[Joey] Joey continues working on her burger while Charlie explains the conversation he had with the Galliard. Joey is a Rotagar. A No Moon. Her auspice is supposed to be made up of stealthy, sneaky bastards whose strengths lie mainly in scouting and reconnaissance. But Joey doesn’t fight like a No Moon. There’s a reason why she came to Chicago packed under Bull. She fights head on, prefers to look her challenges in the face. She’s a heavier hitter than some of her rank and auspice. There are some who might think the ‘little’ Rotagar fights more like an Full Moon.
And yet Sinclair, a Galliard, a Glass Walker, is stronger. Faster. Her attacks are devastating. Sinclair is a Moon Dancer that fights more like an Ahroun than most of the Ahroun’s Joey knows.
But Joey also knows she has a temper. Sinclair has been invaded by the Wyrm twice. She killed her sister, and she killed her sister’s best friend. They were able to fight their way back, however.
So when Charlie says And that’s when she attacked me, Joey knows Sinclair didn’t win a verbal argument with the dopey metis. She knows it was Sinclair, somehow, who snapped Charlie’s bones like twigs.
She thought she was ready to talk to Sinclair. But when she hears that a misunderstanding with Charlie made her attack him and break him, leaving him bleeding and in a state where he felt he couldn’t come to his pack, Joey’s rage spikes. Her jaw clenches. Her body tenses.
And then it passes. Joey is passionate, and the temper she never truly realized she had flares more often these days, but she’s also grown. She’s not as in control of herself as she would like to be, as she found out the day she snarled at Charlie because he wouldn’t accept her healing. Her temper spikes when she hears that Charlie’s horrible injuries were caused by the very same person who pushed him to the very brink of death, but there’s nothing she can do about that now. That was days ago, Charlie is healed of that particular injury, and time marches on.
She sighs. “So she broke your arm and leg ’cause she didn’t know what you wanted her to do?”
[Charlie] “Nah, she knew what I wanted her to do.”
His brow is furrowed, his eyes squinting as if he’s having to focus harder than usual to see four days into the past, but he isn’t averting his gaze or addressing Joey’s elbow or her knee or a point not on her body at all as he speaks about what happened. When she found him Thursday morning he had been bloody and wracked with pain, so ashamed of what had happened and how he had come to be injured in the first place that he had physically restrained Joey from laying a healing touch on him.
That shame and anger at what had happened had colored their discussion, had left him shaking and near-snarling on the floor looking like some sort of beaten, caged wild animal when she finally came back to talk to him. She hasn’t seen him that full of Rage or anger since the night that she was nearly killed by a single hit from a spiritually-imbued chain, and she has to be hoping that she never sees him like that again. How pathetic he had to have looked is beyond him, but he knows that he has been called names and put down in the past for sitting the way he was sitting and talking the way he was talking that morning.
If he’d cried after Joey left, out of anger or frustration or pain, she hadn’t been able to hear it in her wake. When she saw him again less than twenty-four hours later his bones were back in place and his flesh was healed. They’re moving on from that now, but the question remains: what the hell happened?
“She thought I was tryin’a tell her how to do her duty? I guess? All I was tryin’a do was tell her I just wanted people to know what happened, that I didn’t want no restitution or nothing, but… I dunno. I talk to spirits better than I talk to people sometimes. I apologized after she beat the shit out of me, so…”
[Joey] Joey sets her burger on the bed of fries next to Charlie’s, raises her knees to rest her forearms across them. For a while, she just stares out at the cityscape and the dark void where the lake should be.
Thursday was the darkest day in the short history that is the metis Theurge and the Fenrir Rotagar. Most of what transpired might have been avoided had they simply looked at each other, had Charlie been able to raise his face to see the hurt in JOey’s rather than flinching away from the anger in her voice. Her anger had been brought on by exasperation because she’d told him a few days earlier to come to her if he needed help. And concern, because who wouldn’t be concerned when they find their friend lying in agony, their blood drying on their skin.
They talked about it some on Friday, tried to clear the air between them before they were interrupted by a newcomer to the city.
Charlie says he apologized to Sinclair after she beat the shit out of him, and Joey sighs again, this time bringing her hands to her face to scrub at her eyes and cheeks.
“Sin and I were never really close, y’know? So I can’t make any guesses ’bout why she does what she does, or why she flies off the handle so goddamn much.” She doesn’t know what else to say. Joey is good at deciphering puzzles. She can solve any math problem set before her in the blink of an eye. She’s a smart kid, but she does not understand Sinclair.
[Charlie] “I haven’t known a lotta Moon Dancers,” he says, reaching for his burger again. “The ones I have known have had… tempers. Like, worse than some of the Full Moons. I dunno. Everyone flies off the handle sometimes, you know? It’s just how we are.”
He takes another large bite, then hefts a sigh out through his nostrils and considers his sister for several protracted seconds. There isn’t much more to say about what happened with Sinclair, and there isn’t much more to say about the fact that the two former packmates need to talk. So he doesn’t say anything. He just tilts to the side, and jostles her shoulder with his upper arm.
[Izzy Montoya] So, her place? CONVENIENTLY nearby.
Which means she doesn’t have to cook.
Which is good, because she can’t cook – at least, not very well beyond the basics.
Things in her fridge tend to be takeout boxes turned science experiments, and beer. It explains why she’s letting herself in the back door of the Brotherhood again, and in short order, all that can be seen of her is her ass as she bends over and rummages around in the fridge.
There’s gotta be something good in here somewhere…
[Joey] They do all have tempers, even the most mild-mannered of them. Joey told Charlie once, a long time ago, that she didn’t think he could get mad. He’s proven her wrong more times than she cares to remember.
There’s not much more they can say in this vein, so they lapse into silence for a while. Charlie bites into his burger, and jostles Joey. She grins and socks him in the shoulder before she pivots on the ledge. There’s a scuff of rubber on concrete when her feet touch the rooftop once more, and Joey pushes herself up to stand.
“You can finish mine,” she says, nodding at the plate. The bottle she picks up to take with her. “I’m gonna go for a walk. If you see Sinclair…” Joey tips her chin up, scratches at the side of her throat while she studies the light pollution reflecting off the clouds. In the darkness, it’s difficult to make out the scar on her throat. When she drops her hand, she shrugs. “Just tell ‘er I’m ready to talk to her if she wants to find me.”
With that she shoves her hands into the pockets of her old grey hoody, and she sets off for the roof access.
[Marrick] “UGH! The fuck!“
It had been some time since Marick Fisher cursed and growled at things randomly in teh BRotherhood. In fact, she hadn’t done that since she first moved in. Today, the Fury was frustrated about a rather persistent chunk of something stuck in her hair.
For the most part, she was clean, save for the chunk of bile and goo and viscera that stuck like a chunk of persistent gum in her hair.
When she came out of the bathroom, she looked displeased. Holding one strand of hair away from the rest of it, the blonde went off in search of a pair of scissors. Or peanut butter. Because peanut butter took anything out of hair.
[Izzy Montoya] She’s pulling a bunch of sandwich fixings and leftovers out of the fridge when she hears the cry of a frustrated girl upstairs. She hesitates, waiting, and then dumps her load on the counter. Food first – the damsel doesn’t seem to be THAT much in distress. And if she is, she’ll yell again – right?
Izzy doesn’t make any move to keep her presence quiet. She’s slamming drawers, doors, as she looks for the items she needs. Finally, she sets about making herself a huge roastbeef sandwich with all the fixings. She hears whoever it is walking around upstairs – so moves to the foot of the stairs and calls up
“Making a sandwich – want one?”
Does she care who it is? No. Does she care that it’s midnight? Obviously not.
[Marrick] She tromps down the stairs and finds herself observing a Fenrir kin that she has not met before. Lonna is blonde haired, she’s blue-eyed and freckled, and she screams the blood of fury heroes. However, kinfolk couldn’t quite see that.
So, a rage-imbued teenager makes her way down the stairs, cursing a wad of you-don’t-wanna-know and looks at the roast beef sandwich.
“Sure, soon as I get this outta my hair-” she waves her goo-stuck hair at her “-I c’n get us drinks.”
She started her search for peanut butter.
“I’m Marrick,” she drawled.
[Izzy Montoya] She studies the blond haired girl as she tromps downstairs, still bitching about something in her hair, and nods. She can’t see the blood of fury heroes, but there’s no denying the girl is Garou – not with that amount of rage coursing through her. She almost asks whats in her hair, and what happened to the other guy – then decides that she doesn’t really want to know.
Instead, lips curve into a smirk as she nods. “Deal. Beer – whatever’s closest and coldest.” She points with the knife at a cupboard. “Looking for peanut butter? Saw it over there.” and she gets back to slicing onions, pickles, lettuce, cheese – whatever you can think to want on the worlds largest and most perfect roast beef sandwich – and slapping it together.
Just as Marrick’s blood sings – so does her own. Not in any way she’d notice, or care. It just does. Thomas showed her just how much last night – she’s still kinda weirded out about it. She pushes it aside though, and nods. “Izzy.”
[Marrick] The Fury takes her time getting the peanut butter out, and it’s not really a dignified sort of hing. She is a warrior of the Nation. She is a lot of things, and she should not be readying her hair for this sort of thing. It’s times like these that Marrick wonders, briefly, whether or not she should just chop all her hair off to half an inch and deal with that.
She realizes that she likes her hair, though, and that it would be cold and, therefore, not a good idea.
Marrick talks while she butters, “been in town long? Ain’t ever metcha b’fore.”
[Izzy Montoya] It’s not dignified, but well, Izzy ain’t one to care about dignity in many a situation, and saving one’s hair is one of them. She isn’t much of a girly girl, herself? But she likes her hair, and prefers to keep it right where it is.
She lifts her had that holds the knife, and uses the back of her hand to rub under her chin, almost negligently. “Couple days. Born and raised here – but been down south a few years.”
She drops a piece of onion. “Fuckin’ shit bastard!” and then reaches down to pick it up and toss it in the garbage, before she grabs another plate so she can start building the sandwiches. “You live here too? A fuckin’ boarding house for Garou. S’fuckin’ weird if you ask me.”
[Marrick] “Lived here, I’m now a proud homeowner.”
She grinned ear to ear, like it might be a joke. It doesn’t seem to be, though, “you’d think with the economy that they wouldn’t let jus’ anyone buy the things, but Wendy pulled some strings.”
There was quiet pride in that.
“Dayum, what part of th’south?”
[Izzy Montoya] She glances at Marrick and her pride at being a homeowner. “Wendy?”
The she concentrates on slicing the sandwiches in half – no easy feat if she intends to keep everything inside, these are definite 2 handed sandwiches, for sure – and then tosses the knife into the sink.
She don’t do dishes, either.
“Miami. Things gotta little fuckin’ sticky round here, and I had to bail for a few years, get my rep back. Friend of mine’s in a bit of a fucked up sitch, now. Came home to help.”
She does, however, put leftover things away – and before she will let herself enjoy her late night snack.
[Marrick] Her hair was nice and peanut-buttery, and the Fury headed off to go get something for them to drink.
Soon enough, she returned with a couple beers. She offered one to the Fenrir.
“Who’s yer friend?” she cocked her head to the side, brows knit and jaw set.
[Izzy Montoya] When Marrick returns with the beers, Izzy trades one for a plate with a mammoth sandwich on it. She digs her keys out of her pocket, and uses the bottle opener keychain to pop the top, and offers it to Marrick as well.
She flips the bottle top into the garbage and tips the bottle back, taking two or three healthy swigs before she answers. “Detective John Thornton. He’s had it a bit rough since they found out he was kin. I was his partner back in the day – we didn’t fuckin’ know bout each other then though. I got some explainin’ to do about some fuckin’ shit I pulled, and well. He could use a hand gettin a handle on all this fuckin’ shit-rolled kin crap we call life with with you fuckers.”
[Marrick] “You figure out how t’tell someone their kin nicely? Tell me, ‘cus it fuckin’ sucks,” she tells her. Marrick doesn’t so much eat the sandwich as she does attack it. She takes a bite, something fierce and full forced. Something that kept her mouth busy so she wasn’t talking. With her mouth full, she takes the bottle opener and pries the lid off of her beer.
“Brother took the news pretty rough. Sucked.”
[Izzy Montoya] She studies Marrick for a long moment, and then smirk slightly. She reaches back to take her keys, and shoves them into her pocket, before hopping up to sit on the counter and take a bite of her sandwich too.
“Imagine it was easier for him – being as he can’t be too fuckin old. You’re what, 17? 18?” She shakes her head. “S’harder when ya older, set in your ways. I always knew, but John – well, he just fuckin’ found out within the last couple years, an’ it’s no fuckin’ picnic to learn the war you thought you were fighting? Wasn’t the real war at all.”
[Marrick] “Nah way, man, he works vice,” she says as she hops herself onto the counter. The Fury holds the sandwich in one hand, beer in another, and starts talking, “you know what that shit does to people on this side, but the other side? Desperation, addiction, pain, suffering, the kinda shit that comes around with crime? Becomes more solid than a gang. It’s scary shit.”
She takes another bite.
“Fightin’ a fire by refusin’ to give it air.”
[Izzy Montoya] She smirks, and reaches into her pocket, and pulls out her badge, flipping it open so Marrick can see it. “No shit, sherlock.” but there’s no real emotion behind it. She’s not talking down to her, just pointing out that she knows, both sides, extremely well. She shoves her badge back into her jacket, and takes another bite.
“It’s all scary shit. Those of us in Vice get a double dose – more than jus’ kin, but all the same. And all I hear from you fuckers – present company excluded, so far- is that’ it’s war” she makes a face and waggles her fingers like one would telling a story to a child. “Like we ain’t fuckin’ know it.”
She pauses, and swallows her mouthful with the aid of her beer, then uses the back of her hand to cover her mouth as she belches. “S’all fucked up shit. But we still do it. On both sides. Hopefully I can fuckin help John get a handle on it too.”
[Marrick] “What I’m sayin’, is what y’all are doin’ is fightin’th’real war. By dealin’ with shit in the real world, yer makin’ the umbra less scary an’ shit. ‘s real badass an’ al that. People who don’t think kin are fightin’ it are dumbasses.”
Bite. Chew. Swallow.
[Izzy Montoya] She chuckles, wryly. “Lotta fuckin’ dumbasses round here, then.”
She takes a bite, and is quiet as she takes the time to chew, swallow. “So what’s your story?” A beat. “Full moon, if my guess is right…”
[Marrick] “Nope,” she tells her, “PMSing Ragabash.”
She can’t even say it with a straight face.
[Izzy Montoya] Blink. And then she’s laughing – truly laughing. It takes a few moments to recover, being as it almost made her choke on her sandwich. She coughs, and shakes her head, until she can finally wash it down with her beer. Another minute later, and she just chuckles.
“You’re ok, kid. You really are.”
[Marrick] “Yeah, Black Fury Full Moon,” she admits with a small amount of pride. The Fury takes another bite of sandwich and seems quietly satisfied by this. “An’ I’m pretty sure you gotta get sick of people fawnin’ over yer Fenrirdom all the time.”
[Izzy Montoya] She snorts, and nods. “Ya get used to it, but it’s still a pain in the ass. Just yesterday some dude rattled off my linage after demanding my name, and my parents. Everyone around was all ‘oooooh aaaahhh impressive’ and I’m like motherfucker, let me prove myself on my own fuckin’ terms, you know? I’m more than just the decendent of some big fuckin’ Fenrir.”
She lifts a shoulder in a shrug. “Comes with the territory, I guess.”
[Marrick] She looks at Izzy for the longest time, and puts one hand on top of the other, so that her thumbs are facing in opposite directions. she twiddles her thumbs in clockwise motions for a second. This, ladies an gentlemen, is what we call the awkward turtle. The awkward turtle makes its appearance when things are so uncomfortable that words do not describe.
Congratulations, Ms. Montoya, you have invoked the spirit of the awkward turtle.
[Izzy Montoya] She blinks. Looks at the hands, and back up to meet Marrick’s eyes, then back down again.
“…the fuck is that?”
[Marrick] “Awkward turtle.”
She says definitively.
“You ain’t been around high schools much, have you?”
[Izzy Montoya] “…awkward…turtle.” She snorts, and shakes her head. “Not in a decade or so. Least not if I can help it – didn’t like it when I had to be there, ain’t like it much now that I don’t gotta be there. Spend time doing busts while I was a beat cop, but vice has bigger fish to fry that…. awkward turtle toting teenagers.”
[Marrick] It was her turn to laugh, and she did. It was full bodied, and pleased. To say the least, it was a sound that seemed to fit her, date her at an age more appropriate than the one she was functioning at from time to time.
[Izzy Montoya] She grins, and takes a last bite of her sandwich, chewing as she drops her plate into the sink. She runs her hand through her hair, and then tips the bottle back again, finishing it off.
“Gettin a place close to here was a GENIUS idea. I may never have to cook again.”
[Marrick] “Coltrane’s are decent folks. The food here’s pretty good, help out when ya can, place is open when it’s open. Damned good roast beef here, too… an’, well, if you’re ever in Lake View near Oz Park… well.. that’s La Familia territory, we can hook you up with somethin’ decent.”
[Izzy Montoya] “I’ll drop a twenty in the box on my way out. I can’t cook worth shit.”
She nods, slightly, tucking away the bit of info. “La Familia, huh? I’ll keep that in mind. My place is over on Fullerton.” She digs in her pocket, this time not for her badge, but for the little case that holds her business cards. She fishes one out and then offers it to Marrick. “In case you need anything.”
[Marrick] She takes her card, holding it between her fingertips as she looked it over. Her hand grazed the pretty letters as she read over it. She almost forgot about the peanut butter in her hair, really. The Fury slipped the card into her pocket, took a drag off her beer, and went to try and get the viscera out of her locks yet again.
“I’ll call you, I’m a four-oh-fiver so, if you get an outta state call, it’s prob’bly me.”
[Izzy Montoya] She nods. “Good. Good luck with the hair.”
She dusts off her hands, makes a little swipe at the counter, before she digs a $20 out of her pocket and heads toward the door. “Take care, Marrick.”
She drops the cash in the donation box, and lets herself out again. She’s got work to do still.
[Marrick] She gives her an upward nod, looking up fromt he sink briefly.
“Keep safe, Izzy, see ya ’round.”