Video 愛 un: companioning

[companioning]

[The feed flickers a few times as Inara pokes at her phone a few times. Finally it steadies and Inara shakes her head.]

Bàoqiàn. I'm sorry, I'm still attempting to get use to these communication devices.

[She settles back and offers a charming smile before briefly dipping her head.]

Nín hǎo? For those of you I've failed to meet, I'm Inara Serra and still relatively new here. [She draws in a deep breath before continuing on.] Now I know that there are a great deal of you came from Earth, and while I find that truly fascinating and would love to hear some of your stories concerning it, I'm interested in knowing just where everyone else comes from.

I ask because though my ancestors come from Earth, though, no one has lived on Earth for centuries. I was born and raised on a planet called Sihnon. I trained there as well but before coming here, I'd spent a good year traveling between the different planets and various moons of our system.

[She takes a small sip of her tea before giving a brief nod of her head. She might have borrowed a teapot and some cups.]

I can't offer much, but I've only just made a fresh pot of tea and I'd be willing to share it with anyone who wouldn't mind telling me about where they come from.


((OOC: hover over Chinese for translations))

Comments

[icingonthecake]

My home world is called Radiant Garden, but it hasn't gone by that name in a while. There was kind of a... natural disaster about ten years ago that kind of threw the whole thing into a big mess. That was about the same time I left, and I haven't been back but a few times since.

['About', nothing; he left at the exact same time the natural disaster happened, and it wasn't even remotely natural, but he's not going to try and explain something so horrific as a world crumbling into Darkness to someone who's brand new. It's bad enough for people to hear about the Storm having destroyed worlds; no sense telling them there's more sentient evil world-consuming Darkness out there.]

What's your Sihnon like?

[companioning]

I'm sorry to hear about that.

[And she was. She couldn't even imagine what a natural disaster was like. Her home had never gone through anything like that. But, that was because of the technology they had and she found herself grateful they'd had it.]

Sihnon is beautiful. Full of green mountains that are home to many monasteries and training houses. Prosperous and peaceful. It's considered one of the most beautiful planets where I come from.

[icingonthecake]

Ah, you know, it was a long time ago. I hear they're kinda putting things back together, at least, so... who knows? Maybe it'll get fixed up even better than it was the first time.

[He's not holding his breath, but he's sure stranger things have happened.]

Training houses, like martial arts? I hear monks can be pretty impressive combatants, I bet a monastic training house would be quite a thing to see.

[companioning]

That is good to hear. Hopefully your people have found a kind of peace.

[Now that all of their worlds are gone, she does hope that.]

Ah, in a way. It is one of the things that are taught. The training houses I speak of are for Companions. They are highly trained and educated women and men who if they complete their training take on clients and offer them different sorts of companionship.

sorry for the wait! i'm moving and everything is a disaster lol

[icingonthecake]

One can hope. [He's only been back a few times, and while the remaining denizens seem okay enough with the way things have turned out, it appears none of them remembered the world's real name, which is troubling. Well, maybe ignorance is bliss, who is he to judge?

He listens to her explanation, and of course his mind immediately goes right where you would expect it to, given her words. The way she explains it very carefully and deliberately tells him she's used to a negative reaction, but for what it's worth, he doesn't really have the unsavory associations with her profession that a lot of people apparently do. Radiant Garden was always big on personal freedom of expression, and he had been raised with the idea that love was love, and so long as everyone was enjoying themselves, there was nothing inherently shameful about, uh. Loving multiple people. Or getting paid for it, for that matter. So he just smiles a little.]

'Companion', huh? That's a nice word for an underappreciated service. I didn't realize there were like... fancy schools for that sort of thing.

no worries! I'm slow due to some teeth issues. :)

[companioning]

[Her eyebrows lift a little in surprise but soon, she's flashing him a warm smile. It's not often that she's met someone outside of where she's from who doesn't automatically judge. It's a nice change.]

Well, they teach many things before anything of an intimate nature is taught. A Companion must be able to read their clients and know what they want and need. They have to be able to move through different circles and hold conversations all on their own. It's not easy and not everyone finishes their training.