Everett
Somewhere down in Federal there was a welcoming little outdoor cafe that hosted live music and kept late hours on the weekend. It was the kind of place that Everett used to hang out at, once upon a time, when dinner had meant something different to him than it did now. The food was Mexican and Asian fusion, and the drink selection was fairly impressive, for those who cared about such things. Everett used to. In a way, he still did, if perhaps mostly with a sense of nostalgia.
In any case, he showed up outside the cafe with his phone out, texting Lux to let her know that he was there. A large and somewhat intimidating Alaskan Malamute walked beside him, panting in the summer heat. It glanced up at Everett and gave a lazy wag of its plumed tail.
Lux
The night's always gloomy, always second-best to day, always a moody, atmospheric thing which draws sharp distinctions between what shines and what does not. Most of the things that shine need to be made, need to be fashioned, because the muse of invention is fire. But tonight it's especially gloomy, with the stars and moon hiding behind thunderheads, the sidewalks and gutters a ghostly radiant under street-lamps and beside store-fronts where the afternoon's rain has left its mark, and you know what? That just makes Federal more a thing of glass-and-dark-and-gleam-and-warmth clustered around places like this cafe that has live music and is outdoors and keeps late hours and smells like something you'd like to know if you remember certain cuisines fondly.
Everett arrives, texting and with hound-in-tow; Lux arrives, coming from the opposite direction, with her hands tucked away high in the pockets of an unbuttoned summer-tweed coat, something foxy, hounds-and-foxy, not just foxy, oh no, as graceful as if air and flame had made some secret agreement out've love pure and total and true and helpless to give her whatever grace they had, and somebody else's hat crammed over a careless braid. Her phone buzzes; she doesn't check it, though, because she can see Everett with his intimidating Alaskan Malamute looking down to text.
"Hey, 'sup, Stone! Orpheus. Everett," she calls, although she's eying the dog rather warily, as if expecting it to bare its teeth (she does), and raise its hackles (yes, that too), and give her that manic mad-dog look some animals get, slowing as she reaches her fellow-Anarch. "Who's your friend?"
Loose Ends
The refugees and displaced (unseated) power players of a city under siege are many and varied. The Sword of Caine's indiscriminate carnage leaves no shortage of chum in its wake. Even the detail-oriented Ivory Tower, with its many fingers and fixers, can let one or two liabilities slip through while trying to save their own necks and eternally damned souls.
Cue Edward Alexander Scott, III, long-time ghoul of Charles Léandre Séverin Vincent Comtois, Toreador Harpy of Denver lost in the early nights of the wintry siege.
Well, don't really cue him, as he's sitting, looking about not-too-nervously as he takes leans into a brightly-painted metal folding chairs in the front patio of the bustling Nha Trang Cafe. The more-traditional Vietnamese cafe sits directly across from its competitor, that equally busy watering hole Everett and Lux are set to meet at.Isn't he lovely? Combed dirty blonde hair and a peppering of stubble, eternally in his late-twenties-to-early-thirties for as long as the vitae keeps running. Appeal and allure practically drip off of the energized borders of his hale form. A seersucker pair of slacks and a jacket with a white Panama hat, its baby blue band matching the detailing of his suit and the loose fitting v-neck shirt he wears under it. Fashion not only forward, but at a headlong sprint. His legs are crossed, chair turned away from the table and the small cup of espresso in front of him so that he can watch the street. He seems to be waiting for someone.
And there is Simon Hodge. He's a bit more discreet. Dressed in his finest slumming it attire, a white polo shirt with that hungry little crocodile over his left breast. A pair of salmon shorts. Desert boots without socks showing off the other ghoul's athletic legs. He wears a baseball cap that hides the familiar short-cropped ginger curls of what anyone who has visited Elysium in the past century would remember as the ghoul of former Prince Isaac Winthrop's. Who also should've withered away to bones and petrified flesh - if the vitae weren't still running.
Wonder and awe, here they sit, looking fed as lazy lions on the Savannah. A step above the kine, but nothing like the big game poachers approaching. One even has a hunting dog with him.
[ Reflexive Perception + Alertness, difficulty 8, to notice the ghouls. Anyone with Auspex does automatically. If you succeed, roll Manipulation + Subterfuge if you're hiding that you spotted one another. ]
[
Lux
[Percept + Alert.]
Dice: 3 d10 TN8 (8, 8, 9) ( success x 3 )
Everett
[Per+Alert]
Dice: 4 d10 TN8 (1, 4, 7, 9) ( success x 1 )
Lux
[Manip + Subt. ... I... No. Totally cool.]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (2, 2, 4, 5, 8) ( success x 1 )
Everett
[Manip+Sub]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 6, 6, 9) ( success x 3 )
Loose Ends
[ Whowhatwherewhenwhy? ]
Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (2, 4, 4, 10) ( success x 1 )
Everett
Orpheus, she called him, and he smiled at that like it pleased him a little. The dog pricked its ears and held its head high while Luz approached, watching her with a hunter's keen attentiveness. But it did not bare its teeth. It did not raise its hackles. It did, however, step in front of the tall musician as though to stand guard, and for a moment it looked every bit as dangerous and powerful as Lux imagined it might be.
"His name's Wolf. I got him a couple years ago." Everett let his hand drift affectionately toward the dog's neck, ruffling his fingers through thick fur. At this light touch, the dog dropped its jaw and let its tongue loll to one side, happy. It gave another wag of its tail and leaned forward to sniff at Lux's pocket.
During this exchange, Everett happened to glance over his shoulder toward the cafe across the street. It was habit, really. This kind of environmental awareness. Many things could sneak up on you in the moonlight.
When his gaze landed on the familiar faces of the two ghouls, he went silent. A heart-beat later, his attention was back on Lux, and he was smiled as though she'd said something interesting. "He likes you," he added, of the dog, in that dangerously charming tone he used sometimes. And then, more quietly. "The place across the street seems to have attracted some interesting guests."
Lux
Lux notices Edward Alexander Scott, III., and that would be enough. Enough for what? An excellent question; enough to cause her to, upon reaching Everett and his hound, pivot smoothly so her back is to the street and her eyes are on a window, reflective, just there, where she can watch Edward Alexander Scott, III., be joined by Simon Hodge, and seem to be looking in the other direction. Lux notices the ghouls, and she does not like what it makes her feel. Does not like the waiting, even when it seems to be met by Simon's presence, and does not like Simon's shorts. Lux reaches up, precisely rules a lock of gloom-tarnished hair that's 'scaped her braid back behind one ear, unsettling the angle of her hat to one more rakish. As Wolf investigates her pocket, she offers the dog one hand, taking it out of the pocket in question, murmurs - " - hello, Wolf. No treats. He's beautiful," she says, with a smile. The smile is a vibrant, winsome curve of recklessness; a gesture; it's as meant as anything is.
Lux puts her hand back in her pocket, turns to the side, checking her heels, locking her knees to do so, very waif-sweetheart from French art-film circa 1960s, and then says, "Them. Second tier," the way someone else might say, testicular cancer needs to die in a fire; my father died from testicular cancer, with each syllable enunciated. Hate can be pretty, too. The prettiest: it tempts you in, lures you, ravels you, witching, and before you know it. She shrugs then, and leans in to add, "They say that Charles is dead," a faint taut line between her lovely eyebrows. "Ed should be gone, or gone to suck on the teat of one of my 'siblings,' not here hanging with salmon shorts."
Lux
ooc: Actually, nah. He won't be 'salmon shorts.' She said "not here hanging with slum dog polo shirt."
Loose Ends
Everett and Lux's notice and exchange of words seem to have escaped the attention of the two ghouls. They, upon completing a brief trade of pleasantries and a short conversation across the street, seem to come to a decision as they rise from their chairs.
Edward reaches into his pocket to produce a billfold, pulling crisp currency out to leave on the table, before tucking it back and away. Next the Toreador ghoul leans, picking up his briefcase from where it had been leaning into the legs of the table. Simon nods in a direction, down one end of the street, and Edward nods.
They begin to make a beeline for the exit out of the little patio and in that direction.
It a few moments they are down on the sidewalk. In the next few moments they're going to be on that next street corner. The way Edward is blustering that seersucker sail of an arm in the air to hail a taxi cab, who knows where they'll be headed a moment after that.
Except Simon's hand snaps out. Grabs the other ghoul's by the elbow and lowers it, waving his hand at the livery driver that stops to shoo him on and away. He says something into Edward's ear and nods down the street. They decide to walk instead.
Everett
[Per+Empathy on Lux - do I sense personal feelings?]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 7, 7, 10) ( success x 3 )
Lux
[Eh, maybe? Maybe hiding something, instead of being totally glasslike? We'll see. Manip + Subt.]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (4, 4, 5, 6, 7) ( success x 2 )
Lux
Lux is definitely personally invested, at least in one of the ghouls. It's in the way the cant of her chin becomes slightly more defiant, settles itself more firmly and more sharply; it's in the way her pupils dilate, blacker than black. The finely etched tension settling itself like a mantle on her shoulders, or maybe it's just intuition, something in her tone. Lux is worried, and perhaps - just maybe - feeling guilty. The dislike verging-on-hate, fall-out hatred, echo-of-hatred, that's obvious. But it's also more than a veneer.
Everett
The dog stepped out from between them without needing to be told, tuned in as it was to Everett's body language. Everett stepped closer to Lux, leaning toward her as if the two of them were lovers in some old movie - she the elegant aristocratic lady, and he the rakish boy from the wrong side of the tracks. Maybe for a moment they could imagine that they were - that they could wipe clean what had once been of their lives and become something new. From a distance, it looked as though Everett was captivated, drawn, on the verge of offering a kiss.
Up close, his eyes told a different story. Alert and watchful. Perhaps he noticed the way that the Edward's presence seemed to affect her. Sublimated anger and defiance marked with flickers of guilt. If he did, he knew enough not to ask (yet.) "Mm," he pressed his lips together thoughtfully. "Maybe we should see what they're up to."
And here he pulled away and bent down on the sidewalk, crouching on the soles of his boots. "Hey boy," he ruffled the dog's ears and looked into it's eyes, making steady eye contact. "Follow them for me." He turned his head toward the two ghouls, making it clear who he meant, and nodded toward them.
[Manip+An Ken, diff 5, Enchanting Voice -2 woo]
Dice: 4 d10 TN3 (2, 2, 3, 8) ( success x 2 )
Loose Ends
The dog is smart. Already of an intelligent breed, the blood of its domitor seems to have shepherded its canine sensibilities toward something more sentient and purposeful.
It waits until a couple out on a stroll passes, trailing behind them like a well-trained pet left off its leash. It trots ahead, latching onto a clutch of children, bounding around them playfully, mouth shut and not a tooth in sight to scare them. On to the next, always seeming the errant but loyal pet, within bounds of propriety so as not to arouse the suspicions of kine who might balk at such a large animal roaming free.
Wolf - Orpheus? - keeps his icy eyes on the prize, catching the scent and even stays downwind as if it would matter. Who knows, maybe it knows something Lux and Everett don't, its final few bounds leaving it behind an old man making his way down the roadside in a motorized scooter. Its pace allows him to finally catch up with the two ghouls, a dozen or so yards back.
The ghouls seem just as purposeful in their gait, heading toward boarded up (condemned) old school a couple blocks off Federal Boulevard proper. At this point, though, Wolf's bushy tail is finally out of sight as he turns off the main thoroughfare.
Lux
Maybe we should see what they're up to, Everett says, and Lux flashes a killer smile, something that is as lovely as a fall of light through glass, or a fall of glass through light, something to cut the soft-hearted up with. Everett is a vampire; they can't afford to be soft-hearted. She steps back in order to watch Wolf frolic ahead, and says, "I could learn to like Wolf, too."
Then, after waiting a measure, she angles her head to the side and steps away from the outdoor cafe with the good live music and the belly-warming smells and somebody's beginning to strum inside and there are twinkle lights; did anybody mention the twinkle lights? And her reflection-shadow is a cool, dark shiver across asphalt, a suggestion of shape when she says, "By foot or by cab."
Everett
The dog played its role well, mixing among the crowd of pedestrians as it bounded up ahead, tracing the path that the ghouls made toward their intended destination. It afforded Lux and Everett a moment to hang back and consult with each other on the proper course of action. When Lux presented Everett with his options, the Brujah smiled all slow and honeyed and said, "On a night like this? Come on, we're walking."
And he took Lux's hand in his own as though he meant to whisk her off on some great adventure, then turned to stride down the sidewalk with long, purposeful steps, his eye on the disappearing flash of Wolf's tail.
The pair of them kept back far enough to remain inconspicuous, and likely Lux would have to remind Everett of her shorter stride and less comfortable shoes - lest his forward momentum cause her to break a heel. Eventually they drew upon the old school, and here Everett hung back, giving a low whistle to attract the dog's attention. When it returned to his side, he bent down to offer it an affectionate scratch and a little nuzzle of gratitude. "Good boy."
The dog whined softly and licked the side of Everett's neck.
Loose Ends
Three stories of laid brick and mortar with imposing turrets and crosses that say it was part of Roman Catholic academia, the school has a sizable footprint in the neighborhood.
Its main bulk taking up most of the block, the rest of the acreage is packed with smaller facilities that once supported it (trailers when additions weren't possible, a gymnasium, and even a parking lot with another across the street, all covered in temporary fencing with signs for DiNapoli Construction and notices of imminent demolition, though upon closer inspection the dates on these notices have passed by months.
Most likely another victim of the construction industry's bust, the place has many entrances. One for each side of the block, each with a large stone stairway one can imagine children playing on in bygone days. Smaller maintenance doorways for staff lead downward toward its basement, the largest of which is where the malamute can be found patiently sitting, turning back and forth as it paces, as if considering how far his master had wanted him to follow his quarry.
The fencing that comprises the school's perimeter is no longer bound together at this point.
Just the fact such a decrepit institution is where the firm of Seersucker & Salmon seem to have disappeared into will probably be unsettling enough. The fact that Wolf now begins barking and growling at his own shadow and empty expanses of air, even upon Everett's approach, may truly set them on edge. When he whistles, he breaks his sentry duty and sprints in a long loping run toward Everett, showering him in licks of affection.
Everett
[Blood pool?]
Dice: 1 d10 TN1 (3) ( success x 1 )
Lux
Lux's legs are long, if not as long as Everett, and if she needs to remind the brujah she is not quite that able to quickly devour the ground as he, she does it deftly and from old habit, but the heels are not in danger. The apparently-young woman hangs back when Wolf comes sprinting over to Everett, her narrow and intent gaze on the school. The brick, the mortar, the decrepit moulder of it, and that line is between her eyebrows again.
Lux cannot help but feel somehow, perhaps out of paranoia, lured; the feeling goes through her like a hook through an eye, fish-hook, open-eye, you see? Margaret Atwood. Precisely so. Is this the kind of place Charles would've kept his cache of in-case-something-happens-to-me-loyal-ghouls-have-my-vitae-and-take-care-of-my-affairs-Vitae? What about Winthrop? Hard to tell. And why would they go together?
"The romance," she says, unsmiling, "and the majesty. I am choosing to imagine those assholes meeting other girls for Ouiji Board and Light as a Feather Stiff as a Board."
Then Lux: she steps to the side, starting to eye potential entrances, specifically those that mean you-enter-from-above. That's the way to do it. Start at the topmost top,
then go as low as you can.
Everett
Lured they may very well have been. And they might have been walking into any number of potentially hairy situations. Or maybe they'd simply been following a couple of formerly bonded men who'd managed to survive the fall of their masters. Everett didn't seem to be quite so scandalized by their appearance as Lux had been. More, perhaps, curious. He got to his feet and tossed Lux a glance, smirking at her assessment of the ghouls' character.
"I take it you prefer the careful route to the direct one."
Probably a good idea, all things considered.
[Per+Alert - looking for a good sneaky entrance?]
Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 3, 6) ( success x 1 )
Loose Ends
Maintenance doors abound, yes, and the main entrances are still there too, bound shut with chain link and large padlocks, though perhaps the most simple and quiet means of ingress might be to kick through one of the boarded up windows. It would open up into a closed class room or office, depending on which, so as not to announce their entrance to echo down its inner corridors.
Lux
"At first," Lux says, succinctly. She gives Wolf another glance, this one searching, but if there's anything the dog can tell them that he hasn't already with his wary yapping at shadows and circling, the exuberance with which he ran to meet his master, then there's no way Lux would be able to read it. Animals are not her thing, unless they're pieces of animals used to paint a fresco or work on a particularly tricky oil.
There is a fence around the school, peeling away, crumbling into urban decay; Seersucker and Salmon probably didn't climb it. After that look at Wolf, at Everett, Lux finds a point to climb, finds a chunk of cement or a trash-can, something old monument, in swing through with maximum hoodlum flair.
She leaves the real hoodlum work to the Brujah, though.
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (7) ( success x 1 )
Lux
ooc: Uh, that roll was for nothing, ignore it.
Everett
Everett glanced at the fence, then at the dog, who was watching them with an alert and ready expression. Everett pointed to a shaded, out of the way spot beneath a tree that was within eyeline of the school. A good lookout post. "Stay here, boy."
This kind of thing was rote for them by now. Wolf looked a little disappointed at being left behind, but he did as he was asked, trotting over to the shaded spot where he would remain as sentry.
Then Everett grabbed hold of the fence and scaled his way to the top, dropping to the ground on the other side. When he got to the window, he reared back and kicked the boards with a precise, heavy strike of his boot.
[Str+Brawl]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 3, 3, 5, 7, 10) ( success x 2 )
Everett
[Potence duh]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (5) ( fail )
Everett
[Dex+Celerity+Stealth - sneak sneakity sneak]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (3, 3, 6, 6, 6, 9) ( success x 4 )
Lux
[Ditto!]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (2, 2, 4, 7, 7, 7, 10) ( success x 4 )
Loose Ends
[ Doop-de-doom. ]
Dice: 8 d10 TN8 (1, 3, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10) ( success x 3 )
Loose Ends
The boot doesn't fully unhinge the board fastened to the window. But maybe that's a good thing. Enough nails give that, as they climbs through, the Brujah can fold it open and then push it back shut so that, from outside the school, all looks as it was.
The inside is dark, only the sliver of light from around the loosened board illuminating the room. It looks like a kindergarten classroom, the cubbies stripped of their toys and graffiti permanently marring the chalk board.
Decorations demonstrating letters, colors, shapes and occupations litter the walls, supplemented by seasons winter wonderland Christmas shapes and images that tell what time of year the school was finally shut down. The walls are molded from rain, probably from a leaky roof long forgotten, and the door is shut.
They both land inside with featherlight footfalls, and one wall is lined with security glass windows, the kind that in case a child should break them sharp panes wouldn't fall like guillotines. The hallway on the other side of the glass, and the classroom across the hall with similar windows, are all empty.
The interior of the school's main level is completely silent.
Lux
So, Lux. Lux, sneaking into a school, sneaking in spite of or because of the shoes (cloven), the hat still angled jauntily but swept away to be abandoned near the window. The hat is not warm, as if fresh-left, does not for a few seconds more remember its close tete-a-tete with life.
They're in a classroom. Lux gives it a cursory glance, but doesn't seem as interested in it as she might otherwise b--
Let's be honest. There's very little chance Lux would be interested in an abandoned classroom, rain-gutted. There's something haunting and haunted about an empty school-hall, something about the ambience that soaks into Lux, makes of her a starry thing and cold.
Her eyes take the color some of the classroom's gloom, even though she gives Everett a look.
Then she heads into the hall, an ear out, and let's say to the left. Her hands aren't in her pockets anymore.
[Let's also have another Percept + Alert. Cluuues. Shoeprints. The waft of that gross cologne.]
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (2, 9, 10) ( success x 2 )
Everett
They were both careful and altogether more quiet than they should have been. Like the ghosts of the once-living slipping through the halls. No pulse or breath to give them away. Hardly even a hair out of place. And see how Lux moved so precisely in those heels. How Everett's boots did not click or slide on the floor. After giving the classroom a cursory look, they made their way out into the hall, silently searching for some sign of activity. Everett looked one way and then the other, his head high and his senses on alert. Watching. Listening.
[Per+Alert]
Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (3, 6, 7, 9) ( success x 3 )
Lux
[I refuse to be the Daphne. Percept+Invest.]
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (2, 5, 10) ( success x 1 )
Loose Ends
It is the harbinger of voices. When words can't be heard, instead the reverberation of tone along stone and through still and musty air, carrying it all the more easily. It plays at Lux, teases the Toreador's senses, their periphery, like an animal who can hear a storm brewing as mother nature gathers its ingredients, before the sky even begins to twist and darken like stew. There is a conversation going on somewhere.
And Everett actually manages to catch it on his own radar. Give that unsettling of a quiet place direction. Toward that end of the hallway. Southward toward stairs that lead deeper into the building's deceased bowls where some parasites still linger.
Lux spots it as they go. Not in the classroom, but in the hallway. How some of the refuse - balled trash left over from a construction crew's lunch, disturbed dust on one side it turned over. It tells part of a story. Someone has walked through these corridors recently. After the dust had settled and the building had been forgotten.
And there. Drag marks. Maybe two, two-and-a-half feet wide.
Lux
Lux reaches out to arrest Everett's forward motion. Southward, toward stairs that lead deeper into the building's deceased bowels, right? Where some parasites still linger. Southward, the exact opposite of compass-North, the direction facing Janus-away from knowing where you always are. She isn't bothering to breathe, and she isn't taking a breath in order to speak; her breast remains still. But once she has his sleeve, she points the drag-marks out.
But these signs of Ominous Things Happen don't mean she isn't still drawn away-from-North, toward the sound of a conversation she wants to hear.
If only she'd been a better Toreador, sharpened her senses until they gleamed like a sword in the morning or a stiletto under-cloak.
But she wasn't a better Toreador.
Lux
[Sneak.]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (2, 4, 5, 5, 6, 7, 9) ( success x 3 )
Loose Ends
[ Doom. ]
Dice: 8 d10 TN8 (1, 1, 4, 4, 6, 6, 9, 10) ( success x 2 )
Everett
Everett tilted his head toward the end of the hall, indicating the stairs that led down toward the indistinct murmur of voices. He hadn't yet noticed the track marks, as Lux did with her keener eye for detail, but when she touched his sleeve and pointed to the floor, he looked down and saw the story that was written there in the dust. He took it in for a moment, processing the information in his head. It didn't do much to halt his progress. He was already headed toward the stairs with Lux, stepping out ahead to lead the way to the lower level (basement?) of the school.
[Sneaky sneak]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (1, 3, 5, 7, 8, 9) ( success x 3 )
Loose Ends
The closer they get, their quiet footsteps taking them toward the stairs, the more vibrations become words they can overhear and voices they can recognize. It isn't an argument yet, though it's skirting the verge of one.
"Of all the people to bring here," and this, to those that know their voices, is neither Simon nor Edward.
To the small circle of Anarchs in Denver, though, it is still familiar.
Andre Darmon, Caitiff, still complaining, "These two? Of all the fucking people?"
And then, another familiar voice. Ezra Levi, tone unyielding: "Yes. These two. As wronged as any, and realizing it more every night, Andre."
There is a prolonged silence. "It's not the first time they're here," and Lux more Everett would know this distinct voice, as John St. Germain continues.
"And it won't be the last. They're our connection to everything left behind when the dust settles. The Tremere are back. We've had Rasmussen in our corner, but they won't be as kind, and who knows how long he'll last. Who knows who's coming in that caravan on Sunday," a certain stress to those words, a subtext that needs to be kept hidden in mixed company.
"Settles!" Andre, again, incensed by John's argument. "Settles!" He repeats. "Does it look like anything's settled?"
"That's exactly the point," Ezra, firmer this time, continues. "Exactly the point. They're all off balance. And we've got a bargaining chip."
The ghouls had remained quiet for quite some time, but one of them at least, Simon, seems to have gained a back bone. "And we've got our own bargaining chips, Ezra. Don't you forget it."
"What was that?" Andre says, unsure of it.
"You're hearing things," John replies.
"Timothy's upstairs anyway," and with that, the sound of barking from outside. The barking of a loud and angry malamute. A bark and howl of warning meant for its owner, master, domitor.
Lux
The elementary school is abandoned and decrepit and decaying and full of rot (down in the basement [monsters!]), and the creatures who've broken in and are now listening to the middle of a conversation-about-to-turn-argument do not suit the surroundings. Lux doesn't. A too, too perilously lovely thing, who - when they reach the stairs - pivots on those ridiculous(ly well-balanced and frivolous) heels she's still wearing so that her back almost touches the wall and she tilts her head to the side in order to better hear just as Simon gains a backbone and mentions this 'we' that he and Edward are and the 'bargaining chips' they've got. Lux gives Everett a Look. The Look is rather shadow-saturated in the lightless/low-lit school, but her lashes aren't low and she looks far from languorous, absolutely resonant with quicksilver energy and contained [black-hole] radiance. The Look is very much a: What fresh Hell is that bother about? And the Look is very much a cautiously relieved: Oh, it's just the other Anarchs, plotting in a basement? That's okay then. And then the Look transforms when Wolf starts to howl and yelp and she jerks her chin in tht direction, not inhaling yet, just a narrowed and intent look that fixes a line between her eyebrows.
And then, she cups one hand around the side of her mouth in careless exaggeration, Look becoming just a look that takes in the hall as if expecting Timothy the Ventrue Anarch to appear out've nowhere, and she mouths,
We've been made.
Followed by this: a tug on her jacket and that Look, man, that Look says, do the unexpected. Don't flee. Or something.
Everett
No, they didn't belong here. Or did they? They were, after all, dead (in a manner of speaking.) And here's the thing about the walking dead - they spent so much damn time trying not to really die that some of them forgot why they'd ever been alive in the first place.
Not Everett though. He remembered.
So when Lux gave him that look, he just smiled like he knew exactly what she was thinking. Like he'd been about to suggest the same. Like he probably would have walked down those stairs alone even if she'd abandoned him there. But she hadn't, because they were alike in this.
"Did someone forget to invite us to the party?" Everett called out in a rich, resonant tone as he made his way down the stairs, lifting his hands in the universal gesture of 'no harm intended'. When he reached the basement and the others came into view, he nodded to Ezra. "Been a while."
(Not really that long, all things considered.)
Everett
[Cha+Empathy]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 5, 6, 6, 6, 8, 9) ( success x 5 )
Loose Ends
The domino effect is started long before those open hands and that charming face make themselves visible.
Everett's audience reaches for their weapons before they have a chance to register just who's enthralling voice is echoing down the stairwell. Ezra for something more substantial than a pop-gun, instead a curved bowie knife in the eldest Anarch's hand. The rest? It's pistolas like they're expecting a firefight to break out. Simon and Edward have semi-automatics, each in police-issue silver, and St. Germain something more substantial. A revolver. Something that would make a statement on the streets. Andre's hands ball into fists, out of instinct, and his brow furrows, though that's as much of an armament as he seems able to offer.
But it does eventually register, and the third Brujah to enter the conversation is a force of personality to be reckoned with. His bearing seems to calm them down. Placate their unease. Weapons remain, though unholstered or unsheathed, at their sides, barrels pointed at the ground. Edward and Simon even seem to look at Ezra like maybe this had been planned to further outnumber the ghouls.
Ezra makes a show of pulling back his jacket and thrusting the knife back into its sheath, though John keeps a flexed grip on his revolver's handle, if only because his gaze flickers to the still-armed firm of Seersucker & Salmon in their midst.
"A long while. Just in the middle of discussing some business for the cause," Ezra begins, folding his arms as he cants his head to indicate the ghouls. "You might remember Simon Hodge, our dearly departed local despot's right hand man. And you," his eyes on Lux next, "Viol, I know you'll remember Eddie."
[ Yackity yack. ]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (2, 3, 4, 4, 5, 6, 8) ( success x 2 )
Lux
[I notice things, maybe, besides ugh-hate-that-guyhatehim?]
Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (3, 6, 6, 9) ( success x 3 )
Loose Ends
[ Never let them see you sweat. ]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (2, 3, 3, 7, 7, 8) ( success x 3 )
Everett
[Per+Sub]
Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 8, 8) ( success x 2 )
Loose Ends
[ One more. ]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (2, 2, 3, 5, 6, 6) ( success x 2 )
Loose Ends
That fucker's full of shit. Ezra being the specific of all these fuckers. But that's not much of a surprise. He'd never filled in Bernard's shoes. And if he's trying to now it's certainty not for any mutual cause, but maybe his own.
Edward, though, seems... Well, he's far from excited to see his domitor's wayward childe. And especially not standing beside Everett, and especially not down in this basement. His finger is moving, hair by neigh-imperceptible hair, toward that trigger. Simon seems more practiced at keeping his cool, though, reaching to put his open hand on the Toreador ghoul's shoulder to calm him down and maybe talk him down from a rash decision.
Lux
[I do not hate you, Edward, nor feel at all guilty about not looking you or the other ghouls up once the blood supply went dry 'cause I do not have a conscience. I really promise-that-I-don't. Manip + Subt.]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 4, 6, 10, 10) ( success x 3 )
Lux
Lux is content to be voiceless at first. An entrance has to be made just so, after all. A perfectionist understands these things. A perfectionist understands the seductive quality of well-timed choreography: the disparate weapons reached for, half-drawn or completely-drawn, all fixed on one point [perspective -- and cue the Ennio Morricone, but make it crawl with tension]. At the bottom of the stairs, Lux puts one hand in one pocket, but there doesn't seem to be any latent menace in the gesture, no, no promise of some tiny little knife to poke tiny little holes in tiny little players of The Great Game as a whole. Her tarnish-and-O!-green eyes are wide and interested and she smiles at Ezra and John and why not Andre with a little lift of her shoulders as if to say so-we've-crashed, whoops.
The smile is slight; it doesn't extend to Simon or to Edward. Not until Ezra, who is the recipient of most of Lux's watchfulness after that first second and that tiny shrug, comes out all And you, Viol. Then the creature's lashes flick downward once and she gives Edward and Simon and Edward's hand creeping, creeping this side-long, gleaming look - and then smiles at him with something that seems warm even if there's an edge. Warm, and even distantly-ardent: "'Sup, Ez. And of course; what kind of monster would I be to forget somebody who wears a suit so well."
"You," to the ghoul, "are looking really good."
Like she's glad.
Well, at least like she's not disappointed.
Everett
Everett wasn't dressed to the same standards as his Toreador companion. His outfit was a simple affair: boots, jeans and a black t-shirt, with an aged but quality-looking gold watch on his left wrist. He didn't look like a leader or a politician, but he carried himself that way. Tall and athletic, with an edge of quietly restrained power and captivating charm. Men like Ezra... they tended not to like him (whether or not they admired him as a person.) Because Everett didn't have to try to get people to follow him. They responded to his passion because it was real.
Not that he'd ever posed much of a threat before. Maybe now and then, in little flashes - but he'd been so young then. (He was still young now.) Even now, Ezra or any of the others could have disposed of him with but a word. Everett was all too aware of that. He didn't even have his sword with him.
But he wasn't interested in fighting. (Well, no. A part of him was always interested in fighting, or feeding, or destroying. But it stayed quiet for now, apart from the brief glance he gave to the two living and currently-rather-appealing-looking ghouls.) Everett's eyes danced around the room, sliding from one face to another. Noting the way the others held their weapons. The tense stance of their poses. The lies in some of their words.
He moved closer, but not too close. Confident without being cocky. He didn't call Ezra out on his false pretense. He nodded politely to the group, making eye contact with each. "I remember. Evening everyone. And if you're discussing the cause, you know I'm always happy to help."
Loose Ends
"Two refugees of the siege," he says, again gesturing toward Simon and Edward. This time it is more one of open arms, accepting Everett and Lux into the conversation as he does so with a thin smile.
"Once-loyal servants of the status quo cast to the wind by the violence that broke out in our city. And rather than throw in their lot in with the underlings of their lost domitors, wait for less savory shepherds to consume then into their fold," a no offense type look thrown Lux's way, "or even go rogue and seek out the Blood on their own terms, they've looked to us and the cause as an alternative."
"Sought shelter with our number and offer to bring their assets with them. As a gesture of parlay in good faith, John, Timothy and I have been meeting their own unique needs," a nod to Lux at her commentary on Edward's appearance.
"We have decided to welcome them. And now we consider their petition to be Embraced fulling into our state of being," finally lowering his hands. "Viol, you turned from your sire's ways once. You're proof that from the most entrenched bastions of the Ivory Tower dissent and enlightenment can be foment."
Loose Ends
[ Spinning gold out of straw. ]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 4, 5, 6, 6) ( success x 2 )
Lux
Lux looks -- okay. First of all, let us position her. Lux is not going further into the room. Lux is staying near the stairs. Not precisely in an about-to-flee fashion, but as if she hasn't quite decided whether or not she'll be leaning against the wall or not. Lux doesn't say anything about the cause, either. These types of things always have those words thrown around: the cause, the effort, the revolution, and they do touch something in her, that ardency hinted at in the look she gave Edward, like you could scrape your thumb on the veneer of her voice if it were made solid and passion'd come welling up, like it'd flow free. What Lux does do is listen, and that no offense type look thrown Lux's way acts on her gaze like someone striking a light near crystal, dredging up this wry humour and giving her features a not-quite-ironic cast.
But then. That. That! Lux straightens and looks back at Edward; maybe looks over at John, too; then back at Edward and Simon, and if she sounds amazed - well. Quite frankly, my dear, she is.
"You're kidding."
Everett
Everett listened and nodded in understanding. He didn't present any air of suspicion or disagreement because, truth be told, he didn't have any. He knew Simon in passing, of course, but wasn't especially familiar with either of the mens' characters. Even if he hadn't liked them, he couldn't argue with the validity of their cause. He and Lux were very different in this.
You're kidding.
Everett looked back at her, one eyebrow raised. He didn't say anything, but the look seemed pointed.
When he looked back he said, "Seems a fair enough request, all things considered."
Loose Ends
Andre is becoming more and more agitated by the second, especially once Ezra is through with his long-winded sermon on welcoming the ghouls of two pillars of the high clans into the Sect. He may not be breathing any faster, but that's because he's not breathing at all.
It's more a nervous tick:
The Caitiff's thumbs pin against the cuticles of his index finger in those sorry excuses for firsts, scratching at them, peeling them down and away faster and faster like a hermit crab scrounging to get food out of the very air. Then on to the next, to his middle and ring finger, faster and faster.
And then Lux says it and he almost breaks, knuckles cracking as the tips of his thumbs finally press so hard against his other fingers. And it breaks his silence. His barely contained desperation. It's in his voice.
"I say they can't be trusted. Who knows what contingencies and conspiracies they're a part of," one eye bigger than the other as his face balls up in a fervent shaking of his head, muscles and unbeating veins of his neck flexing beneath a subcutaneous layer of baby fat. "I say they shouldn't be anywhere near here. But who gives a flying fuck what I say, huh?" Looking to Ezra.
Looking like he's already regretting his outburst even as Everett chimes in with a less enthused voice of...
Ambivalence, all things considered.
Ezra, who's jaw tightens at Lux's disbelief and Andre's rant, smiles again now.
A majority seems to be swaying to his side. Well, maybe not his side, but the side he's on. The side he's articulating. This seems to placate him further.
"They'll be given ample time to prove their ideology isn't simply one of survival."
Lux
Everett looks at Lux, raises that eyebrow and says it seems like a fair enough request; then Andre practically snaps. Lux's eyebrows draw sharply together, and one can see a belated-understanding filter in.
The Toreador, proof-that-from-the-most-entrenched-bastions-of-etc., parts her lips to say something, and then reconsiders, hang-the-moment-on-the-gallows, and says nothing.
She doesn't even fold her arms. Stillness and silence.
Everett
[Per+Empathy on Lux - ok what are you feeling right now?]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (3, 4, 7, 8, 8) ( success x 3 )
Lux
[Nothin' special. Manip + Subt?]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 4, 4, 6) ( success x 1 )
Lux
Lux is astonished, wary, and she seems to be feeling bad for and annoyed at Ezra.
Everett
Andre all-but snapped, and Everett took a step toward him. Both his voice and his expression seemed earnest when he said, "I do. We all do, Andre. No one said we have to trust them." he looked to Ezra then and nodded in agreement with the man's response. "But they do deserve a chance. Everyone does, who had their fucking freedom taken from them."
See, he did believe. More than many. And it was likely to get him killed someday, but that wouldn't stop him from trying.
He glanced back at Lux, eyeing her for a moment, then back to Ezra. "What was this about a caravan?"
[Cha+Empathy on Andre!]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 1, 4, 5, 7, 7) ( success x 2 )
Loose Ends
It does manage to calm Andre. A few notches and the steam building within him, threatening to turn the Caitiff into a blubbering and raging pipe bomb, is let off. Diffused. Not entirely, but his ire is shifted with Everett's we don't have to trust them as he casts a looks-can-kill stare at the ghouls, who...
Well, they've been ghouls for some time, and it seems they've got some practice on knowing when to keep their mouths shut and let the Blooded gentry discuss their fates.
Ezra looks back to Everett at his final question, and seems more obliged to answer it what with Everett lending his own voice of reason to his efforts to integrate the ghouls to the Sect.
"Stirrings in the Camarilla. Maybe reinforcements. Maybe a new prince. Maybe an Archon. Things've been going on in the region. Witchita. Omaha. Salt Lake City. Vegas. We're central. Can't stay up for grabs forever. Not with the territory on the line. Still, like I said, no one's sure, or at least anyone who is is keeping their mouth shut or lying about it," and these words actually seem genuine.
