.

"Hey, guys! All went well, I take it?"

Louie being Louie, Lexi was certain that was more than just a guess, and she grinned at him while flashing a very rude hand gesture.

"Yeah, it did," she confirmed, giving Gobo's hand a little squeeze. "Thanks for the nudge, but now I'm gonna ask another favor."

He laughed at the gesture and, so long as the cat was out of the bag, slipped his phone from his pocket and idly passed a couple photos off to Lexi's.

"Sure. What's up, buttercup?"

She didn't even check her phone when it chimed, mostly because she had a vague notion of what just happened, but it was still a clear sign: Lexi was smitten.

"Gobo and I want to visit Fraggle Rock sometime, but I'd need a little help getting through to there. You remember the merduck charm, right? Think you can find something like that, but a Fraggle charm?"

"A Fraggle charm?" He rubbed his beak in thought, looking down toward Gobo. "Let's see... Fraggles are pretty rare, so I doubt there's one already existing since only like, 2% of anybody in the history of everything knows about you guys."

Seeing a bit of disappointment, he held up a finger with a grin. "Wait though, wait! I didn't say one couldn't be made. A singular enchantment can be done, it just takes some sort of information from the species being changed into. Generally that's study and a whole lot of written magic for 'plain' species or, in the case of demons like Fraggles, something to read and copy the magic."

Lexi blinked, confused. "Reading and copying? That sounds more data than magic, man. But okay. How would we go about that?"

"Hey it's like they say, sufficiently advanced technology is indeterminable from magic, or something like that."

He snickered some, then walked them back outside, to where his wares were spread out over the ground. Tracing the perimeter of the blanket, he looked down at them in thought.

"There's a couple of different ways, but the main method is that the demon donating the magic gives up a portion of it to be copied into a vessel, which charges the charm and enchants it for the recipient. Such methods are usually pretty rare, but I think I've got something here..."

"Yeah, sure." Lexi shrugged. "They're both either really awesome or totally frustrating, too."

At the explanation, Lexi hesitated, glancing at Gobo and then back to Louie. "But Gobo will still have his magic, right?" she asked.

"Oh yeah no, of course! Think of it like donating blood." He paused and knelt down, then hand-crawled and reeeaaaached toward a device in the middle of the blanket. This he picked up, carefully, and walked around to where the other two waited.

"Gobo will pass some of his magic, but nothing that won't be regenerated or even passed back to him once the process is complete. You may feel a bit tired afterward, Gobo, but it'll create a permanent Fraggle charm that Lexi can use."

He handed the device to them to inspect, then stepped back and folded his arms behind him. "Of course, this is all up to you. Magic, at least with this, can't be taken unwillingly, nor would it be enough to hurt him. It'd just write the essence of a Fraggle into a charm."

Gobo took the device first, looking it over. It seemed like a squat pair of metal scales, though one side was a claw-like form made to hold the enchantable object, empty at the moment. The other side was like a normal weighing tray but more conical in shape and turned up on its side, wide end facing out. He could almost imagine something flowing in through that and to the object that'd wait on the other side. All along its antique surface were runes he couldn't even begin to decipher, and as he held its weight he seemed to really feel it. Magic had always seemed a vague part of his life, though it wasn't until recently that he had started actively taking part in it, and seeking it out. Everything was magic when you saw it that way, but then some things were.... Magic. Capital M. And this was one of those.

Handing the object to Lexi, he looked up at her. "I think we should do it."

She took the device, weighing it a bit in her hands and inspecting it briefly. "Copper-heavy brass, with a zirconium inlay, and a high-quality silver," she observed, smiling at Louie. "If what you do didn't sound so exhausting, you'd have yourself a business partner."

That established, she crouched down closer to Gobo. "If you're sure. I mean, I definitely want to."

Edited 2020-01-22 13:19 (UTC)

"I definitely want to, too." He smiled at her, putting his hands over hers where they rested around the device. Behind him, his tail waved back and forth.

"Imagining you as a Fraggle is my second favorite thing about today."

She smiled softly, and gave him a quick kiss. Of all the sweet things-

"Then we're doing it."

He smiled just to see that, then leaned over a bit to lightly touch Lexi's shoulder, though it was Gobo he looked at.

"I just need to talk to her real quick, alright? Go ahead inside to the livingroom, we'll be in in a moment."

Once he was gone, he led Lexi a bit further away from the door just in case- Fraggle ears were sensitive, so who knows -and still waited a moment before he said anything. Still, his expression was neutral-positive, so it couldn't have been bad.

"I wanted to give you a heads up. This kind of transformation magic is a pretty close brother to what you've already got, with the merduck form and whatever else." No need to go into detail on that one, they both knew. "It won't give you any problems, but it might take just a bit longer for everything to really configure and fall into place, alright? And, like Bridge had sometimes, you... might get stuck as a Fraggle for a few days until it sorts itself out. Thought you should know before going into it."

Lexi watched him carefully, even with his expression not being negative, some of her older skepticism kicked in. When he'd said his piece, she considered the implications.

"Thanks for the heads-up, Louie. I'm still game. I... Don't mind being stuck as a Fraggle for a bit. I've dealt with weirder stuff. Bad-weird stuff. This is, you know, good-weird. And if things take a little longer to settle with this, that's okay, too." She smiled. "It'll be worth the wait."

He smiled, patting her shoulder and giving her a nudge toward the indoors.

"That's what I was hoping to hear. Now go make out with your new boyfriend while I clean up out here real quick and then go in myself. And I'll even knock on the wall to let you know I'm coming."

He winked, then laughed.

Lexi's expression went flat, and she slugged Louie on the arm.

"You suck, man," she said lightly - she wasn't really mad, of course. Louie was just like that. It was exasperating, but she was used to it.

Besides, she thought as she headed inside, it wasn't the worst idea he'd ever had... Although, considering one of the reasons why Louie had pulled her aside to bring that up...

Yeah, she probably needed to talk to Gobo about this.

He laughed again, and the 'crank' of his arm and rubbing the spot, as he walked over to his blanket, was exaggerated.

Though only just.

Gobo was waiting in the livingroom, comfortable on the couch with his feet resting together, and the bulk of his guitar in that space made. He was idly strumming the strings, and when Lexi appeared he looked up with a smile.

"Hey! Everything good?"

"Yeah," she said with a smile. "Louie was just letting me know how it might go, but everything's good."

She took a seat beside him, leaning against him just a bit. "I wanted to talk to you about something, though. I never brought it up because, well, it's a personal thing! But..." She trailed off with a shrug. She still felt a bit bad, now, that she'd not mentioned it earlier.

Edited 2020-01-22 13:51 (UTC)

He returned the lean, blinking up at her in curiosity. Sensing something serious here, he stilled his hands and rested them on top of the guitar.

"Personal things are hard to bring up." Goodness knows he had one or two of his own... "If you don't wanna say it yet, you don't have to."

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