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He clicks his tongue and shakes his head as another guest plunges their face into the punch before it's mercifully swept away by a mechanical attendant. He thanks Gabriela with a half bow and swipes a glass off of the pyramid in order to help himself to the face-free alcoholic punch.

A toast does sound pretty good. He turns to watch Yll'r, frankly quite curious what sort of wish they'd offer to toast to.

"If you insist," Another approving nod. "Pleasure to meet you. You may call me Zeno."

The non-alcoholic punch was gone now. Probably for the better, Zeno figured. "If anyone would like a refill after the toast, do let me know."

Gabriela's smile is frozen on her face, realizing she may have just caused a diplomatic incident with not one but two alien races. "Oh, no no no," she assures Cinder. "This toasting ritual is an Earth tradition, but the, uhm, punch bathing ritual is something new that we are trying as part of llaa-synn/human relations. We are most assuredly honored that you have participated as well. In fact --" She sounds confident, but her smile is really frozen now. She snaps her fingers at the droid that was just starting to roll off to follow Yll'r, summoning it back. Setting her glass down on the edge of the table, she takes the punch bowl from the droid, staring down at it with an almost manic expression. "I will of course not hesitate to participate in this newly minted tradition myself." And with that, she plunged her head into the punch bowl.

"As for my wish. It is my wish that this party sufficiently fulfils all of criteria I have come to expect from my research," Yll'r declared. "And that I may meet many new people. On this endeavour. Is that within the expected boundaries? Also is there caramelised bread involved? Or has there been an error in my translator?"

The Laavian appreciates the words Gabriela offers them, but they're unsure they should participate in the next ritual. It's another drinking ritual, and so far all Cinder knows is not to bathe in the liquids. A wish, however, was something they could manage. Quickly they grabbed a glass and filled it, unsure what they'd do with it once the wish was made. Holding the glass high, they exclaimed with much vigor, "I wish for the end of war, and the end of oppression." It seems like a good wish to them, if not inappropriately timed, anyway.

The man laughs, bright and mirthful, and raises his glass to the offered toast. "To research and merriment," he proposes, echoing the sentiments of the jelly-creature.

"Cool." he said, with an unconcealed grin. "I've battled in the arena some back on my homeworld, myself--but I'm not sure I'd want to take you on! That sounds like a load of firepower. I'd love to see that in action. But, er maybe not here." he added, with a short laugh. "I'd hate to see the look on milady's face if I was the reason this place exploded into a million tiny pieces."

"Oh, I didn't give you my name--I'm Kolt. Kolt Gavryn. and this is Cryostryker." he said, introducing the spear that hovered at his shoulder, which gave a little dip as if giving a bow. "She doesn't really talk--" the spear gave a slight whistle of indignation at this. "--Well, not really with words, anyway, but she can do... this!"

With that, he raised his arm up into the air, holding his palm flat. The spear flew up on top and started to spin like the needle on a compass, spraying tiny, glittery ice shards in a wide radius around them--harmless, but very, very cold to the touch.

Lifting her head back out of the punch bowl, dripping with citrusy juice, Gabriela hastily shoves the punch bowl back into the droid's mechanical claws and shooes it away. Hosting a party for aliens is turning out to be way more complicated than she had thought. But she can't stop tap dancing yet -- she immediately grabs her glass off the table and raises it high. "A toast to a great party!" she announces, doing just a tiny bit of translating for Yll'r, and then tosses back her very much alcoholic drink.

As another wish is offered, she refills her glass with the ladle, and repeats in a loud voice for all to hear, "A toast to the end of war and oppression!" This time, she takes a more measured sip, and continues on to "To research and merriment!" for one more sip.

A droid rolls up to the buffet table and quietly replaces the non-alcoholic punch bowl with a fresh batch.

Zeno had begun to fill his glass. Well, not necessarily his glass, but one he could use for the wish.

"I wish... to find my place in this universe." With that, he raises his glass to the sky. "To companionship!"

Yll'r slowly twists their head around in various directions, tentacles eventually following in a fluid wave of motion. Whilst the llaa-synn had no blindspots in electromagnetic perception, something was definitely missing here. Why, these toasts were being declared, but there was no sign of any actual toast being deposited anywhere. How curious!

He chuckled, saying, "Impressive! Watch this;" Not trying to one-up Cryostryker, but he did have his own trick. He steadied himself as his vents opened, thin wisps of flame appearing as yellow energy emanated from him. The lights on the ship all turned doubly bright, and a shining yellow at that. Everything seemed... more energized. After a few seconds, he deactivated the ability, saying, "Overcharger; all mechanical entities within a fifty-meter radius of the charge conduit gain an extra 100% to their current energy reserves for the duration of them staying within the field of overcharge, increasing speed, reload times, and ability refresh times, as well as boosting damage output." He monologues slightly.

Yll'r seemed to immediately flinch at the increase in lighting - and maybe other electro-magnetic signals that might have been affected that others could not as easily perceive. They dropped a good metre of so of hover height in process. When all was over they shook it off and spread their tentacles in a posture of uncertainty. "What in the name of all that radiates was that? The sudden increase in electromagnetic activity was painful! Is that... is that normal here?" They rubbed the top of their head with a tentacle as though they now head a headache. Which in a manner of speaking was true.

Cinder was glad to be a part of the tradition, and wondering what more traditions there were, and how much these humans could drink, they stared down at their glass several moments trying to decide what to do with it. Drinking it would be....bad, but then, who were they to break with tradition? Reluctantly, they slowly brought the glass to their lips as everyone else had, and struggled to down it with a twisted face, eventually getting it all down. Their body clearly attempted to reject it as they brought down their glass and set it on the table nearby, shuddering a second time now at the feeling of drinking the liquid.

Recovering, Cinder looks to Gabriela, and weakly asks a simple question, "Is that the last drinking tradition?"

Stepping into the venue midway through the toast was another guest. A man - tall, dark, smartly dressed, and seemingly human, apart from his striking gold eyes. He chuckled as he took in the crowd forming around the buffet, a few of which seemed to be dripping with punch. A curious cast of characters to be sure, and many clearly alien or mechanical in some way.

"Well now, ain't this a party?" he said with a grin, strolling in casually.

He tips back his head and downs his glass. Significantly more relaxed now, he flashes a grin at the hostess, Yll'r and Zeno all one at a time. "I most sincerely wish that these toasts come true for all of you."

He pauses as the lights surge, the room glows a bright, sickeningly energized yellow, for but a moment- he never sees who or what causes it, but the environmental change re-grounds him and reminds him of something kind of...important.

He retrieves his journal- there's another new message:

How are you holding up?"

He summons the quill he needs to write back.

Quite alright, love. This event is certainly interesting.

I'm happy to hear it, and I apologize if you're in the middle of something, but the gate is going to close soon.

Mild panic warps his features ever so briefly and he hastily writes back:

Right. I'm on my way, see you soon.

He snaps the journal shut and turns to address his company. "It has indeed been a pleasure, but I best be on my way. The, uh, the method I used to reach you operates on a rather tight time limit." He laughs, "My husband might kill me if I strand myself out here."

"Choresh Eldravyn, by the way," he adds, "...is my name. Ah, I don't imagine we'll meet again, but in any case, I feel that may be important to share. Do enjoy the rest of the party!"

He bids them all farewell with a polite half-bow and a wave of his hand before turning on his heels and rushing out of the venue.

Zeno could not, and would not, down his drink. But fortunately, a new guest had arrived. Perhaps they could join in the fun?

He smiled, trying his best to seem as not-creepy as possible, before offering his glass to Maverick after slowly approaching. "Welcome to the venue. Care for a drink? We just had a toast, but sadly I cannot drink the punch myself... Internal limitations. It's alcoholic, for your information. I hope that's alright with you."

"To companionship," echoes Gabriela, taking a final sip. Then she sheepishly grabs a napkin, dips it in a glass of water, and starts trying to clean up the sticky punch on her face. "Is that the last drinking tradition? Uh, well... we have many others, but most are meant for a much smaller and more informal group. So I think that will be that last one that we do here," she says to Cinder. Not only does she not want to teach this alien crowd drinking games, she's not sure she'll survive the embarrassment of trying to keep up with the weird modifications they'd come up with for them! One punch bath a day is quite enough for her.

At the sudden pulse of energy, she looks around in confusion. "Hey, what are you doing to my station?"

Choresh gets another quick bow, sweeping her arm across herself. "I'm honored that you joined us for any length of time, friend. I hope to see you on Radiance again soon."

Zeno watches as Choresh gave his toast, introduced himself, and proceeded to take his leave. "Pleasure to meet you. I do hope we meet again someday, human. Farewell!"

While Cinder seems distressed at the swallowing of alien liquids, the burst of light seems to do them some good. They stand more upright and their face returns to a normal expression, having offered a hunch and the look of disgust beforehand.

"I'm glad for that," Cinder says to Gabriella, though talking as though to themselves.

Remembering what etiquette they had picked up on during their research, Yll'r turned to wave a tentacle toward Choresh.