Marena: Secret's Lunar Mate?

[ShadowDragon8685]

As per the Latest Errata, Abyssals get a huge safe harbour from their personal shit sandwich with their Lunar Mates.


Could Secret be Marena's? They got along surprisingly well at first - some ribbing and shoving and all, but Marena's first reaction to Secret was "She's cute! Let's keep her!"


I think it's a good idea. Of course, there's two other candidates who are also good: she's Karen's twin sister, and Misho's best friend. But I kind of like the idea of it being Secret. There's some UST going on between them, Marena makes her blush, they get along wlel, even when they're ribbing and throwing barbs at one another. Marena loves to dress Secret up and all...


So I put it to you: Who should be Marena's Mate?

 

[Ledaal Kajiri]

Where's the Any one of the three above? I could see logical reasons for any. She's clearly attached to them each strongly in one way or another...personally, I think Karen would seem...a little too pat, considering their twin nature. Still, it would be a reasonable literary choice, too.


Maybe she's really special and has taken the 'Bed them all' to such extremes she skips the one Solar Bond and actually managed to break the rules and get 3.

 

[Joe_Mello]

I sorta figured it was Misho, since he's the first guy. The lack of unf-unfing is probably a mutual decision due to Misho's past lives, his run-ins with the Fey, and possibly even a discomfort with the lack of control and logic intimacy has.


Karen's her sister, Secret's likely the daughter, and Ten Winds has his own little story to follow and has probably done more Lunars than Marena has "people."

 

[Aasharu]

I vote Secret. My love of the les yay aside, I think it would make sense. Even if there's nothing sexual or romantic, having them be mated really does help out Secret, as you pointed out from the Scroll of Errata. Plus, it would seriously help her out along the whole "path of redemption" shtick.


Of course, were it to grow to a sexual/romantic relationship, I would not be complaining in the slightest.

 

[Kyeudo]

Where's the "All of the Above" option?

 

[ShadowDragon8685]

I vote Secret. My love of the les yay aside, I think it would make sense. Even if there's nothing sexual or romantic, having them be mated really does help out Secret, as you pointed out from the Scroll of Errata. Plus, it would seriously help her out along the whole "path of redemption" shtick.
Of course, were it to grow to a sexual/romantic relationship, I would not be complaining in the slightest.

Exactly. With or without sex, Marena and Secret have something special going on, and for all the things that should be sins of life and Resonance-worthy if the ST is being an asshole about it - things like letting Marena do her hair, take her out on the town, etcetera - Sectret should be a Resonance-reactor. But she's not.


Obviously, we can say that Jukashi's not being an asshole about her getting Resonance, but it would help if Marena was Secret's Lunar the whole time.

Where's the "All of the Above" option?

I left it out for the same reason I left out the "any of the above" option: To piss you off.


Actually, to not, you know, break the setting.

 

[krrackknut]

I say someone we don't know. I'm for a bigger cast.

 

[Weimann]

I voted Misho, because I think it's fitting. They are very close, in a way that they are with no other. Misho even made her flustered at one point, which has to be unique.

 

[Kyeudo]

I left it out for the same reason I left out the "any of the above" option: To piss you off.


Actually, to not, you know, break the setting.

You asked who "should" be Marena's Lunar mate. All three choices have very good plot reasons that each have their own possible evolutions for the story. Roll 1d3. That's who I vote for.

 

[Dracogryff]

Misho. *shrugs*

 

[Teln]

Secret. Just... Secret.


(Congratulations ShadowDragon, you finally got me to register after months of lurking.)

 

[Loki1]

Secret....it'd be glorious ='D

 

[merle]

I don't really know, to tell the truth - I have always thought that Misho and Marena have nice chemistry going, but the arguments in favor of Secret do seem to hold water. Also, Secret crushing over Marena is quite possibly more adorable than an entire week's worth of Cute Overload.


What I'm really wondering about is - if they do find out that Secret is her mate, what does that mean in terms of love-and-marriage terms? If Marena had designs on Misho for that kind of thing, would the revelation of the bond make that impossible?

 

[Kyeudo]

The Solar Bond just makes a Lunar feel an attachment to that Solar. This manifests as a single Intimacy that can never be permanently lost. It is not required to be sexual. Several Solar/Lunar pairs were married to others instead of their bond mates and/or didn't swing that way.

 

[Dracogryff]

Canonically, one would assume not, since both Leviathan and his Solar Mate were sleeping with the same woman, who the Solar was married to. The Bond doesn't have to be sexual in nature, or matrimonial. It can be blood-brotherhood or the like or whatever, too. *shrug*


Thing is, while Marena is motherly and stuff to Secret, the comment by Jukashi himself at the bottom of the link I gave ("The Solar Exalted of the First Age developed many means to control their Lunar partners.") gives me the impression that it's Misho as well as the fact that when Marena limit breaks and starts mother henning...it's not Secret or her sister she spends all her time chasing around, its Misho.


Which kinda leads me to believe that the intimacy to him is stronger than to the other two...which would be consistent for a Solar Bond. *shrug* Could be wrong of course...but that's how I see it.

 

[Jukashi]

I feel I should mention that Marena wasn't actually limit-breaking at that point. Misho was just being sarcastic to himself.

 

[Dracogryff]

Hm. Even more interesting. Well then. *shrugs* I still lean toward Micho, but that's me.


Well, that and all the 'OMGSecretKAWAII!! *SQUEE*' fangirling I see on occasion has kinda turned me off Secret. u.u;

 

[Tsuranis]

Hm. Even more interesting. Well then. *shrugs* I still lean toward Micho, but that's me.
Well, that and all the 'OMGSecretKAWAII!! *SQUEE*' fangirling I see on occasion has kinda turned me off Secret. u.u;

The same here - but I still think it would be interesting for the plot in this case.

 

[chalicier]

The Secret/Marena thing is an interesting question. On the one hand, yes, Secret really should be accidentally killing small wildlife in a half-mile radius by this point (they could get employment for her in taverns, killing pests, only all the tankards would corrode and the beer would go off) what with all the hair-braiding, happy-diary-keeping, laughing and joking and just generally being alive she's been doing. So the Marena option works.


On the other hand, that bit of errata is actually quite recent, and I for one hadn't interpreted Solar Bond that way until the errata (I rather like the idea now - every prod towards Redemption is a good thing in my book), so it seems a bit of a stretch to suggest that's why Secret isn't accidentally exploding cute squirrels every other strip.

 

[ShadowDragon8685]

The Secret/Marena thing is an interesting question. On the one hand, yes, Secret really should be accidentally killing small wildlife in a half-mile radius by this point (they could get employment for her in taverns, killing pests, only all the tankards would corrode and the beer would go off) what with all the hair-braiding, happy-diary-keeping, laughing and joking and just generally being alive she's been doing. So the Marena option works.
On the other hand, that bit of errata is actually quite recent, and I for one hadn't interpreted Solar Bond that way until the errata (I rather like the idea now - every prod towards Redemption is a good thing in my book), so it seems a bit of a stretch to suggest that's why Secret isn't accidentally exploding cute squirrels every other strip.

This is Exalted.


We grab the rules, stretch them, give them indian rubs, pull german suplexes upon them, and pin them to the floor and yank on their arms and legs until they scream uncle.

 

[Ker'ion]

This is Exalted.

You said it wrong.
Madness?


This is EXALTED!!!

 

[Kalatash]

Doesn't Secret kill things randomly in a radius? It's just only been SHOWN happening once*, because it would make a funny joke, but that doesn't mean it doesn't happen other times. But then again, I'm not sure how Resonance works.


*http://keychain.patternspider.net/archive/koc0096.html

 

[Teln]

According to a strict interpretation of the rules, Secret should be a Resonance factory. Yes, plants and small animals dying is one of the listed side effects of Resonance accumulation, along with Secret becoming temporarily demonic in appearance, a temporary shadowland opening up, that sort of thing. The fact that none of this is happening could-could-mean that Marena is Secret's Lunar mate and therefore gives Secret a safe harbor from Resonance accumulation. Or, it just means that Jukashi's taking the same approach to Secret's Resonance as he is to Misho's charmset: it is whatever the plot demands it to be.

 

[Jimborg]

According to a strict interpretation of the rules, Secret should be a Resonance factory. Yes, plants and small animals dying is one of the listed side effects of Resonance accumulation, along with Secret becoming temporarily demonic in appearance, a temporary shadowland opening up, that sort of thing. The fact that none of this is happening could-could-mean that Marena is Secret's Lunar mate and therefore gives Secret a safe harbor from Resonance accumulation. Or, it just means that Jukashi's taking the same approach to Secret's Resonance as he is to Misho's charmset: it is whatever the plot demands it to be.

Well, that and Faithful Killer's Reprieve.