[PRP] It was a Cough that Carried Him Off [Once More/Near]

[Jun D]

Once More with Feeling had travelled many places. Well, more to say, drifted many places. She was a doe who had her whole life been told she was beautiful, but never interesting. She cared little for being beautiful (a sentiment, perhaps, that only those proclaimed beautiful might so easily indulge in), but she had to admit, as much as she was loath, that there was nothing she particularly excelled in. She had drifted a long time, seeking for something thus.

Today, she drifted into the Coughing Bean.  

[Maxx D]

Today Nearly Beloved had risen to staff the Coughing Bean by himself - Rise and Shine in the near distance was already bustling about doing their work, and simply watching them tired him out. After fielding the working regulars, he took little sips of their wares until the doe wandered in.

"Welcome," he said dryly, barely sounding like he meant it.  

[Jun D]

She had heard stories about the Coughing Bean - stories that weren’t very clear one way or the other, but stories, nevertheless. She had heard of the bitter drink that somehow ensnared. She had heard of the stage. She had also heard about the enigmatic twins that ran the show. Clearly this was one of them, the binding wing wrapped around his muzzle, as she’d heard. She didn’t know which of the above she had come for.

“Thank you,” she said, not knowing what else to say.  

[Maxx D]

He regarded her for a while, eyes travelling from head to hoof, and back up again. A slight smirk touched the edge of his lips.

"I have here a brew," he said, voice low, like an unnecessary secret, "an intriguing one. You may like it, you may not. But such uncertainty of new experiences is the joy of life, no?"  

[Jun D]

The coughing drink. There it was, then. She came closer to the buck.

“What would I owe for such an experience?”  

[Maxx D]

"Entertain me," he answered, surprisingly readily. "But not too vigorously, that comes too close to keenness. Not too aloof; pretentiousness bores me." Whether the irony of this was escaping him, it wasn't evident. "If you've nothing on you, take the stage and extract something of worth."  

[Jun D]

Entertain him. Ay, the rub. She had nothing with which to, and nothing, she thought, to extract.

“I have heard of your poetry,” she said, trying to mask her desperation, “but I have never heard it. Is that what you seek? What is it like?”  

[Maxx D]

"Anything. Everything." His head rose the merest of measures from where it used to lay, near that steaming turtle shell. "The poetry we seek lies outside and inside of the Motherfather's realms, but to invoke her name is pithy. About the world, about yourself. About life, and about death. Such is the value of the coughing bean."

"You don't have to do it very well," he chuckled, lazily flipping his fringe aside. "Just adequately or ineptly enough to amuse me."  

[Jun D]

He did not take the bait.

“Could you demonstrate?” she said straight-out instead.  

[Maxx D]

He looked straight into her eyes, an alertness glittering within, and after a while, laughed again, but soundlessly.

"No." He concluded.  

[Jun D]

Somewhat put out, she stepped onto the stage. There were only the buck’s expecting eyes upon her, but that was already one set too many eyes for this endeavour.

She had no idea what to do. Banking on that beauty she had so often been told she possessed, she cast one last beseeching look at the buck.  

[Maxx D]

"The hotter the boil, the sweeter the taste," he called, pleasantly. "Though it's not the bitter brew for nothing."

She was beautiful, but rarely could his appetite for humiliation be sated by something so simple.  

[Jun D]

So even about that they had lied.

“Er,” she started, feeling awkward and at sea, “twinkle...twinkle...little...star?”  

[Maxx D]

"Cast your sights a little further," the tone was sharp and there was an inexplicable look on his face, but his teeth were slightly bared in a strange smile.  

[Jun D]

“There once was a buck most provoking,” she all but snapped at that.