To the wall and back again.

amaranth

They disperse, each to their chosen task. Within a handful of days, a week, perhaps a fraction more, they return with thoughts, ideas, answers. A location; not simply a magickally protected void in the city map, but a target - a certain wing, underground. A number: for both subject and study. Knowledge of something else (a change) of which they were unaware. The ward number; the room number. A date certain when routines will be disrupted enough to ensure that strangers.

An ally whom neither Kiara nor Andres have met or will meet, but who has provided the with security badges, names and clearance; transfer orders for a certain subject. Parking passes for the underground garage. They are informed that the subject will be sedated, as any would for a land-transfer. They must make arrangements to remove him without drawing undue scrutiny. This is a highly classified project, so few have access to the wing. Once the subject is removed, the records will be scrubbed. Agent Weston has already received his own transfer orders.

To Novosibirsk.

This is what they have; and little more.

amaranth

(Note: dice are in emails!)

amaranth

The staff of the laboratory, hospital wings, and offices of Amaranthine Labs at the Colorado School of Public Health were officially notified that all were expected to report for their regular shifts (day or night) on a certain day (Tuesday, March 15, 2016) or night mid-week (Wednesday, March 16, 2016) when operations deemed the disruption to normal routines and potential impingement on the ordinary life of the public to be at its lowest point. No one, of course, was given the exact time of the drill, nor the precise nature of the emergency that would be simulated on that date. The memorandums were terse but perfectly clear. The directive came from levels within the organization high enough questioning the order might have drawn the wrong sort of attention: so there was grumbling, but nothing beyond a few sarcastic jokes over whatever passed for a water cooler among their kind.

--

Kiara and Andres have a much tighter target. That is, if the information in the packet left in a waterproof envelope taped to the interior of the toilets in the lady's room at Zook's Coffee and Ice Cream (which: what the fuck?) can be trusted. Inside: a very small gadget. Three identification badges, another small gadget with a hook-hanger that clearly suggests the shape and form of a parking pass hung from a rearview mirror. Instructions (written, not drawn) regarding lab access. Date-and-time suggestions that mirror the dates of the emergency drills of which Grace learned (seemingly) independently. A set of transfer orders for Subject 88123-123 to Facility HK97-321, that is also marked HIGHLY CLASSIFIED.

The information is conveyed to Kiara and Andres with enough time for the pair to make arrangements. The former to alter her appearance; so secure for the pair of them appropriate(ly untraceable) garments that will allow them to slip into the stream of completely ordinary people, the latter to create (as if by DO NOT CALL IT MAGICK GODDAMNIT) an at least temporarily serviceable facsimile of an ambulance in which they can travel. The badges are left in a safety deposit box, shielded by correspondence and other wards that the warders remove only at the last possible minute before Kiara and Andres leave for their mission.

There is a point certain beyond which none of them have been able to scry successfully. A certain border of US 40 and some cross street, where the rather service-ably modern(ish) bulk of the UC Denver School of Public Health's CU Anschutz Medical Campus occupies 2-3-4+ (??) blocks. Dominated by a big semi-circular brick building with the bulk and presence of a mid-20th century lunatic asylum / fallout shelter, onto which have been grafted newer and shinier and more modern wings, all glass and steel. Night and the campus is largely dark. A few lights in what passes for the patient wings of the specialized facilities, elsewhere office suites all lit up as janitorial staff clean up from today to get ready for tomorrow.

After circling the campus once Andres (the technician to Kiara's supervising physician, and therefore, we assume, the driver) finds the secured entrance to Amaranthine Labs, marked not by the company's name, but by a subtly embossed insignia on the parking gate. Which opens, perfectly naturally, thanks to something embedded in the parking pass, transmitting their clearance to the security guard sitting in an observational kiosk behind bullet proof glass. Once they are in the underground parking garage, a voice asserts itself in the ambulance. The source appears to be the parking pass. The speaker: the guard in the kiosk.

"Park in Bay 2. Door A. Be prepared for security check and ready to present clearance and orders."

Presuming they follow instructions, they are met just inside the swinging double-doors of ambulance bay 2 by a pair of alert young security personnel. One has a handheld device ready to scan their ID passes. The other has... what looks to be an ordinary clipboard. He looks stoic but she gives them a brief, perfunctory but professional smile. "Orders here," she is holding out the clipboard expectantly and there is something about it that makes it clear she wants them to affix their orders to the device (??), while Carl scans their security badges. "Carl'll check your clearance. The usual drill."

Kiara

She's made minor adjustments to her own Pattern before, the Verbena. The occasional wave over her hair to invoke a particular style; the reduction of blemishes; the eradication of a virus building in her system; the modulation of her breathing; the dismissal of a particularly woeful hangover. She'd gifted herself with gills, not so long ago now to dive beneath the waters in Hawaii and rescue a long forgotten artifact.

But - this is another level.

The woman who meets up with Andrés to rescue Alexandr Brant is not the brunette he last saw, rather, she is a platinum blonde creature with pale eyes and a slightly rounder face than the Kiara he knows is beneath the glamour somewhere. Her cheekbones are not as sharp; her nose wider and her hair swept up into a severe knot. She's wearing the clothing of a medical professional and when they climb into the (I-can't-believe-it's-not-magickal) vehicle the Etherite has conjured, she puts a pair of half-rim glasses on.

Her only other hint of jewellery is a watch on a slender silver band.

It is an impressive disguise, if nothing else.

-

"Nice ride, Doc." She compliments when she slides in.

At least she still sounds like herself.

-

Perhaps they talk en route to Amaranthine Labs. Maybe Andrés puts the radio on and they listen to the banality of FM radio. Perhaps they ride in (near) silence, each lost in their individual considerations on where they could have been spending their evening. Kiara's thoughts, as they glide through city streets are mostly shapeless things; her fingers folded in her lap over the transfer orders.

If she is tense, the disguise face of Kiara does not betray it. Streetlights reflect off her glasses.

When they turn into the parking bay there is time for a brief look at her companion's newly clean-shaven features.

Time for a under-breath here goes nothing before the pagan schools her stranger's features into a stoic mask that reads polite, if detached, acceptance of the routine at hand.

--

The usual drill.

The blonde that slides out of the ambulance looks as if she's done this procedure before. She offers over the papers with a crisp authority and returns the female's smile with one of her own. "Evening." She greets, and presents her badge to Carl while her associate does the same.

She smooths an imaginary wrinkle out of her clothing.

Routine. Nothing but paperwork. The words drum in the Verbena's head loud enough to drown out the doubts.

Andrés

When Andrés picks up Kiara it is in a vehicle that had been, two days earlier, a shitty white Ford van. It's now close enough to a Union ambulance that they can drive on in without too much difficulty.

"Thanks," he says. "... Doc."

Getting in isn't the part that concerns the Etherite. It's getting back out.

He's sober for once or at least as sober as Kiara has seen him. He'd shaved his face and popped in a pair of contact lenses and combed his hair. Same fellow as was at the Chantry meeting but he looks like a medical technician now instead of a doctor.

Normally he wears a wedding band. Today he doesn't. Make of that what you will.

On the way over he chatters on about something he read in the paper the other day. Something benign. Nothing concerning what they're about to do. Just two people going to transfer a reality deviant to his new facility. Doo de doo.

Once they're there he does his level best not to appear nervous if he even is nervous. To look at him he's not. If he just expects something to go tits up he won't be surprised when it happens. They both look like they're supposed to be here at least.

Deep breath:

"Daring rescue time, motherfuckers."

And Andrés follows Kiara's lead.

Kiara

[Ugh, one sec. FIXING.]

Andrés

[TOO LATE YOU FUCKED IT UP]

amaranth

The young woman takes a moment to fuss over the placement of the orders on her clipboard, frowns over them, then fusses again. Meanwhile, the young man reaches for their badges and scans them with a device no larger than an iPhone. Something flashes over the screen when he scans Kiara's that pulls his already dour mouth slightly further down at the right corner. Then there is Andres. Another something-of-a-flash. He steps back and shows the device to the young woman, who whistles, low, glances up at both of them, and then: straightens her spine.

"Sorry this is taking so long. The frequency dampeners down here always seem to interfere with the - " a sudden, supple, electronic glow that seems immanent rather than sourced. "Oh. There it goes." She lifts her chin and gives the other officer a subtle nod. He holsters his own device and retreats back to the guard station while she offers them the now-glowing blue clipboard and a stylus. "Just need you to initial here, here, and here," she says, indicating three separate locations to Kiara. She repeats the instructions to Andres. "And then a thumbprint - " another indication, "here and we'll get your clearance set up so you can access the restricted area."

The other officer has returned by then, with two small bugs he offers to them. Their function isn't immediately clear, but neither officer seems to think it a mystery and neither offers instruction. It is Andres who notices first that both officers have similar insignia affixed to lapel or collar.

"Fair warning, we are slated for an emergency drill sometime this evening. You clearance gives you priority and if you require additional assistance the override code for team members is Control Alpha Eight Niner. Control channel's always monitored, but most of us hang out on Denver's Finest."

After all of that, she hands back the orders and gives them fairly clear instructions to the secured lift that will take them to the restricted wing of the facility. "Give us five minutes to get your clearance set up."

--

It takes them no more than two minutes to follow the empty, antiseptic hallway past a junction with another equally empty hallway to its terminus at an elevator bank with four separate lifts. Three of the four have standard up/down buttons. The fourth though -

- cameras, everywhere. Five minutes to get their clearance set up? It is a long five minutes.

--

Eventually: the small control panel leading to the secured lift comes alive at Kiara's touch. Her: thumbprint, matched to the signature from the device attached to the lapel of her scrubs. The lift arrives; the doors whir open, smooth and silent. The interior smells faintly of vanilla. Two strangers are already inside, apparently having come from the schools of public health, above. They are in the midst of a conversation -

"That's what I'm saying, if you just try to impose that shit from above, it never works. You've got to speak their language. You've got to get in there - "

- and glance up, somewhat startled, give those strange-frozen smiles one gives to strangers, then resume the conversation in quieter tones.

" - and make it make sense from within. It can't be this top-down structure. What we ended up doing to teach the infection control protocol was to find community leaders - not the political leaders but the social leaders - and teach it from the inside out. Every projection I've done says we got the outbreaks under control from 40 to 65% faster, and saved hundreds, maybe thousands. You really need to read Ementalier's paper on the topic. Evidence for these best practices - "

The elevator opens again. Not their floor. Both of the other occupants exit, with one backward glance, the conversation fading between them. Between them? Amongst them, at least if Sepulveda's assessment of the 'bugs' is correct. They are identification badges, transmitters, and communication devices. Whether he can operate one correctly - another story entirely.

--

Another fifteen seconds, that supple hum, and the doors open again. The restricted labs.

--

There is another security checkpoint immediately beyond the elevator bay. Down here, the secured lift is the only lift that serves the floor. Three corridors branch off beyond the security kiosk behind locked and closed doors. Here, the guards scan their identification cards again and buzz them through one of the sets of double doors, this time with much less chatter. Directions, and the day's security codes, and no more.

This is what Andres fucks up: unhappy with the slow-response of a Technocratic Device to the day's security codes or perhaps convinced that he has input the information incorrectly, he repeats the code. Nothing, nothing. Then again: this time, the screen flashes once a bilious green. Andres feels something like a small shock, really no more than the brief bite of static electricity, but Kiara takes note that the door is, in fact, now open. The first try was all that was necessary. With so many of these Technocratic things: it works, or it doesn't. The circuit is open, or closed. There is no gray area.

--

They come to the cell in which Alexander is being kept. One guard outside is playing Crossy Road on a tablet. He also requests their orders. Fits them to the device. Glances up at them with a bit of apprehension (he is thinking of Agent Weston. He is trying to remember to forget the subject behind the door. He has already received orders for a transfer to Miami, an assignment he much prefers to Novosibirsk.) then back down. "Subject received a titrated dose of the Orpheum cocktail thirty-four minutes ago. We calculate a minimum of four hours, seventeen minutes before the first signs of life return. Subject may be combative on emergence from hibernation. Within the facility, subject's identity is highly classified. You are to reveal it to no one. Got a body bag and a gurney inside for you and far as anyone here knows, you're retrieving a radioactive corpse.

"What you do when you get back to your own rig, well. That's your business, not mine."

Kiara

He's playing Crossy Road on a tablet.

It's funny that this, of all the things the Verbena's taken in throughout this rescue mission thus far, feels the most like some dirty, unclear line being stepped over; being seen for what it is as she does. The Technocracy, the Union ... the Enemy, as she knows them; that bone deep, grief driven hatred of them jangled down to its root. It changes from black and white to murky grey.

The evidence of humanity, of such banal, normal activities here - its distressing. It's bizarre as hell and if anything were going to disrupt their plans (other than that damn door) it's the sight of it right there, at the door to Alexander's room.

(She wants to scream and throw his damn tablet across the room).

--

The bugs.

The sterile hallways and elevator banks and all those cameras.
The way down feels (is) a sort of torment all its own. Kiara can feel a trickle of sweat between her shoulder-blades, beneath her scrubs. Her palm itches as they stand behind two strangers calmly (professionally) discussing tactics for changing the status quo. Seeding belief among the masses from within. Kiara will remember their voices; the fixed smile she'd returned; forced her facial muscles to shape; the eerie normalcy of it all long after tonight is over.

(Assuming she doesn't wind up inside one of these nice numbered rooms).

--

"Understood." Her voice sounds tinny and far away, when she does speak, casts one of the first glances she's allowed herself Andrés' way. There's a body bag and a gurney inside. They're going to reclaim Alexander as if he were nothing more than a corpse.
She nods assent. They're here, there's no going back now.
He's playing Crossy Road on a tablet.

It's funny that this, of all the things the Verbena's taken in throughout this rescue mission thus far, feels the most like some dirty, unclear line being stepped over; being seen for what it is as she does. The Technocracy, the Union ... the Enemy, as she knows them; that bone deep, grief driven hatred of them jangled down to its root. It changes from black and white to murky grey.

The evidence of humanity, of such banal, normal activities here - its distressing. It's bizarre as hell and if anything were going to disrupt their plans (other than that damn door) it's the sight of it right there, at the door to Alexander's room.

(She wants to scream and throw his damn tablet across the room).

--

The bugs.

The sterile hallways and elevator banks and all those cameras.

The way down feels (is) a sort of torment all its own. Kiara can feel a trickle of sweat between her shoulder-blades, beneath her scrubs. Her palm itches as they stand behind two strangers calmly (professionally) discussing tactics for changing the status quo. Seeding belief among the masses from within. Kiara will remember their voices; the fixed smile she'd returned; forced her facial muscles to shape; the eerie normalcy of it all long after tonight is over.

(Assuming she doesn't wind up inside one of these nice numbered rooms).

--

"Understood." Her voice sounds tinny and far away, when she does speak, casts one of the first glances she's allowed herself Andrés' way. There's a body bag and a gurney inside. They're going to reclaim Alexander as if he were nothing more than a corpse.

She nods assent. They're here, there's no going back now.

Kiara

[Seriously, I don't even know.]

Andrés

The moment the keypad zaps Andres for hitting its buttons too many times would be the moment a certain Mercurial Elite would point to as evidence that she was right about his personality and its suitability for this sort of operation. It doesn't impede their progress. It just confirms for Kiara something she may have already been beginning to suspect.

After shaking out his hand, they move on.

This place does not cause the visceral response in the Etherite that it does in the Verbena but then again the Society of Ether used to belong to the Technocratic Union back when it was still called the Order of Reason, when they were still called Electrodyne Engineers. If they're caught, that won't matter.

Once they arrive at the cell, he adopts an at-ease stance with his feet shoulder-width apart and his hands clasped loose behind his back. His propensity is to fidget.

A radioactive corpse.

His eyes flick up to Kiara's face to catch the glance she gives him. On camera it looks as if he's waiting for permission to proceed with his job. Deferring to rank.

amaranth

Kiara nods assent. Andres glances at Kiara as if for permission, deferring to rank. The tablet glows the same electric/electronic glow. This time, the guard does not request thumbprints and initials in triplicate. He makes three quick notations, cocks his head as if he is listening to a far-off voice (hint: he is), finishes the third notation with a flourish and returns the set of orders to Kiara.

And then, there's this awkward moment. An interruption, an interregnum. Kiara waiting and Andres waiting and the guard... waiting too. Looking at them somewhat expectantly, until finally he just says: "Uhm, I don't have clearance to open that door." Brief pause. "I think you do - " and beneath that suggestion, (and this is modestly transparent on his face), he is frowning at them and is entertaining the brief and mildly heretical question: what if they don't?

One or the other of them figures it out: a thumbprint and a thumbprint and a hydraulic sigh and the door whooshes open and they see inside the small cell in which Alexander has been held for the past... weeks. Yes, weeks. He is still and unmoving on the cot, scabs on his knuckles, dressed in a loose set of scrubs. Thinner than he had been.

The promised gurney and body bag are indeed just parked just within the cell.

Kiara

The last real occasion Kiara Woolfe had to come in contact with a body had been her mentor's. She's seen variations of gore, since. Smoldering and dismembered things in a park. The pitiless black of a Nephandus' eye. Stitched pieces of her associates back together and scrubbed more blood off her hands than perhaps any young woman should have need to before they were even thirty.

The gore and blood and physicality of it doesn't connect for her any longer: not in the moment. Not when that awful hesitation passes between Andrés and her and the guard and the door glides open to reveal Alexander on that cot.

Maybe she will berate herself later for the slip up with the Guard but as soon as they figure it out, the brunette-now-blonde is in the room and supervising the dead man's shuffle of the Orphan into the body-bag. She doesn't think about who it is, it is, in the moment, rather imperative that this woman in scrubs with a sombre, severe expression and cool, measuring eyes moves in and smoothly assists in securing the body into the bag.

The zip slides over Alexander's face and there is a reprieve in that.

"Subject secure." She works to inject a certain amount of tedium into her voice. It seems easier to play along, in this skin. "Let's go."

She sweeps back out the door. Best to leave your sentiment in that cell until this is over, Woolfe.

amaranth

Alexander is larger than both of them and he is: absolutely dead weight. They have a modest struggle to make the transfer from cot to body bag to gurney. The guard outside the door might have guessed they would, given their relative size compared to the subject in question. Or perhaps he had not made such a guess. It is not uncommon for members of the order with clearance high enough to be involved in a secretive operation to have some sort of strength enhancement, mechanical, medical, pharmaceutical, or otherwise.

The room itself has a strange feeling to it. A sort of humming absence that makes it feel even colder and more clinical than the corridors outside. That must be the Primium on the walls. So it isn't just the body that seems dead, but the air itself. Neither of them attempts a flare of life magick to determine whether or not it really is a living person in deep hibernation or an actual corpse they are retrieving. Wouldn't be wise to risk it now that they're inside. If this has all been a warning of some sort, an elaborate and macabre hoax, intended to return to them a body, they will know that soon enough.

So they hope.

"It's done." The guard mutters into as they wheel the body back out. Ridiculously, the gurney has one slightly squeaky, slightly bum wheel and the error in it seems all the more absurd in the sterile hallway. There are, further down the hallway, other doors, closed and locked.

There are no other guards.

--

It is a long way back the way they came. The first security check; the second. Three strangers gathered at the secure elevator bay, two with Starbucks cups in hand, chatting quietly. "I'm just trying to figure out whether to start a new generation or not. I need at least an hour and a half to get through it. You'd think they could give us a ballpark or something for the drill. I'm supposed to give a talk on my results in three weeks we're trying to get out ahead of the summer weather, I mean, the last thing this country needs is a new epidemic of birth defects and - "

Two thumbprints. One body in a bag on a squeaky-wheeled gurney. Two of the strangers listening to the chatty researcher flick their eyes over the body bag, glance up at Andres, Kiara as they are wheeling it into the elevator, then glance away again.

Everything in reverse, right back to the ambulance bay and the security kiosk. One last check with the same pair of guards they saw coming in: the glowing clipboard, the presentation of the orders. The initialing of documents. The guard waits expectantly for the bugs and badges to be returned.

Kiara

Somehow, it's worse on the way out. The glimpse of an end to their little staged rescue mission makes every sterile corner and squeak of the gurney's wheel seem harder to bear. Sound abrasive and distorted to the Verbena's ears; makes her want to flinch behind her glasses. To her credit however, she resists. Maybe to the extent she bites down on the inside of her cheek, tastes the blood in her mouth.

Finds the tactility in the pain and the sensation of it comforting.

--

They stop by the elevator bay, two glance their way and the Verbena meets the eyes of one. Offers a brief, curt nod and follows the gurney bearing her associate into the elevator, papers tucked under her arm.

--

She half expected there to be music playing as they glide upwards. Soft, background noise as obscure and jarring as the fact they were wheeling a comatose Orphan in a body-bag out of a facility on a gurney with a squeaky wheel.

The inside of Kiara's cheek throbs as they greet the same guards they'd encountered climbing out of the faux-ambulance. She passes across the documents without hesitation, initial here. Sign there. Bugs and badges unclipped and handed over. Manages a have a good evening to the female security guard with what could have passed for professional courtesy.

All that remained: getting Alexander in, and getting out.

Andrés

This is the part of the operation that would have the Etherite convinced they were fucked if he were letting himself access what's left of his limbic system.

It isn't as if it has gone entirely smoothly thus far but the fact that they got in and got Alexander loaded onto a stretcher and are in the home stretch ought to bring a sense of relief to them. It does not. Until they are out of this dead spot of a building, and are certain Alexander is not bugged in some fashion, Andres is not going to relax.

Even if he does look bored out of his skull. Like this is just another day at the grind for him. Schlepping a corpse from one building to the other. He makes eye contact with one of the fellows who glances back at them and gives him a What are ya gonna do shrug before looking ahead again.

That squeaky wheel is proof enough that the Technocrats are just as flawed as anyone else but every time it makes a noise Andres wonders if they aren't about to find out someone in the course of this operation decided this was a fortuitous opportunity to betray the fuck out of both of them.

At the last checkpoint before they get back in the ambulance and drive off. Andres removes his bug and his badge with all the enthusiasm he's displayed thus far. Signs whatever he has to sign. Lets Kiara answer whatever questions they have to answer.

His hands are steady as he, when he has some sign to go ahead and do so, opens the back doors of the rig and starts to load the gurney into it.

amaranth

"Okay then," the female security, "I think that's everything." She is handing off the site-specific security pieces to her co-worker, glancing at the insignia on her clipboard/tablet. Quick flick of her eyes at the body bag. Neat little shadow then, in that particular moment, across her brow. She glances back at them, on some cusp between apprehensive and aware and hushed, really the way one is in the presence of death. "You guys have a safe - " she is saying as they are loading the body into the rig. This is a parking garage, all concrete, and her voice has a depthless echo in the solidly grounded space.

Her partner, though. Listening. Mutters something to her, not in her ear but in her proximity and she glances back to Kiara and Andres with a wave. Quick and supple.

"That's our drill. Better get on the road before we're on lockdown. Be safe."

--

They get back into the rig and: drive. The ambulance: rises, rises, rises out of the underground garage. Past the final guard. And: up, up up.

Kiara

They drive and the ambulance rises.

They slide out of the underground garage and into the night and somehow, the glint of starlight and streetlight and the resurfacing feels like a layer of suppression being peeled away. But - it does not quite give over to relief, not yet.

Not while they were still within the limits of the facility.

Kiara's seatbelt clicks into place and for a tense few seconds all she can muster is to stare into the rearview as the entry to the garage grows smaller and smaller behind them, her fingers curled around the edge of the belt. She can't keep her eyes from the mirror long, but her cheek continues to ache and her shoulders feel tight with a thrumming tension.

Breathe, Woolfe.

She does, a hiss escaping through her lips. A look shot across to Andrés. "Nothing yet." Alexander won't stir for another hour, maybe two, if her timing figures out. The question was - where on earth in the city was safe to take him.

Andrés

A bit of shuffling around. They did not come up with a comprehensive plan as to how they were going to handle the extraction let alone who would sit where when but Andrés loads the gurney into the back of the rig more or less on his own and he clambers into the back and hauls the doors shut behind him more or less by himself.

If Kiara climbs into the driver's side that's all the better. If she gets in on the passenger's side he's in the back already unloading his equipment to prepare to examine the Orpheum-infused body and ensure he is just infused and not expired. Beyond that: if the body is bugged he wants to be able to tell the body is bugged. He doesn't trust the Verbena to locate a bug. Call it intuition or experience. Matter tends to be a Sphere far from the average Witch's experience.

At any rate:

Nothing yet.

"No shit," he says without malice. He has the body bag unzipped now and is introducing his stethoscope to the cop's neck. "Drive fast, drive far. This place is giving me heartburn."

amaranth

Nothing.

One block. Two. Three and they are starting to feel safe. Four and the city unfolds around them, in all its unutterable chaos. Four and five and now they are skimming past Sand Creek Park, where Kiara and Nicholas summoned a murder, the interstate above them like a ribbon of uncertain light.

Everything left behind: everything, everything, everything.

amaranth

?

Dice: 1 d10 TN3 (1) ( botch x 1 )

Andrés

[matter/prime 2: you good, bro? -1 diff for taking his time.]

Dice: 3 d10 TN5 (1, 1, 9) ( success x 1 )

Andrés

[come on, doc.]

Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (1, 6, 10) ( success x 2 )

amaranth

There is residual magick there diffuse throughout his body. There does not appear to be a focus area like an implant. Easy deduction: the Orpheum has a magickal component and he can sense the prime in that.

Kiara

Drive fast, drive far.

The Verbena's foot depresses the accelerator. She speeds up, but within limits. There would be no justice in coming so far and bringing Alexander back if all of it ended with the police pulling them over for speeding. Still, she zigs and zags where she can, sliding between cards and weaving through the traffic - outside, lights flash overhead and the city unfurls around them.

She has no clear direction, the pagan, but to keep the momentum up. But to take them as far from those sterile rooms and inane conversations about disease and outbreak and changing things from within as she can. Soon enough, though, there does seem to be a route sliding into place. There is a sense of purpose to the route Kiara takes, turning here. Diverting there.

Across the city limits and out again, toward the outskirts.

A tick of her eyes into the rearview where the Doctor was pressing a stethoscope to Alexander's neck. Her jaw tense. "How bad is it?" His state. Whatever they'd done to him. The Verbena's eyes return to the road and she focuses on it; her eyes have changed color, from pale blue to their regular brown. Her glamour was slowly wearing off. "I'm taking us outside the city if we need to - " she trails off, frowning.

Need to, what? Destroy what they'd created? Pull bugs and who knew what out of Alexander's body? The choices, apparently, were endless.

Kiara

[edit: cards and also - cars.]

Andrés

"It's not bad."

No emphasis on any of the words. She can hear the frown in his voice but cannot tell at what it is directed. Others might refer to what is draped over the Orphan as magick but he has other words for it. If it's keeping him subdued he's content to leave it where it is. Suffuse as it is he would have to circulate the man's blood if he was hoping to remove any tracers from his blood that might be there. He does not trust that there are no tracers in his blood but how the fuck would he know there aren't any. He isn't versed in the study of Correspondence. At all.

"... I don't think it's bad. Keep driving."

He scrubs his hands down his face. This is the part of the journey that begs the question: Now what?

"Did the collective think this far?"

If the answer is 'no' she knows what his answer is going to be. She had better hope the answer isn't 'no.'

amaranth

Alexander isn't breathing. Not that Andres can see on site. Thus far, he has confirmed that Alexander's 'corpse' does not seem to contain a bugged implant. There is still the matter of the parking pass hung from the rearview mirror of the ambulance.

Except there is not. The pass proper begins to... disintegrate when they are four blocks out from the UC Schools of Public Health. A self-destruct mechanism. Apparently: their allies (Allies?) are not interested in allowing the Traditionalists an opportunity to reverse engineer their tech.

Around them a chilly, snow-laden March night. The flat city unfolding, golden on the plains. The teeth of the mountains. With the go-ahead, Kiara heads toward an anonymous, cheap motel on the outskirts of Denver proper.

After fifteen - twenty minutes, Andres feels a ... bit of an itch. Near his left ear, on his neck. Within approximately twenty-five seconds, his entire shirt has... fallen to pieces, to nothing. Disintegrated, just like the parking pass. And his pants are starting to...

Kiara

It's not bad.

Then:

... I don't think it's bad.

Kiara curses.

Under breath and quiet, as she tugs her hair out of the confines of the updo she'd secured it into for the extraction. Her features have begun to change, too. It's a strange sensation, like subtle knives sliding around beneath her skin; her cheekbones shifting, her chin sharpening. The cursing doesn't seem directed at Andrés, rather her agitation has a more focused recipient.

It would be enough to make a Chorister blush, that whispered recitation of disgust. It may have been enough to convince a frightened villager they'd been hexed, in another time.

"Hang in there, Alexander." She instructs. "There's a motel up ahead. Sera paid in cash, warded the hell out of the room. We can hold up there at least long enough to figure out what the hell they've put in him." Kiara's fingers grip the wheel.

"And get it out. After that - " She doesn't say we'll figure it out. She doesn't add that it all hinges on whether or not the man who currently didn't appear to be breathing made through this (relatively) unharmed. There would be time for formulating their next move, time for blame and disbelief and inter-tradition politics.

For now: she drove.

Andrés

Don't blame his lack of shame regarding nudity on his ethnicity.

His grandparents on both sides were prudes. If his father were around more he might have a better bead on how his father felt about the matter. His mother was a nurse. She didn't give a shit about busting in on him or his younger sisters when they were growing up but if she forgot to lock the bathroom door while she was in there he'd get holy hell slapped out of him. Usually with a sandal. He was well into his twenties before he could abide the sight of a sandal.

Anyway.

Someone within the Amaranth Laboratories rigged the keypads to tag an offending party with fiber-consuming nanites and being as he had been the last person to get zapped by a keypad it isn't exactly a shock that he's the one whose clothing starts to dissolve.

"We know what the hell they've put in him," he says. "Santo Cristo, you're acting like they're from Neptune."

This, as his clothing is dissolving.

"You, ah. Might not wanna look back here until you toss my jacket back."

amaranth

The motel is a motel. That's what its sign says: MOTEL. It is lost amid a chaos of other similar structures: old, low, concrete. There is an outdoor pool in the parking lot, now covered with snow. A half-dozen semis and a set of small soccer goals pushed up onto the walkway between rooms. A Jack in the Box and Frisch's Big Boy and Carl's, Jr. and on and on in the parking lot.

The room is on the first floor. Sera gave Kiara the key, When they get there, if and when they get inside, they might feel another resonance, different from Sera's, lingering in the walls. Stoic and psychedelic, among other things. It is no accident that she picked this place.

For now, though, a half-full parking lot. Snow drifting between the tractor-trailers. The world muffled, shifted, changed. The wind sharp, bright and cold. The stars up there. Andres with his clothing disintegrating in the back of the rig.

amaranth

HOW MANY DAYS IS ANDRES NAKED?

Dice: 2 d10 TN3 (7, 9) ( success x 2 )

Andrés

[I just want to recognize that this is the best dice roll title I've had in my three years of Mage'ing on this site.]

Kiara

[Awareness, etc. Cuz!]

Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (2, 3, 5, 6, 9, 10) ( success x 3 )

Kiara

"Doc, I attend sky clad festivals. Nothing you've got going on back there is going to offend my sensibilities." This, with raised eyebrows into the rear-view mirror.

She does reach over and toss his jacket back to him, though. If she catches sight of anything, she has the grace not to comment on it, though all things considered, it's probably not the top of the pagan's list of pressing concerns, glimpsing Andrés naked.

They pull into the motel and the Verbena is careful to park as close to the room number on the key Sera had given her as possible. The engine ticking as the brunette leans forward over the wheel; her eyes roving the drifting snow and covered pool and winking lights of the fast food chains.

"Hang on."

She instructs and they're moving again, shifting. She reverses them into the spot and kills the ignition.

There's a precious moment now to breathe. "I'll get the motel door."

Andrés

It may well not be her sensibilities he's afraid of offending. May be he doesn't give a shit about anything he may offend. He wants his jacket because there's a cold front blowing through. Doesn't matter. Whatever prankster nanite has implanted itself in his skin will consume it in a few moments.

She tosses it back. He holds it over his crotch and midline. It does not last long. That is all the catalyst he needs to consider what Spheres and what strains of fabric this shit is honing in on.

In the meantime Kiara brings them to a place that once warded the people of this city against a member of the Fallen. It will ward them against the Static.

He holds the jacket over himself until it gives out or until Kiara comes back to undo the doors. Whichever comes first. Worst people to see naked in the back of an ambulance. He is shorter than the average female among their constituency but Kiara can read all of the muscles in his upper body and some in his lower limbs. That which is not covered by the disintegrating jacket. This is a problem. If he were trying to seduce her this is not the path he would take.

I'll get the motel door.

"Great!" he says. As if he isn't about to be nude in another thirteen seconds.

amaranth

The parking lot is still except for them. It is the middle of the night; a handful of lights are on. The low-hum of the highway. Inside, the room is still, quiet. The low-throb of Sera's resonance, felt from within rather than without. No indication to Kiara or Andres why she chose this room. Only Sera and Dan know that she has paid the rent on it for ... nearly three years.

She does have the money to spare.

She always hopes, doesn't she? that Jim might come back. Might need it again: a place to crash. A place into which to disappear. A bathroom. An old CRT television and a microwave and a fridge. Which is: stocked a bit, heavy on the booze, light on the food. Because.

Now they need it. inside, two double beds. A place to put Alexander's body. Enough time for Kiara to engage in enough life magick to confirm that he is: alive, absolutely, and not a corpse. Then there is the awkward interregnum, waiting.

They can amuse themselves however they want.

Andrés

Maybe the jacket she tosses back to him lasts the extent of the ride. Maybe it doesn't. His concern is not so much for his dead-turned client but for the driver. The driver is concerned with the road ahead. She knows where she's going.

Alright. Jacket over his crotch so long as it lasts. So long as it lasts. If it does not last her clothes are intact. She can go in and get the key and the pass and let them in and they can both struggle the corpse-that-is-not-a-corpse into their room.

Blame it on whatever you want. His heritage or his age or his tradition. His prime physical condition or the fact that despite his deplorable social ability he is still a disgustingly attractive man. His junk is covered when they wheel Alexander into the warded room. Either by his discarded jacket or some other bit of clothing. The body bag.

Once the door is closed though the adrenaline kicks in. Andrés grabs Kiara by both jaws and kisses her square on the mouth.

Nothing in it that she does not want to be there. He is a once-doubled creature halved by virtue of his other half dying after all.

And adrenaline. Let's not forget adrenaline.

Andrés

[JAMIE IS GOING HOME SHE LOVES YOU BOTH <3]

Kiara

Kiara Woolfe wasn't shy about many things. If the brunette had an inclination to seduce the good Doctor, the chances were fairly strong that he'd know about it. She'd had a reputation in New York and it hadn't particularly occurred to the Verbena to mind. That had not, overly much, changed since she set foot in Denver with her wild hair and blood red lips.

It would have been a stranger thing, perhaps, to meet a self professed witch who had inhibitions about embracing all facets of life. Nudity, sex, heartbreak and death.

Andrés was married to one of Kiara's kind, after all: he knows full well what to expect from a Verbena.

-

Kiara pulls the doors open on the back of the van; her disguise has disintegrated likewise; though she still wears the glasses she'd procured. Her hair is a violent tangle around her face and her expression, when she sights him attempting to shield himself from the frigid temperature, ventures somewhere south of drastically amused.

Her eyes glint.

"Let's get him inside."

-

There is no manner that it isn't awkward, piling Alexander's dead weight into the room, carefully laying him on the mattress. Kiara sheds layers and pushes her sleeves up. Leans over Alexander's body and carefully flits her hands over him; touches his face with a surprising degree of tenderness.

Surveys and declares him whole (enough) and safe enough that she can finally (desperately), put her mind into some semblance of ease.

Turns around and is -

promptly kissed.

-

The door is closed. Alexander spared. And adrenaline was a hell of a thing.

Mad Blind Faith

Ms. Gray

It has been two or three days since Alexander received a visit from Keller. Meals come and meals go. A guard is posted outside his door, day and night. For the last several days, he has been provided with a copy of the daily Denver newspaper with his morning meal. At lunch: a copy of Time or The New Republic. At dinner: Science or Nature or National Geographic. It is as if someone were preparing him to be reintroduced to the world.

And some of the unbelievable news therein. To-wit: Donald Trump's status as the front runner in the Republican primary election.

The date on this morning's newspaper is Sunday, March 13. They have left everything in. The comics, the sports page. The endless array of glossy ads.

Sometime during the no-time that comes between one meal and another there is a hum, and a voice that is either in his head or in the room, which seems to be female, says -

"I have some good news for you, which requires some planning and which I would like to share confidentially and in person. To do so, I must have your word as an officer that you will not attack me should I join you."

Alexander

The time between trips to the white room to meet with Keller had seemed oddly separated, but Alexander just assumed that it was some way that his captors were trying to mess with him. The papers and magazines go mostly ignored, except the first. That one is skimmed over for a date: it’s a date which makes him toss the paper back to the floor, discarded, and makes him sink down onto the floor.

“Shit.”

Assuming that wasn’t some other attempt to mess with his head. (Assuming they were trying to mess with his head: the jury really was still out on that one, from Alexander’s point of view. Would he really know if he was the same man he arrived as?) Assuming that were true, he’d been here that long?

So Alexander doesn’t pay much notice to the delivered extras that came with his meals. They stay ignored; much like the food was beyond the bits and pieces that he pecked at to stave off hunger pains. No, he spends more time inside his head these past days than outside of it. He may have no power over this world now, but his dreams and meditations are another matter.

He’s lying on his bed, eyes closed and mind drifting, when the hum and the voice arrives. It asks for his word. His eyes open looking at the blank ceiling. “Good news? You’re done with me and releasing me back into the world, a better man? Oh please, I think we both know how much bull that is.” There had been time when he had been a good little prisoner, following the rules and trying to toe the line. More recently, especially since he went unexpectedly Seeking, he’s less restrained. He refuses to walk to the sessions with Keller. He has periods where he tried to punch and kick the walls, looking for some way to break free. Dry scabs still cling to his knuckles from the last one. He hasn’t made an active attempt to attack the guards again. Not yet, at least.

“Just do whatever you’re going to do and let’s get this over with.” Alexander’s eyes close again. He has very little expectation that the bluff will hold for much longer, or that Keller will make good on his promise to try to get Alex out. Whatever happens, happens.

Ms. Gray

It is not Keller who joins him. There are fewer trips out of the cell. Fewer guards. Fewer strange faces. A low hum and the doors whoosh open and a slender blond woman joins him. There is a quiet crisp-ness to her demeanor, her features are equal parts plain and attractive, distinctly unmemorable. The door closes behind her.

She has a small file folder in her right hand.

"I'm happy to tell you that arrangements are being made for your release. The Agent who arrested you has been transferred. Records are being wiped. You should be able to resume your previous post in the police department. The record will show that you were briefly hospitalized after being injured by a suspect, and required an extended period of rehabilitation up to your release. It will take several more days to get all the pieces in place, but an end is in view."

Alexander

This woman arrives, the sound of her shoes echoing slightly on the metal walls. Her entry doesn’t get much of a reaction from Alexander. Her little speech, however, does get him to open his eyes and look up at her. Maybe she keeps her distance, news of his first waking minutes here travelling. He sits up, swinging his legs over the side of the bed so that he can sit up there, feet planted on the floor.

And all Alexander does is look at the woman, studying her, for some time. He’s silent. Watchful. There’s no threat in the silence, but maybe it’s something uncomfortable for her. It takes some time for the conflicting thoughts running through his mind to settle a little.

They settle on a question: “Why?”

Ms. Gray

"I'm not sure that you'll believe me, but the why is really quite simple. For me: I would rather spend my time working to put an end to the Zika virus and improve the lot of those families afflicted it than fighting a war with a handful of Ptolomeic Flat-Earthers over whether the earth is the center of the universe. Those are my reasons.

"And I am not the only one in my organization who feels that way."

Alexander

I’m not sure that you’ll believe me...

“I don’t know if I do, but then I don’t know if it really makes any difference. Either I’m free, dead, or as good as dead. But it’s clear that you and yours are the ones with all the control here.” He pats his knee, to emphasise the point. “You’ll excuse me if I don’t feel much sympathy for your situation.”

“So what’s suddenly changed? Doesn’t the world still need protecting from reality deviants like me?”

Ms. Gray

She is very quiet and very self-contained and she does not allow herself to be goaded. Instead, she stands there slightly apart from him, holding that file against her body. There are no obvious weapons on her person.

"The world does require protection from those who would - under the aegis of faith or voudoun or magick or allegiance to an alien named Xenu - exploit others' weakness and superstition for their own benefit. Ask the Untouchables of India whether they prefer a world of reason or a world of mad blind faith, they are condemned to the dungheap based on an accident of birth.

"With that said: I don't believe that it requires protection from you and I have worked very hard, with Agent Keller's supervision, to effect your release and to ensure that you are released in a manner that is least disruptive to your life. Had I been the agent you encountered, I would not have taken you in to custody. I hope that you will understand that he did so because he believed that you had information about a young woman who caused the deaths of twelve people."

A quick, crisp half-smile. "Please understand that I tell you this not with the hope or expectation of convincing you of the righteous of the Order of Reason, but because I would like you to understand the context of our meeting. And your release.

"Which brings me to the next subject. We have made contact with some of your kind. One or more of them, I expect, will come to retrieve you - under cover - within the week."

Alexander

Alexander stands and takes a few steps – truthfully that’s all that he can take before facing the wall – and there’s a reaction that this woman may not be expecting. A shuddering of his shoulders that come along with a brief, joyless laugh. He turns to face her, but keeps his distance.

“I always thought it would be someone from the Order I said this to first, but fuck you.” There might be more that he wants to say, but he holds it back and turns to face the wall again. His hands balls into fists and relax again, while the movement of his shoulders show an increased depth to his breathing; whatever he’s holding back is enough to fan his anger. But this woman is apparently offering a way out. Although a way out that doesn’t make an awful lot of sense.

He speaks, but his voice is controlled. “If I’m so insignificant that you can release me, why can’t I just walk out of here? Why do they need to retrieve me? What aren’t you telling me?”

Ms. Gray

Ms. Gray whethers Alexander's verbal assault with an admirable degree of equanimity. There is, however, a certain spasm of something that curves her mouth and knits - so briefly - her pale brows. Some internal shadow darkens her eyes: a moment's deep consideration before she expels a slow breath.

" I never said that you are insignificant. I said that I believe the world requires protection from a whole variety of charlatans who use superstition to wield power over others to their detriment. You do not appear to be one of those charlatans.

"Therefore, I am putting both my life and my freedom on the line to get you the fuck out of here. I am not the only one who is risking my own life, limb, and autonomy in order to give you back yours. You cannot walk out of here. We have to erase the records of your arrest or render them so highly classified that no one in Denver will ever know who or what was held in this room for the past several weeks. The officer arrested you has been transferred to another facility more than 6,000 miles. Most of the guards assigned to you have been transferred, or will be transferred, too. That is why you cannot walk out. As far as most of my associates will ever know: a subject was arrested and held here, and transferred to a more secure facility with all appropriate precautions in place.

"Do you understand now?"

Alexander

She can’t see his face, but she can see that his hands relax once more and don’t ball up again. Instead, Alexander plants them, palm flat, against the cold metal walls. A strange feeling, that. Cold in a way that normal metal isn’t. His breathing relaxes, too.

Quiet, this. “Hardly the release you were happy to announce then, is it. Don’t get me wrong, I won’t be sorry if this does turn out to be the last few days I see the inside of this metal box.” One way or another. Alexander still isn’t entirely convinced that this isn’t some game; some scheme to get him back into the Awakened community in the city as some kind of unknowing infiltrator. Given this conversation, could there be any question as to whether the conditioning had taken? Or maybe it had..?

“What happens after? You say I can return to my life, but can you really say that I won’t always have to look over my shoulder for you guys? Or your more... aggressive colleagues. Someone manages to find the files, or works out that I never arrived at whatever hole I’m supposed to be shipped out to, or you and Keller get caught and someone goes fishing in your heads.” Alexander turns at this, but there’s still no approach. Instead he rests back, back against the wall, with his arms crossed in front of him. “Or another agent just happens to pass through the department and works out what I am? Assuming that’s even was what happened with Weston. That puts you at just as much risk, if not more.” It hadn’t, after all, been any great challenge for Weston to get him here in the first place.

“What happens then?”

Ms. Gray

"All of those things are certainly possible. And I cannot tell you what will happen at the end of any of those eventualities. If you would prefer to stay here and avoid those risks, I will see about calling off the operation.

"For whatever it is worth, I am not without allies, and we have enough access right now that the records of your arrest should be destroyed. You will have to live with the risk that you will encounter another Agent in the course of your work. Most of us do not arrest Disparates and Throwbacks on sight, however, not without clear provocation or a reasonable belief that the subject repesents a danger to unsuspecting civilians.

"Still, that risk will always be there."

Alexander

There’s a sigh as Alexander knocks his head back against the wall several times. They’re gentle, a dull thud against the metal, until the last one: a little harder, a little louder. “Given the option of those risks or the certainty of worse if my presence gets noticed here again, I’m hardly going to stay. Whatever happens, happens.” Fatalistic? Maybe. Fated? Never.

“Would you believe me if I said that of the Awakened that I have met who live here, all of them have been trying to remove dangers to the Sleepers? Tradition, Orphan, whoever. This is our home. Nobody wants to get back into any kind of conflict with you.” Some of the others come to mind, making him quietly add: “At least, I hope that’s still the case.” Whether the disappearance of a single, Orphan apprentice would be any great concern to those of the Order who hoped to stir up a battleground in the city was something that he would, hopefully, wait to see. “Just so the lines are clear, do the Traditions get that same courtesy?”

“And what happens now? I assume you need something from me to make this work.”

Ms. Gray

Her pale brows flick upward as he assures her that all of the 'Awakened' work hard to remove dangers to 'Sleepers.' Something about her expression is plain-as-day: she does not like either term. She does not favor the implications. No, more than that: she rejects them on a real and fundamental level. And the somewhat patronizing egalitarianism inherent in that rejection is clearly evident on her face.

But: she is not going to tell him why she believes he is wrong. That, too: hopeless. "I prefer that we simply stay out of each other's way, and avoid reigniting some ruinous war. As for what happens next: I do not require anything from you. Simply your awareness and your consent. Once the arrangements are finalized and we know that your team and on site, we will give you a preparation that will take you into a deep hibernation and conceal your life signs so that you will appear to be dead to both physical and superficial magickal examination. The cocktail will last for several hours. That will be enough time for your associates to remove you from the facility and for us to move the pieces around and destroy the electronic trail.

"Until then, I suggest that you read the periodicals we have supplied you with: enough, at least, so that you will be as conversant with recent events as your co-workers when you return to work."

Alexander

In a different situation, there might have been some pleasure in getting such a reaction from someone so intensely arrogant. (Hell, Alyssa would probably be proud.) But all that exchange does is reinforce the basic differences between them: differences that may well have come from as early as her Awakening, or whatever she chose to call it, and from the way they had each been introduced into this life. Neither was at fault in that. They were simply different.

There is hesitation when she talks about this preparation, though. He didn’t trust this woman, any more than he’d trusted Keller, and he was still sceptical about the whole situation. The distaste is equally obvious on Alexander’s face. “Is that really necessary? I mean, wouldn’t it be quicker and easier to get me out of here if I didn’t have to be dragged or carried?” Unspoken: I’ve hardly touched the food and drink you’ve given me, and now you want me to neck something unquestioned?

Ms. Gray

"It is absolutely necessary. A living person will trigger every security check and be seen by every camera in the facility. A corpse, in a body bag - "

She is not reading his mind. She does not follow the natural progression of his thoughts to the unspoken question.

Alexander

“And two strangers roaming around won’t be noticed? Won’t be picked up by every camera they walk past?” Given the degree of organisation that she’s talking about, it’s a question is likely to have already been asked and answered. But, still, there might be some way to manoeuvre out of having to take Alice’s Drink Me potion.

Ms. Gray

"Not if they wear an appropriate skin. Beyond that, the less you know about the arrangements, the safer this project will be."

She does not know that he is trying to avoid Alice's potion; and in any case: she intends to use gas. As she said: she does not need anything from him to put the plan into place.

"If there is nothing else, I will bid you goodnight."

Alexander

Alexander’s eyes close again as he rests his head back, gently this time, against the wall. He’s motionless until there’s a small, sharp nod. Acceptance. Consent. He really doesn’t like this plan, but it’s really the only possibility he has for getting away from here. There are no other options. So he agrees, still expecting to see a little glass vial with a hand-written note roll through the door at some point in the future.

He stays like that as she turns to leave, but tries to catch her before she reaches the door with a, “wait.” He opens his eyes again, studying her as he pushes off from the wall so he’s standing on his own two feet. His arms are crossed across his body, some subconscious barrier between them. “Assuming you’re telling the truth about all of this, thank you.”

Again, something unspoken: If you’re not, I will find you in my next life... The words may be unspoken, but there’s a fire in his eyes as the thought passes through his mind.

Ms. Gray

She does turn, briefly, her chin lilted upward, her pale eyes fixed and intense.

"I am sorry for what you've been through, officer."

"Goodnight."

And then she turns to go; and he is alone, once more.

Ms. Gray

Ms. Gray

Okay. so:

- this scene comes three days after the last one.

- danger is unlikely, but could happen. i don't know what your characters plan on doing they could be really, really dumb, what do i know?

- questions, ask me.

- any effects you want to have done ahead of time, any other preparation you think they might do, now is the time.

- based on rolls we have already done: pen has a dream roll in effect gives +1 to politics / lore - technocracy. pen has a corr / prime no follow rote going on. sera has a corr / prime / time - no follow / no scry now or later rote going on.

- any other effects you wanna initiate (dampening resonance, et cetera?) mind shield? magickal equivalent of arcane? anything else: feel free to roll now!

Kalen Holliday

[Watch the Weaving d=3 (4 -1 personalised instrument) // 4 suxx target because duration]

Dice: 3 d10 TN3 (2, 3, 4) ( success x 2 )

Kalen Holliday

[And extend - now d=4 - WP because Mages think that should be gone through like whoa]

Dice: 4 d10 TN3 (7, 8, 8, 10) ( success x 5 ) [WP]

Ms. Gray

Mind Shield - Sera. Dif 4-1 (personalized instrument)

Dice: 4 d10 TN3 (2, 7, 8, 9) ( success x 3 )

Ms. Gray

Mind Shield - extension. +1 / -1 taking time.

Dice: 4 d10 TN3 (4, 5, 9, 10) ( success x 4 )

Ms. Gray

Sera: Mind Shield on Pen. Mind 2. Dif 5 -1 -1 (personalized / time)

Dice: 4 d10 TN3 (1, 5, 6, 7) ( success x 3 )

Ms. Gray

Extension.

Dice: 4 d10 TN4 (3, 5, 6, 8) ( success x 3 )

Ms. Gray

Three days later and they meet at the chantry and the hour is early early early early ridiculously early (so says Sera who is cranky before it is still before noon and she had to get up and get dressed and shower and drive all the way out to Morrisson (DAN DROVE, SERA NAPPED) and her crankiness is a cover for something else, the ratcheted anxiety that has asserted itself more sharply, more presently, with each passing day.

Forty-five minutes later and they are back in Denver. Rather a long way from the likely Technocratic complex that Kiara and Nicholas scouted spiritually this night past, and really (the way things go) rather close to the neighborhood that Sera and Dan call home.

Zook's Coffee and Ice Cream, which shares a building with the Denver Puppet Theater. Twenty-seven minutes after one p.m. on a modestly warm March Saturday. That's where we begin.

Penelope Mars

Today is the ambush -- of diplomacy. Fuck yeah! The goal: to woo an ally who is already an ally, if the rite was successful, untampered with, Good, but doesn't yet know it.

The night prior she considered the Technocratic Union and its Conventions and she considered what she had heard of a faction within the Union which does not want to stir the sleeping embers of their feud into something too too hot and she considered, also, the rumors of someones working within, which the rite has confirmed, and thought on what signs and by what Names such a society might be known - and then she had slept. Dreamt. Just before she met Serafíne and Kalen the Flambeau for their diplomatic mission (ambush), she cast a warding and when she shows up to meet them there is this. Her resonance: sheathed, tucked away, ace up a sleeve - diamonds (she is not a cheater), the glint of a possible weapon all that power: given over to secrecy.

Scrubbed of her resonance, Penelope is still something of a Presence.

Study of a Flambeau, sans resonance.

Here she is: red hair braided into a crown, some waving tendrils loose around the face, bangs pushed off to the side; the same silver-gray coat the inside an interlocking pattern of green leaves with frock-coat cuffs rolled back. Beneath the coat, a tunic with a collar that skims her collar-bones and falls to mid thigh. The coat is belted by a belt with a belt buckle that wouldn't be out of place on a runway, or in a painting: you know the type. Modern-day, updated legend: myth: circles. The tunic itself is simple and also rather modern (but the Echoes), and the leggings are High Fashion leggings, another Morrisian design on those. Her boots are high. There's a knife in one, probably. She has a purse which is more of a satchel, hangs at her hip, is easy to reach within: and within a few odds and ends, just in case she needs some instrument other than her wand (up her sleeve in truth: sheathed, just like her resonance). She is wearing a ring on the finger of Mercury and the finger of Saturn (and her wedding band, which never comes off, on the finger of Apollo - sing love with a golden lyre), and a ring again on the other finger of Mercury.

Composure is belied by a troubled shadow in her eyes, which will remain regardless: she is too earnest, too open, for there to be no shadow.

Pen's suggested (it's always a suggestion, never a demand) plan, as she expressed to Sera and Kalen on the way over, is not very Ocean's Eleven. Identify the potential ally, strike up a conversation with this person, quickly establish credentials We-Know-You, This-Is-What-We-Are-Interested-In, and try to make a deal.

Anything more Machiavellian or Byzantine at this point in time will have to come from the other two.

Kalen Holliday

Kalen arrives at the House having already cast what little magick he plans to cast today. There might be more magick, counter-magick and striking magic and whatever else. The truth though, is this: the Technocracy has Alexander. Kalen assumes that anything he could give away is compromised. Alexander knows all of the places he could go, knows his Resonance. They can take what they want from Alexander's mind if they press hard enough. What good will warding do him now?

Instead he comes ready to watch for magick. If their potential contact or anyone else is attempting to do anything with whatever knowledge they have gained, that may tell him something. That he will respond to.

There is, of course, the matter of what thoughts he might have on their negotiation. Those might be relevant. But then, he does not intend to lie. His last few dealings with a crisis have taught him that honesty is good and that violence is not necessary and his priest tells him these same things. Take away misdirection and violence from him and you get what?

The young man in jeans and a mottled grey and purple sweater that is practically begging to be touched and that brings out the green in his eyes. No weapons beyond those that cannot be separated from him. This afternoon is for diplomacy and ice cream. Tomorrow, or later today, perhaps Kalen will be all monochromatic and razor-edged. But not now.

He's in agreement with Pen's plan; neither more complexity or duplicity suits him. At least not for the moment.

Ms. Gray

Sera does not have any Machiavellian plans. She has no Byzantine schemes. She may have a dress from the Dolce and Gabbana Byzantine collection, but that not mean she knows what a Byzantine scheme would be, except perhaps: intricate and gilded. This is new and strange and foreign and she has within her mind and heart a piece of the seeking shaped by the work, pushed to the point where such a conversation would be most propitious.

Dan asks questions. Like: "Are you all three going?" and "Where do you want to park?" and other questions about logistics and appearances and The Way This Will Work. He flicks a thoughtful eye over Pen's get-up and then glances at Sera. She is wearing a sweat-shirt turned inside out and denim cut-offs and fishnets when they show up to the chantry, but when they leave he has convinced her to change into skinny black jeans and a long-sleeved flannel shirt and gloves, yes gloves, to cover her tattoos. Her hair is its native brown, long and curly, and the remainder of her tattooes have been covered with make-up or bandaids or something.

--

They all prepare in their own way. Two cars, both rentals. One is left in the parking lot if needed for easy escape, and that is left before their quarry even arrives at Zook's Coffee and Ice Cream. The other lets them off a half-block or so (or more?) away from the location. Sera is seeing/remembering; waiting, listening to some ineffeable point in time before saying: okay. Now.

Inside, an attractive young woman with (natively) blond hair and cool gray eyes sits tucked in one of the far corners of Zook's. She has been here working for an hour and a half.

The staff do not complain. She always leaves an excellent tip.

Sometimes she reads, quietly, steadily, meditatively. More often, she works on / frowns over a Microsoft Surface, folded out to reveal its neat little keyboard, or up to just the touchscreen. At a certain time on a certain day, that device dings. She has a new email. Something in it makes her mouth tighten. She looks up from the device, and away, at her reflection in the glass.

She counts to ten.

Ms. Gray

Then she counts to ten in Swahili.

Ms. Gray

Then she looks back.

Penelope Mars

Serafíne is seeing/remembering. Okay. Now. Pen has given herself over to events and to a certain trust so: they go, Pen's stride goes long and she gets first to the door to the coffee shop and ice cream parlor, will hold it open for Kalen and for Serafíne. Meanwhile: give both the street and the restaurant an alert and absorbent glance. How gray her eyes are; how dark. There could be anything out there: there could be anything in here.

"Milkshakes will be on me today," she says; and if she sees nothing suspicious, only a woman who may or may not match what description Sera was able to give Kalen and Pen three nights ago, she asks Sera: "Do you see our friend?"

Because - well, one hopes there is a friend, hm?

[And we'll have a Perception + Alertness roll. -2 diff for Acute Sight.]

Dice: 4 d10 TN4 (2, 2, 5, 10) ( success x 2 )

Ms. Gray

Per + Awareness - Ms. Gray

Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (2, 3, 4, 4, 5) ( fail )

Kalen Holliday

Kalen is content, here and now, to let Pen lead. Pen is like some wary mythic knight; he trusts her to walk first into danger. All of the training he has been agitated others in Denver neglect to recognise, she has. And she has a willingness to strike too. He might wait, and he might wish that she had waited; but he trusts that if she senses danger Pen will respond.

And so, the potential ambushes are left to Pen. He does not search out potential threats and exits and entrances and where all the cameras are. He steps through the door Pen holds open with a faint smile about the milkshakes and then his eyes scan the crowd for one target, alight, and linger.

[Perception + Empathy - WP b/c first impressions are the most important]

Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 2, 3, 3, 5, 10) ( success x 2 ) [WP]

Ms. Gray

The blond woman with the tablet appears calm and well put-together. There is, however, a small frisson of frustration evident in her at the moment. Something about the way her brows are pulled together. Something about the cut of her mouth. The way she holds the device she has in front of her.

Ms. Gray

Pen declares that milkshakes are on her and Sera gives a tiny little smirk. Too early in the day for her to want to eat anything but they have smoothies and smoothies appear to be the name and title they have given to their milkshakes. Whatever. Instead of charging at their target, the trip wait in line and order something. The lunch rush is past; there is a low murmur in the air and some sort of singer-songwriter album on the PA system and a perky young man behind the counter who takes their orders and takes Pen's payment and proceeds to make whatever they have ordered while the trio stand at the counter and Sera confirms the target to both Pen and Kalen with a flick of her eyes. Even dressed down - looking rather younger and perhaps a bit more plain than is her wont, even with her tattoos hidden and her resonance dampened, Sera is a presence in the room. She flirts a bit with the kid behind the counter. Winks when he offers her a perfectly civilized cup of tea with her own little teapot, both of which she picks up and carries as she heads over to Ms. Gray.

Flashes a quick, incisive smile. "Mind if we sit?"

Ms. Gray's pale brows rise. The gesture: precise. She takes in Sera and she does it head to toe. Then Kalen. Then Penelope.
Something there: some knot of a breath, let go. Bemused.

She looks back at Sera. "I haven't much time, but you're welcome to join me."

Surreptitiously, she glances back at Pen again. That get-up. She probably has crystals in her shoes, tumbling around her toes.

Penelope Mars

Pen does - indeed - have a willingness to strike. But she is also sipping on a milkshake by the time they've approached Ms. Gray (and there. Even the Union cannot escape the mythic threads which run bright through the world: cool gray eyes, intellect, everybody knows the sign of the goddess), which does not exactly seem like prime leap into action position. Maybe that's part of the idea: seem disarmed, be disarmed, and later one will be disarmed.

The surreptious look: Pen catches it; it dredges up the beginning of a smile, some gleam in her own gray eyes (still troubled [shadows]), and she sits beside Ms. Gray and leaves the other side of the corner table/booth for Sera and Kalen. The silver-gray coat drapes over her thigh with casual glamour and she does not yet set the milkshake down: it will leave a ring on the counter.

"Thank you. You have the air of a regular; is the food here good? I'm Kat, by the way." She is, too, Katabasis being one of her names, and the she deems most appropriate to the moment. She offers her hand; the one she hadn't been holding the cold milkshake with.

Then: "We are Traditionalists; we were hoping you would consent to a conversation."

Kalen Holliday

Pen sits beside Ms. Grey and starts talking. Kalen settles across from Ms. Grey with a blueberry milkshake and no magickal defenses and he smiles at her a little. It puts him in position to watch her eyes. Puts him in position to strike straight at her while Pen strikes from her side, too. He does not anticipate striking. He met once, he is almost certain, another Technocrat in another coffee shop and they were, for about forty-five seconds, allies of a kind. No one was shot in a coffee shop then and he expects no one will be shot (or otherwise physically attacked) in a coffee shop today.

This will be more complicated and will need to hold for longer than forty-five seconds, but he has faith. Hope. A ridiculous willingness to find humanity in monsters. Given that they've kidnapped Alexander, he might certainly be willing to cast the Technocracy as monsters at the moment. He might be a little less inclined to forgive.

Still. He and Serafine once saved a man from a spirit of justice by convincing the ghost of the child child he murdered it didn't need vengeance. He brought a flower to a sea witch. Forgave this entity that...long story there. And then, layered with those, other stories. He can believe in Ms. Grey.

Assuming that Ms. Grey does consent, Kalen offers one of his hands across the table to her. "Elliot."

Ms. Gray

"Mmm." Ms. Gray murmurs. In response to the name and perhaps the question: about the air of a regular, about the quality of the food. This may be a note of agreement: why yes, the food is reasonable. Or yes, I come here with some regularity. I have found that I am able to work without disturbance, here.

Until now.

Pen does not set down her milkshake. Sera, however: sets down her tea. Feels awkward holding it with gloved hands and Ms. Gray gives the gloves a mild glance. Assumes that is another eccentricity of these throwbacks. Vestigal, superstitious.

A moment's consderation from Ms. Gray. Then a nod: of agreement. "A brief one," she reminds Penelope. Wonders if these strangers understand that they are no longer necessary. That the sun will continue to rise and fall and fall and rise, with or without their prayers. " - but yes."

This mild flick of her gaze up from those gloves; across the table. She reaches up - delicate gesture, this - and takes Kalen's hand. "Dr. Deidre Gray." This mildly expectant pause. She works in circles where she expects her name to be: often, recognized.

Penelope Mars

[Oh, oh. Wits (One Jump Ahead specialty totally qualifies, yeah?) + Politics (Tech! - thanks Dream). Now is the time to Know Things That Can Be Useful, right?]

Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 3, 6, 7, 8) ( success x 3 ) [Doubling Tens]

Ms. Gray

Idealism is a remarkably strong thread in the Technocracy. The belief in humanity, in a path-forward, a rising tide lifts all boats, et cetera. Certainly a Technocract disposed to not-murder Traditionalists, to aid one, to be On Their Side would subscribe to such an idealistic philosophy. But would also be burdened with / struggling again, an often-oppressive and many-layered bureaucracy that constrained her ability to act and to actually live up to her own ideals.

Penelope Mars

Pen considers Deidre. The cadence of her voice. The neatness of her measure. Pen's gaze stays on Deidre's face, and there is this true thing: House Flambeau has a strong feud against the Technocratic Union. Another true thing, of course, is that flesh and blood is weak, and the heart wants what it wants. She glances once at Kalen, consideration there too: splits a tiny tendril for Sera, and then all for and back to the Conventionalist. She says:

"I will be as brief and direct as it is possible to be and still be successful in convincing you to aid us in our endeavor. You have one of ours locked up in your facility; he works for the Denver Police Department and is slender of power but a good-hearted defender of - " Brief pause: this spark of a smile, and she is ardent. The resonance is sheathed but it is an Echo of the wizard's heart and the wizard's will. The smile is not good humored; it is grave.

" - people unable to defend themselves. We want him back; we want there to be no overt war in Denver because an apprentice was snatched - " Emphasis. Pen is invested in Alex because he is a person and she cares about people (too much), but she is more invested in the rest of it: rumblings of an Ascension War, rumblings of War period. " - or because somebody wants to be promoted in a spiritless bureaucracy and the easiest path to promotion is fomenting trouble, dismay, and bloodied lunacy. We want to know that somebody on your side is against the mindlessness, the muddying of the human spirit, which comes with such conflict."

"What do you think of starting up pointless war-in-the-streets between yours and ours; making Denver a battlefield? Would you not rather focus on saving lives; on ingenuity? What do you think of the cop - can you help us retrieve him?"

[Charisma! Expression! Beguiling Specialty! Willpower!]

Dice: 8 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 2, 2, 3, 4, 6, 10) ( success x 4 ) [Doubling Tens] [WP]

Kalen Holliday

Kalen is gentle with Deidre's hand. Gentler than usual, not so much because he is hesitant as because Deidre's delicate movements remind him of hummingbirds. Though, he thinks of word in Spanish. Kolibri. He has Named two people for hummingbirds, in two languages, and he adored -adores- them both. He has seen neither for some time. He is not certain one still lives. He knows, that in at least some manners that make anything between them impossible, one hasn't been alive since well before they met.

That delicate movement conjures up bits of poems and live music and flashes of brightly colored feathers. Pen is speaking and Kalen is not so persuasive or so charismatic or so....

For decades he wove his will into lies and violence; and yet, here, he has stripped himself of those things. The only things he really has to give Deidre in this conversation are honesty and faith and hope. He knows that. He came here with his mind open because if those things were all he had, there was no reason to hide them.

Those things were meant to be seen. Luminous like stars. Whole swarms of suns.

"We are not always in agreement," he says quietly. "But we must all want a better world. One we don't have to keep tearing apart." He meets Deidre's eyes then, if she lets him. "Help us?" Pen might be asking because Alexander is a person. Kalen is asking for a much less abstract kind of love; Alexander is, after all, one of the only people he considers family that he has left. Even so arguably as he still has Alexander at the moment.

Ms. Gray

Ms. Gray listens to Penelope and watches Penelope and there is a mild degree of neutrality in her pale gaze. A curious lilt to her chin, the faint rise of her brows. Something clear and - searching about the way her eye tick over Penelope while Penelope favors her with such a clarion call.

There is - beneath that part of her that is meant to rise to such calls - an abiding skepticism. It serves her well, you see: questioning assumptions, refusing received knowledge. An insistence on empircal evidence. She thinks, when she cares to, that their kind are absurd holdovers from some ancient evolutionary course. The coccyx, the appendix: some shadow of once-necessary organ that has been reduced to superflueity and will eventually simply correct itself.

"His arresting officer was transferred three days ago. There may be a small window of opportunity in the next three days. We may be able to clean up the records enough to allow him to return to his former occupation.

"For that, though. You will owe me a favor."

She still has the tablet out. Slides her finger across it and executes a program, then snaps it shut.

"Come back tomorrow. I'll leave a packet with Lola at the ice cream counter, after three p.m.

"And do not attempt to follow me. The first lick of reality deviance and the deal is off."

With that, she fishes out a tip, stands up, picks up her perfectly sensible tote bag, and takes her leave.

Ritual

Serafíne

After the chantry meeting: Dan tells Pen and Kalen that Sera will need some recovery time. They'll regroup in 24 to 36 hours, then? Here at the chantry.

An imprecise amount of time later, then, and what we know is that it is no longer morning full of new light, but evening. Lengthening shadows and all the strange, too-bright warmth of the early spring day all but gone.

Sera and Dan meet the others at the chantry. Sera is just-awake, sitting on the kitchen counter drinking whiskey-laced tea from a travel-mug. Slightly better than just-awake, because she has had a shower and her hair is a loose damp twist of curls swinging half-way down her back. She's wearing a metallic silver micro-mini dress beneath a cropped-and-altered tuxedo jacket, with her usual assortment of spikes and studs and safety pins bristling in her elfin ears, and a bicycle chain and intertwined with a long strand of golden south seas pearls wrapped around her neck. Earbuds in one ear wind beneath her ear to the right pocket of the tuxedo jacket and she's kinda moving a little bit with the music she hears. Mouthing the words while Dan packs a cooler and a re-useable shopping bag with supplies. Pours water from the just-boiled kettle into a thermos already prepped with a concoction of 'shrooms. The usual.

"We can take two cars, if you want?" Dan tells them. No need, really, for three. "Follow me."

---

It is a rather long drive from the chantry back towards Denver. Full night has fallen by the time the little caravan (if there is a caravan - Dan is happy to drive them all) is winding its way through a posh neighborhood in Cherry Hills. Here every house feels like it is trying to become an estate, and the it is not simply the communities that are gated, but each individual house.

Kalen has been here before. Only once.

Pen never has.

There are gates, the looming bulk of a largely dark and apparently and perhaps obviously uninhabited house. It has a century-old solidity to it, an impressive, comforting bulk, the details of which get lose entirely in the darkness. Lingering impression of wards that Sera will renew, and strongly, tonight before they start to cast.

If Pen and Kalen have followed rather than joined Sera and Dan in the third-degree of separation rental car he picked up sometime that afternoon, Dan opens the doors to the empty garage so that they, too, can park there. Out of sight-and-mind.

Inside, an impression of grandeur shrouded by shadows. High ceilings, empty corridors leading only into darkness. The lofty suggestion of an elegant stair rising rising rising. What little furniture remains is mostly covered by dust shrouds, which create odd, looming shadows all around.

Penelope

In Morrison, Pen is:

on time in a silver coat the interior of which is an interlocking pattern of green leaves because as warm as it is it is still cool enough when the wind blows for such coats. The cuffs of it are sharp, pointed: frock-coat cuffs, rolled back with glamourous nonchalance. Her trousers are fitted, some durable fabric of another gray, only a touch of embroidery on the pockets, and her boots lace up almost to her knee, gape a little there with piratical [Wizardess] swagger. The kind of boot which holds a knife. The kind of sleeves which hold a wand. Or is that vice versa? Rings on every finger, some of them Hermetic in nature [Enochian carved against the bands, pressing into her skin, kiss of other languages: and so. She likes secret rings, the lady of the lake with her clear dark eyes and her hair as red and burnished as any devotional offering to Mars (this is the trick)], one of them most certainly not.

Pen: likes Serafíne's outfit. Asks what kind of tea Serafíne is drinking. Greets Dan and Serafíne with equal warmth, and when the topic of rides is discussed (briefly), the two Flambeau take one of Kalen's cars (Pen rocked up on a motorcycle. Kalen might need a ride home, afterward).

--

Out of sight and out of mind the economy car the Flambeau rode in on is parked.

Pen: regards this place - not with awe, precisely; but surprise. "Whose is this?" Because she has been to Serafíne's home before and so a querying glance for Kalen, here; is it his? Is this the compromised Library?

Pen is also: direct, and frank, says: "I will assist if and how I am able; direct me as you see fit." Her assistance will be that of a consor's, likely: make certain the mood isn't broken; get the lights.

Her assistance will be that of a soldier's, held in reserve: watchful, observant, just in case.

Penelope

ooc: ahem. "Flambeaux rode in on." plural.

Kalen Holliday

Kalen arrives in well worn-in jeans, faded from a near-black to grey, and a thin dark red athletic hoodie with thumb-cuffs and a dandelion yellow lion rampant embroidered onto the side of one sleeve. There are magical tools on him; though, for Kalen, magical tools are things like the pack of cigarettes tucked into a pocket and the knotted hemp bracelets tucked beneath his sleeve. There are more things in the Jeep, but not things he expects to need until the day is closer to over.

He is quiet in the chantry. Quiet on the car ride. His greetings are subdued, though they are not cold. He is drawn inward enough though that he reached out to touch none of them. But then. He has always been reserved with contact with Dan. Has never really reached out for Pen.

"This," he says quietly when they arrive at the house. "This is Hawksley's." He glances over the abandoned house. "Was, perhaps. I never...." Knew what to make of Hawksley. Of the way he wanted to be close to the sense of Hawksley without the actual experience of talking to Hawksley which was never easy. "We were never close."

She puts herself at his disposal, Pen. And it makes him smile a little. "Of course. Thank you." There is a formality that echoes his training, but there is something in that thank you that is warmer than his training. A legacy of something else.

Serafíne

Kalen tells Pen that the house is Hawksley's. This perhaps: beneath the bulk, as they are winding through to the kitchen or the emptied-library, which soars, enormous, banks of windows on either side, open, open to the sky. And Kalen tells Pen that he and Hawksley were never close and maybe they are in the kitchen now, packing/unpacking items from the cooler, the 'shroom tea, all of it, and there is a studiously neutral glance from Dan and Sera gives a neat little twist of her shoulders, confirming what Kalen says. The house is Hawksley's. The house was Hawksley's, whichever the fuck it is.

She does not remark on whether they were ever close.

--

She just leads through the winding corridors, past the ballroom, maybe, or the indoor pool, the fucking theater whatever: and surely somewhere there is a corner of the abandoned library or some nook, some study or den with a fireplace and leather couch or two from which the dustcovers have been removed, where her own resonance is strongest, where some of her things are still littered, like oh hey! that pair of fuzzy cookie monster slippers tucked beneath the leather couch, whatever.

She would like a fire in the fireplace: something about the comfort, the warmth. Certainly one of the Flambeau will oblige and if not, hell. Dan has one of those easy-light logs he can lay in the grate. No she doesn't need it to cast, she just needs the 'shrooms and her own intentions, her memory and Kalen's too, and all of this will take some time. First there are wards to be cast and wards to be strengthened.

And then -

Serafíne

Mind Shield: Dif 4 -1 (using a surpassed instrument.)

Dice: 4 d10 TN3 (4, 7, 9, 10) ( success x 4 )

Serafíne

How about an extension!

Dice: 4 d10 TN4 (5, 8, 8, 9) ( success x 4 )

Serafíne

Correspondence 2 / Mind 2 / Prime 2 (Warding against: scrying; resonance sensing; magick detection from without) Dif: 5 -1 (surpassed instrument) +1 the dampening bits are opposed to her resonance, -1 taking time.

Dice: 4 d10 TN4 (2, 2, 4, 9) ( success x 2 )

Serafíne

Extension:

Dice: 4 d10 TN5 (1, 2, 4, 5) ( success x 2 ) [WP]

Serafíne

Extension: -1 quint.

Dice: 4 d10 TN4 (1, 2, 3, 5) ( success x 2 ) [WP]

Serafíne

One more extension,

Dice: 4 d10 TN5 (1, 7, 7, 9) ( success x 3 )

Serafíne

One more time.

Dice: 4 d10 TN5 (4, 4, 7, 10) ( success x 2 )

Serafíne

(Ugh, you guys. Like an idiot I was typing my post in this window and lost it.)

Serafíne

(Ugh, you guys. Like an idiot I was typing my post in this window and lost it.)

Serafíne

It takes Sera hours to cast those wards, visceral more than enthralling, gut-wrenching, a solid fuck-you-don't-see-me to the universe or at least the Technocrats. Liminal: too. Slipping definition, finding someplace between this world and some other world, that almost refuses to be seen, and that is hard for her. There is nothing hidden about her magick, but: fuck.

--

When she is done with the warding (which is boring to watch. No ritual: just urge, desire, demand, change), Sera has to go pee, and Dan insists she eat and drink something and she wants whiskey or tequila and he wants oj or gatorade so maybe instead there are cocktails and conversation in the shadows and then there are cigarettes to be smoked (she wants one: outside in the garden, the curling impression of cloves-and-spice in the air) and then she says: the scrying should be done from the garden. They should be beneath the stars. Everyone is beneath the stars, even Alexander, wherever he is right now. Time to start casting again. Sera is still hallucinating. She has surfaced from it and now she is ready to sink back into it. She reaches out a hand, to Kalen.

Penelope

Penelope provides the fire, albeit via more mundane means than otherwise; she wishes to reserve her energies, just in case there is a breach of the castle wall; just in case she needs to conjure fire later and turn some far-flung, long-distance machine-man's metal bones into salt or the oil which lubricates their system into water or, fuck, the electricity which delicately connects muscle and synapse to fire. Penelope provides the fire and is not bored and there is conversation when there is opportunity for conversation and what ifs and hopes and there is quiet consideration of what might come and hope. There is hope, because Penelope does believe in the ability of human beings to transcend (ascend) expectations and Penelope believes that it is possible to forge an alliance with erstwhile foes and Penelope believes:

oh, Penelope believes in the human spirit; that through it the Golden Age will come again. Something. Out beneath the stars, the Adept of the Order of Hermes (which is only a Disciple, elsewhere), Penelope takes a deep breath:

readied, and steadying, and ardent.

Kalen Holliday

Kalen lets Pen tend to the fire and lets Sera put up Wards around them. He stays near the fire, watches the way shadows and warm light flicker and dance against the walls. Lets his awareness of what is real slip into something more immediate and something more present. Less present, too, maybe. Though his eyes drift now and again to Serafine. The way the light plays over her cheekbones and catches itself in her hair.

There was a closeness between them once. And once a distance. Kalen has been so many people since both of those things were true. It isn't the same way he watched her once, as though she were some divine thing he had no real hope of catching hold of. There is also no sign of whatever betrayal he had perceived on her part; that wariness and that distance is gone too. Light writhes against her skin and his skin and the skin of everyone else in the room and the skin of the world and Kalen watches it with fascination and no judgment.

And then they are out in the garden and he remembers starlight, remembers one of the first times that they spoke and remembers that she remembered enough of that to have Dan read to him about a lightbulb. He remembered it enough to buy her a Christmas present that he still hasn't given her months later, but he remembers that too, glittering and celestial. He does not get it now.

There is smoke drifting here. Cloud shadows drifting across stars.

Sera reaches out a hand and Kalen does not look away from her. Not now.

Still, his next words, softly spoken, are undeniably for Pen. "You can trust Dan," he says softly. "If there is anything of which you are unsure." Because Kalen might have appreciated what Pen offered. Might have accepted it. But his magic is too immediate and too intimate to involve someone from outside it. To involve someone who needs words or instructions.

Kalen reaches out and takes Sera's hand. Slowly closes the last distance that he had left to linger between them. And the physical distance, yes. That too.

And ,as he takes a breath to reach out to something divine and holy and golden, gazing into Sera's eyes, he smiles. And this might be about finding Alexander and their situation might be entirely fucked up, but this moment is magic and echoing with power and promise and for the first time in days he means it when he smiles.

Serafíne

Correspondence 2/ Mind 2 / Time 2 / Entropy 3 - Finding: a potential ally who will help them with Alexander (if such exists) and making it an auspicious / fortunate moment to approach sometime in the near-future. Difficulty - 3+4 (Vulgar w/out Witnesses). -1 sympathetic magick. -1 oracular ability. -1 personalized instrument.

Dice: 4 d10 TN4 (5, 6, 10, 10) ( success x 4 )

Serafíne

(Threshold: 8 successes or more.)

Kalen Holliday

[D=5 (7-1 oracular ability-1 personalised instrument)]

Dice: 3 d10 TN5 (3, 4, 4) ( fail )

Penelope

[I think you get 2 suxx there for taking time?]

Kalen Holliday

[Or, D=4 for sympathetic magic. So. Less fail.]

Serafíne

Extending: +1 dif!

Dice: 4 d10 TN5 (3, 8, 10, 10) ( success x 4 ) [WP]

Kalen Holliday

[Now D=5; WP this time because reasons (as if Sera doesn't already have it)]

Dice: 3 d10 TN5 (6, 9, 10) ( success x 4 ) [WP]

Serafíne

One more time: going for extra successes to find a moment when the person they seek is most disenchanted with the idea of kidnapping and confinement and most ready to help them.

Dice: 4 d10 TN5 (1, 5, 6, 8) ( success x 4 ) [WP]

Kalen Holliday

[d=5; still WP because now would be a bad time to break a spell]

Dice: 3 d10 TN5 (2, 9, 9) ( success x 3 ) [WP]

Penelope

[Meanwhile, doo-de-doo, Prime Sight. I wanna see how this ritual is made! -1 for personal instrument, -1 for time taken.]

Dice: 3 d10 TN3 (5, 6, 8) ( success x 3 )

Serafíne

What happens is: they are outside and they have something from Alexander. Some scrap of memory: for Sera it is the feather of an owl that once had a broken wing, for Kalen, perhaps it is something else. They join hands and Sera closes her eyes and somehow at once she is sinking and rising, falling and straining, opening, opening, opening. She imagines herself - no, she is - losing all but the most golden kernal of her consciousness into the ineffeable vastness of lakashim and also still absolutely, entirely within her skin. But:

she feels bright, pierced through, pulled apart, shattered and remade and open, open, open. She's breathing and she's hallucinating and half-dreaming, Alexander as she last saw him, near-dawn, exhausted, frustrated, frozen. Alexander as she first saw him: shattered and newly awake and alone on an empty mountain road. Alexander as he is wherever he is, where he does not belong, where she refuses to leave him, and and and - something else, some forward push, the strange and terrifyingly numinous threads of the future, all the worming possibilities, as infinite as any others:

and,

and,

and,

exhaustively mad hours later: a single resolving impression. Blonde hair and cats-eye glasses. Professional attire with a hint of the hipster: a peter pan collared cardigan over a polka-dot blouse. The gleaming scroll, unreadable, of a laptop open in front of her in as she sips a perfectly ordinary pour-over-coffee on a perfectly lovely afternoon three-days hence in a public square beneath a strange and warm spring sun. She's looking up, she sees some thing. She -

(Sera will share the details when she comes to. But look: see. They have an option. They have a choice.)

Kalen Holliday

Kalen is easily immersed in rituals. Easily falls into magic and connection and lets his power entwine and enmesh and entangle with others. Well, let us be honest, with some others. But he has always fallen into rituals with Serafine as easily as rain falls to the earth. As easily as snow and starlight.

It is no different now.

When the ritual is over and the echoes of their magic are fading he looks up at Penelope. He does not know what Serafine saw, but he knows that she saw something. He does not rise and he does not speak; though he seems to refrain from both of those things less because he cannot do them as because he simply does not chose to. Whatever this ritual took for him to cast, he is not close to beyond doing either of those things.

Instead, he offers Penelope only this: a brief, triumphant smile.

[Sorry. I was waiting on our post order, like an idjit.]

Penelope

How interesting it is to watch other Mages Work together. Here is a Cultist of Ecstasy and here is a (?) Hermetic (with a great deal of Cultist Influence - or so the rumors have it). This is a complicated ritual with many moving parts. How does a Hermetic observe? A Hermetic observes with both eyes open; with an invocation, shaped from nothing, except the wand at ready (readied, always; be a weapon, Flambeau, hot-hearted) and a word, and: perhaps she could replicate this exact ritual later.

She will remember it; she will remember the way the bands of power fit together, anyway, the way they (unrestrainedly) reach out. Kalen's brief, triumphant smile finds a gleam in Penelope's eyes - dark under the starry sky, her red hair wild; and when Serafíne tells them what she saw, Pen is all poise and all frank directness.

How much time do they have until the auspicious moment? Pen will want to have plans; somebody who will not be there, but who will know what is happening: daring does not mean reckless. Pen will want to have plans;

but Pen is hopeful, see. And so are they all who are willing to reach out to an enemy, to find the chink in their armor, to believe beneath that armor there is something human and living and willing to give.