He had to be nuts to do this right? Why would he subject ANYONE to his ******** ancestor’s craziness?!

Because he was a selfish b*****d and he didn't want to suffer alone, that's why.

And this Joyeuse person was already at the same stage he is so they wouldn't be too intimidated by his stupid ancestor, which hopefully meant that they would give just as much back as they would receive. So here he was, arriving at the designated meeting spot a little late due to his youngest and his lack of wanting to fall asleep unless something spooky was on the TV [He put on The Thing classic and the 3 year old was out like a light after the first twenty minutes]. Of course he worried about the tyke, but he figured one of his three children would turn out to be more like him and it just so happened to be the kid that came from his husband…Go figure.

The saturn knight walked up to the Earth knight with his bora hanging around his neck like a pair of boxing gloves, giving a casual wave, “You must be Joyeuse I take it? Sorry about bein’ late. Name’s Aaru.” He offered his hand for a friendly shake.

–

Joy was never much inclined to offer her grace to those who could not observe punctuality, but she was more interested in what Aaru had to offer than in upholding her own strict standards of conduct. She pushed aside the urge to chide him, therefore, and gave him a broad, dimpling smile as she shook his hand, her own being of a kind that might make a CEO tear up with pride.

“Just Joy is fine,” she assured him. “The other one’s way too French. Thank you for giving me this opportunity. You’re helping me out a lot, and I appreciate it.”

Which was, also, as much gratitude as he was going to get. She’d keep the rest in reserve for the stranger she hadn’t met yet, who might or might not deserve it. “Shall we?”
_

As a CEO in civilian life, Aaru would have teared up, maybe bowed at the waist, that handshake was so solid. But, they were not civilians at the moment and he was pretty sure the other knight would not have the need for an architect or his construction services. “Alright, Joy it is. You're welcome~” He kept the flirting out of his tone, trying to be more…Approachable and friendly, especially if he wanted to help others out more in the sense. “We shall.” He said his pledge and beamed them up to his wonder, landing at the iron gate. As soon as he could figure out some sort of electricity, this gate was going to be remote controlled.

For now, he pushed the massive things open with zero effort. Yay being a knight he supposed. “Welcome to Aaru.” He gave her a small grin and continued down the renewed brick path that would lead them to the front of the wonder. “Lemme know if you have any questions or want to see anything in particular. Des only likes to show her face in the house.” He gestured to the mostly reconstructed Victorian mansion in the distance, then pointed to the giant filled in field. “This is the actual wonder. Used to be a mass grave yard.” It took him years to move everyone and fill in the various holes from the graves, let alone to get grass to grow back.

“The main entrance to the catacombs is there. Still renovating and putting everyone where they belong.” He pointed to the sculpted marble and concrete building with an elegant, almost medieval door attached to it. Dessie hated that door, which is why he installed it in the first place.
_

“I have a bit of a crypt,” said Joy in a tone of detached admiration, “but nothing like this. Must be a hell of a job. Do you have records, or how do you figure out who goes where?” She was not at all, it seemed, disturbed or disgusted by the nature of the Wonder. The cosmos, she figured, needed a cemetery too, and it was not the sort of thing that generally skeeved her out. She might not generally look it, but she was a former goth kid, after all.

She followed him at an unhurried pace, a little queenly for all her short stature, with eyes that were quick and observant, filing things away for future reference. “And is there anything I should know, before we meet?” This was increasingly seeming to be a good question to ask.
_

“Oh?” That was something he wanted to see, he was tired of looking at his own so much.

Ah, records.

That was a work in progress.

“Theres a tag on the bodies. Some are in bags, some are not. So I'm trying to put them in numerical order as best as I can given I cant read the ******** language of this planet.” He wished he could but he wasn't exactly sure how to go about that yet, so that would be something to ask the code later. “There were also urns down there already that needed recategorization. Truthfully, this place was…Haunting when I first came here.” That had been when he was in college and still pretty young, ******** he was old. After a bit more walking, Aaru had made it to the first step of the mansion, then turned to look at his guest. There was something between an annoyed and tired look on his face.

“She’s crazy, will call you all sorts of weird ancient names if she so pleases.” He sighed and continued, “Unless you want to hear some morbid s**t, don't ask her about her research.” With that, he walked up the rest of the stairs and opened the door.
_


“I don’t mind morbid s**t at all,” she said cheerfully, although she wrinkled her nose as she did so, this little aside of his having derailed the question she was lingering on, which was: why not ask your ghost to help you read it?

If she was a recalcitrant a*****e, that would answer that.
_

Strangely enough, the house was actually quiet, which unnerved Aaru greatly. It meant Dess was either hiding or up to something and neither didn't bode well for him or his patience. “Well, I guess she's not home at the moment. Thank ******** god.”

That relief didn't last long.

And just who have you brought in my home now?!

Yep….There she goes.

“Des knock it off and just show yourself yeah? You're being ruder than usual."

There was something of a tch noise as the ghost materialized to the side of the knights, looking Joy up and down with interest.

Humph. At least you didn't bring another pillow hugger like you did the last time. Why not bring Chillingham back? I would love to meet them again… There was a small gasp, and her crazed eyes widened, Oh! You're not a Saturn Knight at all! She swirled around Joy with delight, Oh you must ABSOLUTELY let me take a closer look at you! An Earth knight!!!! The interest she was taking only meant one thing and he was going to try to talk to Joy before Des could open her mouth.

“Joy…Let me show you the rest of the mansion…Da?” He was so frustrated, his mother tongue was about to come out. ******** he HATED dealing with this witch whenever he had visitors over.

Oh hush you man thing! Ugh! What a perfect specimen! I never got to dissect one of you, missed opportunities and all that. But! If you could give my useless descendant a weeee small strand of your hair? Or I'll even settle for a fingernail, yours are so pretty! Fit for a queen! Is that what you are dear?
_

“Yes, sort of,” she answered promptly. Castle, tick. Crown, tick. Ermine, tick. She even had a loyal devoted Knight pledged to her service, sort of. As far as she was concerned: Queen. “My name is Joyeuse Garde,” she added, looking to see whether there was some glimmer of recollection in response to the name. “But Joy is fine.”

Had Des been a corporeal presence, Joy would have reacted with prompt self-preservation instincts and been completely unashamed to do so, probably triangulating her way between simpering, flattery, and running like hell.

But she knew - that was the whole point, wasn't it, of everything she was doing? - that she was perfectly safe, and therefore she disregarded her more fleshy host in favor of preening beneath the ghost’s attention, turning this way and that to show herself off. She was a fine specimen, thank you. Dissecting her would probably uncover all kinds of unprecedented and exciting things.

“If you'll tell me what the nature of that research is,” she said mildly, immediately defying Aaru’s suggestions largely on the basis of how thrilled she was with the phrase man thing, “maybe I'll give up some hair. But the nails are too expensive, darling.”
_

Well….

He supposed this was better than the knight running and screaming home.

The nature of the research is to figure out Earth Knight DNA of course. I wonder if it's different from say…A Uranus knight of sorts? The name Joyeuse did seem a bit familiar, but if the ghost truly knew who it was, she didn't give any outside indications. Obviously I can't dissect you, but I'm sure your insides are the same as any humanoids I've cut open in the past. I would love to know if your soul would be different though given the fact that you're not from here…If anything, I would love to put it in a pretty bejeweled golden flask.

The ghost moved as if she were to caress the knight before her, but pulled back to stand by Aaru. He may be a man thing, but at least this Aaru has done more than those in the past. My alchemy lab is almost brand new! Her face soured, I don't like the fact he moved my works down into that stupid catacombs though….They were FINE in their little holes, rotting away like the disappointing garbage they were….Absolute failures!
_

She did not seem at all inclined to run screaming. If anything she seemed very invested, and flattered by the idea that her soul ought to go into a bejeweled flask. This was consistent with her general worldview, and she approved of it with a beaming smile.

“Your works?” she prompted with genuine interest, suspecting that something macabre and awful was lurking on the other end of that question and entirely excited to learn what it was. “Were those dissections too?”
_

Oh Aaru! I want this one to come by more often! She’s so curious! Aaru shrugged and waved his hand dismissively, “If she wants. Why don't you take over for the tour then Des?” The ghost didn't hesitate, dancing and twirling with delight. Of course! Also my dear lovely queen, my works consist of frankensteining whenever I was bored. Strange works of art made for only the finest specimens! Well, for humanoids I suppose. I would have loved to get an alien or two. She proceeded to the first part of the tour, which was an actual kitchen. My descendant is a bit slow on the reworking, but since he is the only one to come here and remodel, the kitchen is practically useless at the moment. SO moving onto my favorite part of the remodel so far!

Just down the hall to the left, Desmonia flew through the door, then poked her head out. Well come on now Aaru! Walk with dignity and open the door for the guest! She slipped back into the room, while Aaru sighed and walked a bit quicker, opening the door for Joy to enter. THIS is my brand new alchemy room! As soon as Aaru is able to find my family’s special little book, we will be able to work on all sorts of things here!
_

Joy for her part was already behaving as if Aaru was a necessary but undesirable adjunct to the conversation, waiting for doors to be opened for her so that she could sail along after this particularly interesting ghost.

“Book?” she asked pleasantly. “With your case files and notes, I take it?”

She was gazing around herself with suitable admiration, very sincere. She wondered briefly if she might have been better placed as the protege of this kind of ghost, or if eventually - woeful likelihood - they would have begun to butt heads just as surely as she and Gouvernail had taken the opposite route, and cooled from conflict to mostly-uninterrupted smoothness.

“Did you reanimate things, then?” she asked with genuine interest. This was a line of questioning consistent in some sideways fashion with her own goals, after all, although it sounded like Des had taken a decidedly fleshier route to circumventing the hereafter. “Or was this more of an art project?”
_

Smart, lovely, AND curious?! Des was in love with the fact that she didn't have to even tell Joy how important the book of Aaru was to her, Why YES! Right on the money! The Book of Aaru holds notes, diagrams and past studies from all Aaru’s before. The case files are in a different book somewhere which is unimportant. it only contained the cryptic way she used to categorize the bodies that she used in her experiments. If said book was found? She would be delighted, but it wasn't needed.

I tried to, yes. I wanted to find a way to transfer the soul between things, bodies, and containers. No success, but I….Did manage to create something…Im not sure I can remember at this current time but I would like to tell you whenever you come to visit next! at the mentioning of art, she further explained, There is the art aspect to it, yes. The hosts that I would create out of the bodies were nothing short of marvelous~ But as you know…Aaru just had to move them from the front yard where they were currently resting and MINDING their business. Aaru himself rolled his eyes, “Des….We’ve been over this….I MOVED the body bags BECAUSE you just can't have a MASS GRAVE in the FRONT yard…”

She narrowed her eyes at the knight and raised an eyebrow, but she chose not to say anything. She would get him later.
_

“Men often have these disagreements with us about domestic design,” said Joy gravely, shooting a glance at Aaru as she attempted to do some sort of mediation on his behalf. “But we have to take pity on them. They go lumbering around all willy-nilly and I imagine a stack of corpses is a trip hazard.”

She paused, suddenly actually and truly interested on a personal level and beyond the point of mere idle fascination. “It's interesting, isn't it? The way you - forgive me if it's rude to say it - the way you, yourself, have sort of become similar to what your work was. Your soul got transferred from its old vessel to - well, I guess I'm not sure if it has a vessel now, unless it's the Wonder itself? It makes sense for a Knight to be the one to work on this sort of thing. I don't know anything else that can push a soul to keep existing after it's dead without cycling it through the Cauldron first.”

She paused, adding with complete sincerity: “I don't much like the way the Code does things. I'm sure your work had better underpinnings, even if you never had time to finish it.”
_

”Very true my dear. Water under the bridge now anyway.” there was a bit of a frown while listening to Joy asking her questions in a very cute way. THIS is why she preferred the fairer gender over whatever Aaru would consider himself to be. If anything, she’s never thought of her….Gostly presence in that way. ”You know…That is a new way of looking at things~” Suddenly she was thinking deeply and that was when a thought came to her. ”I…..Yes the code and me did not get along those last few years I was alive. BUT!” she clapped her hands together, ”I DO remember something that I had tried…I would need to reflect on it first before telling you.”

Des floated around with her hands behind her back, floating around Joy before coming back to the front of her, getting in close enough so that their noses would be touching, “Have you…..Are you interested in soul transference or imbuing? Is this something you’ve tried before? Do tell~”
_

Joy would normally have been offended - possibly even frightened - by this sudden intrusion on her personal bubble. But few people in the world had spent more time reflecting on the insubstantiality of Wonder ghosts and their futile inability to interact with reality than Joy, and so she was unmoved by it, only smiling and wrinkling her nose, as if she might have reached out and tweaked Des’s chin fondly if she could have.

She did, however, glance at Aaru before answering. There was no harm, she supposed, in his being a party to the conversation - it might even be of some benefit - but her true motive for speaking honestly was a simple sense that she owed it to Des, as she owed it to every dead person whose peace she’d been going around disturbing willy-nilly.

“Sort of,” she said. “But not directly. I, too, have a ghost on my Wonder. He also spent a lot of his life absorbed in his work, but he regrets it. And, well.” She paused, speaking calmly. It was easier sometimes than others to not get emotional when she talked of her half-formed ideas. “I didn’t ask to be a Knight, and I didn’t ask for him, but it’s sort of like when a starving cat shows up and you have tuna in the cupboard. You just sort of have to. And during the Hollow - those big lightning storms a while back? - I don’t know if this happened to you too, but for a second, he was able to touch reality. I think he’d like to be able to do that again, and enjoy - you know. Life,” she finished, a touch apologetically. It was, really, a cruel thing to talk to a dead person about.

“I’ve been sort of vaguely trying to figure out why that happened and how it might be duplicated, even if only for a few minutes. But I don’t even know if it’s a good goal. I think maybe what I’m trying to do is worse than the hope he’s already gotten,” she finished, in a moment of unvarnished truth. She’d rarely admitted that last part even to herself, let alone a stranger. “But I have other reasons, too. I think in some way it might help me understand how a Wonder is made to live, if I can understand why the Knight that’s tethered to it can’t.”

-

She could understand and resonate with that…The not wanting to be a knight part that is. There was a bit of clarity that came to Des’ eyes, and she moved back a little. The thought that another ghost was alive, even for a precious couple of seconds, caused her to look at her own hands with something of a confused sorrow. If she had the chance, what would she do with those precious couple of seconds? Throw a vial across the room in anger? Try to summon Aaru? Not that she had a way of answering him but it would be nice to have one. The thought that she would run to her daughters grave and weep also brought itself to the forefront of her mind. Something was running down her cheek and she quickly swiped at it as if she were offended.

Aaru was a little more curious about how Des reacted to the suggestion that she could have been alive for at least a couple of seconds… Maybe he could speak with Joyeuse more about what she was trying to do? As much as he kept his distance from Des, there were times where he caught her floating this way and that, muttering, weeping, laughing, then repeating the process over and over. Damn, it must suck to just be so fractured like that…He said nothing as Joy continued, not wanting to be exiled from the girl chat again or some s**t. As much as he would like to know more information, that might be better done elsewhere for him.

Des frowned, but then she moved behind Joy, wrapping her arms around her in what would be considered a loving embrace. Her crazed eyes looked to Aaru as she spoke, “We will help you dear…Whatever you need. If your ghost was able to experience something like that, then it's only right that he should be able to do so again. A Queen should reward her most loyal subject…Right? Aaru?”

An eyebrow was raised, but the knight decided to play along, “Exactly. We can help Joy. I want to do whatever I can.”

—

Joy was, on the whole, not that unaccustomed to ghosts making futile gestures of interacting with her in a way that, obviously, they could not. The twinge of guilt she felt, not for the first time, was in raking up difficult conversations with the most helpless people imaginable.

For the greater good, as she told herself. And if the greater good just so happened to be aligned with the secret, unacknowledged wishes of her own heart - well, that was no business of hers.

“I appreciate it. I want to help you, as well. So if you hear anything - anything at all - that might be of help to us, please share it. Maybe between the two of us we can sort something out. And I’ll do the same, once I know anything concrete. If I ever do,” she was forced to add.

She gave Aaru a thin little smile. “I am aware that I’m taking on something impossible, but a lot of impossible s**t has happened to me in the last year, so I think I’m OK with that.”