Molly Deals with the Devil (And Dies)

M. Toombs
[Dexterity 3 + Athletics 2]

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

M. Toombs
[Perception 3 + Alertness 3]

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

M. Toombs
[Dexterity 3 + Stealth 2:  Better cautious than dead!]

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

nothing
[Eyes in the Dark]

Dice: 8 d10 TN6 (3, 7, 8, 9, 9, 10, 10, 10) ( success x 7 )

nothing
[Ears in the Dark]

Dice: 8 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 2, 4, 4, 4, 6, 7) ( success x 2 )

nothing
The danger of falling is very real, but Molly is at this moment as graceful as she can be. The danger of noticing nothing is also very real, but Molly at this moment is as sharp and as shrewd as it is possible for Molly to be. The air tastes of salt and brine and age is something she notices, and it leaves a strange taste on her tongue, which she might want to smack away: but when she does she can still taste the metallic blood, her own saliva having done little to do away with out spot out the blood is real is dried. How long has she been there?

Time is not what one expects time to be and it continues on. Once again, Molly notices the dark bat-winged things on the ceiling, gathered in many clusters, crenellated mollusk-like horrors. The stones have fossils pressed into them and here here here there are tracks on the ground there are drag marks furrows almost hidden by the passage of water but not hidden to Molly. Furrows, as if some clawed thing walked there over and over, wore a path into the ground, left behind scratches and marks little dents and oh. Her shadow is being pulled from her as she walks. Her shadow is going away, root by root. There's even a pulse to the ground: just so.

And then there was darkness.

And the darkness swallowed Molly Toombs whole.

And she was never seen again, hey?

She ceases to be able to feel her body, but she can still will herself to move forward into the Dark, to speak if she wishes, to feel around: 

The darkness doesn't have a border.

M. Toombs
Forward, she marched.  There were wee beasties overhead attached to the ceiling that she visualized as being terrible bat-pirhannas, and there were marks along the ground as she walked (graceful, careful, light-footed and certain).  She could tell they came from many passings, claws on the feet and hands of something.  Something she may very well be encountering.  Something that might use those claws on her.

She visualized a yeti.  Then visualized the Abominable Snowman from the old claymation Rudolph movie.

Chuckled a little to herself grimly, and disappeared into the Darkness.

Well, merged with it?  Was swallowed by it?  Became one with it?  She couldn't very well define it right now, and might not be able to if she were ever to survive to tell the tale.  She did feel more than just essence merging, though-- there was consciousness as well.  Communication was just waiting for her to try.

Is Jack here?

M. Toombs
[Perception 3 + Awareness 3: Is Jack here?]

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

nothing
There are so many Jacks.

Can you be more specific?

The words are sluggish; curl into her head invasively.

But she does get a sense that there are some Things in the darkness, not far away. Is one of those things an undead vampire's reflection? Well; she may feel a familiar tingle, but it isn't strong enough to guide her. Perhaps it's just strong enough to give her some assurance: she is on A path, whether or not it is the right one.

M. Toombs
She felt familiarity in the darkness.  Not identity, not necessarily, but familiarity was good.  It was doubtful that she'd be finding many other people in here that she knew.  Taking this as a good sign, and agreeing with the comment of there being so many jacks, she continued.

Humble Jack.  Good Jack.  The Jack of Many Faces, from Denver.

Then, probing out in what felt like the 'near darkness', if you could distinguish any kind of real space here, she inquired more directly.

Is that you?

nothing
I am not that Jack.

I - 

and sensation returns to Molly, as if something cold were brushing against the shape of her. Is she wearing clothing? It does not feel like it; the cold strikes right through her and tightens. If Molly is moving, or trying to move, she feels herself suddenly constricted;

it is claustrophobic, being suddenly forced into shape.

- am a devourer of Jacks. What are you doing here?

Are you a Jack too?



M. Toombs
The negatory response was disappointing enough, and for a moment Molly was confused because she thought the answer also caused the sudden cold and restriction that she was feeling.  But it occurred to her that this was different.  It wasn't that something was necessarily happening to her as it was that she was returning to normal.  How long had that been?  Why did it feel so unfamiliar to be back in a body again, being pressed into shape and solid form?

The message continued, still in her mind.  This was a devourer of Jacks, and they wanted to know if she was one too.

She tried to feel for her head and her hands.  Tried to lift a hand to look at it, tried to see it at all.  Tried to shake her head 'no'.

I'm a Molly.  I'm seeking a Jack.  Could you perhaps spare one?

M. Toombs
[Self Control]

Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (2, 9, 10, 10) ( success x 3 )

nothing
What do you have to offer me?

Molly manages to keep a firm hand on the reins of her self control, and lift her hand. She still cannot see it, but she is aware that when she moves her hand, she does move it. She can feel herself if she touches her own arm, her own waist and her own hip, her own neck and her own chin. If she flails out, however, she'll find her hand bumping into something hard. Metal, maybe.

M. Toombs
Molly checked her chin, touched her chest and stomach as well.  She didn't flail, but she did feel in the space around her, slow and creeping, until she found somthing.  The cool hard surface had her worried, but nothing was as it seemed was it?

She had other things to worry about anyways.

Knowledge.  Information has always been the most valuable thing I could carry.

nothing
Your knowledge isn't valuable to me. What else have you to offer?



M. Toombs
There's a lengthy pause as Molly considers what else she could offer.  She didn't want to make promises of life or blood or death.  She figured it would accept a promise to deliver it more Jacks, but had no desire to go feeding lives to this thing.

Elsewhere (right here), her hands rested back on her belly.  A thought occurred to her, and they rested a little lower.

How about the power to create life?

nothing
What else?

... It 'sounds,' shall we say, musing. Considering. 

But it wants to hear what else she might be willing to give up, chop out of herself, sacrifice. There are any number of sacrifices when it comes to the arcane and the occult. Molly's read about them.

Now she's living as one of the things that go bump.

M. Toombs
Fingers numbly clench for the fabric of the shirt she remembered having tied around her waist.  She didn't want to touch the metal around her, didn't want to think about what it implied (is this my physical body back in the physical world?  am I in a closet?  a box?)

She thought to ask what it wanted from her, but realized that wasn't the point.  It wanted to know what she was willing to give-- to what extent she would go before it would finally put a stop to her offers and accept one, or perhaps all, of them.

I can't think of much more I can offer.  You aren't going to be interested in money.

A pause, and:

I can offer you help.  A task.  A barter of deeds over goods.

M. Toombs

M. Toombs @ 4:48PM

[Willpower]

Roll: 5 d10 TN7 (1, 4, 9, 10, 10) ( success x 3 )

nothing

Molly might get the sense that the Voice in the darkness has decided what it wants from her. There is a waiting; a gathering.

This is what she hears.

The power to create life, an hour of your life, and the answer to a question. I will bring you to your Jack. I will give you your Jack. Do you agree?

M. Toombs

The answer didn't take long to be decided upon.  Frankly, Molly was just glad to be getting out of there without having to promise to kill ten men for this Darkness, or without having to shave twenty years off the end of her life.

Done.

There's a sense of her yielding, then.  Waiting for the Darkness to take what it was promised.  Anticipation as well, waiting for her Jack.  Hands within some physical space elsewhere flexed and curled.

I agree.

nothing

[Dice: 10 d10 TN6 (5, 5, 7, 8, 8, 9, 9, 9, 9, 10) ( success x 8 )

Which is followed by Molly rolling Willpower instead of Stamina to soak.

Leaving her at 5 L.]

The Abyss hears.

The Abyss smiles.

What's that old chestnut? Look not into the, or the will look into -

The moment after Molly agrees she does not feel well. This is an understatement. This is the most intense understatement of her life. Molly feels as if her womb is turning inside out and her inner skin has been slicked with oil and fire has been introduced to her skin and she will never be allowed to die. Molly feels as if something is worming its way into her. She cannot see. There is nothing to see and there is nothing to feel, except for the pain which is, many-segmented legs a-click a-clacking, she can imagine the sound even if she cannot hear it, which is crawling into her: taking residence inside, heavy and dark and livid, a background hum.

But how it hurts; how much it might hurt, if her mind were weaker.

And then, there is a sense of motion. A rush. Flying at night, flying: through night. The heart of night: speed to compass a globe; she is being moved.

M. Toombs

The initial sensation of feeling unwell may have been a prophetic one.  Perhaps nothing was happening at that exact moment, but as soon as the pact was sealed she felt what must have been a warning of what was about to come.

For when the pain struck, and oh how it struck, she at first didn't entirely comprehend its truth.  She thought perhaps that she was having a stroke instead, but that wouldn't make her feel fire.  She felt like she was being stabbed and pulled and burned, and the sensation of having something climb within and settle inside, click-click-clicking all sharp-legged and evil, she wailed with her mind and perhaps with her mouth as well.  Cried and screamed and groaned but...

ultimately, pulled through.

She felt dizzy and burned and exhausted and wrecked.  How her mind felt, how her sixth sense of space and motion and relation to the world around her reacted, she felt much like waking up hungover-still-drunk in the back seat of a car.

Her mouth and throat felt dry and her stomach felt so, so sick, but all the same Molly tried two things:  swallowing, and opening her eyes.

nothing
A cave.

And in that cave, a Jack.

A Jack she knows, and just bargained so much for. A Jack she knows, and mirrors around him. And in one of those mirrors, his reflection.

Jack has his head down on his knees; his arms, twisted and scarred up as they are, mishapen and half-baked, tight around them.

He hasn't heard her yet.

Nor has his reflection.

(But this is the reflection; Jack is caught in his reflection. There's Jack and then Jack's Doppelgangar. One is the real Jack, one isn't. Right?)

M. Toombs

The sense of moving came to a close, and Molly found herself standing within a cave, just outside a circle of mirrors.  Quite familiar to a circle she'd had set up earlier that night (or was it longer ago?  she was still so unsure of how much time may have passed...), but no doubt different in its own ways.

Within the circle was a Jack she knew-- not the gawky man with the weak chin and weak eye but bright and bold sense of mystery, the supernatural, and adventure.  His ugly arms were up around his knees and perhaps head as well, which rested curled in with the rest of him.  Molly realized that she'd found her feet, though she was frankly unsure of how she was still managing to stand at all.  She took a few steps forward, and perhaps even swayed as she did so.  The ordeal she'd just gone through took a lot out of her, and if any background hum were still perceived it absolutely had to be ignored for now.  She could only deal with one thing at a time here.

Shakily, she called out to the Jack in the Circle and the Jack in the Mirror both.

"Come on, it's time to go."

nothing

The Jack in the Circle looks up sharply; his face is a ruin. How hard it is to look at; how painful it must have been to have his face transform so, to run like wax; be re-frozen, re-shaped. He swallows; his eyes are very human. He looks - shocked.

"Molly? How are you here? I resting my eyes; the Sun - did the bus get you?"

"Did I - ?" He frowns, suddenly. Memory is difficult in this place, for him; Molly can see fog roiling in the mirrors around him as soon as he tries to follow a thread of thought. Did he come to her and ask for help? Did he hear her earlier? "I thought I heard - "

The Jack in the Reflections looks earnestly at Molly, but shrugs. Holds up one finger: One or the other, that's all.

M. Toombs

Molly's eyes softened, first, for the Jack in the circle.  She looked exhausted, but relieved.  His very words were the finish line in sight at the end of a tremendous marathon.  She smiled weakly and briefly and stepped forward.  She was sluggish in her walk, pained and holding a hand over her midsection like it cramped and ached her terribly.  Taking a deep breath, she walked to the edge of the circle of mirrors but paused before stepping in, wary to do so at all.

Crystal blue eyes eyed the Jack in the Mirror, and the solo finger that he held up.  She scowled at the reflection like she were upset at it, as though it could manage the bargain.

But the Darkness did say as much-- just the one Jack that she was looking for.

That Reflection?  It was what they came here for in the first place.  But when it came down to it the Reflection could just be damned.

It was ugly as fuck anyways.

"Jack," she began, "You made sure the bus didn't get me.  We have a lot to talk about, but we're not going to start that now."  One hand still holding her middle, the other was extended out into the circle to encourage him up and forward.  "Come on."

nothing

There is no blood. But Molly hasn't had a chance to examine herself. Hasn't had a chance to feel how slick she is between her legs. How raw, and how something is moving there. There is no wound: But isn't there? There is bruising, but she hasn't had a chance to see it yet. How the claw marks are black on her, how she can see where it might have burrowed in: it. There is an 'it.' That hum. That hum. The power to create life. How weak she feels, indeed: and will continue to feel.

"I wouldn't have chosen that way for you to learn what I am," Jack says, and he sounds despondent. Earnest. Silver his tongue, but his heart is good: isn't it. "For a number of reasons, some of which are more obvious than others." He smiles, sorrowfully. But it is hideous to see; she has seen hideous things in the course of her work, but those people were wounded: this is an old wound that will never heal. Curse. Cursed. "Is the cat all right? Are you hurt?"

He braces himself to stand, not taking her hand (he is a Gentleman Jack), but sharpening. He seems to be having an easier time paying attention to now with her reaching out. The fog is roiling; boiling. The white of it is beginning to smother the Reflection, which looks upon Molly with desperate eyes. 

M. Toombs

Jacky found his own feet, and when he spoke again he seemed to be doing a better job of remembering.  The words made him seem more lucid, at least, and he found his feet without trouble and was able to follow a train of thought.  Molly lowered her hand and sighed out, listening to Jacky's explanation and questions alike.  As she did, the Reflection caught her gaze.  She held its eyes through the glass for a moment and looked apologetic.  Shook her head helplessly.  She couldn't imagine what more she could have done, to have bargained for two Jacks.

I'm sorry, she spoke the words silently to it.  Felt it toward them, clinging to how it had felt to communicate when she was within the Darkness still as though it may still work.

The fog roiled and boiled and bubbled about against the glass, and Molly moved her hands so they were gathered together over one hip.  She had felt the slick-slip between her thighs when she stepped forward but focused away from it.  She was stark pale under her freckles and her hair was stuck to her face and neck where it had escaped from her ponytail.  There was still blood crusted and flaking from her mouth and chest, more likely than not, and now there were claw marks that she could vaguely feel but wasn't about to inspect closely.

All in due time.  One crisis first, then she could handle the next few.

"The cat's fine.  He comes around every so often.  We can talk about how upset I am with your hiding all of this later, but first...," she paused, cringing.  Certain she felt something move, and feeling a little of the structural integrity of what kept her sanity and wits about her crumbling with the awful thawing acceptance of what had happened.  What she had intended to promise and what she'd actually offered were two different things.  Her head began to swim with what that would mean for her, but she shook her head physically to chase it away.  Not now!

"I am," she confessed.  "But I'll worry about that when we're out of here.  Do you know the way?"  She looked imploringly at Jack.  "Can you take us?"

nothing

"If I knew, I would have left already," Jack says, with regret. He seemed relieved at news of Boots, neutral at the prospect of Molly's upset - in the long run it was regrettable but irrelevant on that point, but children will gnash their teeth; "I wanted you to stay in the Day Kingdom," he says, and he sounds weary. He has propped himself up; he has stood. He was a tall man when he was a man, and he is a tall man now. "How did you get here? Was it a trance? You may be able to wake yourself up, and take me with you."

The pain hurts Molly, yes; it is traumatic. But she had the right idea, and she knows she had the right idea, the first time: go through the mirror, though it is full of fog. Push through; touch it.

She knows also that it is going to hurt, and that she needs to hold onto Jack. Reverse Sleeping 'Beauty,' eh? 

M. Toombs

Molly remembered that there were two rituals she had prepared for.  One to get into this realm to collect Jack, and the other to bind him.  She was still collecting.

She felt almost ready to pass out when she realized there was still an entirely different ritual to perform.  When she realized that it would hurt to get back through to the other side once more.  Jack wanted her to stay in the Day Kingdom, and he regretted her coming down here to join him.  She thought little of this, distracted by searching through her own fogged mind to plan out the next couple of steps.  As he mused about waking back up again, Molly nodded her head slowly and stepped forward, into the circle of mirrors.

"I think I know, then."

With a gesture of her head she indicated the mirror that his reflection had been standing in, and went to stand in front of it herself.  Molly was not a particularly tall woman, nor was she very short.  But a tall monster-once-man beside her would tower all the same.  She looked to his melted-and-mashed face and cringed when she straightened up.  Her free hand turned away from her side, palm up toward him, requesting once again to be taken.  This time not to help lift, but this time to physically anchor and pull back through.  Or so she would hope.

"You'll need to hold on," she advised.  "And this is probably going to hurt...."

Her face was grim, but her expression was set.  Forward was the only option, after all.

nothing

He takes her hand, and his is cold. Harald had chilly hands, sometimes. Mostly they were cool, could have been human. Ice cream hands, or gloved because it was winter. Lucky Jack.

He follows her lead. If she steps forward -

She steps forward. The mirror melts around her; she can feel the fog, roiling; feel it on her skin, and it does not bring relief. And then the air smells like the warehouse, and like blood - 

And she is there, again. Jack's hand in hers, but turning tenuous.

M. Toombs

The passage through was never comfortable, but this time it did not feel as though any of her bones creaked or snapped under the pressure of the transferal.  This is, perhaps, because she'd already felt the initial shock between worlds once before.  But she grasped the cold hand in hers tightly and didn't let go all the while that she pressed her way back through the portal between worlds.

When she reappeared in the underground chamber of the warehouse, with blood still in the air cloying in her nostrils, Molly gasped the air like she thought she may never have the chance to breathe it again.  It must have been quite a sight to see, Molly suddenly feeling and pushing and stepping through the mirror she'd vanished through before, now bringing along with her the grotesque wraith that was Jack.  She couldn't stand up straight and so crunched forward instead, like her stomach muscles were cramped and tight and she was sick and perhaps even poisoned.  She was pale and sweaty and shaking and ready to pass out, but unready to slow down.  She could feel the hand in hers fading away, and knew her time was short.

So, clinging to the hand of the Jack she'd pulled through the mirror like he were a child in a crowd she was fearful of being separated from, she hunted for Gregory.  Found his eyes for a moment, only just a moment, enough to make it clear that she would explain later but now all she needed was that support she felt him promise before she'd started this whole ritual.

"The chicken-- the gold.  I need my notes too.  Hurry."

And, with or without Gregory's help, she'd gather together what she'd said that she needed.  Dumped the gold (a couple of plain bands for rings and a thin necklace chain) from its velvet pouch onto the physical chest of the stiff-bodied Jacky on the ground.  Lit a stout white candle that was cylindrical enough to not need a stick within which to stand using a pocket lighter.  All of this hasty and one-handed, not letting go for fear that he may drift away, not until she needed both hands for the final act of this ritual-- the sacrifice.

Molly was trembling and sweating by this point, on her by the Jack-Husk's elbow.  Her hands weren't keeping still when she reached up for the chicken to be handed to her.  But they didn't need to be very steady for this purpose.  She was still able to read the words as she wrote them on her notes, Hebrew (vaguely) in incantation, and she was still able to keep the chicken still clenched in one arm against her body while the other hand quickly stabbed into the neck and breast of feathers.

Bind, bind, stay and let this work, even the dead deserve their rest.

M. Toombs @ 10:14PM

[Dexterity]

Roll: 3 d10 TN8 (7, 9, 9) ( success x 2 )

nothing

Of course Gregory helps.

He looks with wide eyes at Molly and the spectre she is hauling through the reflection. The Ghost of Jack and Gregory look at one another for a moment. Their eyes meet. Is it meaningful? There is meaning for Gregory, and perhaps for Jack too. He knows the truth about the world: how it works, what the story is, the Night World and the Day World, the Kingdoms and the Courts, how easy it is to co-exist: and how difficult. Jack.

His hand continues to dissolve in Molly's hand: she must hurry.

Gregory does, too. Molly might notice something different about the warehouse: the metal box has been opened completely, everything inside it taken out. Rancid bags of blood, not too many. Laid in a circle. The ladder has been pushed up, too. High enough. There's a chain, dangling.

The chicken is not cooperate. The chicken wants to not be sacrificed and it flaps its wings and stabs at Molly with its beak and she feels something inside her wrench as it does. She can feel the chicken go rigid just after, muscles quivering but unable to move as she stabs it in its throat. The blood runs. The pain inside her thickens, and if she gets a sense that it is pleased: well.

Blood runs. Not much; it is a chicken's breast. A feather falls, and the Jack she'd been holding is gone.

"What's the gold for?" Gregory is at Molly's side; he reaches out for the knife and for the chicken's carcass, once the blood has run. "Let me help," and he sounds urgent.

The Husk Jack's shadow thickens; he begins to stir. Of course there is no telltale inhale to show whether or not he is alive again - so to speak. But surely he just stirred

M. Toombs

Thank goodness for Gregory.  Molly could understand why Jack kept him around.  Others may look at a man for his wealth or position, but Molly got it-- or at least she thought she did.  Gregory was reliable.  He was bound to Jack and would therefore have to do anything for him, but he was reliable for Molly too.  She liked to hope that it was a part of him as a person that made him this way, and not just her association with the person to whom he was bound.  Not just the fact that she was likely the very best chance that he had to reunite with Jack.  That certainly helped, though.

Her sense of urgency was contagious, thankfully, so they were able to get everything together quickly enough.  Molly nearly doubled over when the chicken jabbed its beak into the meat of her hand, but not for the pain from that jab itself.  No, rather for the wrenching sensation within her gut.  She tried to ignore it, and did an effective job of stabbing the writhing and flapping fowl right as she had hoped, where she had planned.  The chicken went stiff and bled its life out, and the Jack that she'd brought along with her seemed to disappear.  Something seemed sinister and satisfied within her, like quelling and curling back up to wait, but Gregory was there beside her once more to distract.

Without fight or fuss she relinquished the dead chicken and knife both to Gregory.  "Something to do with wealth and sacrifice.  Paying a spirit for it's help binding, maybe...."  She chuckled quietly at a joke in her own mind and shook her head.

When a twitch of motion occurred in the body near near her knees, Molly's attention sharpened.  She wasn't sure what she saw move-- was it a twitch of the hand?  a grimace in the face or roll of the shoulder perhaps?  But she was sure there was something.  He seemed... still very much like a husk, but somehow a little less empty.

Swallowing thickly, Molly leaned forward over her lap with her hands pressed onto her thighs.  Panting, struggling, but never anything less than present.  It was hard to tell anymore if she kept on going because she was the Unsinkable Molly, or if she was now being propped up by the supernatural command of a beautiful undead woman halfway across the city.

"Jack?"  She whispered, the sound dry with suspense and wavering with hope.

nothing

This world uses hope roughly.

--

Jack swims back to consciousness and it is not at all what it would be were he a Man he of course remembers the tableaux the Mirror World and his reflection not dragged behind. He remembers the Hag, though the Hag is many thins, the Hag shifts and changes Her face: he ceases to remember, because as his body cold body his body nonetheless Cursed body but his still his still once knew Sunlight this body because his body is famished. Because his body has the Beast, the real curse riding beneath the more obvious Curse. He'd heard her, right. He'd heard her and he'd been blindsided by hunger. Her and Him. He'd stirred, but stirring made it worse so he'd tried to stay still.

Jack? she says, and the blood-haze descends. He --

--

From Molly's perspective: His eyes open. The hopeful waver in her voice is what does it: solidifies her triumph. Yes, Jack is awake. Yes, she fucking did it. Nobody will believe her. Even vampires won't believe her. Molly Toombs can survive on her own. And it will hurt, but she can do it. He picks himself up.

And then the blood-haze descends, and though she is so quick-witted, though she is so usually on the ball, this time --

M. Toombs

M. Toombs @ 10:41PM
[Init + 7]

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

nothing

Jack +6

Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (7) ( success x 1 )

Greg +5

Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (6) ( success x 1 )

So.

1. Jack
2. Greg
3. Molly, what'cha gonna do.

M. Toombs

Jacky stirred and his eyes opened and, for a sweet second or two, victory and relief and accomplishment all flooded her.  Her shoulders and arms relaxed, her spine did as well and she exhaled a sigh that sounded like she was settling into a very soft bed.  Like perhaps she could rest now, at last.

But then Jack picked himself up, tall and monstrous and full of blood haze.  There was something wrong.  Something off.  She had a sense of him not quite being there, a sense of intention or violence written in his muscles.

She was worn out, she was slow and ready to collapse, but Molly was no quitter.  Despite her increasingly poor choices and how deep she dug her holes of trouble, she had no desire to die.  So she went with the very first thought in her mind-- jam something in his mouth, find something to distract him with.  She'd been attacked by a remorseful vampire before, and could suspect that he hadn't had a drink in a long time (perhaps this is why he looked so withered, so much like a husk-- he needed blood).  Perhaps if she gave him something to chew on....

The chicken was dead but warm, so she leaned aside and scrambled to grab it, hoping to wield it like a feathery shield.

[Declare:  Counter/perry an anticipated bite by jamming a chicken at Jack's mouth instead!]

nothing

Literary Declare for Greg:

Greg doesn't know what Jack is going to do quite yet, but he, like Molly, recognizes the danger - that Frenzy has come and the Beast has been loosed. He'd been afraid of that. He'd brought blood specifically for that purpose, but it'd been used up already: Molly could still taste it.

He tries to cross the room and get to those rancid bags of blood, stab one open. Maybe it'd be enough; maybe.

Literary Declare for Jack:

His teeth are sharp; his mouth is a rictus-snarl, and there is no saliva to dangle tooth to tooth. He looks like he is going to fall into ash, but he's terribly knotty, terribly solid, as Molly has cause to know while she waps at him with the chicken. He doesn't lead with his teeth but grabs at her (Jack the Snatch-You-Up, Jack Catch, Jack the Hold-You-Close, the Crush-You-Up), the better to sink his teeth in: anything there is to sink his teeth in.

But first the clinch-grapple-hold.

[OOC: Okay, if Molly wants to change her action to a dodge, go for it. Trying to break free is reflexive and if she does she gets to try and feed him chicken instead of herself! YEAH MOLLY DO IT! Jack will feel REALLY BAD ABOUT ALL THIS oh shit a conscience roll is gonna be needed D:

Jack Clinch. ST + BR.

Roll: 5 d10 TN6 (5, 6, 7, 8, 9) ( success x 4 ) ]

M. Toombs

M. Toombs @ 4:50PM
[Ahh dodge! Dex 3 + Ath 2, +1 diff to change action, -2 dice from damage penalty]

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

M. Toombs
Declare:  Struggle weakly to break free!

nothing

Greg: Toss open bag of blood toward Jack. e.g. Why eat that fresh mouse kitty when here is some stale dog kibble for you?

Jack: Bite. Kiss Bite, so.

Dex + Brawl +1 diff.

nothing

What happens happens quick.

Nobody's Jack (Frenzy Jack, Beast's Jack, Jack's Beast Off the Leash, Monster Jack) catches Molly. He is strong, but his strength is not terrible: it is now. Molly sees it: the need to evade. Tries to take it, chicken left wilted dead feathers limp blood on the ground not as much blood on Molly or in Molly and Jack catches her regardless. Too strong for the nurse, who's so often had to wrestle with patients: who's been so lucky. This isn't the first time she's been fed on by a vampire who will be remorseful later.

But Jack isn't there right now. Greg speeds across the room, does not finesse. He stabs open one of the bags of blood and, just after Jack sinks his teeth into Molly's throat, the bag hits Jack's side, flops to the ground. Greg is desperate. He knows what Jack's Humanity means to Jack, and he knows what Molly's done to bring him back. He knows nothing in this life is fair, that you have to get what you can get, that you have to be prepared to dick people over, but he's not prepared to dick Molly over by standing back and letting it happen. He tries to call his domitor's attention elsewhere:

Might've worked, if Jack were still there. Molly brought him back and the Beast swallowed him. The dark thing in her womb, dripping down her legs, flutters. Jack's teeth are in Molly's throat and there's a sharp moment of pain (at least it feels like clean pain: comparatively, relatively) and his mouth is on the wound and - 

at least there is no pain. They're monsters but they don't have to hurt anybody if they don't want to. They don't have to pain anybody if they don't want to. (Some of them want to. The blueblood spoke about these people.) This isn't a terrible way to wind up in the hospital and it isn't a terrible way to die. There are worse. 

Because this feels good. Molly knows how good this feels already, but in this moment it robs her of her will to resist and it is pleasure upon pleasure. The Kiss is a curse but it feels like a blessing, it feels like that first bite must have felt: the bite of the Fruit of Knowledge in the Garden of Eden, what it must've felt like on Eve's tongue and then Adam's. What a pleasure. Better than any sex she's ever had, better than anything: exquisite.

And her blood leaves her, and it leaves her,

and she loses consciousness,

and she dies.

nothing

Until, hunger.

First hunger, and then consciousness; and then her name, and then memory.

But no heartbeat, and no lungs working to gasp at breath;

no pain, either. Just: hunger.

---

OOC:

Welcome to having a 13th Generation Nosferatu. 

Molly Can't Turn Back Now

Molly

On the following topics:

Molly's Sleep:  Molly is going to go home and resolve to do her very best to sleep so she can have a solid day of research ahead of her and be ready for her best at midnight.  She'd take a hot shower, some melatonin, and other such things to try and sleep as soon as possible.  She'd probably get about 6-7 hours worth before she was up again the next morning and diving into her books and the internet.

Molly's Research:  She's specifically looking into rituals-- hunting for information on seances to summon up lost souls/spirits, and for lore that would support them as well.  She wants to know if there's some way to stitch the 'good reflection', what she believes to be the Jacky-Spirit (based on what Gregory had said), back to the body

If she doesn't blow all of her time on research rules doing the above-mentioned, then she would also spend a little bit of time looking up information on banishing or vanquishing other spirits, thinking of maybe looking into lore on protection against the other reflection were it to attack again.  She wouldn't be opposed to looking into lore on cleansing one either.

She'd probably call Gregory up around 7pm or so, provided everything goes off successfully and she didn't have to leave home to run any errands on her research or anything.  She'd want to meet at 11:30pm and be 'prepared to start' at midnight.

mystery

Okay! The rolls I want you to do for me:

Self Control, to see if Moll sleeps in what with tiredness.

Thee-e-e-e-en! Further research, let's say an Intelligence + Occult roll, diff 8 (because you're looking for something actually useful), then a stamina roll, then another Intelligence + Occult roll, diff 8, if the stamina roll is acceptable. We're gonna need 4 suxx to find a hint of anything.

The-e-e-e-e-e-en! If there's anything else Molly does in pursuit of occultism before calling Greg, let me know. I believe in earlier occult research-y bits for this she found out some sort of crossroads demon-summoning ritual, and the reflection told her to help it by getting the cards read (before Morris came along to distract Molly from that >:) ) so if either of those sounds like something she'd pursue/look into more, lemme know! I'm just mentioning them again because it's been so long (grin)

Molly

It looks like Molly smashed the everloving hell out of the research on binding, but just barely missed it on the 'banishing/warding' research.  Molly's just like "Lol well at least I got the important stuff figured out, and I kinda get the rest, we're gonna be okay!".  And they were famous last words.

I wasn't sure what would be deemed an 'acceptable' stamina roll to continue the research, and got 1 success, so I presumed that would be okay and threw dice as normal.  If you want to provide some kind of penalty-in-post (like an upped difficulty or reduced number of successes), please do feel free!

Molly wouldn't have found the energy or time, it seems (based on the dice), so she wouldn't have come up with anything different to contact Greg about.  She'd reach out to him around 6:45pm the next day saying she was ready and wanting to know where she should meet him.  If he had a gun or something maybe he should consider bringing it (she didn't think it would help against the Reflection, but she had no idea what else might be mixed up in this, lurking around wherever Jacky might be hidden, or perhaps sent by that old Hag), but her probably was already going to.  Greg ain't new to this game.

Anyway, here's dem bones:

M. Toombs @ 11:46AM

[Self Control]

Roll: 4 d10 TN6 (5, 7, 9, 9) ( success x 3 )

M. Toombs @ 11:47AM

[Intelligence 3 + Occult 4]

Roll: 7 d10 TN8 (6, 7, 8, 9, 9, 9, 10) ( success x 6 ) [WP]

M. Toombs @ 11:47AM

[Stamina]

Roll: 3 d10 TN6 (1, 5, 9) ( success x 1 )

M. Toombs @ 11:51AM

[I'm going out on a limb and considering that 'acceptable'?  Otherwise we can find a way to penalize her (maybe you can subtract successes afterward or something idk).  Continuing!]

M. Toombs @ 11:52AM

[Intelligence 3 + Occult 4]

Roll: 7 d10 TN8 (1, 4, 4, 5, 6, 9, 9) ( success x 3 ) [WP]

mystery

Molly is weary, of course she is: bone ache. This might be the most important week of her life. This might be (surely she has considered the idea) the last week of her life. Certainly, it is her last week unfettered by vitae. But she has been fettered by vitae before.

Molly is weary, of course she is, but Molly is also lucky. Might be Jack's influence, mightn't it? He might tell a story about it if he knew: make that story what is real. How he has a certain kind of luck and maybe that certain kind of luck translated itself into his companion. Distilled it. Might be fortune, playing favourites. Wanting to spool Molly's tale out just a little longer. Molly is also fucking lucky: and somehow, in the books she has acquired, via the very small group of people on internet forums she never quite interacts with (greedy, taking without giving), she finds 

one potential ritual to 'bind' a shadow. A shadow and a reflection are practically the same thing, right? It requires an animal sacrifice, pure gold, and fire. The pronunciation of words in a bastardized version of Hebrew.

She finds a way to animate one's reflection and use it as a messenger. The ingredients for this ritual are likewise expensive: and a pint of blood, necessary, needs be drunk, and four mirrors (eight mirrors) set up facing the ritualist in a ring then facing away from the ritualist in a ring double sided mirrors see and then the sacrifice (not the blood, though perhaps a frugal person would combine the two ingredients). The sacrifice must be a geas, a vow: do this, and I'll never _______, I'll give up _______, I'll not have ______. Best done when the moon is dark.

And then, perhaps most interesting, at least most closely tied to Denver itself: a story about a mine (abandoned) and how in the darkness of that mine one can pass between this world and the mirrored world if one is unlucky, one gets lost, how the darkness in this mine listens. There are stories going back to Denver's inception, attached to stories in other cities: San Francisco, Seattle. They touch on some religious group which has settled in Littleton, too, owns a lot of property.

Maybe one of those ideas is good. Maybe it's not. Molly's lucky, but luck only takes one so far, even if skill and sharpness and determination is riding high behind it. By the end, she feels drained -- pushing so much will into something takes its toll.

Greg answers when she calls. The suggestion of a gun gets an audible heh. And then, "11:30, ey? Meet me at," and an address. If she asks him to bring anything, he's open.

---

doom
The address M. Toombs was given by Gregory Wilce takes her to a warehouse. The warehouse is just one warehouse among many, not very interesting at all. The warehouse used to be a textile factory, but it's been many years since the thing has been used for anything but storage, partitioned into different rooms for a certain price. The security on the place is acceptable, more than acceptable, but in the front yard behind the barbed wire topped fence amid the detritus of litter gathered by a helpful wind desolate stretch of graffiti it doesn't look like the safest place to loiter or to keep one's things. 

Greg the baker has a white van parked in front. The back of the van is open, and he is sitting on the edge, shoulder against the side of the van and his eyes apparently on the sky. It was a warm September.

M. Toombs
When Molly arrived, it was in a dark green sedan that was purchased new within the past year or so.  Simple, reliable, unimpressive, forgettable.  Exactly what someone who lived the life of a supernatural sleuth (more accurately, someone who just wouldn't disappear and mind her own business) would want and need.  It had a big trunk and good gas milage, and that's just what she'd needed today.

When she stepped out of the car she was drinking a latte with extra espresso in it.  She had her hair back in a ponytail and was dressed in a snug black t-shirt.  The neckline swooped low enough to show that a charm rested on a necklace just below her neck.  She wore black exercise pants and sneakers and a red flannel shirt that was at the moment tied around her waist.  She looked the kind of exhausted that existed before a monumental task.  She didn't yet know how she was going to make it over this particular mountain but kept forward anyways.  The end had to be somewhere just out of sight, after all.

She'd gestured a greeting to Greg from inside the car once she'd put it in park, then got out and approached him at the back of his van.

"So we're going to need to haul some shit in with us."  She was explaining this in person, hadn't opted for doing so over the phone.  Figured it would be easier to back herself up once she'd gotten there.  Sipping at her iced drink, she looked back to the car.  Looked doubtful and disgruntled both.

"How far away are we?"

doom
"I'm going to ignore the your question until I'm sure what you've got planned is on the up and up," he says. He holds up a bag and a paper cup holder with two cups of coffee. An offering. Molly recognizes the paper cups. Harald-Jacky often had one when he was pretending to be human. Maybe he liked the warmth, holding it against chill flesh. Maybe he didn't, but it was penance to pay. He'd brought her coffee on more than one occasion. There's a furrow between Greg's brows, but he doesn't seem anxious. Just: in need of action.

And they're taking action now, aren't they.

"But we're probably not too far away. What kind of shit do we need to haul? What did you find?"

M. Toombs
Not keen on being deterred, Molly rolled her eyes at Greg's need to checklist the legitimacy of everything.  The look she gave him said As if you'd know the difference.  She went along with it anyways, though, and nodded gratefully at his gesture of coffee.  Lifted the plastic cup of iced latte she was currently halfway through to indicate that she was good, though.  "My heart'll give out if I try putting anymore caffeine in my body than this."  Plus, she's learned lessons about taking coffee from this man.

She wrinkled her nose, not at his questions but at what her answers were.

"I've got a big cardboard box I'd appreciate your help carrying.  It contains some materials, including eight mirrors that we're going to need.  That's the heaviest part."  If looked at uncertainly, she'd clarify-- "They're not that big, just twelve-by-twelve frames."  She'd hope the 'other materials' part would be let to slide.

As they spoke, she gestured, then started to walk around to the trunk of her car.  The fob on her keychain blinked the lights and popped the trunk.  She was clearly going to show him anyways.

"I know how to bind Jacky back to his body."  The real question wasn't the how anymore, though.  It was whether she actually could.  They'd get to that when they got there, though.

"I also know how to go and get him to bring him back.  We can do this."  She sounded more confident than she felt (hopefully*).  That soon faded, though, because she sounded a little more hesitant when she spoke next.

"It does require some... voodoo-level business, though.  A ritual."  When she reached the trunk of the car there was a stirring noise from within-- kind of a cooing sound if you listened close.  When she lifted the lid Greg would find within a large cardboard box stacked with eight mirrors, sized as promised, as well as a small velvet pouch tucked down at the bottom and a plastic solo cup as well.  Wrapped carefully in towels, a knife.

More importantly than any of that, though, was the chicken clucking and fluffing itself disgruntled at them in the small cage beside it.  Molly sounded displeased when she added:

"Sacrifice."

doom
The ghoul doesn't bat an eye. He'd cut Molly's throat if he thought it would do any good. His regnant has more humanity than he does, but he doesn't wear his lack of humanity on his sleeve, and he does have a finely tuned conscience. He doesn't think cutting Molly's throat would do any good. 

He likes chicken salad. It's one of those little pleasures in life.

"So the plan is we go and get him to bring him back and then we bind him into place?"

M. Toombs
"Well, when I say 'go in', I mean one of us has to go into the mirrors after him."  She licked her lips, gave him a moment to pick up on the fact that she said 'one of us' instead of defaulting to herself.  Glanced up at him and raised her eyebrows almost apologetically.

"I think... It would be a better idea if I sent you in after him.  You guys are bound, it'll be easier for him to find you."  She wasn't sure of that, but she's learned to lie.  We'll see if he sees through it.

"That way I can bind him quickly when we get him back."

[Manipulation 3 + Subterfuge 3: It's not lying if I don't know whether it's true or not right?]

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

doom
"Huh."

The baker believes her. He believes her absolutely: that she thinks it would be a better idea, that it might even be a better idea, that there might be something to this idea that being bound by blood will make things easier on the other side. He knows a smidgeon of occult lore; what he knows does not match with Molly, who is a virtuoso on that particular subject. A precocious wunderkind. No wonder Jack liked her, so. 

He starts hauling the mirrors out of the trunk, resting them against the side of her car. Pauses, to get a dolly out of his van, put the mirrors and the crate with the chicken on top of that. He hasn't raised a bit of protest yet, so perhaps he's not going to.

M. Toombs
Molly smiled appreciatively at Greg when he conceded to her explanation, and it broadened even moreso on a face that saw very few of them anymore when he started loading the things onto a dolly.  She liked that he came prepared.  Maybe after all of this, if they both survived, she would ask him out for drinks.  They would both need it, she was pretty sure.

Clearing her throat, she stopped letting her eyes linger on the man around the time that he finished propping the chicken crate up.  She carried her phone along with her, tucked into a zipper pocket on her pants.  Put it on silent and tucked it away in vain hope that it may come in handy in case of an emergency.

She'd wait for him to lead the way, silent for she wasn't sure what else to say.  I mean, what do you say in a situation like this?

Gulp.  Here we go.

doom
Here we go.

Here they go. Once everything is loaded, he wheels the equipment (the rising protestation of the chicken) toward the ex-factory's front doors, pausing to unlock it. The keys are attached to his belt. He reaches in, practiced remembrance, to turn on lights before he and Molly are both inside the building. The building is, as perhaps expected, cavernous, something out of the 70s, partitioned without a care for light or human comfort. A maze. A warren. A labyrinth. All things appropriate for Nosferatu.

Here they go, and Greg says, "The thing is, Miss Molly, I just don't have the what the fuck reflection world the fuck is that even know-how if something were to go wrong. And I don't know I trust you with my body and his at once, because I'm guessing we'd be pretty helpless. But if the blood matters, it'll be easy enough to get you hooked a step. If you want a drink, it'll be a useful drink."

[Charisma + Empathy. This isn't going to manipulate you into anything, but you'll sure feel sympathy toward this idea, eh? EH? Charisma specialty Depend On Me in play.]

Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (4, 7, 9, 9, 10, 10, 10) ( success x 9 ) [Doubling Tens]

doom
[.... what the fuck Gregory.]

M. Toombs
Before they stepped inside the warehouse Molly paused to look up to the night's sky.  She took in the moon and stars and breathed in one last deep gulp of the air before stepping through the door.  She felt like there was a chance that might be her last time getting to do so alive.  She should have taken a moment to do some studying out in the sun.  She felt a sudden pang of regret at not seizing the opportunity.

As they were walking in and Molly was looking around Gregory presented an idea to her.  Something about the tone of his voice caught her attention and called to her loudly.  She stopped and lent him her full attention.  Felt a pang of sympathy like a jolt of electricity in her gut and heart.

She understood where he was coming from.  It was scary as hell, the prospect of being flung into a different dimension where you had no idea what the mechanics were or how you could get back out.  He didn't have a mind for shit like this, but Molly clearly did.  If anybody had a higher chance of traversing the Mirrors with any efficiency, it had to be her.  Not him.  Please not him.  He didn't know what the fuck he was even doing here.

But the very idea of what he was suggesting...  She scowled, looked sad, and asked to clarify:

"Are you suggesting I get a drink off his body?"

doom
"Yeah." He notes the scowl without comment, but nods as if to himself or as if to punctuate the thought. They're going deeper and deeper, down this aisle and then the next. His voice is warm and deep. "It's what I'll have to do in another month or two. Jack provided some back-up, but that won't last forever. As worthy as my continued existence is, this seems like an even worthier use, huh?"

Survivor. Molly's talking to a survivor, somebody who is committed to the next day and the day after that, to weathering whatever the night throws at him.

Survivors can be good guys. Survivors can be villains.

M. Toombs
Molly continued to walk along with him.  She didn't like what he was suggesting, but she wasn't denying it either.  He reminded her that drinking vampire blood was a part of his routine-- he had some on back-up, but he was going to have to go straight to the source himself before too long here.

Her mouth was pressed into a thin line.  Wasn't this a worthier cause than his continuing to go on?  Perhaps it was.  She didn't know his life.  She apparently didn't know enough about Jack's to determine whether his was worthier or not on its own.

So he was a survivor, so what?  She knew one friend in particular who wished that she was one herself, as opposed to the kind of adventurous soul that kept diving headfirst into trouble without considering other options first.  After all, she was here planning on killing an animal and drinking its blood in tribute to some dark magics that she probably didn't have any real grasp of anyways.

After that she didn't have a lot to say.  She was just steeling herself for what was to come when they reached the center of this labyrinth.

nothing and Nobody
There is a door. "Here." Greg hands the dolley off to Molly at this point. He reaches into his jacket and pulls out a key. The lock is a complicated one but not that complicated and Molly may think that this abandoned factory turned storage is not so dissimilar to the warehouse she initially stashed the Jack of Nobodies. Sweetheart Jack. Unlucky Jack. Ugly Jack. But he opens the door, grimacing: "Expect a climb."

They're going underground. There is an awkward ladder. They're both clever people and Gregory is a ghoul who gives the impression just now of having to transport let us say sensitive goods that are meant to pass under the radar more than once before and the mirrors, chicken, etc. all get passed down with relative safety. There is a light switch in the under the ground level room at the bottom of the ladder and Gregory flips it on. The room is long and narrow and at the end of the room is a series of metal boxes. Inflammable. No wood. The baker grunts, "He's here. Now how do we set up?"

[ooc: and when you get back, you can have Molly roll... hmm. Perception + Security or Larceny diff 8 oooor Perc + Alertness diff 10, Reflexive so no WP spent on this one.]

M. Toombs
[Perception 3 + Security/Larceny 0 (+1 diff penalty)]

Dice: 3 d10 TN9 (3, 8, 10) ( success x 1 )

nothing and Nobody
Molly, if she takes care to look at her surroundings, notices this: there is something odd about one of the walls, about the brickwork maybe but there's no brickwork. What is it? Ah. A smear on the ground, as if someone dragged into the wall. Faint. Very faint.

M. Toombs
When you walk through doors not knowing how you were going to come out again, if at all, you tend to do so one of two ways:  kicking and screaming, or silent and pensieve.  So when they reached the door leading down, Molly was silent as she went about assisting with the dolly and getting down the stairs.

Once they reached the point where Greg announced that they'd arrived, Molly took some time to glance about at the boxes.  Took note of a peculiar something amiss about a brick wall, spied the smudging-scrape that went up into it, and made some guesses about the actual integrity and purpose of that wall and what may exist beyond it.

Her eyes narrowed just a touch at that particular anomaly, but Greg was soon asking how they should set up.  It was time to get down to business.  Molly gulped a breath to steel herself, then approached Greg and the box of supplies:  "Here."

They followed directions that she'd written out in neat handwriting within a leather-bound notebook.  Mirrors were to be set up in a circle large enough for a body or two to fit inside.  She'd ask Greg to work on this in particular while she studied and prepared the rest of the details.  Hovered near the dolly going over her notes and looking progressively  more pale with each time that they read them over.  One of the rituals required gold, and this was what was in the small velvet pouch that she cupped with one hand, rolling the contents absently about between her fingers while cradling her notebook open by its spine in the other.

When he was finished setting up, he'd find her looking at the chicken uncertainly, her brow furrowed like something was amiss.

"Fuck," she muttered.  "I'm missing something."

What?  He would no doubt ask, and she'd fix clear and serious blue eyes on his to respond.

"Blood."

nothing and Nobody
"How much?" His response is simple. His tone is heavy, but perhaps not easy to read. He squints at her.

M. Toombs
"A pint."  She answered quickly, and looked hastily back down to her notes.  Flipped a few pages as she explained.

"There's two rituals--  sending someone to bring him back, and then binding him.  I need sacrifice to bind."  A quick glance to the chicken cage.  "I thought I'd just drain the chicken's blood, but I had my order of operations mixed up..."

She sighed and rubbed her face.  It was pretty obvious that she hasn't slept much.

nothing and Nobody
"Eeh." He sounds unenthused, lifting his fingers briefly to rub up the bridge of his nose then between his eyebrows. "All right. That's a little more than I'd care to bleed out, not knowing how things are going to shake out later. But I've got just the thing." He'd started walking over to those metal boxes around the time he said 'things are going' and now he plugs in a code and opens the topmost one.

There's no Nosferatu body in the box. There is a large cooler, and in the cooler various things he doesn't necessarily want Molly to see. But she's over by the mirrors, right? And amid the various things, a big stoppered bottle. He uncaps it, sniffs, and recoils. "Fuckaduck."

Sighs, and reaches into his bag. He has a bag, of course. He'd put it on the dolley and has to walk back to get it. From the bag he pulls out a thermos, uncaps it and sniffs this one. His expression goes blank but not disgusted as before, and he holds the thermos out to Molly, but there are worry lines on his forehead.

"This should do."

If she takes a smell of it, she doesn't get the hunger-cramp craving that the smell of vitae might give her -- it being so delightful, so delicious. Worth living for, worth being immortal for. Really.

M. Toombs
She hesitated before accepting the thermos and looking inside.  She sniffed it cautiously, as it was likely too dim to make out the contents very well.  Ultimately she nodded in acceptance-- there wasn't much else of a choice, and she didn't particluarly want to drink warm blood from Gregory's arm either.  It was bad enough drinking any, but she certainly wasn't a vampire.  She had no love for the stuff.

At this point she looked around and sniffed.  Put a hand on her hip and with an air of finality, like someone about to jump off a cliff, she said:

"Okay, we're as ready as we'll ever be.  Where is he?"

Her eyes flickered tell-tale toward the wall she'd noticed the scuff marks by, and then back to Greg with a pointed lift of eyebrows.  "We'll need to have him available right away so as not to waste time with the binding."

nothing and Nobody
"Okay," he says. "Okay," and tension simmers rising up in his tone, a trigger-warning temper which hasn't had occasion to show since his old regnant. The one who wasn't as nice as Jack. Molly doesn't know much about Gregory and how Gregory came to be Jack's man, but Gregory is invested for a number of reasons.

No theatrics. He goes to the wall Molly noticed something off with and it turns out the wall is a fake wall and he opens that. There's one of those fire proof boxes, a big one, and he hauls that out. It's heavy. It's really heavy. Gregory pauses to look inside, briefly. Not too long. Licks his lips, unconscious gestures. 

"You need him outta the box?"

M. Toombs
When Gregory glanced up again he'd find Molly's nose wrinkled.  Even though she'd been there herself, was there herself, she still didn't much care for the idea of being so drawn to vampire blood.  She knew what those licked lips were for.  Wondered about the internal struggle to keep on task, but only briefly and in incomplete thought.

"Yeah," she said, nodding her head and looking back to where the mirrors were set up on the ground.  "I don't want the box messing with any of the..." She waved her hand in a twirling gesture while she searched for the explanation.  "It might interrupt energy movement.  Like how coppper is a conduit, this might be iron to an x-ray, you know?"

She didn't really offer to help move Jack, but probably would if Greg was struggling excessively or pressured her to do so.

nothing and Nobody
Gregory does not act as if he wants Molly's help with Nobody's Jack (Sweetheart Jack, Honey-tongued Jack, Jack-of-the-Underground), though he smiles a rather wincing smile like brace yourself babe and then he reaches into the box and pulls the creature inside the box out.

The creature inside the box is one that Molly has seen, of course. She transported him once the bus hit him, knocked his Mask away, knocked his projected humanity his conman's face away and left the truth: 

The Curse. Skin melting, horns drifting thither-hither, and most horrible of all:

the clear definition of a man beneath all those gnarled knots of ugliness, those scabrous calloused hardened twists that must be painful (how can any one thing be so hideous? Hideous: Hide, Hide-Away, Right now). That is a person. That was a person. That could be you.

He doesn't breathe. He - it - seems to be dead. And to have shrunk, some, become withered, somewhat dessicated even paler, since last Molly clapped eyes on him. He's wearing the same clothes he was the last time Jacky and Molly went chasing down reflections, though they're torn. Have been mended.

Maybe there's a telltale cat hair. Gregory puts him down carefully enough, and then looks at Molly with an eyebrow cock for more direction. He is brisk with his handling of Jack's body. Brisk, but careful; doesn't look at him too closely.

M. Toombs
Brace yourself, the sardonic smile said.

Molly's grim lack of a smile answered -- she'd been braced for the past five goddamn days, she was ready to be done bracing.

Jacky-- or, well the actual Jack, not the Jacky that she had come to recognize and even kind of love in a way (thanks to adventure, to shared interests, and to vitae)-- looked the same as she recalled, but it was still a hideous thing to see and still took a moment to adjust to.  He looked more withered, though, like a plant that desperately needed water.  Like a husk of a beast-body, dry and shriveled and stiff.  A life-sized voodoo doll monstrosity.

Once he was out of the box and on the floor, Molly began.

For the first ritual Molly stood with mirrors both facing her and facing away from her.  The gold was set aside, near the chicken, for the ritual to come (assuming that this first one went accordingly, at least).  For this one she needed a different kind of sacrifice-- a promise, and blood let.  She'd cast an anxious glance to Gregory with her chest out, full of the deep breath to make her promise to set things into motion.  Didn't say anything, but didn't need to-- her gaze told stories of how unsure she was if this would work, how it would work, and whether things would end in any positive light.

No direction but forward, though.  Heaving that breath, Molly spoke clearly into the room.

"For this, I surrender something of worth to me.  An exchange-- a tit for tat."  At this point she reached into her pocket and produced a small deck of cardstock business cards.  Each with a different name for a vampire.  Each different and dangerous in its own way.  Phone numbers, names, connections, strings to pull and fellowships to call upon, bargains that could be made based on shaky alliances built in curiosity and little more.

"I'll give up all of these names.  All of these people."  The cards were too thick all together to tear up in one fell swoop, so she spent a moment shredding them with blunt fingernails and letting the pieces fall to the floor.  "I cannot contact them, not for help or information or shelter.  Not anymore."

There wasn't necessarily anybody to answer, but figuring that she needed to seal the deal with a promise in crimson, she lifted the thermos, faltered momentarily, then closed her eyes tight and tried to chug it down.

M. Toombs
[Stamina 3]

Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 9) ( success x 1 )

M. Toombs
[Charisma 3 + Occult 4]

Dice: 7 d10 TN9 (1, 2, 3, 9, 9, 9, 10) ( success x 4 )

The Nosferatu ghoul stays out of the circle of mirrors once the ritual begins. His arms are folded. Of course he can still see his reflection in the mirrors, the ones that face outward. Face outward, face inward. The body of Jack is Nobody indeed. There is no reflection caught in the mirrors. Molly can see her own reflection, though: multiplied, all angles caught. The Fun House Tradition.

Molly pulls her offering out.

They could be kids, playing at understanding things greater than they. Molly and Gregory.

This could be stupid, a game.

But it isn't. Molly manages to feel the air grow dense as she speaks. Her reflection is innocuous. Her reflection is under her command. Her reflection does what it is supposed to do. Gregory makes a sound when she starts to quaff the blood. It hits her throat and tastes just like actual blood, copper, disgusting, stomach-churning, nothing to be excited for. It isn't vitae. It isn't ambrosia and delight. It isn't immortality: it's iron and who knows what it came from and her stomach wants to rebel but she manages to swallow the whole thing.

That's not why Gregory makes a sound.

When Molly is done drinking, she might notice that the mirror directly in front of her is not quite as it should be. She can still see herself, looking back at her, mouth gory and grim. But the mirror Molly is -- there. The mirror Molly is closer than she should be to the mirror, as if Molly herself were standing pressed flush against it instead of in the middle of the circle.

M. ToombsWhile she drank, Molly's eyes were directed at the ceiling.  Her face looked as if she wanted to cry.  But she kept chugging, not being neat or taking her time, wanting it over as quick as possible.  By the time she was finished there was blood all down her chin and dribbling into the neckline of her shirt as well.  Wearing all black had been a strategic call, no doubt for this reason exactly.

When she finished she couldn't see anything but mirrors, so the fact that her reflection had shifted while she drank certainly was not missed.  Gregory was standing with his arms locked over his chest, aside and out of the way.  Jacky nearer, but hardly anything more than a shell right now (albeit an impossibly ugly one).  More than that, she was focused on her reflection.

Initially she'd been startled by it-- the double-punch impact was not only registering the fact that her reflection was much, much closer, but that its being closer made the impact of how she appeared with crimson down her front (not the first time, but it was startling and grim all the same).  The reflection was close enough that it may reach through the glass for her if she got too near.  She worried for this-- in her studies, she had gotten the impression that they could be very jealous things and try to change places with her.  For this reason, she didn't approach the mirror to be any nearer to her now-independent reflection.

Doing her best to keep her tone confident, as well as trying hard not to throw up, Molly lifted her chin and filled her chest with air to address the messenger.

"I need you to find and bring this--" and she pointed to where Jack was in the physical world, for his reflection had long since been gone.  "--back to me from your side.  There may be two-- if there are, I need them both.  ....Please."  The word tacked on at the end because she wasn't sure how manners translated through the looking glass.

nothingMolly's Doppelganger touches her bloody chin, wiping away the blood. She'd seemed to speak when Molly spoke, and other than being too close had mirrored all that Molly did perfectly -- until the touching of her chin, the wiping away of the blood just so. 

The reflection presses her fingers against glass and writes.

The way is open for you.

M. Toombs"Fuck."

The explictive is breathed more than spoken aloud.  She had hoped that she could send the reflection in her stead.  No, the way was open for her to go on her own.  She frowned a little, brow creasing, and asked the reflection:

"Can you not go without me?"

nothingMolly finds herself on the receiving end of a look that some of her coworkers might just be familiar with. It's an unamused, impatient look - just be perfect and don't talk about stupid things that don't matter! She scrapes more blood from her chin, paler finger trails in the mess, and using all four fingers underlines 'for you.' Then steps back and to the side.

The lights flicker.



M. ToombsShe didn't actually curse aloud this time, but the face she made said it loud enough instead.  She didn't move forward just yet, but instead paused and looked to Gregory once more.  Maybe for a last time?  Who knew.

"See you soon."

I hope.

Then she looked forward and, finally, stepped from where she began in the center of the circle of mirrors.  Walked directly up to the first mirror so she was as close as the reflection had been.  Molly lifted a hand up, but hesitated.  Looked down at her hand and rubbed her fingertips together.  Then, with a breath, she reached forward and pressed her fingers to the surface of the glass.

nothing[Gregory! Let's throw Molly a you-can-count-on-me supportive look, eh? Charisma (Specialty 'Dependable' applicable) + Empathy.]

Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 4, 6, 7, 7, 10) ( success x 5 ) [Doubling Tens]

M. Toombs[Wits 4 (Cool-Headed specialty]

Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (2, 5, 7, 10) ( success x 3 ) [Doubling Tens]

nothing[A damage roll.]

Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 3, 7, 7, 8) ( success x 3 )

M. Toombs[Soak!]

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

nothingGregory, beyond the circle of mirrors, has his arms loose at his sides. He seems ready for something. He's been around the block. He knows it's best to be ready for something, for anything, because something and anything will happen. When Molly gives him a look, perhaps for the last time, he musters up what warmth and competence he has to project them into a nod, keeping his eyes on hers until she looks away. Whatever else happens, Molly has the feeling that Gregory has her back and will do what needs to be done, at least while she's on this particular journey. 

Her hand on the mirror. The mirror is cold enough that she feels as if her skin is blistering. No reflected hand mirrors her; the mirror just seems to show the other mirrors, endlessly repeating, no Molly at all. No Molly and no Jack and maybe a shape that could be Gregory.

Then her reflection blinks into existence again, eye to eye. It smiles, and then its pupils widen and widen and widen until the whole mirror is black and the darkness splashes out of the mirror and it swallows Molly whole. 

Gregory pulls out his gun, but the darkness subsides and there's nothing and nobody left behind.

Molly, though. Molly's perspective: the darkness blinks over her; it feels as if her wrist is broken, her hand is frozen, her skin is peeling off; she keeps her wits about her, though, and after a pin-prick tingling which passes from her soles to her head and back again she finds herself on

the ground of the same room she was in before. But Gregory is a ghost only visible from some angles. If she looks hard at the walls, she can see all of these places where the picture blurs into fog and mist and hallways and darkness. If she looks up, it's more fog and murkiness.

Welcome to the other side of the mirror, Molly.

M. Toombs[Perception 3 + Alertness 3: Reflection, are you there?]

Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 3, 6, 8, 10) ( success x 3 )

nothingMolly finds it difficult to notice her reflection now if she looks directly at it, but at the perepheral, out of the corner of her eye, if she just keeps this one area in the corner of her eye -- the Molly-reflection is still there, leaning against the edge of one of the mirrors and chewing as if on gum.

There are also things up above, vaguely bat-like in shape. They seem very still right now, and are likewise difficult to look directly at, but there's a sense that if they move

if they are wakened

if they

...

... well, don't wake them.

M. ToombsMolly knew a trick or two about looking for things.  In search for the reflection she didn't just turn her head all around and search frantically for hiding places.  She let her gaze unfocus as well, checked the peripherals.  There, against the side of a mirror, like she was going to wait patiently for her to return.  Maybe hang out and play catch-up with Gregory, who knew.

She also noticed shapes huddled all over the ceiling, like resting bats.  She could really only imagine what would happen if they were disturbed.  Would they tear her flesh from bone like a pack of winged pirhannas?  Best not to find out.

While she couldn't see the reflection directly, she still gestured in her direction and breathed her words soft, smooth, and gentle-- as though there were a sleeping baby the next door over.

"How do I find him?  Do you know?"

nothing"I don't know." Molly's reflection doesn't have Molly's voice. How would she? The visual copy is a visual copy; do they even have music in the world beyond the mirror? The reflection's voice sounds froggy, harsh and raspy, like cat claws and velvet. "I'm not your guide. You didn't summon one. Just look around, do your Nancy Drew thing."

M. ToombsMolly seemed to think about the answer she got for a moment, then shrugged one shoulder and nodded as though to concede.  "That's fair enough, I suppose..."

If this was Molly's Reflection, she knew enough of the person she was bound to to know that she was smarter than to just walk off into the land of reflections and get herself lost.  She did roam around the room, looking about carefully.  She checked carefully the area where the mirrors where, were she'd left Jack laying on the floor as well.

The doorway was checked out as well, but before that she spoke softly to her reflection again, as though absently wondering aloud while doing her Nancy Drew thing as suggested.

"If I were go go looking, how worried would I have to be about getting lost?  Or nabbed by something nasty?"

nothing"We hate you here," Molly says. "Every time you primp and preen, every time you build something reflective, something to show your fucking faces, one of us gets trapped and we have to dance and do whatever you want. We can't talk. We lose our voices. We hate you here; how worried do you think you should be?"

Beat. "There are lots of exits. Finding one isn't something you're going to need to be worried about. Hopefully your boy out there lights a candle to draw you back to those mirrors but if he doesn't," a shrug. A shrug Molly knows intimately. 

M. ToombsThere was plenty of vitriol in her reflection's voice when the mechanics of reflections was explained.  For what it was worth, Molly listened to the answer that was given and looked sad, or maybe regretful about the nature of mirrors and what they've done to the spirits on the other side.

"What were you before--," she started to ask, curious about the origins of reflections.  She said that when a mirror was created one of them was trapped, after all, indicating that they used to be something before the awful magic of mirrors was worked.  Instead, she sufficed for.

"I'm sorry."  She never made a mirror.  She didn't know that her primping in the mirror-- applying mascara and checking ample cleavage-- was slave's work for the image on the other side.  All the same, a bit of sympathy was offered.  It wouldn't cure anything, but at least it was there.

"Okay," she said, then nodded.  "Thanks."  And with that said, Molly moved quietly from this room to the ladder that would lead her upstairs again.  She was willing to search the rest of the warehouse that Jacky apparently haunted but with the warning given about how hated she was here she had no plans to wander far enough to find any other people's reflections.

She just wanted to find one in particular.

nothingThe ladder is cold to the touch and when Molly begins to climb she can feel the beginning of a bruise in her muscles, but it isn't bad enough to give her any great difficulty, so Molly climbs. This has been an exhausting week for the young nurse; who knows if she'll have another week? This might be the last.

She might never get home.

Up she goes, and the things she noticed hanging from the 'ceiling' (though the ceiling disappears the higher she climbs; dissipates into a dark fog, a smear of formlessness) do not seem to be wakened quite yet.

But when she is done climbing the ladder, she finds herself standing somewhere quite different from the factory she remembers walking through. Oh, there are little slivers of space which look like they've been cut out of the factory, little bits of familiarty: the things that were reflected and so are given form. But between those reflections of the real world as captured (and somewhat distorted) by a door knob or a handle or a broken bottle the ground is slag rock folded over and over again stretching out a very long way, a thick white fog roiling across, and the air is full of lightning.

That-a-way, there is a door.

That-a-way, there is the ghost of a car, and its reflection. Other ghostly reflections, echoing silently whatever it is their person is doing- rigid beneath it but you'd never know. They don't get to express themselves.

That-a-way-over-there, open doors in the ground.

And that-a-way, over there, a bus.

M. ToombsEverything was cold, incredibly so.  She had to favor her right wrist-- the pull through from the Physical Realm into the Realm of Mirrors was a painful one, and though she was a gal with a sturdy constition her hand still took the brunt of the damage from the transition.  She'd put it in a brace when this was all over, assuming that she would make it through intact.

The world above was nothing but fog, with snips and clips of the 'real world' to be found throughout.  She recognized a knob here, a bit of familiar flooring there, but there was no ceiling, and there was no way to see through the distance.  There was a car, a bus, some doors left open that are in the earth itself, and a solitary upright door.

Molly had carried the thermos that once held the blood along with her, forgetful about it still being clutched in her right hand.  She looked around thoughtfully, and stared at the standing door in particular for quite a while.  Looked to the door in the ground that she had come through herself.  Slowly, carefully, she tested out a theory.

Fingers dipped into the interior of the thermos and scraped along the side, pulling what blood residue was still in there (admittedly, there was plenty of it-- Molly certainly didn't lick the thing clean or get every last drop) onto her fingertips.  Testing first, she smeared the red of blood onto the door she'd come through.  As it was her only real option and seemed sufficient enough, she made several dashes of the bright red blood on the earth with her fingertips, forming a circle around the door she had come through.

The trail of blood was lightly, sparingly dribbled on the ground between this door and the next as she walked.  The single door that stood upright was what she would test first.

This time when she grabbed the knob and twisted, she used the flannel shirt tied around her waist as a guard for bare flesh.

nothingThe bloodied markings do not become any more sinister than any bloodied markings are to begin with. They do not disappear; they hold.

And Molly grabs the door knob and twists it, using her flannel shirt. The door knob twists easily and without sound; when it opens, she finds herself looking at what might be a city. Denver, but viewed from above: a spider web of lights, blinking and illuminated, a strange staircase leading from the door and spiraling downward.

It is incredible and it should not exist but Molly is no longer on earth or in the fields she knows. As for Jack or Jack's Reflection: 

The few times she's seen Jack's Reflection, it has come to her, in her own house or her place of work: it haunts the familiar locations. (There might be two of them, she thinks.)

Molly is looking for a needle in a haystack, but she has also made herself into a needle in a haystack: the thing needles in haystacks are is lost. Directionless? We'll see.

Going down the staircase will surely take her 'far' from where she is now, although who is to say what direction means now.

M. ToombsThe sight through the door took Molly's breath away for a moment.  She knew she was in a place that made no sense, where the rules didn't apply, but it was still mind-boggling to open a door and see an entire city below, with a staircase leading down to it on top of that.  She stood with the door open for several seconds, just staring with her mouth slightly open, before hastily (but gently, quietly) closing the door again.  She was slightly worried that something may have 'gotten in' during the time that she was standing there.  Doors weren't really made to be ajar, after all.

Rather than assuming this was the right path and moving forward, Molly wanted to know her options.  She very much did not want to get lost.  There were plenty of endings that she would accept, but forever wandering through fog was the least of them.

That was close enough to her actual life as it was.  She wouldn't be able to stomach the irony nearly as well as she did the blood.

This door was marked with a crude pictoglyph of multi-height rectangles, just three of them so she wasn't being wasteful.  To her it represented a city's skyline.  That was what this door went to.

Next, she would check one of the doors that was built into the ground.  Presuming that nothing intervened otherwise, she did this with all of the doors available-- simply opening and looking and checking, then closing, marking, and moving on to the next.  The whole while she looked about shiftily, as though paranoid of attack or being snuck up on.

nothingThe first one: opens into darkness. The darkness is wet and cloying and seems to be breathing. In, and out. In, and out. In, and out.

The second door: opens into a street. The street is wide and generous, and after a moment or two, Molly may recognize it for a street down in Santa Fe. There are people moving around on the street, but it is absolutely silent. Nobody says anything at all to one another, although if she takes time to watch the way people move she may notice a pattern. 

The tiny little revolutionary acts that one might commit.

The third door: opens on a car, black and wide and wealthy.

The fourth: on the hotel room she had an audience with the Sophie the Ventrue and Morris the Malkavian.

The fifth: a cave with a sign written in a script she does not know, roots tangling over them. The roots are pulsing, as if they are feeding, in time not to breathing but to the beating of a heart.

M. Toombs[Wits 4 + Investigation 2: Which door will fuck me up the least?]

Dice: 6 d10 TN9 (1, 2, 5, 5, 7, 9) ( success x 1 )

nothingMolly considers and by considering realizes a couple of things. 1. In darkness, things which are enslaved by sight might have more freedom of movement. 2. If Jack's Reflection is here, so is She that took it. 3. The door which might fuck her up least and the door which might take her to Jack are not necessarily the same doors. 4. This place has rules, but she doesn't know them. Still: it must be easy to spy from this place she is in. 5. Spying is not what she is here for, so the car and the hotel room likely do not have what she is looking for.

M. ToombsMolly took her time, stopped and thought carefully about each door that she opened and each option that was available.  She decided immediately  not to go to Sophie and Morris.  That was the last place she wanted to be-- it was like hitting her timer early going to them.  She didn't even mark what this door was, actually, just wrote "NO" in big bloody letters across it.

The car seemed interesting.  She had a feeling that if she got into that big, expansive back seat the driver would appear faceless in a black hat and start quizzing her.  She was willing to bet she'd learn plenty, and see some amazing places in that car.

Not now, though.  This door was marked with a crude crawing of a steering wheel and nothing more.  The first door was marked with hatch marks to represent darkness.  The second, lines to show a street and its paint marks, and the fifth was a small cave drawing (an arch within an arch).  They were all considered, and very carefully.  She was a smart woman, but in a land whose rules were unfamiliar to her.  There were some things that she was able to put together, though-- likelihoods, possibilities, and so on.

It was only when she started to feel rushed by herself-- how long had it been?  How long did time here translate to on the other side?  How long could Gregory just stand there waiting for them before he assumed her lost for good and packed up his show and left?  What happened if her mirror circle got disturbed?  A decision definitely had to be made-- she didn't want to waste any more time finding out.

Taking a breath, deep and nervous, she opened one of the in-ground doors and walked from the land of fog into a cave of living, feeding, thriving roots.  It seemed the kind of place that a creature like Jacky may go.

M. Toombs[Dexterity 3 + Stealth 2: I don't want to disturb anything I just wanna get my guy and go]

Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (2, 5, 6, 8, 10) ( success x 3 )

nothing[Ears in the Dark]

Dice: 8 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 3, 4, 4, 4, 7, 10) ( success x 2 )

nothing[Eyes in the Dark]

Dice: 8 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 3, 3, 4, 4, 6, 8) ( success x 2 )

nothing'Walk' is more of a 'gently let herself down into this oh wait gravity is behaving strangely now oh walking indeed okay' and then she is somewhere that is underground. The sense of being underground is strong; didn't Jacky tell her that his reflection was stolen when he was exploring beneath Seattle?

The Cave.

If Molly looks past the door she just walked through, she can see the cavern stretching out and over until it turns into something manmade, something with arches and brickwork and the sound of water rushing. The air has a hollow feel to it; it echoes. The sound of water rushing is one of the first sounds she has heard since coming here; something that is a sound natural to this environment.

If she looks ahead, the cave broadens, there is the sign, and past the sign:

a labyrinth made out of stone. Staircases built into the wall, and tunnels. Graffiti here and there, looking more like glyphs than anything else, and of course the pulsing roots--feeding roots. The roots snake across the ground, and what light there is seems to come from no light source at all but to be dim and ever-present, a diffuse filtered out almost-brightness, the sort of light you get from the last gutter of the last candle, a sort of night air brightness when there's no moon and it seems dark but if you know darkness and shadows you know it can get much much much much darker.

M. ToombsThe rubber soles of Molly's sneakers were quiet on the rock-and-earth upon which she tred.  They, too, were a decision made with intent.  She didn't just happen to pull on the clothes she did-- she knew she may need to run or sneak or climb, so she wore clothes with give, clothes that were dark and wouldn't show evidence of everything she did tonight, shoes that she could get the hell out of there with if need be.

There may be something lurking about-- more than likely, as a matter of fact.  Places like this didn't usually exist without sentries and residents.  But if anything was there it didn't notice Miss Molly as she slinked forward past the sign she couldn't read, following the deep echoing sound of water and noticing how the walls gave way to man-made brick.

At last she came upon a labyrinth that looked like something out of M.C. Escher's portfolio.  For a few moments she stared, and even tried to follow a path from whatever vantage point she had until it was lost.  Those moments were precisely that, though-- just a few seconds ticked by on a clock somewhere (in her perception, at least).  It didn't take her long to decide against this particular path.  She was trying not to get lost, after all.

So Molly turned about and went right back the way she came.  Seeking the hatch-and-door back to the plane of someplace inbetween.  She didn't want to go to the darkness, but perhaps it was better after all...

nothingAs soon as Molly returns to the door, re-opens it (for it is closed when she returns to it, whether or not she left it that way), she will notice a change:

The air smells of salt. The door opens not into the room fog-world many doors and many corners that she'd climbed up into, but into the room where her mirror ritual stands and Gregory is standing, or half of Gregory is standing, the half that is visible in one of the mirrors a pale ghost she can reach through perhaps if she tried (although isn't he a slave? He is a slave; a mirror world slave), back braced against the side of the room, his kindle on, reading.

The ladder seems different, too. Darker; abyssal tendrils hiding just behind it, as if something would snatch at her were she to climb again.

The labyrinth waits at her back.

All ways are forward.

M. ToombsBack into the room-- not the room with doors again, oh no.  Apparently she didn't have the option of seeking the breathing darkness, or the mirror-world Santa Fe street where everyone walked silently in a pattern that she didn't take time to dissect.  Rather, she was back in the room where she'd initially stepped through to this realm.  She spied the half-views of Gregory (oh good, he was still there!), and glanced briefly about for her own reflection as well.

Well damnit.  Her nostrils flared-- the room smelled salty, like the sea or perhaps some rock chamber far below the earth where salt actually grew into crystals.  It was different from before.  Something had changed, but what?

A glance back at the ladder.  The tendrils of darkness that swayed around it, vaguely threatening, had her backing away from the ladder and further into the room.  She scowled, stuck for the moment.

Tonight was a night of trying, apparently.  She touched a hand to her face- the blood that had caked her chin and neck was drying quickly on the surface area of her skin-- it would flake off if she took the time to scrub at it, but this wasn't the time for that either.  So, bloody-faced and pale underneath that still, Molly approached the mirror circle again and came to stand in its center.  After a cautious glance upward, she looked into one of the mirrors and called softly, gently, as though cooing for a child to wake from their sleep.

"Jack...  Can you hear me?  Can you come to my voice?  Please, I can't find you.  I need you."

nothingThe surface of the mirror shivers as the flat surface of a lake might shiver when a breeze comes trip-trapping over it.

Trip-trap, skim-shudder, and then: Molly's own eyes looking back into hers. They shift into something hideous, drooping; her skin loses its lustre, becomes paler; her visage shifts into something truly hideous. She loses some of her hair.

Monster-Molly reflection opens her mouth and says "Molly?" in a voice she knows quite well. Honeyed voice, something about it and its cadences cornfed and hale and hearty and it's a good voice and it's Jacky's. Sounds foggy, with sleep.

M. ToombsHer own reflection appeared at first, and Molly was braced for sarcasm.  No, she was sure she'd hear herself say in that raspy growl of a voice.  I told you to go do your Nancy Drew thing on your own what are you doing asking for help from me again..  But the image shimmered along the surface, then began to melt and morph and grow.  The monster was a disfigured thing, and watching her own face transform into what Jack's face was now had her cringing.

But there was Jack's face, ugly as sin as it was.  And more than that, there was his voice.  Her name on his voice sang in her veins and made her heart soar with relief and excitement and a weird, deep, bound love all alike.  She had to resist the urge to press hands to the glass between them in her excitement.  Remembering the cold burn and worrying that it would disrupt the connection and send him away kept her hands to herself, both wrapped tightly around that thermos.

"Jack!", she exclaimed quietly and leaned forward, closer, but touched nothing.

"Jesus Christ, Jack.  I'm gonna help get you back, okay?"  He sounded sleepy, though, so she felt compelled to explain:  "I need you to stay here, okay?  Can you do that?  I'm gonna fix this, but I need you to stay here in these--" indicating the mirrors around them.  Even as she was gesturing to the mirrors she was looking around at them, and if he were coherent enough he could see the gears spinning full-speed in her head.  She was figuring out getting back across, when she should, and how quickly she would be able to go into binding.

Waiting for his answer first, though.

nothingThe mirror is not flat or smooth right now. The surface has the texture of liquid but it is still held perfectly straight. Ugly-Molly (for there is more of Molly in the face that looks back at her than there is Jack, but there is more Jack than would mean the reflection looking back at her is strictly Molly, so Ugly-Molly) monster-Molly blinks. Lifts her/his/its hands up knuckles skim out of the mirror elbows poke out too and then presses the palm of her-it-his hand to her-his-its face.

"Jack is an important name. A humble name. It's important to be humble but also arrogant enough to know you can get more if you only want it enough," and the end of the sentence wanders away from sleepy-Jack voice.

"Molly, I haven't been sleepy for longer than I can remember."

And the mirror shudders again, and the reflection is gone.

Instead, the mirror reflects a hallway. 

M. Toombs"I don't want anything more than getting you back to the right side of the looking glass right now," she said quickly a the reflection that was mingled between herself and Jack rubbed at its face.  More to Jack's voice than not, a statement about not being sleepy for a long time ended their talk.  The reflection faded away, shuddered and shimmered, and instead there was a hallway.

Only forward, not back.  And this was the best lead she had so far.

Without near so much hesitation this time as what she's shown before, Molly reached out to touch the glass surface, reluctant to whatever pain it may cause her, and then pushed through to try and access the hallway she was seeing.

nothingThis time there is no pain. There is no cold and no shock and she gets no bruises, but the hall is slippery: difficult to walk on. The walls seem to be coated with water; water is slowly, and noiselessly, dripping from the ceiling, slicking down the walls, slick across the floor, a subtle and constant undulation.

The hall she is in might be a castle: it seems old, with wooden beams (crusted with salt deposits), and then all the stone. It also has the sense of being under-the-ground, under-the-world. Up ahead, it opens up into a couple of rooms, and one of them is a blackness. A darkness.

Behind the door-mirror she just came through, a stair case that spirals downward. More darkness.

M. ToombsThe pain didn't come, and Molly was grateful.  Her wrist was a constant throbbing ache and was no doubt beginning to swell up.  Her muscles were all tired and worn already, as though she'd run a couple of marathons over the course of a week.  That she transitioned so easily into the hallway was a blessing.

There the walls were stone, supported by wood, and everything was slick and wet and salty.  It made her think vaguely of saline spills at work.  One hand touched the wall in case she needed steadying.  At the end of the hall there opened a room, and there were more doors.  She got the impression that she was at the same crossroads that she was at earlier, but with a different facade to it.

Ahead-- the darkness.  Behind, the darkness.  Good, she thought.  That's where I thought I had to go anyways.

So, not going back, but instead going forward through the door, Molly stepped into the dark.