And Then There Will be Pancakes and Grief Counseling

Grace Evans
Grace's apartment complex is one of those types with electric locks. One must be buzzed in, however, most people can bypass that requirement by simply asking one of the (young, naive) students who live there to be let in. It's a fairly busy place in the middle of the day.

Grace herself is within, and if Kalen is aware enough, he can feel her presence -- that shifting sliding sensation that she is. Weak, but there.

Her apartment has one of the smallest floor plans this complex allows. It's little more than a dorm room, really, with a tiny kitchen and one small alcove off to the side for a bed. It's very clean, very white, very plain. What furniture exists is mismatched and obviously chosen for its practical use instead of form. There's no art on the walls, or even rugs on the floor. It's almost as if this is a place to exist, not a home.

Grace is lying in that bed, reading her Kindle. She spent the start of the day at one of the computer labs on campus ordering new equipment, but it won't be here for entirely too long. So instead of distracting herself with work, she distracts herself with fiction. Escapism exists for a reason.

Kalen Holliday
Kalen does drift in with the other students, because that is the most expedient way to get in.  He moves through the building until he finds the right room number, and then knocks lightly on her door.  He's dressed to blend into the students, jeans and a tawny gold hoodie, nothing particularly attention-catching.  Except, well, his Resonance.  And the way he moves through the halls like some kind of predatory cat, a hobbled predatory cat perhaps, but a predatory cat all the same.

Grace Evans
[Perception + Awareness = Does she sense Kalen?]
Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 4, 7) ( success x 1 )

Grace Evans
She's reading Dune for about the fortieth time perhaps. Liet Kynes is dying in the desert for that fortieth time now, leeching his water into the parched sand, his dream dying along with him. She knows how the end goes, but this part is harder to get through now.

And then she feels the oncoming storm of Kalen, the promise of rain, and for a moment she has hope for Kynes.

She shakes her head, slips out of her chair, and heads for the door, unlocks it, opens it...

Grace looks like shit, honestly. Pale and grayish, a bit thinner than normal. There are sores on her arm that look like they were gouged out by her own hands. She hasn't been sleeping well, and her eyes are dull things. Her mouth a line scratched into her face.

She's wearing jeans and a sweater that doesn't quite cover those sores, and fuzzy pink socks that look incredibly out of place on that drained girl.

"Hi," she says, but there's no mirth there. No smile to greet him.

Kalen Holliday
[Speaking of sleeping!]
Dice: 5 d10 TN7 (2, 3, 3, 7, 10) ( success x 2 )

Kalen Holliday
Two years ago, Kalen would already have caught her to steady her.  Because he could.

No.  Two years ago, Kalen wouldn't have been quite so attached to Grace.  He would not be here at all.  Not because he didn't care at all, but because then Kalen had so many more people.  He would have sent flowers or something.  Sent a message indicating he would get her access to any chantry resources he could should she need them.  It would have been very polite.  It would have been less personal for all Kalen was less distant.

He would have.  Because he could.  If he had seen her.  Which he would not have.

There are possible worlds where they met years ago.  Where they both stayed in Arizona and met somewhere else and he never cared like this and it was easier and calmer and then one of them died.  Bled out in the sand.  And it was nothing but a footnote.  A moment in time.

They met here.  Now.  And Kalen knows, because he cannot help but know, that somewhere there are possible worlds where she died.  They radiate outward around some central hub like snowflakes and spreading frost and snail shells and rose petals.

And here -now- all Kalen says is, "Hi."

It sounds like less than all those things that might have been.  And it is completely the opposite.

He has to clear his throat before he can add, disapproval blunted by seeing her alive but so obviously not well, "Your building security is appalling."

Grace Evans
"Yeah, well..." she trails off. She knows the security in the building. But still, this place feels safe. Safer than outside, that's for sure. "You want to come in?" she offers, standing aside.

"I'm not contagious anymore," she adds, as though Kalen might even care. "The virus is gone."

Kalen Holliday
Kalen doesn't answer the question directly, but he does step into the tiny apartment.  He looks it over slowly, the mismatched but highly functional furniture, the lack of decoration, the tiny kitchen.

"Which is good."  He settles, carefully, onto a chair.  He leaves her the bed.  "I am sorry I couldn't come until now."

Grace Evans
"Oh, don't be sorry. I tried to keep everybody away. I didn't want to spread it around," she says. "I would have just told you to leave."

She wanders into the room after him, once she's done locking the door again. Slips onto her bed, cross-legged and curled-in.

"So, um... what's new with you?"

Oh, the pretense at normalcy. She's trying hard. But she picks at one of those sores with her fingernail before realizing that she's doing it. Crosses her arms after, to keep herself from it.

Kalen Holliday
"I found lots of information about Umberto Montanari and the Thakinyan.  Some information about the family.  You think you feel up to research soon?  I can remember I was half mad while I could barely get out of bed for anything.  Or...I could probably make other offers, I don't know.  Games?  I didn't really do much but really goal-oriented things or research.  I may not really know what to do here."

He shrugs, and smiles a little.  "Most of the Mages in Denver continue to be indifferent toward me.  Sid still seems to hate me, and I honestly don't even know why.  Shoshannah and I talked very carefully about why we shouldn't date, and she doesn't hate me but that's a little strained now.  Garrett's been my adopted father for the better part of a decade, but I think he's mad at me right now.  Shoshannah and I met a new Mage, at least to Denver just recently.

"And...that is my life.  Monster hunting and not really being great at having friends."  He seems amused, mostly.  Maybe, maybe, under layers of distance and amusement and more space...wistful.

Grace Evans
She listens, grateful for the news, for the reprieve in thinking about what happened to her. Imagine being Kalen, and having 'normal' things to deal with. Social problems and research and meeting new people. Yes.

"I can't really research anything right now. I'd have to use the college computers, and I'm not doing that with Montanari stuff." If Kalen notices, her laptop and her phone are on her desk, but she doesn't explain why she can't use them.

"Sid... I don't know. She saved us, you know? She's amazing. Just, might be a good idea to stay away for a while. Give her space."

Kalen Holliday
"I don't ever chase her.  She's just never been fond of me.  I didn't realize just how much that was true until the other day."  What the hell happened there?

"So...not using those?"  He waves at the laptop and the phone.

Grace Evans
"They're very dead," she says. Sighs.

In her replaying memory, a man uses his last words to tell her exactly how he wanted everyone in the world to die, and a woman fries every piece of electronic equipment in the building -- including the chips in their brains. They're very dead.

She curls that body up a little more.

"We had to go to this lab to get Sera and Lena out. They'd been imprisoned. There was a... thing there... it popped all the electronics in the area."

Kalen Holliday
Kalen sighs.  Frowns.  And then, because Kalen is better at actions half the time, he rises slowly, crosses the mercifully short distance between them, and carefully tugs the blankets up to rest around Grace's shoulders.

"I'm sorry it was difficult for you.  I was...my childhood lent itself to this.  And I had training.  I can't imagine what it would be like to have a relatively normal life and suddenly be forced to deal with all of this."

Grace Evans
When he gets close, Grace starts to look a bit uncomfortable, though she tries to hide it. Twitchy, like holding herself back from leaning away. But he doesn't try to hug her, or something equally horrible. Just pulls the blankets up around her, and that's okay.

"Kalen, I don't know... even with your training..." she trails off. "How do you train for something like that?"
She's asking herself, really. Kalen doesn't even know what 'something like that' could be.

Kalen Holliday
"If you want specifics, you'll have to tell me what happened."  He retreats back to where he was sitting and carefully resettles.  "And, if not with me, you probably should talk about it with someone.  If...it is not easy.  I do understand that.  Even if you just talk to someone who was there, where you don't have to explain what happened, just how you're processing it."

Grace Evans
She stares at the wall for a bit, processing who she might talk to about everything.

Sera? Sera's a mess. Lena's worse. But of course, they spent days down in that pit, being tortured. If anything, she should be listening to them.

Sid is probably the only one that went through it that she could talk to.

But Kalen's here. And he already knows some of it.

"Well... ahh... You know I was kind of out of it for a while. The blood hallucinations, right? They got worse before the end. I didn't really update Ginger much on that particular symptom. It's hard to explain how you keep experiencing your death over and over again."

She swallows hard, before continuing. "Are you sure you want to know specifics here? It wasn't like... normal dying. Think... vivisection."

Kalen Holliday
"I will tell you about my childhood and then my training and then you will understand better why this is, but you can discuss such things in as vivid and graphic detail as you see fit.  It will have little enough effect."

Grace Evans
She scratches her face, her neck.

"I uh... In one of them, I gave birth to a bunch of worms, and they started eating me, crawling under my skin. I tried to claw them out." she tilts her head to the side, as if to say, that really didn't work.

"Just... things like that. You know. And then, Sid found the cure to it, and we were both doing so much better. I kept thinking about Lena and Sera off in some lab somewhere, not surrounded by friends, and not getting better. Kalen, they're... I don't know if Lena's going to be okay."

Kalen Holliday
Kalen listens.  He does not look horrified.  He is not generally the person to come to if you want someone to let their eyes widen with some sort of shared trauma. If you want someone to cry with you.

But if you want someone who won't lose it, basically no matter what you say.  "Physically or mentally, for Lena?"  He asks, and his voice is gentle.

Grace Evans
"Yes."

She lowers her head. Lena's isn't her story to tell. But she's worried about them all, even Sid, who'd been spared so much.

"We almost didn't get there in time. One more day, and..."

Oh God, the thought of them finding Sera too late, of her melting like bloody wax out onto the floor...

Kalen Holliday
"People are stronger than you might think, Kit.  Look at me."  He waits, and then smiles a little if she does look at him.  He continues whether she does or does not.  "I know you must have been afraid.  For you.  For them.  I know it isn't going to feel like it's over for some time.  Maybe there will be things for at least of you that linger forever like scars that you feel instead of see.

"But you found a cure.  You are healing.  That is what people do.  However impossible it seems.  Whatever the odds are.  You are alive now.  You can recover."

Grace Evans
There is a bit of comfort in this, isn't there? Kalen's not the touchy-feely type to get all worked up over what she has to say, and that's just perfect. If he'd been squeamish or reacted badly, she'd feel bad.

But no, he calls her that nickname, and she looks up at him, and he's smiling at her with one of those rare Kalen smiles that she once joked would break his face (he should be careful). She doesn't return it, but she does nod at him when he says that recovery is possible.

"I know. I didn't have any hope for the longest time, and now I'm thinking about going back to class tomorrow. I missed all my midterms, and I'm going to be drowning in homework. But it's like, that kind of thing, that would have horrified me before. Now it's just like, eh. I'm not drowning in blood. At least there's that."

Kalen Holliday
"So, you asked what would prepare you for something like this."  He sighs, smiles a little, but this is forced.  "I never knew my father, I don't even know his name.  Considering the parade of men my mother had through the house though, I doubt I missed much.  She was never really interested in me or my sister, and even when we were very young we learned it was better to be out of the house than in it.

"We went out exploring one day.  I was six and she was nine.  She thought that ice skaters looked like princesses and so we tried to ice skate in our shoes on this pond.  Which would be a charming story if we hadn't fallen through the ice.  I was pulled out of the pond, barely in time.  She drowned.

"I was on my own after that.  It was much better still, to be out of the house.  I was young, and I was small, and I was weak - at least compared to most of the other kids around.  And I was alone.  So, I learned to hide. I found places to crawl into sewers and I found abandoned buildings and abandoned rooms in used buildings and places that I knew that no one else did.

"I went home less and less.  And then, eventually, not long after I turned sixteen, I didn't go home at all.  I wasn't alone then, I met Kharisma and Jack the night I Awakened, when I was fourteen.  They spent the next two years training me to do various things.  I mean, I learned a lot about magic from them, but I learned forgery from Jack.  How to hotwire cars.  Useful little life lessons."  He does smile a little there.

"They blew town when I was sixteen, which is when they introduced me to Marcellus, who was my mentor in the Order.  I met Garrett around then, he visited my chantry fairly often, he had very close friends there."
Kalen sighs again.  "So, I was trained to hunt monsters.  About history and the occult.  I learned a lot of practical skills there.  And then, I learned what it was like to belong in a place.  With people.  To have a family.  And then someone blew it up.  Almost everyone died.  As far as I know, only Jenna and I are alive."  He swallows.  "There could be others.  We were presumed dead, and that made it easier to run.  So I did, for a year.  Even Garrett didn't know I was alive until he ran into me here.

"So, I'm good at hunting monsters, Kit.  I'm good at stalking them and killing them and remaining dispassionate enough to stare straight at death.  But the thing is, you're going back to a life that I can't imagine.  Something, not normal, I guess.  Because after this nothing really is.  But, you point out how this changes your life, how it reorients things.  I don't have anything to go back to.  I have only this.

"That is how you get prepared.  I'm not sure that you should, Kit.  It isn't what I would want for you."

Grace Evans
She doesn't talk about her childhood much with anyone. But the way Kalen describes it, he escaped to a Chantry, and she escaped to a University, and she sincerely hopes that nobody goes and blows up UC Denver.

"Kalen, you're scaring me. I just found out what it's like to belong in a place too," she says. "Someplace where people don't find me so weird, because they're all weird, and they don't care. I've only been Awake for a few months, and I already have friends, good friends."

She looked up again, at him for one of those rare moments of eye-contact. "I don't want to lose them. I almost did. Just... Things were so good, for a while."

Kalen Holliday
"That isn't the most common experience.  I promise you that.  It is relatively rare for chantries to fall.  And, yes, you almost lost some friends.  You almost died.  But you are alive, and they are alive.  I know that it is very difficult to lose people.  I know that once you find people again it is terrifying to think of how you might lose them."

Kalen smiles again, haunted and faint maybe, but not forced.  "Things will be good again.  I promise, Kit.  You haven't lost everything.  We're all still here."

Grace Evans
"The Chantry here fell once already," she says, laying down some history for Kalen. "It was before I Awoke, but there's already been someone who came back and wanted to know where the hell all their friends were."
"We're all just kind of... cobbled together here. Newcomers. All of us."

She kind of unfolds herself a little, even though what she's talking about isn't all that great.

"You know. Those people who infected me. The virus, it started out targeted to only infect the Awakened. They were trying to kill all of us, everywhere. Just because of what we are... It never stops, does it?"

Kalen Holliday
There are a few seconds, just a few, where there is something pained in his eyes.  Sympathetic and wounded and so unlike anything Kalen lets people see it would seem wrong on his face if it weren't so completely unguarded.  Honest.  Real.

If he thought he could get away with it, he would hug her now.  He doesn't.

"You don't want things to stop.  Life is just a series of events, moments and seconds and the things that happen in them.  You don't want it to stop, you want it to change.  And it can.  That's what we're doing.  One thing, one moment, one second at a time.  That's what we're doing."

Grace Evans
Grace rolled her eyes at Kalen's emotional response. "You know what I mean. I'd just like to go a whole month without the world ending. Just one month. Would it be possible?"

"I'm not going to stop, Kalen. I promise."

Kalen Holliday
"Hey.  Don't look at it like that."  Kalen smiles.  "The world's always being saved.  Again and again.  Because people love it too much to give up hope.  And you're a part of that now.  When you look at them, at everything, remember it is here because we love it too much to give up, and before us, people loved it too much to give it up, and all around us people love it too much to give it up.  I bet it gets saved like seventy-five times a day.  Look at that.  Forget the rest.  It doesn't matter."

Grace Evans
"Seventy-five times a day?" she says, incredulous. Of course, he's (probably) exaggerating, but she didn't catch on. "How many horribly fucked up people are out there, that it needs saved..."

"Okay, yeah... okay..." she sighs. "I know the lesson I should be taking from this. Sid saved the day. She loved us to much to let us die. I should take comfort in that. Forget the Callums, remember the Sids. Right."

Kalen Holliday
"It's not easy, Kit.  I can't do it all the time.  I have nightmares.  Constantly."  His lips press together.  "I know so many ways that you can die.  So many ways that I can fail you.  Everyone.  Believe me, Kit.  I know how the world can be.  But you can't stay there and stay you.  So don't."

Grace Evans
Kalen's experiences, well... they aren't much of a comfort. He has nightmares, and knows the horrors of the world. But the comfort here is that he went through, well, whatever he went through, and made it across to the other side. And he's not crazy, at least, she doesn't think he is. Maybe a little.

"I'm going to try," she says. "Give me time."

"Thanks, for coming over. I did need to talk to someone."

Kalen Holliday
"Yeah.  You should...if you ever get to know him...Garrett.  He can help.  I know you might not want him to help you right now, but he has training.  He can talk to you.  If you want, he can...he can do other things.  You know, our kind of things.

"And, if you really think they need help, he can probably help Sera and Lena.  People who can do the things he can get a kinda scary reputation, but I trust almost no one and I trust him.  If he can help, he will.  He'll want to.  He's just...good."

Grace Evans
Her face kind of crinkles up. "Garrett? You mean Doctor Garrett, the blahsiblabla bani blahsibla von blah? I don't know, I couldn't keep up with all the names."

She licks her lips, realizing that Garrett is also Kalen's adoptive father, and maybe she shouldn't have been so flippant. Well, it's done now, anyway.

"Sorry. I just... Hermetics are kind of lengthy with the names, aren't they? He's not one of those kinds I'd just piss off, is he?"

Kalen Holliday
"He treats me like a son.  What does that tell you about that?"  Kalen smiles.  "Sometimes he is a little formal.  But mostly, he's just Garrett.  And, they aren't my stories to tell, but he's been through a lot too.  He still is, really.  He's raising his son on his own, he's in a new city where he knows almost no one, he lost two of his best friends a year ago when someone blew up my chantry.

"There are times he's formal.  There are some times he's really formal, but those have to do with codes and laws of the Order, you'll probably never see that.  He really cares about people though.  And...whatever you think of the Order and all its names and its traditions, he's in this to help people.  It's just who he is.  He'll judge when he has to, but he'd rather just teach and make you pancakes."

Grace Evans
"I don't really do well with formality. Pancakes, though..." she shrugs. Maybe a little of that old Grace comes shining through. And then she's back to closely inspecting her fingernails, a little shaky.

"I don't know if Sera or Lena would be... okay with him. Maybe Sera. She's okay with everybody, usually. I don't know. But, if you say he's a good guy, I'll believe you."

Kalen Holliday
"Well, what about this.  You can meet him, because it would be good for everyone I think if he had access to Ginger.  And you can see what you think then.  I..." He draws out the sound of the 'I' playfully.  "Will make sure it involves pancakes."

Grace Evans
"Kalen... I can't until... I lost all my gear. Ginger will have to wait for a while, until I can get it back. I ordered some stuff today, but it's not going to be here until next week."

She lost all of her important machines. Kindle's the only one left, and it reads books. Can't code on a Kindle. Can't Code either.

"I can't wait till next week. This sucks."

Kalen Holliday
"There isn't anything closer?"

Grace Evans
"What do you mean, closer?"

Kalen Holliday
Kalen shrugs.  "Aren't there stores that sell computers like...close by?  I would think that there are."

Grace Evans
"Well, okay, yeah I could go to the generic computer store and buy some piece of crap, or I could pick something out that's going to do what I need..."

She's got standards, basically. High ones. Her computers are Ferarris, don't you get it?

"I need a machine capable of rendering high resolution 3D spaces like that. You know, for my other software?"

Kalen Holliday
Kalen laughs, raising one hand in a lazy, playful defensive gesture.  "Okay.  I was just going to offer to go pick something up if there was something closer.  If they don't have what you need here and it will take that long, then I guess it will take that long."

Grace Evans
Grace looks like she's scanning the boundaries of the room with her eyes. She's thinking. "You know... If you're willing to just 'go pick something up' I know someone who could use it. You know, I get the thing for the week it's going to take me to get set up again, and then give it to her?"

"I mean, if you're okay with that. It would be nice if I could at least make sure my backups are good, and I could have Ginger abilities back."

She scans the room again. "Whitney. She's one of us. When she heard I was sick, she came over and took care of me for days. Slept in my computer chair. I told her if I didn't make it, she could have my laptop. Kinda... I feel like I owe her."

Yeah, Grace owes her, so she's going to use Kalen to pay her back? But whatever...

Kalen Holliday
"Sure.  Can you write down what you want, so I pick up something that you can use?  I know it won't be up to your usual standards, but at least you'll have whatever the next best thing we can get here is?"

Grace Evans
"Hmm... Not off the top of my head really. Asus isn't bad, I see a lot of them in my classes. So maybe one of them?" she fidgets in her nest of blankets. It's not like her to not have the answers. But she can't just Google anything right now.

Damnit. She can't just do anything right now.

"I'll pay you back. Just not right now..." she sighs. "I haven't been getting paid these past few weeks. I might have to beg to to get my job back. Luke wrote me a doctor's note, but... Toward the end, I wasn't exactly calling in every day."

Kalen Holliday
"Don't worry about it.  I'm pretty sure I can handle buying a computer."

Grace Evans
"Well, I'm sure you can..." she scratches her face again. "Just, you know, it's the principle?"

Kalen Holliday
"Ah.  Have I mentioned that being able to predict patterns in seemingly random things means I make pretty serious money on stock.  And I have other skills that will resume making me money as soon as I can move properly again.  Trust me, you shouldn't worry about it."

Grace Evans
"Really? Isn't that a bit... dangerous? Won't someone get suspicious that you're making a lot of really good bets?"

Someone, everyone, or the universe perhaps?

"But okay. I suppose you know what you're doing."

Kalen Holliday
"It's not as easy as you'd think to trace that.  Stocks aren't like Vegas bets.  Much quieter.  Less flashy.  Plus, the other jobs pay well.  Shouldn't be a thing."

Grace Evans
She nods. She's the novice here. And in any case... "Thanks."

"I mean it. for coming over, for the laptop, for everything. Makes me feel a little better."

Kalen Holliday
"You're welcome.  Why don't I go find you a laptop?  I'll be back soon."

Grace Evans
Grace tries a smile. It kind of works. "Okay."

She watches him leave, thankful that he didn't want her to go with. It's just not safe outside. Maybe he gets that, that she wouldn't want to go somewhere else just yet.

He's probably been there before.

And that's the thing about friends. They just know, don't they? Forget the Callums, remember the Sids, the Kalens, the Lukes. Look to the helpers. Until they're gone. The sharpness of the loss that Kalen must have felt...

She looks over to her Kindle, but decides that a nap might be better. Preferably one without dreams this time. Please, no dreams this time.