<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
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<Crion>
<Crion> Well, that was certainly...a lot.
<VoxPVoxD> Long night.
<Crion> There are four days left to Halloween, the second-biggest night in the Baltimore freehold social calendar and the big to-do that Autumn and Spring have been jointly planning since, oh, July or so. It's not actually a costume party, or at least not a normal one. This is the one night of the year -- and the vampires in the Court of Baltimore are in on this too -- where some of the restrictions
<Crion> of secrecy and skullduggery are lifted. It's the one night of the year where, as long as you're not ridiculous with it, you can spend some time being who you are now: Mien, not Mask. Of course, you have to be very careful, and not go too far. But the Sidereal on Halloween will represent the greatest collection of supernatural power in the entire city: the Freehold, the Court, the Consilium,
<Crion> and a couple other friends in high esteem all coming together to form something like a community.
<Crion> After all, a mutual defense pact is nothing if you only hang out when you're fighting.
<Crion> But! That's a couple days away. Stewart presumably has time to stream, hang out with Lauren, etcetera. How many subscription tiers does his Twitch account have, again?
<VoxPVoxD> He's got 1/2/3, at 5/10/25. He doesn't do a ton of exclusive content; besides the chat emotes higher tiers mainly give you more influence on the main stream, the ability to vote on builds, and for top tier subscribers the chance to play games with him on stream around once every two weeks.
<Crion> So how does it strike him when lybarene21250 hits him with a tier 3 subscription with the subscription comment, "cool content bro...........really digging this though video games arent my thing"?
<VoxPVoxD> First he notices the zip code. Then he notices the name.
<VoxPVoxD> His voice catches as he reads out the sub message on-stream.
<Crion> Does he have face cam?
<VoxPVoxD> "...thanks, man. Glad you're enjoying the stream." Facecam shows him wide-eyed and tight-lipped. It's another four seconds before he gets his focus back, but once you're delving around 600 or so that's enough. RESURRECT IN TOWN / RESURRECT AT CHECKPOINT
<Crion> The account has added Stewart as a friend, but hasn't sent any other message in private.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart... doesn't actually pick the game back up. He's futzing around in his hideout, playing dressup with different microtransactions, and engaging with the chat. Keeping a very, very close eye on the chat. Long conversation about the difference between 'good RNG' and 'bad RNG', a topic of dispute in the PoE community second only to griping about its shitty-on-purpose trading system.
<Crion> It'll go idle -- for long stretches, even -- but it doesn't log off.
<VoxPVoxD> Finally Stewart can't take it anymore and shoots the new tier 3 subscriber with a private message. He doesn't know what to say, or how to say it, so he just reaches back to a few weeks ago when he felt the same way as he and Lauren first started flirting a lot. <...hey>
<Crion> The response isn't immediate -- the user remains idle for a minute or so -- but as soon as the account comes off idle it immediately shoots back <hey man>
<Crion> lybarene21250: <whats this name mean anyway>
<VoxPVoxD> Awkwardly Stewart sends at the exact same moment: <cool username. whats it mean>
<Crion> <ha>
<VoxPVoxD> Then: <oh>
<VoxPVoxD> <okay>
<Crion> lybarene21250: <we should talk. not on here>
<VoxPVoxD> <i heard a theory once that everyone's online handle is either a philospher, a pokemon, or an expensive drug>
<VoxPVoxD> Fucking what. He just wants to-- what??
<VoxPVoxD> Absolutely not. Under no circumstances.
<Crion> <haha. well it sounds like something maura'd prescribe>
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart's heart drops like a stone.
<VoxPVoxD> The person on the other end doesn't see a response for five full minutes.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart needs to rub his eyes a lot to focus on the screen.
<Crion> <anyway i get that this is weird and shitty. i don't like to tell dudes from the internet i've been dreaming about them>
<VoxPVoxD> Finally: <where>
<Crion> He gives an address, but instead of in 21250, it's in 21228 -- Thistle, MD.
<Crion> <she's at a conference this week>
<Crion> <you drink beer>
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart Google Maps it. What is he looking at?
<Crion> Street view has it as a very nice two-story, one-family house, with a big lawn and a driveway with a modest black coupe and a...Catonsville Fire Department SUV in the driveway. There's a guy mowing the lawn, but his face is turned away.
<Crion> Certainly has the body of a firefighter.
<VoxPVoxD> <do you have liquor>
<Crion> <whisky and rum>
<Crion> <might be some patron around here too but lets not get too rowdy>
<VoxPVoxD> <sounds good. youre right its gonna be weirder not to meet at this point than itll be to meet>
<VoxPVoxD> Right?
<Crion> <itch gets worse the longer you don't scratch>
<VoxPVoxD> <until its all you can think about>
<Crion> <ill be waiting out front. you get second thoughts when you get here, wont blame you if you just keep on drivin>
<VoxPVoxD> <thanks for taking the first step>
<VoxPVoxD> Okay. Okay, fuck. FUCK. Fuck! "Fuuuuuuuuuck."
<Crion> He logs off.
<VoxPVoxD> He texts Lauren. <hey, this is happening really fast and out of nowhere but i'm about to go meet my fetch for drinks out in the county>
<Crion> Lauren: <wtf>
<VoxPVoxD> <yeah.>
<Crion> <is it safe>
<Crion> <should i call gerald>
<Crion> <im calling gerald>
<Crion> <AT LEAST so if something happens hes ready>
<VoxPVoxD> <idk. dont yet. heres the address i'm going to. if you dont hear from me in like half an hour call gerald>
<VoxPVoxD> He sends the address.
<Crion> <...ok>
<Crion> <be safe.>
<VoxPVoxD> < <3 >
<Crion> < <3 >
<VoxPVoxD> It's after dark at this point, but not SUPER late. Stewart opts for a sweatshirt instead of a shirt-and-jacket. Sweatshirt won't get caught on anything if he has to run.
<VoxPVoxD> He thinks about taking the wand.
<VoxPVoxD> ...it'll fit in his pocket, he won't even know it's there.
<VoxPVoxD> He feels better having it on him.
<VoxPVoxD> White knuckles stud the wheel on the drive out of the city. How long is it?
<Crion> Once you hit 695 coming out of the city on 95 it's not long at all. Maybe 20 minutes if there's a postseason baseball game letting ouahahahahah.
<Crion> Call it 15 once you hit the Inner Harbor, heading north on 95.
<VoxPVoxD> Hey, 97 was only like ten years ago.
<Crion> Mmmm.
<VoxPVoxD> He's got music going in the car. Fireman's singing to him as he moves onto well-lit but largely empty residential streets. "...but my peace has always depended, on all the ashes in my wake.>
<VoxPVoxD> Choke comes on as he's pulling up to the address and he almost throws his phone out the window.
<VoxPVoxD> What greets him out front?
<Crion> Porch light's on. CFD SUV is in the driveway; the black coupe's missing. And there in the crisp dark of the October night sits a man with a firefighter's build in jeans, boots, an open flannel shirt and a white v-neck undershirt beneath it, a cooler sitting next to him. In one hand, a Miller High Life. The other scratches the belly of a panting yellow lab.
<Crion> He has Stewart's face.
<Crion> ...Maybe a little bit more jaw.
<VoxPVoxD> ...
<Crion> He'll raise the beer in greeting as Stewart parks, assuming Stewart parks, but won't make any sudden moves.
<VoxPVoxD> The car comes to a stop out in front, but the engine doesn't die. The two of them look at each other for a moment before he pulls into the driveway, blocking the SUV in. Hopefully the guy thinks it's an accident.
<VoxPVoxD> The man on the porch sees someone with his face. Maybe a little less body fat, dressed in a blank gray sweatshirt and jeans. He turns his keys over in his fingers a moment before pocketing them and meeting the homeowner's gaze once more.
<VoxPVoxD> "Hey, Stewart."
<Crion> He leans back and takes a sip, watching, relaxed. The dog, on the other hand, will leap up and bound at Stewart with joyful dog enthusiasm as soon as he gets out of the car. "Dammit, Beau!" shouts Stu Mankiewicz.
<Crion> "Get on back here."
<Crion> Beau, however, wants pats.
<Crion> "Hey, Stewart." He stands and pauses. "I go by Stu. At first it just felt better. When I realized why, it felt more..."
<Crion> He searches for a word.
<Crion> "Respectful, maybe."
<VoxPVoxD> "Beau's a good boy," Stewart says, kneeling down to give the dog pats.
<VoxPVoxD> "Stu, huh? Is that with a U or with an E-W?"
<Crion> "He recognizes his master," Stu says, not bothering to elide or play down the implication of that statement. "I go with the u; the e-w's food."
<Crion> He gives Stewart a once over. "Neither of us look like what we used to, huh."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart gives Beau one last rub and stands up. "You got fuckin jacked, dude."
<Crion> He nods. "Yeah. I needed to. In the days after I...well, in the first days, I needed the discipline, you know? A way to center this shit." He ambles back to the porch. "I got whisky, rum, and some cokes in the cooler. If you want to sit."
<Crion> Stu Mankiewicz -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=idnJnjV_8rg So when you look at me, you better look hard and look twice; is that me, baby? Or just a brilliant disguise?
<VoxPVoxD> Something makes Stewart smile. If Stu can feel Glamour stirring within him, he might be able to deduce what's going on. He relaxes several notches almost instantly.
<Crion> Stu's eyebrow raises a bit, but he says nothing.
<VoxPVoxD> "Yeah let me just - I promised to text my girlfriend I was okay so she wouldn't call for help."
<Crion> He nods. "Wise."
<Crion> He also seems to relax several notches.
<VoxPVoxD> Lauren get's a <i dont think he means me harm. incredible dog here>
<VoxPVoxD> And Stewart gets on the porch. Is Stu inviting him inside?
<Crion> Lauren: <still be careful. and pet the dog>
<Crion> Stu hesitates. "I thought you'd be more comfortable out here, but we can go inside if you want. If you're up for it."
<VoxPVoxD> <done and done>
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I kinda want to see your place."
<VoxPVoxD> "Is that weird?"
<VoxPVoxD> "No idea what is and isn't weird here."
<Crion> Stu: "No weirder than the rest of this shit."
<Crion> He picks up the cooler and leads the way in.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart will hold the door open for Beau unless Stu tells him not to.
<Crion> It's comfy and well-appointed, with new-looking hardwood floors and a piano in the living room. There's a parlor room that's been converted to a home office -- not Stu's, surely -- and a big TV. Kitchen is very nice; there are some dishes in the sink. Stu made a dinner for one. Basement door and a door upstairs. Stu will whistle for Beau.
<Crion> There aren't many pictures, but there is one: Stu and Maura Mankiewicz, on their wedding day, on the wall over the piano. Stu carries the cooler into the kitchen.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart stands in the living room, staring at the picture over the piano.
<Crion> "There's more in the--" Stu walks back out of the kitchen and follows Stewart's eyes. "Ah, shit."
<Crion> "I don't like having pictures up much. That one's...the exception. But I should've warned you."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart's choking. His eyes burn. He shuts them for a long moment but when he looks Stu in the eye, they're clear. "This is a really nice place."
<Crion> He grimaces and nods. "She decorated it."
<Crion> "Anyway. The kitchen's clean. The kitchen's just a kitchen."
<VoxPVoxD> Nothing's just a kitchen. Not even The Kitchen's just a kitchen.
<Crion> Perhaps so. But he leads on nevertheless.
<VoxPVoxD> But what Stewart says as he follows Stu into the kitchen is, "You said you have whisky?"
<Crion> Beau does this weird thing where he insists on walking between your legs, as you're walking, which probably nearly trips Stewart over the first time it happens. Dog just loves getting in the way (more pets).
<Crion> "Yeah, I -- dammit Beau, stop that -- have Jack and Crown Royal. Coke or diet for mixing."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart never had a dog growing up. Dad was never home enough to take care of one. Maura, though. Maura loved dogs. He chokes again. Loves.
<VoxPVoxD> "Jack's good. Straight."
<Crion> Stu blinks and nods, pulling a chilled tumbler from the cooler, wiping it with a clean towel to get the condensation off and pouring a liberal single pour.
<VoxPVoxD> That'll do. Stewart's got to drive home. He can drink properly then.
<Crion> He finishes the last of his High Life, meanwhile, and cracks open another using the countertop. Even though those twist.
<VoxPVoxD> That makes Stewart smile despite himself. Tony and this guy would really get along. He sits at the table and sips his drink. "So, uh. How'd you find me?"
<Crion> He hops up to sit on the counter across from Stewart. "Wasn't really my idea. Like I said, first time I've ever dreamed about a guy for a week straight."
<Crion> "You've been back for 137 days."
<Crion> "136 nights."
<Crion> "I've been getting sleep, but I haven't been getting much rest."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart does some math in his head. "Shit."
<VoxPVoxD> "I didn't- I didn't know it was like that."
<VoxPVoxD> "For you."
<VoxPVoxD> "What happened in the dreams?"
<Crion> "Nothing good." He pauses to sip again. "So that game you play. Path of..."
<VoxPVoxD> "Exile." Kind of a pregnant word in the circumstances. Stewart has to force it out.
<Crion> "Yeah. So when the dreams started, you were playing the game, but YOU were the...you know, main character. Whatever. You were the one burning up zombies and soldiers. And eventually you'd start burning up people I knew. And then me. And after me..." Stu trails off, shaking his head. "At first I thought it was ME in the dream, but I knew it wasn't, somehow. I also knew I wasn't going insane.
<Crion> There was this urgency that this shit was real and immediate. Bought myself a shotgun without telling Maura."
<Crion> He chuckles. "Which, like. I have a dream about a guy killing 20 dudes just by waving a magic wand. What's a shotgun going to do?"
<Crion> "But there was this little voice -- this little voice whispering, telling me, do you believe all that?"
<Crion> "So I didn't keep the gun locked and loaded under the bed, but in a gun locker. And I didn't go looking for trouble. And after a couple weeks -- bad weeks, man, bad weeks -- the dreams began to change."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart stares at his drink and listens.
<Crion> "They pulled back. I could see you were at a computer, playing a game. And sometimes you'd be in the game, and sometimes you wouldn't be. But eventually my feelings about it changed. It went from alarm and danger to feeling that I was, like. I don't know. Invading your privacy."
<Crion> "That red-headed girl with the laser eyes, that's your girlfriend, right?"
<Crion> He grins. "Don't worry, chief. The dreams only show me what happens in your computer room."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart's voice is even. "Yeah. Her name's Lauren."
<Crion> He nods. "I got the feeling I liked her, in the dreams. I always figured that was actually coming from you."
<Crion> "Anyway."
<Crion> "I don't think we can sever this connection, but I'm hoping maybe this sitdown will at least stop the dreams."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "There are... people I know. People who study this kind of thing. And my boss, and his... the word we use is 'fetch'."
<VoxPVoxD> "He and his fetch think of each other as brothers. So there's gonna be some way to, to settle that down. If this doesn't do it, we'll find it."
<Crion> "Mmmmmm." He takes another sip. "Guess that explains why I trained Beau on 'go get it, boy.'"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart snorts.
<Crion> The dog perks up, and Stu grabs a Nylabone from the counter and tosses it into the living room. "Go get it, boy!"
<Crion> "...Never much liked that word."
<VoxPVoxD> "It's kind of a funny historical note. Like... the word we use for ourselves is 'changelings', after these old stories of babies getting snatched from their cribs. But in the stories, the changeling is, you know, the one who *doesn't* get taken."
<VoxPVoxD> "I don't actually know the etymology of... of that word. None of this is interesting at all, sorry."
<Crion> "Makes sense you'd get the cool word." He seems to be taking this remarkably well, but then, he's been haunted by dreams for four months and seems to know pretty precisely what he is by intuition.
<Crion> "You're not the first...one of you...I've seen."
<Crion> "First changeling, that is. You're the first Stewart."
<VoxPVoxD> "You can see us? Like, you can see that we're not-- you get what I mean."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart plucks at his sleeves, which have ridden up to expose the manacle scars.
<Crion> He nods, grimacing at the scars. "That I can. And it almost got me killed. Was responding to a building fire near the university; active shooter on location, too. We go in with a cop escort. It's one of the satellite research buildings on the campus. We go in, using the floor plan, and the fire seems limited to just one conference room and lab set on the second floor. No sign of the shooter."
<Crion> "We prep for a breach when the door opens and out walks this black guy, buff as hell, shirtless, completely on fire from the waist up. My EMT training kicks in, I run towards the guy before realizing his eyes and teeth are glowing. My buddies scatter, the cops draw down."
<Crion> "He throws me aside, almost puts me through the big window bank across the hall, and kills two of the cops. Breaks the third's leg."
<Crion> "We clean up, get the cop to the ambulance outside, and I ask Bryan -- partner on the line -- about that dude being on fire. He looks at me like I'm crazy."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Middle of summer?"
<Crion> He nods. "I remember it because it was during the All-Star Break." Stu pauses. "You know him?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "By reputation. He doesn't get out much in the offseason. I expect I'll meet him come June at the latest."
<Crion> Stu grimaces. "Well, be careful. I'm sure he had his reasons for doing what he did, but...you know, I always thought the Human Torch was lame?"
<Crion> "The superhero."
<Crion> "Not so much now."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "He's not great but like, there's a dude whose only power is being stretchy right there to make him look good by comparison."
<Crion> Stu laughs into his beer.
<VoxPVoxD> "I can't tell at all, by the way."
<Crion> Then a wolf howl floats through the open kitchen window, and he straightens and pauses.
<Crion> A couple seconds pass, and he relaxes.
<VoxPVoxD> "Like with you. You just look like a regular guy. Like anybody."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart looks out the window. "Oh, uh. Werewolves are real, by the way."
<VoxPVoxD> "Vampires, too. Heads up."
<Crion> Stu nods. "Yeah I get the feeling that if your guy knew what I was, I'd have gone all the way through that window."
<Crion> Stu's sigh is long and rattling. "Yeah. Yeah, I guessed."
<Crion> "Lot more missing pet posters in the neighborhood this year, than last year."
<Crion> "Lot more missing kid posters."
<Crion> "Lot more Ranger Service jeeps rolling around."
<Crion> Stu: "Once you realize the world isn't normal -- and you're part of why it isn't -- you start to see a lot of shit."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Those guys are legit by the way. Tougher than SEALs and shit. Because they've got to deal with werewolves."
<Crion> "I don't see much that often. Sometimes a woman at the grocery store has doe horns. Sometimes a bum with weird patterns glowing on his face. But enough to know things were real."
<Crion> Stu pulls out his phone. "I took this last time the Park Rangers were rolling through. Look at this shit."
<VoxPVoxD> Could this be the Lodge of the Hook Hand? Stewart will look more into it later. Stewart peers at Stu's phone.
<Crion> He shows Stewart a picture of a Ranger jeep from the rear, with a tier-one operator Ranger carrying an AR-15 nudging a tarp down over a much larger rifle. It's very clear what it is, though: https://images.fineartamerica.com/images/artworkimages/mediumlarge/1/barrett-l82a1-anti-materiel-rifle-andrew-chittock.jpg
<Crion> "They use that shit against armored vehicles."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart nods. It was pretty good in Fallout 4.
<VoxPVoxD> "If it helps, all the werewolves I know are pretty chill guys."
<Crion> "So yeah. I wasn't much inclined to like woods anyway, given...all of this. But I'm thinking about trying to convince Maura to move."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart, too quickly: "What?"
<VoxPVoxD> "I mean, where to?"
<Crion> Stu politely pretends he didn't notice. "The city. She's looking at a position at Hopkins. Better than these fucking jackal private hospital gig.s"
<Crion> *gigs
<Crion> "Until then, I'm glad you know some good werewolves. Tell 'em to do something about the bad ones."
<VoxPVoxD> The tension Stewart didn't realize he was feeling eases up. "In the city there'll be more vampires than werewolves. But vampires like... police themselves, at least. I met the Sheriff of Baltimore once. The vampire Sheriff I mean."
<Crion> Stu: "You're a real man about town." There's actually no mockery in there.
<Crion> Another sip of the beer.
<Crion> "I can see why--"
<Crion> He shakes his head.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I try to keep busy, you know. Lot of people need help and-- what?"
<Crion> He smiles tightly and crosses his arms. "She knows."
<Crion> "She doesn't know that she knows, but she knows."
<VoxPVoxD> Deep breath.
<VoxPVoxD> "Shit."
<VoxPVoxD> "How do you know she knows?"
<Crion> "On our honeymoon, she tells me--" He smiles wider, tighter, looking down. "She's drunk, we're both drunk, it's the second or third happiest night of her life after the ones before it, and she looks at me and she tells me: she's loved two men in her life. Both were named Stewart Mankiewicz."
<Crion> "I smiled back. And for a long time, I had no idea what to do with that shit."
<Crion> "You wake up one morning for the first time and you memories but it's only like you read them in a fucking book--"
<Crion> Stu stops and gathers himself.
<Crion> *you have
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart stands up abruptly. He turns to look in the living room. At the piano.
<VoxPVoxD> His fingers drum on the table.
<VoxPVoxD> Deep, shuddering breath. Then he's okay.
<Crion> "So when I woke up Stewart I pushed her away. Pushed everyone away. Until I came back as Stu."
<Crion> "...Your father doesn't like me much anymore," he says, finishing the beer. "But Mom's fine."
<VoxPVoxD> "Dad was never gonna like me after I grew up."
<VoxPVoxD> His back's still to Stu.
<Crion> Stu: "Yeah. But you've got ironclad proof it's him, not you."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "So you don't know anything about... about before that, or about where I was, or about... who made it happen?"
<Crion> He shakes his head. "It's weird, though. I kinda hate video games. And computers."
<Crion> "No offense."
<Crion> "But I get the feeling maybe that was a thing."
<Crion> "...Do you know what made me?"
<VoxPVoxD> Quietly: "Yeah."
<Crion> Another bottle pops open. "And do I want to know what made me?"
<Crion> "That's a bullshit question."
<Crion> "How about: how much is learning what made me gonna suck?"
<VoxPVoxD> "Put it like this."
<VoxPVoxD> "The questions you're going to want to ask me are questions I'd refuse to answer if anyone else asked."
<VoxPVoxD> "Even Lauren."
<Crion> "Well, fuck."
<VoxPVoxD> Even Maura, he can't bring himself to say.
<Crion> Stu: "Let's go with this, then: what's the exposure. What's the danger to Maura?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart gets himself another single pour, stares into the tumbler for a second, and makes it a double.
<VoxPVoxD> "I don't know."
<VoxPVoxD> "I don't know how it thinks."
<VoxPVoxD> "I've spent so long trying to understand how it thinks."
<Crion> "It took you. It made me to replace you."
<VoxPVoxD> "Yeah."
<Crion> He sips his beer. "So it thinks, but it doesn't feel. If it does feel, it doesn't fucking care."
<Crion> "It's a Terminator, basically."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart barks a laugh at that. Finally he sits back down.
<VoxPVoxD> "It's Skynet."
<Crion> Stu grimaces. "Yeah. The Terminator is me."
<Crion> "You know I can choose not to feel pain?"
<Crion> "Found that out the hard way."
<VoxPVoxD> "That must be scary."
<VoxPVoxD> "Pain's how you know shit's still working."
<Crion> "I thought I'd lost my arm."
<Crion> "Maura had me stay overnight for tests."
<VoxPVoxD> "And tests don't show anything weird?"
<Crion> "Everything was fine...except I can stab myself through the hand and feel nothing."
<Crion> "But I'm still losing blood, still suffering tendon damage...and when I stop thinking about it, stop concentrating -- oh, I feel it."
<Crion> Stu shakes his head. "Nope. But I'm pretty sure the tests lie."
<Crion> "...Sometimes I see myself in those dreams, you know."
<Crion> "And I look like this."
<Crion> He takes a deep swig. "But I'm made of asbestos. Scrap metal. Nonflammable trash."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Asbestos?"
<VoxPVoxD> "You're not like... kicking fibers into the air or anything, right?"
<Crion> He's quiet for a minute. "...You can buy asbestos testing kits."
<Crion> "After the first dream I had when I saw...that."
<Crion> "I lied to Maura, told her I was working an early shift."
<Crion> "And after she left, checked the house."
<Crion> "It's clean."
<Crion> Another swig. "I'm not really sure what I'd have done if it wasn't."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart looks down at the grain of the table. "Yeah."
<VoxPVoxD> "I can open any lock in the world, pretty much. Walk into any home like I own it. I can listen to someone's heart and hear the song their soul sings itself. I can listen deeper and hear their darkest desire."
<VoxPVoxD> "But the pain... the dial only goes up."
<Crion> He grimaces. "So that's what you were doing."
<Crion> "Was it a good song?"
<VoxPVoxD> "You like Springsteen?"
<Crion> "Hell yeah."
<Crion> Then his face falls. "Oh come on--"
<Crion> "Really?"
<Crion> "Brilliant Disguise?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "They're not all that. Gerald, he's- he's my boss's brother, has something completely different."
<VoxPVoxD> "I don't think it's about you being what you are. I think it's about, you feel like you're living someone else's life."
<VoxPVoxD> "You can be what you are and not feel like that."
<Crion> "Your boss's--" He catches the meaning and nods gratefully.
<Crion> "I thank you for saying that. I just don't think anyone ever imagines themselves being that...predictable."
<Crion> Stu is quiet for a minute: "I tried to do a lot of work, to make it my life. As much as I could."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I have no idea what my song is."
<Crion> Stu: "Might be a blessing."
<VoxPVoxD> "Lauren knows. We promised not to tell each other our songs."
<VoxPVoxD> "That was the first promise we ever made to each other."
<Crion> He nods. "I can respect that."
<VoxPVoxD> "If it helps, pretty much everyone's songs are... not predictable, that's not the word I'd use. But they resonate."
<Crion> Stu: "I guess that's the way it should be."
<Crion> He finishes the beer and opens a fourth, because he's not going to have to drive.
<Crion> "We should--"
<Crion> Another wolf howl. Closer.
<Crion> And two more answer.
<Crion> Stu grabs Beau's collar.
<Crion> He drops down off the counter and peers out the window.
<VoxPVoxD> "Listen, if you ever feel like you guys are in danger, from werewolves or, or whatever, there's a place I have that's safe. No one can get in unless we want them to."
<VoxPVoxD> "Me and, uh, my friends."
<Crion> "Shut up and get down."
<Crion> "There's something out there."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart gets down. "You saw the shadow too?"
<Crion> "Yup. And he's upright. That's new."
<Crion> "Do me a favor. Get to the family room. Turn on the TV. Turn on the sound system. Turn on the lights.
<Crion> "
<Crion> Stu straights and lets go of Beau's collar, walking to the backdoor and making sure it's firmly shut.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart does. Stu sees him walk into the living room with a fancy-looking long thin piece of dark metal in his hand.
<Crion> Then he turns on the lights in the kitchen, walks into the living room, turns on the lights there...and sits down at the piano.
<Crion> "You said Springsteen, right?" he calls out.
<VoxPVoxD> "Yup!"
<Crion> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0u9zYJj4yk0 You can hide beneath the covers and study your pain; make crosses from your lovers and throw roses in the rain...
<Crion> Stu doesn't have to say that this is cover.
<Crion> Is Stewart watching the treeline?
<VoxPVoxD> This is like the only Springsteen song Stewart actually likes. Of course he's watching.
<Crion> The shadow is joined by another, almost eight feet tall...and then both melt back into the darkness of the wood.
<Crion> Whatever they are, they're at least not going to hit a house with the lights on.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart, quieter than the piano but still audible: "They're gone. It worked."
<Crion> Stu sighs, stands, and pets Beau, who is wagging his tail and has spent this entire tense affair bouncing back and forth searching for attention. "That just means they're going to kill someone else."
<Crion> "...But I'll take it."
<Crion> Then in the distance, automatic rifle fire...and the boom of something bigger.
<Crion> It goes on for some time.
<VoxPVoxD> "Maybe not, after all."
<Crion> Eventually it stops, but it isn't cut off.
<Crion> And there is no more howling.
<Crion> Stu: "Yeah. We'll see."
<Crion> He's back in the kitchen, and has picked up his beer. "I expected to like you. I didn't expect to like you this much."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I know exactly what you mean."
<Crion> "But it brings us to the big question. The big...issue, you know."
<Crion> "Maura."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart hasn't said her name since he crawled through the Thorns, and he's not about to start now. "Yeah."
<VoxPVoxD> "Listen."
<VoxPVoxD> "There are two things I want to say."
<Crion> Stu nods.
<VoxPVoxD> He finishes his double in one long pull. Sets the tumbler on the table, taps it once, twice against the wood, a tiny ritual.
<VoxPVoxD> "As far as I'm concerned... as far as anyone I respect is concerned... this is your life. This is your house. This is your job, your dog, your family."
<Crion> Beau barks happily.
<VoxPVoxD> "The stuff that happened to make that true doesn't matter. It wasn't your fault. It wasn't mine. It wasn't anyone who's anyone to either of us."
<VoxPVoxD> "You built this up, you took this places I never would have. And you're a good man. You have a good heart. You deserve a good life."
<VoxPVoxD> His voice comes out much firmer than it feels in his throat. "But I need to see her."
<VoxPVoxD> "I don't know when, or how."
<Crion> "Yeah," Stu says.
<Crion> He pours himself some whisky, now. "That's gonna be a hell of a conversation. Or it's not."
<Crion> "She's pregnant."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart manages to throttle his gut reaction until all that surfaces is a Scanlon Blink.
<VoxPVoxD> "How far along?"
<Crion> "Not enough to show." He chuckles, barks a laugh, then grimaces. "It's a fucked up, fucked up world where you wonder if you're the father, not because you think she's cheating -- and I don't -- but because you don't think you're even a person. That you don't even have the means to do that."
<Crion> "I just gotta believe."
<Crion> "But that's the American dream, right?" he asks, finishing the whisky. "A pile of cancerous trash, making something better."
<VoxPVoxD> "You know, the first time I fully realized we were different people. It wasn't you typing like Dad, it wasn't that you're jacked, or have a dog. It was when you talked about what a gut punch it was to hear her say she'd loved two men in her life. Cause it meant she knew, even if just on like a pre-articulate level."
<Crion> Stu blinks.
<VoxPVoxD> "But if it was me, that would make me feel... like I'd won. Like I'd earned it. Whatever happened before, I'd won her heart. Fair and square."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I bring this up because... you can't, usually, have kids. Guys in your position, I mean. But there are documented cases. A lot of this shit sounds fairytale, cause it fucking is, but the nagic that undergirds - that makes it possible, is true love."
<Crion> He blinks again. Then he laughs. "You're fucking with me. Are you fucking with me?"
<VoxPVoxD> "I am not fucking with you."
<Crion> He falls back against the countertop, laughing. "Christ I feel like such an asshole."
<VoxPVoxD> "Why?"
<Crion> "Because I've wasted so much time in my life beating the shit out of myself."
<Crion> "Literally and figuratively."
<VoxPVoxD> "Yeah."
<VoxPVoxD> "Yeah, I get that."
<Crion> "And once you, get the house, and the car, and the dog, that doesn't just affect you. It doesn't just affect you."
<Crion> "Thank you, Stewart. Thank you for coming by."
<VoxPVoxD> "Thank you for inviting me."
<Crion> He pours two glasses of water, and pushes one to Stewart. Taking one for himself: "We'll figure out the Maura thing. I won't make a move until you're ready."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart takes the water gratefully.
<VoxPVoxD> "Hey, um. I could maybe put you in touch with a guy who could like... onboard you, into knowing more about yourself. What you can do, how you work, stuff like that."
<VoxPVoxD> "Is that something you'd be interested in?"
<Crion> Stu nods. "Yeah. I mean, I'd say no, maybe, but there's fucking werewolves in the woods."
<VoxPVoxD> "Yeah."
<VoxPVoxD> "Do you have a number I can reach you at? A time when you could take a call like that safely? I'll see about setting this up."
<Crion> He pulls a pad off its magnet on the fridge, and a pen from a drawer, and writes down three phone numbers. One's his cell, one's the house number, one's the fire station number.
<Crion> "If you call the station, or here and I don't pick up, say you're Isaac, calling for Stu. And...don't call here unless you've got no other choice. The phone isn't the best way for that first contact."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Got it. The man who'll probably be getting in touch, his name is Gerald. Gerald Kingsley."
<Crion> Stu nods. "I'll look out for it."
<Crion> He'll walk Stewart back to his car.
<VoxPVoxD> "Man."
<Crion> Better to move in groups.
<VoxPVoxD> "I was so fucking scared when I got that message on the stream."
<Crion> Stu pauses. "Why? Skynet?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "No, I knew right away it was you. I just... I didn't know you at all. Didn't know anything about you, except where you came from."
<Crion> Stu: "We can change that."
<VoxPVoxD> "I don't get dreams or anything. All I know is what I saw when I looked you guys up on Facebook, which you're barely even on. Smart, by the way."
<Crion> "Yeah, fuck that thing."
<VoxPVoxD> "Yeah. Yeah, I'd like that."
<VoxPVoxD> "Getting to know you, I mean."
<Crion> He nods, leaning back against the SUV. "I'll be in touch. Even if Maura knows already, actually...knowing...is gonna be some shit."
<VoxPVoxD> "Yeah."
<VoxPVoxD> "But she'll have us."
<VoxPVoxD> "And we both love her."
<Crion> For the first time, Stu smiles without any reservation. "Yeah."
<Crion> "Drive safe, bro."
<VoxPVoxD> "Thanks. Say bye to Beau for me."
<Crion> "Will do."
<Crion> He'll offer a hand to shake.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart will shake. His grip's a lot weaker than Stu's but the look in his eye is just as firm and purposeful.
<Crion> Stu's is the same, but at the end he pulls Stewart in close for a quick shoulder-bump half hug. Then he'll let go, step back, say goodnight, and head back inside.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart finds himself gasping for breath as soon as he buckles in. The vertigo of the moment, of feeling like he's drifting in and out of a dream, makes the world spin around him. But he recovers. Starts the car and texts Lauren. <stu's cool. is there like a training course or something cause he doesnt know much>
<Crion> <omg>
<Crion> <yes ill call gerald>
<VoxPVoxD> <awesome ty. yeah i told him if he got a call itd be from my boss's brother gerald>
<Crion> <whats he like???>
<VoxPVoxD> <really sweet. kinda broey. works as a firefighter. dude's ripped>
<VoxPVoxD> <hey do you think i should start working out>
<Crion> <lmaooo you dork>
<VoxPVoxD> He's driving now, so he can only respond at lights.
<VoxPVoxD> <im really happy that happened. fuckin scary though>
<Crion> <if you want to thats fine i love big shoulders but i dont think id have fallen for normie firefighter stewart as hard dont worry about it>
<VoxPVoxD> <aww <3 >
<Crion> <thats rly cool tho im happy>
<Crion> <geralds gonna call u>
<Crion> < <3 >
<VoxPVoxD> He's got to tell Lauren about Maura. Some other time, though.
<VoxPVoxD> This is enough for one night. Enough for 136 nights.
<Crion> Gerald calls precisely five minutes later. "Hello, Stewart."
<Crion> He sounds pleasant but detached. So, Gerald.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart's got him on speaker, with the phone in the cradle. "Evening, Gerald. Lauren told you what's up?"
<Crion> "She has. The boy's a firefighter, then?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah, Catonsville FD. He saw the Young Street tearing shit up in a reseaech building at UMBC once. Street almost put him through a window without thinking."
<Crion> "Haha, fuck. Thought the King was on fire, did he?"
<VoxPVoxD> "Human Torch comparisons were made."
<Crion> Gerald snorts. "Human Torch is a moron. I'll let you in on a secret: The Young Street might come off as paranoid or venal off-season, and as a fucking barbarian king on-season, but Street never does anything without thinking."
<Crion> "I know that incident."
<VoxPVoxD> "Yeah, I mean I don't know him, but if he was that kind of guy he wouldn't be Vigilant, right?"
<Crion> "The cop he spared works for Summer. Present tense. And she wasn't even that hurt, that was a pure work. The other two though? Well. Our night on the docks isn't the first time something had to happen. Like you say, the Vigilant plays chess."
<Crion> "Three birds, one stone. Anyway."
<Crion> "How much does he know?"
<Crion> "Other than the Street."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Not a lot. I told him some stuff. Some werewolves brushed up against the property but it sounded like Park Rangers got them. But he knows he can clock changelings and he knows he can inure himself to pain. He knows he's not a danger to anyone he loves. He knows he's gonna be father."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Not a lot. I told him some stuff. Some werewolves brushed up against the property but it sounded like Park Rangers got them. But he knows he can clock changelings and he knows he can inure himself to pain. He knows he's not a danger to anyone he loves. He knows he's gonna be father."
<Crion> Gerald: "Good god damn."
<Crion> "He own a gun?"
<VoxPVoxD> "Shotgun. Bought it when I came back."
<VoxPVoxD> "Bad dreams, apparently."
<Crion> Gerald: "That'll happen. Shotgun's a good choice. Firefighter, so he's gonna be a tough one. Sounds like he's got the mindset. We can work with that. He knows Heart of Wax already, so this goes right to the important conversations."
<Crion> "The ones about keeping people he cares about safe."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "He's a good man."
<VoxPVoxD> "I like him."
<VoxPVoxD> "Never had a brother before."
<Crion> Gerald chuckles. "It's not all roses. Especially not if you work together."
<Crion> "...But I'm glad that worked out. I look forward to meeting him."
<Crion> "What name is he using?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "He's Stu-with-a-you. Mankiewicz is our- is his last name. Stu Mankiewicz. Dog's name is Beau."
<Crion> "Good dog. And Stu's a good way to play that."
<Crion> "I'll call him tomorrow and let him set the schedule."
<VoxPVoxD> "Thanks."
<Crion> "No, thank you," Gerald says. "It's always good when two of us reconcile."
<Crion> "It means they don't win."
<VoxPVoxD> "I mean I couldn't live here with him just across the city line without... doing this. And it sounds like he couldn't either. And we're alike enough that we tried talking first."
<Crion> Gerald: "Yeah. We're people, you know. With all that comes with it: people can be bad and fucked up. They often are. I'm glad Stu's one of the good guys."
<Crion> "I'll let you go."
<VoxPVoxD> "Alright. Thanks again."
<Crion> "Yep. I'll check in tomorrow. Good night, Stewart."
<VoxPVoxD> "Night." Stewart spends the ride home in silence.
<banana>
<banana> From: paperbark@summer.ctl
<banana> To: manbat@losfoundation.org
<banana> Subject: The end of P
<banana>
<banana> Greetings Mr. L,
<banana>
<banana> It's done with complications. "Death is [..] far from having the kind of being of something not yet present" &c. I can give you the details when you're available.
<banana>
<banana> M apparently
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion> The night before Halloween. Mischief Night. Devil's Night. Devil's Eve. ...Cabbage Night? Most call it nothing at all, but it's a Wednesday this year, and that means Stewart's probably streaming, if only because he's probably cancelled his Thursday stream due to a social event over at The Sidereal. Lauren will IM him near the end of his usual schedule, however: <hey, wanna game with the prince
<Crion> after midnight>
<Crion> <also im coming over>
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart assumes that one day their relationship will settle down to the point where thr prospect of her coming over doesn't put a big goofy smile on his face. He hopes it isn't soon, though. <hell yesx2>
<Crion> <what do you want for dinner> She knows he doesn't eat on stream.
<VoxPVoxD> People eating on stream is one of Stewart's biggest pet peeves. He gets the necessity, sometimes. <idk. nothing too heavy. wonton soup?>
<Crion> <ok>
<Crion> <ill get crab rangoon. you can eat UP TO THREE when you decide its too tempting>
<VoxPVoxD> <fair and just>
<Crion> She arrives in just under forty minutes in sweatpants, a gaming tee, and a hoodie. Starting to actually get cold at night. She got a double order of the crab rangoon to go with the soup, and will spend no longer than fifteen seconds kissing him at the door before putting the food down at the counter.
<VoxPVoxD> He gives the apartment a pass to tidy it up, and... can't find anything to do to it. He's been cleaning a lot, lately.
<VoxPVoxD> Mmm.
<Crion> One assumes Stewart doesn't eat at the rig?
<Crion> Streaming or not.
<VoxPVoxD> Oh god no. Think of the crumbs! He's got a little table in a corner of the kitchen. Only two chairs.
<Crion> How's the ventilation in this building? How's the heat? Does he get rattling pipes, because they're turning the radiators back on for the winter now.
<Crion> If the temperature in here is over 73 degrees, Lauren's going to want to crack a window.
<VoxPVoxD> The building's reasonably old, at least as Stewart, a child, reckons the age of things. The radiators are steam, so the pipes rattle from time to time. There's a nice through-breeze most days when windows at both ends of the apartment are open, though true ventilation requires opening the windows in the office, which is a no-go during work hours. He doesn't even have an AC in there because
<VoxPVoxD> of the noise.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart'll let her crack a window. He's wearing a sweatshirt already.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "How's work?"
<Crion> She will do so, then curl up into her chair with one of the two packets of "fried cream cheese wontons."
<Crion> "It sucks! I hate it. It's fine."
<Crion> "I had to go down into the vault both yesterday and today."
<VoxPVoxD> "For the Street? What happened?"
<Crion> She rolls her eyes while chomping on a rangoon. When she's finished her bite: "He keeps melting his CAT5s."
<Crion> "So, Swordhome -- they call that place Swordhome -- has everything running through metal walls. A whole metal environment. If you want to cable something, unless you insulate it, it'll be touching metal. And even if you DO insulate it, sometimes it'll get too hot."
<Crion> "It's INTOLERABLY hot down there, when the Street gets angry."
<VoxPVoxD> "How often does the Street get angry?"
<Crion> She chomps down on a second. "60 times an hour."
<Crion> "24 hours a day."
<Crion> "So. The network is new. The server room is fucking sealed off and plugged.
<Crion> "BUT!"
<VoxPVoxD> Swordhome is a sick name for a hideout, Stewart thinks. Sounds like something out of an old Ultima game.
<Crion> "It has to be wired, at least out to a router, because of the requirements of the walls. And even then the way the place is built plays havoc on wireless signal."
<Crion> "You know they ripped it out of the Hedge and brought it back, right?"
<Crion> "Turned an overpass into a portal.
<Crion> "
<Crion> "Buried it beneath an empty lot and built a club over it."
<Crion> She shakes her head. "That's one way to protest losing your Hollow."
<VoxPVoxD> "What'd he lose it to?"
<Crion> "The Killer, The Crown, and The Case. Three hobs that aren't around anymore," she says.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart nods, mouth full of the first third of his crab rangoon quota. Could be worse.
<Crion> "Anyway you're not supposed to be able to yank two storey buildings out of the hedge, much less encased in a bank vault."
<VoxPVoxD> After finishing the bite. "Did they use, like, trucks, or did they just full-on Superman it?"
<Crion> "And you can't Hedgespin anything on THIS side, of course, so everything has to be done by hand."
<Crion> Lauren: "A combination of the two, I think. Kingsley or Marcus knows for sure, but it was before my time. I get the feeling they spent a LONG time planning and preparing."
<VoxPVoxD> "Have they ever given any thought to like, a water cooling system? Treat the whole building like a giant PC case."
<Crion> Lauren: "Power costs are already absurd for the network room, which is water-cooled. The problem is that Summer guys tend to heat shit up, especially the Street. So the best thing is to keep that room locked down, cooled, and reflective.
<Crion> "The cables coming out of it, though, were melting. So first we tried some gasket insulation, because the melting always seemed to be at the point of contact with the wall."
<Crion> "That worked for a little bit. Enough for me to go home. But today I got called back in because of OTHER failures later down the chain."
<Crion> "And it was always going TOWARDS the Street's office. Not away."
<Crion> She sighs. "So what I ended up doing was putting his PC in a different room from his desk and making it a hotspot his phone auto-connects to."
<Crion> "If he fucks up his phone, not on me."
<VoxPVoxD> "That's really smart."
<Crion> Lauren rolls her eyes again, but they flash with pleasure. "If I was smart I would have done that in the first place instead of wasting a day padding pass-throughs."
<VoxPVoxD> "See that's like a, a PvE idea of intelligence."
<VoxPVoxD> "You gotta look at the leaderboards. The next-smartest person figures that out in a week. Stuff like that."
<Crion> She snorts, but appreciatively. Then eats another rangoon.
<Crion> "Sooooooooo. The Prince...doesn't want to play Destiny 2."
<VoxPVoxD> "Oh?"
<VoxPVoxD> That's a relief. Stewart's not even at like baseline-endgame yet.
<Crion> "I'm trying to think of the polite way to say this." She pauses. "There's no polite way to say this. You know how sometimes French people will tell Americans trying to speak French to them, in broken English, to just speak their own language? Because they're such snots they rather disgrace your tongue than theirs?"
<Crion> "He's kind of like that. He wants to play Path of Exile."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "What, like, party up?"
<Crion> "Yeah. He downloaded it earlier today. He wants to voice chat. Won't trust you unless I'm there."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "So your reputation's on the line. Lot of pressure."
<VoxPVoxD> "Besmirching the name of Lauren Ipsum? Couldn't be me."
<Crion> She laughs at that. "I carried his ass through the last two raids. What's he going to do, go pubbie?"
<VoxPVoxD> "Do you know how much he knows? PoE's got a pretty steep learning curve."
<Crion> Lauren: "Oh, he knows what Diablo is, and he knows it's like that. And he knows it takes 'less skill' than Destiny 2 or Call of Duty, because he's a little shitlord. But he's quite adaptable and smart once you get past all that."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Alright, sounds like we'll be able to just get in the game then. Two things. One is, have you ever noticed him get real mad at something it wasn't obviously stupid to say or do? Like, I don't wanna - you know, cause a diplomatic crisis or something."
<Crion> She waves a hand. "His attention span is 13 and his voice is 13, but he's not going to drop gamer words or start screaming if things don't go perfectly."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Okay, cool. I was a little more worried about him acting like a 400 year old than a 13 year old, but it sounds like that's not a big deal. Second is, what do I call him? Is it just Lister? Am I gonna be going 'that's a staff skill, your majesty, you can't use it with axes'?"
<Crion> Lauren, munching on another wonton: "I call him Listy when I'm annoyed with him. He hates it."
<Crion> "Lister's good."
<VoxPVoxD> "Langford Lister."
<Crion> "Ugh, don't speak that into this world."
<VoxPVoxD> "Did I tell you that that first night back in September when we got motley'd up, List gave us a pep talk about like, the different roles in a WoW raid?"
<Crion> Lauren cackles at that. "That's SO like him!"
<Crion> "He games with his kid."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart's face does not get weirdly tight at all, and he's not visibly thinking about how many children he might have had by now.
<VoxPVoxD> "That's cool."
<VoxPVoxD> "How old's his kid?"
<Crion> "Man, Dante's gotta be...15, now?" Her smile fades a bit. "They don't get much time together. That's the impression I get, at least. So during summer vacation when school's out and he's not running the Summer Court, they sort of fall down a gaming hole."
<VoxPVoxD> That's a hell of a lot more than he ever got from his dad. No, no, no, hold up, this is a tailspin, you're tailspinning, Stewart. Briiiing it back. There's a slightly too long pause before he says: "So do you want the big chair or one of these?"
<Crion> "Since the face cam's off, I could just sit on your lap..." Her eyes flash. "But this chair's fine."
<VoxPVoxD> All dark clouds are banished. Stewart grins. "Cool. Let's clean up and then I'll log on."
<Crion> Turns out she left him all six of the second packet of crab rangoon.
<Crion> Anyway, once you're all settled in, the account you'll need to friend is leprincedesjoueurs.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart doesn't know a lot of French, but he knows 'gamer' in several languages. "God damn, that's a handle."
<Crion> Lauren: "He bought it off someone."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart sends a friend request. Let's see what's up.
<Crion> She is not, actually, in Stewart's lap, but she is as close to him as her chair can get her, nominally so she can yell at the Prince through the mic.
<Crion> The friend request is instantly accepted, and Stewart is whispered a Discord link.
<VoxPVoxD> This is nice. Wouldn't want to get too distracted. Let's hop into Discord.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart plays with a table mic and no headset, so they'll both hear everything.
<Crion> Nevertheless: as close to him as her chair can get her. The server is called Baltimore eElysium, with a couple different accounts logged on -- Lister, TheCount, Hailey5 and, uhhh, HerrDoktor -- and there's an audio channel called LE CHEMIN DE L'EXIL, with just Lister in it.
<Crion> Looks like it's open to join.
<VoxPVoxD> "HerrDoktor, huh."
<Crion> Lauren's voice is suddenly very serious. "Never talk to him."
<Crion> "If he messages you, do not return it."
<Crion> "No matter what it says, or what it promises."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart nods. "Oh, that reminds me. The other day, the day we extracted Loser, we were talking about the Loyalists and I made some offhand comment about how Kid Kid Kid is like a nazi who spends all day on the Internet."
<VoxPVoxD> "Nels, without missing a beat, 'What's a Nazi?'"
<VoxPVoxD> "Total fucking silence. Five people in the room, you could hear a pin drop."
<Crion> Lauren, grimly: "The Doctor of Sciences is a Nazi."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I had a hunch it was something like that. Father Jesse mentioned him offhand, that one night, and even the way he did that was bad news. It was like, 'oh jeez we better hope this string of murders isn't the Doctor of Sciences'."
<Crion> "Yeah. He's kept in check by...a series of agreements."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "If there's anything in any world more powerful than a series of agreements, I haven't seen it yet."
<Crion> She shakes her head. "...Anyway! Join the channel."
<VoxPVoxD> Double-click.
<Crion> A very young voice: "Hullo? Who is there. Is this some...Stew-aaart?"
<VoxPVoxD> 'criticalmass': "Hi! Yeah, this is Stewart, I'm here with Lauren." He pauses so she can confirm her presence.
<Crion> Lister: "Ah, est-ce vrai? Alors c'est ton homme, Lauren?"
<Crion> Lauren: "Parlez anglais, imbécile."
<VoxPVoxD> How's her accent?
<Crion> He tuts. "But that iss indeed Lauren. Hello, Stewaaart."
<Crion> Pretty much perfect modern French. School-taught but flawless.
<VoxPVoxD> Oooh. Nope, nope, getting distracted. Gotta focus. "Hello, is this Lister?"
<Crion> Lister: "No, my friend, this is a particularly gropey skunk, from the cartoons. I have determined how to operate a computer, and now have no object but to game."
<Crion> "I hear that I shall be clicking upon things, until they die?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Or in their general vicinity, yeah, that's the hope."
<Crion> "Excellent. Then we shall log on!"
<VoxPVoxD> "But Path of Exile is first and foremost an incredibly customizable game, from a build perspective. It's possible to construct characters that chain precisely timed skills to maximize their damage, and characters that just, walk around, and monsters die around them."
<Crion> Lister: "Mmmmm. Much like real life, no. I would prefer to play a class that does not rely on stealing life, or blood, or any of that. Big, strong man. Tough and sturdy. Or, sneaky fuck. But no, ah, lifelink."
<Crion> "I am on this character creation screen. This Scion. I like her."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Scion is a really cool class. It your generalist, you can build it to do anything. It starts right in the middle of the skill tree and takes ability from all the other classes."
<Crion> "I enjoy the sound of that! And she is very French murder-chic. Une belle femme de violence. My apologies, Lauren."
<Crion> "I would ask about the Ranger but...arrows. They are too much like stakes."
<Crion> Lister: "You think this would not be so bothersome after such a long time, but no."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "You don't have to build Ranger as an archer... my last Ranger build was a Frost Blades Raider, but yeah I take your meaning."
<Crion> "Mmmmmm. Which is better, for what you are playing?"
<Crion> "You ARE starting a new character, of course...?"
<VoxPVoxD> "I thought we'd be starting characters-- yeah, absolutely."
<Crion> "Excellent!"
<VoxPVoxD> "I'm thinking Templar. I haven't done Templar in a while. Mess around with Smite, that's a fun early-game skill."
<VoxPVoxD> "The Templar model doesn't wear pants for some reason, so, if the thighs of a tiny elderly Scottish man offend, speak up now."
<Crion> Lister: "If the thighs of elderly Scottish men were completely insufferable, I should have had nothing to eat in the 1830s. I shall play Scion, with a complementary build."
<Crion> Lauren, thumbing the mute: "That's a joke. I think?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart shrugs. "I'm just gonna roll with it. Whatever he says, I've heard worse."
<Crion> He will load in with a character named VraieReinedeFrance
<Crion> .
<VoxPVoxD> Before coming off mute: "What's that mean?"
<Crion> Lauren: "The True Queen of France."
<VoxPVoxD> "How romantic."
<Crion> Lauren, still muted: "He can be like that."
<VoxPVoxD> Off mute: "Alright, so this very first zone we'll be doing alone... there's tutorials if the interface is opaque but you can click them away if you get it."
<Crion> "Ah!" Lister says, as his Scion wakes up on the shore and has to kill the other survivor. "Well. More biographical than I'd like."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah, I know what you mean."
<Crion> "Mmmm. Perhaps we'll talk about that sometime. Will you be at Halloween tomorrow, Lauren?"
<Crion> Lauren: "You know I hate parties, Lister."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart, by streamer's habit, runs past all the zombies in the Twilight Strand and just kills Hillock, who'll level you up to 2 from nothing.
<Crion> Lister: "That's not an answer!"
<Crion> Lauren sighs. "Yes."
<Crion> "So I will surely meet you then, Stewart."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I'm looking forward to it."
<Crion> "Ah, you've run away from me. One moment."
<Crion> "Mmm. Hmmmmm. Let us see..."
<Crion> Lister: "I play left-handed, so I must rebind...this entire keyboard. One moment."
<VoxPVoxD> "I'm left-handed too. I play right-handed, though, because that's how every other computer in the world is set up."
<Crion> Lister: "I dislike change. Unfortunately, that seems to lead to having to change everything at least once."
<Crion> A moment later: "Ah! I am set. This giant man is an ass."
<Crion> Soon, however, he joins Stewart in Lioneye's Watch.
<Crion> It's probably not necessary to narrate getting through the first couple areas.
<Crion> What build does Stewart recommend, however?
<VoxPVoxD> Soemthing melee. Stewart's Smite will clear reasonably well, but the single target's not great. Combine it with someone on Viper Strike or Double Strike, though, and Merveil will die before she's had time to grieve her children.
<VoxPVoxD> Is not a thought Stewart vocalizes.
<Crion> Lister plays it well and intuitively, though he still needs guidance through most of the steps.
<Crion> When they finally defeat Merveil -- he plays his part perfectly -- he says, "Well then."
<VoxPVoxD> Yeah, there's a lot of, just, *stuff* you have to learn, and it's real easy to miss something or learn it and then mix it up with something else you learned eight steps later and then get frustrated having to unpick your entire gameplan to see what's not working.
<VoxPVoxD> "Nice! What do you think so far?"
<Crion> "C'était déprimant comme merde."
<Crion> Hastily: "Ah! I am enjoying the gameplay. I especially like the economy."
<Crion> "You do not get this economy in Destiny 2."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart hits the mute and glances at Lauren.
<Crion> Lauren: "'This is depressing as shit.'"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart sighs. "You know that is not one of the parts of Diablo 2 that I missed, necessarily."
<VoxPVoxD> Off mute, if or after Lauren responds: "The PoE economy is really robust. There's a lot of play space in just flipping items and spotting inefficiencies if you've got the inclination."
<Crion> Lister: "Mmmmm. I might. You know, Lauren, we've lost our werewolves for the forseeable future. Kolsch and Cuth say they have business. So we might have to put Destiny 2 aside..."
<Crion> "This would be an acceptable replacement, I think, for gaming night."
<Crion> "If you agree, Stewart?"
<VoxPVoxD> "That sounds fun! Is it the shit out in the county that's pulled them away, you think?"
<VoxPVoxD> "I was in Catonsville the other night, there were Park Rangers with anti-materiel rifles just sitting in plain sight on the back of their trucks."
<Crion> Lister sighs. "Pourquoi sont-ils toujours aussi bien informés. Yes, I would say it is likely that."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart clicks his tongue. "I hope they're alright. Lauren told me about them, they sound nice."
<Crion> Lister chuckles darkly. "Oh, they can be. But one prefers the intervening medium, much of the time. They are, after all, still werewolves."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart nods, then remembers he's not on cam. "That's fair. "So in act 2 there's a choice you have to make, about some bandits. The game will lay all your options out for you with like the story and mechanical implications, but if we end up taking different paths we might have to split up very briefly."
<Crion> "That sounds excellent, I will--pardon."
<Crion> His mic goes muted or dead.
<Crion> Then: "My apologies, Stewart. I believe I have to go."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Oh, I'm sorry to hear that. I hope everything's alright."
<Crion> "It is, or it will be soon."
<Crion> Some incredibly indistinct shouting can be heard in the very far background, but no words can be made out, and it cuts in and out.
<VoxPVoxD> "Then I'm looking forward to meeting you tomorrow. Good night."
<Crion> "Good night, Stewart. Lauren."
<Crion> Lauren: "Good night."
<Crion> Lister leaves the channel.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart'll log out and do the same.
<Crion> Is there a window in the computer room?
<VoxPVoxD> Yeah. It's normally blackout-curtained so the streetlight doesn't mess up the room lighting, but if Lauren was stuffy in the kitchen she'll likely have insisted on opening one in here too.
<Crion> She did. She'll walk open to it and open it a bit further, though; it is a bit hot in the room with at least two big machines.
<Crion> Then she'll turn back and lean against it, in her sweatpants and tee, grinning. "Cela s'est très bien passé."
<Crion> "Picked up a couple languages on the other side."
<VoxPVoxD> "And more importantly, the accents."
<Crion> "Mmmmm." She saunters over to Stewart, straddling him. "Now let's head one room over, et je vais vous montrer ce que j'ai appris de plus en France--"
<Crion> Something slams against the window.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart stands up abruptly and leaps to the window.
<VoxPVoxD> Lauren sort of slides off him.
<Crion> Before he gets there, a grasping wing of metal and feathers reaches underneath the sill and opens it, and then something about the size of a vacuum cleaner falls into the room, squawking mechanically, caught up in the blackout sheet.
<Crion> Lauren scrambles away, to the far wall.
<Crion> Then it rises up, wearing the sheet like a cloak. "LAUREN IPSUM!" it bellows.
<Crion> It seems like...an animatronic pelican?
<Crion> She cowers in the corner of the room.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart's voice is calm considering how fast he's moving, grabbing the kitchen chair and hefting it in one hand. "Any idea what we're looking at?"
<Crion> In a quiet voice: "It doesn't matter if you kill it or not."
<Crion> Drawing itself up to its full height, the pelican intones: "FACTORY RECALL."
<VoxPVoxD> The chair hurtles across the room. Both it and the bird shatter.
<VoxPVoxD> He goes to her and holds her.
<Crion> The bird crumples and twitches, and its head slowly twists to consider the both of them as the light fades from its eyes. Its red, LED eyes.
<Crion> --fin.
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion> It's Halloween.
<Crion> It's a shitty night in Baltimore, really. Rainy and dreary and cold, finally, down around 45 degrees. Should cut down on mortal revelers, which is either good or bad, depending on your appetites. The Sidereal is throwing a "modern monster" party, the crowning event of the Autumn calendar and something Kingsley has been negotiating and preparing for, for weeks. The previous night, he, the
<Crion> Count of St. Sebastian, and Everafter did their traditional walk-through of the site to clear it and sanctify it in their various ways, and tonight they'll party until near-dawn.
<Crion> The doors opened at 5 PM for Friends of the Club -- changelings, mages, werewolves, and technically vampires though they usually don't start rolling in until 8 PM or so at earliest -- and limited public seating is engaged around 9 PM. Even then, most of those tickets are taken up by various mortal or half-mortal lovers, flunkies, groupies, gadflies, and so on. Most everyone in the club knows
<Crion> the score, and for the few peppy, completely unsuspecting mortals who do filter in, it's considered quite poor form indeed to take advantage of them past a scare or two (it is Halloween, after all). Morality aside, no one needs a body-count during one of the two yearly city-wide summits.
<Crion> Amelia Banthem will be watching.
<trenchfoot> There are worse gatherings to attend. This one is at least -- safe. So Nels Foulke will be there, or be square. (She learned that recently; it's catchy.)
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart's got a lot on his mind during the day before the party. How's Lauren's mood, after what happened last night?
<Crion> She is, understandably, terrified. Things moved quickly after that, with the phone calls. She's actually been at The Sidereal since the once-over, since it's arguably the safest place in the city right now; Gerald, Nissa of Fives, Canterbury, and the Liaison of Winter himself have been there overnight, joined by others throughout the day.
<Crion> Stewart can have stayed as well, but at some point he'd be gently encouraged to go home, shower, and sleep; there's not much bunking in the club.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart stayed with her until someone made the suggestion. Does Lauren need anything, though? Stewart can stop by her place and pick stuff up, or go shopping, or or or...
<VoxPVoxD> He feels so helpless.
<Crion> Her specific instruction on that count was to go to her apartment, and then the law office, and take all of her computers physically offline -- powered down, unplugged, network cables disconnected -- just in case.
<Crion> The Kitchen appears to actually live here himself, and has the food handled.
<Crion> Other than that, she just wants him.
<VoxPVoxD> Then they'll have to drag him out of there. But the Gardener has a way of doing just that with words and looks alone.
<VoxPVoxD> He doesn't go straight home, however.
<Crion> Melanie, meanwhile, has received an e-mail from Langford List in acknowledgment, tersely informing her that they'll talk at The Sidereal tonight with the rest of the Summer Court.
<trenchfoot> ...how is the Kitchen, for that matter? That's likely Nels's first stop, unless accosted beforehand.
<banana> How long has it been since Melanie Lucas went to an actual party?
<Crion> He's grumpy, but he's always grumpy. When does Nels arrive at The Sidereal?
<trenchfoot> Doors at 5, so... fashionably late but still before the rush at 6, 6:30. She'll be able to leave early while still having been Around if it gets to be too much.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart arrives at the Belvedere - parking his own fucking car - to find Fireman coming out to meet him halfway between the door to the Owl Bar and the elevator.
<banana> A real proper get-together, people from different groups and cohorts, music and drinks and singles, the stuff of life.. it always felt like the attendees were magical creatures.
<Crion> Fireman: "Stewart. Heard about last night from Everafter. Suspected you might be coming. The artifact?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah."
<trenchfoot> She walked, by the by. Unless she was offered a car to pick her up. Still: driving, not exactly something she can handle just yet.
<banana> Is she anxious about not knowing anyone or how to act anymore? Extremely. Was it traumatic to dress up nice in something that fits plausibly on her real jagged, wooden limbs? Mildly. But it's a party.
<Crion> He nods. "This way." He buttons his coat and leads Stewart to the private elevator, swiping a hand over the security card pad; it dings in recognition and opens. He hits a button for the 13th floor. It's the only floor this elevator goes to.
<Crion> In that case both the lunch and dinner menu is open for Nels (before the rush gets going and it becomes large orders or appetizers only, no custom entrees). The fare is mostly bar food, but if The Kitchen isn't doing anything at the moment he should be able to cook up just about anything he has the ingredients for.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart's silent the whole ride up.
<trenchfoot> ...has she been given a name other than The Kitchen? Titles-as-names are okay, but it feels rude still. Anyway: "Hey, hey. Hamburger for one, with an egg?" If he is busy, she's not gonna get in his way.
<Crion> As the elevator ascends: "Everafter and Sommelier are very protective of their space; please don't touch anything but your computer." The elevator dings as it arrives, but the doors do not open. Instead, Fireman says, "Library." There's a SsshhhhTUMP, and an oddly weightless feeling, and then the elevator door opens on...a library.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart doesn't respond, but he does keep his hands folded in plain sight in front of him until he gets to his machine.
<Crion> The ceiling feels a bit too high; the windows are tall and beautiful but they're oddly frosted over, even though it's not quite cold enough for that, and it's hard to see what's outside. There are shelves and shelves of books, each one with a locking display case in front of it, and public tables for reading. On one side of the room, there are larger, odder objects, also in cases, though
<Crion> these seem just as much to protect you from them as them from you: an old M1 Garand rifle, a strange puzzle box (no apparent similarities with anything in popular culture), a CD collection...
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart could see himself losing a lot of hours in a place like this.
<VoxPVoxD> He doesn't exactly mean that as a compliment.
<Crion> The Kitchen is, in fact, his name now. He doesn't like giving out his real one (understandable) and finds inventing a new one frivilous and silly. "Comin' right up," he says gruffly.
<banana> The Freehold bar is close enough that Melanie considers walking - she can walk pretty much forever, but not quickly. She's impatient enough to ride, instead, the bus; the MTA's night rider program is pretty great when it's early enough that the crowds aren't drunk yet.
<Crion> Along the back walls of the Library, a number of private rooms. Fireman walks over to the librarian's desk in the center and raps on the desk twice, then does something with his hands underneath it, and the door to the second open thunks open.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart's second word since coming inside the building is "Thanks."
<banana> Bus service.. wasn't something that figured in Melanie's previous life, so when she relearned about them she'd forgotten the stigma. Now she doesn't give a heck.
<trenchfoot> Nels: "Thanks." Sweetheart, really, even if he is rough around the edges. "Anything I can do to distract your adoring fans? Keep 'em away from your workspace?"
<Crion> Fireman will show him back to where The Book of Things Strange and Wonderful has been set up. The PC it's on, anyway. Fireman nods. "I'll wait here for you."
<banana> Last time she was at this place she went in from the carpark and it was mostly a blur of being shown past security cordons to the ~kings and queens~. Is there an actual street entrance?
<Crion> The Kitchen grimaces, which is what happens when he tries to smile. "Not unless you can cook yerself. Dancing's gonna make them hungrier and thirstier."
<Crion> There is, Melanie; a pair of fae-touched bouncers -- a man and a woman both of whom she's seen in previous visits to the place, employees of Banthem's -- nod at her when she walks up and will let her in without paying cover. Some rando in a sexy banana tries to follow in Melanie's wake and is sternly stopped.
<Crion> Costume, that is.
<Crion> An actual sexy banana with a person inside is far more likely to be on the list.
<trenchfoot> Nels: "I could. Not like you, but I could help." And it'd keep her away from the ruckus.
<Crion> The Kitchen's brows shoot up. "Well come on back, and roll up yer sleeves."
<trenchfoot> She rolls up her sleeves first, then heads on in. Sweetheart indeed.
<VoxPVoxD> He put a lot of mental energy into formulating a search string that dives at terms he wants but isn't so elaborate it shaves off usable results. He doesn't know how many times the software will hold up before the box kicks itself again. <arcadia* +factory artificial LED huntsman pelican>
<banana> Of course Melanie's allowed into the club. She's got the new kind of In, which is to be Out, which is currently In. "Keep it in your metaphor pants" she shoots back at banana guy... merrily? Doesn't know or care where that came from.
<banana> It's time to get drinks and be introduced to people she doesn't know more or less automatically by virtue of standing out.. which, she's starting to remember, can be a good thing.
<banana> Who's the first random monster she comes across that isn't mid-mingle?
<Crion> There aren't many people here yet -- the guards on Lauren duty mentioned above aren't out on the main floor. There are a couple Winter courtiers here already though; Jordan Kit, the mousey little catboy, and Spring, Winter's trigger-woman. They're argue-gushing about a band called My Chemical Romance getting back together over by the bar. And the Davids, Smitten and Smote, are deep in
<Crion> conversation by the stage with the mage Union, while Harlan Jape runs through some sound tests.
<Crion> So that would mean it falls to...Gemma Franklin.
<Crion> Recently of Arcadia, and now of the Winter Court, who has excused herself from the arguing MCR teens and is sort of wandering around aimlessly.
<Crion> Her eyes light up, relatively speaking, when she sees the paperbark. "Melanie!"
<banana> She's alive! The one the Mistress.. didn't care about? "It's Gemma! Have one of these, if you drink these. And like, welcome to everything!"
<Crion> Stewart gets a long, relatively meaty entry. Maybe 'meaty' isn't the best word, since it's all about robots. There is one True Fae who dispatches robotic huntsmen with pelican heralds -- pelican is a known form, but it can be any bird EXCEPT one of the standard, known witchy birds; so pigeons, perhaps, but not ravens or crows. The birds are usually all-white. That True Fae has the Title of
<Crion> Sky Mother, and if "robots" and "sky" and "glowing red eyes" is beginning to set something off for Stewart, yes:
<Crion> It appears this thing is...some form...of Skynet. From the Terminator movies. But not quite.
<Crion> Instead of satellites, the Sky Mother manifests as a great robotic spider encircling the sky, crawling up over the horizon; its legs never step or crush, per se, but they're vast space-borne superstructures that support the great monster that is always watching.
<Crion> And when it sends a Huntsman after a victim who has escaped via strange, science-magic portal back to "the past," it sends an unstoppable, unkillable bodybuilder.
<Crion> Relatively speaking, of course.
<trenchfoot> Not Nels' first time working in a restaurant, though it is her first time working beside The Kitchen. Whatever he needs done, she'll assist without complaint. "This is - standard?" she says, at some point during downtime. He's a busy guy.
<Crion> If it is based off the Terminator, well...the T-100s die all the time.
<Crion> But they always come back.
<VoxPVoxD> The mouse cursor trembles on the screen in time with the shaking of Stewart's hand as he scrolls to the bottom.
<Crion> The Kitchen: "This is the busy season. I get off three, sometimes four days a week during Summer and Winter. Spring and Autumn, though, we do a lot of work in here."
<Crion> "I don't mind it. Like to keep busy. Feeding people, that's honest work."
<Crion> Gemma will tentatively hug Melanie, if Melanie doesn't recoil. "It's so good to see you! Thank you again!" Then she takes the drink. "Oh, and thank you."
<VoxPVoxD> Okay. Okay. This isn't enough. It's not nearly enough. It won't bring the end of this. But it's a start.
<trenchfoot> Nels: "I wasn't one for honest work before, but -- " chopping up some vegetable -- "I can see how this is... fulfilling."
<trenchfoot> "You do this alone?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart's mental quest log filters down. Disconnect Lauren's hardware and research the Huntsman are both struck through. All that remains is, Unaccountably try to go to a party.
<VoxPVoxD> This time yesterday his biggest worry about the party was dressing up the wrong amount.
<Crion> The Kitchen snorts. "No, I have a few assistants. They don't start today until a half hour before the doors open."
<banana> Melanie: "You're totally in the deep end here. There's going to be some really cool people around and also like.. things I don't even know the name of? Friendly things."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "Well, good. I'd feel awful if I just left you to this all the time."
<Crion> Gemma: "Yeah." She lowers her voice. "Someone told me vampires are real?"
<trenchfoot> "...so who's better, them or me?"
<trenchfoot> She's not serious. Or is she? (No.)
<Crion> The Kitchen laughs: "You beat them on skill, but two pairs of hands beats one."
<banana> Melanie: "Yeah, 'real' in the sense that they're actually out there, or in here pretty soon. In the Lacanian sense.. no. We're from a different algebra of signifiers, a complete metaphysical worldview - theirs doesn't account for us and vice versa."
<banana> She'll steer them across the room toward what was probably 'David Smote' and his... partner? Time to find out about that ellipsis.
<trenchfoot> "When're they showing up? I'd like to meet them." And avoid the main party. She might play a few songs anyway, but hiding out in the kitchen? Pretty solid.
<Crion> Gemma blinks. "Whoa."
<Crion> "So what happens when the uh algebrae come into conflict--oh, here we go."
<banana> Melanie: "It's good actually. You can treat someone from one of these cross-halloween disciplines as, like, just a person, because the weird things we care about don't matter at all to them."
<VoxPVoxD> ...Stewart *is* a little bit dressed up, though, when he returns to the Sidereal after completing his errands, getting home, cleaning inside the oven, and napping for an hour and a half. Deep indigo shirt and black slacks that fit very well, and nice new leather shoes.
<Crion> David Smote sees them first and raises his beer. "Ah, the new girls. Well. Two of them."
<Crion> The bouncers will nod to him as they let him past.
<banana> Melanie: "This is Gemma! As you may know, you're David and... David?"
<VoxPVoxD> Does anyone try to grab his attention between when he walks in and when he gets up to Lauren?
<Crion> Not particularly, though Nels and Melanie are probably in position to see him walk in. Gerald will be on the door, openly carrying his Canadian FAL, and he'll nod Stewart through.
<Crion> Smitten laughs. "Smitten, and Smote. And before you ask, we're twins, not clones or fetches or anything like that."
<Crion> Union: "So sadly, no threesomes."
<Crion> Smote: "And the horny mage here is Union."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart will make eye contact with Melanie or Nels if he sees them, and give a small but sincere smile.
<VoxPVoxD> But he doesn't change course for anything.
<Crion> He grins. "More relevantly, I'm also the largest wholesale pot dealer in Baltimore. If you need a connect."
<Crion> Smitten: "Always hustling, man."
<banana> On some level, Melanie is having effortless fun; she's also a bundle of nerves (not literally; twigs). She's riding revived instincts while trying to also be authentic to whoever the heck she is now. Liquor helps; hanging out with Tony's been instructive in that regard.
<banana> She bows slightly to Union. "Melanie Lucas. I'm pretty green, too!"
<Crion> Gemma looks like she's a bit uncertain what, precisely, is a joke here and what is serious, among the gay/weed dealer/mage triumverate surrounding Union, and seems to settle on 'all three are true,' which is correct.
<Crion> He nods reverently. "If I make reference to 'smoking trees,' please know it's entirely an expression."
<trenchfoot> Nels is still focused on the Kitchen, but she'll give a nod and a smile to Stewart when she sees him. He's probably been the most helpful person since she - came back.
<Crion> Smote, to Melanie: "Heard you've been getting into some shit out in the Hedge. Getting your first blood. Loyalists and Pigs, huh?"
<banana> One which is more literally hurtful than he knows- but Melanie's managed to keep that secret from everyone, so far. She should probably warn List. "Does your stuff work at all for, um, alternative biologies?"
<banana> To David: "Yeah man. It really didn't go according to plan at all, which has got to be like.. normal?"
<banana> "Do we have any kind of library on this stuff? Small group tactics in the context of hedgespun battlefields..."
<Crion> Upstairs, Lauren is sitting a booth with the Liaison of Winter, currently still in his 'Colin' guise. Sitting propped up next to the booth is one of those drum-fed combat shotguns you usually only see in video games.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart will slide in next to Lauren unless a guard or something waves him off. What's the mood in the booth?
<Crion> Smote laughs and shakes his head. "Not really how Summer works, kid. There's the dojo, and you can train with the old-heads whenever they get some time, but you've met the Street."
<Crion> "Man doesn't really...maintain a library."
<VoxPVoxD> Maybe he could start now that he's not melting his CAT5s anymore.
<banana> Melanie: "Well, we all lived." In different circumstances she'd like to talk about this.. but Gemma's right there. It'd be best to move things along. "Hey, I should be the one calling you kid.."
<Crion> 'Colin' is in good spirits, not even forced, apparently, while Lauren seems to be enjoying herself despite herself; she's got a three-fourths eaten meal from the Kitchen in front of her and is drinking water. He's speaking: "--but yes, Mission: Impossible was a huge influence on what I guess we're calling my 'personal brand' these days -- ah, Stewart!"
<Crion> Stewart is welcomed at the table.
<Crion> Smote grins: "Not on this side of the Hedge wall. I got six years seniority on you."
<banana> Hopefully that's a hook which changes the subject and comes off as odd, interesting rather than aggressive? She doesn't knowwww. How do people react to things. They're endlessly fascinating, people, they're the point, but how do they work. Melanie can't believe she used to think this was obvious.
<VoxPVoxD> "Hey." He gives Lauren as big a kiss as he judges won't be awkward with the coming Winter king sitting two feet away. It's pretty big.
<Crion> More seriously: "Nah, but that's good shit. It's not that like...we didn't trust you, or trust List's judgment, or anything. But everyone's gotta get their first kills, you know? Good to see you can carry it."
<banana> "Oh yeah, you've got lived experience and like, actually knowing how to do stuff.. muscles.. I'm just saying, technically I'm like the oldest person in this room."
<Crion> Lauren will kiss Stewart back. 'Colin's Mask averts his eyes; his Mien, of course, doesn't have any.
<Crion> Smitten: "That's true. How are you settling in, Gemma?"
<banana> Melanie shakes her head. "I haven't quite-" No, don't ruin it! She'll turn that into a mumble rather than interrupt Gemma.
<banana> Melanie shakes her head. "I haven't quite-" No, don't ruin it! She'll turn that into a mumble rather than interrupt Gemma.
<Crion> Gemma: "It's been...you know. Shitty and scary. I'm actually from Cleveland. I kinda don't want to go back there now, though. Mostly I just want to crawl into bed and stay there until I need to eat."
<Crion> Smitten smiles warmly. "You are Winter Court all the way. But that'll pass."
<banana> Melanie: "And nobody's going to mind if you actually stay there for a while. Come out at some point, we'll doorknock you to make sure of it, but like.. it's incredibly okay and normal to set things aside a bit. Depersonalise the noumenon until its shadow retreats from the coming ecliptic."
<Crion> Nels has until around 8:30 for the other cooks to arrive.
<Crion> Union, deadpan: "Oh, definitely."
<Crion> 'Colin,' to Stewart: "How'd it go?"
<Crion> It's up to Stewart whether he told the Liaison of Winter where he was going or why, but the man seems to know anyway. He is the Freehold spymaster, after all.
<trenchfoot> Nels: "I'll be back, but - mind if I fulfill some social obligations? Say hi to some people and prove that I was here before I swing back and work the kitchen some more."
<banana> Melanie's keeping an interested eye on Union. Stewart's mentioned the wizards of Baltimore.. users of a kind of magic that claims to be deeper than Wyrd, engaged in existential/cosmic struggles against some real fucking douchebags. She's not sure what their philosophical implications are; they kind of make a mockery of the whole discipline.
<trenchfoot> She very carefully does not waggle her eyebrows at The Kitchen.
<banana> There's one obvious question, though- "Do you guys manage to avoid being as changed?"
<Crion> The Kitchen nods gruffly -- he seems to be able to do that a lot for an Elemental of steam and cookfire, instead of a Wizened -- and shoos her off with a ladle if she lingers.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart just being here with Lauren in what feels like the safest part of the safest place in Baltimore tonight is doing more for his energy level than the nap did. It's so cozy he almost forgets to answer the question. "Pretty well. I think I got about as much as I could've expected." He didn't tell Colin, but he did tell Gerald and well, he's spent a lot of time being watched very
<VoxPVoxD> closely. It doesn't occur to him to feel intruded-upon.
<Crion> 'Colin' nods. "You get a sense of what's coming? If it'll be power, or finesse?"
<Crion> Union: "Huh?"
<Crion> "Oh!"
<Crion> The mage hesitates. "Yes and no."
<Crion> "Mostly no."
<Crion> Union: "We go through a lot less shit on the front end, for sure. We kinda pay for it on the back end."
<trenchfoot> Nels slides out then, and into the crowd. Let's try and have a conversation so it's not obvious what she's doing.
<trenchfoot> Who's available? Most of the people she knows are otherwise occupied...
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I think we're looking at more of a sledgehammer than a butterfly knife."
<trenchfoot> Melanie and Stewart certainly are, at least.
<Crion> 'Colin' nods. "Well then the current strategy is sound. If it was an infiltrator, we'd have to move her. Maybe to Swordhome.
<Crion> "
<banana> Melanie: "What does that mean, though. Weird and interesting threats? Something claiming your, like, eternal soul?"
<Crion> Gemma sees someone and waves across the bar. "Nels!! Over here!"
<banana> "It's the night for spooktales."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "What's our, like, clearance, here? Should we be staying up here, can we move around the club? You know, like... stay away from windows obviously."
<trenchfoot> Oh, thank God. An excuse to not hover around the Kitchen like a weirdo. "Hey! Hi!"
<banana> Oh shit! Nels! Melanie is going to smile and gesture in a way which might or might not be possible to interpret as 'could you bring another round over with you'.
<Crion> Union puzzles that one for a second. "So, it's like...you ever see that Disney movie, Aladdin? And at the end, Jafar wishes to become an all-powerful genie -- and he does! And then he gets sucked into the lamp. 'Phenomenal cosmic power...itttttty bitty living space.'"
<Crion> "That's what it's like being a mage in the Fallen World."
<Crion> Belatedly he waves a hand around. "Y'know. Here."
<banana> Melanie was holding a glass of Blue Rev, until recently. Glass isn't ideal, she worries about scratching the cup, but bars are used to wastage...
<Crion> 'Colin': "Thanks to the wards and such we had laid down last night, we'll know immediately if someone breaches any door or wall with hostile intent -- or opens a portal into the Sidereal with the same. Lauren, it's probably best for you to have someone with you at all times, but there's no need to bunker down."
<banana> Melanie: "Yeah I know, normal people call it that too. The smash mouth timeline, etc."
<VoxPVoxD> Good thing girls only go to the bathroom in groups already anyway.
<Crion> Union: "Our deal might seem a little better than yours because our Awakenings aren't, you know. Hell prison. But the world punishes us for existing, for even using our magic at all in any flashy or substantive way, you know? And we got shit chasing us, too."
<Crion> "Little safer to bargain with than your True Fae, but not by much."
<trenchfoot> She swings over to the bar first to get herself another Chatanooga Dew and a refill for Melanie - she gave the sign. Only fair. "Melanie! And Gemma!" where does she know her from it's gotta be recent probably "Been a minute, hasn't it?"
<banana> 'Fae', capital F is a term Melanie has heard precisely once before. A formal term for Keepers, faeries.. the way the wizard uses it sounds taxonomic. She nods. "The terms of another algebra."
<banana> "Nelssss"
<trenchfoot> it'd frankly be weird if it wasn't recent on account of oh no don't think about that "That's me!"
<Crion> Gemma will give Nels a hug too, carefully though, given the drinks.
<Crion> Smitten: "Nels!" Smote nods. Union says, "Yo."
<banana> Melanie: "We miss you Nels. Come around a bit more? Tony's going for the GED too, he calls it a Ged.."
<banana> "Anyway, I bet we could do like.. study sessions."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "Hello! And. We could, definitely, but -- Tony's going for a GED too? He didn't say anything to me!"
<Crion> 'Colin:' "Only thing I ask is not to leave the premises without clearing it with someone. Also..."
<Crion> "The Young Street might drop by tonight."
<Crion> "Talk of a Huntsman has roused his pouty lordship."
<banana> Melanie: "Well, you didn't say anything to him. We're kind of like hermit crabs."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Damn. Well that's... good...?"
<trenchfoot> Nels: "I'm not a crab! I'm more like, an intensely private songbird."
<Crion> 'Colin' shrugs. "It's not bad."
<VoxPVoxD> If only someone knew why the caged bird sings.
<banana> To Smitten-or-Smote: "Is it better to poke one claw out of the shell at a time or like, bust out? There's the problem of the wrong kind of attention."
<Crion> 'Colin': "Anyway, you kids should go mingle. The werewolves should be showing up soon. Those guys are always a riot. Sometimes literally."
<VoxPVoxD> "Cuth and Kolsch back in from the county?"
<VoxPVoxD> He's looking at Lauren when he asks but it's an open question. He just likes looking at Lauren.
<Crion> He sort of waggles his hand. "They're not REALLY county. But they're basically county. Anyway they don't murder college kids on the UMBC campus for sport, so they're fine by us. They might be bringing the kid, too."
<Crion> 'Colin' shakes his head: "Weird enough for the vampires to have a boy-king, but at least he's 300 years old and just kind of lazy. But a tee--...a werewolf teen? I guess we're not one to talk with some of the kids we have hanging around."
<Crion> "Not you guys."
<banana> Melanie's congratulating herself a little for ending up with a mixed group of guys and girls, although it isn't really... relevant. Habit.
<VoxPVoxD> Involuntarily Stewart's mind conjures images of a Sidereal kid's table with a teen werewolf and Lister stuck at it.
<Crion> "But Jordan's completely not allowed to be here by law."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I'm sure technically a lot of us aren't. At the very least, like, the number of people in this room tonight who are undocumented."
<VoxPVoxD> "But yeah."
<VoxPVoxD> "Has he been in before?"
<Crion> 'Colin' stands up. "Yeah. It's the safest place for him, sometimes. Jordan doesn't have the best survival instincts, from time to time."
<VoxPVoxD> "More teen than wolf, then."
<Crion> "Oh, you mean Liam Two-Tone. No, this will be our first time hosting the once and future king of, I don't know. Disappeared campers. Cuth said he has an 'old soul,' which is hopefully code for 'not as much of a party animal as Kolsch Cameron.'"
<trenchfoot> Nels, sidling over to Melanie: "You think you could help me with the Kitchen? I want to kiss the cook." She waggles her eyebrows, if Melanie looks.
<banana> !!! "Omg. Who's that, there's a guy called that, right? Where is he? What's he like?"
<Crion> Smitten, to Melanie: "Slow and steady is how we do it in Spring. Courses, job assistance, that kind of stuff. Community work, for our community."
<Crion> Smote, to Melanie: "We're a bit more direct in Summer...but there's value in what they do over at the community center."
<trenchfoot> What is "oh em gee." Other people are speaking to Melanie, though...
<banana> Don't worry, she's ignoring them. This is more important.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah... I'm looking forward to meeting them."
<VoxPVoxD> To Lauren: "Want to stretch your legs?"
<banana> Not totally ignoring, actually - Melanie's lit up in a way Nels won't have seen before, fizzing as much as her drink; she's hopping back and forth between conversations but is definitely extremely interested in Nels' request.
<trenchfoot> She thumbs over to the Kitchen, not as subtlely as she thinks she does. "He's sweet. Great cook, obviously. Kind of closed off but we were hanging out for a while -- I'm waiting for his assistants to get here so we can spend some more time!"
<Crion> Lauren: "I'd love that."
<Crion> She'll stick close to him, perhaps a bit uncharacteristically quiet.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart's got his arm around her probably 90% of the time.
<VoxPVoxD> Hey, there's a big knot of people with Nels and Melanie in it!
<VoxPVoxD> "Hey guys!"
<trenchfoot> Nelanie. Melsanie.
<trenchfoot> Next one should be water. "Hi!"
<banana> Melanie: "Well, you don't need a wingman, what you need is.. has he like, Seen you?"
<banana> She's going to smile an apology at David Smitten, though. "I've got to get some info on your community services later!"
<trenchfoot> Nels: "We were cooking together and he accepted my help. I don't know what that means but I'm pretty sure I did a good job?"
<Crion> Smitten raises his glass in acknowledgment and turns back to Union and his brother.
<banana> "Stewart, can you confirm that the way to a man's heart is through his stomach? My mom used to-" Melanie falls silent for a moment.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Well, I think of a man's heart as a Deus Ex level. There's a lot of different approaches. You know, room for some personality."
<Crion> Lauren giggles at that.
<trenchfoot> Nels: "God from the level?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "It's a video game, named 'Deus Ex'. It imagines the future is bad in a comparable but more stylish way."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "This is plenty stylish..."
<VoxPVoxD> "Remind me to show you vaporwave."
<banana> Wouldn't it be God of Level? Melanie's heard of God of War at some point, but- this is irrelevant. "What do we know about Kitchen apart from his hobby? Obviously he didn't have a ring."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "...I guess I'll take your word for it." She's eyeing the Kitchen again.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart follows Nels's gaze. "Why are - oh man. No way."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "Hmm?"
<VoxPVoxD> He seems surprised but not displeased. Lowered voice: "You have a thing for the Kitchen?"
<trenchfoot> Nels, suddenly alarmed: "Shhh!"
<trenchfoot> Quietly: "Yes! And I'm trying to find a good time to go back there again!"
<Crion> The Kitchen is in his element right now, juggling two or three dishes at once -- sometimes literally. It's really quite something, especially the part where he lights a burner from across the room by snapping his fingers. Hard to tell if that's the Elemental in him, or the artist.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart presses his lips together, which squishes his smile into a weird little smirk.
<trenchfoot> "I need some water. And also I need to know what his preferred drink is."
<VoxPVoxD> "Well he's gotta take breaks, right? At least for a couple minutes."
<banana> Melanie: "They bring out more dishes when a group comes in the door. We've had a brief lull, so when the next trick or treaters get here it'll be abundance. The Covey mindset."
<banana> "Maybe.. a good time to offer some help? The trouble is you gotta be Seen but without being in the way. Kitchens are busy."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "Oh, I was helping him earlier. I wanted to spend some time on the floor before the rush hits in earnest..."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart's watching Melanie as he chats with Nels. She's nervous, energized. He sees a heart in motion and a mind at work. He likes her. He hopes she doesn't think he's a coward. "You could go up on the pretext of taking a group of people's orders up."
<banana> Melanie: "What kind of magical being... is the hungriest."
<banana> "Like it's not going to be vampires. But when the werewolves get here?"
<trenchfoot> Nels: "Do you think 'kiss the cook' is too awful. Because I'm thinking about it."
<banana> "Question:"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Anyway, like, I dunno. It's possible to overthink this. Something you can forget is that if you're a pretty girl and you walk up to a guy and are like 'I want to kiss you', that's going to work like, 75% of the time."
<banana> "How attached are you to your shirt?"
<VoxPVoxD> "It only took Lauren three, four tries."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "It... is... on my body?"
<banana> To Stewart: "Yes! You're right. He's right."
<banana> "Here's what could also be on your shirt, and therefore your body: an amusing slogan with a double meaning."
<Crion> Lauren rolls her eyes. "Thanks, Stewart."
<Crion> Lauren: "I'll point out that in this situation, HE'S the cook."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Absolutely."
<banana> Melanie: "Well, it would be a statement of intent."
<banana> "We could absolutely find someone with a marker, or some glitter - you go back there to help again, and last time you weren't wearing a KISS THE COOK shirt, and now you are. It's subtle."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "I don't think that's subtle, actually." She's smiling, though.
<Crion> Lauren: "It's Halloween. Make it part of a costume or something."
<Crion> "That's like, the only plausible deniability you have, girl."
<banana> Melanie: "And it's the absolute most you need."
<banana> "Seriously, let's go to the bathroom and fix this. I can do art direction, if it involves directing people to draw art."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "I'm going to go work the Kitchen."
<Crion> Lauren rolls her eyes. "I'd better go too."
<Crion> She seems to be enjoying herself, though.
<VoxPVoxD> So that leaves Stewart... standing by himself.
<VoxPVoxD> He looks around. Anyone else roving around looking for someone to talk to?
<Crion> No...but someone is coming in the front door.
<Crion> Don't worry. It's not a Terminator.
<trenchfoot> What's a - nope, more important things.
<Crion> It appears to be a group of three: a punk-rock skateboarder looking dude with half his face painted like a skull, an older guy who looks both absolutely jacked but slightly-going-to-seed -- just a tank-like dad bod on him -- and a very handsome but very young man who does not look like he should have passed a card check. The skateboarder dude lets off a mocking wolf's howl and cackles.
<Crion> The werewolves have arrived.
<VoxPVoxD> Oh shit.
<trenchfoot> Nels sashays - holy shit, she can literally sashay that's new - over to the Kitchen. Propelled by the power of a few drinks and a desire to not be around whatever is happening behind her right now, she says to the Kitchen: "Hey, handsome. Placing an order. You think I could kiss the cook?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart makes eye contact with each of the new entrants in turn, and each of them feels their Essence thrumming.
<banana> Melanie and Lauren watch in horror(?) as the decorated Foulke approaches her target. "We've abandoned Stewart. I feel guilt."
<banana> "But like, a skerrick or sub-skerrick. He didn't wanna see this."
<Crion> Cameron Kolsch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7I34zOUZCXM -- Champagne, cocaine, gasoline, and most things in between; I roam the city in a shopping cart, a pack of Camels and a smoke alarm.
<Crion> Cuth: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LaD7Hk-C8XQ -- Why should I worry? Why should I care? I may not have a dime, but I got street savoir-faire.
<Crion> Liam Two-Tone: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xOz2cvHDDJc -- I'm gonna be the main event, like no king was before; I'm brushing up on looking down -- I'm working on my roar!
<Crion> Lauren: "Yeah. Especially since I think it's working--"
<Crion> The Kitchen takes one look at Nels, then takes another, much longer look -- his face going bright, bright red. "Ah. Ahhh. Sacre bleu. I. Ah."
<Crion> "The Kitchen...is open?"
<banana> Melanie's looking Lauren up and down speculatively. Last time they met it was.. a much more comfortable setting, but paradoxically awkward as a result. The club is neutral territory.
<Crion> The sleazy uncle grins at Stewart and winks in return, while the guy with the facepaint has literally lifted Union off of his feet and is playfully windmilling him around on his shoulders before putting him back down.
<Crion> The kid looks...less overwhelmed than he should.
<trenchfoot> Nels: "I certainly hope so." She pulls him away from prying eyes.
<Crion> And far more polite than the other two.
<Crion> There are, in the time that the Kitchen and Nels aren't front of house, a few odd bursts of steam from the back.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart'll go up and offer the older man a hand. "You must be Cuth. Lauren's told me about you guys. Stewart Reader."
<VoxPVoxD> To the kid: "Which makes you Liam."
<Crion> The older man will instead fist bump him. "Hey man. Yeah, yeah. Lauren good? No one showed up yet?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah, no trouble so far. She just stepped away."
<VoxPVoxD> He returns the fist bump after the inevitable split-second awkward pause.
<Crion> Liam smiles pleasantly. "That it does." Liam will fist bump too, but he seems just about as awkward at it as Stewart.
<VoxPVoxD> Liam's song does not sound right at all. Does Stewart remember the Lion King wrong?
<VoxPVoxD> No shadow crosses his face as he considers this.
<VoxPVoxD> To the both of them: "Which means that'll be Kolsch."
<banana> Melanie: "She did it. I don't know why she did it, but she deserves it."
<Crion> Cuth grins and Liam sighs. In unison: "That'll be Kolsch."
<Crion> Cuth: "Cam! Don't break the weed hookup! Without his consent!"
<Crion> Union, while spinning: "Thanks, Cuth,"
<Crion> Lauren: "The Kitchen's been a workaholic since he came back anyway. I just hope it doesn't make things weird."
<VoxPVoxD> Kolsch is... a little much for Stewart, even now, about as outgoing as he's ever been.
<VoxPVoxD> To the three of them collectively: "So how are you guys doing tonight?"
<banana> Melanie gives Lauren an incredulous look. When she smiles, her face crinkles a bit, white bark flaking, but the expression tends to come through. "I mean.. did it?"
<banana> "You know about workaholics who end up finding someone, right?"
<Crion> Lauren grins. "Between me and Stewart? Nah. But I also know I want to stay with him."
<Crion> "And he wants to stay with me."
<Crion> "Nels, well, just ambushed a guy in the laziest slutty cook outfit in the world."
<Crion> "Hopefully the poor guy doesn't take it hard when she's not interested in something long term."
<Crion> She pointedly ignores the "they become your job" crack.
<Crion> Kolsch, meanwhile, like, almost punches Stewart during the fistbump, such that he has to raise his fist almost in self-defense. Stings a little, but only for a second or two.
<VoxPVoxD> Haha. Yeah. Okay. Stewart does not like this guy. It's a weird thing to observe about himself, from the remove he's put between his mind and his emotions. You never see that sort of impression forming in real time. It's also completely unfair, and unreasonable, Stewart reminds himself, probably not for the last time tonight.
<Crion> "Hey man, what's up. So you're like, Lauren's boyfriend? That's chill."
<banana> Melanie: "Yeah, you'd better. Um, look, I know this is discourteous:"
<banana> "Stewart is my first friend. In about three hundred years. He's actually nice, which is more than most of us can say, and he gets things..."
<banana> "You.. are making him very happy. So you are very good. Provisionally."
<Crion> That gets a pretty pointed blink from Lauren. "Oh?"
<Crion> "Is that so."
<Crion> When her eyes flare this time, it's not a blush.
<banana> Melanie: "It is! I wanted to note your contribution."
<Crion> "Contribution noted, bitch," Lauren says, walking away.
<banana> wait hang on wait
<banana> Is this even not what Melanie wanted? She doesn't know.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah! That's me. How, uh, how's... all the horrible shit in the woods."
<Crion> Kolsch grins freezes on his face, then fades. Quieter: "It's horrible shit in the woods, man. I don't wanna think about it tonight."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart's hands-up, concilatory. "My bad."
<banana> ..sometimes moving slowly is a choice. Melanie doesn't freeze up; she follows, putting her empty glass on.. something or someone. "Lauren, please wait a sec."
<Crion> He grimaces. "It's fine, man. Bad shit all over." His grin comes back while he's still looking at Stewart; seems meant to be reassuring, but it's slightly predatory, too. Werewolves. To the other two: "Whatcha want from the bar?"
<banana> Melanie: "I'm really bad at this. I'm really specifically bad at talking to people and I don't want to upset you or to be rude."
<Crion> Cuth: "Natty Bo."
<Crion> Liam: "Ginger ale, for now."
<Crion> Lauren stops after a couple steps of Melanie's second line. "Well, you're not wrong."
<banana> "Could we please take it that I'm overconfident and drunk and said.. something wrong."
<VoxPVoxD> That reminds Stewart he has to decide if he's drinking tonight. Provisionally...
<VoxPVoxD> No.
<banana> This would be easier if Melanie knew what she said, though.
<Crion> Lauren crosses her arms, but her eyes have stopped glowing anger-red. In a more mollified tone: "Okay. Yeah. Apology accepted, even though that wasn't...actually much of an apology. Whatever. We can work on that. For next time? Don't open something you mean as a compliment with 'yeah, you better.'"
<banana> Well, she knows what she said, but not why Lauren reacted. Or how she wanted her to react.. her speech patterns, habits, they come from a time that's not very far away but a totally different social status. This is excruciating! She can't even remember how to sweat.
<Crion> Kolsch moves away to the bar. Samaritan is riding on his shoulders with her own beer in hand when he returns. "WOOOOO! Hey Stewart."
<banana> "I'm sorry Lauren. I intended to evoke.. the friend or family member who was jokingly giving their blessing to a relationship. Like, a speech pieced together out of movie cliches and memories where I.. probably was a bitch, who I used to bed."
<banana> *to be
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Happy Halloween, Samaritan."
<Crion> "Happy Halloweeeeeeeen!" she says as Kolsch passes out drinks. Then she tugs gently(??) on his hair and points at the stage. "This way!!!"
<banana> There's usually a bit of Summer around Melanie, a smoky ripple that's present but not particularly intense. It's faded into actual nothing.
<Crion> Kolsch just grins and shrugs at Cuth and ambles over towards the stage, where Harlan has finished setting everything up.
<Crion> Cuth: "Man I do not understand that boy's energy. And it ain't just because I'm getting old."
<VoxPVoxD> Oh hey! Stewart's just noticed the guy setting up.
<Crion> Harlan Jape -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MKL-BYhRJu8 And we've been burned by all our fears, just from growin' up around here; our father's factories marked our cards, While Eden burned against the stars
<Crion> Lauren softens a bit. "That's fine. And I'm sorry, too. I probably overreacted. It's been...a long two days."
<banana> Melanie: "Okay. I really want you to do well, both you guys."
<Crion> Lauren smiles. "So do I. Let's get another drink."
<Crion> The Kitchen is still, ah, busy, but the goat boy from Summer, Capra, is behind the bar now.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart'll join Melanie and Lauren at the bar. Whatever bad energy passed between them has dissipated so that Stewart can't notice it by the time he arrives. "Nels really got after it, huh?"
<Crion> Lauren: "I didn't take her for the partying type."
<trenchfoot> It's been a minute.
<banana> Melanie was just about to retreat into the corner and watch things for a while; she's got a lot more to learn.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "She's had a lot of re-orienting to do. I kind of expect her to, I don't know... change kind of a lot, as she gets a surer foot in the world she got dropped in."
<banana> She'll take Lauren's offer up instead, but... what if she says the wrong thing again? What if she means the wrong thing again? There was something in there earlier- the condescension of an assumed superior. Queen of the party granting praise and making threats. Is that who she used to be? Is it who she wants to be on some level? Most people aren't as understanding as Stewart and Maggie
<banana> but that's a problem too because they might understand more than she does, about herself. Damn it. Lacan had nothing to say about this reality.
<VoxPVoxD> Like Melanie, he thinks but doesn't say.
<trenchfoot> ...Several minutes. Something like, uh, 50 million minutes. And change.
<banana> Well, Melanie might be looking a lot more familiar to Stewart right now... "Yeah, we encouraged her and I think it's good for her but I'm not sure that's who she is yet, just some kind of.. necessary step? To get connections back?"
<banana> "Lauren pointed out that it's a bit unfair to the Kitchen, but when the heck is he going to pull better than this?"
<Crion> Lauren: "I wasn't THAT brutally honest."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "It's hard to know what kind of place he's in just from the outside. Like I was definitely not, uh, 'on the market' when I met Lauren. We just... kinda clicked."
<banana> Melanie: "My editorialising. Sorry again!"
<VoxPVoxD> Wait, again?
<Crion> It looks like things are getting started at the stage in the front. Some mortals and hangers-on -- all pre-cleared, all dressed for dancing -- are milling about the floor. David Smote is talking to Harlan Jape, who is laughing and shaking his head, but in a way that communicates "sure kid," not "no."
<VoxPVoxD> Oh, well. Melanie must have stepped in it somehow when they were alone together. By no means inevitable with Melanie but not... unheard of, either.
<banana> Melanie: "That particular market's got to be fraught for us. It's not just a matter of efficient preference expression.. people are going to come back anywhere from obsessed to pathologically disinterested, or the most common thing has to be that you just have some of yourself... dormant. Like indefinitely."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah, I've been thinking about that, lately."
<VoxPVoxD> "Especially about like, problems that are sort of us-specific. Like, man, if Lauren was even in a different court my life would suck a lot more. Nevermind if one of us'd never been through the Thorns."
<banana> Melanie: "Are you not interested in spending a whole relationship lying about fundamental aspects of yourself?"
<banana> "It's a joke, but- some people would do that. Even prefer it."
<VoxPVoxD> Lauren might not have a lot of experience of Stewart speaking closely with other people, but by now she's probably observed his tendency to mirror whoever he's talking to. Conversations with Melanie are very abstract and cerebral and more shockingly frank than he'd ever be with Lauren. And then there was the way he acted around Society...
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah, no I couldn't. I actually had a conversation about this the other night with, uh, my fetch."
<Crion> On stage, Smote does Outkast's best song serviceably well. This is a song that's really easy to fuck up, and he doesn't, but he's obviously not a pro. The crowd still gets into it, though. <+trenchfoot> <VoxPVoxD> I'll start proccing the loophole | https://www.youtube.co
<Crion> lol
<banana> Melanie: "Oh, wow."
<Crion> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kaFygeknae8
<VoxPVoxD> But he quiets down when the music begins.
<Crion> David Smote -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8gJ3HzBbdxI Nobody speak, nobody get choked.
<banana> "It's in Maryland? Did you meet it?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart judges that both of these are good, but the soul-song is much better than the voice-song.
<Crion> Lauren: "Yeah, how is that guy?"
<Crion> Referring to the fetch.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "He's a great guy. He goes by Stu. Married," little catch in his voice "real nice house out in the county. Beautiful yellow lab named Beau. He works as a firefighter. He works out."
<VoxPVoxD> "Lauren helped me hook him up with Gerald so he can get a better grip on stuff."
<Crion> Lauren: "Damn." She pauses to drink, then looks over at Stewart. "Yeah, I can't see you as a firefighter."
<Crion> "No offense."
<Crion> She sort of squints teasingly. "Like maybe...five hours in the gym a day..."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah, no, none taken. I didn't even like sliding down the pole as a kid."
<banana> Melanie listens intently.
<banana> "He's.. different to you?"
<banana> "On his own terms, rather than as a reflection?"
<VoxPVoxD> "It turns out that our, uh, return, is really psychically fraught for them. He was having nightmares of me, like, coming and destroying his life. He started having dreams where he could like, see me, sort of through my computer screen somehow? Bits of my life that you could only see if you were watching me through a machine." Another little catch.
<Crion> Meanwhile, Amelia Bantham slips out from offices in the back and behind the bar, touching Capra on the shoulder to let him know she's there. Business is picking up, so she starts cleaning glasses while he takes orders. She hums while she does it...
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah. He put in a lot of work to make it his life and not somebody else's that he got dropped in. He's very chill, kinda... kind of a broey vibe, almost? But in a really sweet way. He reminds me of Tony a fair bit."
<VoxPVoxD> Oh shit, it's the Gardener. What's she rockin?
<Crion> Amelia Banthem -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gVws52PPvEA It gets all right to dream at night, believe in solid skies and slate blue earth below; but when you see him, you'll know.
<Crion> The moment he hits her with the Hedge-busker's Tip, her eyes shoot up...and she returns the favor.
<Crion> Smiles indulgantly and nods, then continues washing glasses.
<banana> "Through a machine. Is that.. how he'd get a warning?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart Reader -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=adrjxbVOtXk That's the terror of knowing what this world's all about...
<VoxPVoxD> That's the first time someone's used it on him since Lauren. Feels nice.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I think we have a kind of sympathetic connection. Like between the two machines in the server setup that gives us our internet."
<VoxPVoxD> "He can sort of... feel my presence."
<banana> Melanie: "Yes."
<banana> It's a flat confirmation, not a 'tell me more'.
<VoxPVoxD> "But I get nothing from him. It seems to be totally one-way."
<VoxPVoxD> His face lights up at Amelia's song, though. That's Lauren's band!
<Crion> Lauren: "Gerald and Kingsley are the same way. I think it's a defense mechanism?"
<VoxPVoxD> He instantly likes Amelia, who's never spoken to him, more.
<VoxPVoxD> Almost never, rather. He remembers she was the one who shooed him out earlier.
<Crion> She doesn't see it because she's happily saying, "Hey, Amelia!" to Amelia.
<Crion> The Gardener smiles. "Hello, dear."
<banana> "Is it?"
<Crion> Up on stage, Smote is sort of like, baiting Nissa of Fives up, saying he'll sing along with her. She seems embarrassed.
<banana> Melanie: "Dinner with her girl and a friend, steak. Bitching about the coach. They're all pretty immersed in the world of the game; I would have been, too. Why think about anything else? She's.. it's a good restaurant, I see nice red leather seats. I don't know who's paying. This might not last but it's good right now."
<Crion> She's also in slacks and a sleeveless vest showing off some powerful arms, instead of her suit from the last time.
<Crion> Lauren: "...what the--"
<banana> "Allie's got a lot to say about the old coach too. She's like a mentor, I guess. I don't follow it well enough to understand who's right. That's not me anymore."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart completely misses the powerful arms, looking at Melanie. Though Melanie's also got-- anyway. "...wow."
<banana> "Little bits of it never would have been but they're... little. Well, one's pretty.. tall."
<Crion> Up on stage, they kick it off: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wwWVC8kLqjg
<banana> Melanie hasn't noticed the Queen at all; she's nearly knocked over a glass, so it's pretty clear she's looking Elsewhere.
<Crion> It takes awhile for Nissa to get into it -- Smote is singing lead -- but by the end the screaming is fantastic.
<VoxPVoxD> Booya.
<banana> Melanie blinks- "What's that noise? Niice."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I just read something about an MCR reunion show, actually."
<VoxPVoxD> "It's out in LA though..."
<Crion> Nissa of Fives -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6XKlRZ9Kq4w I'm not laughing, you're not joking; I'm not dead, I only dress that way.
<VoxPVoxD> A ha ha ha hell yes.
<banana> "That song can't possibly be My Chemical Romance."
<banana> Melanie: "Or.. they got good while we were away."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "They were always good."
<banana> Melanie: "Lol."
<VoxPVoxD> "Unbelievable."
<banana> He's serious isn't he. This... is forgivable.
<Crion> Amelia: "So how are you kids enjoying everything? Under the circumstances."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart looks appreciative, but instead of answering verbally he gives Lauren a squeeze.
<Crion> Lauren smiles. "It's the best it can be. Under the circumstances. Thanks." She squeezes back.
<banana> Oh! "Good evening, spring queen. This is.. a good party."
<Crion> Amelia: "Hello dear, and thank you for saying so." She smiles, and her eyes catch the light.
<banana> Literally?
<Crion> A little bit literally.
<banana> Melanie didn't want to be defined by the song, but after Stewart told her, she had to know. She's looked it up and if they get involved the Karaoke, it might even be what she sings.
<banana> Melanie Lucas -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1MJh2jSkqqA Now I've got that slow, sinking feeling- like a bird without a wing...
<Crion> Amelia's smile widens. "Feel free to sing, if the mood takes you."
<Crion> "And if not--"
<Crion> There's some commotion near the door.
<Crion> Still not a Terminator.
<Crion> Amelia straightens. "Well, look who it is."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart doesn't chastise himself for looking up sharply. Cause then the one time he finally relaxes, BOOM. Terminator.
<banana> Melanie can't tell whether Amelia Bantham is judging her, but she wouldn't be able to do anything about it if she was.
<Crion> The Vigilant of Summer has arrived, flanked by Langford List. Melanie does recall from Langford's email that he said "the rest of the Summer Court would be there."
<banana> Hell yeah. Who needs a Terminator? ..and why are we talking about those, anyway?
<Crion> The Young Street is in timbs, jeans, and a white tank-top. He shoulder bumps and hugs a few people in the crowd, greets a few others, then jumps up on the stage and daps Harlan before embracing Smote and Nissa in succession. "That's right!" His voice carries. "That's right!"
<Crion> Langford List -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cPqK3DkAD6A And you packing your gun, but what you really gonna do when the motherfucking law wanna fuck around with you?
<Crion> "Yeah, alright," says the Street. "We'll do something old school. Mobb Deep. Back in the day. Harlan, gimme the beat."
<Crion> His song is the same as, well, his song.
<Crion> The Young Street -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yoYZf-lBF_U Son, they shook, cause ain't no such thing as halfway crooks.
<Crion> His performance doesn't actually set the room on fire, but it comes close.
<VoxPVoxD> Damn.
<VoxPVoxD> Yeah, he can buy this guy putting Stu through a window.
<banana> he is so cool
<Crion> When he's done, thunderously, he drops off the stage and straight-up chestbumps the werewolf Cuth at full strength for both men, before they embrace.
<VoxPVoxD> To Lauren: "So what are you going to sing?"
<Crion> Lauren's eyes go red again, but she's back to blushing. "That--I--ah--"
<Crion> "Surely that'd be...a security risk!!"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart's eyes widen. Oh my god.
<Crion> Langford List makes his way upstairs, but not before nodding at Melanie in acknowledgment. They can talk when she has a minute.
<VoxPVoxD> It illuminates his whole face - literally, his pearlescent skin catches ambient light like the surface of the moon. He's glowing gently, both literally and figuratively. "Why Lauren Ipsum."
<VoxPVoxD> "Is that nerves I detect?"
<Crion> She like, half-punches his shoulder. "Yes!!"
<banana> Ahaha. Melanie is going to excuse herself, but- "It's a dignity risk if you don't do it."
<Crion> The Young Street is, meanwhile, making his way slowly back their direction. He's also holding court, though, something he clearly enjoys doing and which is heightened by him so rarely appearing.
<Crion> Lauren: "Not you too!!"
<banana> She's.. briefly terrified as she gets up. How did Lauren take that? But you can't just- whatever, whatever.
<banana> Oh, is the Street passing by here? Then before she goes upstairs, Melanie will execute something like an actual courtly bough. Bow. Whatever.
<VoxPVoxD> "This conversation isn't over," Stewart will murmur against Lauren's neck before he sits at attention as the entourage rolls up to check on her.
<Crion> The Street will do that reverse chin-nod acknowledgment and stop to face her. "What up, girl. Heard you did us proud in the Hedge. Like to see it. I owe you an apology."
<banana> Melanie: "Street, I'll keep working."
<Crion> He nods. "That's what I like to hear. Keep the focus. Langford's upstairs. I'm gonna see your boy and his girl, but I'll be up."
<banana> Melanie raises her eyeridges at Stewart and Melanie, then leaves. Good luck to them?
<Crion> Leaves, does she?
<Crion> One assumes she also walks away,
<banana> Upstairs, yes.
<banana> There probably are leaves left behind given how long and inattentively she was at the bar. She can't help it!!
<Crion> The Street swaggers over, flanked by Smote and Nissa now...and someone new. Slightly older man, Latino, close-cropped hair, Wizened, wearing dark slacks, nice shoes, and a button-up shirt open two down. He's got black-out John Lennon glasses on, and he's idly whistling. Around his neck is...a Baltimore Police Department detective badge. His mantle is furious Summer, but his manner seems almost
<Crion> mild.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart's eyes widen slightly, not at the fire giant bearing down on him, but on the badge.
<Crion> Detective Serrato Colt -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9dy3pJZNJJ4 Just waiting to see some sun, never knowing if that day will ever come; left alone standing out on the street, 'til you become the hand that turns the key.
<Crion> The detective notices him staring. "I'm Detective Colt. Don't worry." He leans forward, right by Stewart's ear. "I'm the one that gave those three up."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart's shoulders relax, but his facial expression settles into a slightly harder position than it began in. He nods once.
<Crion> He's got something holstered at his waist; it's a revolver, and it looks like an older gun. Non-standard.
<Crion> The Street laughs. "Well, the vampires had something to do it with."
<VoxPVoxD> Immediately Stewart wonders if there's a huntsman out there with Big Iron as their song.
<Crion> Colt, mildly: "The vampires hemmed and hawed and insisted they didn't know who they might have had on the force."
<Crion> The Street shrugs. "It's good to have diverse friends." To Lauren: "How you doing, kid?"
<Crion> Lauren: "I'm fine, sir. Thank you."
<VoxPVoxD> Sir, huh?
<Crion> He snorts. "I'm only sir when I'm the king. That, or I'm getting old."
<Crion> To Stewart: "So you're Kingsley's new prodigy? And Santander's."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Well, I'm the new guy anyway. Stewart Reader. It's nice to meet you. You were, King-in-Court when I came over but I wasn't really doing a lot of freehold stuff at the time."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart doesn't offer a handshake if Street doesn't first. He seems more likely than most to dislike the ritual.
<Crion> He laughs. "All good!" Instead of a handshake, he'll slap Stewart on the shoulder. "Heard you did good in that shit with the Pigs, and whatever happened with Proctor. That's good enough for me. Enjoy the party."
<Crion> The Vigilant of Summer will then retreat to a private but prominent booth with his retinue, and oversee the party.
<VoxPVoxD> Now it's just Lauren and Stewart by themselves. "How are you doing?" he asks.
<Crion> Lauren: "I'm..."
<Crion> "This sucks, man. This isn't how I wanted to spend time together."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah."
<VoxPVoxD> "It's almost like it was on purpose. You know, like... timed to fuck with you."
<Crion> "It's even worse because now I've got like, the Street going out of his way to be here and the Liaison trying to cheer me up -- that dude! -- and it's like, I don't want to be this important."
<Crion> She frowns. "What do you mean?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I don't know, like... when the Herald showed up. Why not a week before? Why not two days later? I just... like if you had to pick a moment to drop that on someone where it would be most disruptive, and most, like... damaging to a hard-earned feeling of happiness and safety."
<VoxPVoxD> It doesn't occur to Stewart that he's thinking out loud from the perspective of a Keeper.
<Crion> Lauren kinda shivers. "Yeah. Yeah."
<Crion> "And it fucked up the party for everyone else too."
<Crion> "Well, not the Street, I guess."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah, it's bullshit. I guess it could be worse, though, on that front. Like the bosses are pretty much always worrying about something, right? I doubt this kills the buzz for them. And a lot of people just... don't know anything's up yet."
<Crion> Lauren: "Yeah...but like. What if this is just my life now."
<Crion> "AUGH!"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "It won't come to that. We'll figure something out."
<Crion> "I can't believe I kind of want this fucking thing to show up, to get it over with!!"
<Crion> "Not, you know -- not like that."
<Crion> "But they can take it, right? The Freehold?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah. I think we'll need to think sideways at it to deal with it on a longer-term basis though. But we will."
<VoxPVoxD> "And like... if it had to be that way. If we had to crush this thing once a month every month for the rest of our lives, we would do it. We'd do it gladly. Because we need you, and we love you."
<Crion> She leans her head against his neck. "And I love you."
<Crion> And that seems like a good place to leave it, until the party really kicks off.
<banana> https://66.media.tumblr.com/593e44b22eb2b065277ef8b60640e11f/affcd457b4899185-d8/s640x960/8e9df87dfff24c69aeca4a869c9c068efa506338.png
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<Crion> The party this Halloween is just getting started.
<Crion> Before we get too deeper into our drinks, however: What, precisely, have all of you told your courts about what went down with the Loyalists? Stewart submitted his report, of course, and Melanie's about to make hers in person -- but do the Winter and Spring Courts know that one of the gentry was personally involved?
<VoxPVoxD> Well, Stewart already made his report, so he can start drinking. And he has, with a double rye and a basket of french fries covered in Old Bay.
<CBN> Tony called Spring from his apartment's landline until she answered, then matter-of-factly told her everything, down to "And I voted to kill K.I.L.L. and no on else did and then the True Fae swore not to use contracts the next time it saw us and then left" because: better to not have to answer questions by just saying it all up front, at once.
<Crion> Well, that certainly makes things simpler. And it explains why at least one Winter courtier has been pretty much glued to Peter Montgomery all night. Perhaps the poor boy -- sporting a new Spring mantle -- actually thinks it's because he's that interesting, but more likely he knows something is up.
<trenchfoot> If Nels knows who to tell about it, she would have. Probably David Smitten? He's been the nicest so far, and has been helping her get acclimated, so.
<Crion> Then he definitely knows, or should know, but unlike Lauren he seems completely unafraid. If anything, slightly embarrassed by the attention?
<VoxPVoxD> Has anyone actually explained what the Gentry are to him yet?
<VoxPVoxD> Or does he still think he just got out of a bad relationship with a weird rich lady.
<Crion> One presumes so. It was basically the main subject of your first big meeting with the Freehold.
<banana> Melanie Lucas is possessed by a ghost. She climbs the stairs to the bar's upper level slowly, one hand on a wooden rail that welcomes the touch (grain runs the right way, and it feels like a promise fulfilled).
<banana> There was another Melanie, lifetimes ago, who was at home in this mess of acquaintanceship and karaoke and alcohol. That's another thing she'd forgotten. Alcohol! Thank Tony later. She knew all about it intellectually but that's not the same as experiencing dropped inhibitions - die anwesenheit, die anwesen anwesende. Inhibitions serve to protect.
<Crion> Anyway, just about everyone who is anyone in the Freehold has shown up, though apparently some of the shyer or more anti-social changelings don't make the trek out to these events often. Things are just about falling into a groove when the mages and vampires arrive.,
<dammitwho> Did the Spring Court give her some specific contact other than Smitten? Otherwise, she'll have called him to check in, but probably later than Nels did.
<Crion> The mages first: Jesuit, flanked by Everafter and Pardon; no new faces there. Sommolier was mentioned earlier in the evening by Fireman, but neither he nor any other new mage has shown. Jesuit is greeted warmly by Kingsley, who seems to melt out of the crowd, and the lot of them retreat to a private booth across from the Street's.
<banana> Now she's let the ghost out, the face she sees in dreams; Stewart makes sense of things and no sense at all. It's like watching herself through - metaphor fails her. This possession's tricks are painfully familiar - ignorance as social advantage. Naivety as forgiveness. Substance abuse is an easier way to be interesting than knowing fucking anything at all.
<Crion> Melanie will find Langford List sitting alone at the upstairs bar, nursing a whiskey on the rocks.
<Crion> When she's ready.
<banana> That could be a long time! She'd better go now instead.
<Crion> Did she bring her drink up with her?
<dammitwho> Where's the Gardener and the Vigilant?
<Crion> The Vigilant is at a booth being feted by his courtiers and enteraining the werewolves; the Gardener is helping tend the bar.
<VoxPVoxD> What's Lauren drinking? Is Lauren drinking? "Do you want to wait for Lister?"
<Crion> Lauren is having a White Claw. Apparently it's on tap? What a bizarre concept.
<Crion> Lauren: "Yeah, but he should--"
<Crion> Right on cue, the vampires stride in.
<VoxPVoxD> !!
<Crion> Well, the vampires...and one changeling.
<VoxPVoxD> ...
<Crion> The Girl, the Mainer, Father Jesse, the prince, Lister, and a Hispanic woman with short-cropped black hair in a grey suit that Stewart hasn't seen before.
<Crion> No sign of the Count of St. Sebastian.
<CBN> Tony's shitty at parties nowadays. Having your last memory of a big party being the last thing that happened before your Durance will do that. So he sticks to the biggest, most crowded room he can, plasters his back to a wall, and keeps his hands full. With beers.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart guesses that's Gabriel Menendez, the Nice Vampire Father Jesse mentioned.
<Crion> That would make a certain degree of sense; the two seem to be conversing.
<banana> Melanie finished her latest drink. Not necessary to be the way she is with the Summer Court (what is this chameleonic bullcrap? the Talewright didn't teach her that, there's no script, it's just what you do when you don't have anyone better to be).
<banana> "Hello again, Mr. List."
<trenchfoot> An only slightly disheveled Nels is calmly sipping her drink at the bar, carefully watching the new arrivals. I don't believe she's met, well. Any of them.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart wonders if the supernatural effect of Hedge-Busker's Tip extends to vampires and their... blood. Does their blood get thicker? Do they get more blood?
<Crion> The vampires head towards the rear of the establishment with purpose, except the Girl pulls the Mainer off onto the dance floor before they clear it, and then while Father Jesse and the woman, Menendez, head to Kingsley's table -- the Father actually embraces (lower-case e) Jesuit before sitting down -- Lister spies Lauren and Stewart and heads over in your direction.
<Crion> Gabriel Menendez -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c_2gHmpZmzU [Gris, Part 1]
<Crion> Lister, Prince of Baltimore -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OPlK5HwFxcw [Hymn of the Cherubim]
<Crion> List gestures at the bar. "Ms. Lucas. Would you like something to drink?" He takes a longer look at her. "Water?"
<VoxPVoxD> What does Lister actually look like?
<dammitwho> In that case, Maggie will wind her way up to the bar first... well, second. After heading over to the Kitchen to get some sausage rolls. Once she reaches the bar: "Evening, ma'am! Got any Lake Dredge?" Lake Dredge, an imperial stout from the eponymous microbrewery.
<Crion> Like a dead angel. Thin, slightly-chubby cheeked, golden-haired, dead-eyed. He looks dressed for church, though it's possible this is just the formality with which he's dressed for...the past 300 years or so, only changing his style with the times.
<banana> Melanie: "One water on the rocks, please."
<banana> "I should tell you right now, things didn't go to plan and we've got new problems. That's, um, I read a bit about military strategy and it seems normal?"
<Crion> The Mainer has been dragged up on stage.
<Crion> He takes some prodding from The Girl, but finally sings something that fits his vocal range: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aol6RMtEB8Y
<Crion> List reaches over and pours her a highball glass of icewater, then pushes it over. "Indeed it is."
<Crion> "You said Proctor was dead, however."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart's face doesn't falter as he welcomes the dead child to his booth. "It's nice to meet you. I'm Stewart."
<banana> Melanie: "They're all dead or gone. I'll start at the end: we got into Proctor's sanctum and a Keeper was putting him down."
<Crion> At the bar, Amelia frowns and says, "I don't believe we do. Is that local?"
<Crion> List doesn't cough or sputter, but he does close his eyes and take a longer pull of the whiskey. "Killing him, you mean."
<Crion> "Just trying to wrap my head around this."
<dammitwho> Maggie: "Rats. Yeah, one of them tiny places around here. Pull me a Guinness, then."
<Crion> The Gardener grins. "That I can do." Her pour is perfect. "I can see about getting Lake Dredge in, if I can find it."
<banana> Melanie: "Right.. I don't think it thought about it that way, though. Let me go back a few steps and summarise?"
<Crion> Lister smiles. Yep, those are fangs. "Ah! Stewart! It is a pleasure to meet you, in the flesh." He lets that hang threateningly for a half-second--but before he can get a reaction Lauren grouses, "Don't tease him, Lister."
<Crion> The prince of Baltimore chuckles -- it's more of a giggle, really. "Sorry, sorry. I cannot help it." The French accent is more subdued than one might have expected, but then, it has been awhile.
<Crion> Langford List: "Please do."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "That's a nice suit." Stewart actually just bought a suit. He was going to wear it tonight, but, kind of a weird look when Lauren's under bar arrest in case a Terminator shows up.
<Crion> "Thank you!"
<Crion> More seriously: "How are the two of you doing?"
<Crion> "I heard about the...incident."
<dammitwho> Maggie: "So, the other reason I came up here is, I wanted to run something by you for the next party. The Prom, I guess we call it?"
<VoxPVoxD> He'll let Lauren answer first. There's rye to get through.
<Crion> Lauren: "Fine. But tired. Looking forward to going home. This is the longest I've spent not in front of a computer in years."
<Crion> Amelia: "Yup."
<banana> Melanie counts off the points of the motley's tale, telling the ghost farewell. She's in a new world now and needs to be present. "We tracked the loyalists to their rathole, guarded by pigs. We killed some when they tried to ambush us, tricked the rest away and set up a cordon. All of this took a couple of weeks."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "You know what would probably wake you up? A nice round of karaoke."
<Crion> Langford List nods.
<Crion> Lauren makes a face. Lister, however: "Ooh! I like the idea."
<banana> Melanie: "The idea was to get them coming out with the help of some stuff we found at Notgnixel. Things went wrong when Loser was the first one out the door and turned out to be an Autumn Court spy."
<Crion> Langford List straightens up. "A fucking what now?"
<VoxPVoxD> He really wants her to sing... but he also doesn't want to push her too hard. This has been a rough couple of days. "We could go up together. Or I could go up first."
<banana> Melanie: "I know, right? They didn't even tell Stewart, but he knew enough to verify her. She swore oaths too, but she wasn't in great mental shape. Way too long undercover and she had like.. hatred and attachment to some of them."
<Crion> Lauren: "...Together would be good. Aaaafter you go up first."
<dammitwho> She takes a long drink, then puts her glass down on the bar emphatically. "Contests of skill! The clever and the strong demonstrating their prowess in friendly competition! To the winners, a prize of a laurel crown, the admiration of all the bright young things, bragging rights for the next year, and a celebratory bowl of the beverage of their choice!" She adds: "May have to rethink that
<dammitwho> last one for the vampires. Still noodling it."
<Crion> Langford, mostly to himself: "How the fuck does he expect us to run an operation when he's running a SIDE OPERATION that--" He waves a hand. "Sorry. Yes. This Loser. What happened to her?"
<banana> "I can't give you anything more on that because events moved too fast. We got rushed inside by the arrival of this thing , the one called the Mistress of the High House."
<Crion> Amelia chuckles. "Not even a year in to your residency and you're already proposing games of skill. ...Still, I like the idea."
<banana> Melanie: "By the time we got to the bunk room, Proctor and Kid Kid Kid and Cambridge Son were dying, she turned them into - she put them on - she'd killed them pretty easily."
<Crion> Langford List has pulled out a notebook and a pen. "Confirm that for me: 'Mistress of the High House?'"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Hmm... I don't know what to sing. Let me think about it." He goes to get another drink, sees Maggie at the bar. "Hey!" he says, giving her a side-hug.
<Crion> Amelia: "What kind of competitions are you thinking about, Maggie? We don't have the most space in here."
<banana> Melanie: "That's the name Loser used; it's known in Philadelphia."
<Crion> The Gardener will nod to Stewart. Meanwhile, Lister has slid into the booth and is attempting to cheer Lauren up by talking about some Destiny-related nonsense.
<banana> Melanie: "So the six of us try to run away or yell, I don't think anyone thought of taking out a weapon, but all of that was, you know. Irrelevant anyway. It made us stand there and watch in stupefaction."
<Crion> "Keeper is Mistress of the High House; Loser is out of Philadelphia. Of course she is. You said Keeper, not just gentry -- did this thing say whose Keeper it was?"
<Crion> "Was it Loser's?"
<dammitwho> Maggie: "Heya, Stewart!" She will IMMEDIATELY look around for Lauren.
<banana> Melanie: "No, let me skip ahead, it's Peter Montgomery's captor. It wanted us to give him a message, made threats to anyone around him."
<banana> "That's why it went after the loyalists. It wants him back alive and what it thinks is voluntary."
<VoxPVoxD> Lauren's visible over Stewart's shoulder, engaged in conversation with what looks like a 13 year old boy dressed for church by his mother, a boarding school headmistress.
<Crion> List pauses. "So there's no indication that it's coming here."
<Crion> "The last thing we need is a Huntsman AND a Keeper crashing this party."
<banana> Melanie: "It claimed it was not. Obviously we're not idiots, so- huntsman?"
<Crion> What're Nels and Tony up to? Still wallflowering?
<trenchfoot> Yeah. Sipping drinks, not looking at the Kitchen, trying to figure out what and when to sing.
<Crion> Should be an opening coming up soon.
<CBN> Tony needs another pair of beers, which takes him back to the bar. And that's how he comes to politely elbow around Maggie and co. "Hey, hey." Multi-tasking light socializing with heavy getting-more-beers over here.
<Crion> List waves a hand. "The Autumn girl. The one your little nerd motley-mate is attached to at the hip. There's a Huntsman coming for her."
<banana> List might not care about the game it tried to play, though he needs to know K.I.L.L.'s fate. But Melanie's interrupting herself to ask.. she has a sick feeling. Surely not vodka.
<banana> She doesn't know what her face does instead of go pale anymore; there are cracking noises. "Lauren? And she knows, she must?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart, who's having a couple quick ones at the bar before going back, giving Lister and Lauren some time to catch up and Stewart somewhere to be that isn't eight inches from a 350 year old 13 year old: "Hey, Tony! This party's kind of a lot, huh?"
<Crion> List nods. "That's why she's here. If it wants to get her -- and it sent the Herald last night, so it's close -- it's going to have to get through the Freehold and all our friends. We're quietly getting the mortals out of here early; by the time its late and it's tactically appropriate to strike, well."
<Crion> "Hopefully it's one of the stupider ones, and just walks in the front door."
<CBN> Tony turns, grabs a pair of fresh beers, and looks over his shoulder reflexively before leaning against the bar and nodding at Stewart. "Everybody's celebrating like they did something. Halloween wasn't this big a deal back in my day, or with my old crowd."
<dammitwho> Must be one of them vampyres. Eternally youthful with ancient souls, things of that nature. Damnedest thing. To Amelia: "Well, now. That depends on what everyone here is good at, isn't it? And since we're such an eclectic bunch-" She's not nearly drunk enough to say 'motley crew' and think it funny, "Maybe we should do it by boasts? Somebody stands up and says 'I can jump the furthest,
<dammitwho> I can clear these three tables at a bound, not one of you here can jump farther than me', someone else says 'the hell you can', and we're off!"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Honestly I think the day's just an excuse. Autumn's got ties to all the different, uh, communities, and I guess events like this are a way to build cross-community... community. There's one in the Spring too, called Prom. Which, honestly, concerns me more."
<Crion> Amelia smiles wryly. "Do that around Summer and that's gonna lead to some fistfights."
<VoxPVoxD> "Like... imagine doing Prom again?" Imagine actually going to Prom?
<CBN> Tony: "Jesus Christ. Well here's to a long winter and a short spring, huh?"
<VoxPVoxD> "I'll drink to that." And he does.
<dammitwho> Maggie: "Might be okay, as long as nobody gets really hurt? ...I guess that could go wrong pretty quickly, huh. That's why I ruled out wrestling."
<VoxPVoxD> "Okay, I gotta go see my girlfriend and the vampire Prince of Baltimore. Don't be a stranger, Tony."
<banana> Melanie stands abruptly and then... remains in place at the bar, clutching her glass. "Okay, I guess this must be pretty safe... as safe as we can get really. Time-limited. Ah, that's awful."
<CBN> Tony: "Well those're two new things. Have fun." Tip of the beer, drink of the beer.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart slides back into the booth beside Lauren with a (fifth?) rye and a glass of water, alongside another "White Claw" for Lauren.
<Crion> Stewart is quite immediately replaced by Spring, the Winter courtier. "Hey Tone. Tony. The Tonester. Gardener, a vodka cranberry, please."
<Crion> Lauren takes the White Claw gladly, and though she seems a bit skeptical of quite how much Stewart is drinking and how quickly, she doesn't say anything.
<Crion> "So," Lister says to Stewart, "you sing?"
<Crion> Amelia purses her lips but serves one up perfectly.
<CBN> Tony narrows his eyes at Spring-of-Winter's whole, everything. "You doin' okay?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I mean... I've sang."
<VoxPVoxD> "I wouldn't call myself a singer."
<Crion> Spring: "Haven't had to shoot anyone in a week or two, so I'm doing allllright."
<VoxPVoxD> "I actually played a couple of sets as a lounge act once. Like, Michael Buble stuff."
<VoxPVoxD> Long sip of water. "An evil god thought it'd be funny."
<VoxPVoxD> "You know what? It kind of was."
<Crion> Langford List: "Wouldn't call it a good time myself. But Huntsmen usually hunt alone, and they're usually pretty direct. At least the first few times."
<trenchfoot> Finally decided, Nels checks the stage. Free at the moment? She could run for a bit, or just play one and scamper off, depending on how eager the crowd looks to get up there.
<Crion> Harlan Jape makes eye contact and nods. The stage is Nels's if she wants it.
<CBN> Tony: "Here's to doing allllright. So what...is all this?" He gestures around with the emptier of his beers. No slosh shall escape. "Like all the...those, and these over there."
<banana> She had such a brave face on, or brave.. lights.. having a good time rather than let them win. Melanie didn't know. But she can't just go down there and say that? It would be like unexpected condolences at a funeral, like an attempt to excuse herself.
<VoxPVoxD> The fourth drink settles over him like a blanket as he ponders the fifth, unattended. Maybe a little too fast there.
<VoxPVoxD> *untouched
<banana> First few... "So they start from scratch, but they learn?"
<Crion> Spring turns to lean back against the bar. "You mean the vampires? And the mages? And the werewolves?"
<Crion> "Yeah, that's fucked up."
<Crion> "Like half of them are preppies?"
<Crion> She sort of frowns in Peter Montgomery's general direction. "So are some of ours."
<trenchfoot> Let's go, then. She flounces up - flouncing, that's new too, alongside the sashaying - and checks the mic. Then: a song she didn't write, but Stewart showed her YouTube and this one stuck.
<trenchfoot> "Birds flying high, you know how I feel," she sings. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D5Y11hwjMNs
<CBN> Tony: "Yeah, all of those. Why do there need to be so many? Aren't we all fucked up enough in our own ways without other, etynom, taxo...anyway other kinds, of whatever, around? Half of them look like some real boat-shoes motherfuckers."
<Crion> Spring shrugs. "We only gotta see them twice a year. And they're not allowed to start shit while they're here. But yeah, the boss isn't big on them either."
<CBN> Tony: "What's the other time, so I can be sick?"
<Crion> The crowd starts a bit uncertain about Nels's song -- they were expecting something with a bit more of a beat, maybe -- but once the backing instruments kick in, they really start grooving to it.
<Crion> Spring: "Prom."
<trenchfoot> She's good, but she's done better. Feels wrong singing without a guitar in her hands. If they want more of a beat, though... hmm.
<CBN> Tony: "Haven't been around for that one but is it as fuck-this as I'm thinking it'll be?"
<Crion> "They sorta concentrate all our gotta-be-neighborly bullshit into two nights, and we just gotta suck it up and smile through it. Guess that's what extended family is for."
<Crion> Spring shrugs. "I mean usually there's more sex, because it's a Spring court shindig, but apparently some chick was fucking the Kitchen in the kitchen earlier."
<Crion> "So approximately on that level, yeah."
<trenchfoot> Anyone looking eager to hop on stage? Or can she just roll right into song 2? Not actually Song 2, that song sucks, but--
<Crion> Nels has the stage.
<VoxPVoxD> Nels gets a big, uncomplicated smile from Stewart down the way.
<Crion> Langford nods to Melanie. "They do. And they keep coming until they're dealt with for good. Which is all its own bullshit."
<VoxPVoxD> Did the booth go quiet?
<banana> Nels' voice is so nice. Melanie's totally distracted at this point; she's lost any thread there was to her report. Things that happened a long time ago in the Hedge - if List wants anything else on that, he's going to have to ask for it.
<CBN> Tony: "Gonna pass pretty hard on that one. So you got any thoughts about what I told you about earlier? There was a lot of you-still-there? and not a lot else on the phone."
<Crion> "There is no other sort, really," Lister says in reply to the comment about evil gods.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "So I've come to understand."
<banana> Melanie: "What a thing to just live with."
<Crion> Spring: "Yeah I was writing it all down. People who needed to die, died, and that's what counts. The rest is...whew. Boss was NOT pleased to hear about that Loser chick being a spy. Spying's supposed to be our game."
<banana> To List: "Have they sent one after you before?"
<dammitwho> Maggie: "So... what do you think? Good idea, bad idea, old idea everyone's tried before?"
<Crion> Langford, to Melanie: "Yes. We took care of it fairly quickly. Only two or three intervals."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "So, Lister, do you like single player games at all or is it mostly all social stuff?"
<trenchfoot> She beams at the crowd. "We come into this world unknown," she starts. They want a beat, this'll give them one. "But know that we are not alone." A few more lines, and there we go. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0AV8lxGjdZ0
<Crion> "Once you put it down, the Huntsman doesn't come back immediately. You have about a month to regroup. Plan. Prepare."
<trenchfoot> Whoever made the Internet out of magic and dreams is a genius. Whoever put the entire contents of every music library on there even more so.
<Crion> Lister: "Oh, I mostly appreciate the online. Single-player games...not so replayable. And I have so much time. I do appreciate a good...what are they called? Open-world? I do appreciate those, so long as they're well done and not just endless busywork."
<banana> Melanie: "Okay. I'll think of it like an accident, a sudden hurt or setback that needs hard work to protect yourself and recover."
<trenchfoot> Here she is, a hundred years in the future, singing something that wasn't even written until after "she" died, and... there's a lot to unpack there, but honestly? This is good.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I clocked like, a thousand hours in Morrowind."
<banana> "What do we -" she gestures at herself and Langford, with heat burning around both of them "do now?"
<Crion> Amelia to Maggie: "I think it's a fantastic idea. We'll just need to set some baseline rules to make sure it doesn't burn the place down, but I'm definitely intrigued. When we set up the planning committees for Prom, I'll let you know."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "This song rules, holy shit."
<VoxPVoxD> To Lauren: "Do you dance?"
<Crion> Langford: "Well, we finish our drinks and go downstairs. I don't tell the Street what you just told me until we get back to Swordhome tonight, because it won't help anything if he decides to cause a scene now. You should go enjoy yourself. Job well done."
<Crion> "And we keep our eyes open for...some kind of killer robot."
<dammitwho> Maggie: "Beauty! Now I, need to see a wizard, about that mysterious weed that's been corrupting the morals of all of our children." She's finished her drink. Is Union about?
<CBN> Tony: "Speaking of, I got a weird question." And he just plows through with it. "Who can I ask, can I ask you? To look into something for me? It's sorta Hedge-y shit but if I'm over there, I've got geese and fish and shit all over my ass asking for stuff."
<banana> Melanie visibly wants to finish this and go downstairs. There's still a party and- she forgot something. "The only important thing I didn't get to is Kayeye Ellelle."
<Crion> Lauren: "...After a couple drinks, maybe..." She's finishing drink three.
<Crion> Langford frowns. "Oh, right. Did she escape?"
<Crion> "We can tolerate one in the wind, since the ringleader's dead."
<trenchfoot> Once Nels finishes the song, she slides offstage with a slight bow. She can perform again later, if there's another gap. And she can figure out some more enjoyable songs to sing. She had a list, but some of them... not appopriate for company.
<Crion> Spring: "Yeah, what's up?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Okay, so the order of operations will be: I sing, then we sing, then we dance."
<Crion> Union spent Nels's last song grinding really hard on Jordan Kit, who returned the attention.
<banana> Melanie: "She's alive. Loser took her away, claiming her oaths to the faeries were broken. I.. accepted it, because the Mistress had done some very demoralising things. My friends didn't want a needless fight."
<Crion> The mage snickered something in the younger man's ear, then wandered towards the back door to vape.
<Crion> Lauren nods firmly. "Then I will get another drink."
<CBN> Tony: "Okay---He pauses and hollers at the stage as Nels steps down "HELL YEAH NELS" Clears his throat. "Anyway yeah. Okay, so. Those Loyalists, where'd they come from, how'd they hang out over there just doing their shit for awhile? They seemed to have a space of their own all carved out. And related to that, what's going to happen to that space, once the, uh, the fucked up death trees are gone?"
<banana> She's choosing her words to List quite carefully there, but without the intent or really the capability to deceive per se.
<Crion> Langford seems to barely restrain himself from slamming the empty tumbler down. "FUCKING Kingsley!"
<VoxPVoxD> That leaves Stewart alone in the booth with Lister.
<Crion> He composes himself. "You made the right call. The team was more important than...and like I said, you're not a kill squad. We don't want you to be."
<banana> Melanie: "It's quite a thing that having someone unexpected our 'side' threw more of a wrench in things than the presence of an actual.. you know."
<Crion> "But I don't like that two of the Baltimore Hedge's Loyalists ended up in Kingsley's pocket."
<banana> *on our 'side'
<trenchfoot> She smiles over to Tony, then looks around. Her friends are all otherwise occupied - maybe she should speak to one of those vampires? They're certainly in a similar place to her, in some ways... what are The Girl and The Mainer up to? They looked interesting, and besides, one of them sang.
<Crion> Lister to Stewart, more seriously: "Requests for assistance from the Freehold to my Court, by rule, must go through the office of the Mainer, and be delivered by either Kingsley or Santander."
<Crion> "That said."
<Crion> "Lauren has my phone number."
<Crion> "If it is necessary."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart nods slowly, as if the physical effort required to process Lister's words made his head heavier. "We appreciate that. I'm glad you're her friend. She's great, isn't she?"
<Crion> Lister beams. "She's marvellous." The smile lessens somewhat. "I don't...keep friends very long. Not by my reckoning, that is. Everyone grows up, and I stay the same age. I will not permit the time that I have left in her friendship to be interrupted by some James Cameron vehicle."
<dammitwho> Hmm. She wouldn't want to interfere with a young man shooting his shot... that's probably a sin against Spring or something.
<Crion> Oh, he left Kit on the dance floor. That young man is incorrigible.
<Crion> He should be out back by himself.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "By my reckoning, we'll have to kill it hard some time in the next couple of nights, and then we'll have about a month to make preparations to put it down for good. Even by mortal reckoning, that's fast work."
<Crion> The Mainer and the Girl were slow-dancing before, but are now leaning against a wall off to the side. Mainer nods at Nels as she comes down off the stage.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart's realizing that he repeats words a lot more the more he drinks.
<banana> Melanie tells Langford she's looking forward to the next round of this bullshit and walks to the stairs. She pauses by the edge of the mezzanine, looking out over the club - less normal humans now, more weird monsters. All allied, somehow, against the worse and wyrder things out there. She looks for friends, for poeople she'd like to be friends, for killer robots.
<Crion> Spring, to Tony: "To answer your questions last in first out, the Hedge is gonna reclaim that Hollow unless someone goes in to stop it. Not sure why you'd want to, since it's ah, been compromised by one of Them, but if you did, you could put down alternate roots there. As for how the Loyalists were operating in the Hedge -- now that's interesting.
<Crion> "See, usually those mopes get by, by having patrons. You know, gentry fucks that they serve, and are bound to by agreements. Silvery leashes, gilded cages. We thought that was what was happening here."
<banana> Probably works to just start at the bar again.
<Crion> "But you said some bad bitch Keeper came in and annihilated them?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart, sitting with a pale, befanged Fancy Lad, smiles at Melanie as she shuffles by.
<CBN> Tony:"About the shape of what we saw, it was about three-quarters done when we got there."
<Crion> Lister nods. "It is, but I have you're up to it. You are already consulting with the willworkers, no?"
<dammitwho> Goodness. Well, then. She'll take her *next* drink, nod to Amelia, and make her way downstairs. It's a big more difficult to keep people from bumping her and spilling her beer at this time of night, but she manages. "Hey there! 're you Union?"
<banana> A vampire?! Melanie: "Hellooo."
<Crion> "These alliances can be tedious, but they can bear sweet fruit."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Oooh, that's a cool word. I'd never heard 'willworker' before. Yeah, they're helping us out. Keeping something of mine safe in the Belvedere."
<Crion> Union: "Yo. Oh, hey! You're uhhhh. You're with Stewart, right?"
<VoxPVoxD> To Melanie: "Hey! Melanie, this is Lister. Lister, this is Melanie."
<VoxPVoxD> "Melanie's a friend of mine. Lister is mostly a friend of Lauren's."
<trenchfoot> Nels is still smiling as she approaches, hand out to shake. "Hi there, don't think we've met before. Nels," she introduces herself. Almost gave her last name too, but that's still something that's weird and uncomfortable to think about.
<Crion> Lister looks up at the 'hello,' blinks, and giggle-chuckles again. "Hello, Melanie!"
<banana> "It is." A teen vampire?! "Oh, I was- just talking to, you know, my secret boss in the secret war thing.. he told me about Lauren. Sorry." This last isn't an apology to Stewart, it's to the teen vampire, for briefly ignoring him.
<Crion> Spring: "So that Keeper was either the one hold their leashes and it got pissed, orrr...it decided YOLO and fuck you, I'm gonna do what I want. And it killed some Loyalists under the protection of another Keeper."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart nods. "This is the safest place in the city tonight. She's gonna be okay."
<banana> Fascinating that they exist and kind of horrible that they have kids? But this was more important.
<banana> Very firmly: "Yes."
<VoxPVoxD> "How did he take the, uh, Loser situation?"
<CBN> Tony: "That's win-win though, right? I guess we could just ask the two that walked away for more color, or someone else could. I'm not planning on it."
<Crion> Spring: "Which generally wouldn't be a problem -- in fact it's kind of brilliantly lucky. In fact, it still isn't a problem, except for one thing. You all swore an oath with it. Small one, trivial one, helpful to you, yeah -- but that means you're oathbound to a Keeper. Doesn't make you a traitor or nothing, but it IS something the other Keepers might be able to sniff out."
<Crion> "So, might wanna keep your heads down for a bit."
<Crion> "Cause I really don't know how that stuff works."
<dammitwho> Maggie: "Maggie! Pleased to meetcha! Now, Stewart's gal tells me you're the connection for the dreaded marihuana leaf, is that right?"
<VoxPVoxD> Heh heh. "Stewart's gal". Stewart has a gal. Hee.
<Crion> Union sort of frown-smiles and glances about, like he's looking for a candid camera, or a cop. "Why ma'am, whatever could you yes."
<banana> It doesn't even occur to Melanie to think of Stewart as an agent of the Autumn Court, here. "Little bit wall-punchingly. He saw it as a coup, right, two of the five guys now in some way in the autumn king's pocket..." she shrugs.
<CBN> Tony: "Oh, well fuck. Cool. Fuck." Tony's back to alternating between staring at his beer and drinking it.
<Crion> The Mainer: "Evening, darling."
<banana> "Sorry about the shop talk, Lister! I know it's a party, we just don't all get together often enough due to, like, it involves going outside."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart nods, kind of puffing his cheeks in a 'well what can you do' gesture. "I get the sense stuff like that happens a lot."
<Crion> The Girl: "Hello. Beautiful song. Beautiful voice."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart nods, kind of puffing his cheeks in a 'well what can you do' gesture. "I get the sense stuff like that happens a lot."
<VoxPVoxD> "Or at least, you know, relative to other kinds of discord."
<VoxPVoxD> To Lister: "The other kind of discord."
<Crion> Spring: "It's better than the alternative, which is that you KNOW a Keeper is looking for you."
<Crion> Lister archly: "I do understand the context."
<CBN> Tony: "Fair enough."
<Crion> Lauren's returned with her drink. "Hi Melanie," she says, sliding back in next to Stewart.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I'm gonna go up and sing in a minute."
<Crion> Spring: "Anyway, I can have the boss do some digging." She grins. "So you're fuckin around with hobs?"
<trenchfoot> Nels: "Thanks! I've had practice." She nods to the Mainer: "You weren't half bad yourself."
<banana> Melanie: "I think it's petty but if it doesn't change any outcomes, who cares?" To Lister: "Do you guys get the same thing where you're.. suddenly plunged into a world of intrigue, tradecraft and maneuvering even if that was totally not your thing?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Probably want to do something party friendly, kinda upbeat..."
<Crion> The rangy, bushy man scoffs. "Aw, hell. That's all on old Harlan."
<Crion> Lister's face clouds a bit. "Yes and no. For us it comes along with the terror and the violence and the abuse. It doesn't spring forth after an escape."
<CBN> Tony: "They're little mascots for sports teams I never wanna meet. And other than the pigs, and those little watermelon shitters, they seem okay."
<Crion> He shrugs. "I suppose there are upsides and downsides to it all."
<dammitwho> "I've got a business proposition for you." She visibly holds back a smile like, what, is this guy really worried about getting arrested here? She's about to continue, asking him whether he'd like to get a booth in case one of the vampires or other wizards notices something strange going on and phones the police, but that might be too rude for a first meeting. Who knows what makes wizards
<dammitwho> antsy.
<trenchfoot> "D'you sing?" she asks the Girl. Though I don't actually believe she knows either of their names, such as they are.
<banana> Whether it was really not Melanie's thing she prefers not to examine. She smiles weakly at Lauren, incredibly obviously glancing around for threats to her and suddenly terrified of saying the wrong thing and so on.
<Crion> Spring grins. "Watermelon shitters? So are they watermelons that shit or do they shit watermelons or--"
<Crion> Lauren releases what's happening but if anything she's slightly grateful. It has after all been almost 24 hours of this.
<banana> Melanie: "I'm interested in the similarities and differences between these experiences. Earlier I was talking to a weed wizard who had another perspective, similar ends by different means. The.. weird magic differences, who cares, but isn't it fascinating that we all end up in kind of the same place?"
<Crion> Union quirks an eyebrow. "Shoot. Uh, rhetorically."
<banana> "Due perhaps to being in the same literal place. Material conditions!"
<CBN> Tony: "They were little shitheads who tried to fuck us over, that were watermelons. Now they're a thin paste. Again, the Hedge: okay sometimes."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart wonders what Stu, reluctantly supernatural, would make of a party like this.
<Crion> Spring: "Niiiiiiice."
<Crion> Lister smiles. "It's one hell of an afterlife."
<CBN> Tony: "But yeah. Should I not be talking to them? Probably. But it never hurts to be a good neighbor when you're new in town."
<Crion> The Girl chuckles. "No, I don't think so. I make him do it." She nudges the Mainer.
<dammitwho> Maggie: "You ever tried coralscalp? Or coupnettle?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart kisses Lauren on the cheek and says, "Okay, wish me luck." Is the stage empty?
<trenchfoot> Nels: "Ha." How's he feel about that? she doesn't ask, but she does check him for a reaction.
<banana> Afterlife, lol. Is that really how they think of it, or is the kid just leaning in? "So like.. we're all othered, right? There's things out there that are different to us in here, meaning the Sidereal, and maybe the thing that allows for solidarity is.. perilous estrangement? Being made into something, parens perhaps by yourself end parens, which is threatened by the norm."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart flinches as he looks up at Harlan, but luckily that last drink is there to steel his nerves.
<Crion> It is; Cider Stitch -- you know, the Winter Court kid Mainer and Girl and Stewart murdered some more cops to help -- just finished: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQaC3o4Tmm8
<VoxPVoxD> Hell yes.
<banana> Melanie expects that the vampire is probably not really thirteen years old. It- he must have another unique perspective on this stuff.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart hops up onto the stage with surprising nimbleness and murmurs something to Harlan no one else'll be able to hear.
<Crion> Lister nods. "Likely so. There are, of course, vampires and wizards and wolves and things that go bump in the dark which are not welcome here, however -- even changelings! -- so even if such a thing is necessary, it is hardly sufficient."
<Crion> Harlan sort of shakes his head, but then he nods.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart looks around, making eye contact with Lauren and drawing in another deep breath. The song announces itself with a clash of cymbals - once, twice. Then the guitar. Then: "I'm coming out of my cage, and I've been doing just fine..." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gGdGFtwCNBE
<banana> Melanie: "Yes. Even consciousness of your shared interests aren't going to make a bunch of.. humans cooperate all the time. My question is - I don't wanna interrogate you, let me know if this is boring, but what I'd like to know is whether the metaexperience we share acts by the same mechanism on what must be extraordinarily varied psyches. Whether the presence-of-self is altered
<banana> materially, by the darker world we now live in, or whether that being-in-world gives rise to experiential compatibilities..."
<Crion> Lister, quietly: "It's not boring, but it is profoundly upsetting."
<VoxPVoxD> Mr. Brightside's still as corny as it ever was, but people remember it, and between Stewart's big-voiced ingenue-ity and the urgent energy he brings to the mic the song plays.
<banana> D:
<Crion> Lauren has gone to watch Stewart, and is singing along by the first refrain.
<VoxPVoxD> "But it's just the price I pay! Destiny is calling me! Open up my eager eyes..."
<Crion> Lister: "It's not your fault. I've -- we, vampires -- tend to have a very long time to think about this, in very...practical terms."
<Crion> "We have to hurt people to stay alive, you see."
<Crion> "'Alive.'"
<Crion> "This is something we don't precisely share with the rest of you. Werewolves seem to enjoy hurting people, but I do not think they have to. Mages and changelings, even less so."
<VoxPVoxD> When the song is done, Stewart spares no thought for the crowd's reaction. He's reaching his hand out to Lauren.
<banana> Melanie: "I'm sorry, Lister. This attempt to understand isn't.. nice, just necessary. I can totally leave you alone or we could like, get shots and think of something to sing."
<Crion> "So the metaexperience, as you call it, isn't quite shared. Not quite all the same data coming in for all participants, mmm?"
<banana> "Do you want to know something though? Something that might not be obvious."
<Crion> Lister looks up. His eyes are a bit sunken. A hand half-raises but lands on the table; there's nothing to wipe. Vampires don't cry anymore, do they? Not when they're dead. "Yes?"
<Crion> The Mainer seems to be taking this all in stride. He seems used to good natured ribbing.
<Crion> Union, to Maggie: "I...have no idea what those are."
<Crion> The Girl, to Nels: "You don't seem to be from around here." She tilts her head. "Or from around now."
<Crion> "There is something...very much like us, in you."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "...you could say that. Thanks for not yelling at me about the value of a dollar like the last person to notice," she jokes. "Nels Foulke. Same-but-not-the-same as the one you might've listened to."
<Crion> The Girl arches an eyebrow. "Ahhhhhhhhh."
<Crion> The Mainer frowns. "Wait--"
<Crion> Then he shakes his head. "You meet the damnedest folks, in this job."
<banana> "We're kind of.. changelings are made into people who really, really have to stick together. Self-defence. At the same time we're mostly so fucked up that this proximity tends to have us tormenting each other. Our psychologies are shaped like weapons. It's not the same thing - there are these built-in enemies, fetches that we get an incentive to kill, that's closer. Um.. I don't want to
<banana> make any unearned comparisons, I just want to say that I get that surviving has a cost , outsourced, and that you do it anyway. We survive, or we wouldn't be the ones talking about it."
<Crion> Lister nods. "I think I understand. Thank you, Melanie." He leans back and says quietly to himself: "Water, water everywhere, and not a drop to drink."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "It's been something," she agrees. "Still haven't listened to her records, but I bet she's worse."
<dammitwho> Maggie grins: "Faerie drugs. 'Goblin fruits', the technical name. Coralscalp is a very fine, thin sort of seaweed. You smoke it, and for a little bit, maybe an hour or so you notice things you might've overlooked, you're more mentally grounded, more aware of yourself, you know? And then you start to hallucinate when you come down, but even that's not so bad."
<Crion> The Mainer: "She don't have your spark, but maybe they had some of that movie magic. But for, ah, radio."
<Crion> Union has gone from sort of archly amused at the very idea of this upper midwestern woman accosting him about drugs to very, very interested. "You don't fuckin say. How's it keep over on this side? You gotta grow it in your Hedge, right?"
<banana> Melanie does understand having too freaking long to think about it. Would she trade a need to drink blood for human skin and hair? No. Not quite.
<Crion> Lauren takes Stewart's hand, and climbs up on stage. Moving close to him: "Okay so what are we singing"
<trenchfoot> A grimace, quickly smoothed out. "So what brings you to Baltimore? You from around here, or just find a place to settle down?"
<dammitwho> Maggie: "Coupnettle is this shrub with little bitter leaves that people usually make into a tea. Drink it, and it's like a good night's sleep... at least the first cup. Drink another in the same day, and it's like one of them... I dunno, those eight-hour energy things they advertise on the TV made out of discontinued Air Force drugs. Gotta be careful with it, I'd wager."
<Crion> Anyone Tony particular want to talk to? If not, there's a bar upstairs that is completely empty, and stocked. If he wants some peace and quiet. As long as that lasts.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "...shit, I didn't think that far ahead. Uh, duets, I want something we both sing, not something one of us sings and one of us-- do you know Under Pressure?"
<dammitwho> Maggie nods. "S'right. Hard to find. But! If you've got a place in the Hedge, you can grow a few plants... and the markets sell seeds. Trouble is, from what I gather it's hard to carry them out of the Hedge whole."
<CBN> That sounds like the exact place Tony needs to be.
<CBN> Tony, to Spring: "Anyway, be in touch about that other stuff. I'm usually home."
<dammitwho> "But... a small operation could process a select reserve on-site. If you follow."
<Crion> Spring nods and gives a mock salute. "Go on with your bad self." She sort of laughs to herself like she's made a joke only she understands.
<dammitwho> "And maybe, if we do it right, *that* stuff could be taken anywhere."
<Crion> Union scratches his chin and nods. "I do...how bad does bringing equipment from over here, over there, fuck it up?"
<Crion> "Like my big concern is if I put some of our magical bullshit on something, and we introduce it to YOUR magical bullshit, we might end up with bad, unintentional magical bullshit."
<CBN> Tony goes, and does. It's not drinking alone if the building's occupied.
<banana> Melanie drinks with, or at least next to, the sad baby vampire. She could get back into the swing of the party, honestly; the ghost of Melanie past isn't buried very far down at all. ..wasn't that something from a story? Maybe one of the Talewright's derivative plays. She doesn't quite remember.
<banana> She watches Stewart and Lauren sing instead. Not as nice as Nels, or even the winter changeling who went before, but they've got the courage to stand up there and sing. She's glad.
<VoxPVoxD> Then comes the moment where Stewart and Lauren work out the most important thing about any couple: which one of them is the Bowie and which one of them is the Mercury. Once they decide, a look to Harlan and that bass line gets everyone's attention. "Pressure! Pushing down on me..." https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oTMzHcs4mK0
<Crion> Lauren was visibly startled by the choice at first, but she got over it quickly. And...she already seemed to know all the words...?
<Crion> To both parts...?
<VoxPVoxD> That makes sense. It's a really good song.
<dammitwho> Maggie: "Aw, poo. I was hoping you fellas and the Autumn folks had already worked together enough that you could tell me 'this is the worst idea' or 'this is fine, full steam ahead'. I can tell you for free that even ordinary machines get a lil' temperamental."
<Crion> Union scoffs. "Oh, sure. The Mysterium has worked with Autumn."
<dammitwho> "The whom?"
<Crion> Union waves his vape. "Wizard librarians. Nerds."
<trenchfoot> Oh, wow, they are really good. She's gonna have to see if either of them would play with her if she records again. And also if either of them know how to record music nowadays. Well. That's new. Healing, right?
<Crion> "Anyway, they guard secrets pretty jealously over there. Especially from those who they think don't deserve it. So fuck it, we'll do this live."
<dammitwho> "Aren't all wizards more or less--" Pull up pull up! "--librarians? Magic tomes and such?"
<Crion> Union: "Maggie...darling...dearest...do I look like I read over the tenth grade level?"
<Crion> He does not.
<trenchfoot> Way to brag.
<VoxPVoxD> By the time the song winds up, they're singing in unison, and Stewart turns her to face him so they're looking in each other's eyes for the last few lines. "Cause love's such an old-fashioned word..."
<VoxPVoxD> When the song ends, he kisses her right there on stage.
<banana> :3
<Crion> She almost beats him to it.
<trenchfoot> Nels whoops from near the Girl and the Mainer.
<Crion> The Mainer: "You know, I wouldn't've expected that boy had it in him."
<banana> Is Lister or anyone else still at the bar? "Protect at all costs, imo."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "People have a way of surprising you."
<Crion> Lister is, but he's standing up. "I agree."
<Crion> "I think it's time to take my turn. Thank you for coming by, Melanie."
<banana> "Oh, good luck! No, wait- knock em dead."
<Crion> He grins, showing full fang. "Thank you."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart leads Lauren down past Lister as he gets up on stage, and they settle back in at their booth.
<dammitwho> Sunnily: "Aw, there's nothing about working people that makes fancy book learning any harder, and anyway I'd hate to judge."
<banana> That would honestly be pretty scary if Melanie had veins.
<Crion> When Stewart and Lauren are offstage, they almost run into Lister, whose eyes look a little red-rimmed, but not puffy. "It was beautiful," he says to both of them.
<Crion> Then he steps up on stage -- to a couple "ahh fucks" and smattered, but good-natured, boos.
<VoxPVoxD> "Thank you." Stewart looks concerned at the sight of Lister. A questioning glance at Lauren after they've settled back down.
<Crion> Lister raises his hands in mock protest. "I know! Usually I roll out the piano. I'm told that kills the mood."
<Crion> "So tonight I decided to sing something more...modern."
<Crion> He walks back to Harlan Jape and confers for a moment...then takes Harlan's electric guitar, as the man himself slides behind the drums.
<Crion> "I believe this is a band boys my age are supposed to have liked, at one point in time. One, two, one two three--"
<Crion> Kill All Your Friends -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BQndQV9E8C8
<Crion> In the end, some wished he'd stayed with the piano.
<VoxPVoxD> Ahahahahahahaha.
<banana> Another one? What is with this city.
<trenchfoot> This is... well performed. It is an excellent performance of. That.
<Crion> It is perhaps incredibly odd to hear a 13 year old French boy bellow-scream "It's been ten fucking years since you've been showing your face -- round -- here"
<VoxPVoxD> This so song is so good, Stewart doesn't even care about the psychological implications. He was one of those 13 year old boys, god damn it!
<Crion> Union nods...then frowns. "What the fuck was that?"
<trenchfoot> Frankly, Nels' life has been incredibly odd for months now. Well. Almost a hundred years. That's never going to get any easier to refer to.
<banana> 'Do what it takes to survive cause I'm still here'. Sure. The probably-ancient kid knows.
<VoxPVoxD> For instance, Stewart doesn't reflect on 'I was killing before killing was cool' at all.
<banana> Melanie hums a bit despite herself. She's pretty sure her new thesis topic is going to work out at last. Maybe it's time to rejoin the party. There are some cool looking guys and girls.. what happened to Gemma earlier, she wonders? Did anyone tell Nels about protection?
<trenchfoot> Do you want to have that conversation and find out?
<dammitwho> Maggie: "Dunno. Never heard the song before. Do you think it's an original?" 'I was killing before killing was cool' sounds like a vampire thing to sing...?
<Crion> Union: "No, down the street, I thought I saw--"
<Crion> There's a crash from the front of the venue.
<Crion> A bouncer has just gone through the front door.
<Crion> The hard way.
<banana> Melanie's drawn to Nels, yeah. "Nelsss. That was q-"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart's on his feet immediately.
<trenchfoot> Oh, shit. She didn't bring her gun.
<Crion> There's a perfect frozen moment as the six and a half foot tall man built like a walking tank, wearing all black leathers and darkened aviator shades, carrying a shotgun steps through the door, just scanning the crowd. The second bouncer tackles him and is grabbed out of the air and carelessly tossed away. The bouncers are not the priority. The priority is--
<Crion> He sees Lauren and racks the shotgun, and now everyone is moving.
<banana> So they really are that stupid. Wrath boils from the crowd; a glamour harvest later? Things could go wrong here, but the odds are massively in their favour. Melanie moves to become part of those odds.
<CBN> Tony hears the crash and doesn't drop his beer, but he DOES drop the solo-moping long enough to haul downstairs.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart's loose as hell, in exactly the right frame of mind and state of inebriation to be really stupid. He's hopping from well-heeled foot to well-heeled foot like a prizefighter, blocking the machine's line of sight with his body but standing far enough away from the booth that Lauren could either crawl away or be ushered out.
<Crion> The balustrade and table where the Summer Court was holding forth bursts into splinters, and a great writhing MONSTER howls as everyone runs for cover. It hits the Huntsman full-on and shreds an arm and most of the thing's ribcage -- revealing not flesh and blood but gleaming, perfect machine.
<Crion> That might have once been Cuth?
<VoxPVoxD> Rip him up rip him up--
<trenchfoot> Nels flinches back, patting her side where she knows her gun isn't and she's never leaving without it again, God, who even knows if that would help, but she can't panic. Who knows what she can do, but panicking is off the table. Just, get ready to dodge if it looks at her.
<trenchfoot> Also, what the fuck. How is this her life. She didn't sign up for any of this.
<banana> What the fuck Stewart. Melanie scrambles, dropping her old face on the ground as she goes.
<banana> By the time she gets to the stage the visage of a young college student is gone, replaced with a crumbling gleaming-white tree-woman who scatters seeds all along the dais' edge; nothing happens yet, the Wyrd resisting her cajolings despite the offering. A promise broken.
<Crion> "GET DOWN!" from the stairwell. Everyone does but Cuth, who roars, holding the thing in place.
<Crion> Gerald and the Liaison of Winter advance on it, firing their FAL and combat shotgun respectively, until it stops moving. Then 'Colin' walks up to and empties the rest of the drum into the the thing's chest and head.
<Crion> The red lights in its eyes quietly blink out.
<trenchfoot> Holy shit.
<Crion> Gerald: "Clear."
<dammitwho> Oh. Well.
<Crion> There's now a naked, buff man lying in the middle of the floor next to the metal skeleton. "Whew."
<banana> Does that always happen to werewolves? Do they carry a change of pants? It's fine if they don't.
<banana> Melanie's shaking a bit near the others, shedding leaves, but.. as promised, it's safe. This is probably the safest place in the city, tonight.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart just kind of stands there, transfixed, until his heart rate settles down. How's Lauren doing?
<banana> For some kinds of people. With shared experiences.
<trenchfoot> Nels shakes her head from somewhere behind the Girl. How on earth is this real.
<Crion> Someone throws a jacket over him soon enough.
<Crion> Laurens sort of huddled in the corner, staring warily at the corpse, which Kingsley is now prodding with his foot.
<CBN> Tony mutters to himself on the stairs and finishes his beer. "The fuck is this party."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart helps Lauren to a standing position and hugs her. Firmly: "We just bought ourselves a month to beat this thing."
<Crion> The party's breaking up; no one's much in the mood to go any further now. The cops will need to be shooed off and someone's gonna have to clear the dance floor.
<trenchfoot> Not it.
<Crion> The Autumn Court is already quite interestedly hauling it away.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart will help with the cleanup until he's cleared to take Lauren home.
<Crion> That clearance comes pretty quickly.
<banana> Melanie will help on the dancefloor, insofar as it involves picking up bits of herself. She'd like to inspect just what the hell that thing was. Lauren's.. former captor.. did everything as machines? Or everyone? She wonders what the Huntsman used to be.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart's in no shape to drive, but he can still call a cab. It's chilly out, this late. He keeps Lauren close.
<Crion> She'll go home with him. No one interferes with Melanie if she attempts to poke and prod the remains; they'll be taken to the back while transport arrives.
<banana> She'll follow the Autumn people, then. "It was fast. Is that a matter of mechanical augmentation? Can it be disrupted?"
<Crion> Kingsley, mulling things over as Gerald and Jameson lug the body: "Aesthetically, yes. And generally speaking function follows form with these things. It's not a machine, but it conceives of itself as a machine, so usually it will behave as a machine."
<VoxPVoxD> "Nobody got hurt," says Stewart after they're inside. It's stuffy in here; he cracks a window for Lauren.
<Crion> He glances over. "You're Lucas, from Summer."
<Crion> "Good job back there."
<trenchfoot> Nels is out as soon as she can find an escort home. She is... extremely undefended right now, has nothing to add about the investigation, and also really wants to go home.
<banana> "Cuthbert the werewolf had the speed to match it. We can't rely on them, though I'm very grateful they were here."
<banana> "Um, maybe we could replicate what he did though, getting right up close to it.. it moved like an athlete, not a martial artist."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart can get a cab for Nels, or hell, just bring her in his. They live in the same building.
<Crion> "No, we can't," he murmurs. "Huntsmen learn when they're killed. And something based off a machine...likely iterative."
<Crion> Kingsley nods at that.
<CBN> Tony wanders down and over to Melanie, since at least she seems to be talking a lot. "Hey and what the fuck was that."
<trenchfoot> They do. Up to him if he wants to invite her along with himself and Lauren; she can wait, if he's concerned about getting Lauren home fast.
<Crion> Kingsley will nod to Tony as he walks up, but it still mostly lost in his own thoughts.
<banana> "Tony..."
<banana> Melanie: "Let's sit down." Her face hasn't grown back yet.
<banana> "You know Lauren right?"
<CBN> Tony: "Is that Stewart's girlfriend? Didn't introduce me but I gotta assume."
<banana> "Yeah, the hot shy one with laser eyes."
<banana> "Apparently she recently got a Herald, which is faery-speak for when they announce they're going to Get you."
<banana> "So everyone was on high alert tonight - I heard about it an hour ago from Langford List. The lone ranger idiot machine was the first try to Get."
<VoxPVoxD> She's not *shy*, she's selective. Stewart makes some tea - just Sleepytime, with the cozy bear on the box, nothing fancy. "So far things are still going about as well as possible."
<CBN> Tony: "Oh. That's fucked up."
<banana> "Worse: it isn't really dead. This is sort of remote-controlled by its.. heart? In the Hedge."
<banana> "Basically Lauren gets a quest out of nowhere, and the stakes are the worst possible thing that could possibly happen. The reward is she gets to go back to her life. We have to help her." Melanie is vehement, but.. so's everyone on this.
<CBN> Tony: "Well, even better. But it's safe for the rest of us to fuck off now for the night if we want, right?" He looks for a place to set down his last empty.
<CBN> Tony: "And obviously, of course we help. But, not tonight."
<banana> Melanie: "It can't come back for a long time. Weeks."
<Crion> Lauren is stretched out in either Stewart's bed or on his couch, depending on whether he permits liquids in the bedroom. It's good to be somewhere familiar again.
<banana> "That's the rule. I don't know why the fuck the faeries play by rules, but they do."
<Crion> She smiles slightly. "Is that what you call it?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart usually has a glass of water in his room somewhere. What is hard to come by in his bedroom are electronics. Even his alarm clock is analog. He sits down at Lauren's feet. "Those bouncers are the only ones who got hurt, and they're gonna be okay. Property damage is property damage. Everyone's fine. You're still safe."
<CBN> Tony: "Because they are stupid." He states this definitively. "And I am going home. Take care of yourself out there." And Tony sets out for his apartment, ready to sleep off the weird bullshit with some nice normal old Chinese food.
<Crion> Lauren: "...It's still out there."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "We were never going to deal with it permanently the first time it came at us. We just didn't have enough time to prepare."
<VoxPVoxD> "Next time -- if it even gets that far -- we'll be ready."
<banana> They are stupid. It's weird, but convenient. We can beat them, once we've learned enough.
<Crion> She sips her tea, then puts it down. "You know what? I believe you."
<Crion> "Now c'mere."
<Crion> And we can probably shut the door here, and leave them to it.
<VoxPVoxD>
<VoxPVoxD>
<VoxPVoxD>
<VoxPVoxD>
<VoxPVoxD>
<VoxPVoxD> The UMBC library is a big, modern building, the way university libraries tend to be, and Stewart comes out here at least once a week for the Climate Justice Reading Group, where he nods along and contributes little to the discussion, but walks away fat on these teens' fear of the future. It was coming out of the library that Stewart met Melanie in earnest for the first time, and he's found
<VoxPVoxD> her here again, reading something impenetrable in a quiet corner of the reading rooms alone. "Hey," he whispers, sitting down.
<banana> Ah, but it's not meant to be impenetrable today. Melanie smiles a lot more than she used to, including now. "Heyyy Ste-wart. Do you want to be, like, a guinea pig? For an argument?"
<banana> She's shuffling papers, most printed but with a few handwritten addenda from today.
<VoxPVoxD> It's nice seeing Melanie in a good mood. Stewart seems focused, more than he used to, including now. He sets down his laptop bag and folds his hands on the table. "Absolutely."
<banana> "Okay." She's definitely a bit nervous about this, since it's very hard to tell whether these things make sense without a reader - ha! "Okay, this isn't finished, it's an outline to be expanded. I have to give you a tiny bit of context but it mainly stands alone.." She shuffles papers more, pulling out one to go on top of the main pile.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart waits patiently, his mind sliding off the ongoing problem of the huntsman to give Melanie his undivided attention.
<banana> Let's hope he doesn't regret it.
<banana> Melanie begins with that minimal context.. since Stewart knows nothing about her work it would be useless to launch into the actual new argument to start. Okay..
<banana> "...having situated the alien in society, we understand that his distinguishing characteristic is not an inability to contribute. The alien's *presence* is illegitimate, an identity constructed collaboratively between the alien himself and the meme-masters of the society he invades; the classic examples are those alienated by societal changes or requirements, refusing to accept its premises,
<banana> as well as those aliens who try to enter into a closed society without a dominant integrative meme."
<banana> Melanie's voice changes, dropping the cadence of recitation as she puts the page down. "So that's just background, my view of the concept of the alien in the context of.. okay let's not preempt."
<banana> "Remember, this is an outline, the barest sketch. I'd really like you to know what you think, though."
<banana> She picks up the papers again and begins to read, voice steadying.
<banana> "The Alienee is different to the Alien. She is not disallowed from entering society, but forcibly removed from sociability while still physically present. Disabled people, felons and survivors of abuse are not alienated by a process of rejection; they have become inimical, dangerous to society by virtue of the statement they make about it.
<banana> What is the alienee's relationship to contribution? An alien's work may be socially necessary while paradoxically forbidden. An alienee is in a worse position, dependent on society but not aligned with its productive interests.
<banana> A liberal view of the alienee would see her as a victim with special needs - incapable of contributing but to be supported out of common humanity.
<banana> This is deceptive. To survive, an alienee must hide from or *change* the world. Society owes her nothing, for she is its enemy, but if she accepts its support - its framing - then she remains in stasis, incapable of success on the terms to which she has been forced."
<banana> Now she's looking at him expectantly. It's unclear, to Melanie also, what she's expecting.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart... mostly follows this. He thinks. "So if I understand you right, you're saying that people who've fallen through the cracks of society are only cared for as long as they stay where they fell?"
<banana> "That's part of it." Melanie shuffles papers again nervously; she's responding now, not reading. "Actually what I'm trying to do is introduce this concept, I want to come up with a rigorous treatment of those.. crack-fallers, fit them into an expanded sociology that's more than just 'marginalised group'.."
<banana> "That's part of it." Melanie shuffles papers again nervously; she's responding now, not reading. "Actually what I'm trying to do is introduce this concept, I want to come up with a rigorous treatment of those.. crack-fallers, fit them into an expanded sociology that's more than just 'marginalised group'.."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Something that might include us."
<banana> "Yeah and like, take into account that we actually have power, not just exclusion. I want to explore that and see who's really in the most danger, hopefully nobody but I freaking doubt it, get to grips with.. how you theoretically fit normal people and us-people into the same mindset."
<banana> "But I wanna develop an ontological category here, not talk about concrete Evil Faeries. That would cause problems."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "So like, to arrive at a notion of society that integrates kinds of power specific to victimhood, or, or survivorship, you need a model of victimhood that you can attach that power to without changing the underlying..." He gestures vaguely.
<banana> (Vague gesture) "is pretty much it. I'll have to work my way up to" (far more elaborate gesture).
<banana> "Some of this stuff is actually important? For mainstream social functioning? Think about how, like, the vampires deal with local authority. What effects does that have if they're everywhere?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "The question is, is a police officer who's corrupt becasuse of magic mind-controlling blood a different, uh, qualia than a police officer who's just taking bribes from a mobster or whatever."
<VoxPVoxD> "Like to what extent does a vampire subvert rather than reproduce conventional social relations."
<banana> Melanie writes that down. "That's right, that's right. If you look at it from the perspective of a society that can't perceive these things directly - they can't see survivors, don't listen to their voices. Also some of us are literally invisible, with invisiblity magic. Anyway- what kind of mistakes are being made?"
<banana> "Failures of understanding which might be hurting everyone needlessly. Or not. I don't know, yet."
<banana> Maybe it's only hurting the people whose blood a vampire takes or the bouncers a huntsman throws through a door?
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I've actually been thinking about stuff like this recently. Like, you met Lister, right? At the party. Le petit prince."
<banana> Melanie: "Oh, yeah. He was 'profoundly sad', which is probably true but might also be like.. the camoflague you get on a poisonous frog.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart winces. "I don't think he's faking it. I did some research on him. He goes back to the court of Louis XIV. That's like, late 17th early 18th century. He's been 13 for over 300 years."
<banana> Melanie: "And has, therefore, survived for 300 years?"
<banana> "There are at least two ways to do that but being really genuinely dangerous, like having your own sorrow be a weapon, that's got to be one."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart nods. "300 years of full subjective life, too. Lauren told me vampires go to sleep sometimes - to pass the time, I guess - but she doesn't think Lister ever has."
<banana> "I'm not saying I want the guy to be sad."
<VoxPVoxD> "Came to Baltimore about 30 years ago, claimed power, cut all ties with the bigger regional courts, and just... killed every comer, for years, until the comers stopped coming."
<VoxPVoxD> "Now he plays video games all night."
<banana> It sure would be awful if that happened to you. Getting made into a monster and then having to live that way for about three hundred years. This is slightly worrying, though: "So 'prince' is a vampire term like the freehold courts use? Or he was an actual prince in France?"
<banana> "I assumed Lister was dangerous, but not.. kill other vampires for thirty years dangerous. I hope I wasn't tactless."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "A matter of some historical dispute! He tends to deny it, but some sources say he has a claim to the French throne. But no he is, formally, Prince of the Court of Baltimore, as opposed to King-in-Court of the Freehold of Baltimore. It makes me feel better about the feudalism stuff to know other people do it too, so we're not just, you know, aping the Keepers."
<VoxPVoxD> "But Lister avoids all the actual work he can, so there's a Primacy and Regent under him who sort of, run the city, vampirically."
<banana> Melanie: "Do you know any vampires who're more happy to talk about themselves?"
<banana> "I'm really looking for like.. the kind of person who just finds themselves endlessly fascinating, specifically the tough times they've had and all the ways they've been hard done by. Alienees willing to express it."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I think they're like us, you know? They're unified by this... this thing that they have now, this thing they don't have anymore, but how it touches them and how they take it is so wildly variant... some of us love to talk about ourselves but will still have exposed nerves if you touch the wrong topic or speak the wrong way. Some of us don't like to talk about ourselves at all
<VoxPVoxD> until the moment comes when we can't help ourselves."
<VoxPVoxD> "I will say that I met a couple of vampires - one is the Sheriff of Baltimore, the other is some kind of protector or enforcer called Father Jesse - who are, if not *eager* to talk about themselves, much more sanguine about it."
<VoxPVoxD> "...so to speak."
<banana> Melanie: "Ha ha. All these titles seem like deflections to me, including ours.. what do they mean?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "They're, you know... pegs for holes. All the wizards have them. Willworkers, sorry. That's what Lister calls them. But their names are like, Jesuit and Pardon and Fireman and Union and Singular and Society."
<banana> "Regent is like, in charge obviously, Sheriff has to be a law-keeper, vampire law.. Father as in some kind of horrid brood-master?"
<banana> "Christ."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart points. "Yeah, it's the second one."
<banana> Melanie: "I like 'Pardon' though. Ambiguous meaning and it's almost an actual name."
<VoxPVoxD> "Christ I mean. He's a Father father. With a collar and Latin chanting and cursing at God."
<banana> "Ohhhh!"
<banana> "That would be... interesting. I don't remember a lot about that stuff, but it's still there. Like as an ingrained part of culture rather than actual beliefs per se. Hard to maintain any beliefs."
<banana> "On some level I'd like to know what a vampire thinks of God." Melanie scribbles something meaningless. The fact that they even think about this stuff..
<VoxPVoxD> "But you know, you see -- like with us and Loyalists. There's sad vampires, and avoidant vampires, and cranky vampires, like with us. But just like there's the Proctor or the Oxford Lad or whoever, they have the guy who just rides into town and starts eating people until he has to be put down like an animal. They have some kind of Nazi mad scientist who they just let *have* the Johns Hopkins
<VoxPVoxD> campuses. And the werewolves have their Hook Hand Lodge, murderers and cannibals out in the woods. And the wizards have Society."
<VoxPVoxD> "Who is worse than all of those."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Father Jesse doesn't believe in God, but in that way where it's obvious he really wants to and God is sort of the ultimate shitty disappointing dad. His song is Dear God, by XTC, which is exactly that energy."
<VoxPVoxD> "Jesuit seems to come at the whole God thing from a completely different angle. He sees himself as prosecuting a war for dominion of Heaven."
<VoxPVoxD> "Jesuit the wizrd."
<VoxPVoxD> "Willworker."
<banana> Melanie's taking notes in earnest. Stewart knows way more about these sects and beings than she expected, but.. something stood out.
<banana> She looks around; there's nobody near, and these chairs are comfy. They don't assume things about your bones.
<banana> "Do you want to tell me about Society?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart sucks in a breath. "No. But I don't want to keep him a secret either."
<VoxPVoxD> "So:"
<banana> On another level what stood out was 'nazi mad scientist' but, you know. Important stuff first.
<VoxPVoxD> "So like I said, Jesuit sees himself as fighting a war for Heaven, for, I don't know, the soul of humanity. On the side of, like, spiritual liberation. I don't know, their philosophy is way over my head. I'd love to hear what you made of Jesuit or one of the other true believers."
<VoxPVoxD> "Now of course, the inevitable corrollary is that there will be people who take... the opposite view. The view that Heaven must remain sealed, that people must remain, you know I'm sure they wouldn't say subjugated, but orderly."
<banana> "I would very much like to talk to one, maybe over the phone."
<banana> "Maybe radio transmission from Mars?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I know where they work, I've got a pass to go up there whenever I want pretty much, and I could bring guests."
<VoxPVoxD> "Which is the exact opposite of everything you said. But it's an option."
<banana> Melanie: "I'll check whether my stipend does field trips with hazard pay. What's it worth to 'keep Heaven sealed'?"
<banana> "To them, I mean."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Worth enough to try and torture a couple of harmless changelings on a pizza date."
<banana> Melanie watches Stewart talk. He's like a prototype - he's her friend, but he's also an example of a human being experiencing emotions. Things worth caring about. She wants to understand.
<banana> "What's been happening to you two? Are you safe now? Can we.. what happened?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "It's fine now. So like, you remember back when we went to the Hob Market, and you came up empty looking for a weapon? I got this -- it's a digitized version of a magical tome. The Book of Things Strange and Wondrous, it's called."
<VoxPVoxD> "Basically a magical repository of knowledge, an inorganic oracle."
<banana> Melanie: "Isn't that also a weapon?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah. I'm coming to understand that now."
<VoxPVoxD> "Anyway, the bad willworkers, their equivalent of Loyalists - loyal to the world-as-it-is, to humanity-as-it-is, to... well, to society. Society was who they sent. He might be their leader."
<VoxPVoxD> "He traps us, starts gruesomely killing this random bystander to intimidate us - he gave her cancer. He does this to play a game with us. With me. The point of the game is to show me that he can hurt me in so many more ways than I can hurt him. That even hurting him hurts me. He had this sort of, malicious sphinx-like riddle game and he kept trying to take a taser to Lauren. Called her not
<VoxPVoxD> even a person anymore."
<VoxPVoxD> "Society is brutal, selfish, misogynistic, both actively cruel and indifferent to cruelty, and above all just, hugely wastefully inefficient."
<banana> That's fucking awful. "That's awful." Melanie does not write that line down, though she wants to.
<banana> "Cancer. Is there.. are the willworkers as powerful as they think they are? Are they really that kind of a threat?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "It was like a Keeper was in the room. It was that kind of feeling."
<banana> Just the idea is making Melanie panic. "But they're not. They're human, right? So that's worse, but- there must be ways to-" She could plan out ways to fight back, to defend yourself, ask for details of the man-monster's powers. What's the point? The problem is what's already happened.
<banana> "I'm so glad you came through it."
<banana> "Did you give up the book?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah. It's a shitty way for it to happen, but being there with Lauren, feeling the way I did, doing what I did to try to help her... it was kind of how I realized I loved her."
<VoxPVoxD> He looks down. "Anyway."
<banana> Melanie: "That's extra sappy. You're an extra sap."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Heh. Yeah. It's gross. I love it. Anyway... there's these sort of layered, overlapping experiences between different groups of the, uh, supernaturally estranged. And these penumbras of shared experience that say a vampire and a changeling might have, or a changeling and a willworker, or a vampire and a werewolf. And these layers sort of... jostle, right, like tectonic plates."
<VoxPVoxD> "Like, uh, what's that witch expression?"
<banana> "There are witches?"
<VoxPVoxD> "I mean regular witches. Mortal occultists, stuff historians publicly acknowledge. Crowley and so forth."
<VoxPVoxD> "The phrase I was thinking of was 'as above, so below'."
<banana> Melanie: "Only if what you get above is earthquakes."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I mean... there is a war on in Heaven, allegedly. Not out of the realm of possibility."
<VoxPVoxD> "Alienated as we alienees are, we're still within and subject to society. And so society reproduces itself in us, and we reflect society back at itself." Stewart doesn't know the word 'dialectic'. "So what I've been thinking is that we see our place in society represented in how we relate to each other."
<banana> Melanie: "It better not be that difficult to find one."
<banana> She makes an ehhhh noise. "You've been learning a lot, right? About all the powers and personages. That's going to be a thing?"
<VoxPVoxD> "A thing?"
<banana> "For you, a- a role or activity."
<banana> "Like, you're making friends everywhere and finding these common points. I wanna keep picking your brains about those, but more importantly it sounds like some sort of incipient liason..ing."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah. It's sort of, I don't know. The Autumn Court has friends on all the other sides. Those are important relationships politically and materially, but they also contextualize *so much*. It really helps me think about like... our bullshit."
<VoxPVoxD> "The Autumn Court calls it becoming a Lord Sage of the Unknown Reaches."
<banana> Melanie leans back. She steeples her fingers, which is really gnarly.
<banana> "Why... do they call it that."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I don't know. I honestly don't. Maybe the Wyrd inflects our language, which colors our self-concepts inside and out. It permeates, too -- you know the Young Street almost put my fetch through a window without thinking twice, but he still hunkers down in a fortress called, literally, Swordhome. That's like the name a level 9 fighter picks for their stronghold."
<banana> Melanie: "Maybe. Maybe somebody just lost a bet."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I mean... we all lost a bet. That's why we're here."
<banana> "Maybe they're winning it? See if you can get away with calling yourself the Lord Reaching Sage. Make it fifty years without anyone objecting and I'll buy the next round."
<VoxPVoxD> "Oh, I certainly can't *yet*. Now, if I can introduce you to Santander, our current Lord Sage. That man *earns* it."
<banana> "Yeah, I'd like to meet him at some point. The occult is.. oddly inapplicable to philosophy, I'm finding, but it's definitely a perspective."
<banana> "Um, why did the Street try to kill your fetch?"
<banana> "Like obviously he didn't know, or it wouldn't be trying..." this may be impolite.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "My fetch is a firefighter. Fetches can see through our Masks, so he thought the Street was on fire. In like a bad way."
<VoxPVoxD> "And yeah, fetches don't look like anything but regular people to us."
<banana> "Ahaha! Oh man, yeah, you can't fight that fire!"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "You know he's a lot more charismatic than I was expecting. The Street, I mean. By reputation I was picturing a guy who just gets mad at everything and can't turn it off."
<banana> Melanie: "He gets mad at the right things. Injustice, faerie monsters. There's just.. a lot of both."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "That's it! That's exactly the thing!"
<VoxPVoxD> "The, like. I don't know. The unified theory."
<VoxPVoxD> "Have you ever read Lovecraft?"
<banana> "It's an element. Wyrd-touched entities make themselves into metaphor deliberately.. I'm surprised I haven't found anyone writing about this stuff yet. There's an obscure screenplay floating around, but no nonfiction treatments."
<banana> "Not that I know!"
<banana> Sounds like a romance novelist, and Melanie thinks she read a few of those back in the day, but if so they weren't memorable.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Okay so, basically HP Lovecraft was a weird, prissy racist, who wrote a lot of really imaginative and enduring horror fiction. I wonder if he's still alive, like Poe is. Anyway, one of his most famous stories is called 'The Call of Cthulhu', and it opens like this."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart recites from memory:
<VoxPVoxD> "'The most merciful thing in the world, I think, is the inability of the human mind to correlate all its contents. We live on a placid island of ignorance in the midst of black seas of infinity, and it was not meant that we should voyage far. The sciences, each straining in its own direction, have hitherto harmed us little; but someday the piecing-together of dissociated knowledge will open
<VoxPVoxD> up such terrifying vistas of reality, and of our frightful position therein, that we shall either go mad from the revelation or flee from the deadly light into the peace and safety of a new dark age.'"
<VoxPVoxD> He's silent for a moment after finishing. Then: "And like, that's-- that's the thing."
<banana> Melanie: "That's well-written. It's evocative, but it's bullshit, right?"
<VoxPVoxD> "Yes and no. It's bullshit that it's good. But it's true that it's true."
<VoxPVoxD> "You have to understand mercy as an enforced, dominating peace. The conditional withdrawal of violence."
<VoxPVoxD> "A you-are-safe-unless."
<banana> "Nope. Ignorance isn't a mercy. It's a literary equivalent of the caveman meme about playing gods."
<VoxPVoxD> "Mercy isn't good, it's just a promise by the powerful not to hurt the vulnerable anymore."
<VoxPVoxD> "It says nothing about the value of who is powerful, or who is vulnerable."
<banana> Melanie: "The kind of fight that we avoid through lack of knowledge - whether it's inner struggle or a conflict you can't help but fight if you know it's there to be fought - those things fester somewhere. It only lets individuals shelter under a- a wound in society."
<VoxPVoxD> "Right! Exactly."
<banana> "Right?"
<VoxPVoxD> "That wound is what we inhabit. This is the relation we enforce and reflect."
<banana> "It's only a starting point."
<VoxPVoxD> "What society does to us... what society says about itself by doing this to us... is inhibit that correlation. As a means of keeping the peace. Of enforcing space and distance. And, yeah, in some quarters, it's absolutely seen as a mercy."
<VoxPVoxD> "But all it really does is deny us unity. It's a way to keep us from reckoning with -- to keep everyone from reckoning with -- the sheer, the fucking, the awful depth and diversity of the things that can be taken from us."
<VoxPVoxD> His voice has grown thick with emotion. Stewart hisses, tears in the corner of his eyes: "He was thirteen years old."
<banana> Melanie's sitting up and in fact waving her arms a bit. "I don't think we're disagreeing, it's just.. if you lose everything. If you fail utterly and it turns out every thing you did was totally worthless, misguided, harmful."
<banana> "You can go on from that."
<VoxPVoxD> "You can. But the inhibition is self-reinforcing. Self-perpetuating. And it peels some of its victims away to feed it directly."
<banana> "You don't have to but you can, and the sheer human will to continue can turn into.. anything. Wonderful things."
<VoxPVoxD> "So there's this need to perpetually go on."
<VoxPVoxD> "To begin again and again and again."
<VoxPVoxD> He hits the table with each "again".
<banana> "Yes. Sure."
<banana> "It sucks, I know. You can still do it though."
<VoxPVoxD> "You know, it's not impossible. You're right, we can do amazing things. We can help people. We can heal, we can find love."
<VoxPVoxD> "But that's... that's the force that we're pushing against to do it."
<VoxPVoxD> "That struggle, I think, is definitive."
<banana> "You mean definitional."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart smiles. "You're right."
<VoxPVoxD> He dries his eyes.
<VoxPVoxD> "You're right."
<banana> Melanie isright. "Hey, um. The next time the peeled ones, the inhibited ones.. when you're in danger again we'll be there again. When Lauren's in trouble you'll be there."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart reaches out to pat Melanie's hand. "I know."
<banana> "Sometimes the trouble is just going to be.. profound sorrow. I know. When there's something to fight though I am going to help with that, and I'm going to get really good at it."
<VoxPVoxD> "I know you will. You're already good at it."
<VoxPVoxD> "Nowhere to go but up."
<VoxPVoxD> "I'm really glad you're my friend."
<banana> "That's what I want to write about. The things we can do, since it's not like we're gonna stop."
<banana> Aghjb.
<banana> Melanie doesn't know what to say to that.
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion> Did Lauren spend the night?
<VoxPVoxD> Yeah. Stewart was probably up before her (he can never sleep much past dawn when he drinks).
<Crion> Then depending whether he's in his bedroom or at his PC, Stewart will hear either her phone buzz on the nightstand (surely he has one; and a boxspring; and a bedframe) or hear the sound of his hex box receiving an IM.
<Crion> If he's between, both.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart hears both; he's sitting on the couch checking his phone. He doesn't like rolling out of bed and going right to the computer. Since only one of those devices is his, that's the one he checks.
<Crion> QUOTH|THE|BITTER|WIND: <'STEWART READER,' KNOWN OTHERWISE AS 'CRITICALMASS:'>
<Crion> From the bedroom, Lauren grumble-shouts. "Stewart. Check your computer."
<Crion> <Assuming direct control.>
<VoxPVoxD> "On it," he calls.
<Crion> <Good morning, Stewart. Say hello to Lauren for me.>
<Crion> *QUOTH|THE|STEWARD|KING: <'STEWART READER,' KNOWN OTHERWISE AS 'CRITICALMASS:'>
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Kingsley says hi."
<VoxPVoxD> Wait. How did he know she spent the night? ...this doesn't trouble Stewart much. Probably just a reasonable assumption.
<Crion> She makes an irritated growling noise, and then there's sound suspiciously like her slamming her phone down on the bedside table.
<Crion> <Santander and I should like to have a talk.>
<Crion> <In private.>
<VoxPVoxD> ... <when?>
<Crion> <About lunch. What would you prefer we order in?>
<VoxPVoxD> <a deli or something is fine. BLT. down at the office?>
<Crion> <Indubitably.>
<VoxPVoxD> <ok! call it 1?>
<Crion> <Indeed. Tell Lauren she has the week, if she wants, it barring emergencies.>
<VoxPVoxD> <thank you. see you then>
<VoxPVoxD> You know, say what you will about the professional conspirator and schemer Robert Kingsley; he's a damn good boss.
<Crion> The account logs out.
<Crion> When Stewart emerges, Lauren is in the kitchen wearing a t-shirt that's long, but not THAT long.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart's face is flushed when he sees her, perhaps from residual alcohol. "Hey, Kingsley called me down to the office for a lunch meeting with him and Santander. He says you can take the week off, barring IT emergencies."
<Crion> She's putting on tea, without asking. At that, she crosses her arms. "Him and Santander, huh?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart comes up behind her, holding her by the waist and swaying gently while they both look at the kettle. They never did get to dance last night. "Yeah. I've never actually seen them in the same room before. Think I should wear my suit?"
<Crion> "Mmmmmmmmm."
<Crion> "How well does it fit?"
<Crion> "Theirs are gonna be tailored."
<VoxPVoxD> "So's mine. I figured, I'm making money, I've got a hot girlfriend... clothes gotta fit, right?"
<Crion> She giggles and turns towards him in his arms. "Then wear the suit. In fact...let's go get dressed."
<Crion> It's awhile before the kettle's off.
<Crion> When does Stewart roll into the garage?
<VoxPVoxD> About 12:45. He was budgeting time for 12:30 but he underestimated the number of showers he was gonna have to take. The suit is navy-colored and makes him look very sharp. His dad would like him like this. As long as he kept his mouth shut.
<Crion> Well, he's someone else's problem now.
<VoxPVoxD> ...yeah.
<Crion> The garage is dark, but this time the bellhop is upright and tips his cap. The elevator opens with a merry ding, door closing neatly, and ferries him up to the 27th floor as soon as his finger touches the button.
<VoxPVoxD> "Afternoon," says Stewart to the empty elevator. Just in case.
<Crion> There's an old-school LED display -- the ones with the very simple red-bulb numbers -- above the door, with the room for two full characters, and when it passes floor 12, instead of floor 13, it displays :)
<Crion> Then 14, then 15, and so on.
<Crion> The doors open on...not an empty reception desk?
<VoxPVoxD> Aww. LEDs are cute.
<VoxPVoxD> What the?
<Crion> There's a changeling sitting there, but she's not using the computers. Stewart's seen her before, but only once. Her face is drawn and pensive, pinched around the lips, eyes expressive but focused. A Beast, in the Mien of a bird; the Mask has her light, agile, and fragile, in a blouse and jeans.
<Crion> She's mulling over...a note? Something.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart's eyes narrow very briefly, but he's smiling and his voice is present as he walks up, offering her Glamour for a song. "Hi! Stewart Reader. I've got a 1 o'clock?"
<VoxPVoxD> *pleasant
<Crion> Cormorant -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YYsfFJT3cBc After this there's calm upon the sea; broken waves can't ever damage me. Broken seems a solemn bird, but when she sings she's always heard.
<Crion> She looks up sharply. "Conference room. Take a right. Left afore the Mainer's office. Big glass thing."
<Crion> "Have fun."
<Crion> As he passes, she gets up to leave.
<VoxPVoxD> Wait, was she just there to send him that way? No, that can't-- whatever. Stewart follows directions to the conference room.
<Crion> The law office is eerily empty as usual. It's actually quite difficult to imagine what this place looks like bustling, at this point.
<VoxPVoxD> Are all the desks empty? Does it look like people ever work here?
<Crion> The conference room is a long rectangle against the far wall of the floor, and both of the long walls -- facing the hallway and facing the city -- are plate glass floor-to-ceiling windows. The short walls...are also full glass? But they're mirrors. You look in one, you see the room behind you...except for the other short wall, which is black. Then you turn around and look at the 'black' wall,
<Crion> and IT'S a mirror...except the first wall that's now behind you is black.
<Crion> The desks look used, but almost like...life-sized dollhouse furniture?
<Crion> Like someone took some giant tweezers and put that box of Kleenex on the desk just so.
<Crion> Maybe that's paranoia.
<Crion> Kingsley and Santander are inside. Alone.
<Crion> Together.
<VoxPVoxD> They've got each other, and that's a lot for love~ Stewart will open the door, slowly, without knocking.
<Crion> Kingsley beckons him forward, eyeing him. Well, his suit. Kingsley is in his usual tie-less three-piece, while Santander is wearing what looks like a suit-jacket...trenchcoat? With a vest, chain-and-pocketwatch, and white shirt under it, with a simply incredibly vibrant violet tie.
<Crion> "Stewart. Hello."
<Crion> To Santander: "Next time I'm showing up in sweatpants. Write it down."
<Crion> There is an assortment of incredible sandwiches on offer.
<VoxPVoxD> "King. Lord Sage. Sandwiches." Stewart greets each in turn.
<Crion> It appears they ordered five; both men have selected their own, leaving three for Stewart's perusal. They all fit his specifications, but have varying amounts of mayonaisse/mustard. Next to them sit six strips of bacon, in case he wishes to add more to any of them.
<Crion> The default seems to be two strips, broken in half.
<Crion> There is also a pitcher of iced tea.
<VoxPVoxD> That's fine, a BLT is really more about the tomato than the bacon. Stewart takes the one which has a roughly even amount of mustard and mayo, which he thinks of as the Squirtle sandwich. Pours himself a glass of iced tea. Sits down.
<Crion> Kingsley nods again and takes a big bite out of his own sandwich, which seems to be a Reuben. There's already a bite out of Santander's, which is a BLT, but heavy on the bacon.
<Crion> Kingsley realizes that now he can't speak for a moment, frowns while chewing, and points at Santander, who says: "STEWA--"
<Crion> "Stewart."
<Crion> A cough.
<Crion> "You have done...exemplary work."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart sips his iced tea, waiting to eat until one of them starts an in-his-opinion-inevitable monologue. "Thank you."
<Crion> "We have some questions, and, OF COURSE! Concerns. But not in the customer service sense."
<Crion> Kingsley has finished his bite, and touches his mouth with a cloth napkin. Those are, of course, available for Stewart as well. "You've met a lot of shitkickers in the past two weeks."
<Crion> "Jesuit had to pull you out of a bad bind. I don't like that. Not because of anything you did, but because of what I didn't do."
<Crion> He waves the sandwich around. "I didn't hear about the thing with Sobriety--"
<Crion> Santander: "Society."
<Crion> Kingsley: "I'll say his name however I fuckin' want."
<Crion> "I didn't hear about it until after it happened. It occurs to me that's probably because I wasn't checking in, and didn't know you'd gone to the goblin market and picked up...that fuckin' thing."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "The Book of Things Strange and Wondrous, you mean?"
<Crion> Kingsley: "Yep."
<Crion> "Don't get me wrong, great purchase. Worth whatever you paid, unless it'll kill everyone you love."
<Crion> "But, things like that, they tend to make psychotic wizards tetchy."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I'm sorry, I should've reported in that I'd taken in a token that powerful."
<Crion> "Especially ones obsessed with Fate."
<Crion> Santander: "DO NOT APOLOGIZE!"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart blinks.
<Crion> The lord sage's tie...flashes? "Gaining power for the freehold is virtuous! Humiliating the willworker Society is virtuous! Putting the willworkers we DO like in a position where you can access their librarium upon demand...is virtuous!"
<Crion> Kingsley: "'Librarium' isn't even proper Latin. Okay, it IS, but not for--"
<Crion> Santander: "I AM CORRECT."
<Crion> Kingsley takes another bite of his sandwich.
<Crion> Has Stewart touched his food?
<VoxPVoxD> Not really, yet.
<Crion> Kingsley finishes his bite and puts his sandwich. "It's been a busy time, is the point. I wanted to sit down and sort through that business, see what we can do. Decompress."
<VoxPVoxD> He'll take a bite after saying, "Like, there are risks I'm prepared to undertake on my own behalf, for the sake of protecting the freehold and expanding the knowledge of the Court. But bystanders were in danger. Women were tortured."
<Crion> Santander: "NO ONE IS JUDGING!"
<Crion> Kingsley: "Christ, Santander."
<Crion> Kingsley: "We have no problem with how you handled the situation. It's unfortunate you were put in it in the first place, and we'll be doing what we can to make sure it doesn't happen again."
<Crion> He pauses. "But it will."
<Crion> "That's just how this goes."
<Crion> "Eventually, it will."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I guess that's a conversation I need to have with Lauren, then."
<Crion> Santander, snatching an unattended piece of bacon from the plate instead of eating his sandwich: "Mmmmmhrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrmmm."
<VoxPVoxD> This is a good sandwich.
<Crion> Kingsley meets Stewarts eyes, and the wind kicks up a bit, and there's leaves on the corners of his vision, and the King of Autumn's eyes seem to sink back into his skull. "Do right by her."
<Crion> Then the room snaps back. "Or end it quickly."
<Crion> "I'm not going to try to dictate courtiers' personal lives."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart presses his lips together and wipes his hands over his plate. "Do you think it's possible?"
<VoxPVoxD> "To be in this line of work and do right by someone?"
<Crion> Kingsley: "Absolutely."
<Crion> "That doesn't mean it will end well. That's not in your control. Or hers, or mine, or anyone's."
<Crion> "And nothing ever really ends well."
<Crion> Santander chuckles.
<Crion> Kinglsey avoids giving him a look.
<Crion> "But yes, you can do it."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "We've got a month before the Sky Mother's Huntsman reconstitutes."
<Crion> Santander: "I have SUGGESTIONS about that. For afterwards!"
<Crion> Now he takes another bite of the sandwich.
<Crion> Kingsley: "We'll handle that. There are signs and signals; we can know with...some degree of certainty, when it comes back. And I'm sure you'll be on top of it. What I want to talk about here are two things, one of improbable but incredible importance, and one just downright important."
<Crion> "The first: you had a night out with Father Jesse."
<Crion> "He...disclosed...that he used his, ah. Word. On you."
<Crion> Kingsley leans forward: "Did you experience time loss?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Oh, yeah. That wasn't really a big deal, it was just like, stop and start. He didn't make me do anything messed up."
<VoxPVoxD> "No time loss to speak of."
<VoxPVoxD> "The whole thing was maybe thirty seconds."
<Crion> Kingsley ignores the first bit, but leans back comfortably when Stewart answers the question. "Good, good. I like Father Jesse. But...one must be vigilant, when it comes to powers like his."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I understand. Is the power of compulsion common among vampires?"
<Crion> "If you ever enter his company, or any vampire's company, and leave it unable to account for any length of time -- a blankness there, you'll know it when you feel it, when you focus on it -- come immediately to this building, call us, and then lock yourself in the Mainer's office."
<Crion> Santander: "Too common!"
<Crion> "They toy with minds in ways which degrade their own."
<Crion> He snatches up another piece of bacon.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Is there a lot of precedent for that happening? That level of abuse. It seems like the Court and the Freehold are on really good terms, you know, considering."
<Crion> Kingsley, curtly: "Yes."
<Crion> "Next, and more important, order of business."
<VoxPVoxD> Nodding, eating, listening.
<Crion> "The Mistress of the High House."
<VoxPVoxD> No longer nodding or eating.
<Crion> Kingsleys takes another bite. Santander jumps in here. "The report, Stewart, was vague."
<Crion> "On the specific matter of this creature.
<Crion> "We should like to know what was discussed, and what, if anything, was promised."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I'm happy to provide clarity. I might've skipped some details in my haste to report."
<Crion> "Even in prospective terms. Possibly unsealed."
<VoxPVoxD> "We'd just caught up with Loser outside the Loyalist Hollow. There was some friction over how long it took us to respond, tempers were running a little hot. Then we hear this sound. Something cracking, and trumpets. Come to find out the Mistress had breached the Hollow, and was growing trees *through* the Loyalists. Two of them were already dead when we got there. We watched Proctor die."
<VoxPVoxD> "The Mistress of the High House turns to us, and goes, 'You must be Peter's friends!'."
<Crion> Santander narrows his eyes and scribbles something down on a napkin with a piece of thin charcoal he seems to have summoned from nowhere.
<Crion> Kingsley pinches the bridge of his nose. "Montgomery, of course."
<VoxPVoxD> "Right."
<VoxPVoxD> "The fourth Loyalist runs in from a side room, with her chainsaw. The Mistress entangles her. She says she's not here to hurt anyone who wasn't hunting 'her Peter'."
<Crion> Kingsley hisses, while Santander leans forward.
<VoxPVoxD> "The tree's spreading over - K.I.L.L. is the name she gave - and she's absolutely stuck in place. So are we, but not physically. It was like someone snapped the dial off of the Common Crown contract to freeze someone in place with fear. None of us could move. Some of us weren't taking it well."
<Crion> Santander, more reserved than usual: "What was she like."
<VoxPVoxD> "Then the Mistress turns to us like, 'You're the heroes. So I want your help. What should I do with her?'. Her being K- the last Loyalist."
<Crion> "The Keeper."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "She presented as a tall woman, blonde hair, a little past shoulder-length. Stunningly beautiful. Eyes of green fire. She had kind of a high-society accent? Very upbeat - smiley, optimistic. Perky."
<Crion> Santander: "And what were her stakes?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "She tips on a Taylor Swift track - Miss Americana and the Heartbreak Prince."
<VoxPVoxD> "Stakes?"
<Crion> "That is to say: why was she there? Did she have any other involvement than this Montgomery boy? Did she mention anything else? Any other Keepers? Any other reasons she might have had to murder a sect of Loyalists?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "She seemed totally fixed on Peter, and on punishing people who hurt Peter. Like, you know... like she loved him. I got the impression their Durance took the shape of, of a romantic relationship."
<Crion> Kingsley: "I was afraid of this. Wasn't I afraid of this, Santander?"
<Crion> Santander, mildly, picking up another piece of bacon. "You were. I still don't think it's as dire as you do."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Anyway, like I reported, at this point she had us vote on whether or not to spare the last Loyalist. The vote went 4-1-1 in favor of saving her. I voted to save her because Loser did, and Loser was the only one of us who knew her at all."
<Crion> Kingsley, frowning: "How kind of it."
<Crion> Santander, between crunches: "Her."
<VoxPVoxD> "Then looks sort... bashful? Like she'd have looked if she realized she was talking too loud in a room that suddenly went quiet. Then she gives us the message she wants us to pass on, that she wants him to come home. Bt only if he wants. She was *very* pointed that we not coerce him in any way."
<Crion> Kingsley: "Fine. Her."
<VoxPVoxD> "Then she's like, 'next time we meet, let's not use Contracts, okay?'."
<VoxPVoxD> "An actual, to-the-Wyrd promise. I sealed it myself."
<Crion> Both men straighten up. Almost at the same time: "What?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Totally unsolicited. We could still barely speak."
<Crion> Santander looks amused bordering on delighted; Kingsley looks shocked bordering on horrified.
<Crion> Kingsley swivels to Santander, and to his court wizard: "Why would she do that."
<VoxPVoxD> "So... what do you know about the Mistress? You seemed familiar with her already."
<Crion> Santander: "I don't know."
<VoxPVoxD> "Does she have a history in the Freehold?"
<Crion> Kingsley: "She swore an oath. Why would she swear an oath?"
<Crion> Santander: "I don't know!"
<Crion> The lord sage snatches up his sandwich. "But isn't it INTERESTING?"
<Crion> Then he takes a big bite.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart eats too.
<Crion> Kingsley shakes his head. He turns back to Stewart. "We're...aware."
<Crion> "Of this creature."
<Crion> "And unfortunately, nothing you've said is out of line with what we've heard."
<VoxPVoxD> "What would have made it fortunate?"
<Crion> "This is just the first time someone from this Freehold has encountered her personally."
<Crion> Kingsley sighs. "Look."
<Crion> "My concerns about the Mistress of the High House are two-fold. On the first level, my worry is that she is playing some long game and baiting you into a situation that will redound to her favor, will permit her to kidnap Peter Montgomery again, and will permit her to sell you back to your Keepers for money on the nail."
<Crion> "My second, far graver worry, is that she is completely and totally sincere."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "How do you tell the difference between a Keeper who's sincere and a Keeper who's lethally committed to their bit?"
<Crion> "That she didn't abuse Peter Montgomery, in the traditional sense. That she didn't kidnap him. That he came with her of his own volition, that she let him leave of his own volition, and she has done the same so far all of her victims -- and that this is why there were Loyalists waiting to jump on him as soon as he left. They knew there was an easy mark coming, even if he was just fae-touched."
<Crion> Kingsley raises two fingers. "That presents two problems, that theory. One is philosophical, one is existential. The philosophical one first. Santander?"
<Crion> The wizard straightens and puts down the crust of his sandwich. "Ah. Yes. If Peter Montgomery went into Arcadia of his own free will, and LEFT Arcadia of his own free will, how then is he one of us? He should be, as noted, a fae-touched, as he did not have to claw his way through the Thorns. HOWEVER! Our model here is skewed, because by his own story, Peter Montgomery was immediately set upon
<Crion> as he left the High House by Loyalists in wait, and had to run through the Thorns of the Hedge! So: he did undergo our rite of passage...but he did NOT do so escaping from his Keeper! This leaves us in an epistemic quandry, regarding what we truly know of the Thorns and their intent as coupled to a Keeper!"
<VoxPVoxD> 'Fae-touched'. Heh heh.
<Crion> Kingsley waves a hand. "And that's fascinated, but it's not what I care about." He leans forward. "Do you understand the damage that would be done to our society if someone even floated the idea of a Keeper that wasn't abusive? Do you understand how badly that would break everything we believe in? It's unacceptable. We cannot permit the idea to take even a whisper of a root. So much of
<Crion> our abuse was based on lies and manipulation -- so much! -- and so much of our solidarity is based on the idea that Keepers are an absolute evil. That there is utterly no wiggle room, no conversation to be had. A changeling that came to this court telling use about his Keeper openly like this -- like you have -- would have been exiled or executed as a Loyalist. Montgomery, it appears, is
<Crion> smarter. Or hopefully, the Mistress is lying."
<Crion> "But."
<Crion> "If she's not."
<Crion> "She must die, and Montgomery must die."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart finishes his sandwich quietly.
<VoxPVoxD> "Why tell me that? I'm no assassin."
<Crion> Kingsley's face breaks into a smile and he leans back. "To see how you'd take it."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "So did I pass?"
<Crion> "Yes. You're uncomfortable with the idea of killing Montgomery. Good. It shouldn't be necessary. Of course, it will be, if he wants to defend his...woman...but that is a bridge we can cross when we've built it." His face straightens again. "I was not joking about the Keeper."
<Crion> "The idea of a 'good Keeper' in our society is utterly unacceptable."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Even a totally benign Keeper is still an alien being with unfathomable power and no impulse control."
<Crion> Santander: "That doesn't make them particularly special."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "She could work parking at the Belvedere."
<Crion> Santander laughs at that, and picks up another piece of bacon.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "So obviously the biggest problem with killing the Mistress is killing her. Keepers are very strong. But if that was the only problem, you wouldn't need to float this balloon."
<VoxPVoxD> "Who do you expect opposition from?"
<Crion> Kingsley steeples his fingers and frowns. "I do not endorse the notion that she is what she claims to be. I merely wish to underline: if that is so -- even if she is actually a genuinely kind and generous creature, somehow -- she must die."
<Crion> Santander laughs again, around a mouth of bacon: "Whatever comes looking for her, of course!"
<VoxPVoxD> "Comes looking for her?"
<Crion> Kingsley: "Those Loyalists weren't hers."
<VoxPVoxD> "Ah."
<VoxPVoxD> "Yeah, I hadn't... really considered that they must still have patronage."
<Crion> Santander: "Now, you say to yourself: Ah! The Keepers, they will solve this problem for us themselves!"
<Crion> The lord sage swallows the last of the bacon. "But it never really works that way. If she falls to them, they will...take up her markers."
<Crion> "And now we have a traditional Keeper hunting Peter Montgomery, of the Spring Court."
<Crion> "With all that entails."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart, dryly: "Well, in that case it sounds like the simplest thing to do is just to kill every Keeper."
<Crion> Santander, mildly: "The werewolves had an idea for something like that once. Spirit nukes..."
<Crion> He picks up his sandwich again. "Bad idea. Not worth dwelling on."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Did Loser have anything for you on Proctor's real patron?"
<Crion> Kingsley grimaces. "She did. We're still...processing. You'll know when we're sure."
<Crion> He sips his own iced tea. "Oh, and you're going to be sworn to secrecy for the proceedings in this room today. This is an oath of acknowledgment, not one of intent. Meaning you can't talk about anything we discussed here, but you can act on it."
<Crion> "Lauren will understand."
<Crion> "She's been in this room eating sandwiches before."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart draws in a breath: "Okay."
<VoxPVoxD> "I'm more worried about the Wherehouse than Lauren. Keeping this a secret from her is one thing, she's still Autumn. She still swore our oaths."
<VoxPVoxD> "None of the others did. Some of them don't even like you. If I'm acting on this information and meet opposition from them, what am I supposed to do?"
<Crion> There's the smell of leaves and a gust. It's sealed between the three of them.
<Crion> Kingsley: "You're supposed to lie."
<Crion> "And live with it."
<Crion> "Welcome to the Court of Secrets."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "There are ways of outing lies, though. Cupid's Arrow, that one goblin contract, shit, just... I'm actually just not a good liar."
<VoxPVoxD> "I don't have any, what's the word. Tradecraft."
<Crion> Kingsley: "You should get some. But in the most mercenary sense, getting caught in a lie doesn't violate your oath, does it?"
<Crion> "It just makes me angry."
<Crion> "And while sworn oaths are quite useful, I prefer social pressure to it, if we're being honest. It's easier to predict. It's easier to heal, but it can hurt more."
<VoxPVoxD> "Speaking of angry, I was told that Langford List reacted to the news about Loser with, uh. The word used was 'wall-punchingly'."
<Crion> Kingsley leans back. "He'll get over it. Or he'll punch me and we'll have diplomatic incident."
<Crion> "I'm not concerned either way."
<Crion> "I like Langford, and I respect Langford, but Langford doesn't run this shop."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart nods. "Okay. So is the plan just to wait? What should I be doing?"
<Crion> Santander: "The plan, sadly, is always to wait."
<Crion> The door to the conference room opens, and Gerald saunters in.
<Crion> "Hey, Stewart."
<VoxPVoxD> "Hey, Gerald."
<Crion> He picks up one of the other sandwiches and plops down a few chairs away. "Don't mind if I do."
<Crion> Kingsley: "Hello, Gerald. Yes, Stewart. For now, wait. Develop contacts, develop yourself. Take advantage of that book. Get familiar with the Hedge and working in it. You have things on your plate besides a rogue Keeper, I believe."
<Crion> Santander: "Yes! This Huntsman business."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I've got some leverage through the Book. I don't fully understand the nature of Huntsmen, though. Are they, like... minor Keepers?"
<Crion> Santander: "No! And yes. A Keeper has stolen their heart, and fashioned them into a weapon, and replaced their desires with the Keeper's own. They are, in a way, victims. But in a much more significant way, they are violence."
<Crion> "A fox-hunt."
<Crion> "There is the fox, and there are the dogs, and there are the men in perfect clothes on horseback."
<Crion> "The Huntsmen are the dogs."
<Crion> Gerald: "That big guy in The Sidereal was...the third?"
<Crion> Kingsley: "Yes, the third."
<Crion> Gerald: "The third of these ones I've been around for. They iterate."
<Crion> "They get worse."
<Crion> "But it's possible they can get better."
<Crion> "Not that I've seen that, mind." Gerald takes another big bite.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "So the way you kill a Huntsman is by destroying their heart, right?"
<Crion> Santander: "IT IS!"
<VoxPVoxD> "What if you just, like..."
<VoxPVoxD> "Give it back."
<VoxPVoxD> "It would overwrite the piece of the Title that's animating them, right?"
<Crion> Gerald finishes chewing. "Like I said. Possible they can get better."
<Crion> Santander: "Indeed...though they have to want it back. Perhaps all do! But handing a heart back to a killing machine -- literal or figurative -- can get complicated."
<Crion> "IT INVOLVES--"
<Crion> Gerald: "Dream shit."
<Crion> Santander: "Damn it, man!"
<VoxPVoxD> Gerald is a really indispensable part of these guy's dynamic.
<Crion> He finishes his sandwich and looks at Stewart, pointing at the last remaining one. Stewart want it, or...?
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart waves it off. All his.
<Crion> Gerald chows down. He's actually still sweating; maybe he just came from the gym he has to spend 2 hours a day at to maintain that body
<Crion> .
<VoxPVoxD> He thought Gerald being in vastly better shape than Kingsley was funny. Then he met Stu.
<Crion> It's still kinda funny.
<VoxPVoxD> Yeah...
<VoxPVoxD> "What does dream shit entail?"
<Crion> Robert and Gerald Kingsley at the same time: "Nothing good."
<Crion> Santander: "An adventure!"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart turns to Santander. "Tell me more."
<Crion> The wizard grins, munching on another piece of bacon. Did he steal one from a sandwich? "What do you know about the Gates of Ivory and Horn?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "The Gate of Ivory is how you enter a dream as a dreamer. The Gate of Horn is a way to enter a dream bodily through the Hedge."
<Crion> Santander nods sagely. "And neither of those will matter until you encounter the Huntsman in the Hedge, and cajole or convince it to permit you to return the heart. Or even find it! I have been told that this Huntsman did not murder the bouncers at your nightclub, with our friendly vampires and werewolves and etcetera?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Nope. Just bumps and bruises."
<VoxPVoxD> "Big bumps and bruises, mind."
<VoxPVoxD> "But that thing was *strong*."
<VoxPVoxD> "It could have done more damage."
<Crion> "Good!" says the lord sage, ignoring the qualifiers. "A Huntsman may act with some semblance of humanity -- say, only brushing aside bouncers rather than splattering them outright -- when in vague proximity to its heart. That means that it is possible that Lauren Ipsum's Keeper was either lazy or busy, and hid the heart in the dreams of a nearby mortal, rather than forcing you to dream-trek
<Crion> across the planet."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Define 'proximity'. Do you mean, in Baltimore, in the club, in the Mid-Atlantic...?"
<Crion> Grinning: "No idea!"
<Crion> "Hopefully, the city."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "So I'm looking for... I assume the presence of the heart affects their dreams?"
<VoxPVoxD> "So like, hope they have a therapist or something or else I just start, fuckin, hiking down a Dreaming Road until I see a cyber-post-apocalypse?"
<Crion> Santander: "Mmmmmmm. Yes, perhaps. It's really too bad you haven't made any friends who know anything about dreams. Or magic."
<Crion> "Of course, the Freehold DOES have a dreaming specialist..."
<Crion> Gerald sighs.
<VoxPVoxD> Innocently: "Who is it?"
<Crion> Kingsley: "John of the Falls."
<VoxPVoxD> "What's John's deal?"
<Crion> "He is...technically...of this court."
<Crion> Gerald: "He's a fucking psycho, is what his deal is."
<Crion> Santander: "That's unfair, Gerald."
<VoxPVoxD> "'Psycho' is kind of a board word for our purposes."
<VoxPVoxD> *broad
<Crion> "John of the Falls is chaste and pure, as a matter of his singular religion. He is, however, quite insane."
<Crion> "One too many times through the gates."
<Crion> Kingsley: "Or a dozen. Or two."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Can't distinguish dreams from reality?"
<Crion> Gerald: "Something like that."
<Crion> Kingsley: "Wait until a sunny day to contact him."
<Crion> "And don't go alone."
<Crion> "I'll make the arrangements, and forward the address when I get it."
<VoxPVoxD> "How not alone? Like, am I bringing witnesses or backup?"
<Crion> Santander: "Yes."
<VoxPVoxD> "Ah."
<Crion> Kingsley: "It's not John you'll need protection from. ...Probably."
<VoxPVoxD> "I can tell the Wherehouse about John, right?"
<Crion> Kingsley nods. "The oath ended when Gerald walked in."
<Crion> "Well, its remit."
<Crion> Gerald groans. "You assholes."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah, I just wasn't sure if there was another layer protecting John from the Freehold or vice-versa."
<Crion> Gerald: "Oh no, we all know who he is. We just don't invite him to parties."
<VoxPVoxD> "Autumn is a Court of specialists, I've been told."
<VoxPVoxD> "And most of us specialize in not going outside."
<Crion> The fetch grins around a quarter of a sandwich. Then: "Well, it's like the horror movies say. You'd best believe in specialists, because they believe in you."
<Crion> Kingsley: "Actually, I think it would be, 'you'd best believe in specialist stories, because you're in one.'"
<Crion> Gerald: "Whatever, Bob."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Okay. So I'm waiting for word on an address for John of the Falls."
<VoxPVoxD> More waiting.
<Crion> Kingsley: "Ehhhh. The address isn't really the problem. It's the letting him know you're coming. It should only--"
<Crion> Santander: "IT WILL ONLY BE A DAY OR TWO!"
<Crion> Kingsley: "Yes. Thank you."
<Crion> Gerald finishes the second sandwich and takes his feet down.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "What should I be doing while I'm waiting?"
<VoxPVoxD> There's that old restless Stewart the other three men will remember, notable now mainly for highlighting his relative absence. "What else can I be doing?"
<Crion> Kingsley: "Good lord, young man."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Well, fucking, YOU try just sitting around waiting for a phone call with shit like this hanging over the head of someone you love!"
<Crion> Gerald: "Well, he's not satisfied helping hunt down a vampire serial killer, holding the fort against a Huntsman, bringing a deep cover asset in from the cold and doing it all while making our IT girl swoon--"
<Crion> Kingsley, coldly: "I have."
<Crion> Gerald grimaces.
<VoxPVoxD> "Was it fun?"
<Crion> Kingsley: "Do you think it's meant to be?"
<Crion> "One thing you need to understand very clearly, and I want to be quitespecific on this, is that fun is no longer a part of your professional dossier."
<VoxPVoxD> "No." Quieter: "No. I'm sorry. I just... having work to do helps me focus."
<Crion> "If you worry about your woman, good. You should. That is healthy. Keep her close...without alienating her. But do not confuse activity for purpose."
<Crion> Gerald: "I think he's had enough. I certainly have. Good sandwiches."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart bristles a little at 'your woman', but no vocal objection surfaces. "You're right. I'm sorry."
<Crion> Kingsley relaxes. "Speaking against me in this room doesn't require an apology. Never got one from this guy, so why should I from anyone else." Santander shrugs.
<Crion> A pause. "Very little of what you do here, for Autumn, will require apology."
<Crion> "But if you choose to give it, we won't stop you."
<Crion> "Anyway." He stands.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart stands too.
<Crion> Santander has been standing the whole time, of course. Gerald hauls himself to his feet.
<Crion> "Good work out there, Stewart," Kingsley says, shaking his hand if he takes the offer. "You're doing well. Very well."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart shakes the King's hand. "Thank you." Stewart knows he's doing well. But the urge remains to do better.
<Crion> Kingsley: "We'll be in touch with John of the Falls's address when we're sure he'll know you're coming. I'd offer you leftovers, but my brother ate them all. Gerald, see Stewart out?"
<Crion> Gerald nods.
<Crion> Kingsley nods to Stewart. "Good afternoon."
<Crion> Santander: "FAREWELL!"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart says goodbye and leaves with Gerald. "So how's Stu doing?"
<Crion> Gerald grins and puts his hands in his jacket pockets. "He's good, he's good. He's...ah. This is gonna sound weird."
<Crion> "He seems a lot more like me than you."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "You mean cause he's jacked?"
<Crion> The grin widens a bit. "That, and he really takes to guns."
<Crion> "I've wondered if that's a fetch thing, right? If we just do better with machines because...well."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I don't think he's fond of machines, generally. Because of the Keeper. I figure if he likes guns it's just because he's a red-blooded American man. Which I am... not."
<Crion> Gerald: "Maybe so. Nevertheless, he could explain to me pressure in a firehose and he's a good hand with a rifle. Which is some red-blooded American man shit too, I guess."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "He could be in a truck commercial."
<VoxPVoxD> "I'm glad he's doing well. I was worried he wouldn't take to it. Sort of... this stuff."
<Crion> "Indeed." Gerald pauses. "Here's the thing: he thinks he can contact you...mind-to-mind. He tried it once before but you were asleep, so he got your dream. Wouldn't discuss the contents, don't worry."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart flinches. Man that is just inevitably setting up an awkward sex dream situation.
<Crion> "He doesn't want to try it again without your consent. I told him to ask you when he was ready. I assume he hasn't yet. You ah, probably haven't been online much, the past couple days."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah, no, I haven't. I'm off work tonight too."
<Crion> Gerald nods. "Well, that kind of...psychic link, I guess, it's normal. Bob and I have it, both ways. You can have it with him if you want it, and he seems decent enough that if you don't want it you don't have to have it. But it is something you need to work at to keep."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "What does working at it entail?"
<Crion> Gerald: "Mutual understanding, feeling each other out, time spent together. Or brute-forcing your way into the other guy's head, but. That's not really good for comity."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Right. So, uh, speaking of Stu taking to guns. I feel like... I don't know. Like when the Huntsman kicked the door down, I couldn't really do anything but get in front of Lauren. That was fine, cause you guys were there, but if we're going *looking*, and also just if something happens again with Society or whatever... I don't want to be a liability."
<Crion> Gerald: "I've seen you with a gun, remember. I know you're uncomfortable with them. You can become comfortable with them -- over time -- if you want to. But you also have contracts."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "They're not great for fighting, though. Or at least, they're not great for using in a fight instead of fighting."
<VoxPVoxD> "I know Autumn's Fury but it's *so* messy and *so* high-collateral..."
<Crion> Gerald mulls that over. "There's a range we could go out to. Both of you. Might have to pretend to be twins for a minute or two, but it's owned by an old half-blind dumbass who doesn't ask questions."
<Crion> "So if we go at the right time, range to ourselves."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "That sounds good. I don't know if I have the stomach for it, but, I gotta try something. I can't afford to be helpless."
<VoxPVoxD> "Also... what gym do you go to?"
<Crion> "Locally-owned place called Cutty's. A boxing gym. Some hardcases there but you show up and you train and it's good. We could try it for you, but maybe I'd suggest the UMBC gym. We can get you enrolled on the books and a student ID, maybe the kids there are more your thing."
<VoxPVoxD> "Is Cutty's in the city?"
<Crion> "Southeast precinct."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah, that's a lot closer to my place." Closer to Lauren's. Further from Maura's.
<Crion> He shrugs. "If you want, I can come down there the first few times with you. Or you can do it on your own."
<VoxPVoxD> "That'd be cool. I don't want to put you out though."
<Crion> He grins. "I'm there just about every day."
<Crion> Looks it, too.
<VoxPVoxD> "I believe you."
<Crion> They've just about reached the elevator. Anything else?
<VoxPVoxD> No. Stewart's got a lot to think about.
<VoxPVoxD> And even, blissfully, things to do.
<Crion> Gerald will call the elevator for him then, and leave him to it.
<VoxPVoxD>
<VoxPVoxD>
<VoxPVoxD>
<VoxPVoxD>
<VoxPVoxD>
<VoxPVoxD> It's pretty late, by normal standards, but the Hedge keeps its own time and so do the visitors and residents of the Wherehouse. Stewart and Lauren are currently showing Nels a movie called Battle Angel Alita.
<trenchfoot> She's requested they keep it on a low volume, but the effects are threatening to pop her eyes out of their sockets. HOW do you DO that.
<Crion> Well, Alita: Battle Angel, unless they're watching the anime release from 1993.
<trenchfoot> Also, they put this out? Nobody goes to jail for things like this?
<VoxPVoxD> They aren't.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart doesn't really know from anime.
<VoxPVoxD> Does Lauren...?
<Crion> He might not even know From Software...Demon Souls would be about when he was taken, wouldn't it?
<VoxPVoxD> Yeah. Stewart missed a lot of good games.
<VoxPVoxD> Definitely the worst part about being kidnapped by a True Fae.
<Crion> Lauren liked the anime, though the 1993 film was kind of abbreviated, and thought the recent live action movie was fun but unremarkable.
<trenchfoot> No, wait, go back, hang on, they just let women be the protagonists of things and be stronger and cooler than any of the men? A hundred years is a long time.
<trenchfoot> Nels, whose most prominent role would have been "maid," is entranced.
<VoxPVoxD> Wow... can't believe Stewart's dating a nerd. "Yeah there's been a big push for more movie leads who aren't white guys recently. Like it was sort of slowly getting better over time but since I got back it seems like they figured out how to make it marketable or something so they're doing it on purpose."
<Crion> Lauren whispers to Stewart at some point that if Nels loves this, they should show her Kill Bill before the spell of female protagonism is completely broken.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart nods quietly.
<trenchfoot> Nels: "There's - so much happening, but - do you know one of the last movies I saw before was Birth of a Nation? And I come back to find out everyone thinks it's awful now."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Prooooobably not everyone."
<trenchfoot> "They're right, but nobody said it before!"
<VoxPVoxD> "But yeah a lot of early 20th century forms of entertainment have depreciated, unless you're an overt fascist or the Prime Minister of Canada."
<Crion> Lauren sort of makes a face...has Stewart seen the Alonzo Mourning meme? He's online a lot more now.
<VoxPVoxD> He's probably seen it, but he definitely doesn't know who Alonzo Mourning is.
<Crion> She goes from dazed confusion to understanding very quickly, then, is all he needs to know. https://media2.giphy.com/media/mGjv5hUEOlCPm/giphy.gif
<trenchfoot> Nels: "What's a fascist?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Did you ever look up what a Nazi was?"
<trenchfoot> Nels: "Not yet. We've been busy."
<trenchfoot> "...also I got the impression I wouldn't like what I saw."
<Crion> Lauren: "You won't."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Where did you leave off in your GED history stuff?"
<trenchfoot> Nels: "I had to go back through what they considered important, so I'm right around the aftermath of the Civil War. 1870 or something?"
<trenchfoot> "Also, they are very confused about Columbus. Like, depending on who you ask."
<Crion> Lauren muffles a giggle.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yyyyyeah."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Okay, so, skip to when you got taken. In the early 1920s a political party took over Italy called the National Fascist Party. Their thing was basically Italian ethnic nationalism and militarism. Marches, trumpets, cool uniforms, invading Ethiopia."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "Getting the sense this takes a turn."
<trenchfoot> "I mean, beyond the nationalism and the invading Ethiopia things."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Named after like, a bundle of sticks, or something. Anyway 'fascism' sort of became a catch-all word for ethnic nationalism and militarism that popped up all over the place after the first World War - or, uh, the Great War, as you probably remember it - and the Great Depression, which started in 29 and lasted through the 30s in most places."
<VoxPVoxD> "One place it got real big was Germany. Germany got its back broken by the treaties that ended the Great War, huge extractive war reparations, cause the war fucking sucked and they lost and deal with it, I guess."
<Crion> Lauren, darkly: "They dealt with it."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart nods. "In Germany the political party was called the National Socialist Workers' Party, or 'Nazis' for short. Not... not actual socialists, don't worry. They hated Communists, like in the Soviet Union that'd just formed in Russia."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "I remember them! People were kind of mad but also they were really concerned about the whole. Great War thing, that I've since learned wasn't the only one."
<VoxPVoxD> "They took power through a combination of winning elections in a shitty system and overt political violence, and were totally in control by the early 30s. They campaigned on restoring German cultural identity and national power by asserting themselves militarily and purging the influence of undesirable people."
<VoxPVoxD> "Undesirable meaning anyone who wasn't a blonde, blue-eyed ethnic German."
<VoxPVoxD> "They particularly hated Jewish people. Like, people in Europe have hated Jewish people for a thousand years, but the Nazis made it into a science, literally."
<VoxPVoxD> "It started with, Jewish people can't go out after dark. Jewish people can't own businesses. Jewish people have to move into these special 'ghettoes' all in one part of the city, where they'd get filthy and sick and be attacked daily by police."
<trenchfoot> Nels, haltingly: "So... I picked a good time to miss. Is what I'm hearing. Because that sounds awful."
<VoxPVoxD> "Around this time, Germany had started invading Europe again. It'd built its army back up, so it was time to push. They started with Poland, in 1939."
<trenchfoot> Check how the other Nels reacted. Anything less than complete horror and possibly calls for war to stop this are unacceptable to her good name. "No, I get it, you can - you can stop. I'll get there eventually. Um."
<Crion> Lauren sort of exhales to herself, the way you do when you weren't aware you were holding your breath.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "It gets a lot worse. Heads up."
<VoxPVoxD> He looks relieved not to have to keep going.
<trenchfoot> Nels: "...worse?" Small, pitched up. "Oh, Lord."
<Crion> Lauren: "Let's...talk about something else!"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "How's the still coming?"
<trenchfoot> Nels: "Got the setup, still need the materials and also I'm not even sure what we're going for. Probably whiskey, just 'cause that's what I know best, but we could make... pretty much anything."
<trenchfoot> "Also, gob fruit could be an addition, but I gotta talk to Maggie about that. Or Tony. Or both."
<trenchfoot> She's as relieved to switch subjects as they are.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "You were around for the 18th amendment getting ratified, right?"
<Crion> Lauren blinks at that.
<trenchfoot> Nels: "Yeah. Missed the fallout, and they still sell liquor, so I guess it didn't work out."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "It sooort of did. Liquor consumption rates are way down from where they were before Prohibition. They just figured out that making it legal but licensed and taxed did more to reduce the rate of consumption than banning it outright did."
<VoxPVoxD> "But, yeah."
<Crion> Lauren: "Ohh. Right. That."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "For the best, I guess." Battle Angel Alita is probably still playing, as they chat. Or it's over, and they'll have to find something new for the background.
<Crion> Could always put on a Wick.
<trenchfoot> Why would we want to watch a candle burning?
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart fishes around for a change of subject that isn't history. "How was your Halloween, anyway? I didn't really catch up with you between when you, uh, went to the kitchen and when we went home."
<Crion> So much to learn.
<VoxPVoxD> He takes the remote and starts clicking around. "What do you want me to put on?" Open question for Nels and Lauren.
<trenchfoot> Nels brightens. "Oh! I mean, after the kitchen, I started talking with a couple vampires - I don't think I got their names. Um. There was a girl and a guy, and I think only the girl was a vampire..."
<Crion> Lauren: "There should be a Spotify or something with some music if we just wanna talk."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart can put some music on. He has no idea what playlist the Wherehouse has, so whatever music is playing is up to Nels.
<Crion> She spins on the couch next to Stewart, sort of leaning behind and over him to look at Nels. "Old guy? Hot?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart looks sideways at Lauren.
<Crion> She shrugs. "It's true."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart shrugs. Can't really argue.
<VoxPVoxD> "That was probably the Mainer and the Sheriff."
<VoxPVoxD> "The Mainer is the ambassador for Baltimore's vampire court to our freehold. He's a courtless Changeling."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "Yes, unless this is a way to make fun of me, in which case no."
<VoxPVoxD> "The Sheriff is the vampire court's enforcer of vampire law. When I met her she twisted a couple of cops' heads off and then picked me up and carried me back to my car."
<VoxPVoxD> She's also hot, but Stewart's not gonna SAY it.
<Crion> Lauren: "She does that."
<Crion> "She's also hot, by the way."
<Crion> "Fair's fair."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "Oh, wow. For me she just. Implied I was, um, not of this time."
<trenchfoot> "And. Yes."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah she's pretty old. Vampires can live forever, I think, as long as they don't get killed."
<trenchfoot> "I hid behind her when the scrum broke out. Figured it was safest."
<Crion> Lauren: "Well, neither are vampires, really. Have you met Lister?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Lister was the kid who got up at the end of the party and sang Kill All Your Friends."
<VoxPVoxD> "Vampire Prince of Baltimore. Dates back to the court of Louis XIV."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "That's it, then. He... made a choice."
<trenchfoot> "To- okay."
<trenchfoot> "I can't exactly go around complaining that people are older than me."
<VoxPVoxD> "He's cool. He and Lauren are friends. We play games sometimes."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "You ever been 'ok boomer'ed by someone who's, conservatively, 350 years old?"
<trenchfoot> Nels: "I don't know what that means."
<Crion> Lauren: "But yeah, Mainer's like. Half the Girl's age? Something like that."
<Crion> "Sorrrrrrta like you and the Kitchen."
<trenchfoot> Nels, primly: "I do not know what you are referring to."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart presses his lips together.
<trenchfoot> Then she laughs. "I know exactly what you're talking about. Fun once, going to make getting food weird for a while."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I can take your orders up for a while, it's fine. You guys are like... cool, though, right?"
<Crion> Lauren: "Eh, he won't be a jerk. The Kitchen's good people."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "As far as I know. Um. Not that we spoke much. After."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "He's a champ, then. Honestly, that would've messed me up."
<trenchfoot> Breezily: "Hey, though, about the Mainer and the Sheriff."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "What about them?"
<trenchfoot> "Are they just, around? I don't think I'd seen them before the party..."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "They're in the city. The Mainer's got an office in the Autumn King's firm. He's not around much. I assume he mostly spends his time with vampires."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "And the Sheriff? I guess we don't have much reason for social calls..."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart, with a glance at Lauren. "I've got his number..."
<Crion> Lauren shrugs. "Everytime I run into them, they honestly seem kinda bored."
<Crion> "You're not breaching protocol or anything if you do."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "They should play more video games."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "I barely know what those are."
<Crion> Lauren: "Yeah that's why they like Nels more, I think."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Also Nels never tried to harrass a grieving widow for a research project."
<VoxPVoxD> "Probably a factor."
<VoxPVoxD> "Anyway!" Stewart will step out to make the call.
<trenchfoot> Nels: "Wait, what?"
<VoxPVoxD> "Can't explain on the phone byeeee" The elevator door closes.
<trenchfoot> She turns to Lauren.
<Crion> Lauren: "Sup?"
<trenchfoot> Nels: "The thing Stewart just said. What?"
<Crion> She grins. "Well, he was saying he couldn't explain, because he was on the phone."
<Crion> "As for the widow, she was a cop."
<trenchfoot> Nels, slightly distressed: "Research project??"
<trenchfoot> "Grieving? Harass?????"
<Crion> "Some cops got dead because they beat the shit out of a woman who carried things for us, and stole one of the things she was carrying for us."
<Crion> "She's still in the hospital. Physical therapy starts next week? They were gonna kill her but fucked up."
<Crion> "Anyway those guys worked for the vampires, so the vampires...helped us take care of it. Permanently."
<Crion> She sighs. "Mainer and the Girl were going out there to congenially sew that wound shut, but Stewart and Maggie ah, got there first."
<VoxPVoxD> Man the worst thing the Mainer can do is yell at him but getting yelled at by the Mainer fucking sucks. Still, he's probably more chill about not work stuff. Stewart makes the call.
<trenchfoot> Nels: "Oh, golly, that's awful, and I'm not even sure who it's awful for. Other than the people who died."
<Crion> Mainer answers just before the third ring. "I'm here."
<Crion> Lauren: "Probably the cop left alive. I mean, she sucks too. I'm sure. But."
<trenchfoot> Nodding. "Cops."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Hey! This is Stewart, from Autumn. Purely a social call. I've got Nels Foulke here, she says you and her and the Sheriff hung out at Halloween and was wondering if you'd like to hang out."
<Crion> "Anyway, then fucking Cider Stitch got run up by some other cops the PREVIOUS dead cops have been working with, because Cider Stitch is an idiot, and that's what Stewart meant when he talked about the Girl popping off some heads."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "She... didn't seem the type, when we talked," she says, cautiously.
<trenchfoot> "Are you sure it was her? And also... heads?"
<Crion> The Mainer: "Mmmmmmmm. You know, this is generally a business--oof. Damn, darling. Watch the ribs. ...Uh huh. Bet you would. Sorry, Stewart, was just fucking with you. Yeah, we have some business for the next hour or two, but around midnight we'll have a space for the old jaw-jacking."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "........cool! We're at Lexington Market, the elevator right off the main concourse."
<Crion> The Mainer: "Be by in a bit."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart comes back inside. "He'll be by around midnight."
<Crion> Lauren: "That sounds like them."
<trenchfoot> Nels exhales. "Mostly she just seemed kinda loopy but supportive of the Mainer."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Who, the Sheriff?"
<Crion> Lauren, chipper: "Oh yeah, she's a stone-cold killer."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "...wow."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart nods. "Just an absolute murderer."
<VoxPVoxD> "Straight up."
<trenchfoot> "Wow."
<trenchfoot> "I... do you have whiskey?"
<VoxPVoxD> "I've only seen her kill crooked cops that were beating the shit out of one of us, though."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah, I've got some."
<Crion> Lauren: "Should a bottle of Jack somewhere back here, unless Stewart sprung for the good stuff."
<Crion> "Midnight..."
<Crion> "Just enough time to watch the first John Wick movie!"
<Crion> Time passes...
<Crion> Lauren, as the credits roll: "..."
<Crion> "...You know, in the uh."
<Crion> "Theatrical version of the movie."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart keeps a bottle of Booker's Kentucky bourbon in his room in the Wherehouse. It's unopened. Lauren and Nels didn't know it was there.
<Crion> "The bulldog doesn't say 'Hell yeah' at the end."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "That's their loss."
<trenchfoot> Nels looks vaguely queasy. "Do all movies involve that much violence these days?"
<VoxPVoxD> "Next time we watch this, it'll be Jimothy Wick."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "No, John Wick is at the upper bound."
<Crion> Lauren: "Nah. I just like watching Gerald: The Movie."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Does Gerald have a dog??"
<Crion> "I mean there's other action stars that look more like Gerald. But he basically acts like that guy."
<Crion> Lauren: "He's a cat man."
<Crion> "Weird!"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Nice."
<Crion> Stewart's phone buzzes.
<Crion> It's the Mainer.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart is also a cat man. Well, cat guy. Feels weird thinking of himself as man.
<VoxPVoxD> He stands up and heads for the elevator as he checks his phone.
<trenchfoot> C-c-c-c-cat man do.
<Crion> <We are outside. Guessin I'm not supposed to kick down this door. Any motion detectors before the elevator or whatnot?>
<VoxPVoxD> <Nah it's fine. omw out>
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart probably arrives before the text does.
<Crion> Mainer is checking his phone as the door to the Market opens. The Mainer is in a black-on-black-on-black three-piece suit with a white bolo tie, and the Girl is in her usual cloak and hijab.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Mainer. Sheriff. Come on in."
<Crion> The Girl: "Mmmmm. You know that's not technically necessary to say."
<Crion> The Mainer: "Much obliged."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I remember the first time Lauren visited my apartment, she was like, I'm not a vampire when I invited her in."
<VoxPVoxD> "Even though she was clearly waiting for me to do that."
<VoxPVoxD> Lauren can hear this, they're walking in now.
<Crion> Lauren: "IT WAS A JOKE!"
<trenchfoot> Nels files that away. Apparently you don't need to invite vampires in.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "It didn't sound like a joke! We weren't really on joking terms."
<VoxPVoxD> "I didn't even have a crush on you yet until like ten, fifteen minutes in."
<Crion> Lauren: "NERD!"
<VoxPVoxD> "Takes one to know one~"
<Crion> She pivots immediately though: "Hi, Sheriff! Hey, Mainer."
<Crion> The Girl: "Hello, Lauren. Hello, Nels."
<Crion> Mainer, to Lauren: "Miss."
<Crion> Mainer, to Nels: "Ma'am."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "We've got some bourbon if you want a drink."
<Crion> Mainer: "I think I might."
<Crion> The Girl's cheeks flush. "I think I will as well."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "Hello! Glad to see you again under, ah, better circumstances."
<Crion> "I'm not supposed to drink alcohol," she says, "but then, I'm not supposed to drink pig's blood. And I've had my fill of that. So what's the harm now."
<trenchfoot> Whispering to Lauren: "what is the harm in that"
<Crion> Lauren, also whispering: "vampires can hear you whisper"
<Crion> The Girl smirks.
<Crion> Is there a recliner free in this room? Where are they in the Wherehouse, anyway?
<Crion> How cozy has this place gotten?
<trenchfoot> She glances at the Girl, then back to Lauren. "shoot"
<VoxPVoxD> This is the main downstairs chamber, which has enough couches and recliners for the whole motley plus a couple of guests. There's a strong sense of being in construction - Mainer might be surprised to notice it looks like the motley's trying to put up a second floor by hand, with wooden frames and joists.
<Crion> He is, in fact, evaluating the carpentry with a skilled eye. "Looking good around here, Stewart. Glad to see it." He'll splay out on an unclaimed loveseat, and the Girl will half-pounce, half...apprehend herself atop him, reclining but still seeming coiled and ready to move.
<Crion> Both have their whiskey neat.
<trenchfoot> Nels will need to brew something if there's a next time.
<VoxPVoxD> So does Stewart. Mixers are for when you just need to get the poison in you as fast as possible. Social drinking is for slow sipping.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Thanks. Most of this is Maggie and Tony - they're the real handy ones. Though Nels is no slouch either. She's building a still."
<Crion> Mainer nods. "Distillation. A good and honest craft."
<Crion> The Sheriff of Baltimore chuckles. "You always should have been a brewer."
<trenchfoot> Nels, sipping on a mixed drink, for which she shan't be shamed by her friends: "It's built, courtesy of the hobs. Just got to figure out what we're making first."
<Crion> He shrugs, but smiles.
<Crion> The Girl: "Ah, yes. So: what are hobs?"
<Crion> The Mainer very pointedly doesn't roll his eyes.
<trenchfoot> Is Steve around?
<Crion> The Girl: "They have been explained to me before but I seek further clarity."
<VoxPVoxD> It's awfully late to be honking...
<Crion> Nah, Steve's out and about.
<Crion> Last time you saw him he was wearing a tricorn...?
<trenchfoot> How did he even get that. No, don't answer that. Nels: "The ones I've encountered have been either rude honking jerks or in immediate need of laying to rest. It's been a trying time."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Hobs, or hobgoblins, are the native fauna of the Hedge, which we're technically in right now."
<trenchfoot> "More accurate!"
<trenchfoot> She sips her drink. Ahh. Lemon.
<Crion> The Girl waves an irritated hand. "Yes, they are animals of a sort, but -- okay. The honking. Why?"
<VoxPVoxD> "They come in all shapes and sizes. Tony's in with the hobs, he's got a friend who comes around sometimes we call 'Steve'. Looks like a goose. Loves to drink our beer. He's pretty chill."
<VoxPVoxD> "He's the honker."
<trenchfoot> Nels nods, as though it explains everything: "Steve."
<Crion> She leans forward, arms on the loveseat's armrest. "Can you eat them."
<Crion> The Mainer: "Darlin'..."
<VoxPVoxD> "Then there's the big anthropomorphic pigs in cop uniforms. They mostly hassle the other hobs. We had an infestation in our neighborhood we had to clear out recently."
<Crion> Her eyes light up at that.
<trenchfoot> Nels: "Haven't tried. Though... the pig cops..."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I wouldn't recommend eating them."
<VoxPVoxD> "Not very nutritious, probably very toxic."
<Crion> The Girl, declaratively: "Eventually, I will eat a hobgoblin."
<VoxPVoxD> "We saw some that were like, little snitch watermelon people."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "They're pigs. And cops. It might be the most moral type of ham."
<Crion> The Mainer looks very long-suffering.
<VoxPVoxD> "Steve ate those."
<Crion> The Girl: "!!!"
<Crion> "Steve...the goose."
<VoxPVoxD> "Yes."
<Crion> "Do geese normally eat watermelon?"
<VoxPVoxD> "Well, he presents as a goose. There aren't actually any geese out here."
<Crion> The Mainer: "I do not believe so."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "I don't know what geese do or don't, because Steve is singular."
<VoxPVoxD> "Geese eat like, berries and bugs. Shoots and grass. Stuff like that."
<VoxPVoxD> "I guess watermelon's not out of the question..."
<Crion> The Girl looks speculative. "I would try to eat Steve...but I sense you like him. So, I won't."
<Crion> "Pigs, however..."
<Crion> The Mainer coughs. "We're not going out in the Hedge."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Especially a bad idea after dark."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "Are you sure? It could get them to leave us alone..."
<VoxPVoxD> To Nels: "They're our guests, you asked me to invite them over!"
<trenchfoot> "No, the pig-cops!"
<VoxPVoxD> "They've already mostly cleared out, thanks to us and the Walking Man."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "Mostly, but not completely. I'm just saying it's an option."
<Crion> The Girl sinks back into the cushions, easily convinced because she perhaps wasn't all that serious about it anyway. "If you say so. Still...Hedge pig..."
<trenchfoot> Nels wasn't saying so, but she's also not about to badger their guests into doing her work for them. "It's been strange to get used to."
<Crion> The Mainer, deadpan: "Stick to long pig, darlin'."
<Crion> She cackles at that.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart takes a drink to hide his discomfort.
<VoxPVoxD> Then: "So how's the Court?"
<trenchfoot> That's clearly a reference to something. Should probably check her encyclopedias later.
<Crion> The Mainer shrugs. "Prince is more active than he's been in awhile. That's good and bad."
<Crion> The Girl: "What my lover means to say is that Prince Lister has taken a more active interest in the community as of late."
<Crion> "And we welcome it."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "...is that bad?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart nods. "Kind of a lull between patches."
<Crion> The Mainer, to Nels: "And good."
<Crion> The Girl sort of slaps his chest lightly.
<trenchfoot> Nels: "Can I help?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart snorts.
<Crion> Then she says: "Our Prince goes through phases. Sometimes he's engaged, sometimes he leaves things up to the Count. This is an engaged period. The reasons him being engaged is bad have nothing to do with him."
<Crion> The Mainer: "Him being engaged means other vampires get engaged."
<Crion> "So things get a lot more fun downtown."
<Crion> The Girl: "Where we technically are."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Like who?"
<Crion> The Mainer: "Technically, darlin', we're in the Hedge."
<Crion> Stewart's question gets a sigh from the Mainer, and from the Girl: "The Doctor of Sciences, for one."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart grimaces.
<VoxPVoxD> "Yikes."
<trenchfoot> That good, huh.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "We haven't, uh."
<VoxPVoxD> "We haven't explained Nazis to Nels yet."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "I gather that they are bad."
<Crion> The Mainer: "We make jokes, we all have fun here, we goof off about the long pig, but no one in the Court is tearing co-eds limb from limb except that motherfucker."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "...okay, I think I just got what long pig is, but he - and everyone just - ???" The last part is just a confused noise.
<Crion> The Girl, to Nels: "They killed over 11 million Jews, Muslims, communists, Roma, gays, lesbians, and people who were just in the wrong place in the wrong time. In industrial slaughterhouses."
<Crion> "That's what Nazis are."
<trenchfoot> She slumps in her seat.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Also did horrific scientific experiments on the people they were killing."
<VoxPVoxD> "Which is, uh. Relevant here."
<Crion> The Mainer: "That it is."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "He's kept in check by a series of agreements, as I understand it."
<VoxPVoxD> "But like... in check. Not under control."
<Crion> The Girl: "Correct."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "I need another drink."
<Crion> Casually: "We speak of this freely, of course, because we loathe him."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart hands her the bottle, which he'd just poured himself another drink out of.
<VoxPVoxD> He huddles closer to Lauren.
<Crion> She's there for the huddling.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "So I gather he's too powerful to just... get rid of."
<Crion> The Girl: "He has been a useful counterbalance against the vampires of Washington, D.C. And also the Kindred of Washington, D.C."
<VoxPVoxD> 'Kindred' is a cool word.
<trenchfoot> Nels, sipping a whiskey straight: "I'm really not inclined to hear about them, given what I just heard about him."
<Crion> The Mainer: "We're also not quite sure how a death match between him and Lister would play out. Lister would probably win -- he's got the Doctor beat in raw power -- but..."
<Crion> The Girl: "And the consequences of losing that fight are...dire."
<Crion> "Of course, there have been...irregularities...around his hunting grounds recently." She looks over at Stewart. "You know about this."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah, although that was an out-of-towner."
<Crion> The Girl, flatly: "Was it?"
<Crion> The Mainer coughs again. "Let's not get out over our skis."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Well, it was someone who wasn't recognized by the court. Father Jesse made it sound like that doesn't happen."
<VoxPVoxD> "I guess... I don't know vampires, uh, reproduce, but I guess the Doctor could have made him...?"
<Crion> The Mainer: "If he did, he didn't do it the normal way. And since there's no proof or even no theory of crime here, probably best not to speculate."
<Crion> The Girl: "Gabriel doesn't just miss something like this in her territory."{
<Crion> The Mainer nods. "I agree."
<Crion> "I just think until we've done more forensics...any further statement might be premature."
<Crion> The Girl makes a noise in her throat. "You're no fun."
<Crion> The Mainer, charmingly: "Sure I am."
<Crion> Then he sips his whiskey again.
<trenchfoot> Nels: "Should he go missing, forever. Who takes his place?"
<trenchfoot> She sips her whiskey.
<Crion> The Mainer: "Worst case scenario?"
<Crion> "He does."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart glances at Nels.
<Crion> The Girl: "The Doctor of Sciences has been working on things that perhaps he shouldn't be working on. He is trying to outwit Final Death."
<trenchfoot> She's not exactly in a position to do it.
<trenchfoot> She could assist, though. And. Someone who has been compared to a Nazi, which she has just learned of...
<Crion> The Mainer, grimly: "That means more disappearances, but fewer bodies."
<Crion> "The Court's estimation, that's easier to keep a lid on."
<Crion> "Not that it's preferred."
<Crion> "The Prince and the Count take a...catch and release view on feeding."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "I hate everything about what I've learned tonight."
<VoxPVoxD> To Nels: "The Count of St. Sebastian is the guy who runs the city when the Prince doesn't want to. His title is Regent. Looks like an older guy, English accent, dresses like he's going to the opera in 1840. Turns into a cloud of bats."
<Crion> Mock hurt from the Girl: "You hate that we like whiskey?"
<trenchfoot> Nels, apologetically: "Almost everything."
<Crion> The Mainer: "The Count is a character. But he's good people."
<Crion> The Girl: "He's adorable. In his tuxedo. And his cape!"
<VoxPVoxD> "You gotta be a character to sincerely go by 'the Count' in the age of Sesame Street."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "I don't know what that is either."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "It's an educational puppet show for kids. It's been on TV for like 50 years. One of the puppets is a vampire who teaches kids their numbers. Goes by 'the Count'."
<Crion> The Mainer, straight-faced: "He pretends it's a compliment."
<VoxPVoxD> "Vun, two, three bats! Three! Ah ah ah ah!"
<trenchfoot> Nels: "They show that to children?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Vampires aren't scary. Pop culture vampires aren't scary," he hastily clarifies.
<VoxPVoxD> "They're totally monetized."
<Crion> "Got some neonate in up from College Park, down at the University of Maryland. Grad student. She made the Count crack. He spent the next fifteen minutes talking about how it was good representation for their people."
<Crion> "Didn't break character."
<Crion> The Girl: "Most neonates don't 'get' the Count for, oh, five or six years."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I respect that. We don't get a lot of us calling each other 'fairies'."
<VoxPVoxD> Ah shit now he's thinking about Dad again. Another drink!
<Crion> The Mainer: "That one has thankfully gone out of style, for the most part."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "I, um. UMBC? That University of Maryland?"
<VoxPVoxD> "University of Maryland Baltimore County. Melanie goes to grad school there."
<VoxPVoxD> "I'm out that way once a week or so."
<Crion> The Mainer: "Nah. One down south. University of Maryland College Park."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "I have a great grandkid there."
<trenchfoot> "The Baltimore County one. Not College Park."
<Crion> The Mainer, measured: "Lotta woods around there."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart's already finished that drink he just poured.
<Crion> Lauren will slip away and return with waters for both of them.
<VoxPVoxD> Sets his glass down firmly. Does not pick it back up.
<VoxPVoxD> She gets a kiss on the cheek for her trouble.
<trenchfoot> Nels shrinks back in her seat, clutching her glass. "Sorry. Didn't mean to make it weird."
<Crion> The Mainer: "It's fine. It wasn't me I was worried about. Keep an eye on that kid, if you can."
<Crion> The Girl: "Bad shit happening in the woods."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "The Lodge of the Hook Hand."
<trenchfoot> Sip.
<Crion> Mainer cocks an eyebrow while the Girl grins. "Rightly so," he says.
<Crion> He finishes his whiskey. "If there's one thing I trust the Rangers on, it's this kind of hunt. So I'd just stay out of their way."
<Crion> He leans forward towards the bottle and looks to Stewart. "Mind?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart shakes his head. All his.
<VoxPVoxD> In the sense of 'all yours', not 'all mine'.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah. My-- I've got a friend out in the county, up in Thistle. It got real nasty one night when I was up visiting but then we heard the Park Service and their fuckin, anti-materiel rifles. No more howling after that."
<Crion> The Mainer nods and pours half his last offering.
<Crion> He just grimaces at Stewart's story though. The Girl, still smiling: "They'll be back."
<Crion> The Mainer: "I'm just glad they're not doing it during summer."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I guess you gotta expect that from people who identify themselves as slasher villains explicitly."
<Crion> "They'll have the flamethrowers out by the end of this."
<trenchfoot> About to respond, but then: Sip.
<Crion> The Girl: "One of the many things I prefer about cities: no werewolves." She pauses. "Or merely silly werewolves."
<Crion> The Mainer opens his mouth, but then his phone buzzes again. He checks it. "Shit."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "Small miracles."
<Crion> Finishes his drink in one gulp.
<Crion> The Girl: "Work?"
<trenchfoot> It's hard to tell if she's being sarcastic or just very upset and dead inside.
<Crion> The Mainer: "Body dropped on the UB campus. Not consistent with the Doctor."
<Crion> The Girl: "Shit!"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart winces.
<trenchfoot> Sip.
<VoxPVoxD> "Well, it was nice to see you guys."
<Crion> The Mainer stands, and the Girl stands with him. "Thank you for your hospitality, Stewart and Nels. Lauren, darlin', good to see you again."
<VoxPVoxD> He'll untangle from Lauren and stand up - whoaaaa he's more drunk than he thought. "Don't be strangers." He offers his hand.
<Crion> The Girl: "We can see ourselves out." They're already moving, after Mainer shakes his hand. The Girl just smirks at him as she disappears out of the room.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart slumps back down.
<trenchfoot> Nels: "Yeah. Um. Good to see you. If I can help, I --" She checks her phone that the Court made her get. "You can find me."
<VoxPVoxD> When they're gone: "Cool people."
<Crion> The Girl nods to Nels too before she's gone.
<trenchfoot> Once they're gone, to Stewart and Lauren: "I just learned some things I wish I didn't know. Do you have something relaxing?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart throws on Detective Pikachu. Nels can ask alllll the Pokemon questions she wants.
<Crion> --Fin.
<VoxPVoxD>
<VoxPVoxD>
<VoxPVoxD>
<VoxPVoxD>
<VoxPVoxD>
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart's not great at waiting. But sometimes there's nothing you can do but pace around and think about how bad at waiting you are. So this evening he's at the Wherehouse, having given the afternoon to pacing, and the stream delayed until the following day for the live announcements at ExileCon. He's folded up in an unopened recliner, drinking a beer, watching... what did Maggie want to
<VoxPVoxD> watch again?
<dammitwho> The Star Wars! A lot of people seem to like it, and she's never seen it before.
<VoxPVoxD> Which one?
<dammitwho> There's more than one? Does it track every individual Star War? What's the first one?
<VoxPVoxD> Oh jeez.
<VoxPVoxD> So then they're settled in watching Star Wars: Episode IV: A New Hope, which Stewart insists was the first one that came out. But Stewart just calls it Star Wars, because that's what it says on the title card (the mechanics of Lucas post-hoc edits and fan re-edits and de-edits of those edits is largely over Stewart's ehad.
<VoxPVoxD> He hasn't actually sat down and watched this movie since he was... maybe thirteen?
<VoxPVoxD> This copy predates the pre-Phantom Menace touchups which Stewart recalls annoying a lot of people, though he doesn't recall why.
<dammitwho> "Hoo! That Dark Vader fella doesn't mess around." She seems to be enjoying it thus far!
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "You know, the guy doing his voice is different from the guy in the suit. They dubbed his lines in later."
<dammitwho> "Huh. Now, is he supposed to be a robot, or what's his deal there?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "He's basically a guy, but he's had some parts replaced. He can't actually survive outside his armor, kind of like a Dalek."
<VoxPVoxD> Suddenly realizing: "A Dalek is a thing from a different story."
<VoxPVoxD> "Like a mean bug in a trash can."
<dammitwho> She snorts with laughter. "Mean bug in a trash can..."
<dammitwho> "So this'n's a real big deal, huh? It is pretty exciting. I liked that fella who went 'you're far too trusting'."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Grand Moff Tarkin! Lot of great bad guys in this."
<VoxPVoxD> "My favorites are the droids."
<VoxPVoxD> "Everyone's so mean to them though..."
<dammitwho> "The little one, R2, he seems to get by okay."
<dammitwho> Maggie: "I don't think there's really six million forms of communication, though. I think ol' 3PO there is padding his resume."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I guess it depends on whether you'd count every language machines are programmed in as a separate thing or if it's just one big 'talking to machines' language."
<VoxPVoxD> The answer is clearly the former, btw.
<VoxPVoxD> "C-3PO gets treated worse but R2 must be so much lonelier. So few people can talk to him..."
<dammitwho> "Really? Everybody seems to understand him."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "They understand the emotional inflection but 3PO needs to translate. There's bits in the other movies and in the books and games and stuff where it comes up more."
<dammitwho> "Books and games?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Oh yeah there's like, books, and comics, and tv shows, and so many video games. It's a really big, evocative setting so people have used it to tell a lot of different stories."
<dammitwho> "Huh." She shifts in her seat and leans back. "Makes sense."
<VoxPVoxD> "Most of them are *really* stupid, but there's some cool stuff in there."
<dammitwho> "Like what?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "The Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic games are pretty good. The second one's better but it didn't really get finished."
<VoxPVoxD> "Those are set hundreds of years before the movies."
<dammitwho> Maggie: "That's the old republic the guy said the last remnants of had been swept away?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah it lasted a really long time. In the games you start out playing a Jedi no one likes anymore and you go around meeting new friends and trying to solve a big problem and over the course of each game you can make decisions that will either set you on the path of good, like Obi-Wan and Luke, or evil, like Vader."
<VoxPVoxD> "A different Jedi no one likes anymore in each game."
<dammitwho> Maggie: "What sort of games are they?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Role-playing games."
<dammitwho> "Eh?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Role-playing games are games where you guide a character or a group of characters through a defined story and take on their role. Usually they involve fighting bad guys, getting gradually stronger, often in customizable ways, and exploring detailed imaginary worlds."
<VoxPVoxD> "Good RPGs are some of the best video games there are, like Chrono Trigger and Chrono Cross, Knights of the Old Republic 2, Morrowind, Planescape: Torment, The Squared Circle Saga..."
<dammitwho> Oooh, this is clearly something Stewart's really into. "So... those are your favorites? Tell me about 'em."
<VoxPVoxD> This is something Stewart's really into. "Chrono Trigger and Chrono Cross are games where you sort of jump around -- in Trigger you're time travelling but in Cross there's like these alternate worlds. I like them because the stories are really good, and the music is INCREDIBLE, and you can see where all the monsters are instead of fights happening randomly as you walk around."
<VoxPVoxD> "Knights of the Old Republic 2 is the Star Wars game I mentioned earlier, you got exiled from the Jedi for doing war crimes and now you're going around trying to figure out why the other Jedi have all disappeared. My favorite thing about it is how you can influence the characters to follow your philosophy, whether it's selfish or noble, and even train some of them to become Jedi themselves
<VoxPVoxD> if they follow you far enough. Lot of really cool characters in that one. It's kind of a sad game, though. Bittersweet."
<VoxPVoxD> "Morrowind is a game that has a defined story, but its biggest feature is that it's *incredibly* open-ended. You come off this boat onto this island where everything sucks and everyone's miserable, and you make your character, and then you're giving directions to the next part of the main story, but then you're just... turned loose. You can do whatever you want. You can explore, you can rise
<VoxPVoxD> in the ranks of different organizations, you can find treasure and rob people, or if you're a complete psycho you can just stab pretty much everyone you meet."
<VoxPVoxD> "I spent hundreds and hundreds of hours on that game."
<VoxPVoxD> "Planescape: Torment is sort of the opposite. It's got levels and fights and stuff like other RPGs, but mostly it's like a giant... do you know what a choose-your-own-adventure book is?"
<dammitwho> Maggie: "...no?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Okay. Planescape: Torment has these sort of branching paths you can take based on stuff you do, and you get to react to every situation in your own personal way. The character's kind of a blank slate but with a defined history, so your task is to take this fully formed person, with a whole past and people who already know about him, and decide who he is and what he cares about.
<VoxPVoxD> There's a question that keeps getting asked over the course of the game: 'What can change the nature of a man?'. And that's what the game's sort of about. How to change. Whether you can change."
<VoxPVoxD> "The Squared Circle Saga is sort of in between. You take the role of the hero, Excessively Righteous Blossom, and fly the airship she builds all around this HUGE world going on adventures, and the world and all the characters sort of changes based on stuff you do. You can save a city-state from zombies and hand the power over to the workers, or you can dick around and go fight dinosaurs in
<VoxPVoxD> a huge arena, or you can take sides in a shadow war between the Stars and the Moon. You could even do all of those things, if you wanted to for some reason."
<VoxPVoxD> "You can also just spend hours and hours in the cooking minigame and playing dressup."
<dammitwho> "That's pretty complicated stuff. It makes sense that people would pay to watch you play that!"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Oh, no, I've never played any of those for an audience. The kind of people who want to sit through story stuff is a veeeery different crowd from the one who watches my streams."
<dammitwho> Maggie: "Hoorm. Are these the kind of games I would like?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Well... some of them. A lot of them have a core gameplay loop that's about sort of doing the same stuff over and over again and watching numbers go up. But there's some in there you'd like, I bet."
<VoxPVoxD> "It's a really broad genre, there's something for almost anyone in it, assuming that person is willing to spend hours of their lives pretending to be a time traveling cartoon character or a laser Buddhist or a magic zombie or a really emotional superhero teenager."
<VoxPVoxD> "Sometimes they feel like books, sometimes they feel like movies."
<dammitwho> "Or a vampire! Heh heh heh!"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Oh man, there was this one game I played, it was like, Chrono Trigger with vampires."
<VoxPVoxD> "Okay get this: there's a city way up in northern Norway, in the Arctic Circle, where the sun doesn't set during the summer and doesn't rise during the winter. And it's full of vampires. All these really weird and cool vampires like a time-traveling invincible nerd and a postmodern blood witch and a whole family of these blind yetis."
<VoxPVoxD> "It was a lot like Chrono Trigger actually. It had the weird slug monster and the girl named Luca..."
<VoxPVoxD> "But anyway the main characters were this kind of skeevy rich guy vampire from New York, this scary rich lady vampire from Germany, and this workaday vampire scientist who was slowly turning into a yeti."
<dammitwho> "A *yeti*?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "An abominable snowman. His was like this huge eyeless bat thing. Eventually if you play as him enough you can take control of his mutation and get turned into this really messed up man-bat that has maxed stats all the time."
<dammitwho> Maggie: "No, no, I know what a yeti is. But what do they have to do with vampires? This guy just get really unlucky?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "There was like this really complicated vampire mythology. Basically he was part of this one cursed bloodline, yeah."
<VoxPVoxD> "I can't remember the name. One second..."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart's got his phone out and he's searching. He's searching...
<VoxPVoxD> "I can't find it."
<dammitwho> "Eh?"
<VoxPVoxD> "The game! I can't find the game!" Stewart almost snaps.
<VoxPVoxD> "Maybe I'm using the wrong search terms..."
<dammitwho> "Well, if it's pretty old..." She says mildly.
<VoxPVoxD> "It's not that old! It came out in... in..."
<VoxPVoxD> Increasingly frustrated typing.
<VoxPVoxD> Suddenly Stewart stands up, almost throwing his phone on the chair as he does, and goes to get another beer.
<dammitwho> Hoo boy. Maggie doesn't know how to react here, because Stewart's the one who knows about search terms and the internet and such. It feels like something's wrong, but like... is it?
<dammitwho> "You okay, there?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart looks back at her, furious, then he holds a finger up while drinking angrily, like he's Jamie Lee Curtis.
<VoxPVoxD> Finally he's rolling the now-empty beer bottle between his fingers, slightly stooped, face darkened with ugly thoughts, more Morlock than Eloi for the first time in a while. "What else?" he mutters to himself.
<VoxPVoxD> Belatedly he realizes Maggie is looking at him. "It's not real."
<dammitwho> "Wh-- ahhh... jeez. I'm sorry..." A long pause. "You want me to make you a nice sandwich or something? Ham and cheese?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "You've been-- sorry. You've been asking me all these questions for weeks now. And Nels? Hoo boy. So like... what. What else isn't real?"
<VoxPVoxD> He turns to face her fully. "What else have I confidently described to people that never fucking happened?"
<dammitwho> Maggie: "Do you want to see about the others?"
<VoxPVoxD> "I know the Others!" Stewart hisses. "I know them just as well as you!"
<dammitwho> Maggie's eyebrows go up a little. Carefully, she replies. "I meant the other games you talked about. Nail down which ones are real and which, um, aren't. I don't know how much it'll help, but maybe it'll get you your bearings? For this conversation, anyway?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart opens another beer - against the counter, like Stu - and takes a sip without meeting Maggie's eyes.
<VoxPVoxD> Looked up how to do that on Youtube. At least, he thinks he did.
<VoxPVoxD> "...no," he says finally. "No, I don't want to look those up right now. I'll do it later. At home. Double check with Lauren."
<dammitwho> "Okay. You wanna finish the movie?" She has it on pause.
<VoxPVoxD> "...yeah, okay." Where were they?
<dammitwho> Kenobi just became more powerful than you could possibly imagine.
<dammitwho> "Let me ask you this. Do the higher-ups in Autumn talk like that? Becoming more powerful than you could possibly imagine?"
<dammitwho> "Because I'd bet money the wizards do."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart, red-eyed, thinks about his friends used to say that line to each other before shooting nerf guns. "Santander absolutely does."
<VoxPVoxD> "Kingsley's got way more of a white collar, I-am-the-senior-partner-at-this-firm-and-I-am-constantly-judging-you vibe."
<VoxPVoxD> Was his Dad like that too? Is he even remembering that right?
<VoxPVoxD> Is that really Maura's face he sees in his mind?
<VoxPVoxD> They pass the rest of the movie in silence. Then: "As I understand it, that is now the fourth of what will, this time next month, be nine movies."
<dammitwho> She nods. "You want to invite Lauren over? Maybe get Nels or Melanie in too, make a night of it?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Lauren's waiting on showing me 7 and 8 until closer to 9. I don't think she likes the first three but I remember them being pretty good." His voice breaks at the end there.
<banana> i just did some birth-date calculations
<banana> melanie was born in 1997 and, since generation is surely based on when you grew up rather than biological age, is technically a zoomer
<banana> but, ths is the wrong channel
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion>
<Crion> It's been...one week since Halloween.
<Crion> Give or take a few days, of course.
<Crion> Things have more or less gone back to normal; your courts are a bit more into your business now that there's a Huntsman on the loose targeting a girlfriend of a motley-mate, and also that you've run into a True Fae who has made her intention known to, ah, continue to make her intentions known. But mainly you're being left to devices as the temperature continues to drop.
<VoxPVoxD> That's too LONG! 25% of the month is gone and Stewart STILL hasn't heard about this John of the Falls guy, who the motley is probably sick of hearing about by now. Here's Stewart again today: "But yeah when I get word he's ready for visitors I was told it was best to bring friends. He's the Autumn Court's oneiromancy expert. I don't know which Falls he's the John of."
<Crion> Stewart's been getting the runaround for a day or two now, first from Kingsley and then, when Kingsley was tired of dealing with him, from a very apologetic Gerald.
<VoxPVoxD> God DAMN it Kingsley!
<Crion> Kingsley's been very clear that he doesn't really control access to John of the Falls. John of the Falls controls access to John of the Falls. And for whatever reason, he's being...recalcitrant.
<CBN> Tony: "Oni-what now?" The Wherehouse kitchen's stove periodically gets char from meals you didn't cook inside it, and Tony is scrubbing that off before it probably gains sentience or something. Which means any conversation is with him shoulder-deep in the oven.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Onieromancy is dream-magic. The Huntsman's heart - the key to getting rid of it permanently - is hidden in the dreaming mind of a random normie. Signs are they're reasonably local."
<VoxPVoxD> "So we'll need to enter someone's dreams to get it out."
<VoxPVoxD> "You need help with the oven?"
<trenchfoot> Nels: "...why would someone dream about that? Nevermind that, how do we stop them from doing it?"
<trenchfoot> "I guess finding them first, but."
<VoxPVoxD> "I don't know!!" Stewart's practically hopping. "That's why I need to get face time with the oneiromancer."
<CBN> Tony: "Yeah if you can just nudge the soap bucket a little closer that'd be---there's a lot of people local now though, isn't there?"
<Crion> Steve has been back. Currently he's wearing a newspaper boat as a hat, and is "supervising" Tony's work. He does not move to help with the soap bucket.
<banana> Melanie sympathises from by the kitchen island. Like any surface where Melanie hangs out, it's starting to get covered in books, crowding out some of the cutlery and dishware. "Do we have to find them locally? The collective unconscious is a freaking weird way to travel but it might be easier to navigate when you're loking for metaphors made flesh made dream."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Presumably there's some kind of, I don't know, some kind of magic to--" He slides the soap bucket over slowly so it doesn't slop over onto the floor. "--to narrow it down. Refine the search. I don't really know what the process is because I'm not an onieromancer."
<VoxPVoxD> "I don't know how we have to find them. I know there are, broadly, two kinds of ways to enter someone's dreams - while asleep, through your own dreams, or bodily, through special gates in the Hedge."
<VoxPVoxD> "I only know that, by our best inferences, this dreamer *is* local. The Huntsman's behavior suggests some, uh, proximity, of their own personal desires."
<dammitwho> "We can wander about through people's dreams?" says Maggie, surprised.
<trenchfoot> Nels has her study guides spread out over the coffee table, where she's looking from the couch. It'd be easy to shuffle them back into a neat stack, should someone else require the space, she's not rude. Just. Messy. "That's, um, more than a little upsetting to consider."
<banana> "'Can'. It's not always voluntary," says Melanie. Stewart won't have any problem with the bringing friends part, that goes without saying.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah. I mean, like. We can do a lot of stuff that's upsetting to consider. So can regular people, honestly."
<CBN> Tony: "What, you mean like appearing as the villain of the absolute classic and wildly optimistic Terminator movie?" Tony's movies over years have him in the sweet spot between Terminator and T2. No one's broken his heart about the current state of the franchise.
<trenchfoot> Nels: "I meant the personal desires thing, actually."
<CBN> Tony: "Maybe the person whose dream it's in, likes good movies?"
<banana> Melanie: "It's statistically likely."
<CBN> Tony: "Or large Austrians. Whatever happened to the guy who played the robot man anyway?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I'm going to be so pissed if we can't set this thing free before it-- Tony have you seen Terminator 2 yet?"
<CBN> Tony: "Have I seen what."
<VoxPVoxD> "Oh dude."
<VoxPVoxD> "The guy who played the robot man was Governor."
<VoxPVoxD> "Of California."
<CBN> Tony: "In the sequel? Weird direction to take it in but okay."
<VoxPVoxD> "He'd have been President by now if he was eligible."
<VoxPVoxD> "No, in real life."
<VoxPVoxD> "Arnold Schwarzenegger."
<VoxPVoxD> "Married a Kennedy, Governor of California."
<CBN> Tony just looks around to see if anyone else is going to give up the game by bursting out laughing at this obvious joke-lie-jape at his expense.
<banana> Melanie: "What, like Ronald Reagan? Why do they keep electing actors?"
<trenchfoot> These names are meaningless.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I mean. It's like how they keep electing bankers in New York, isn't it?"
<banana> "Statistics again."
<CBN> Tony: "I hate all of this."
<CBN> He withdraws a blackened rag that you could swear tries to bite him before he drowns it in the soap bucket. "So much."
<Crion> honk
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Argh! If I just knew, like, how they were going to wake John up..."
<VoxPVoxD> "I could go and do it myself."
<VoxPVoxD> "That'd be dumb. I shouldn't do that. He'd freak. But I could."
<VoxPVoxD> "I can't even do the stupid fucking thing!"
<banana> We've got to do something to take Stewart's mind off this stuff. Melanie considers saying that, but she hasn't got anything concrete in mind.. he's bouncing around like a small frustrated animal.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "But they do wake him up, or have some way to contact him inside the coma he's been in for the last 55 years..."
<CBN> Tony, somewhat distracted while clearing another layer. "I can do some dream stuff if it helps."
<Crion> Is there an easy way to contact Stewart inside the Wherehouse? He's got a laptop or something, right?
<VoxPVoxD> He's got his phone. There's probably a laptop around here somewhere but Stewart mostly doesn't come to the Wherehouse to go online. He can do that at home.
<trenchfoot> Nels adjusts her papers on the table and sets them in order. Maybe enough studying for today.
<VoxPVoxD> To Tony: "Wait, what?"
<banana> Hang on. Coma? There's no way that this one eccentric nonaligned expert is the bottleneck for the freehold dealing with Huntsmen 'at all'. Melanie's thinking Stewart's being fobbed off somewhat here, given a time consuming task to keep him away from.. things that the powerful elders of the court are doing, probably. It makes her a little angry on his behalf, but that's the danger of thinking
<banana> about stuff.
<banana> Typical autumn court though. The first thing to do when there's a crisis is start keeping secrets from each other.
<Crion> Then he will receive the following text from sender QUOTH -- it's already in his Contacts, even if it's not actually in his Contacts -- reading: <'STEWART READER,' KNOWN OTHERWISE AS 'CRITICALMASS:'>
<Crion> <TRUNCATED MESSAGE FOLLOWS>
<Crion> <Door under the I-83 overpass of W 29th next to the park>
<CBN> Tony: "Yeah isn't that just a thing we can do? Like, you touch somebody while they're asleep, you walk into their brain and find something weird and you eat it, and you feel recharged?" He looks around. "Isn't that how the rest of you top off between our weird adventures? With like, magic crap?"
<Crion> <Portal>
<Crion> <Seek the Gate of Horn>
<Crion> <Do not go alone>
<banana> Melanie: "I start fights. Mostly political arguments."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart's stopped listening to Tony to look at his phone. "You guys you guys I got something. Under the 83 overpass, West 29th, next to the park. A portal. A Gate of Horn."
<VoxPVoxD> He looks around at the others. "You guys... wanna come? I'm not supposed to go alone."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "I'll get my gun."
<CBN> Tony: "I mean I can't bring guests with mine, or at least I've never tried, but this sounds like another weird adventures. So I'm game." To Steve: "Please don't eat or drink anything in this bucket while I'm gone."
<banana> Melanie: "Why do you think we're all hanging around waiting for them to let you off the leash?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I don't know, this looks basically the same as what we're usually doing!"
<VoxPVoxD> "Whatever!! Thank you!! I'll get my coat."
<dammitwho> "Huuuuagh." Maggie levers herself out of her chair. "Alright, let's get to it, then."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "The Gate of Horn is the way to enter dreams bodily through the Hedge I mentioned. The other way is called the Gate of Ivory, which is what it sounds like you're using, Tony."
<VoxPVoxD> "So we're cutting through the Hedge here."
<VoxPVoxD> To Nels: "You should bring your gun."
<trenchfoot> She's already got her papers back in her quarters and her revolver at her side.
<CBN> Tony: "Cool beans. We do enough Hedge shit already, what's one more thing."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah! Team Wherehouse!"
<Crion> A concerned: honk
<banana> Melanie scoops up books to dump in her rooms - Imitation and Gender Insubordination , The Signal and the Noise, a german-english dictionary. She doesn't need tools or rituals of preparation. If they're lucky, contacting John Of The might be a vital but irritating task, the sort of thing you hand to plucky subordinates rather than an actual waste of time.
<Crion> Steve cocks his head to the side. He seems to have understood the discussion.
<CBN> Tony: "Steve is this going to get more fucked up than I think it will?"
<banana> "Steve. We're going out, so if you don't want us to do up the catflap you better act responsibly."
<Crion> honk honk. honk
<trenchfoot> That's a concerning number of incomprehensible honks.
<CBN> Tony: "Steve says to be careful, I guess this gate is maybe a dude? Named The Fall? Who... He's parsing some honks here. "Oh good, fucks around and taunts you until finally letting you in. Real Hedge shit."
<Crion> honk
<VoxPVoxD> "Nice. Great. Welcome to fucking Autumn. I'll be outside.":
<Crion> To Melanie, Steve cocks his hat and salutes with a wing.
<Crion> The hat is still a newspaper boat.
<trenchfoot> Wonderful.
<banana> If we come back to find a teen goose party, he knows what'll happen.
<CBN> Tony: "Yes thank you Steve. The usual sixer is yours, and you may read up to three of my magazines."
<Crion> A decisive nod, then a beer from the fridge.
<CBN> Tony: "Well, lead on Stewart, let's go have some adventure."
<banana> With all of the motley starting from their cool secret base, the most time-consuming part of the journey is getting from Lexington Market to wherever they were able to park a couple of cars. Melanie's only got one question, in case today goes better than expected:
<banana> "Destroying a huntsman's heart. Does that end the creature totally? Does it matter whether it's currently manifest?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I don't want to destroy it, I want to give it back."
<VoxPVoxD> The five of them should all fit in Stewart's car on the way up to Druid Hill Park.
<VoxPVoxD> Melanie's probably gonna want shotgun, for the legroom.
<CBN> Tony: "Is that how this works?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "A Huntsman is a victim of the Fae, like us. Their hearts are stolen and replaced with a fragment of a Keeper's title. If we can negotiate and seal an oath with the Huntsman they should just... go home."
<Crion> There's public parking nearby. The good news is that it's not very public. In fact, the underpass itself doesn't even appear to have a...hmm. https://i.imgur.com/nS8kM34.png
<trenchfoot> Nels: "Oh. Then, yes."
<Crion> Actually wait.
<banana> Melanie: "Negotiate? Why would we need a deal if we took the risk of letting it get close to us already?"
<VoxPVoxD> Oh right. Jones Falls.
<Crion> Way up that concrete embankment, there's a door laying on the ground.
<CBN> Tony: "What happens to the fragment of the title afterwards?"
<VoxPVoxD> "It returns to the Keeper, same as it would if we destroyed the Huntsman."
<CBN> Tony: "Hm."
<VoxPVoxD> "Yeah, like..." he gets quieter. "Stopping one Huntsman, no matter how, doesn't do anything about the one after that."
<VoxPVoxD> "We're here."
<Crion> Should be easy enough to clambor down there. ...No one's carrying longarms, right?
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart hugs his black peacoat tighter around himself against the wind cutting through the underpass.
<Crion> Might be harder to get to the underpass from your parking space open-carrying a shotgun.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart's still unarmed. Apologetic Gerald and Wants-to-Talk Stu weren't any more helpful with that than Kingsley was with John.
<banana> Melanie: "At that point we rely on carrying on, on the fact that the whole thing is rare. Inevitable but not constant."
<banana> "It's like... cancer you can cure."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Right."
<CBN> Tony: "Do we at least know what Keeper this one's a part of, or in service to, or whatever? Feeling like it'll probably come looking for whatever undid its weird heart-title-swap-thing."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Yeah. It's Lauren's Keeper."
<VoxPVoxD> "Titled 'Sky Mother'."
<VoxPVoxD> "It's like if Skynet was designed by the bad guy from Wild Wild West."
<VoxPVoxD> Fuck, god damn it "It's a big fuckoff robot spider in the sky."
<CBN> Tony: "That show's still on? I watched that when I was a kid!"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "There was a movie."
<CBN> "Don't remember any spiders though."
<CBN> "Oh."
<banana> "The forensics team said that the huntsman-robot was weaved together, molten metal strands formed into an exoskeleton. It looks mass-produced on purpose but it's not."
<VoxPVoxD> Anything stop Stewart from opening the door?
<trenchfoot> Nels hides her confusion well. What on Earth is a robot?
<Crion> Nope. It'll just open onto concrete...unless he gives it that kick.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart literally kicks the door. "Hell is coming, and we're already behind schedule. Yield."
<Crion> The door swings through the other way...down into the concrete...and there's a misaligned world on the other side.
<Crion> The Hedge.
<CBN> Tony: "Me first, or?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart looks back. "What?"
<VoxPVoxD> He blinks.
<VoxPVoxD> "Oh. Yeah, sure. Thanks."
<VoxPVoxD> He hesitates again before stepping back and letting Tony through.
<CBN> Tony sizes it up, and hop...scoot...passes through, in whatever way at the moment feels the least awkward. Stupid physics.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart's in second.
<trenchfoot> Nels is in next.
<dammitwho> Maggie will trundle in behind.
<Crion> It's a weird feeling -- you're stepping into the Hedge, but also up, half-throwing off your internal balance. But across from you, when you arrive, is a giant basalt...slab? It looks like it might be a door, but there's no seam for it to part. There's just a horn, dirty and yellow, looking as if it was cut off...a VERY large rhino, fashioned by a strange black metal chain into a knocker.
<Crion> The Hedgerow here is wide; instead of a street, it's a highway -- but it's just aesthetic. This is no Trod.
<Crion> Still, you have to cross four lanes of "traffic" to get there instead of two.
<CBN> Tony looks both ways before attempting to cross. Never a bad idea.
<banana> Melanie's been quiet today. Stewart's not ok, but it's due to like.. actual bad things that have really happened. That's what they're addressing. Still- once they make it to the other side, she asks: "Are we expecting to meet John in here? Let's decide who does the talking."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "It should be me, right. He's an Autumn courtier, I'm the one they'll have told him to expect."
<banana> Melanie: "Maybe. If the guy responds to pressure 'taunts and fucking around'.. you don't need that right now."
<banana> "How about Nels? Literally everyone likes her and she's got the last half-century in common."
<banana> "Um, sorry Nels."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "And Nels does need to be taunted and fucked with?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart narrows his eyes. Is this some kind of sacrifice-the-pretty-girl-to-the-slasher kick Melanie's on? He doesn't understand.
<banana> Melanie won't push that further unless Helen herself has something to say about it.
<CBN> Tony: "I can get yelled at, I don't really give a shit. Especially if it's just part of some stupid game face Hedge rule stuff."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I mean, if he's that kind of asshole there's no reason to assume he won't fuck with all of us."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "I..." She's considering. "I'd be happy to help, but yes, that's what I was expecting more generally."
<trenchfoot> "Bring your friends so he doesn't simply focus on you the whole time."
<banana> Nels is the pretty girl; that's why an asshole might be nice to her. That's how the world works. "The key is to avoid antagonising a man who sounds likely to take offence to things and use it as an excuse to be unhelpful. I feel like.. I've got a nasty feeling he'll take advantage of desperation, if that's what he sees."
<CBN> Tony: "Worse comes to worse, if the guy is a door, we can always kick him down, right?"
<VoxPVoxD> Desperate? What the hell's she-- whatever. You know what? Whatever. "Whatever, fine, Nels can take point. Let's just go before we stand here too long and turn into Froggers."
<banana> "We can kick pretty good."
<Crion> Well, you're all here. There's no wind on this version of the Jones Falls Expressway -- if you look over the side, the perspective is all weird too, it's like you're not even off the ground -- but that great basalt door stands opposite you...and, oddly, real Hedge.
<Crion> Not fake buildings or barbed wire: thorny hedgerow.
<Crion> The street seems clear, if you want to approach.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart starts across the street.
<CBN> Tony approaches at Stewart's shoulder.
<banana> Melanie wonders whether the wild growth under the underpass makes this entrance different, closer to the.. quasi-nature that the Hedge likes to pretend at.
<trenchfoot> Nels: "If you're sure." She'll be just a touch behind Stewart, who seems to be both stressed and in a hurry. ...not sure how to help, there.
<VoxPVoxD> Assuming he doesn't get run over or trip a snare trap or something on the way, Stewart takes the knocker in both hands and thuds it firmly against the door three times.
<banana> If it doesn't open, we'll have to Spin it.
<Crion> The door is silent. Nothing happens. Then...a laugh? Then a growl? Then a sigh?
<Crion> And BAM!-BAM!-BAM! BAM!-BAM!-BAM! BAM!-BAM!-BAM!
<Crion> With each resounding slam, a louder, deeper version of Stewart's, the great basalt door flies backwards into the Hedge, creating a perfectly great-basalt-door-shaped passageway with every regression, thorns sprouting and growing to curl over the new walls. After the first six retreats, the door suddenly takes a right, and disappears from view -- though you can still hear the last three
<Crion> "knocks."
<dammitwho> Maggie: "Suppose it was too much to hope we'd avoid a Hedge maze."
<banana> Melanie: "A dark mirror of Jackie's guidance."
<banana> To Tony: "Do we follow the door?"
<CBN> Tony: "Feels like, though I don't know what happens if it doubles back on us?"
<banana> "We can try some of those tricks from the pig siege."
<banana> Now that there's no imminent prospect of a tricky conversation, this becomes a collective problem-solving exercise. Let's head into the maze and try to twist it back to something like a path...
<CBN> Tony: "If the description was accurate, I gotta assume the more stuff we do, the more stuff it's gonna do back."
<Crion> In front of them...spikes drive out of the ground and wall, and spikes drive out of THOSE spikes, and so on, creating what appears to be a twenty-foot deep not-quite-really-barrier that you'd need to very carefully maneuver through.
<trenchfoot> Rude.
<CBN> Tony: "So what if we just try to focus our efforts on doing one big thing? Can we do that? Is that making sense?"
<banana> "Crossing that is certainly big."
<CBN> Tony begins making his way forward, very slowly and not-that-surely grabbing spikes from the side and attempting to break them off as he goes. Doesn't make much progress.
<banana> Melanie: "Okay, please get back. I'll try something."
<banana> "Like.. a long way back. You need to get back out the door entirely, maybe cross the road."
<banana> Melanie's standing in front of the hedge-spikes, sinking into the ground a little. She quivers and flakes.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "What are you trying?"
<banana> Melanie: "Destruction." The false-sun is very bright overhead.
<VoxPVoxD> "Are you... gonna be okay?"
<trenchfoot> Nels is hanging back with the same question. Well. Hanging forwards, because she hasn't yet run away.
<banana> Melanie smiles. "I am, thank you for checking! But seriously get away please. Out to the highway." The Elemental's Mask looks happy, but her Mien.. does not. Her true mouth twists into an artificial snarl. Something far away in the hedge walls moves with a judder.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart trusts Melanie. He heads back out front.
<trenchfoot> Okay! Away it is.
<Crion> A rumble across the asphalt...even if the bass isn't quite satisfying enough.
<banana> Just after the others are out of sight, there's a tearing noise of earth which escalates to a roar. The hedgerow begins to shake and collapse. They can hear crashes and the screech of wood-turned-metal.
<banana> One of the inner hedge-walls, visible through the gap where the basalt door was, collapses entirely with a huge motion. Then it all comes to an end and the noise begins to abate.
<banana> Barely audible: "It's okay now!" At the maze junction, Melanie's standing exactly where she was, blinking happily in the bright daylight. Around her the field of spikes has been smashed apart as if by a giant's fist; the ground is rent with hairline cracks, each seemingly a chasm of great depth. The little island of earth where she stands is the only part of the ground that isn't torn
<banana> up and churned apart.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Jesus."
<VoxPVoxD> "Nice."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "...wow."
<Crion> As soon as the rumbling stops, the Hedge reasserts itself. The ground returns, sort of queasily bouncing back like a bad computer game bug or particularly twisty loam -- but the thorns^3 are still reduced to splinters, and the way ahead, such as it is, is clear.
<CBN> Tony gives Melanie a thumbs-up and brushes some splinters off his hands. "Hey nice."
<Crion> This is real, old-school, HEDGE Hedge. Close-cropped grass and deadly vines on the walls. And -- oh. There's a...swamp ahead?
<Crion> It's not a large swamp. The walls don't even widen. It's just this little strip of Hedge, here, between you and that turn where the door is...and now it's all soupy.
<banana> "Does anyone have a boat."
<CBN> Tony: "Probably gators in that."
<VoxPVoxD> "Or leeches."
<Crion> A great splash!!!! And a massive...thing! Rises up to greet you! With huge teeth! https://i.imgur.com/RjGbbbB.jpg
<Crion> "Hrrrooooooooooommmmm," it says. Then it blinks.
<CBN> Tony: "Well hey buddy."
<dammitwho> Maggie: "Gah!"
<trenchfoot> Nels blinks. "Hello."
<Crion> It nods, sagely. "Hroooooooooom."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart starts. What the fuck?
<banana> Melanie has no immediate reaction to that. Her briefly delayed reaction is also what the fuck?
<CBN> Tony: "We're trying to get to that door. Could you help us?"
<banana> Quietly: "Why do they make hobgoblins that large? Who did this?"
<CBN> Tony, to the group: "He wants tribute of some kind. No idea what." To the hob: "What do you usually get for tribute? More importantly, what do you want for tribute?"
<Crion> "Hroooooooooooooooooooooom."
<CBN> Tony, to the group: "It seeks, 'amusement' " Quote-fingers.
<trenchfoot> Nels blinks again. "Well, that's my cue."
<banana> You know what, this could be worse. Incredibly large snakes asking for bribes is no more dangerous than if a smaller snake did the same thing.
<CBN> Tony nods to Nels and starts clapping. "One? And'a two? And'a..." And negotiates the beat from her cue.
<trenchfoot> Let's go. She's even got a beat, which is good - didn't much care for the original she heard. "I am sitting in the morning at the diner on the corner," https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-26hsZqwveA
<Crion> The big wormy hob is positively dancing about thirty seconds into the song, and as it goes on, its dance gets even more beautiful and more strange. It bends in ways it shouldn't, but those ways are more beautiful than they are terrible (though they're a little bit terrible). When the song ends, the hob bows deeply with a "Hrooooooooooooooom," and suddenly slides back into the Hedge-floor
<Crion> almost like a flushed toilet, the swamp going with it.
<Crion> The Hedge is clear up to the right turn ahead.
<CBN> Tony: "Nice."
<Crion> Around that turn is...the door.
<Crion> And three growls that sound almost like chuckles.
<trenchfoot> Nels: "Thank you again, Stewart."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Don't thank me, thank Suzanne Vega."
<trenchfoot> "I wouldn't know who she was without you." Still, she nods. "I'll thank her if I ever see her, too."
<Crion> They slip out of the hedge, these Briarwolves. Three of them. There are needles and knives caught in their fur. Their faces almost look like people. Hideous, rictus-grinning people. With bad noses. They snap their teeth and howl and pounce!
<banana> Melanie: "That was great, whoever's it was. We got a break as well as fucking off the big snake." Well, the rest of us did.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Oh shit! It's the Korn Word Up video!"
<CBN> Tony: "I don't know what that is!"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "I'll explain later!"
<banana> The what. Melanie snaps a twig off the hedge walls and eats it.
<banana> Tastes like.. a twig, but it gives her magic powers.
<trenchfoot> The best kind of twig.
<banana> *colour
<CBN> Tony gestures for the earth itself to take a swing at the wolf that just tried to pounce him. Nothing worth writing home about happens.
<Crion> The wolves leap. One goes for Tony and gets nothing. Two go for Maggie; the first misses her...but the second finds purchase.
<trenchfoot> Nels draws, breathes, aims, exhales, fires. Just the way mom taught. Hits one of the wolves, first one to act - all she could've asked for.
<Crion> The wolf snarls, but a huge chunk of its shoulder falls away. There's no blood, just soil and trash.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart just gets up in the middle of the wolves, shouting "Go on! Git!" while orange sparks trail behind him.
<banana> Melanie snaps off more twigs cruelly - and the Hedge is bestirred to action. Vines and thorns lash out from the side-walls, seizing one of the wolves that's assaulted Maggie and dragging it over to her.
<banana> She leans back into the thorns (lowercase) listening to their whispers. This place can't attack us without giving up its secrets.
<banana> To nobody in particular: "I knew it."
<dammitwho> "Aaaagh!" Maggie howls as one of the briarwolves manages to race in and take a bit out of her arm. "C'mere you little s--t!" She bears down on the wolf that Nels has already taken some potshots at, bringing one arm way back... as she swings forward, gauges embedded in her rusty skin suddenly bury themselves in the DANGER red, the hot metal of her flesh pings, and a thin pipe running
<dammitwho> along her underarm suddenly vents hot steam, the pressure shooting her clenched fist forward with incredible force!
<dammitwho> The briarwolf bursts into pieces, wooden shards of bramble bouncing about the landscape!
<Crion> The Hedge responds. As Stewart wades in, vines snap up from the ground to grab his left leg...
<VoxPVoxD> "Fuck!"
<Crion> The wolf that failed to strike Maggie pounces!
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart lets the vines work *for* him, taking the support their hold offers as a way to put extra weight on that leg as he leans waaaay back, letting the wolf leap right over him and onto the one in Melanie's arms.
<banana> Melanie: "Thanks, I'm starting a collection."
<banana> Alright, let's get rid of the first one here... as the new wolf stumbles forward blindly, Melanie obligingly holds out its ally to take the blows; then she leans forward and the hedge comes with her.
<banana> Paperbark limbs and the thorned vines of the wall all tangle together, seemingly grown out of the same organism; the briarwolf shreds, coming to thankfully bloodless pieces.
<banana> Paperbark limbs and the thorned vines of the wall all tangle together, seemingly grown out of the same organism; the briarwolf shreds, coming to thankfully bloodless pieces.
<Crion> What used to be a hideous trashwolf crumples up and blows away down a windless hedgerow.
<trenchfoot> Well. Change targets, exhale, aim, inhale, fire. If she's going to keep doing this, she's going to need better training, but - BLAM - that one was on target. Two for two tonight.
<Crion> As Maggie swings at the last remaining wolf...rumbling...rumbling...rumbling...the walls burst!
<Crion> Water begins pouring in! The Hedge is flooding!
<banana> Oh for heck's sake. Melanie shakes off bits of dissolving wolf to point at the door just ahead. "John of the Falls is behind the door. He's doing this, presumably as a joke."
<dammitwho> "Can't say as his sense of humor appeals!"
<Crion> The wolf thrashes around, trying to bite Maggie and failing.
<trenchfoot> Keep the aim steady, fire again. Remember you need to reload soon. Keep your feet steady despite the water rushing in. There has to be a better way.
<banana> There is. Melanie leans back into the lowercase-hedge once again and lowercase-thorns burst forth through the lowercase-trod. Ropy wood rises around the 'wolf' - and pulls it down, bones cracking, drowning the hobgoblin in one foot of water.
<Crion> It thrashes...thrashes...then goes still, doesn't shudder, just falls apart, a wave of trash drifting away.
<Crion> The water stops pouring from the walls.
<Crion> The sea level lowers.
<banana> "Ugh."
<Crion> Now everything's just...damp.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart staggers free of the withdrawing vines. Where's Maggie?
<Crion> And squishy.
<CBN> Tony, who has mostly been gesturing at the ground and is now shaking a leg to keep his jeans from being so damn soggy at the ankle. "Everyone alive?"
<dammitwho> Maggie's tipping water out of her shoes irritably. "More or less. Stupid critters."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "I should have worn wading boots. Not a scratch otherwise."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Maggie, you got bit. Let me see that."
<dammitwho> "Aw, you're a sweetie, Stewart, but don't worry about it. I heal real quick. Watch!" She rolls up a sleeve, and next to the gash down her arm are several large dents in the shape of briarwolf teeth marks. A few seconds pass, there's a screeee, and one of the dents pounds itself out from the inside!
<banana> Melanie crosses the squelchy earth to the basalt door. She stands contemplating it, arms folded, and doesn't yet knock thrice.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "We could get attacked like, immediately. Come on, it'll just take a second."
<banana> The Hedge doesn't care for John any more than it does for the motley, and it's informed on him.. but it's really up to their contact whether this is over yet.
<dammitwho> She shrugs and holds out her arm.
<Crion> Ahead of them, the door beckons. It doesn't seem to be going anywhere this time.
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart runs a finger down the split seam and there's a flare of green light and the wound fills in with brass-colored pixels that increase rapidly in resolution until they're contiguous with the rest of Maggie's arm. "It's a relief to see some proper warriors come through Lut Gholein."
<dammitwho> "Eh?"
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart blinks and looks up. "Huh?"
<dammitwho> Maggie: "You said something about 'loot golain'."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "Oh. That's a town in Diablo 2. I don't know, I must've been thinking of what the town healer says."
<CBN> Tony: "Oh thank god so this isn't something I'm not getting."
<VoxPVoxD> "Anyway, you're right as rain now."
<CBN> "Who's in Diablo 1 and 2? That Arnold guy again?"
<VoxPVoxD> "Those are video games."
<trenchfoot> Nels: "I think this talk can wait until we get back. I still only barely understand what those are."
<VoxPVoxD> Stewart: "If you want more Schwarzenegger you're a couple years away from his other best movie, which is called Predator."
<Crion> They stand outside the Gate of Horn as the tide rolls back, and will see what's behind it...soon.
<Crion> --Fin