House of Cards

Anneliese was sitting on a soft chair which was fairly big and she looked like she could have been swallowed inside the chair at any moment now. The einherjar was building a house of cards, having a really concentrated look on her face. It was the third time she was doing this. The first time some 'prankster' decided to destroy the house when she was almost done, and Anneliese was tempted to insult him. The second time she accidentally hit one of the cards on the bottom. "I swear to god, or well gods, if I fail this time I'm going to give up." the daughter of Eir said in a quiet voice.

Ian was sitting cross legged in front of a chess board, and across from a fellow einherjar, who claimed to have played chess against a medieval king and won. He wasn't so sure as to how true this story was, considering at the current moment he was winning by a lot. Ian moved his last piece, into a spot that would guarantee his victory. His opponent was apparently not thrilled to be beaten by someone so new as Ian was, and smacked the board across the floor and started going for his sword. "Hey! Hey! We had a deal, no death this round! Besides we're in the lounge!" Ian gave the guy a large grin, and pointed to the "No Impale" Sign posted on the wall. The einherjar grumbled, and stormed out, leaving Ian laughing to himself.

Now that, that was over Ian stood up to collect the now broken chess board and chess pieces. He glanced around the room hoping to find someone else to talk to. He promised his sister, he would attempt friendships, so he would have to unless he wanted another poisonous snake in his bed. There were only a few people still here. Someone building a card house, and a few other people playing pool. It was very crowded when he first walked into the lounge, and hadn't even noticed people started to leave. Once he finished cleaning up the broken game, he walked over to the girl building the house of cards. "Hi, that looks cool." He said, hoping not to startle her or anything.

Anneliese was surprised by the question and fidgeted, which resulted the card house to get destroyed. "Yeah, it did look cool." she said her German accent shining through while her hands were still hanging in the air. She studied the boy closely. He looked like one of those people. What were they called again? Oh yeah, jocks. she nodded to her thoughts.

"Oh... Sorry! Didn't mean to surprise you..." Ian said, almost sheepishly. He really hadn't meant to knock it over. "I can help you rebuild it?" He offered, genuinely feeling bad that he had caused the card house to fall over, especially since she had managed to make it pretty tall by the time he had interrupted her.

"It's okay, you didn't mean it." she said with a straight face and moved an escaping tress behind her ear. "So, Mr. Homewrecker, no wait.." Anneliese mumbled. "I mean, Mr. Cardhousewrecker, what brings you in here?" she asked one brow raised. "Sure you can, if you have patience for it." the woman started gathering the house for the 4th time.

Ian smiled, laughing a bit. "Yeah... Guess I deserved that nickname." He sat down across from her, "don't worry, if I didn't know how to build a house of cards, I wouldn't have offered." He told her, giving her yet another small smile. He picked up a few of the cards and started placing them together.

"Yeah, you do." a small smile escaped her mouth. People would often remind her how she looked funny, when only smiling with one corner of her mouth. Not that she would care about peoples opinions anymore. "What brings the young man here?" Anneliese asked, leaning towards the cards. She picked two and started placing them against each other, having that concentrated look on her face again.

Ian shrugged his shoulders, with a small smile still plastered to his face, not really knowing how to answer such an easy question. He noticed the look of concentration on her face, and decided to not bother her. He picked up another two cards, and placed them together as a part of the card house's base.

Anneliese noticed that the question was probably making him uncomfortable and decided not to ask further questions. Picking cards up, one by one she was almost done. The heavy silence was getting awkward in her opinion and she decided to break it. "So, since you're not telling your name, I'm going to tell mine. I'm Anneliese. Just don't call me Annie and we're good." the girl said in a demanding voice and leaned back on her chair.

Ian nodded, as he picked up more cards and put them into place. He glanced up from his work, "Got it. Don't call you Annie." He repeated, "I'm Ian, son of Loki."

"Fast learner." Anneliese praised him, since it was such a sacred trait thee days. "Oh Loki, I'm almost jealous." she said before picking a bit dirt under her nails. "I'm the daughter of Eir." she folded her hands nicely to her laps and crossed her legs.

"Thanks, I try hard for that, Annie." Ian said, smiling. He was joking though, that would probably be the one and only time he'd pull that on her, since she didn't seem to be the type to want to kill him over an 'ugly' nickname. "And Loki's ok, I guess." He tells her, "Eir sounds cool." He wasn't too familiar with a lot of the gods and goddesses yet. He tended to pick up on a new one every day.

"No problem. Hey, did you just call me Annie?" she crossed her arms comically. "Loki's okay? He's like, one of the most respected gods! You're a lucky guy." Anneliese leaned forward to hear what he had to say. "You don't sound like you know who Eir is. Mom's a pretty cool goddess. Defender and aid to warriors, metal smiths, fire and healing." Anneliese said proudly, she did like being the daughter of Eir.

"Maybe, maybe not." Ian said, smirking at her. "Ahh yeah... I'm not to familiar with everything and everyone yet. But your mom sounds like a really cool goddess." He told her, "And yeah... Loki is ok. I'll spare you the uhh... interesting details on why, because I just met you, and I don't want to freak you out... yet."

"Whatever." Anneliese puckered her lips and stopped crossing her arms. "So, how long have you been in here?" she tilted her head like a puppy, exited to tell him how long had she been in here. "Oh, after being here for a damn long time I don't really get freaked out by anything anymore." Anneliese shrugged. He never did give her an answer why he decided to come and greet her.

"A year and a half. He told her, oh not freaked out by anything? "Loki is my mom." He said, "I'm guessing you've been here a lot longer than me?" He asked, most people he had met so far were a lot older than him. Hey, maybe he wasn't the first kid Loki decided to be the mom part of the equation for. Maybe it was a more common thing, then he and his sister had been led to believe.

Anneliese laughed when he mentioned how long had he been in here. "151 years, and it's considered pretty young in here!" she was wiping away nonexistent tears. "Loki as a mom? Not even going to ask, I think I know what's going on." she said. "So, Ian was it? How are you in this beautiful day?" 'Annie' asked while looking at the cardhouse.

"That seems so long though..." Ian said, everything about this place still confused him. He couldn't really wrap his head around being partially immortal just yet, he figured once his twin started aging and he didn't then maybe it would click in his brain that he was immortal. But till then... "Yeah Annie, its Ian. Not that hard of a name really..." He told her laughing a bit. "I'm doing pretty good today, you?" He asked.

"Don't worry, I'll have plenty of time ahead of me. But it's funny, I could be your what.. great great grandma?" Anneliese joked, until she realized it wasn't that funny. "Call me Annie one more time, Ian..And I will find a way to kill you!" she shook her finger in front of his face accompanied with those 'tsk tsk' sounds.

"OK! That was the last time, Annie. I'll never call you Annie again, Annie. I promise. Please don't kill me, I've died twice today already!" He laughed, he meant it though, that would be the last time. "That's kind of weird to think about, you being my great-great grandmothers age..." He told her.

"I'm seriously going to hit you right now!" Anneliese raised her hand and more like patted him roughly on the head. "You deserved that. Also let's not talk about the grandmother thing. It's making me depressed." she sighed at the thought of old-ass grandmother Annie.

"Agh... Hey!" Ian said, "you're right, I probably did deserve that." He reached up to fix the damage that had been done to his hair. "And ok, no more grandmother talk." He promised, nodding his head in agreement. He personally missed his own grandmother, and felt bad that she had to go to his funeral instead of the other way around.

"I wasn't expecting for you to obey this easily!" she said clapping her hands. "You promise no grandma talk? Or I'll kill you once again!" she lifted her pinkie to do the pinkie promise. It was childish and stupid but it was Anneliese's way of making sure no one would cheat.

"I promise, no more grandma talk." Ian said, holding his pinkie finger up for her kind of childish pinkie promise need. He laughed a little, "Just no killing me again, ok? I've died enough today, as it is." He smiled.

"We'll see, we'll see." she said while shaking his pinkie and then quickly reverting back to her personal space. "You're probably used to it by now." Anneliese laughter sounded like champagne glasses tinkling together, another trait people used to criticize about her. "Ian, I'm bored. What should we do?" the girl put some weight on 'Ian' assuring him that she remembers his name.