Welcome to Ginger, Lavinia

Grace
Hey. I have seen you around. I'm Grace. I got your number from Kalen. You want to get in on some things?

The text comes in on a Friday afternoon, the day after Lavinia faced down a horrible dog thing. She might indeed be wanting in on some things. Grace has yet to find out about the incident. Perhaps this invitation comes a little too late?

But whatever. It comes.

Lavinia
There was a text that came back. It wasn't immediate, of course. There were moments of good downtime, maybe fifteen minutes of whatever it was that Lavinia happened to be doing for the time being, and frankly who knew what it was that she did in the times that things. Maybe Lavinia was sleeping, and oddly enough that seemed to make sense. There were odd typos in her reply.

Sue, i want to di Thigs.

And then, shortly thereafter.

Fuck, blindtexting. I would love to do things. Location?

Lavinia rolled off the bed, stumbling to her dresser to grab some tights. Time to be presentable.

Grace
Come to Auraria Student Lofts, apartment 314. I'll meet you there. Bring your phone/computer/whatever.

Maybe a little cryptic, that? Okay. But it's Grace, right? Has Lavinia paid any attention to her? If so, it might make a bit of sense.

Grace arrives at her own apartment, and unlocks it for the first time in days. It's a bare-bones thing, not like her office. Nice to get away to sometimes, when she needs the blankness and solitude, or needs to pick up some clothes, but that's rare. And so, it sits empty the vast majority of the time.

There's a small table with a chair, and a bed in a little alcove. There's a tiny kitchen, too, off in a corner of the one big room. The only other rooms in this place are the closet and bathroom, which are only barely big enough to be called rooms.

It speaks the language of college student (or, perhaps, ascetic monk with bad taste in mismatched plastic furniture).

When Lavinia arrives, Grace will be set up with her laptop (bright, shiny, new and sleek, a sharp contrast to everything else around) at that little table, sitting on a box.

Lavinia
It was a little cryptic, and for that Lavinia was.. intrigued. Pleased, to say the least, but there was a sort of joy in finding someone who was going to be covert about things. She looked at her phone again, and got onward and outward to where she needed to be.

Lavinia showed up with tights on. Tights and a skirt that was short beyond measure, hammering in the fact that she is taller than the average man. She even has a couple inches on Kalen, and today she hasn't deigned to wear heels. There are combat boots. Legitimate, honest-to-God combat boots. Her constant companions.

It's into the apartment, not at all with a bit of judgment. Actually appraising, actually pleased with the surroundings. She drops a purse by the door. Phone comes out of her back pocket.

"What's the rent on this place like?"

Grace
"Cheap, but you could probably find cheaper farther from campus. I used to go to school here, so it made more sense," Grace says, and then swivels her her head over to get a better look.

Ahh. Much better. Not a suit this time. There's a bit of a relief, eh?

"So, welcome to Denver, eh? Have you been here long?"

Grace is clad in her usual jeans and t-shirt. The t-shirt is black, and has a penguin on the front, waving a red and black flag with the anarchy symbol on it. There's some text too, but unless you're of a certain persuasion, the jargon may as well be another language.

> kill -9 state

> rm -rf

/system/capitalism

# apt-get install anarchy

[t-shirt reference: http://www.wired.com/wp-content/uploads/blogs/wiredenterprise/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/capitalism.jpg]

Lavinia
"I came a few months back, work took my partner and me out of town. He settled down, I came back," she told Grace. She rolled her shoulders back and stood a tad hip-shot. There was a sort of early punk. The skirt wasn't short because she liked mini skirts, it was just because she was ungodly tall. The tights had holes. The shirt was torn up.

There was something about that, though. On first glance it's carefully cultivated disheveled mess. On second glance, the holes seem to be genuine and dressed up to be workable. The holes in her shirt? More than a couple looks like it survived a fight instead of just being cut up to look cute. She had a sports bra on, but Lavinia didn't have much to hold up.

"So I've been back for about a month? Did Jo tell you about what happened?"

Grace
Blink. Blink. Something happened? With Jo?

"No. Could you elaborate on that a bit?"

Grace looks around, seemingly at a wall.

"Oh yeah, and please do come in. Get comfortable. Mi casa es tu casa and all that shit."

Lavinia
"Basically," this isn't good. Nothing good ever happens when someone starts their sentence with basically, "we were in the park and there was a dog-that-wasn't-a-dog- twisted warped once-a-dog-but-corrupted-and-no-longer kind of thing. Comes at us, Jo keeps me from getting completely mauled, takes some damage. Thing dies, Ian comes and patches us up-"

a beat.

"Jo kept a corrupted physical monster from attacking by basically insulting it and throwing a bicycle at it. She means well, but that generally doesn't actually end well. I'm grateful? But seriously, don't throw bicycles."

She plops down in a nearby plastic chair.

Grace
"Ohh, geez," Grace says, rubs her eyes. Jo. "Well, I'm glad she's okay. She is okay, right?"

There's okay physically, and then then there's okay mentally. Ian patched them up? So don't worry about the one. The other?

"I'm going to have to teach her better techniques. I guess now, she knows why."

Lavinia
"Yeah," she said, "Ian made sure she was patched up, she's got a spine so that's... that's a pretty damn big deal. You can't teach someone that. She also asked for me to feed her ice cream in an apron. And I have no clue what a waifu is."

Grace
Grace snerks while staring at a spot just behind Lavinia's head. It really sounds like that, too. Snerk.

"Well, yeah, okay. That answers that question. Spine gets her props too. Just, you know, as you said, a bicycle is not really the appropriate weapon to wield when taking on a dog monster."

Oh, the strange things that come out of one's mouth when one is a Mage...

"A waifu, by the way, is another word for the target of your obsessive love for an anime character."

Okay. Adjust. Look at the person you're talking to, okay? Okay.

"Right. So, I did invite you here for a reason. You're a Traddie, right? Or at least not all hostile with us?"

Lavinia
"I'm a Disciple of the Celestial Chorus," she said. Unashamed, unabashed, proud even- and why shouldn't she be? "I'm with the Sisters of Gabrielle, we're an order charged with keeping care of the physical- actually, if you don't care, just say so. I won't keep you up with the details. Long story short, we're a martial order."

Grace
Oh, yay. A Chorister. But then, Pan wasn't too much of a little shit, and Kalen's a member of the Pretentious Little Shit's Club, yet he manages to stay sane. The labels people choose often don't come with every single piece of baggage.

Lavinia gets smiled at.

The t-shirt, by the way, was a test. A Technocrat would have been nonplussed, almost assuredly.

"I'm a Grand Hooptydoo of the Virtual Adepts. I'm an informational order. Speaking of which -- I have some for you. Chantry location, and a shit-ton of other goodies, should you wish for them."

Lavinia
[Perception+empathy- do I catch the Grace emotions?]

Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (2, 2, 6, 7, 7, 10) ( success x 4 )

Lavinia
"Hunting demons alone is a shitty hobby," she told Grace, "I'll take what I can get, I want someone to know to look for me if I die."

Chipper, but... not at all being anything other than serious. She wasn't being dramatic, over the top, in fact she was almost flippant- but there is an understanding there. A hope that someone really would notice if she died, just in case it is an unpleasant occasion.

Grace
[Manipulation + Subterfuge = nope, there was not just a slight disappointment that Lavinia is a Chorister...]

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

Grace
[She seems genuinely pleased, genuinely playful. She's rather unafraid of Lavinia, despite having felt her rather strong resonance before, so there's not a lot of watching her tongue or deferential respect there. Her needling, joking statements are how she speaks to friends and equals.

However, yes, there was a bit of a microexpression there -- a frown at the mention of the Chorus that could only mean a split second of disappointment, before she put her face back in order.]

Lavinia
She grinned, the expression pleased, "don't worry, I totally got over my convert all the things phase years ago."

Grace
"You sound just like Kalen. He's a Flambeau," she says, as though that should explain everything.

"And, I think you just found out that Denver is a happening place for hunting evil corrupted nasty things. We have a kind of underground communication system for that. Runs off of a hacked phone sex line, which I hope you're okay with. It's a place where nobody would look, right? But, it'll show up on your phone records that you enjoy dirty conversation.

"There is no actual porny stuff on the hacked version," Grace says, and is she blushing a little? Yup. "It's just our message drop stuff."

Lavinia
"Aw, no actual porny stuff? Well that kills half the fun of having a secret conversational line," her lips upturn and she's got a grin on her face, eyes dark like the space between the stars and bright and shining like torches. She's getting a bit of a tan, coming close to bronze or getting there. It seems to suit her, what with her golden halo of hair and a voice like a herald.

"It's a burner phone, if someone is checking my phone records I've done something wrong," she says as she produces her phone, "I think. And would it be weird to ask your friend to come hunt demons with me? Is that a thing? Or do I have to take people out to coffee first, normally someone else set up my war party play dates."

Grace
"I'm sure he would be thrilled. He likes investigating tunnels and abandoned places? And I'm pretty sure it's just so he can run into stuff that needs killed?"

She takes Lavinia's phone, looks it over for data ports, and rummages around in her laptop bag for the appropriate cord. "I do... have to install a piece of encryption software. I'm also not going to guarantee complete and utter safety. This setup has been designed to avoid people being able to easily track down the entire network of users, through various means. Encryption, obscurity, the fact that the hub never calls out, we are only calling it? But if somebody were truly truly relentless and skilled at Magicking it out... It could happen. Then again, dog-monsters could happen. Anything could, right? Right."

After finding the right cord, she pauses before connecting it to Lavinia's phone. After the safety spiel is done, Lavinia has to consent to the terms and conditions.

Lavinia
"Well, first off, abandoned places are gorgeous, and secondly things tend to pool there and there's this feeling of- well, it depends on why it's been abandoned. Anyway, totally loved checking out abandoned places with a posse," she watches as the other woman takes her phone. Listens to the spiel and waits. She does turn so that Grace is on her left side, so that she's where Lavinia can keep her full attention on her.

"So, more secure than most things, but not completely secure, use with caution and care. I agree that I won't do anything stupid intentionally."

Grace
"Well, that's the best policy, I find..."

Grace plugs in Lavinia's phone, and then gets to work. It's not a long, drawn-out endeavor, here. The process of installation has been streamlined and smoothed out so that hiccups can be avoided. She's had to do this a lot.

"Then, we'll uh... have to... explain how to get to the Chantry..."

And we're all done. Lavinia's phone gets unplugged, and Grace hands it back.

"It's out in Morrison. I wish there was someplace closer, but no such luck."

Lavinia
"Do you think I could crash there?" she asked a little more quickly than she realized she was asking. She cleared her throat, "generally when I blow into town, I crash at a chantry because I'm not staying but I'm staying this time and I'm kinda sick of living in a no tell motel."

Grace
"Oh, absolutely. I mean, you'd probably want to ask Annie first, but I'd be pissed if she said no," Grace says. "It's a really big house, there's lots of rooms. And a Node, and a library. It's pretty chill, if you don't mind the country living."

The address is discussed, as are the important landmarks. The mailbox. Thing is, the Chantry can be hard to find. All good Chantries are hard to find, of course. It makes sense.

Lavinia
"I wouldn't mind country living. Who knows, if I stick around for too long I might actually get to get my books out of the damn trunks," she informs Grace, "but whatever the case, if I'm staying I don't want to be in people's hair for too long. It's been a long time since I've sene a node."

Not true. It's been a long time that she's seen a node that wasn't attached to someone she had no desire to speak to, who she said in no uncertain terms that she never wanted to see him again. (Lies, all lies. Ezekiel or Eric or whatever she wanted to call him, Palmer. Whatever his name he wasPalmer and she was something that defied human lips and-

It was complicated. Suffice to say, she never wanted to see that person again, and therefore cut herself off from a pretty nice node in the northwest.

"Oh," she says, brows raised, smile lights up and there is a moment as if she finally remembered something, "I actually acquired a student, I don't know if you know her- Arionna?" No statement about how she is or how she interacts with people, "if she does anything that gets her into hot water, let me know?"

Grace
Grace's eyes pop open wide at the mention of Arionna. What. The. Fuck. That girl has a teacher? Does Lavinia have her chained up in the basement or something, and is calling that a mentorship?

"Really? Her? Uhh... Well, that's... Yeah. You're a saint, I think. If she does anything that gets her into hot water, it'll be on Ginger. Just so you know. If she becomes a threat to people, they have a right to know. Unless it's, you know, not that serious. Then, sure. Yeah. I'll just call you."

Lavinia
"Yeah," she says, matter of fact and completely unabashed. It was as if there was no question, as if there was nothing that was to say. She said it, solid and sound. She said it, like this wasn't something that she should shy away from and shudder and act embarrassed about. No, it's said with the same way that she said she was a member of the Chorus.

"And with anyone, if they become a threat to people then everyone does have a right to know. And if anyone becomes a threat to anyone else, I will be there to make sure that the problem is taken care of."

This isn't lip service.
This is the kind of taken care of that one only thought Chakravanti dealt in.

"I assumed that was just customary behaviors of where you are." No, Lavinia, having the guaranty that someone will kill you if you become a threat to the community at large on account of walking some unpleasant path is not normal.


Grace
"That's actually the best news I've ever heard about Arionna. I'm glad you're going to be there for her, in whatever capacity."

Because, you know, cleaning up after fallen Mages is not a fun and pleasant task. It never has been. And if Lavinia can keep it from happening entirely? Even better.

"It's not something I could do. Don't have the patience. That's for damn sure."

Lavinia
"I was a shit when I was an apprentice," she said matter-of-factly, "I definitely got more chances than I should have courtesy of good ol' fashioned nepotism. If I can have faith in an intangible, unknowable divine, then I can have faith in a tangible, knowable piece of it."

Grace
Grace has no faith in any divine. And yet, others do. And they're able to hack with that, and so be it. Still, she gets it -- Arionna bends the universe with her will, and that is not something that you should just throw to the winds. One could conceive of their skills as being a tangible, knowable piece of the divine, even if one does not believe in divinity. Gods, perhaps, for certain definitions of the term...

"Well, good luck with that. I'm extremely surprised she let anyone teach her anything. But yeah, go you. Major props."

Lavinia
"I feel bad for her," she laughed, "because I? Have never had a student until now. She has the unfortunate honor of being my guinea pig."

she crossed her legs and drew her attention to the ceiling. Stretched because she needed to stretch, "so... is there anything else I need? Sending you thank you texts? Loaning you library keys? Something?"

Grace
"Library keys?" Yeah, Lavinia mentioned books... "Actually, if you don't mind, I would like to get a look at your books. My partner and I have a digital library project going. We take books and scan them for the sake of sharing through a distributed network. So far, we have... uh... our books. And a few others. But we'd love to grow it."

Lavinia
"I've got it all packed up into a nice, viable format. Are you working primarily in English or does the language actually matter? A fair bit of it is in Greek as of the current. Greek and Latin and a little Arabic. The arabic is for personal purposes." Lavinia muses, "but once you want it let me know how long you'll have it."

Grace
"Language doesn't matter. It's for sharing. I'm sure some of the people who would eventually look through it would know Latin and Greek and Arabic. And I can always hook it up to a translation dealie, but those are never quite as good as you'd hope they'd be...

"I'll have to show you where we work sometime. Aside from the various projects, we also have a gun range, a bunch of nonperishable foodstuffs, thick doors, and a combat training arena, because some people like to be prepared."

Grace grins. Lavinia seems to be the kind of person who would not consider her crazy for such a statement, but would understand. Life's tough out here sometimes.

Lavinia
"You know the worst part of traveling?" she said, and it was a non question, because Lavinia was no doubt going to tell her the worst part about traveling, "the worst part about traveling is that you don't have people to practice with. It's being the perpetual army brat, from what I understand. Everything I've read says this is what other people who travel a lot do."

A beat.

"I'd show you where I work, but it consists of a car, a motel room, and my sister's attic. I'm lucky I have that. "

Grace
"Well, now you have our place too. If you ever need a safe place to crash that's closer than Morrison, or just need a lot of guns or backup fast? Well, we're usually around. And if I'm not around, I can be around -- quickly."

It's the welcome wagon, Lavinia. Here's your gift basket of ammo...