[Joss Lehrer] It’s not been a good day for Joss. Each day, each week, it seems that Chicago is determined to steal her smile by doing the unthinkable and killing her friends, one by one by one. Today, she doesn’t go to the park, she doesn’t go to the swingsets where she and Marrick had talked and played tag with many others of the Sept, she doesn’t go anywhere that might remind her of her loss.
…but everything reminds her. And so, instead, she is crouched just inside an alleyway, her skirts gathered around her knees, her dreads falling thick and heavy around her shoulders, as she tosses something to the ground, studies it, scoops them back up and tosses them again in frustration.
The Runes have told her nothing.
[Wendy Berber] *She’d taken the morning off. Then she’d taken the afternoon off. Then she’d called in to work and promised to be there for the late shift. That was three hours ago. Wendy Berber had yet to touch a computer. Yet to look at a line of code. Yet to attend to her Gaia-given fiscal obligations as glasswalker kin. She was in Cabrini. Not where she should be. The moon was full over head. Marrick’s moon. Marrick wasn’t where she should be either. It was enough to have the skinny kin draw back a stork leg and kick a can hard down the street, a hard sniff as the aluminum clanks and clatters, echoing as it bounces into an alley. Wendy scrubs under her her glasses with a cold hand. She’d forgot her mitts somewhere between the cafe where she’d had no stomach for her hot chocolate, and the hobo she’d blindly given a ten dollar bill.*
[Joss Lehrer]
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 1, 7, 8, 8, 9, 9 (Success x 3 at target 8)
[Joss Lehrer] She gathers, and she stops, and just holds the Rune bones in her hand. They were made traditionally, they were carved from the bones of her enemies, cleansed and carved with careful precision, charged with her own spiritual essence, and lovingly kept in a specially made velvet bag. She stifles a soft cry, her eyes closing as she holds the stones to her forehead, as she raps her knuckles against her skull once, twice, three times…
Then she takes a breath, and throws them one more time, her dark eyes searching for anything, for any explanation, for any warning of what’s coming next, for what she must next endure.
The skittering of a can nearby pulls her attention away, and she looks up at Wendy, down to her runes again, then up once more. “Wendy?”
Dice Rolled:[ 4 d10 ] 3, 7, 8, 10 (Success x 2 at target 8)
[Wendy Berber] *Wendy jerks up short as she’s addressed, kin suddenly stock still. Glasses crooked and fogged with the moisture of hot tears, the spindly kin is unsure who’s calling her. Both hands come away from her face and ball into bony fists at her sides as she stammers accusingly.*
Wh-wh-who’s there?
[Joss Lehrer] “It’s just me, Wendy. S’Joss.” Her voice is soft, though only in volume – as it sounds like she’s been crying, too, like even her voice has lost the power to remain strong in the past weeks. It was bad before, but then Evan, now Marrick.
She returns her gaze to the Runes before her and furrows her brow slightly, as she reaches to nudge them into an order that only makes sense to her..
[Wendy Berber] *Boy’s scrawny mate scrubs her eyes, adjusts her specs, and approaches. Her body falling into a leggy heap beside the Godi, as though she just didn’t have the gumption necessary to control her limbs like she should. Her satchel of books clunks uncomfortable against a narrow hip, pudgy swell of her stomach testing the buttons of her ugly tweed coat. Her head ducks as she studies the runes dispassionately.*
Hey Joss.
[Joss Lehrer] She chews on her lower lip, though she pulls her eyes away from the Runes before her as she collapses next to her. Blue eyes slide over her form, noting the pudgy swell of her belly, and the evidence of tears. She sighs softly, and reaches out to touch Wendy’s shoulder gently, her fingers sliding over and squeezing slightly in shared misery, understanding, before she drops her hand and pokes at the Runes again.
“Something’s coming. Marrick believed it was, knew it was and I knew she was right. Something’s coming soon. Just the beginning, though – there’s far more in the distance…”
Resigned. Tired. Wounded deep in her soul, where no Mother’s touch can heal.
[Wendy Berber] *Wendy’s mouth twitches. Its something, but whether an attempt at a smile or a grimace is never to be established. Too fleeting an effort at anything but sorry. Glasses taken off, halfheartedly cleaned on her sleeve, the tall kin squints at Joss’s blurry figure a moment. A sniff as wet lashes blink against the cold.*
Marrick’s smart. S-So much smarter than she thinks she is. Just..
*Just not smart enough to get the hell out of the way. Too damn stubborn. Too determined to do whats right instead of whats smart. Maybe.. Maybe Marrick wasn’t so smart afterall. Wendy huffs and shoves her glasses back on.*
[Joss Lehrer] She nods, slightly, and then scoops the up the Runes and dribbles them into the small bag one by one. “She is.”
Not was. She can’t say was. She can’t admit she’s gone, not yet. She can’t show up on Imogen’s doorstep again, wasted and broken and unable to stand the way she was with Evan. She has to be strong for those Marrick left behind – for Boy, for Wendy, for Doodle.
“You guys… you…” No, Joss, they’re not alright – anymore than Joss is… “..anything I can help with?” better. barely.
[Wendy Berber] *Wendy shakes her head. Stops. Thinks. Shakes her head once more. Stares at her knees and whispers.*
No flame of phoenix to make this right.
[Joss Lehrer] She nods, and sighs. “I know.” She reaches for Wendy and squeezes her shoulder again, and then. “You need Boy. I’m gonna go and stand watch for a while so he can come to you.”
She nods. There will be no talking her out of it, either. Marrick would want her to be stubborn in this – not that she wouldn’t be anyway…
[Wendy Berber] *Wendy looks to Joss, half hopeful for a moment before her narrow features crumple in confusion.* He c-can’t leave the bawn until n-next moot. He’s.. b-b-being p-p–puh..
*Thats all the kin can manage before its broken off in a sob, head buried in her knees as thin shoulders shake.*
[Joss Lehrer] And she tucks her Rune bag into her Godi bag, and turns to wrap her arms around Wendy, holding her close. “Shh. I know. I don’t care. I’ll stand watch, and we’ll bring you to the edge of the Bawn. I’ll send Boy to you. Shhhh. He’ll need you as much as you need him, and if I have too I’ll beat eveyrone’s ass into submission until I get him to you.”
There’s the steel of Fenrir in her voice, in her tone, in her spine. It’s as good as done.
[Wendy Berber] *Small sharp gasps of breath as Wendy’s hugged close. She’s like hugging a bag of bones, all the weight she’d dutifully packed on having fallen off, absorbed by recent grieving and the demands of an ever growing baby. A deep shuddering draw of air, kin making to speak, failing, and trying again, voice muffled by her knees.*
Th-through the fence.. would it b-b-be.. o-k-kay.. Doodle.. d-doodle.. I think he’s –
*And whatever she thinks Doodle is or isn’t is lost to a fresh torrent of salty tears.*
[Joss Lehrer] “No – it’s not ok. I’ll get him outside to hold you, Wendy. It’ll happen, and it’ll be ok.”
Then she mentions Doodle, and Joss sighs softly. “I’ll look for him after. Ok? I’ll do what I can to find him and bring him home.”
[Wendy Berber] All of his stu-stuffs.. all gone. *She whispers, sniffling her way to coherence once again. She flings her glasses off with little care as to where they land. They were mostly tape already, who cared if they broke apart again?* He d-didn’t take the rats. The rats aren’t gone. But m-maybe the rats.. the one that k-kept the w-wuh-weaver out. I..
*A hard sniff as she sits up and rubs her eyes again. Practical matters at hand, it was easier to think on those. *
I should shut off the in-in-internet.
[Joss Lehrer] She sighs softly, and nods. “I’ll talk to the Rats, and send one searching. I’ll also make sure they’re fed so that they stay at the packhouse, and keep protecting you. I know you need the internet for work, so keep it on. I’ll see to it.”
It’s not her pack, not her pack house, it’s true, but she was Marrick’s friend, and Boy isn’t able to be there. “I’ll run it past Boy first, then see to it the house is as safe for you and the baby as I can make it.”
[Wendy Berber] *Joss is hugged. Genuinely hugged. Wendy shaking her head. It wasn’t Joss’s pack. Wendy wasn’t Joss’s kin. She was the kin of a dead Fury, an imprisoned Uktena, an MIA Gnawer, and an absent Fianna. Still, she hugs the Godi with spindly arms circling so tightly they shake.* I’m sorry. S’not fair.
[Joss Lehrer] “I know. It’s not. Too.. too many…” she trails off, unable to finish the sentence, unable to face all the friends names she’s lost. Its bad enough they haunt her sleep.
So she does what she can do.
She hugs the skinny kin close, and nods with a soft sigh. “And if you need a safe place, you can come to the Eagle Packhouse for a while. I know it’s safe there. Don’t be scared to call me, for anything, alright?”
[Wendy Berber] OK.
*Wendy wipes her nose, looking to Joss with red rimmed, squinty eyes. Hugging the Godi like she hugged few Garou, outside of Doodle and her mate. She’d remain like that until the cold seeped through her tweed jacket and settled deep in her bones. Before pulling away.*
…Should go home. See if ..
*What? If Doodle was there? She sniffs again and begins to pat around for her discarded glasses.*
[Joss Lehrer] She nods, and then reaches down to pick up Wendy’s glasses and hands them to her.
“Alright.” She stands, and helps Wendy to her feet once she’s put her glasses on, and smiles up at the taller Kin. It’s a shaky thing, that smile, but it exists – she makes it so. “I’ll let you know as soon as I can get Boy to the edge of the Bawn, and come get you first, ok? You have my number. You call. For anything – even late night pickle and cookie cravings.”
She carries the next generation, and does so despite how terrified it all is to her – that makes Wendy nothing short a hero in Joss’ book.
[Wendy Berber] K *The ghost of a smile to the shorter theurge. Wendy swallows hard, balancing tear streaked spectacles on her long nose and nodding. Spindly hands reach timidly to Joss’s and squeeze. Not reassurance. Not thank you. But in quiet commiseration. Another nod, and she’s on her way.* T-thanks J-Joss.
[Joss Lehrer] She returns that squeeze of her hand, and then watches Wendy go, until she turns back to the alleyway, to where she had been casting her Runes, then to the streets themselves. She pushes her dreads back, tucks her hands into her pockets, and starts walking – it’s time for Patrols, and then she’ll see to the Familia packhouse, Wendy and Boy.