[Prayers to Broken Stone] It’s minus 8 degrees outside.
It’s also storming. Yet, finding perhaps the only relatively wind free alcove out front of the Church where the Last Watch make their home is the Garou known by others as Prayers to Broken Stone. There’s a cigarette between his fingers and his back is braced against the old, crumbling wall. A trail of sweet smoke curls off into the air by the doors from his vantage point and the Galliard; one knee propped up on a loose piece of debris left in place has his eyes closed to the elements.
He seems quite unperturbed by the elements rushing by around him; his hood drawn up around his face so there is merely the suggestion of his profile; his cheek, the fair hair. The less glamorous burn of his Rage.
[Kora] “You’re better off with Simon as an ally than an enemy,” returns the Skald, quiet. She gets that out of the way, first thing. There’s a certain – muted vibrance to her voice, which opens in the chest and throat, no nasal overtones. The couches she offered are comfortable, broken in, blankets everywhere.
Some recently washed, soft with it, smelling like one of those organic fabric softeners, marked with a complex wash of scents underneath, most too faint to be detectable by their human senses. She pulls one from the back of the spine of the couch, wraps it around her. Her frame looks bulky with the heavy coat underneath. “He’s a blunt instrument, but he’s an instrument. Fought to defend my packhouse less than a moon ago; was cut down by a cursed one on the steps. He was out there alone while my pack was on the porch, just inside the doors. You see?” A quick, narrow shrug. “He’s got his failings. They’re not the same as his elders’ failings.”
Then, a look of sharper interest, intent, alive. “This is a city, Hunter. A blight. The unmaker and weaver fucking each other, and fucking each other over. There’s always going to be another nest.” Still quiet, somehow. “How much territory are you claiming in Bronzeville, anyway?”
[Jackson Montgomery] Roman heads off one way, and Jackson sighs a bit. He totally didn’t mean to cause frustration, but the kinfolk does occasionally have that particular talent with Trueborn, if his siblings and father are to be believed. He watches the Ragabash go and then looks to Rain.
“If I see her on my way back, I’ll let you know. I’m sure she’s fine, though. I’ll call you either way” He looks to the new faces for him amongst the kin. “Trent, Starla, nice to meet you both. I’m sure we’ll see each other later.”
And with that, he withdraws to leave.
[Starla] Trent passed out the hot chocolate, Starla accepted hers with another mumbled “Thank you” and finishes most of it while watching in silence. She drinks it down rather quickly just as Roman’s about to head off, standing up and sets the empty cup down somewhere it can be washed out. She gathers up her coat and suitcase, bobbing her head to the others. “Think ah’m gonna go find that place to sleep and get some shut eye, pretty tired. Nice meet’n ya.”
People were already making hasty exits out of the kitchen, Starla manages to stifle a yawn and shakes her head a little, heading off after Roman.
[Trent Brumby] “Roman,” Trent cuts in gently. “Can you point me to some things around here that might need a little fix up?” There’s plenty around, he knows that, but the CoG will have an idea of what’s more immediate compared to the others. He hadn’t come here to just lounge around. He’d come to lend a hand through the storm and do what he could to make Kora’s life a little easier, and by default, the packs.
[Rain] “I appreciate it,” she says, softly, to the film-maker and friend. “We’ll talk soon,” she promises. It’s no idle thing.
“I’m headed back to the bunks and what not, if you want to come with me,” she offers to Starla. “I’m sure we can get ya something set up while the grown ups talk,” she offers a smile, a little cajoling and easier to fall in line with than one might guess. Rain’s naturally warm, and she usually means well for everyone. Either way, she heads back for her quiet (colder) corner of the packhouse rather than hanging close to Hunter and the rest of the gathering.
[Roman Turner] He paused, looking back at those in the kitchen. Meeting Trent’s eyes even as he opened one arm to pull Starla closer in a little hug, murmuring.
“Hang on a moment.”
“Has Kora mentioned anything to ya yet about hunting down the possible owner of this place Mr. Trent? I am thinking it might be the city for delinquent taxes, but there’s a chance it’s a private owner. I think we need to see if we can get hold of the place all legal like. Then we can make it clear someone stays here. Repair the roof proper, fix windows and all. For now though, I’d say the windows and roof are the most important. I been working on bathrooms and fixing up the nursery school rooms for folk to sleep in. Only problem right now is a lack of heat so we’re pretty much bunking around the fire.”
[Roman Turner] ((oops, should of read Rain’s post as I typed. Sorry))
[Starla] (It’s alright. I need to head out anyhow, falling asleep)
[Hunter] He is better off with Simon as an ally than an enemy. That much is obvious by the grunt of assent and the nod of his head, he knows this. The story of Simon’s defense of the pack house isn’t exactly new to him but the details from the mouth of the Jarl have heavier weight, sink in deeper.
“Down to bout, 8 by 8 block tween mandrake’n southside. I’d say that’s a fuckin’ stretch as it is too, I ain’t no optimist. I can’t hold it with just Jo, so I’m makin’ a few changes, pickin’ up some muscle like I said.”
A pause and he eyes the Skald with something of a shadow of that former amusement lifting the corner of his lips.
“What’s this bout’ his elders failin’s?”
[Slaughter] The door opens without a knock or fanfare, just a rush of blowing snow and Imogen Slaughter, the folds of her coat filled with snow, her red hair rimmed in white, steps in. She does not redden with the chill, instead she grows paler, as if her blood were rushing inward. She shakes the snow from her clothing, careful to keep the bulk of it out-of-doors, standing on the threshold.
There is a blizzard of apocalyptic proportions and it appears that Imogen went off and took a walk in it. There are some who would merely shrug and say figures.
She pulls the door shut behind her, and glances up at Hunter and Kora, casting them both a look that with widened eyelids and a discrete eyeroll that silently says something like: Can you believe this weather?
“It’s bloody snowing out there, have yeh noticed?” she says, ironically. Of course they’ve noticed.
[Trent Brumby] “No, she hasn’t.” But then Kora isn’t always discussing those sort of things with him and it’s been a busy past few days. “I’ll see what I can find out, but I’m not all that good with that sort of thing.” He’s a handyman after all, not even savvy with computers unless it’s got to do with mechanics and machines of that like.
Nodding, he offered a small smile. “I get onto the windows. The roof after the storm has passed.” He’s not going to get out there and break his neck in a snow storm.
Picking up the hot chocolate from the bench, the big tall one, he walks out to go and find his mate to make sure she has something in her hands to warm them up.
[Roman Turner] “I’ll be happy to help ya. Thing is, we ain’t gonna find a hardware store open in this crap and chalking won’t hold in these temperatures. It’s gonna be more like a slow work in progress.”
He followed Trent out, waving Jackson to follow.
“So Mr Trent, I bet you’re excited for the baby to come. Gonna be something else, ain’t it?”
He smiled, then got the blast of cold when Imogen came in. Somewhere Patrick was lurking.
[Rory] She has never, ever, in all her born days, seen ANYTHING like this. There’s gazillions of feet of snow and the wind and the blowing and the THUNDER during a SNOWSTORM and… well. She finds it utterly, completely, totally, 100% fascinating. She has trudged through the snow, threadbare and beat-up old coat held closed against the wind, boots pushing through the snow with something akin to a childlike glee.
At some point, just about when she realizes that hey, it’s kind of cold, even when warmed by a tremendous amount of rage, she looks up to find herself near the territory of The Last Watch. She’s been there once or twice, and after a moment’s hesitation, she pushes her way through the snow, and wanders up to the door…
And unlike Imogen – knocks lightly.
[Kora] “They’re not his.” There’s a certain settled caution there; a quiet undercurrent beneath the words. Kora meets Hunter’s eyes; her own are dark and level – quiet. She’s has always been a thoughtful creature, perhaps too cerebral for her own tribe. There was a time not long past when she was the leash that bound a pair of madmen to the earth on which they stand. Now they’re gone, one dead, the other disappeared beyond the horizons of reason.
He describes his territory, and she cuts a sideglance at him, a sharp look that yields by a degree or two when he admits that his territory is already a stretch. “There’s a junkyard near – what was it? King Boulevard, you know it?” A brief pause, for him to acknowledge or deny, “Joe and Thomas and I claimed territory there, before Silence-rhya left. It’s probably cleaner than anything else in the Bronze – you know? Residual. Might be worth reclaiming. Shift your boundaries north a bit, pull it in.” Another, brief pause. “You need a theurge, though. If you want to keep your territory clean. What muscle are you bringing in?”
The door opens: a swirl of snow. Kora glances up. She’s not got a drink in her hand. “Doc,” a greeting, “I hadn’t noticed. There’s beer in the coolers to keep it from freezing, though.” Maybe that’s humor. The remains of a bonfire litter the chancel. In some errant corner, exposed to the elements, a Galliard is smoking.
Kora glances up, back, touches dark eyes on the figures emerging from the kitchen, and flashes her mate a smile. She’s still wearing his coat, bundled up further beneath a blanket.
[Trent Brumby] “I have a few supplies in the trunk,” he tells Roman with a glance over and a brief smile. “I’m sure we can find some wood around here, some planks to cut down to size. With a few nails hammered in we can board up the windows and stop the snow getting in. It won’t do much for the wind sliding through the cracks, but this way we won’t have wet puddles for pregnant women to be sliding through.” Which was his concern. He’d already spotted one such snow cluster that he was going to clean up.
Talk about the baby has this unexpected softness go across the otherwise hard lines of his gruff features. “Yeah. It’s going to be something alright,” he agrees with no small fondness. He looks around then, lowers his voice as he pauses to speak to Roman. “I don’t know what she’s planning when comes the birth. Has she talked to you about it?”
[Kora] And a half-second later, Kora lifts her voice with the knock on the door. “Come in!”
She does not have to shout for her voice to carry.
Apparently she agrees with the theory that the wyrm does not (usually) knock. Except the Beast of Etiquette and Cotillion Schools, a rarely seen manifestation in this day and age.
[Rory] She hears Kora, and after a moment’s hesitation, pulls open the door and slips inside, shoving the door closed behind her. Once she’s sure it’s shut, she takes a moment to shake all the snow off her – pulling the knit hat off so that blood red curls fall in a tangled mess about her face, the ends damp with snow where they were exposed to the winter air. She shakes her shoulders, and snow falls from her – top to bottom. She even stamps it off her feet before she even thinks to venture farther inside…
Green eyes sparkle with delight, a child’s thrill in something every sane person is griping about. So much so she even speaks before being spoken too, in astonished and unadulterated glee…
“I made a MOW SNAN!”
[Hunter] They’re not his. She refuses to say more on the topic than she has already said though the look in her eyes and the finality of the statement tells Hunter there is more. Kora has more to say, she just doesn’t want to say it. Hunter doesn’t press her.
“King Boulevard?” He asks, lifting a hand and scratching over his chin. “Ye’ sure. North ya’ say..”
A smirk.
“Well some’d like us ta’ all be lookin’ north’a bit more wouldn’t they?”
The door swings open. Kora says Doc, Hunter says Imogen.
Attention reverts back to the Jarl. “Few names, few plans. I’ll keep ya’ posted when shit starts happenin’–” Rory made a Mow Snan. Hunter does not look particularly amused, but he doesn’t bristle with anger either. He just sips his beer and looks in the direction of disturbance.
[Slaughter] Kora offers Imogen beer and the kinswoman’s mouth curls as she pulls a hand out from beneath her jacket, holding a papered bottle. “I brought whiskey,” she says, her gaze flicking toward Kora’s swollen belly. “Save yer share for a few months, shall I?”
She is moving out of the way, when Rory bursts in, declaring her glee. Hunter, who greeted her by first name, appears to be attempting to get back to business.
“Did you then,” she does not quite put enough effort into the words to make it appear as if she were humouring the girl.
“Come on, I smell hot chocolate.”
[Prayers to Broken Stone] At some point quite after the others have made their entrances the door is opened again with minimum fuss and Patrick slips inside; shaking out the inside of his jacket and lowering his hood. His blond hair is still dusted with snowflakes; though they quickly begin to melt as he exits the storm.
The Galliard brings with him the wash of his presence and the strong cloying aroma of cigarettes.
No question, then, where he’s been. He stamps his boots together without bothering to glance up at who was around him; breeding already ironed out the what for most. When he does glance up, it’s to Kora his focus goes first; he nods at her and moves into the Church proper.
[Roman Turner] He waved to Imogen and when Rory came in he smiled and waved, though for the moment he kept towards the corner with Trent, murmuring.
“Most of the spare wood has been going to the fire to keep the cold out lastnight and tonight.”
Then Trent asked if Kora had mentioned the birth to him and his eyes nearly popped right out of his head.
“Or Lord no. We are close, but she don’t talk about them womanly things to me. I’m right sure my hair would turn white.”
[Trent Brumby] “We’ll find something.” Spare wood went into the fire, but maybe he could pull apart something around here and see what could be done. Some hunting for materials wouldn’t go astray. A patch up job would have to do now and he could look at hiring someone to look into finding about the Church. There’s people that do that sort of thing for a living.
He finds himself laughing low at the way Roman’s expression turned. Reaching out, he squeezed the younger mans shoulder briefly. “I didn’t mean like that, Roman. I meant plans for after the child is born.” Dropping his hand away, his voice lowers more and his eyes become more serious. “I don’t want a child raised in an abandoned church when I have a warm apartment. But I don’t want to separate child from mother either.” Which is going to be the big problem here. It’s only a matter of time before everything comes to a head.
[Rory] She waves at Roman in return, and smiles shyly at Imogen, even as she nods. the doc isn’t humoring her, but she doesn’t seem to care – the moon is dark and the world outside is white, and she’s like a kid in a candy store.
“And someone showed me how mo take angels too!” Sometimes it’s the little things…
She follows Imogen into the church proper, in search for hot cocoa, shoving her hat into her pocket, followed by mismatched gloves she’d found somewhere.
[Roman Turner] “Um, I think she will want the babe to be in a safe place. As you can see we are kind of like a church, we’re open twenty four seven and all sorts of lost souls come and go. I betcha the little one will spend a lot of time in your home. Then again, I ain’t Fenrir nor a new mommy. Like as not she would kick our butts if she heard us talking about her like this right now.”
He was actually whispering, cutting a look in Kora’s direction.
“So don’t let her hear.”
He lifted his voice to cover the low conversation.
“I betcha we could steal part of the buildings down the street to try and board up some of them windows. But too much and we’re gonna die from smoke and fumes.”
[Kora] “Mmmmph.” The sound is subtle. Her voice is an expressive instrument, but there’s a certain reserve to the Skald, rarely broken. Rage coils around the base of her spine, but doesn’t spark her blood with every contraction of her beating heart. “If you decide to pull it in, I can come by. Walk you through the grounds, on this side and the other. I can’t renew the few deals we had on the other side – those contracts are personal, in a way I hadn’t realized. But I can give you a sort of relief map, yeah?”
A short, narrow glance up. That noise of agreement in the back of her throat. “Targeted strikes. Coordinated. Strategic,” there’s a twist to her mouth. “That campaign starts with good intel. If it becomes a war of attrition,” she looks at Rory, delighted over her Mow Snan. Imogen, Patrick. The space, and offers Hunter another quiet shrug, ” – that’s a war we lose, yeah? We haven’t got enough bodies to fill the breach up with our English dead.”
Imogen’s remark about the whiskey gets a low, moving laugh. “I’ll donate my share to Patrick here, yeah?” a lift of her chin toward the Galliard as he comes in the door, smelling of cigarettes. “Buy me another in a few months.”
[Trent Brumby] “You’re right. Let me give this hot chocolate to her, and I’ll grab back my jacket, then I’ll go out and have a look around.” He claps Roman on the back and walks past with the mug in his hand.
Glancing to the others, he nodded a silent greeting and approached his mate directly. She was offered out the hot chocolate. “I’m going to steal my jacket back,” he tells her with a quick smile, “and go and look for some more wood. Won’t be long.” Well, as soon as she gave him his jacket from off her frame.
[Roman Turner] “I will go with ya. Two sets of arms are better than one. Though if I vanish in a snowdrift, ya can’t just leave me there.”
[Trent Brumby] [phone! brb.]
[Hunter] His eyes follow Imogen even as Kora is speaking, Silence.. he mumbles almost parroting her and he seems thoughtful. It’s obvious he is listening despite the lack of eye contact because he responds swiftly without a hint of distraction in his voice. Silence
That’s a war we lose, yeah?
“Yeah. That’s one we’d lose.” His eyes return to her. “I’m makin’ a list’a places I need ta’ get. I’ll add ya’ junk-yard to tha’ top of it. If you got more ideas, more places, feel free ta’ chuck em’ in there. Ain’t snoopin’ no more, maybe if I bash some skulls n’ take some land back right quite it’ll stir some shit up for ya’, they might get sloppy somewhere, ya’ might be able ta’ get some more’a that info.”
[Slaughter] Kora says that the kinswoman can give her share to Patrick – the doctor’s gaze flicks toward the Fianna then back again, a faint smirk twisting her mouth, a lift of her shoulder indicating a shrug. Then, she is off toward the kitchen and does not appear to notice, or more likely, acknowledge, Hunter’s eyes as they follow her. Imogen does not wave, but she does nod in Roman’s direction as she walks with Rory into the kitchen, setting her bottle on the table.
“I think it’s on the stove,” she says over her shoulder to the Bone Gnawer, peeling out of her jacket and throwing it over a chair. There is a weapon at the base of her spine – no, it’s two, a double holster maintaining two glocks, the shape of it clear beneath her sweater, the holster peeking out in a gap between sweater and jeans.
She pulls the bottle from the bag and sets it atop it on the table, a crackle of the paper as she does.
[Slaughter] (FIANNA)
[Hunter] [WHAT THE HELL IS ON THE STOVE]
[Slaughter] (Imogen’s just in denial that she is now in the presence of two Fianna. Yes. That’s it.)
[Rory] She follows Imogen, happy enough with the suggestion of warm hot chocolate to do so. And also, for all she doesn’t encourage the metis, she has never shunned her either. In Rory’s world, that is something quite special and rare indeed.
Imogen says it’s on the stove, and Rory heads that way, pausing to locate herself a mug first. Once found, she pours her cocoa, and wraps her fingers around the cup with a soft little sigh of delight. She lifts the steaming cup to her lips, pausing to inhale the scent and let the steam wash over her face. She smiles – without hiding it away.
[Prayers to Broken Stone] The Galliard glances at Imogen, his expression showing a mild interest as something is donated to his cause. “Oh yeah?” The Cliath ambles after Rory and the Doctor, a hand rising to salute at Hunter as he passes, with a very cryptic remark idly passed on as he heads toward the kitchen.
“Those boots are still waiting, man.”
He finds Imogen peeling off her jacket, and notes absently, his penchant for finding women who carried firearms on their persons around him. It was not what most men would call a comfort, but it merely draws a quirk of Patrick’s lips as he looks away; down at the bottle on the table and flicks up a brow.
“I hope it’s a good, Welsh brand.” He’s pretty certain it’s not, and shrugs out of his leather jacket with a rustling of fabric and smoke, clinging faithfully to fibers.
[Kora] “Thank you,” says Kora, twisting on the couch to accept the hot chocolate from Trent’s hand. She lifts her face to him as he comes close, canting her head just sidelong, offering him her cheek for a kiss. Then he tells her that he needs his jacket back; her thoughtful half-smile deepens into something bemused but somehow private.
She hands the mug back to him. “Hold this for me, then, yeah?” And unfolds her legs, rising from the depths of the couch. It takes a hint of extra effort, visible perhaps to Roman, Trent, even Imogen – likely invisible to the rest. Her weight is more forward, now, her center of gravity changed and changing. First, the blanket is unwound from around her body, dropped back onto the couch. Then she shrugs out of Trent’s winter coat and offers it back to him even as she accepts the hot chocolate from his hand. She touches him lightly, familiarly on the ridge of his obliques above his waist, touches his knuckles as the mug is exchanged again.
“Okay,” she says, quiet. “Be careful in the storm, yeah? If the wind dies down and Li gets the Hrafn out again, I’ll come back with you tonight.”
A quiet thought filters into Roman’s mind. I’m glad you two are getting along.
When she folds herself back onto the couch, Hunter has her attention again. There’s a subtle twist to her mouth. “Good intel isn’t about them being sloppy,” she cautions, that sharp awareness in her eyes. “They’re always sloppy, somehow. It’s about us being smart. Don’t waste yourself tilting at windmills, Hunter. Targeted strikes. The joints, the knees. Their fucking eyes.” A brief, thoughtful pause as she looks up, at the rafters, imagining the rise of the belltower above it. “Actually, if you’ve got a target in mind, this storm would be perfect cover. If the Hrafn won’t brave it, you can be sure as hell whatever tainted shit they have is grounded by the wyld, the storm, the ice and snow.”
[Trent Brumby] “I’m staying the night.” Trent calls over his shoulder with a rare grin, and a little glint in his eyes. Swinging his jacket on he heads out of the Church with Roman to go and find what they need.
[still on phone!]
[Slaughter] “It is a serviceable American brand,” she says, casting a sharp glance at Patrick as if she expected his protest, or perhaps his judgement, “it wasn’t originally fer me.”
Rory enjoys the smell of hot chocolate nearby, Imogen’s gaze flicks there, but does not remain.
[Roman Turner] There was a wary twist to his lips as he sent a thought back to Kora while following Trent out the door.
Yeah, well just wait till the next time I get sick on his shoes. Besides, can’t let him freeze his parts off out there or Linus won’t have anymore nieces and nephews.
[Rory] She offers Patrick a very shy smile in greeting, before she takes the first sip of her hot cocoa. There’s a sound in the back of her throat, pleased with the taste, the warmth as it spreads through her, radiating out from her belly.
She has nothing to add in terms of serviceable whiskey, though.
[Hunter] Patrick gets a grin, a flick of his chin on greeting. “One day, one day patty.” He chimes back to him before continuing the discussion with Kora. She warns him of sorts, or gives advice at least, tells him to put his efforts to good use, don’t just swing at nothing.
“Ya’ sound like fuckin’ Joey.” He grins to the Jarl. “I know though, gotta make em’ count. Can’t do that till I gots’a target though can I? I’m just sayin’ I’mma stir the pot a bit s’all. If I roll around bold as fuckin’ brass now hittin’ anythin’ and everythin’ then when it comes time ta’ hit somethin’ worth while – they’ll be taken by surprise by tha’ sudden shift in my game plan. Ya’ feel me?”
[Prayers to Broken Stone] The Garou makes a hmming noise; vibrated from his chest as he crosses arms over it; interrogating the American brand with his pale eyes. They lift, brow furrowed: “Serviceable might as well mean we’ll sell it but we don’t want to drink it ourselves.” Still, for his complaints he still takes it out of the paper bag and undoes the lid; sniffing it.
“You gonna join me, or make me into the absolute stereotype of every Fianna, drinking alone?”
Rory gets a brief smile, the flare of Patrick’s amusement extending to her. “Hey, Red.”
[Slaughter] Her mouth twists faintly as she crosses to the kitchen, reaching up for a cupboard. The handle, a small knob on a screw comes off in her hand. Imogen looks at it, faintly surprised before reaching up to screw it back in place, and opening the cupboard properly.
She takes out two plastic cups – the kind you would find at Target or a similarly cheap store and sets them down.
“If I weren’t going to drink,” she says, “I wouldn’t ha’ brought it out.”
A flick of her glance toward Rory, “Yeh don’t want any o’ this, do you?” she asks, offhand, an eyebrow arching, “Bit o’ whiskey wi’ yer cocoa?” True whiskey drinkers everywhere turn in their graves.
[Hunter] [D:]
[Rory] She blushes when Patrick calls her Red, and she ducks her head to hide it behind damp curls. Then she watches Imogen get the cups, and offer a taste. Though so shy, Rory is an incredibly curious creature as well. She holds the cocoa closer though, not willing to sully it’s perfect taste with something like whiskey, but well.
She is Fianna. And she nods, slightly. “Can I sry tome?” Though clearly in a different cup.
[Kora] Wisely, our heroine does not inform Roman that she has at least three younger siblings – half-siblings – capable of giving Linus more nieces and nephews. Apparently, she prefers Trent’s parts intact as well. Puke on his shoes again and I’ll kick your ass. Affection, warning, twined.
Trent receives – for his pains, his promise that he’s staying the night – an expression of supple, quiet pleasure. A certain dark-eyed gleam that follows him as he exits. It is like a window – suddenly, briefly, narrowly – opened on her features. It closes nearly as quickly, as she looks back at Hunter.
Dark eyes shadowed by pale lashes, the glint there is quiet, assessing. Then she makes a low noise in the back of her throat – a sort of acknowledgment.
“You want my share of the Doc’s whiskey?” Kora asks, rising from her place on the couch. The blanket around her unfurls as she stands, that hint of awkwardness in the balanced moment between sitting and standing glossed over by her inherent – animal – grace.
Hot chocolate still in hand, she lifts her chin toward the kitchen. “C’mon.”
[Trent Brumby] [sorry guys, gotta bail. back later if peeps are around.]
[Roman Turner] ((Well, that makes me out. Thanks guys!))
[Prayers to Broken Stone] “Touche.” He says with a vague suggestion of humor, and finds a place to lean his frame. The handle of the cupboard comes off easily in Imogen’s hand and Patrick watches; amusement apparently growing if the glitter to his eyes is any indication as she screws it back in place.
Rory blushes and proves the Galliard’s affectionate nickname quite appropriate and like any red [or alcohol infused] blooded Fianna asks for a sample of the whiskey. “Saw you in action last night,” he says, apropos of nothing and so vaguely it could, on the surface mean he saw her buying a coffee before he adds.
“That shooting.” He studies her face a beat; inquisitive. “Tough.”
[Hunter] Business is over, perhaps not agreement but acceptance was found. It’s all Hunter can really ask for from another Alpha, even if it’s one he respects more than most. She offers him her whiskey and the corners of his lips bend in a wry smile. “Thought that was Patty’s.” A raised eyebrow but he pushes himself up off the couch and follows after her regardless.
“How long?” He asks on the way to the kitchen, eyes flicking down to her belly and back up to her face.
[Slaughter] “The barley’s from Scotland, if it helps,” she adds, pouring three fingers of liquid into each cup with practised ease, as if she could actually see the liquid level within – the cups are opaque and brightly coloured. The amber drink disappears into them to remain as only a shadow.
Rory would like to try some. Imogen gestures with a hand toward the cupboard. “Cups are in there. Yeh might want to try it wi’ a bit o’ water first. Cuts the burn. Put about this much,” she holds up two slender fingers, the nails cut close, and carefully shaped “water in and then I’ll pour yeh whiskey.”
Patrick speaks of seeing her in action, and Imogen glances at him, frowning. Several seconds of silence indicate the time required to identify what he might be talking about. “Oh.” The sound is quiet, restrained. “The domestic violence case.” A pause, and then without gloating or grandstanding, “I found it rather routine.”
[Rory] She hides her grin as Imogen tells her she can have some to try, and reaches up to get a cup, and do as she was instructed, carefully measuring out the liquid as if it were life or death important, even though it’s simply her first taste of whiskey.
Shameful, for a Fianna, isn’t it?
She turns off the water, and then sets it back near the other glasses so that her’s can be poured. She scoops up her cocoa in the meantime and takes a drink.
[Adamidas] Adam is coming to the church.
Adam is coming to the church to see people.
Adam is coming to the church and she hasn’t quite done her research.
When the female arrives, she wasn’t expecting to see people. She wasn’t expecting much other than Last Watch, to be honest, but she heralds her arrival with a pounding on the door. Hits once, twice, three times and the fourth is done with a flat palm. The cold sticks to her skin, hits her eyelashes and hangs in her lungs. Even this theurge can’t insist that the cold leave.
[Kora] “I’ll give Patrick my share of the beer,” she offers, a wry twist to her mouth. “I bought a six pack of Bell’s Two-Hearted just before this fucking storm hit.” Even if she can no longer drink, she can buy it. There’s a certain pleasure there, epicurean, indulgent even. A brief flash of memory: a park in the summer, a six pack, a bullish tattooed modi eyes gleaming with the reflected lights of the loop when she told him, gravely, that life was too short to drink cheap beer.
She was right.
The space is vast; Trent, maybe Roman have taken to cleaning up the snow, to remedying the hazards the abandoned, once fire-engulfed structure presents to a pregnant woman. There’s a certain decayed grandeur, though, in its great neogothic lines. In the strange confluence of the white christ and wolf pack who have come after. The chill in the center of the nave is teeth numbing, and Kora keeps her blanket wrapped around her shoulders, sets her jaw against the bitterness.
Hunter flicks a look down at her stomach, firm against the stretched fabric of the gray t-shirt, stretched enough that the shadow of the waffle weave from the thermal under is visible through. Her dark eyes follow that flicker, down, then up. “I don’t know,” is the quiet answer. She does not touch her stomach, as many women might wth the question. But a moment later, there is a certain, subtle give. “Quickened, though. Starting to kick, too.” Low and confidential.
The knock comes before they’ve made it to the door leading toward the kitchen; she cuts a glance back over her shoulder, then lifts her chin in that direction. “I’ll get that. You go on. The kitchen’s just down the hall beyond that door,” set into the stone, just outside the chancel. “Can’t miss it.”
A half-minute later, Kora’s opening the door. “Adamidas,” a note of surprise in her pale brows, a twist of greeting to her fine mouth. She pulls the door open further, a whirl of snow preceding the Black Fury. “C’mon in.”
[Prayers to Broken Stone] The Fianna is still looking at her when she answers, and only deviates from his attention when she offers over one of the cups. He studies the liquid within it; nostrils flaring slightly at the strong aroma before he looks back at her; frowning. “That might be upsetting,” he says without fanfare; matching her honest assessment of her work.
“Or really disgustingly well adjusted.” Patrick toasts his cup toward both Fianna women and downs it in one fluid motion. It has to burn, but aside from a pinching around his eyes he doesn’t seem too perturbed. “I guess it’s serviceable.” He concedes, without inflection to accompany the remark.
[Slaughter] The doctor picks up the whiskey bottle and pours Rory’s drink. “Take a sip,” she advises. “Not a swig.” This is advice she knows by rote. Rory is not the first she has introduced to whiskey.
The galliard comments that it is either upsetting or well-adjusted and she turns her head sharply to look at him, the corners of her mouth twisting slightly. “Pardon me, but yeh must realize the irony when yeh tell me that my ability to handle gore and blood is either well-adjusted or upsetting?” Her eyebrow arches, “Last I checked yer kind was the cause of much, much worse, aren’t they just?”
It’s not with rancour that she speaks. It is more like a thrust of wit.
[Hunter] Quickened, starting to kick too.
It seems like it should be strange that Kora doesn’t know when she is due, Hunter has no experience with the subject but it seems odd for some reason. It confuses him but he doesn’t have time to respond really. She tells him the direction of the kitchen and then wanders off towards the door.
Hunter doesn’t actually wander off to the kitchen, he rather awkwardly follows the Jarl. When the door is opened he peers out and seems to relax when he sees that it is only Adam.
“Yo Adam.”
[Adamidas] “Kora,” she says, and her lips are chapped. Her expression isn’t grim. her expression isn’t anything, really, but it seems to make sense that she is proceeded by snow. She comes in and shakes her hair out. The snow flies and she kicks the snow off of her boots. When she has time to thaw out, she grins.
“Gah, this place is bangin’,” and it sounds right when she says it. Her attention snaps back to Kora, or rather Kora’s belly, then it’s back up, “I need to talk to you.”
Hunter gets a wave, her wrist twists back and forth. If it looks like this in the physical realm, imagine what it looks like in the umbra, “hey Hunter. Holding up?”
[Roman Turner] The door opened for Adamidas and before it could close something white and cold rushed through the door like a ferret with it’s tail on fire.
“I hate snow! Did I fall in a snow drift? Noooooo. I fell in three of them!”
He was stripping as fast as he could, shaking snow out of his coat.
[Prayers to Broken Stone] “Unfortunately, yes.” He says immediately, without skipping a beat. He’s holding his empty cup against his chest and lifts his shoulders as he speaks as if his body would apologize despite his words. “We’re born to be the cause, though. There isn’t much choice there, we either do it, or walk away and still do it, just not to what deserves it.”
Patrick’s expression is grim, suddenly. “We stub our toe, and someone is torn to pieces.
Someone dies, and we’re in the wrong place at the wrong time, still grieving.” He glances away, straightens. “Another round?”
[Rory] She takes the advice to heart, and nods, reaching to take the cup. She sniffs the whiskey experimentally, and had made no attempt at all to hide that she watched Patrick take his drink. Call it progress, perhaps. Or rabid curiosity.
She tips the cup up and takes a sip, as cautioned, and her eyes widen slightly at the heat slipping down her throat, into her belly, in a much different way than the cocoa. She coughs, a little, and closes one eye to look into her glass, as if it holds the mysteries of why people can drink it straight and barely react like Patrick, or Imogen. So, in effort to discover why, she takes another sip. The taste isn’t bad, per se, its just different, and distinctive.
then, much to the dismay of whiskey drinkers everywhere, she follows it with a swig of chocolate.
[Adamidas] Her eyes are wide, and the young theurge finds herself looking at a snowy, snowy ragabash. She blinks once, twice, and-
“… three?”
She blinks.
“You have to really… and…three?!”
[Roman Turner] Leaving a trail of clothing in his wake he paused just long enough to blink at Adamidas.
“Three, yeah, ya know. One, two, three? Who are ya anyway?”
And he kept right on talking as he tugged a boot off to dump snow out of it.
“Not only that, there was this fella out there all dressed in white and he had like a really small head and got fatter the further down ya went. Ran right in to him and sure enough, it was like running in to a wall of snow. By the time I got untangled, I couldn’t find him the snow. It was like he just became part of it. Darndess thing I ever seen.”
[Slaughter] Imogen’s mouth twists as Rory takes a sip of hot chocolate. “I cannot imagine those flavours blend well.”
Patrick says a lot. In the end, Imogen merely looks at him, evenly, and does not answer any of it. She’s invited to another round, and the kinswoman glances at her as yet untouched cup. “Not even had my first yet.” With that, she picks it up to take a swallow. While she had recommended that it be sipped and not swigged, this kind of whiskey is not meant to be savoured. At least not by those who consider themselves true connoisseurs of the water-of-life from across the pond.
[Kora] “Sure,” Kora accedes, low-voiced. She steps back as Roman comes tumbling in, shaking free of the snow. A brief glance over her shoulder at Hunter as he follows her – awkwardly – to the door. There’s a certain native humor in the shape of her mouth, that half-seen half-smile visible over her shoulder, not as intent as the look she gave her mate, just watchful.
Adam flicks a look at Kora’s stomach. She’s five and a half months, maybe six months pregnant, showing less than many women would at this stage – but showing now, without question. Kora says nothing, does not seem to acknowledge the look. “Like I said, c’mon in – ” she’s already turning around, leading Adam (and Hunter, and Roman?) back toward the couches. Where she pauses, sinking to her haunches beside a cooler. “You want a beer, Adamidas?” Lingers there long enough to get a beer, “Or a root beer?” belatedly, a memory flash.
If Adamidas accepts, she’ll have her choice cool in hand a moment later, melting snow curling down the neck of the bottle. Kora makes a gesture toward the couches – an invitation to sit – after Roman has finished his story. Her humor’s quiet, an undervoiced huff. When her packmate’s done, she asks, “What did you need, Adamidas?”
[Hunter] “I gotta jet, say bye to Imogen for me will ya’?”
Hunter tosses the request out to all three of the Garou emerging around the door. Maybe there is an acknowledgement, maybe there isn’t. Either way Hunter is pushing back open that huge door.
“Take care Kora.” He shouts back at her over the winds and pulls the door closed.
[Roman Turner] The second boot was removed and he waved to Hunter with it, giving a warning.
“Look out man, there’s some weird things out there and I ain’t sure where that fella in white went. He might be waiting to fall on ya.”
Rory’s snowman was history.
[Rory] The look on her face suggests that Imogen was definitely right about that – the tastes don’t mingle, at all. She lifts a hand to rub at her nose, absently, and then looks between the two glasses. She isn’t one to not finish something she’s started, and so she grabs the watered down whiskey and lifts it up to drain the rest of it, before she sets the cup in the sink, and moves to take a seat at the table, cradling her cup of cocoa to her chest.
It’s not like the expensive wine’s that Ray has shown her, at all. She’ll stick with her chocolate for now.
[Adamidas] “You’re pregnant,” she says, “we need to talk about your challenge. And some other things, but it can wait for now.”
She says. She nods, and waves goodbye to Hunter, “don’t fall in a snow drift.”
[Prayers to Broken Stone] “Pathetic.” He says lightly to the notice she hasn’t yet had her first, without malice and then chuckles; the warmth a rumble from his throat as much as actual laughter as Rory tries out the whiskey and evidently isn’t that pleased with the taste. “Next time I’ll find some of the stuff my Dad brings home for you to try,” he tells the shy Stag.
“It’ll leave you crying.” Which did not seem, on the surface, much of an advertisement.
[Kora] “Night, Hunter,” Kora says, a brief glance at Roman. As he warns Hunter about strange things in the storm. ” – you walked into someone’s snow man?”
Adamidas says, you’re pregnant, and Kora’s mouth twists, mild, mildly ironic. “I am pregnant, yes – ” She nearly makes a joke of it, lifting her voice at the near-end of the statement, but swallows that touch of humor at the end. Her features shift, touch of dark eyes on Adamidas’ features. “Go on. What’s on your mind?”
[Hunter] [Thanks for scene ya’ll!]
[Rory] She wrinkles her nose and considers that advertisement that it’ll leave her in tears… then decides to ask Imogen. As far as Rory knows, the redheaded kin has never lied to her. Patrick, she doesn’t know too well yet…
“…is gat thood?”
[Slaughter] Pathetic, Patrick says, and Imogen’s glance is wry, and half challenging, an arch of an eyebrow, but little more than that.
Rory turns to Imogen, who has never lied to her. Imogen’s mouth quirks, a twisting smirk, “Tha’ depends on yer perspective. To serious whiskey drinkers it is.”
She drains her cup.
[Adamidas] She looks up at Kora. She isn’t tense and she isn’t overly concerned. The Fury drops her voice and she tries to keep it between them. the Fury is patient, but… decidedly more mature than she had been when they had first issued this challenge.
“I remember that I had passed you under the conditions that you teach me about the Fenrir and I would teach you about the Furies. I’ve come to make good on my half of the arrangement,” she tells the female.
[Roman Turner] “Snowman?”
He paused in the middle of fighting his way out of his Wranglers, frowning as he considered Kora’s question.
“No, why would I walk in to someone’s snowman? I tell ya, it was some guy with a big hind end all dressed in white. He must of been one of them negative Ninja’s cause he vanished by the time I got back up.”
There were the red long johns, completely visible by the time he got his shirt off. The flesh coming up out of the neck of the long johns was mottled, purplish like fingers reaching upwards where he’d had a minor mishap at the river one day with Kora. In a moment he was hunting around for those bear claw slippers of his and snagging up a blanket.
[Prayers to Broken Stone] Patrick is pouring himself another cup of the American brand as the Kinswoman directs her wry, challenging glance his way. He answers it with a little toast but doesn’t immediately down this one, rather he takes it and holds it as if it were a good red in need of airing first.
The Galliard’s knuckles, as he braces one arm behind him on a counter-top, are now fully healed, and free from bruising. It’s a little niggling reminder, as are so many tiny things about his kind that tell of the need for privacy, of discreet maneuverings when it came to the public eye. Scratches, could be overlooked.
But broken bones healed at the speed by which a Werewolf did them was dangerous. “If you’re not cryin’, the whiskey ain’t tryin’,” Patrick recites into his cup as he gives in and takes a sip. “A very original creation by my father.”
[Kora] “Someone’s snowman,” Kora returns to Roman, a twist of her mouth, good humor evident in the shape of it. “Three layers, fat head, fat middle, fat ass. Carrot for a nose, yeah?” Kora gives Adamidas a quick, dark-eyed look. There’s a certain stillness there like a lacuna. She might have asked if Adam, too, was getting cabin fever to brace the storm to fulfill her half of the challenge. Instead, she just says, “Cool.”
A moment of – something like attunement, follows. As if she were listening to something just beyond her ken. “Give me a few, yeah? And I’ll be back. Meantime, there’s whiskey, bread and stew in the kitchen if you want some. Roman, make sure Adamidas gets whatever she wants, alright?”
[Kora] (hah. AKA: OMG, I NEED TO SLEEP.)
[Kora] (night all, many thanks for sceneage!)
[Rory] It depends, says Imogen. Patrick makes a quip, and Rory studies them both. Then, she nods, with that shy little grin, accepting their words as truth, and likely planning on trying Patrick’s Father’s Whiskey as well. She is always open to try new things, after all, and this is no different.
She even made a snowman today – and if/when she hears of the death of the poor Man In White at the hands of Roman.. well. She might learn the fine art of snowball fighting. But in the kitchen, whiskey holds her attention. That, and her cocoa.
[Roman Turner] He muttered as he headed for the kitchen, inviting Adamidas with him.
“It weren’t no snowman. It was one of them negative Ninja’s. Sneaky guys, them Ninjas.”
[Adamidas] Adam, in turn, toddles along with Roman. Out of her element, she seems every bit her age. She bops along behind the Child of Gaia.
“Only thing more sneaky than a ninja is a pirate. If we were in New Hampshire, I’d warn you about them,” she says.
[Slaughter] “Most,” she says, picking up the bottle and pouring herself another drink, “would say that whiskey is no good if it’s not strong. Phrases such as: ‘will put hair on your chest’ are used as a positive thing about these drinks.”
Her mouth twists as she lifts the cup. “Yeh should try his father’s whiskey. Fer the experience if nothing else.”
[Slaughter] A flick of her eyes over her shoulder as Roman enters, “I’m sorry, negative what?”
[Roman Turner] “Negative? Er….negative pressure outside is making it colder than cold. And er, Pirates, yeah, there’s Pirates out there. Right?”
He looked over his shoulder at Adam for back up.
“Oh and this is Adamidas, she’s come to spend the night.”
One hand clutched the blanket tight around his shoulders while red thermals and bear claw slippers made up the most visible part of his clothing.
[Adamidas] “Of course there’s pirates,” the Fury says, and she seems content to insist upon that fact, “if there are ninjas there are also pirates because they’re forever locked in epic battle, forever to hammer out their ancient grudge.”
Yes, ladies and gentlemen, this is your theurge elder. She offers Imogen a hand.
“Hey, I’m Adam.”
[Rory] She smiles again, brief and as pure as the snow outside. “I will.” try the whiskey. It’s as much a simple statement, as a promise, something that she won’t back out on. She’s not even scared of hair on her chest – she is metis, after all.
[Roman Turner] “This is Patrick and Imogen and Rory. Ya want cocoa or whatever they are drinking or a beer?”
He introduced Adam to those in the kitchen.
[Prayers to Broken Stone] “We’ve met,” Patrick confirms to Roman, and perhaps to the Fury, too. “One of the first nights I was here, at the Brotherhood.” There’s a pause, and the Galliard takes a significant amount of whiskey with his next swallow. His eyes are still that ridiculous shade of blue, as if someone had drawn them in with a neon marker.
“How’re things, Adam?”
[Slaughter] Imogen’s coat chimes, three times in succession and Imogen turns in her chair, reaching in to put a hand in her pocket and retrieve it, glancing at the screen.
“I ha’ to go.”
A glance over her shoulder at Roman, “Come help me get my car out, will yeh? It’s stuck.” Even as she speaks, she is getting to her feet.
[Adamidas] “Uh,” she pulls at straws and she doesn’t quite come up with anything just yet. the female puts her hands on her hips and looks up to the side, “can I have cocoa, please?”
She pulls off her hat, and the little cat eared knit thing comes off. She reaches up and rubs her head, scratches her half-matted tresses. Adam inspects Patrick and half smiles.
“I’m okay, dealing with a feathered serpent. It’s… needy,” a beat, “You holding up?”
She knows about Howard. Of course she knows.
[Rory] She waves at Imogen, as she asks for Roman’s help getting her car out. “Need te mo?”
To help, she means. she finishes her cocoa, and goes to put her hat on again so that she can help…
[Roman Turner] “Yessum, sure will.”
He waved to the others.
“Save me some cocoa. I’m gonna see Miss Doctor Slaughter Ma’am out. Can’t let her wander around alone what with them adominal snowmen out there, or is it, imbominal pirates?”
He was still talking as he walked out of the place to tug on his clothes again and leave with Imogen.
[Roman Turner] He looked back at Rory with a shake of his head and a little grin. Miss a chance to be alone with the Goddess? No way.
“Thanks Rory, but I got this one.”
[Roman Turner] “Unless….well, there are things out there. Maybe two are better than one?”
He had second thoughts, turning back to hold the door for Rory.
“Come on, I might need ya if I fall in another snow drift.”
[Slaughter] Roman speaks, and Imogen fixes him with a bland stare, before he changes his mind. She adds her opinion to Roman’s. “It can’t hurt.”
A glance to Patrick, “Leave the bottle, shall I?”
From there, to Adam, “A pleasure.”
[Adamidas] “Abominable!”
Is what she says to Roman. And to Imogen?
“Ma’am.”?
[Rory] He says no.. than changes his mind, and she flashes him a brief – yet warm like the sun – smile, and tugs her hat down over her curls, and slips her gloves on too. To everyone else, she waves..
“Bye.”
And she moves to follow Doc and Roman out.
[Roman Turner] “That’s what I said!”
He called back to Adam’s correction.
“And yessum, it’s Miss Doctor Slaughter, Ma’am.”
The he hooked an arm around Rory, leading her to the door with them.
“Now, ya want to watch out for them Yeti Ninja Pirates out here. They are sneaky.”
Still talking as they went out the door with Imogen.
[Roman Turner] ((Thanks guys! Night! ))
[Rory] He hooks an arm around her, and she blushes… clear down to her toes. At least she’ll be warm….
[Slaughter] And they can hear, as the door starts to fall shut, Imogen saying in a tone of incredulity, “Yeti Ninja Pirates?”
SLAM. Out into the snow the trio goes.
(faaaaalling asleep!)
[Rory] (night ya’ll!)