Kissing Game CR write-up.

[detectivewonder]

 

So far, I have a pretty good handle on Eclipse’s CR and how it’s developing; but the kissing game had such a density of threads with so many people he’d never met I wanted to take some notes to keep everything straight in my head.  This ISN’T me reading romantic CR into a kissing game or doing shipping things; just keeping track of his evolving headspace and the various positive or negative first impressions people made so I can keep their general CR straight whenever they bump into one another again.

So, his kisses, in order: Cass, Luna, Aoko, Barnaby, Bubbles, Anri, Annabeth, Jason, Loki, Tavros, Naha, Hulk, Solstice, Haruki, Zuko, Kira, Sasuke, Hua Mulan, Jill, Ling; and postgame he had to choose between Erika & Lambda to help them resolve a bet, and kissed Cass again for demonstration purposes.

Not all of these substantially altered his impression of either kissing or the people kissed, so more practically, the list looks like this:

Cass, Luna, Aoko, Barnaby, Bubbles, Anri, Annabeth, Jason, Loki, Tavros, Naha, Hulk, Solstice, Haruki, Zuko, Kira, Sasuke, Hua Mulan, Jill, Ling; (Erika or Lambda), Cass.

Everyone he already knew and had spoken to, generally speaking the kissing just reinforced existing opinions.  Cass kissing him was really helpful, as was the fact that she told him it was supposed to be fun.  Her word is law, and she demonstrated that it wasn’t a big deal, so he set out to help his team win nervously but trying to enjoy things and relax a little.  If anyone else had kissed him first, his count would have been much lower, because it would have taken him much longer to have fun.  Bubbles, who’s also definitely a friend, might have been able to do it?

Aoko (Berry to him, since that’s how she introduced herself) also made it light, cheerful, not a big deal.  Good first impression.

Anri was the only person he kissed who was more shy about things than he was, though a few others were equally shy and some were definitely more awkward.  He got to be a little big-brotherly (in a weird way), and if he sees her in a game again, he’ll probably check to see if she’s okay if she seems nervous in that context, too.

Annabeth.  Uh, Annabeth is the one who taught him that kissing could have technique.  While he actively enjoyed kissing both Cass & Bubbles, Annabeth was where he started actively having fun and learning something from what he was doing.  Also then they geeked out about strategy and continued to check back with one another throughout the game.  If he WAS going to emerge from this game with a crush, it would be on Annabeth -- for the strategizing, not the kissing.  XD  But no, his feelings at the moment are totally geeky bromance feelings.

Jason.  AND first actively unpleasant kissing experience.  It made him very uncomfortable, but it didn’t change his impression of Jason, and on a technical if not interpersonal level there were parts of it he responded to positively... which only makes him feel more uncomfortable about it.

Naha.  From kissing Slick, he’d already gotten a little more notion of technique here, but... wow.  In general, in several different ways, Naha is just a bit intimidating and overwhelming to him.  Still, for the rest of the evening, when he was trying to impress someone, he did his best to imitate her kissing style.

Zuko: not a first impression, but they talked longer than he did with most of his smooching buddies, and Zuko had a distinct, gentler style that stood out from everyone else’s.  First post-Naha kiss where he had an inkling that there wasn’t just one right way to do this kissing thing.  Also, he definitely wants to be friends with Zuko.

Kira:  ...they didn’t kiss, they totally made out for an unspecified period of time.  I’m guessing a minute, maybe two.  If he had more memory to draw on, he might be really embarrassed about this, but as it is, it was just a game, a learning experience, and he was being competitive.  It was fun.  Her confidence is enough to make him want to meet her again, but that’d be true even without the kissing part, it’s interest but not romantic interest. (at this point?  I could see him developing a crush, it’s just not there now).

Sasuke: this was a weird experience, both positive and negative?  Sasuke has made him ambivalent but very curious; he’s definitely someone Eclipse feels the need to learn more about ASAP.  He was standoffish and encouraging at the same time, which delighted me as a great Sasuke portrayal, but since Eclipse isn’t familiar with the canon, he’s just baffled.

Ling: worse than Jason.  The simple act of grabbing his hips went WAY past his comfort zones in a way that’s maybe a little out of proportion; he’d only gradually relaxed into the notion that touching wa a part of kissing, and that had been mostly touching his face, or his shoulders.  Unexpectedly bringing the rest of his body into it scared the HELL out of him, and he’ll be very wary of Ling in the future.  It sort of undid his gradual relaxation over the course of the night: now that he knows that Jason’s not the only one to vault over his boundaries, he’s also going to be more cautious about kissing games than he would have been if this hadn’t been the coda to his evening.

Lambda & Erika: both seemed like interesting people he wants to know better.

Cass (again): the postgame kiss with Cass, demonstrating what he’d learned, could actually be a big character development moment.  Cass being weirded out by the fact that he mimicked Naha has him thinking a lot about style and modeling in identity terms, not just about kissing.  So far he’s taken a patchwork approach to identity construction; I admire this trait in this person so I will emulate it; and that trait in that person so I will emulate that as well.  Cass gave him the epiphany that these should be a seamless whole, that skill and technique and style are not simply building blocks for identity but also EXPRESSIONS of it.  It was... a weirdly profound moment.