Checking on Samir

Samir

Dynamic Resonance vs. Perc + Awareness, GO.

Dice: 2 d10 TN7 (5, 9) ( success x 1 )

Samir

Dice: 6 d10 TN7 (1, 4, 7, 7, 9, 10) ( success x 4 )

Samir

[Fuck yeah he knows this shit ain't real! That drops him down to Paradox 6 and WP 1.]

Elijah

[songs!]

Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (2, 2, 7, 9, 9) ( success x 3 )

Elijah

His apartment had people in it. At first, he had been pretty okay with the fact that a friend from Louisiana was going to live with him- temporarily, of course. He usually split his time pretty evenly between his apartment and his room in the warehouse, though now the warehouse had actually become his own little fortress of solitude, or at least as much solitude as Elijah could stand.

Besides, there were books here. He had yet to develop the habit of falling asleep on one of Henry's couches after doing whatever it was that Henry had him doing in the first place. Though, admittedly, he did know where the nearest IHOP was on the route. Drank a lot of crappy coffee and then obsessively brushed his teeth because he drank that much coffee and he was pretty intent on keeping up with oral hygiene. Elijah was the kind of person that the dentist didn't chastise for not flossing enough. We digress.

But, there he was, passing from the kitchen to the space where there were offices and bedrooms and bedrooms that were used as offices and offices that were used as bedrooms. The place still felt a little like (okay, a lot like) Kalen. They hadn't had much overlap, but we digress. Clothing was comfortable- sweatpants and a tee shirt. He'd borrowed the pants from some one night stand since he couldn't actually find his pants in the morning. The tee shirt was his. He had a necklace on with a little sun charm on it, tied on too tight and he was just waiting for it to call off at this point because even Jenn couldn't get the knot undone.

"Ohhhhh won't you take me home tonight? Ohhhhhhh down besiiiiiide that something liiiiight?"

There was a pitstop to be had, though. He could make his run to the room, consider putting on decent pants, and be done with the day. He could stare at the ceiling for all anyone cared. Hell, he could actually be a good student and study for something that wasn't a harp recital (harp was coming on Wednesday. Piano was still int he works, but he didn't actually know how he was going to get a piano to fit in either of his living spaces, and he wasn't going to get a keyboard because fuck keyboards.)

He stopped, though, remembering that he wasn't alone and that their houseguest (patient?) probably didn't want to hear Elijah fumble through Fat Bottomed Girls. He scales back to humming, makes a turn, and finds himself at a door. Knocks three times, because he always knocks, even if he was going to barge in.

He doesn't barge in, though. That's self-restraint.

knock knock knock

"Hey man, do you want anything to eat?"

Samir

Whatever happened last night is nothing to which Sam could attest with any degree of certainty. For all he knows he teleported from the massage parlor to the office. For all he knows he isn't even at the office. This could be someone's dungeon for all he knows. Made up to look like a guest room.

He hasn't come out since last night. Sat at the table with Grace and ate his food with as much enthusiasm as one can muster when all one wants to do is crawl into bed and enjoy oblivion for a few hours. It was good fucking tofu though. Maybe he'd said something to that effect. Even in the depths of his madness he would like to try to give some indication that he is present in whatever capacity he can say to be present.

So Elijah startles the shit out of him and he lets out an undignified shout and something crashes into something else and something else drops to the floor behind the closed door. Shit happens sometimes.

"No!" Sam says in that overshot friendly tone that doesn't do anything but announce that he's lying. "No, I'm good! I ate..." He doesn't remember when. "I ate already! Thank you!"

He does not say Go away! but that's the implication.

Grace

Grace went on a mission this morning. First, she made sure that Samir was sleeping, and then went on a circuit of town, picking up all the things she'd need to host a vegetarian for however long. There is a vegan cake (carrot cake gone very carrot) in the kitchen, along with a pack of cookies. But more substantial than that is the samosas with tamarind sauce, eggplant curry, spinach curry, some more of that lemongrass tofu (because he liked it). There's soy and almond milk in the fridge.

Whenever Samir gets hungry, he'll have food, and choices of it. There's enough for everybody, really.

Grace comes padding down the hallway from the kitchen, wearing socks on her feet (and of course, jeans and a black tee shirt, because she cares about scaring people) carrying a 'chocolate' cookie in hand. It's really carob. But hey, vegan right?

No, I'm good! I ate...

"Yeah, you ate yesterday! You can eat today too, it's almost magical that way! I bought cookies!"

Elijah

"Wait, you bought cookies?" he turns around and looks at Grace. And her cookie, then up to Grace's face. He took a step away from the door, hearing the crash of things that he didn't quite know what fell down but given the the tone of his voice, and given that Elijah is a hormonal young man in his early twenties, there are things that he presumes (incorrectly.)

"Hey, uhhhh, I'll give you, like, ten minutes or something," he backs away from the door and whispers to Grace, "I think he's having personal time."

Samir

After three almost four days of this Sam has himself pretty well and assured that he can distinguish between the things that are not actually happening and the things that are.

So Grace doing a pretty spot-on impression of his mother back in 2002 is something he can file away under Unsettling; Very Real.

A pause while the two whisper outside the door and then Sam cracks the thing slow. He was not jerking off in there. He's still wearing the same shit he had on yesterday to include his boots. What he was doing was dismantling the bed for fuck knows what reason. Looking for insect nests or dusting the baseboards or whatever it is obsessive-compulsive young men do when Quiet is kicking their ass.

At first he just stares past them to make sure they're alone. Then he takes a deep breath and opens the door open all the way. An invitation or a demonstration. He doesn't have the glassy-eyed harried look that he did last night. Improvement maybe.

"What?" he asks Elijah like he almost caught what he was saying. Might have heard something else. Might know exactly what he was saying and be mildly offended. Never mind. Mild confusion takes the place of paranoia. He's still addressing the other young man: "Oh. Shit. Hi."

He doesn't remember Elijah's name and he doesn't remember whether he should or shouldn't remember and he isn't entirely sure he remembers what they were doing when his brain exploded either. Fuck.

Grace

Grace ambles by and hands Samir the other cookie she was holding. It's not the best cookie ever. It's what vegans use to approximate a cookie. But there is no excuse for Samir not to take it this time.

"Good morning," she says, and looks into the room, notes the disassembled bed. Huh. It doesn't really shock or surprise.

"If you want to shower, I'll bet Elijah would wash your clothes."

Wouldn't you, Elijah?

Elijah

Elijah Poirot learned several important things during his apprenticeship with Kalen about the structure of the Order of Hermes.

Specifically, there was protocol and rank and you could get your underlings to occasionally do things for you because you are that badass and you said so and this is was the way of things. Somehow, he also managed to get that certain things the Order did influenced large parts of awakened society. Which meant this: when someone told him he was going to do laundry, he didn't bitch about it anymore. Grace might not have pulled rank, but laundry had to get done and he wasn't going to whine about it being unfair or whatever because there was a dude standing there who could probably stand to have Samir just chill in crappy dirty clothes.

"I could loan you a shirt, too? And maybe pants, because I don't think you got a change of clothes there," he told Samir. "I am halfway decent at getting blood stains out-" crap don't say that "-and red wine stains. But not mustard. Fuck mustard, that shit can go die in a fire for all the damages it does."

Samir

"Ah..."

He glances down and he can't see the dried blood that's gone to flakes on the side of his neck but now that they've reminded him that he's a wandering filth beast showering does sound like an excellent idea. He's never been in the bathroom in this place. It's probably filthy.

"Yeah... where's the..." A glance back at the room and he debates picking up that mess before he goes and tackles a new one. Fuck. Sam takes a bite out of the cookie Grace gave him. Frowns. What the fuck did he just put in his mouth. He chews and swallows whatever it is. "Where's the bathroom?"

Grace

"Oh, that's nice of you, Elijah," she says, gives him a big smile, like hey -- he's doing all right at this.

"There's a shower downstairs. I'll show you," she says, and starts down the hallway, looking at the walls as she goes, amused at the pattern the textured wall makes when it's moving. Who's the crazy one?

She takes another bite of cookie, and disappears down the stairwell.

Elijah

[per+alert: What size are you, Samir?]

Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (2, 4, 6, 9, 9, 10) ( success x 4 )

Elijah

[I take stairs gracefully!]

Dice: 4 d10 TN7 (1, 1, 3, 8) ( success x 1 )

Elijah

Then comes the awkward part, the part where Elijah is standing there and it dawns on him that he's going to actually need Samirs clothes to wash them and he didn't seem like the type to walk around the office naked. Now, grant you, Samir is a handsome man. Samir has also had a break from what is traditionally considered reality so Elijah would rather not see him walking around naked because in his mind it somehow effects his agency as a person. He's not cognitively sound enough to go you know, I think I'll walk around naked. As such, it was not an experience that other people could enjoy.

Plus it might weird Grace out. Which was also not a good plan. He gives the dude a quick look over, tries to gauge what size he is and concludes that the guy- who just disassembled a bed- probably also would not like to borrow another dude's boxer briefs. He nods, then heads off to his room, leaves the door open- bed made save for the blanket that is thrown haphazardly on top of the comforter- he doesn't sleep under the sheets unless he absolutely has to- and alarm clock flashing 3:27 because he turned off the strip outlet at some point during the day. (precisely three hours and twenty seven minutes ago, actually). It's off to a chest of drawers where he retrieves athletic pants and a black tee shirt.

It's soft, at the very least, and he then half jogs to catch back up with those headed down the stairs… which he almost falls down because he takes two at a time and then accidentally three at once because he jumped and half teetered.

"Grace, do we have- wait," a pause, "dude person, do you have an allergy to fabric softener?"

Samir

So he trails behind Grace eating this carob-whatever cookie and wondering what fresh hell awaits him in the bathroom. She may very well have shown him where it is already but he'll be damned if he's able to retain his sense of direction when he's like this. Not even his sense of direction. Any sense of direction.

Reality is super fucking pissed at him. It doesn't care if he gets turned around walking through a door. 

That's what he gets.

Then Elijah comes barreling down the hall after them and Sam spins around like he's ready to confront the creature that came at them in the park. Like he has no idea it's been reduced to a pile of nothing and dumped someplace by a Hermetic and a Verbena already. That cookie wouldn't make a very good conductor but he could throw it.

He doesn't throw it. Elijah calls him dude person.

"No. I don't know. I don't think so. It's not--?" No. Shut it down. That way lies delusional rambling. They are not putting radioactive sludge in mass-produced fabric softener and it sure as shit isn't mind-controlling radioactive sludge. "Sam. My name's Sam."

Oh hey look a bathroom. Sam holds up the rest of the cookie like to say well this has been fun I'd best be off now and then ducks inside and slams the door behind him. Doesn't mean to slam the door. It just kind of happens.

Grace

"And yeah, showers..." SLAM! "Are in there. Right."

Grace turns to Elijah and shrugs. She bites her cookie, because it needs eating more than it really tastes good. Being vegan is terrible, she decides, if this is the cookies they get to look forward to.

"So, it strikes me that I haven't told you much about Samir," Grace says, walking a bit down the hallway as she does. Strikes her, because Elijah just called him "dude person" and yeah... No.

Elijah

The door slams and Elijah and Grace are left standing there. He has clothing under one arm, eyes locked on the door before he shot Grace a sideward glance. He reached forward to take part of the cookie completely unashamed to partake in cookie while Grace was eating it. Bite, chew, swallow.

Stand there.

Blink.

Slowly reach for another bite.

"I'm Elijah!" he offers through the door, which sounds quiet and a little muffled and the name is a bit hard to make out, and then it was back to Grace, "So, uh, how do you know Sam?"

Grace

"He's a Mercurial Elite. Virtual Adept. We changed our name. Anyway. He's cool," Grace says, even though nothing about Samir's behavior has even hinted toward his being 'cool' in any fashion.

She breaks off half of her cookie and just hands it to Elijah so he will stop stealing bites.

"He said he was vegetarian yesterday, so that's why all the stuff in the kitchen is veggie right now. I'm making sure he's okay with food."

And none of this explains or touches on the obvious mental distress poor Samir is facing at the moment. Grace just keeps taking it all in stride.

Elijah

She thinks this will stop him, giving him part of the cookie.

Part of the appeal, of course, is that it is Grace's cookie. He holds the cookie in one hand, shifts the laundry to be under his arm and he reaches forward, slowly, as though this were a scene from Dune. 

The slow hand steals the cookie.

"So, I'm super relieved he's not a technocrat, because… uh… yeah. Did anyone tell you what happened?"

Samir

After he finishes rifling through the cabinets in search of towels and satiation of his curiosity and paranoia Sam investigates the shower. Whether it's a curtain or a clear door he opens it and stares around for a bit. Decides that even if it is filthy it isn't any worse than he is now.

The water begins running.

Grace

The bathroom is not filthy, at least not by normal standards. The tiles are of sparkly granite, the grout scrubbed. There's two gold-colored showerheads in that spacious shower, one coming out of the ceiling to provide a nice rain effect. The toilet has a lightly-used candle sitting in a gold candelabra, deep red. There's a painting on the wall in the short hall opposite the sink that looks to be a real oil painting, not a print -- of something that looks like an expressionist's take on lions. The painting might have some dust. But hey -- it's obvious that whoever did this bathroom up cares little for expense. There's no litter of toilet paper or toothpaste spots all over the mirror here.

Grace just ignores stuff like that, most of the time. What Kalen spends his money on is often beyond understanding.

"Yeah," Grace says, rolls her eyes and hands Elijah the rest of her cookie. If he likes carob so much, he can have it, seriously...

"Maybe you could fill in some more details? I get that he was bitten in the face a lot. Another vampire in the park?"

Elijah

[Manip+sub: NBD, it was just a normal night in the park aside from death]

Dice: 7 d10 TN7 (2, 4, 4, 5, 5, 6, 7) ( success x 1 )

Grace

[Perception + subt = no, no it wasn't. FFS.]

Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (3, 3, 7, 7, 10) ( success x 3 )

Elijah

The whole half of Grace's cookie goes down the hatch in a matter of two bites. Apparently, he really did like carob that much, that or he had no standards when it came to putting baked goods in his mouth. He chews, takes his time chewing because it gives him a chance to formulate his answer. You know, one of the great things about vegan cookies is that nothing about them has the consistency of cooked flesh, which Elijah was starting to develop a taste to avoid courtesy of awakened life.

"So, we met up at the park for a business thing," which is inconsequential and I am totally glossing over it, "and this thing just kinda comes out of the bushes and it has four arms and when it stood upright it had to be at least eight feet tall. It had this mouth that looked like… you know, have you ever seen something that just has rows and rows of teeth, all sharp and… fuck… I don't know think sarlac pit or something. Or a lamprey meets a fucking pelican. It could have fucking bit Sam's head off if it had gotten a better hold."

That… he's holding it together, but something indicates that he's shaken, still shaken, that things went from bad to worse pretty quickly, but they were alive. He inhales slow, takes another bite of carob and chews. Because it gives him something to do, an excuse for not talking. He thinks, because he's always thinking. There's quiet, then?

"I don't think it was like a vampire, it ate meat, I remember that much. I remember sees some tuft of fur and then it came barreling over and Sam had it on the ropes with, like, the dude called lightning out of nowhere-" says the young man who literally told the forces of creation that they were going to do what the fuck he said and strike his enemies down with holy fucking fire from the sky. "Anyway, we killed it and it was dead… and… I don't know, it was warped but sometimes it's like… you kind of got the impression that it was fucking miserable, like you're fighting against instinct and humanity. You want to eat, but you don't want to be a monster and… yeah, guess what won out."

Grace

"Crap. Okay. That was a night, then," Grace says, although it doesn't really surprise her. "I think we should stay out of the park at night, just 'cause having things shove shadows down your throat and / or bite your head off just isn't awesome."

She sighs.

"That explains a few things, like why Samir might be having some issues dealing. He's having hallucinations, I think. Or at least, dealing with the aftereffects of them."

And she's got him tracked just in case he decides to go wandering the streets again. So there's that.

She's also fully aware that Elijah isn't telling her everything about their 'business thing'. Elijah has business? Like hell he does. Whatever. The thing with four arms that about ripped her friend's head off is a little more important than that lie.

"There's samosas in the kitchen if you're hungry. And other stuff."

Elijah

"I think that, instead of avoiding the park at night we should actually look into the place. Just because we're not there, it doesn't man the problems are going to go away. And, yeah, we'd be safer if we weren't out there, but there are sleepers and stuff out there- people get attacked and die and nobody knows what happened to them except for a missing person's file that doesn't actually ever get looked into.  Like that guy that got eaten awhile back from that weird cult? Who we didn't find out about until he was a ghost wandering around looking for his dog? I'm of the belief that we have a bit of a duty to leave the place better than when we found it."

Cookie gets finished. Down the hatch and brumes wiped off his hands courtesy of the side of his pants. Elijah took a second, looked back at his clothes and knocked on the door, "Sam? I need to get your shit and trade you clothes. I need to wash things."

then, back to Grace, "I just kinda figured it had hallucinogenic spit or something."

Samir

[PERC + ALERT: WUT]

Dice: 6 d10 TN7 (2, 2, 2, 4, 9, 10) ( success x 2 )

Samir

He did say I need to get your shit and not Would you stop being weird for five seconds and hand me your shit.

"Okay!"

Door is shut but he didn't lock it. No point. Hallucinations don't give a damn about locks.

Grace

"Usually, when people say 'leave the place better than you found it' they mean clean up the trash and don't take souvenier pinecones... But I get you. Thing is, I don't know the first place I would go to for looking into something like that. Maybe you should ask the Gingerites," Grace says, shrugs.

Monster with four arms and a mouth like a shark just doesn't seem to be something one could look up on Google. Mr. Monster didn't leave a business card behind, she doesn't believe. Dead ends are dead, Elijah...

"Or maybe we need to spend more time in the park such that the monsters get the idea that we're there and not to be fucked with, I don't know. Do you think that would make them stop? Honestly?"

Elijah

[dex+athletics, just backing in and getting your clothes. +2 diff (because effectively blind)]

Dice: 4 d10 TN8 (1, 4, 8, 9) ( success x 2 )

Elijah

"It depends," he says, almost like perhaps he had grown up a little or had time to think about these things or had the wherewithal to somehow come up with a plan for something. He's talking and going into the bathroom, and he's backing in because he doesn't want to peek in on the dude (nope, he kinda did, which is why there was such a production to not stare at Sam.) One does not oogle their dealer; it's bad for business. It also makes your prices go up, or starts a turf war accidentally.

He leaves the pants and the shirt folded neatly and stacked on top of the toilet seat. Clothes are fetched and he makes his way back into the hallway. Then, off to the laundry. He's still talking, though. Also, completely forgot to close the door.

"If you are dealing with vampires and things that have a sense of agency and organization and aren't just fucking around doing whatever it is they're doing, it will make a difference. Mostly, like the thing with Victoria and tonight? It's isolated incidents- one with obvious conclusions when we don't step in, and one where we do step in. It all kind of goes in to the theories of begin a general deterrent versus a specific deterrent. Things that look like they're made of human body parts and really not human body parts don't just randomly appear."

"I figure we can at least go and see what we can see for the time frame at least. What's done is done, and you'd have to be some kind of badass to change the past."

Samir

Sam does go startled-still when the door opens and even while Elijah isn't looking at him he is looking at Elijah. Good job coming at him back-first so he has to stop what he's doing and reason out that that is an actual person whose name he now knows and not another monster. Ready to throw a bottle of shampoo if he has to. It is not a monster nor is it a hallucination.

The Hermetic makes off with the Elite's clothes and leaves the door open. Sam is too tired to care.

Grace

Grace notices the door being left open. Of course she does. Now she has to face that. So, she goes to close it, being just as blind as Elijah was, with her arm over her face, fumbling around for the doorknob and yanking it shut.

Then, it's to go follow Elijah's voice down the hall and pretend that she can't see Samir's underwear amidst all that.

"Yeah, we can go back I guess. See if it left anything..."

Elijah

"Awesome, it shouldn't be hard, just alter your perception to encompass living beings and possible mental states, which- ugh- I can't do yet," yet being the operative word. Elijah has been pretty insistent on things being of the yet variety. He continues on, off to where they do laundry. He's checking tags the whole time, looking for laundering instructions. 

"When do you wanna go? It'll be an adventure."

Grace

"When I can be reasonably assured Samir isn't going to flee the place in terror and go wandering the street for two days with a bleeding face again," Grace says, rather firmly. There's people to take care of, is the point she's making.

She leans up against the wall. "I can scan for living beings and mental states. And non-living beings for that matter. Only thing that would be a problem is if it's some kind of spirit, which it might be. Could be that thing escaped out of a tear in the Gauntlet, sort of like that Message dealie? In which case, I got nothin'."

Elijah

"Oh dude, umbral beings and weirdness? I got that," he said, solid and assured that, yes, he was capable and, yes, he knew what he was doing with regards to spirits. He checks the tags again to be sure, thinks of the person in the shower at this juncture, and gets on to getting the clothes in the washer. He took a moment, looking over the blood stains. 

"Yeah... these are cold, it's going to be a bitch to get out," he said as he rummaged through cabinets for some Shout or something that he could leave on the clothes to let it set for a minute or two. 

"Okay, weird but not weird question- you can see the future, right?"

Grace

"Sure, when the future becomes the present. But that's not much of a super power, is it?"

There are two things that Grace doesn't know much about. The first is spirits. The other is time. She's fairly certain time is just another of those things humans made up because experiencing everything at once is too much sensory overload. But things that don't actually exist are hard to perceive...

Grace is pretty much a creature of the here and now, of the 'real' bits of reality.

"I can see the past too, but only in memories. Sorry. I suck."

Elijah

"Okay... uh... theeeeen... I could- ugh, I think we buried it," he takes a second, thinks about it, puts it all together in his head. He takes a moment and recenters. A little more rubbing at the spot. He quirks his mouth to the side and makes a little displeased sound. "I guess we could unbury it? If you wanted to take samples? Kiara and I took care of it so that wasn't... yeah. I guess exhuming the corpse would totally not be weird."

Yeah. because he totally sounds like he is completely okay with this and the idea of digging up some nameless monster's dead body to figure out what it was is really high on his to do list. He mentions it and scrubs at the bloodstain a little harder, sounds a little disconnected and distracted (just a little dissociation, nothing terrible in comparison) 

Exhales. Hard. Focuses. 

"How about... I can go to the park during the day and do some on-site research and theeeen you and I can go dig up a body and you can look at it, like it's CSI."

Samir

Through the closed door the sound of crashing shower water stops.

Sam psychs himself up to open the shower door and find the towel he'd already excavated and dry off. Wherever they've gone is a location to which he is not privy and after he steps out of the shower he has to ask himself whether he knows from whence the pants and t-shirt came. Decides it doesn't matter. He doesn't want to wander around in a towel. He hangs the towel from whatever hook he finds and climbs into a stranger's clothes.

Down the hall the bathroom door opens and then slams shut again. Sam rests his forehead against it. He doesn't want to go out in the empty hallway but he doesn't want to stay in the bathroom all day either.

"Fuck," he says to no one.

Grace

"Oh hell. On CSI, they had two people use a keyboard at the same time because it would allow them to hack faster. I'd hope we're better than that," Grace says, trying to lighten the mood a bit, since they're talking about digging up the corpse of a thing Elijah helped kill.

Really, this is a normal Sunday. When did this become normal? No idea. Still...

Samir slams the door to the bathroom again, and Grace perks up again. Elijah has his plan, and as much as she doesn't relish digging up a corpse, it's the best plan they've got. Grace has to make sure a certain somebody knows where the food is.

"Somebody's out of the shower," she says, and starts off to find Samir.

Elijah

"Oh my god, that was a thing?" he says, holds the shirt for a minute and he seems just shocked. H muses over blood stains, wonders if this is something Henry's going to have him do at some point- probably yes. He does a lot of cleaning at Henry's place. And organizing, and listening; it makes the time go after. You get to associate an action with a word, makes it stick better. Like doodling during a lecture, but more productive. 

"Things will work out," he says, as if this was the truth because he said so. 

Samir

[COMMERCIAL BREAK]

Emergency calls

Elijah

Elijah is not calling Ian.

Elijah is not calling Ian for very specific reasons. he is not calling Ian because he knows damned good and well that he could have run and things would have been fine (they might not have been fine, he didn't know that, there was a guy having a psychotic break that Elijah was trying very desperately to keep up with in case he wandered off somewhere and got in some deep shit). He wasn't calling Ian because this was falling into the realm of things that he wasn't quite ready to talk to his friend about, because he doesn't want to lose his shit in front of Ian.

Elijah is not calling Kalen.

He could have called Kalen, but some part of him that is quiet and bitter or simply understanding knows that Kalen can't fix this. Kalen can't fix this and the likelihood of Kalen Holliday showing up when Elijah needed him was… well, that wasn't fair. When Elijah genuinely needed Kalen, he was there. In most instances, he just seemed to realize that, perhaps, he didn't need Kalen at that juncture. Now was not the time to work through his incredibly complicated relationship with his former mentor and he sure as fuck wasn't going to try and alert the Order just yet because- because-

Because he didn't want to lose his shit in front of people that he was trying to impress. Doesn't want to explain why he felt it necessary to use incredibly vulgar magic in front of a stranger who could have been a sleeper to render some fiend's creation to a pile of charred bits and mostly ashes into- fuck. He can't even think in a complete sentence. Can't call Sera because Sera will come and Sera will help and she's done enough, she'd bleed herself dry and he's seen her do that too recently to ask her to do it again. (He'd never ask her to, the more he thinks about it the more he realizes his feelings towards the Cultist are complicated in how uncomplicated they are. We digress.)

He calls Kiara, though. He calls Kiara because she has a level head. Because Kiara will tell him if something is bullshit, even if he bats his eyelashes and asks nicely. Kiara, in his mind, seems like the type who can handle a crisis.

So.

ring ring.

Kiara

There are other people Elijah could have called. Better people, perhaps. Those he was closer to, had been through darker times with, understood and connected with on a deeper level. But then, that was, in part, the hardest part about calling them after things get messy and there's aftermath to cope with. Sometimes the last people in the world we ever want to see us at our worst are the ones that matter the most to us.

There's a psychology to that, buried somewhere.

A very human response to mayhem and disorder. To disaster and near loss. So - he doesn't call Ian. Or Kalen. Or even Serafine. He calls a phone that begins to trill and vibrate across a low coffeetable in Denver's heart. The screen lights up with Elijah's name and a picture the Verbena has taken of him at some point in their interactions; a half blurred capture of the fair haired man's face; some smiling; frozen in perpetual motion capture - somehow perfectly imperfect and suited to the tumultuous Initiate seeking her tonight. 

"Wait, wait, wait. Shit." There's footsteps, barefoot and hurried, Kiara appearing from her bedroom in a wash of steam and a dark green towel; moisture still clinging to her shoulders and neck. She scoops the phone up in one hand; water dripping down to puddle on polished floorboards as she answers in a rush, breathless with the anticipation to pick up the call.

"Hello? I'm here. Who is - " She pulls the phone back, checks the number and settles it into the cradle of her cheek and neck, freeing her hands to rub water off her arms.

"Elijah hey."

Elijah

There are a hand full of people who have pictures of Elijah that don't have the slightest bit of motion blur. He can't sit still. Can't help himself, can't stand the idea of being static, of being stuck and right now he's there. He's waiting and he's watching and someone, somewhere, must be proud of him because this is the most mature, most collected, most direct he's ever been. Elijah exhales, places his hand to his throat for a second and feels the slight sting of a scratch across where his pulse beat- as though the cut had just been an accident and the connection had been for some desperate clawing towards a human connection.

It used to be human. He didn't know that, but in the aftermath he suspected. In the moment where the phone rang and he waited his mind wandered and then-

Elijah, hey.

He laughs and it's a release valve, laughs because it's the only thing he can do and, for a second, he takes a tiny bit of pleasure in the chaos, thinks it adorable because he needs something to focus on that isn't terrible. "Hey," he says, sounds tense and sounds wound tight, "uh… how far are you from Wash park?"

Kiara

Hey, he says and there's a beat where Kiara pauses because the way Elijah laughs, like it's borne of both relief and anxiety transfers across the line. The brunette transfers the phone to one hand, tucking the edge of the towel beneath another layer and settling on the arm of her sofa. "About thirteen minutes, give or take."

A beat, Kiara can feel beads of water where they drip from her damp hair and trace along her spine; feels a chill that races in their wake and isn't entirely sure it's all to do with sitting half damp from a shower on her sofa.

"Why? What's wrong?"

There should be more panic in the pagan's voice; it shouldn't sound quite as steady as it does, especially for the way her pulse has picked up in response to Elijah's tone.

Elijah

[manip+sub, diff 6+2 (because paradox isn't nice and lying to people on the phone is hard)

Dice: 7 d10 TN8 (2, 2, 2, 5, 5, 6, 8) ( success x 1 )

Elijah

She's steady. Her voice is steady and all he can think is that he needs to match that, that he doesn't need to lose his shit just yet because there is already a guy having a psychotic break (Kiara might be able to hear him in the background, someone else talking, pacing, saying something that even Elijah can't quite make out and he's standing there with the dude)

"Okay, so… uh- here goes?" he inhales slowly, reaches for his pocket to take out his watch and at least mark some kind of time with it even though it's only right twice a day. He needs to get it fixed, but he thinks it silly- doesn't need to wind the damn thing to know it can keep perfect time.

"So, it turns out my dealer is a dude who can break reality too, and we're just sitting here in the park and this-fucking- thing comes out of the bushes and it's dead now, but… like… the dude I was with is having a major breakdown here… he's… like… I think he has genuinely had a break from reality and he's hurt and if someone can make sure he's okay I can deal with the body, it's just…" he inhales, sharp. He sounds like he's okay, he sounds like he's holding it together. Like things are going to be okay.

"Things are going to be okay. He's okay, it's just a little messy."

Kiara

[Use your skills, Kiara, can you tell he's trying to hold it together? Perception + Alertness, maybe +1 because they are on the phone and she's wearing a towel]

Dice: 6 d10 TN7 (3, 4, 5, 6, 9, 10) ( success x 2 )

Kiara

She doesn't interrupt him.

While he speaks, there's nothing but silence on Kiara's end of the phone and what he can't deduce as he tries so desperately to hold the slivers of his cool together is what the Verbena is thinking as he weaves the pieces of his evening so far together. He cannot see the contours of the brunette's face, half concealed by dark strands of hair where they've slid across her cheek. He cannot see the tension she betrays as she steadies herself on the arm of her sofa.

The way her eyes close for a moment and she listens, mouth a compressed line, brows drawn together. 

Things are going to be okay, he finishes with and Kiara sits up a little straighter; draws in a quiet breath and combs her hair over a shoulder. Slides off her sofa and is half way to her bedroom, tossing the towel over the edge of her bed and reaching for her clothing; Elijah can hear the rustle of it as she pulls things on. "Okay, Elijah, I want you to listen, okay?"

There's a subtle thread of concern in the Verbena's voice, but she sounds focused. There's authority, if subdued, in Kiara's voice as she pulls a pair of sneakers on; winding the damp ends of her hair over a shoulder; without product; its going to dry into a thick tangle of waves and cast into greater affect the sense that others got, sometimes, of the young pagan being something slightly other; untamed and wild. "I'm going to come now. I'll drive over. We'll take care of that guy - whoever he is. Whatever attacked you - we can get rid of it. Bury it or destroy it, somehow."

There's the jingle of keys as Kiara starts grabbing items and pushing them into her purse. "Just breathe, okay." Gentler, that. A pause as she stops, settles the phone against her ear more firmly. "I'm on my way now."

Elijah

He doesn't know what to do.

He's not a doctor, all he knows about people having mental breakdowns is that Haldol is a hell of a drug and he can personally attest that being in certain types of institutions fucking sucks and he doesn't want to go back, doesn't want to get this poor guy sent there either because he just saw something fucked up. It tried to eat him. It literally opened its mouth and wrapped it around his shoulder and the wind shifted and he can smell what's left of the body and his stomach turns again.

"There's barely anything left. I-I think that if we just had some, like, heavy duty trash bags or something- I will pay to have your car cleaned, I fucking swear," like he's living at home and puked in his friend's car after drinking too much and not that they were going to be moving a body. It sounds like an apology.

She tells him to breathe, and he does, but not without being told to breathe. He's been holding his breath, not taking anything slow and deep and centering but she said that she was going to come, that they were going to take care of this, and his dealer friend- whose name Elijah can't even recall (had he ever known it?)

"I should call you for things that aren't shitty sometimes."

Kiara

There's a huff of something breathed against the receiver at that; a gust of breath as Kiara pulls a hoodie on over an old college shirt with frayed holes in one shoulder. There are damp patches where her hair rests and she's pulling her apartment door closed and jogging to the elevator as she responds and maybe on some level there's a deliberation to it.

He wasn't a doctor but Kiara was, in a certain manner of speaking. She healed people, put her hands and her energy into their bodies and mended what was frayed; weakened and destroyed. "Things are always shitty, kid. It's just a sliding scale of how badly." There's a muted ding as the doors slide open and the Verbena punches the button to the basement level. Static fluttering across the line as it begins to descend.

"My car will survive, I promise. Are you hurt? How badly is he other than ... " She doesn't say what's she thinking, Kiara, but Elijah can guess what she means: other than his mind. Other than the fact he's separated from reality. Neither one of them can be naive to the dangers that poses; an Awakened without a sense of what was real and imagined.

Elijah

"It bit him, and he's bleeding but… It's nothing that I don't think stitches would fix? It's not bad enough that he's gonna bleed out. We both did some pretty vulgar shit so he might be reeling from that?" can't fix the kinds of things reality does, though. It's pretty insistent. Makes sure that it's point is known but in Samir's case perhaps reality was just a tad heavy handed.

Elijah has no fucking clue how lucky he is, or how if things had been a little different he'd be the one losing touch with reality right now. "He won't let me get near him."

Kiara

"Okay. I can fix that." She says it with such calm assurance, the brunette, as she unlocks her car door with an electronic chirp and the muted thump of the door closing in her wake; she shifts the phone around under her chin as she deposits her bags on the seat across from her and turns the engine. Elijah can hear the distant rev of the Verbena's engine as it starts.

The sounds of Kiara in motion; there's a reassurance to it. She's on her way. He won't be dealing with - whatever had just happened, whatever was happening, to Samir, on his own for much longer. "Just - hang tight for a few more, okay? I've got to hang up now and drive but I'm on my way."

There's a click as she hangs up and suddenly, Elijah is plunged back into the moment. His tether through Kiara temporarily lost.

Kiara

[Vroom. Drive + Dex. Does she manage to cut any time off that drive with some (very minor) moves?]

Dice: 4 d10 TN3 (1, 3, 6, 8) ( success x 3 )

Business deals gone bad

Elijah

Elijah has problems with focusing.

Anyone who has met Elijah knows that he has a problem with focusing. Knows that he takes in too much sensory information at all of the wrong times and has had people express very vocally that they will take it out of his scrawny ass (slender, asshole, thank you very much) and probably just never study with him. It was fine when he had finals to study for or he had some innocuous thing that Kalen left him alone to do for various and sundry reasons.

Now, it was different. If he didn't have results and didn't measure up, he was done in the order. Done. Completely done. He didn't think he could possibly fail out, but at the same time h didn't think he could get a C in a harp performance class but he nearly did after not showing up to a midterm recital. (Car accident, he had almost said fuck it and just taken the C but he would have had to explain to his parents how you get a fucking C in a harp class.)

Anyrate, not the point. The point was that he had to take in a lot of information very quickly and seem like he had a good foundation and like he knew what the fuck he was doing.

So, he put in an order for some adderall from a dealer he'd done business with before, and left good feedback. Five out of five, would repeat the transaction again. Adderall and ecstasy. Because seriously, why not?

So, there he was, on a bench waiting. And reading a book about the history of the printing press- he was actually interested in it. Somewhere, his club kid cred was tanking.

Samir

Elijah has good timing. If he had tried to reach this dealer a week ago he would have found him to be decently divorced from reality but that's a story for another time. He may not be able to form a mental picture of the guy in his head but he has the handle he uses on the Dark Net (slakhani) and he has a good idea of his level of intelligence and education (proper grammar and punctuation when he types!) When you're dealing with drug dealers the less you can remember about them the better anyway.

No better way to regain one's club kid cred than mixing stimulants with MDMA.

His dealer comes out of the darkness skinnier and wide-eyedier than the last time Elijah saw him. He is not disheveled and unwashed like he just this moment decided to crawl out of his apartment but he does have the jittery look of a man who hasn't gone outside in a while.

In his more alert state Elijah can appreciate the way Samir walks. Long strides with his hands in his pockets and his shoulders bunched as if to make it more difficult for someone to grab him from behind. He has long black hair he keeps tied tight in a knot at the base of his neck. Beat-up wine-red Doc Martens and black jeans and a leather biker jacket overtop a band t-shirt. No jewelry. He's chewing his lip as he rounds the bend towards the kid with the resonance like disorder with a purpose.

Sam feels like the needle when it first hits your vein. A stranger staring at you from across the room. He looks like he needs a fucking cigarette.

"Yo," he calls just before he's right up on Elijah's bench.

Elijah

He's not yet at the point in his magical career that he can say that his timing is the result of being clever and having mastery of reality. No, right now, Elijah can just chalk up good timing to good luck- sometimes, he gets a break. Prefers to deal with this guy on the Dark Net because he remembers very distinctly that they guy with… you know… hair. Hair and probably not glasses. Anyway, he remembered that the guy very distinctly did not look like he was going to kick Elijah's ass. He could have been a blackbelt in something- appearances are often deceptive- but he definitely gave the feeling that beating the shit out of Elijah wasn't on his to do list.

(There are things Elijah remembers, vaguely, things he doesn't think about often but occasionally come up in deals. He doesn't know how lucky he is, well and truly. Doesn't remember what he'd said to Nines- except that he'd heard some disembodied voice say that the man was a murderer, that Elijah shouldn't push it. He doesn't remember how much he bought, or much else, save for that moment when the needle hits your vein, then euphoria, then just… nothing. He doesn't remember taking too much, doesn't remember how he got home or even how he got to the ER. Just remembers his dealer/"friend" Megan telling him that she wasn't too keen on one of her best customers dying on her and not to run his mouth off.)

The less you know, the better.

He does appreciate the way Samir walks, the way he seems to be aware that things could go from bad to worse. Guy looks like he could use a cigarette; Elijah smiles at him like they're friends. They both know that's not the case. "Hey man," he says as he puts the book aside. Careful with it. Clothes are comfortable, but somewhat professional. Slacks, button down shirt, a vest (who wears a fucking vest?). Clearly, while club kid fred may wain, his hipster game was strong.

Samir

So he's graduated from sweatpants and crippling physical pain to two seconds away from revealing himself to have a fucking pocket watch. Kid must be a Hermetic. No other Tradition treats its initiates as if they've just been sent off to boarding school and then acts surprised when they wander around at night looking for drugs and sexual adventure.

This park is crawling with vampires according to some people. Something could come out of the dark at them at any moment. Samir could stop the electricity in a person's heart with the power of his own fucking mind and he still looks as if his own mind is the thing causing him the post trouble.

Elijah has no way of knowing that. For all he knows the dude has a hit out on him or he's pissed off a rival dealer or he's high himself. Good dealers don't use their own product but they don't know each other.

A friendly smile begets a nervous twitch of a response and Sam keeps his hands in his pockets as he sits down beside Elijah.

"You, ah..." Right. Gotta act normal if they're going to do this shit out in public. "You ready for classes to start?"

Elijah

[Manip+sub: This is completely normal.]

Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 3, 5, 5, 5, 6, 7) ( success x 2 )

Elijah

He does. Have a pocket watch, that is. Checks it right quick, as though it was going to show anything other than the same time it always does. Except for when it does. You know, standard cat logic. Watch goes back in his pocket- because why else would he wear a damn vest except to carry a freaking pocket watch.

"Yeah, kind of? I'm taking some short courses that are pretty much kicking my ass," he says, that much is the truth, too. It wasn't so much a short course and more I'm making a horrible lifestyle decision that is going to essentially make me lie to my family for the rest of my life but then again that could also be true of going to college to play the freaking harp (and the piano, but mostly the harp). Elijah has a good track record for lying to his parents, so everything is golden there. I'm taking my medication or it was the only class open or of course I'll come back to Louisiana after school ends.

"There's something about doing difficult things that I was gonna say, but I totally fucked it up."

Punctuated with a laugh. He's comfortable, like they know each other.

Samir

"If it's easy, it's not worth doing?"

Aside from both participating in a parallel economy they have a core group of associates in common. It's strange to sit beside someone about whom he knows so much simply from going on a digital message board and skimming his posts. Not strange in the sense that he hasn't done it before because he does shit like this all the time. He's a reality hacker. He can learn a person's life story within minutes of meeting them as long as he can conjure up an Internet connection. That isn't how he's gotten to know the Awakened who call Denver home and that isn't how he intends to get to know them.

Still: he knows Elijah has had a storied time the last year or so and Elijah doesn't even know this guy's name. He knows he's a good-looking brown-skinned kid with a Canadian accent. Even that will fade once the dealer's walked away.

Pretending to shoot the shit is a good way to keep suspicion off of them and what they're doing but it also helps Sam practice his social skills. Maybe takes the edge off the loneliness riding him like a vengeful spirit for a bit.

"Or, ah... what'd Teddy Roosevelt say, about envying people leading difficult lives well."

Elijah

(Straight intelligence: GAH, I have totally heard this quote before!)

Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (4, 7, 7) ( success x 2 )

Elijah

"Nothing in the world is worth having or worth doing unless it means effort, pain, difficulty… I have never in my life envied a human being who led an easy life. I have envied a great many people who led difficult lives and led them well," he replies to Samir. He does remember what it was, or at least remembers the quote well enough because he remembers having to write it down fifteen times in middle school because his history teacher had been insistent that they learn one important quote from one influential person a week. One of those awkward things that people try and make you learn in school and it stuck with him.

He can also recite a hand full of poems by Walt Whitman. He prefers William Carlos Williams. They weren't talking about poetry, though.

"What is that? A Tautology? When you flip two things- not the dog in the fight, but the fight in the dog? Or all the crap that big teacher guy in Mystery Men was saying?"

Samir

Samir never experienced the joy of public middle school. Having a hippie physics professor for a mother gave him plenty of world experience but it didn't do a whole hell of a lot for teaching him how to survive in group settings. Everything he knows past a seventh-grade level he knows because of his own natural curiosity and his own nerdish intelligence.

Poetry isn't anything he has much experience with. He is not a creative type. He has a certain elegance in the way he writes and he looks like the type of guy who might like spending his nights at indie rock shows or hanging out with other counter-culture chain-smoking types. If he does he's the quiet one in the group. Too busy sitting back and listening to participate.

So this is difficult for him. Difficult and necessary. Loneliness won't go away if you ignore it any more than voices or intrusive thoughts will go away.

"Or, ah... A or not A. If A implies B, then not-B implies not-A. If at least one of A or B is true, and each implies C, then C has to be true, too." A beat. "I don't know shit about grammar. I think Roosevelt was just ripping on people who skate through life without ever encountering any..." He clears his throat. "... any adversity. The dude rolled out of bed and pissed manliness."

Elijah

"Didn't he, like, punch a bear or something?"

A beat.

"I'm not even joking, I thought he did things like wrestled animals and busted trusts because, y'know, fuck monopolists."

Samir

The question is so absurd Sam actually laughs. He looks like the sort of person who doesn't even know how to smile. Turns out he has quite a nice smile. Takes care of his teeth even though he smokes a pack of cigarettes a day. Laughing doesn't do anything to dispel the electric anxiety from his eyes but it does loosen him up for a few seconds.

Elijah isn't even joking. Fuck monopolists. Sam considers this and then pulls out his smartphone and starts to tap the screen as he talks.

"They didn't have Wikipedia back then. Bullshit had to travel by telegram. The amount of physical evidence generated by rumor propagation, even if he didn't actually punch a bear, if he--okay." A beat. "He was hunting in Mississippi and the dogs found an old bear they 'chased until exhaustion,' and the guides clubbed the shit out of it and tied it up so he could come shoot it, but Roosevelt didn't think it would be sportsmanlike. So he had one of the guides shoot it just so it wouldn't keep suffering. A political cartoonist named Clifford Berryman published a cartoon about him refusing to shoot the bear, and that's how Teddy Bears got their name. Google doesn't say anything about him punching one though. Sorry."

He bookmarks something called 'Dirtbag Teddy Roosevelt' and puts the phone back in his pocket.

Elijah

"Whaaaaat?" he laughs, starts to lean over to see what was on the screen before sitting back up. Elijah concluded that he probably didn't need to be looking at the smart phone of his drug dealer on account of the fact that there are Things He Does Not Need To Know. Sits back up and shakes his head. Looks sideward and notes that the guy does have a pretty nice smile.

"I had no idea how that came around, I thought it had something to do with bears? But seriously, thought he punched a bear and I thought that's a really weird thing to do if you are off Mike Tysoning bears," he looked at his book, then back, "I totally knew I liked Taft more."

Samir

"Wait, was Taft the one who looked like a walrus?"

Ah hell. If they're going to sit here talking about bear-punching and whether or not it ever actually happened then Sam is going to light a fucking cigarette. He extracts a small yellow case made out of plastic and from it extracts a filtered cigarette he rolled himself. Avoiding contaminants requires a certain amount of paranoia. His lighter is a cheap plastic thing he picked up at the gas station.

It's worth mentioning that Sam's hands smell like rubbing alcohol. So does his phone. Elijah might not have noticed this until he leaned in to glimpse the screen and even then it might not have registered. It is not a strong smell but it is a persistent one.

He shucks a filter out of the pack and puts it into his mouth without touching it. Lights the tip and shoves everything back into his pocket. Presumably this ritual takes as long as Elijah's response. It isn't universal collusion. Sam would rather listen than speak.

Elijah

"He did kind of look like a walrus," Elijah confirmed, "most people just remember the thing about the bathtub? But by current standards Taft is probably about the size of a regular husky guy. Totally not going to judge his presidency based on his BMI, but the guy did more than freakin' Roosevelt did. I mean, he did a bunch of anti-trust stuff and he improved the postal system, which was a big deal for the time because the postal system was super important. Hell yeah effective postal system."

He looks at the case, plastic, and takes in the faint scent of rubbing alcohol. Elijah propped his arms up on the back of the bench, sat there like he was comfortable with the space. talked like they were friends, because the young man didn't know strangers.

"Did you know that some people suspect Lincoln had Marfan's Disease?"

Samir

[int + academics IDK DO I?]

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

Samir

The question makes Sam frown but then again plenty of things make Sam frown. He's a pretty sharp guy and he can crack jokes when he's of a mind to but his mind is a preoccupied place. If Elijah takes away from this encounter that Sam seems as if he's got someone nattering in his ear that oughtn't be that wouldn't be an unfounded observation.

They are not kindred spirits. Sam isn't haunted by the dead. It's his own thoughts that won't leave him alone.

He frowns and then he cleaves a plume of smoke out his nose. Ashes lazy into the grass and adjusts the way he has his feet planted on the sidewalk. His back has not been touching the bench this entire time and it doesn't start now. If anything he's slouching where before he had been bunched up. Turned towards Elijah like they're friends sure but if the two of them are friends it's hard to tell which is The Weird One.

"Marfan's the one where super tall people don't have enough connective tissue, right?" he asks once his airway is clear. "I mean, that'd make sense. He died way before Marfan wrote about it, eh?"

Elijah

"I think so? I have no idea, I know it's the disease when you don't have enough connective tissue and people end up being, like, super tall and having weird ribcages. I just saw something on TLC when I was in high school about the Mütter Museum? Which was, like, really freaking cool and I kinda want to go at some point… but I'm not actually super keen on flying?"

Which was amusing. He was willing to jump out of an airplane, but he was not willing to stay there and just ride out the flight. Whatever the case.

Somewhere, in the bushes, there was something rustling. It wasn't' anything strange, nothing really. It was the time of day or night or twilight that people didn't often have reason to be hiding in shady places, but there they were. Something rustled, and it seemed innocent enough. Something rustled and it made a sound. Something that gurgled and burbled and sounded wet and sickly-

Then, stopped.

Samir

Sam is on his feet and spinning towards the noise before he can even stop and think if he ought to consider the possibility that he's still fucking hallucinating.

It was the sound. He's heard noises like that before. His eyes are bright-wide in the dark and his nostrils are flared as he tries to keep his breathing under control. Now would be a shit time to panic. He holds onto his cigarette a moment longer.

A quick glance at Elijah. He doesn't have to ask whether Elijah heard that if Elijah didn't react to it. He'd rather hallucinate than have to admit Grace was right and he shouldn't come to Vampire Park after sundown.

Elijah

[Per+alert, I heard that, right?]

Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (1, 6, 6, 8, 8, 10) ( success x 5 )

Samir

[so alert]

Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (1, 4, 5, 7, 9, 10) ( success x 3 )

Elijah

There is an awkward moment, and it is awkward- even Elijah knows it's awkward, when one has to wait and see if the person with you heard something. He's holding his breath, looking sideward at Samir and trying to play it cool. Trying to pretend like he didn't just hear some unpleasant gurgling noise and now would be a shit time to panic.

Beyond that, the blond has no self preservation instinct. So, he's standing up, turning his attention the other way, and starting a slow approach to whatever is in the bushes.

---

Samir can see it, just the peeking of something sickly white and sallow in the bushes. He sees it, with patchy hair and awkward posture. It seems like something that might be human- possibly. Human is a relative term in some instances, but it isn't the sight of the thing that catches his attention. It's the sound, it's the slight crunch and sickly slick tearing of muscle.

He can see something in the bushes with it, splayed wide open and filled with vivid reds and putrid pinks. He catches a look at a tuft of fur- something that goes into the air and is tossed.

There isn't enough blood on the ground to warrant a second humanoid figure in the bushes. Crunch, rip, sickly sweet ironbloodsweatshitgarbagedead.

---

"What the fuck?"

Yeah, if there was a question of whether or not Elijah saw it, there wasn't one anymore.

Samir

Normally Sam has to psych himself up to touch another person. Psych himself up or smoke a joint. He keeps a bottle of hand sanitizer on him and avoids shaking hands when he's introduced to other people and that's easy enough to chalk up to the fact that he's a hacker. Anyone who spends all their time inside breaking into other people's digital lives doesn't have much time to figure out how to interact with them in the meatspace.

Sam tries. And Sam isn't stoned right now. Turns out adrenaline is a powerful substitute.

His customer may not have a sense of self-preservation but neither does the dealer have a strong stomach. Sam reaches out and grabs him by the upper arm. His fingers are cold and his grip is not powerful. This is not a man who knows what the inside of a gym looks like.

"Don'tgotowardsitwhatthefuckareyoudoing?"

Elijah

Someone is holding onto his arm. Elijah isn't particularly strong, either, but he does have a bit of stamina. You have to if you do the kinds of stupid things Elijah does on a regular basis. He does stop, though, eyes don't come off the bushes though. He thinks about things Dan's told him recently, but we digress.

"… something really stupid that I kind of regret thinking about," crunch, snap, swallow.

The thing sits up, viscera hanging from its too-wide mouth. It has an almost comical frown, like a gulper eel from the depths of the abyss. Its neck is too long and its eyes are small. Too small for its face and so achingly human. A robin's egg blue with the softest doe-eyelashes. Its hair was oily and dark. Its arms long- or at least, one set of arms was long.

There was a second on the big cage, cracked at an angle that was almost reminiscent of a praying mantis. Not the shade of the rest of the body but a lovely golden tan, set against an almost breathtaking set of breasts- its belly distended and sloshing fullness. Its legs bent the wrong way. The place where the nose should be was flat against the face.

It turned and Elijah immediately stopped moving. Waited. Held his breath.

Samir

Something happens to the unseasoned mind when it encounters something only the reptilian brain knows to fear. Even stepping out in front of a car or registering the approach of a barking dog is enough to shut down the conscious thought of a person afraid. The concept of fight or flight being the only two options is an old and misleading one.

More often than they do anything else when human beings are confronted by danger they do nothing.

These two young men are not just men. They're fucking wizards.

They both still fucking freeze when that thing rises up out of the bushes. Sam already threw down his cigarette in favor of grabbing Elijah's arm and now his fingers create a vice around his biceps. His other hand claps over his own mouth like to stifle the voice he's too nervous to generate anyway. He's shaking. Being quiet about it. Shared instinct that stillness will get them out of this.

At least if they're going to die they aren't alone. Right? At least Sam isn't. If Sam dies first Elijah won't remember he was even here to begin with.

The Madame

It opens its mouth- oh god why did it have to open its mouth? It doesn't so much open as it flops downward, exposing row after row of tiny, saw-like teeth. Viscera hangs from its lower jaw and tumble down onto the ground. Its tongue laps at the air, not unlike a snake would to taste what was around them. It's small, painfully human eyes fix on something near the two men- the ones who bend reality to their whims.

The small hands on its rib cage knit their delicate fingers together, rest over the top of its breasts in a mockery of modesty, as though it would be embarrassed to be in such a state in front of mixed company. The vestiges of humanity, the kind that give way to rage when those lovely blue eyes detect something-

Disgust, perhaps?

Rage, a natural response. The sound it makes is that of two women screaming, the sound of broken glass in a garbage disposal, the sound of a vicious harpy. How dare they be appalled.

(Initiatives, please?)

Samir

There's no time to think and he doesn't have the capacity to do it anyway. Samir doesn't have a child or a soulmate or a family that takes up the forefront of his desire to get out of here alive. Even his cactus would forget about him if he didn't come home one day. That doesn't mean he doesn't have anything to live for. He's going to change the world one day.

Tonight about he's going to do is have to change his shorts.

He still has his hand around Elijah's biceps when she shrieks.

[+5!]

Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (9) ( success x 1 )

Elijah

There is this moment, a quiet section when his stomach tightens and fear holds onto his mind and all he can think is that he isn't a coward. He is not a coward, but this is terrifying. All he can tell himself when his lunch threatens to come up on him and he feels everything run cold and his focus goes pinprick fine is one thing: this is wrong. He knows that the creature can't possibly be human… but it was. The cant of its head, its eyes, that sound it made that was so fucking wrong and so fucking human.

"Oh, fuck," his voice cracks.

All he can think is to stand there, straight and tall and to try and focus. Says something under his breath that isn't in fucking english, that isn't in a human language, but here goes nothing.

[5+1d10]

Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (5) ( fail )

Elijah

[Ms. Thang - 6+1d10

Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (1) ( botch x 1 )

Elijah

Order:
Ms Thang: 6
Elijah: 10
Samir: 14

The Madame

The creature leans forward, lays its long and slender arms on the ground. It hunched forward, its vertebrae straining against the skin and it lurched forward bounded towards the two men and its stomach sloshed as it ran, as it tried to bridge the gaps between them. It was hungry, god it was so hungry, don't you fucking judge me hungry.

(action: Run and cut off your food supply)

Elijah

Elijah swallowed, exhaled slowly and straightened. Words came, not just words but Words. Actual, True Words, instructions and pleas and Instructions (because it was an exertion of will, and his will was law, please, please work (it will work))

(Action: Start Prime 2 Rote- Striking whatever the fuck that thing is with prime-based lightning. Mostly just prime)

Samir

Samir can't just chant and make shit happen. He has to take a handheld computer only slightly larger than his smartphone out of his pocket and tell it what he wants to have happen. This hack doesn't have a shortcut because he's only ever had to use it once.

[Action: Readying focus. Excellent use of your time, buddy.]

Elijah

[Prime 2: What the fuck, universe? Diff 3 + sphere 2 + vulgar (without witnesses) 1 = 6 - 2 quint = diff 4.]

Dice: 2 d10 TN4 (6, 10) ( success x 3 ) [WP]

The Madame

This is what happens when you corner two people who are capable of defending themselves in means that make literally no sense to anyone else. The creature lunges, bounds forward and skids around, stands up to a height that is tall and oppressive. Its head cants to the side, mouth still open tongue exploring the air around the two men. Its eyes didn't seem focused. Its breath was atrocious.

There was the barest hint of Chanel number five on the air, clinging to the creature's hair. The last bits of human vanity.

It's standing up lanky and tall and tasting the air around them and it can feel the judgment, can feel the disgust and the frustrations and all it can think of and all it knows is an undying hunger. It can feel its body rotting, dying and the vestiges of humanity slipping as its more human side clawing for recognition. It stands up, lanky and tall- and rakes its chipping, brittle fingernails over whomever it may hit.

[Action: claw the crap out of Elijah, sorry kid- the dice were angry.]

Elijah

Oh shit, oh shit oh shit oh shit.

He has to keep talking, isn't sure whether or not this will make a difference, but he's damn sure that he isn't going to stop now.

[Keep with this stupid effect, oh my GOD DO NOT KILL ME]

Samir

And there goes his future ability to tolerate that scent.

Sam's hands are shaking but he doesn't drop the little computer. He hits a few keys to tell it what he wants to have happen. First thing he's going to do when he gets home is write a program for a SHE'S GONNA EAT ME scenario so he doesn't have to think next time.

[Forces 2: BACK THE FUCK OFF LADY, aka Electrical Chaos. Base diff 6, -1 for Unique Focus, -1 for Quintessence, +1 for Fast-Casting. Yes WP.]

Dice: 2 d10 TN5 (7, 9) ( success x 3 ) [WP]

Elijah

[More prime stuff: +1 difficulty because we're extending the effect]

Dice: 2 d10 TN7 (3, 10) ( success x 2 ) [WP]

Elijah

[This is going to hurt. Dex3+brawl2=5 - 1 (OWW!), diff 6]

Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 5, 6) ( success x 1 )

Elijah

[And damage!]

Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 1, 2) ( botch x 3 )

Samir

http://www.sadtrombone.com/

The Madame

It makes an agonized sound, and the smell is atrocious. The smell is that of burning hair and searing flesh and it is in pain, it is shocked, overwhelmed, not thrown off its game just yet. It sat up, looked with the kind of confusion that only comes from sleepers. It couldn't find a source, but that was definitely electricity. It shrieked, raised its hand high and raked its claws down-

Except.. it didn't. Except, it should have been rough and aching but, instead, all the ire was restrained, all the strength sapped from its too-long limbs, bloodied fingers running across the young blond man's cheek, down the front of his shirt, leaving bloodied marks across his skin and along the front of his vest.

The air felt cold and everything was so achingly quiet and burst forth into something loud. Something terrible, something that rips apart at the seams and gives way to something that is beyond reason and suddenly painfully real. This is the truth of the world, set apart in blue eyes and gaping jaws- there was something larger here. there are people who are pawns. The world is made of components and they're interchangeable.

The beast before them is art. Terrible, astounding art from the imagination of some horrible genius.

Samir

Later he will contemplate the significance of the story of a dead president's refusal to shoot an incapacitated predator even while recognizing the mercy it would grant. He doesn't want to kill this thing. It was alive once. Underneath the horror of it Samir can recognize it as something that was human once too.

It's caught in an arc of weak electricity and if he executes the program again there's a very real chance he'll kill this thing.

He doesn't want to kill this thing but he doesn't want to die either.

Elijah

Don't touch me.

It's all he can think and he can feel blood on his cheek and there's a scratch at the place where he can feel his pulse beating and he wants to scream. he wants to drop the effect, he wants to run away, he wants this to all stop and all that comes to Elijah's mind is the imperative don't touch me. His heart is beating too fast and his cheeks are pale and-

"…"

Words stop for a second. He's about to throw up, the world is small, and somewhere his mind recognizes that this was a person. Can catch the ebb and flow of human emotion there, the pain, the frustration, the hunger that overrides the human parts that are left. What life is there after this?

He can't stop now. Can't drop it now, he has to finish this.

The Madame

It shrieks again, lunges forward towards Samir because it's hungry, because it wants something, because it's angry and scared and hurt and like the more basic instincts it needs to fight, it needs to attack, it needs to consume until it can feel nothing.

[action: Bite Samir. Because you're delicious.]

Elijah

Words finish, the focus shifts, and it is through absolute force of will that Elijah even finishes what it was that he was saying. Words and intentions and Truth and any number of bullshit things come together into something that was real. It wasn't kind, it wasn't beautiful, but at the very least it would be swift.

[Action: Finally finish that Prime 2 effect, sitting on 5 successes right now!]

Samir

All he has to do is execute the function and hope it doesn't make his computer explode.

He executes the function.

[+1 diff for extension, all other modifiers carrying over.]

Dice: 2 d10 TN6 (6, 10) ( success x 3 ) [WP]

Elijah

[Prime 2: Kindly hurry up and die. Please? Please please?]

Dice: 2 d10 TN7 (3, 4) ( fail )

Elijah

[Aaaaand biting Samir, sorry Samir. -2 (because fuck having 7 health levels)]

Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (3, 6, 8) ( success x 2 )

Elijah

[Sorry 'bout your face.]

Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (3, 4, 5, 6, 8) ( success x 2 )

Samir

[OKAY I TAKE IT BACK KINDA WANNA KILL YOU RIGHT NOW. he can't spend WP this time and he's almost out of quintessence so he's not spending any sorry buddy.]

Dice: 2 d10 TN7 (1, 5) ( botch x 1 )

Samir

ARE YOU FUCKING SERIOUS SAMIR

Elijah

Prime 2: PLEASE DIE NOW. -2 quint= diff 6?

Dice: 2 d10 TN6 (7, 8) ( success x 2 )

Elijah

[Paradox]

Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 2, 3, 4, 5) ( botch x 1 )

Samir

[MY TURN.]

Dice: 9 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 2, 2, 3, 3, 5, 6, 8) ( success x 2 )

Samir

[THANK YOU UNIVERSE soak.]

Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (2, 2, 6, 10) ( success x 2 )

Elijah

Aaaaaaand Prone to Quiet? Diff 9- "I looked in its eyes and it got weird for a minute."

Dice: 6 d10 TN9 (1, 2, 3, 6, 8, 9) ( success x 1 )

Samir

Ooh look at me my name's Elijah I can oppose my Prone to Quiet roll. *upgrades to Level 9 Madness and goes home*

Elijah

There is a sound something makes when it is in pain, when it is dying, when its life is slipping from it and the world is going bleak and oh god, oh god this is the end and all it knows now is hunger and all the basic, decent human parts of this monstrosity are screaming for all of this to end. Oh  please, please let this end. And the two men are standing there, wide-eyed and intent and certain that they want to walk away from this.

Samir pushes, executes programs and protocols and whatever pleas and bargains and ultimatums Elijah issued to the universe are met. The world is bright, then smoldering, then charred. Then, it is beyond charred, the beast is molten, melting, little arms curling inward until all that was left was the scent of ozone, similar to chlorine and stinging their eyes and noses and what had once been a towering mass was reduced to little more than unspecified bits and charred pieces.

A lock of hair. A single jagged fingernail.

Samir

Adrenaline and shock help him ignore the fact that the melded forms of two once-women tried to take a chunk out of his fucking face.

The fact that he hits the wrong key and his effect arcs back on him and knocks him on his ass helps too. Whatever else happens after that is nothing to which he is privy. He can't see or hear Elijah's effect unleashing on the mound of sentient flesh that came out of the bushes.

Though the wound bleeds and he obviously ate quite a bit of paradox just now Elijah has plenty else to worry about right now. There's a pile of smoking ash where a monster once stood and though he shrugs off his own backlash as much as one can claim to shrug off backslash. The nausea and the shaking come after the adrenaline releases its old. That smell.

On the ground Sam makes a low miserable noise that sounds like it would be a plea to some sort of deity for assistance if he weren't an atheist. If there weren't a chorus of voices around him arguing over whether one of them ought to tell him not to open his eyes.

They're the only voices he will be able to make out under the crackling of electricity and someone or something far-off in the distance screaming over and over.

Elijah

[Stamina, diff 8- because seriously this is disgusting]

Dice: 3 d10 TN8 (6, 8, 10) ( success x 2 )

Elijah

His stomach lurches and he closes his eyes, strips off his vest and uses whatever clean pieces there are to scrub the blood and the bits of something off of his skin and there is a forced calm punctuated with shaking hands and a decided moment where he feels like he's going to heave, like something is going to come up but nothing does.

He can worry later- because there is a sound coming from the man on the ground, "hey-"

it's all he can think of to say, still holds his vest too tightly in his hands and his steps are uneven and the world still feels like it's skipping beats and traveling too quickly and everything is fucking screaming. "Hey, we need to clean you up," it's all he can think. It bit him, and Elijah doesn't know if whatever that thing was happened to be contagious and-and-and-

He takes a few steps forward, almost reaches for Sam to try and check if he's okay but the universe seems intent on telling him to slow the fuck down.

Samir

On the ground Sam digs his heels in an unconscious test to ensure he still has control of his body. He's breathing fast and panicked but if this were just a panic attack he'd be fine. There are drugs for that. Drugs would do something for panic. This is not an organic psychiatric meltdown but how the hell is Elijah supposed to know that. He doesn't even know the guy's name.

He sits up. He still has his hands jammed in his eyeholes. Vocalizations with every exhalation and there's too long a pause for him to be responding to Elijah but Time and Elijah are having a bit of a tiff at the moment.

"SHUT UP!"

Opening his eyes doesn't make it any better. He shouts and springs to his feet and tries to brush something Elijah can't see off his arms and chest and face. Blood coats his palm and he doesn't realize he's bleeding but he is beginning to realize that he's slightly fucked. Panting respirations don't do anything to calm him down and he jumps the way he'd jumped when they heard the creature in the bushes earlier whirling around to face something Elijah can't see.

Stopping up his eyes didn't help. Stopping up his ears doesn't help either but it's worth a shot.

"SHUT THE FUCK UP!"

This is what is referred to in English as Not Good.

Elijah

"Dude-dude!" that's all he's got, that's all he can think to say and the seconds are ticking on or maybe they're minutes, or maybe it's all moments and there are times where he is fairly certain that the measurement of time is kind of bullshit but whatever they were, the time seemed to pass at the wrong rate. Some seconds too fast, others too slow, like it's an oval instead of a circle. He inhales sharp and knows he doesn't need to fucking touch Samir right now because that? That doesn't end well.

"Stand still," he says, he insists, and he tries to keep up, has a horrible feeling that the man is going to run, he has a feeling he's going to run and he has to keep up. He has to keep up because all he can figure is that he's had a psychotic break or he's tripping out or there's something with the blood and the bite mark and-

"You're bleeding," is all he can say, looks for something that he can't see. Tenses and lets a feeling of dread wash over him when he realizes that either Samir is hallucinating or Elijah can't see something very fucking dangerous. He reaches forward, puts a hand on his arm without thinking. Doesn't realize how bad this could be.

Samir

"GET THE FUCK OFF ME, MAN!"

He whirls around and shoves Elijah. That's the extent of his violence. He shoves Elijah and something about the way he shoves him suggests it's less to maintain his own sense of personal space than it is to stay away from the younger man so something worse doesn't happen. Blind madness in his eyes. For all Elijah can tell he doesn't even recognize him right now.

Sam's blood is on Elijah's clothing now. The Virtual Adept stalks off and he's hyperventilating still sounds like he's very close to letting despair collapse in on him like snow through a rotted roof but he appears to be in the same physical condition as he was in before the monster bit him.

"I don't have to listen to them," he says low like he's talking to himself. A mantra. "I don't have to listen to them I don't have to listen to them..."

Now's as good a time as any for Elijah to practice calling an adult.