Pen

Grace
The African Grill & Bar is a nice-ish place. Well, okay, so it's rather aesthetically boring, but the food isn't. Grace doesn't care for aesthetics much anyway, as long as the purpose of the thing (obtaining food) is accomplished.

It's the kind of place an immigrant with some starter funding might set up. A rented building, whose very American walls are festooned with tiny reminders of the kind of place they came from. You see it all over. If this were a Korean restaurant, the shelves would be packed with little dolls in hanbok, even though the more common dress a Korean girl might wear in this day and age looks like something out of 50's Americana. Hanging up here are little leather purses and large wooden forks, masks, bows... African coded knickknacks.

And so it is that Grace is seated at a table by herself, two large bowls in front of her. When last she'd been at this tiny chain of two restaurants, Mike had opted for the vegetarian fare, and well -- fried sweet spiced plantains are really not horrible at all. He has good taste, she decides, after digging into one of the bowls.

The place isn't really hopping on a Sunday night. Saturday is when the musicians play, so most people stop by then. Grace isn't most people. She doesn't much care for crowds of strangers.

She also feels like a thrum of power. An earthquake perhaps, sliding the ground beneath your feet with a sharp jolt...

Pen
[Dice, a question. Will anybody with the sixth sense to feel earthquakepower feel it or will they be oblivious as f'? P + A. -2 for Ms. Grace's Arcane]

Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (2, 2, 3) ( fail )

Grace
[Nooo! Will Grace save the day with a finding of Pen?]

Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 4, 5, 6, 10) ( success x 2 )

Pen
There is a Virtual Adept (Mercurial Elite [Science Fiction Writer?]) in the corner. Remarkable, but often unremarked by the sleeping population and even sometimes that Mystery which can smudge away the details of her passage works on those who aren't asleep. The woman who opens the door to the African Bar & Grill and walks in is not a sleeper and looks nothing like anybody on a hunt. The woman appears to be in her mid-to-late twenties. Her jaw is strong, and her hair is braided into a coronet. The coronet is burnished a deep red a red that'll set a gray day afire. There is a glint of some metal thing in her hair, a chain with a stone. Her leather jacket is a autumn-leaf orange, zipped up and close. The collar is military and the cuffs are dramatic and there is a ring on every finger, even the thumbs, and her trousers are green and they disappear into oxblood doc martens (which serve as a place to hide things [of course. Some people have smart-phones and lap-tops and some people have things that get sheathed by boots]).

The door shuts behind her because she doesn't shut it and she is unzipping her jacket and seems to be one of those creatures who is calmly self-possessed: even though there is a newness to the way she takes in the African Bar & Grill, an open sort-of measuring, what is this place like, there's not even the slightest shiver of uncertainty: wait here? Wait where? Wait there? Just sit? Pen sweeps the African Bar & Grill with a glance and her eyes meet the host's or waiter's immediately and she tilts her head and flicks her eyebrows up in a question and the host or waiter comes over to tell Pen that she can take her pick of places to sit and to hand her a menu.

The woman is not a sleeper. The woman is a Mage, and she might like to be in the middle of an earthquake: might just dare it. This Mage's resonance is resplendent: is radiant glory, is a daring tempered only by the sort of passion that is a verb see ardent as a kiss as an ideal dearly held as the meaning behind dear as a spark as love.

Chance has brought her here, of course. Chance also sets her down at a table just one over from Grace's, although the African Bar & Grill is mostly empty.

Grace
A newcomer walks in, and Grace is the first one of them to figure out that she is a Newcomer. Capitalized for emphasis, for importance, you know? She gets a bored flick of the eye, a raised brow, and a satisfied crunch of spiced fried plantain.

But that's about all she gets.

There are rumors, you see? And there may have been a time when Grace was totally keen on walking up to the New in Denver and chatting them up like they're already old friends. Technocrats and monsters have driven away that drive. Still, this woman doesn't look or feel like either.

Instead, Grace pulls out her phone and unlocks it, gives the woman a side-eyed glance. Rings on every finger. Cuffs on the jacket. Loud, to go with the gloriousness of that resonance.

"Hi," she says, after a second of contemplation. Mouth's full of plantain, but she doesn't care. And she's loading up programs just in case Pen isn't the friendly type...

Pen
"Hello." Pen looks up from her menu and over at Grace when the Virtual Adept speaks. There are a number of ways to say hello to a stranger in a restaurant. Timidly: as if uncertain they're really speaking to you. Or draaaa-a-awling, as if, ugh, why are you speaking to me. That's not Pen.Cursorily: as if certain they're speaking to you and don't make eye contact don't invite don't open the door allow disinterest to be obvious bare recognition eyelash flick and end it. That's also not Pen. Bubbly!: a sudden fountain of enthusiasm, ending on a high note a query bubbly charisma.

That's still not Pen.

This is Pen, right?

The redhead answers with a hello that is (beguiling [a touch of welcome]) easy without being familiar and she doesn't look back at the menu immediately, but keeps her regard on the nondescript woman because hi never wants to be alone and maybe Grace is going to recommend her favourite food or something. Maybe she's just the kind of person who says hi when someone sits nearby and then they'll subside into mutual silence and understanding.

Beneath the coat, Pen's blouse is a pale rose-cream, peach-cream, something also warm; something utterly feminine. The light glints on the zipper of her leather jacket.

Grace
There's a sharp red coat slung over the back of Grace's chair, something far more expensive and eye-catching than the rest of her outfit, which consists of a grey turtleneck and jeans and sneakers. That is the clothing of choice for the one who likes to avoid attention. The turtleneck is bite-proof, for the sake of zombies and other things of the mostly-dead variety.

It's useful, you see?

"I haven't seen you before. Are you new to Denver?"

An odd sort of question for a Sleeper to ask. There's lots of people you get to see for the first time every day in a city the size of Denver. Not so much when it comes to the Awakened population.

Pen
"I am." The menu in Pen's left hand droops toward the table because the tension in her fingers changes. It makes that muted boomf sea-sound that all laminated menus make when they curve. There is a slick of hair that was never constrained by the coronet (bangs, too; thick and swept to one side), and it is a hook at her jaw and throat. Pen likes Grace's coat.

"Nice coat. Is altitude sickness the kind of myth one finds oneself grappling with after a drink or the kind of myth that dissolves like smoke upon examination?"

Pen has set her right elbow on the table and she rests her chin on the her thumb, her fingers curled inward against the side of her chin. Her eyebrows flick upward to punctuate the question.

Grace
"It bothers some people, sometimes. A little bit less oxygen, a little more dry air," Grace says, shrugs.

"Thanks. Um... Nice, uh..." she waves her finger in the air as if to encompass the whole of the other woman. "What you've got going on there."

Compliments exchanged. Okay, so maybe not enemytastic night at the African food place. Well, it could always change.

"This place is pretty good. Try the jerk goat stew."

Pen
"Jerk goat stew, hmm?" Pen looks back at the menu. Her posture is good; she does not slouch. But she lets her head tilt to the side, exposes more neck; a minute adjustment of her spine. Her leather jacket gapes at the back and there are chains around Pen's throat, too, three of them. She finds Jerk Goat Stew. "Would you join me?" Mid-way through the question she looks up from the menu again to (open [lucent]) find Grace's face again. Beat. "Or may I join you?"

Grace
"If you join me, I won't have to move my bowls," Grace says, and shrugs. Noncommital. Just, she doesn't want to move, but you can do whatever you like, stranger lady.

"If you'd like some vegetable samosas or kelewele, feel free," she adds. Some might think that's being incredibly friendly, but there's still something closed-off, waiting for Pen to prove herself a 'Crat or whatever. Grace just doesn't often think in terms of yours and mine. Sometimes, she has to let other people in on that frame-of-mind.

Pen
"Thank you." Noncommittal is not one of Pen's sins/virtues so she joins Grace's table. Places the menu down on its surface, and keeps her jacket on. The waiter returns as Pen is changing places and Pen orders a glass of pink moscato. Then Tuo Zaafi, the Chapatti, whatever the fuck that is. Then, yes, more food, why not also the Jerk Goat Stew. But what do you think the best thing is, waiter? That? Okay, that too. Pen has a refrigerator in desperate need of some left overs. Pen also has a kitchen that longs to be cooked in, but the kitchen can wait for the pots and pans to be unpacked. The kitchen may well be waiting for a very, very long time.

Having committed to a feast and to company, Pen settles. "Who do I have the pleasure to be speaking to? What do you find interesting about the world?"

Grace
Oh, good grief. Pen orders food the way Kalen orders food -- half the menu at a time. There's a growing smirk on her face as Pen orders and keeps ordering. And then... oh. Someone is speaking to her.

She considers. Who is she?

"Grace. And I find the world itself interesting. One of my primary studies, in fact, is what makes it all go 'tick'. But then, you probably already guessed that."

Pen
Brief interruption for Pen's drink brought by the waiter who is grinning a flash of white teeth. He pours the wine at the table twisting the bottle at the end so there are no drips. The twist follows the same geometric lines as a spiral at the center of a flower rose or a sea shell. There is mathematics everywhere: circles to circumnavigate. The waiter asks Grace if she'd like a refill or anything else and then vanishes.

During the mundane exchange, Pen's eyes have sharpened; have become more thoughtful. But then, you probably already guessed that. Mister Bond. Now release the laser sharks. Her glass looks filled with roseish light with some fairy drink. There's tension at the corners of her mouth; the beginning of a smile; rose-glow, and she picks up the glass once the waiter is gone.

Honest woman: "I hadn't yet guessed a thing. If you were spoken by the sphinx, the sphinx would still be speaking; I don't have a feel for you yet! What do you believe makes it all go 'tick'? Time?"

Grace
"Time? I can't say much about it. I suspect it doesn't exist in any real sense. Entropy's afterthought. An emergent property. Not sure yet," Grace says, and chomps down on some more fried plantain. And surely, this is not mundane conversation anymore.

If she realizes she's coming across as some kind of Bond villain, she doesn't let on.

Call it, testing the waters.

Come on, everybody here knows what everybody else is, right? The only question that really remains for Grace is what factions, who's friends with whom...

Pen
"Ha." The punctuation should be something between a period and an exclamation: time as entropy's afterthought. "Do you know Dylan Thomas? Your opinion calls to mind his poem 'the force that through the green fuse drives the flower.' The next lines are -- no, hold on." The fair-skinned woman closes her eyes for a flicker moment but doesn't keep them closed; her gaze has resolved into a distant thing when they're open again, pulling the words from her memory. "'The force that through the green fuse drives the flower drives my green age; that blasts the roots of trees is my destroyer.' Oh, the whole thing is so good."

Grace
"Oh, destroying is a part of it. So is creating. Doing. Anything doing. Time is the way we measure change. Entropy is that thing which..." she inhales. Thinks. How to put this in a way that isn't math. "It is a record of things as they change, in a way."

She ponders vegetable samosas, and lofts one into the air with a bit of sauce as though she were about to make a point utilizing food, but no -- she's just eating. And then talking without much consideration.

"It bothers me that so many can only see death and destruction in that green fuse, you know? Fuse, like it's a bomb waiting to go off. Says a lot about how we view the past, and the present, and the future. Like people would rather us stay stock still and in stasis than risk running across a fate."

A challenge issued, a shot across the bow to some Technocrat who might fear the future so much as to put it in chains? Maybe... She's also seeming to speak to her food rather than to Pen.

Pen
The stranger listens. Pale lake-sword eyes still and intent. Of course they're intent. The woman looks like some carved thing, some painted relic. The flamboyance is visible but restrained. How can flamboyance be restrained? The same way a flame can be restrained: to a candle wick or a brazier or a fire place a hearth a home. When she is intent she is balanced on the edge of that intentness, with interest but without judgment.

"Mn. I have an alternate proposition. A devil's advocate sort of position to change the connotation. Fuse. Like two lovers." Pen steeples her hands and then lets her fingers twine. "Fuse. A mingling or a transformation." Twists her palm thumbs wrapped one around the other fingers fanning out like birdwings. Shadow-puppetry. "Or fuse. Like an explosion, not a bomb." Make a fist. Make the fist explode. Wiggle of elegant long fingers. "Big bang. Stars. Universe. Expansion. The sort of fuse that drives 'my green age' might be the sort of fuse that is doing, right? I think the key might be 'drives.' Verb. Being a verb. Being driven out of stasis by this force that compells verbing."

Shift of tone. She isn't playing devil's advocate (poet laureate [almost was]) now. She's voicing an opinion. Hers? Probably. "I don't believe anybody really wants us to stay still and in stasis. Those who seem to are afraid and think that trying to be always the same is the best way to find security. And what's the point of security? What desire does it spring from?"

Grace
"It can be both. Poems, eh?" They often get to truths you can't easily say any other way.

She takes more spicy plantain, because she has decided it it the better of the two dishes, and why save for later what you could have now? It's crunchy.

"The desire behind that is to avoid pain. Oh. I suppose I can say it now, huh? I'm with the Mercurial Elite."

Because Pen does not strike her after this conversation as the type who would blink an eye at that and attempt to shoot her in the head. Precautions were taken, right? Now it's time to experience some change.

Pen
The waiter isn't approaching yet laden down with Pen's feast. They've another two or three minutes before that happens. Pen takes a sip of her fairy drink; sunset in a rose garden distilled into liquid. The taste is just sharp enough to make one think of frost or the late afternoon.

Mercurial Elite. The Virtual Adepts re-branded. Speaking of change, of the fuse that drives. The woman's eyebrows flick, but her response is simple.

"Listen to that. We ae linguistic cousins, then. Order of Hermes."

Grace
Oh. Well. There are a number of reasons why a new Hermetic might be in town, not all of them good reasons. There may come a day when Grace and this as-yet-unnamed woman will be arguing about why exactly she decided to come to Denver to start a war. Change is going to be, as it does. Humans like to put value judgments on change, but one thing in particular tends to stand out: war is bad, mmkay? Really, Grace wouldn't be against it entirely, if the Hermetics had a plan that stood a chance of succeeding.

Some people just want to watch everything burn. Some people with a fine control of Forces magick especially.

It's not going to be tonight.

For one, a public restaurant is not the place to get in a row about magickal wars and vampires and shit. Not without some heavy-duty mental fuzzing and possibly a sonic disruptor shield.

She chews. For once, without speaking.

"You should come by my place sometime. It's this office set up by a Flambeau. We can talk about things. Are you... staying in Denver long?"

Pen
Here is the food!

The waiter flashes another dazzling grin at the red-haired woman. Pen is not petite, mind. But she has a certain something, and the certain something does not imply packing away vast quantities of food of the sort that she has ordered. Before he goes, Pen asks him to tell her what each dish is, and then he is gone and the air is redolent of spice and meat and simmer.

"I hope to, and thank you for the invitation. What Flambeau set up your office?"

Grace
She waits until the 'mundane' conversation is finished, if one can call the discussion of food mundane. Grace's eyes flit from thing to thing in the feast, cataloging them for later trips.

And then? The waiter leaves, so Grace can return to business.

"Kalen. He's cool," she says, and narrows her eyes a bit while chewing. "But who are you? I mean, you've asked me two people's names so far. Should offer up one of your own?"

Pen
Kalen? The Hermetic Mage looks pensive, but the name does not seem to dredge recognition up from 'neath the lake.

"I go by Pen in our circles." No dismay or, oh, how silly; I forgot. No hesitation, or dishonesty, or arrogance; no argument or explanation. When she is asked a question, she answers it. Frank and forthright and without ornament. "Pen Mercury."

Grace
"Heh. Linguistic cousins. Yup," Grace says, shovels some more food into her mouth. Starting to run out of plantains. A pity.

"Kalen's down in Santiago right now, but I can show you around."

Kalen's the one who got her that coat. It must be why Pen likes it so much... Of course, Grace promptly sewed sensors and LEDs into the thing, because adding purpose to an item isn't ever bad, right?

Penny
Pen is not diminutive (and like most Mages gives the impression of being more present [beguile], being more [ardent & resplendent & daring it is a subtle note like a perfume some people don't even notice something that clings so closely to the skin mingling see with the body] than her inches), but she certainly does not look like she can pack away all of the food that she ordered. And she can't, but can't is the worst kind of spell if one just accepts can't as a barrier against what if and there is always the possibility of left overs. All of which to say she tries one of the lentilsy meatsy stewy dishes first, grease swimming a shimmer on sauce savory little spice imps practically building castles out of it. And a bite. Is it spicy? Her skin is naturally fair, as fair as some British sorceress' should be pulled out've a book peeled out've a certain kind of story; she doesn't flush very much; just a very little. Her eyes go to water and she blinks the water away and the water leaves behind a glitter, chokes her voice into a thread: pleased and shining though:

"Thank you! As I find my feet in Denver -- which has always in other cities meant meeting other rule of shady characters and finding the best book shops, whisky bars, and pawn shops -- " nonchalance (flamboyant nonchalance) as she scoops sauce up with some flat bread, economic gestures " -- I'll be glad of the help."

Grace
"I don't know where the good whisky bars are, except for the one at my place," she says. "I mean, I don't like whisky all that much myself. I don't know good from bad. But Kalen does, and he stocks what he likes, so..."

So it's guaranteed expensive and whatnot.

"Bookstores, yes. I know a few good ones. There's An Arch Key Books, used to be run by one of yours," she says, as if chewing on a bad memory. "I think it's his aunt running it now? Adam Gallowglass ring a bell? Anyway, it's really good for old books and whatever."

And whatever. Whatever includes all the screaming at each other, probably.

Penny
"Kalen sounds like a paragon," Pen slips in neat as a blade between ribs the one rib being the trail away and the other rib being bookstores, yes, I know a few good ones. The scoop of spicy stuff finds its way to her mouth. Pen doesn't eat with gusto, precisely. She eats carefully but steadily, with frequent pauses to taste what is on her tongue. If she has a unicorn horn in her boot or strapped against her ribs, it needs time to react to any poison, after all. The pauses seem born less of suspicion and more of care, though. And attention on Grace. Occasionally, Pen looks around the quiet restaurant, and it's a soldier's learned care there. "And the bookstore certainly sounds intriguing, although I take it you and Adam were not fond? Forgive my prying prysomeness, but was it an old media versus new media horns locking sort of thing? I'd ask you what your favourite computer shop was, but I imagine you built your machine from the ground up. And I don't actually know whether there are computer shops; isn't there just Best Buy and the Apple Store?"

Grace
"Mmm. Maybe. He insinuated that I was a 'Crat, and I got a little heated. I'm sure from his side of the story, I'm a total overreacting she-harpy or something. I don't know," she says, and drowns her sorrows with another veggie samosa.

She doesn't know, because they've never spoken again. Perhaps that was an error, but you know? Things happen.

"I don't know where the best computer shop in the city is either," she says, a bit surprised at herself, and with her mouth still partly full of samosa. "Kalen occasionally dumps a bunch of electronics parts at my door, though. He must get them from somewhere. I usually just look for exactly what I want online, but random parts drops are always fun. I get to figure out what I can make with it."

Penny
"Are there build-something-cool-with-random-parts contests?"

Mm, food. Pen takes a sip of the rose, which is sadly depleted now. Fortunately, here's that waiter with a refill and some water. The ice cubes go tink-tink, catching and refracting light.

Grace
"Once, I tried having a robot-fighting contest, but my challenger moved," she says, sadly. "I made Gamera-bot though. Friend to all children. Tried to figure out how to get it to spit fire, but... it's an ongoing project."

So yes. Perhaps Grace has forgotten what 'grown up' entails. And maybe that's a good thing. She actually relaxes and smiles when thinking about Gamera-bot.

Penny
"Oh!" Ardent. "If only I was at the point of making homunculi, we could have a homunculi versus gamera-bot showdown. Perhaps one day."

Grace
Grace blinks. "Huh. Well. If you're going to be like that... It wouldn't be fair, would it? I'd want to have my Gamera-bot equipped with appropriate defenses for a homunculus, right? And..." she waves her fingers in the air at Pen, as if to suggest spell-casting. "Offenses?"

There's a grin on her face. She likes this bit.

Penny
"And of course my homunculus would need to have appropriate defenses for a robot," Pen says, and she sounds fond. Both of her elegant eyebrows flick upward sharply, suggestively. "We could have a ring somewhere safe from unwanted eyes for the contest."

Grace
Kalen will be so thrilled. If Pen isn't actually here to destroy everything in Denver, that is. What fun they could, potentially have, in the future?

"Oh yes. And theme music. And snacks."

Grace doesn't even blink at the homunculus bit. She knows what one is. And she's learned by now that if she knows what something is, chances are it exists, or can be made to exist. Such is the way of Denver to teach one that there is more in heaven and earth than is dreamt of in their philosophy.

"Sounds like we have our work cut out for us huh?"

Penny
"Isn't that the most perfect story," Pen says, and there's a quiet thrum of (still - an ardent thread) pleasure in it. "Our work cut out." The warp and weft of expression changes, a new subject grafting on to the old. "Do you write music?"

Grace
Oh, Grace almost chokes on plantain when Pen asks her that question. "Hahaha, no," comes the response. Grace's taste in music has been called into question before, and likely will again. Not that she cares. The Install Gentoo song is totally awesome.

"I occasionally write stories. When I'm not building robots and saving the world and shit."

She says that last one like it's a ha-ha joke. There is a little more substance in there than a passing Sleeper might guess though.

Penny
"Stories inspired by your adventurers or stories inspired by what you'd like to see in the world?"

Pen doesn't bat an eyelash at Grace's ha-ha joke or nonchalant bravado, whichever it is. Grace is one of the Mercurial Elite, after all, and more importantly someone who is Awake to some of the subtler nuances of the world. There is something somewhat meditative about the way the red-haired woman turns her plate around, the better to reach one of the other dishes.

Grace
"I try not to put my adventures into words like that. Don't want to make it too easy for someone to trace those adventures back to me, eh? But the latter, yes."

It's a shame, really, that she can't write about her time in Bastion, for example, without almost certainly getting whisked away for an all-expenses-paid vacation to some Technocratic lab/dungeon. But such is life.

"What about you? Do you create anything other than homunculi?"

Penny
Pen's answer doesn't come immediately. The creature (woman [no, all Magicians are creatures; are shadows thrown into the world by some singing light, human only until they are no longer human or are quintessentially human which amounts to the same thing]) gives the question due consideration. The silence also doesn't stretch out too, too long; when Pen is done chewing, an excellent cover for thought, her throat clicks when she swallows. She says:

"My Art is mostly," and she wiggles her fingers in an echo of Grace's earlier spellwork gesture, a grave thing. "Or lends itself to that. But I like to play with metal. Before my move I was playing around with found industrial objects, broken steel things, and cutting them up into filigreed designs. The idea is that I can eventually make an interesting candleholder or something to throw shadows as I want them to be thrown against the walls."

"And I am a poet. Playwriting next, perhaps, if I ever force some time."

Grace
"Oh, that sounds neat. My robots just cast robot-shaped shadows. I don't know if I could make them look like anything if I tried. Well, okay, I did try to make Gamera-bot look like a turtle, but it had to."

And, really, it didn't get so wonderfully turtle-shaped. It has a shell. And four legs. And a "head". That's about the entirety of the resemblance there.

"I know about the time thing. I mean, how everything else sucks it up until you have almost nothing."

Penny
"Right. It never quite seems important enough in the grand scheme to put all those other, hmm, grand schemes aside. But it is a choice after all." Pen smiles; a half smile, not wistful because she is not wistful (it is a choice after all [one she made]), but something distant kin to it. "What would you do with more time? Build more robots? -- I like the idea of a turtle bot. -- Write more stories?"

Grace
"Sometimes it's not much of a choice. It's all doom and gloom and death unless you act. And so you act."

Instead of poetry or love, writing or creating (the small c creating, the small l love) their Poetry is writ across the world, saved every day because people out there happened to Love it.

"I would... study more. With more time, heh. Be utterly boring."

Penny
A curtain falls over the next half hour.

Pen is passionate about a great number of things, but her passion is restrained (nonchalantly [austere]) or directed by interest in her dinner companion. Here is a picture of the industrial what-have-you. Do you have a picture of your gamera? What about an anklyosaur or dragon-themed shape? There is robot talk or more shop talk (such as there can be between two Mages, still mostly strangers, having a nice impromptu dinner).

They shoot the breeze. They talk. That's why there are restuarants, public places to eat; why it's not done behind closed doors all the time. Convivial. Society.

By the time they part (Pen boxes up most of her food), Pen gives Grace her business card. It has a phone number and P. M. M. on it along with an image of some appropriately alchemical but fairy tale thing her player has yet to think up. Perhaps a moon; perhaps the background is a faded forest. No; a lake. Pen's invited Grace to call her whenever she finds time (ha, ha) and wants conversation or needs etcetera.