Margot
The park is a big damn place, capable of hosting multiple events simultaneously-- which truthfully was most often the case, as far as gatherings and events went. Some people met regularly at the volleyball sand pits to play during the summer, others scheduled weekly arrangements for yoga or drums or playdates with childrens groups. All of these people could coexist without realizing one another were there. That was the wonderful thing about great public spaces like this.
Margot was taking advantage of the ease to become lost by settling upon the bank of one of the less populated edges of a large pond. She had a blanket spread out to sit on, with a bag of yogurt pretzels and a bottle of water beside her. A messenger bag was on the blanket as well, with the flap folded open and over to reveal the spines of a couple books. A smaller paperback book with pink-dyed pages was in her hand, posture neck and spine curled down over the yellowed pages as she read.
Were it not for the constant low thrum of war (
the steady march of boots caked in mud and blood on toward the next battle) that saturated the air around her, Margot would be very overlookable indeed. Her brown hair was drawn back into a ponytail, loose bits tucked behind ears. She'd dressed in a three-quarter-sleeved baseball tee (white body/navy sleeves) and a pair of blue denim shorts, with her feet in white ankle socks and white tennis shoes alike.
She had a pencil held between her teeth as she read. At a certain point she moved it to scratch at her scalp with the eraser end, then twirled the utensil about in her fingers to put graphite to the paper of a spiral notebook and take some notes. When finished writing she looked up and about with wide and watchful eyes. Hunting for someone.
Specifically, a Doctor who was finally available to come out and visit.
Sepúlveda
Marking their mentor as unreliable isn't the fairest assessment anyone could make of the guy. Granted, he provides such an abundance of unflattering characteristics that one probably doesn't need to fling on another one, but the two of them are beginning to be able to tell when their mentor is either out of town or buried in work because the emojis stop flowing.
Up until earlier today, or yesterday, whenever the hell it was that Margot reached out to him or he answered something she had sent weeks ago, the kids had not heard from him since the end of June.
He comes ambling down the path towards the duck pond wearing tan Oxford shoes, jeans that probably came out of the boys' section, and a tri-color panel shirt that looks like it's been alive since the 1950s. His hair could use a trim, as could his beard, but he doesn't look as if he's been living under a bridge for the last month, at least. Doesn't reek when he plops down next to her, and if his eyes are bloodshot, he's wearing sunglasses.
Before either of them speak, he wiggles one of the books out of the stack and reads its spine.
"Huh," he says.
Margot
To her credit, Margot's sense of anxiety about the Doc's well-being and sense of self preservation has abated considerably. The successful rescue of Alexander Brandt helped solidify faith in an otherwise doubtful and anxious girl. Helped, but didn't contribute soley. Since her Seeking she seemed less high strung, still just as serious but more thoughtful and
steady. She saw the pattern in unresponsiveness followed by reappearance, saw it as a pattern of work and Work both, and settled for 'no news is good news until multiple months have gone by'.
All the same, she was quick to reply when he'd answered an old text she'd forgotten about, and now when she spied him she smiled and raised her hand in a still-motion version of a wave of greeting.
The book that he wriggled forth from the bag was laminated over the cover, checked out from a library, and covered some asshole's theory on chance over fate. If he wriggled further the next book was Nietzche's 'Beyond Good and Evil'. The one in her hand was some Wiccan-proclaimed book of rituals. She surveyed his shirt and hair length while he judged her taste in literature.
"Huh," she agreed. It sounded like he passed whatever test there may have been in initial meeting. Glanced around, then moved the bag of pretzels to offer him some.
"It's good to see you," she started genuinely. The tone would become forgetfully casual with familiarity as she continued on, groping about for her bookmark around her for a few moments before realizing it was in her lap and fetching it from there. "I would say that pre-Awakened I didn't forsee myself doing nothing but studying over summer break, but that would be obvious lying. Didn't really predict the Nietzche though," she confessed, glancing to the books as well after marking her page in the little rituals paperback. Then, up to him: "What've you been up to?"
Sepúlveda
"Oh shit," he says, "pretzels."
Nietzsche returns to the pile and the Etherite takes up the task of transferring pretzel twists from the bag to his stomach. It seems like he's attempting to stave off any sort of inquiry into or observation about his physical well-being. Seems that way, but it doesn't do him any good.
She can't see him roll his eyes when she tells him it's good to see him, but she can see his chewing slow to a halt. Maybe she has something nestled in her gray matter he's going to have to extract in a minute.
What've you been up to?
Crunch goes another pretzel before he tosses the bag back at her and dusts off his hands. He folds himself to sit cross-legged rather than sprawling out on the grass like a goddamn college kid and bounces crumbs off his shirt.
"Sorting out the connection between immediate and distant locations," he says, "and how to warp said connection so as to be able to Work remotely." You know. The usual. "Where's the other one?"
Margot
The Doc was studying Correspondance, it seemed, and when he said as much Margot's attention sharpened a bit more. Specifically the bit about working from a distance. She could be seen considering that, almost with a dab of envy (
how nice would it be not to have to go to the actual scene of a murder and try to find a bloodstain to summon a victim from-- if only she could speak to the dead from the comfort of her own living room.)
"Huh," she sufficed to say again, rather than really speak her mind on the subject, then nodded appreciatively and looked around when he inquired where the 'other one' was. When she didn't see him she shrugged. "Probably studying and practicing, like one does." It seemed to be the theme these days. She reached for the pretzel bag herself and popped one into her mouth before shuffling the books all back into her bag and closing up the notebook she'd been writing into as well. That, pencil in the coils, tucked away as well. That done she leaned forward over her knees, which were bent up into the air, and began pulling the laces of her own shoes.
"I've been unlocking the secrets of Life and Spirit," she said casually and with a small grin to match the twist of humor in her voice. She'd glanced over and started pulling off her shoes, followed soon by socks. "With your help, of course. But I'm deciphering what I'm supposed to do with those secrets."
Toes curled into the grass, finding it cooler here at the bank where the riding mowers didn't clip as close to the dirt for the sun to steal all the shade. "Do you just... Work for yourself? I mean, I know what I'm doing is all tied up in my Goddess, but what about people like you without that diety?" A pause, then, caveat: "Ned's obsessive puzzle-solving is another story, I'm not talking about that one."
Sepúlveda
At twice her age, there are loads of things Sepúlveda can do that Margot can't that may or may not cause her envy. He's already aware of their class differences and the visceral reaction she has to flashes of exorbitance, near as strong as her reactions to stressful situations. He is not aware that she might be experiencing something akin to covetous thoughts.
It would be something he could understand, though. He was nineteen once. Granted, at nineteen he was studying biochemistry at DU and had a newborn daughter to worry about, couldn't do half as much as Margot could as far as Work goes. He likes to remind the two of them that he didn't just open his eyes one morning capable of melting walls and turning mailboxes into trees and whatever the hell else he does with his free time.
She starts to clarify what she means, and Sepúlveda shifts his hip to extract his flask from his back pocket. Glug.
"Do you remember what I told you about Avatars," he asks, "the night I showed you two dunderheads what Quintessence is?"
Margot
"I remember what you said about the types of Essences that people have," Margot mused thoughtfully. She tucked her socks into her shoes, then set her shoes neatly in the grass next the square of blanket. She'd glanced over to Sepúlveda, then looked out toward the pond. Intently at the grasses and mud along the shore, specifically.
"I know that they're different not just in their relationship, but they're a part of what your Magick is, what your Essence is, where it all comes from. Which is why everyone's perception and ability is different."
Yeah, that would about summarize it, kid.
[Frog Huntin'! Perception + Alertness]
Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (5, 6, 6, 7) ( success x 3 )
Sepúlveda
"Well..."
Whatever it is she's doing, she can do without having to explain herself. The last time they met at the edge of the water, Margot sensed a dead body at the bottom of the lake. It turned out to be a skeleton with no lingering spiritual agenda.
"You also have to take into account people's refusal to admit when they're wrong. That has as much to do with their perception and abilities as how their avatar appears to them. So long as I don't become, eh, uninspired, you know, lazy, mine leaves me alone."
Margot
"So it's a Demon and a Muse both..."
She felt a scolding for analogies in the static of the air, but those seemed only to come with half a heart if ever at all despite the warnings they've received about drawing dumb analogies before. Somewhere in the mud she spied a peek off smooth green skin shining through-- just a glimmer, and she felt elated like she'd just accomplished what a hawk would in spying a rabbit in the fields below.
Only she didn't swoop in for the kill. She did keep her eye on that spot, though, for later. It wasn't moving anytime soon but she didn't want to lose track of it.
"That relationship can change, though. Like.... what if it were to catch you, but the instead of just shaking you up and setting you loose to go back to work it kept a hold of you and that's the way it was from there on out?"
Pen
(
Life ain't easy, sing the Fates,
One by one they sing:
Life ain't fair.)
Enter a long-limbed runner, one Pen. Pen whose appearance is always a myth-whittled thing, asking for oils and canvas or gouache and wood, is this coming 'round the bend: Burnished curls braided into a crown, bangs a rake of embers, curling around her ears, and she's been running hard enough and long enough that there's a glow to her skin and the suggestion of a flush to her cheeks and her lungs are bellows and air is transformative air is flux air can be coaxed into Fire or Matter air can be cajoled into Gold and there's nothing gold about Pen's color scheme. Short shorts which nonetheless are possessed of pockets and a thin but long long almost covering the shorts moon-gray t-shirt for a band called Sapsorrow.
(
Girl's gotta fight for her rightful share, say the Fates.
They wanna know:
What'cha gonna do when the chips are down?They gloat:
Now that the chips are down?)
This wood-block piece of art across the chest, roiling waves and an arm and a chalice with a flower. The hippiest thing. Stark. An earbud in an ear, another earbud dangling, and the mp3-player is tucked away in her bra.
(
What'cha gonna do when the chips are down?
Now that the chips are down?)
Monochromatic, Pen: or almost. There's color at her fingers and at her wrist, little droplets of light spraying out scattering where a lance of the late afternoon light hits just so; Millais-vibrant color, on fire. Rings jewels things a Hermetic will wear.
(
Help yourself, the Fates sing.
Hell with the rest.)
Her footfalls are steady, drumbeat rhythm boom and boom and boom and thud and thud and thus and fleet-footed be light be Mercury be swift be steady be a drum.
(The Fates are bold:
Even the one that loves you best.
What'cha gonna do when the chips are down?)
She's getting tired and she's circling toward water; it's always water, isn't it? Water which is the one element to dare shape your image back at you: A challenge. Look at this. What is it.
Some runners hold their mp3 players, but Pen is not doing that. Pen is holding a bottle of water, and it is sloshing, sloshing, and she'll be near enough Andres and Margot to notice them in T-minus. But does she have advance warning; does the air suggest them to her before she sees them?
Let's see.
[Am I aware?]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 3, 4, 8) ( success x 1 )
Sepúlveda
In t-minus the cavalry will arrive and he'll have reinforcements. In the meantime, it's just him and his former student and her ceaseless questions. And her frog hunt. Or whatever the hell she's doing.
Margot can practically hear him roll his eyes at the analogy but the eye-rolling keeps him from lashing out at her. Gives him the strength to uncap his flask and take another big swig.
"That would defeat the purpose of the entire relationship. The Avatar can only achieve Ascension through the practitioner's expanding enlightenment, so locking me in a dreamscape or, eh, whatever the fuck analogous situation you just tried to describe, it's not... it's not likely. I've never heard of anyone getting trapped in a dreamscape because of a Seeking, not unless they were already in a Quiet episode or something." Sip. "Demon and Muse..."
Margot
For all of her gold and fire Penelope was difficult to miss. Margot was so focused on the frog, however, that she wasn't even mindful of what Magickal tickle or familiar sense of Resonance might be on the horizon (or nearer). The Hermetic would be a welcome sight, but only after she'd drawn the little witchling's attention to her first.
Conversation, though, that didn't require eyes.
Margot shook her head a little as though she was going to correct her mentor's statement.
"That's not what I was saying."
Oh, look at that.
"I didn't mean that your Avatar was going to catch you and hole you up forever. I meant, what if it caught you but kept close? Changed the nature of how the relationship works entirely? Or, perhaps it would even change the nature of the Avatar itself. What if instead of being shadows on the wall and in the edges of eyes it kept close like a cloak on your shoulders? Empowered instead of drove?"
She paused, then added in a somewhat self-conscious manner: "I mean, it could potentially..."
Pen
(Eurydice sings,
Oh my aching heart.And the Fates keep on her,
What'cha gonna do when the chips are down?)
The freezing, ice-rime touch of augury, of fatalism just before it becomes numbing, wafts through the air; does resonance waft? No; it's a note, like the smell of grass, of water, of the air full of ozone. The grisly blood-splattered gut-strung note coupled with a steadiness an even-keeled something a hand that won't rock or waver too. Together a pair of ominous signatures, but Pen knows them like she knows little duck fluff-butts are cute (they simply are), and if either of them made her aware of omens they'd likely know; Pen is a woman of emotive countenance.
(
Take if you can.
Give if you must.
Ain't nobody but yourself to trust,the Fates say.)
Once she knows what to look for it doesn't take long for her sharp eyes to pick them out, an Impressionist painting on a blanket by a pond, and ducks in the duck pond beyond a child much further with his parents running at the ducks flinging a stone at them and squealing with laughter. It's funny how sounds can make certain planes seem otherwhere elsewhere.
She leaves the path, cutting across the grass, and slows. Slows, while calling out, "Hey, fellows!"
Pen
(Man I do not know what's up with the ginormous blank space. I typed that sh' in the window!)
Sepúlveda
(Jove hates the soft return tag)
Sepúlveda
[awareness!]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (2, 4, 6, 7, 10) ( success x 3 )
Sepúlveda
That's not what I was saying.
Even with the sunglasses in place Margot can see the frown take over her mentor's entire face. He sucks on an eyetooth and settles in as if for story time. It's not possible for him to frown any harder the more she talks, so he sighs and scratches at his beard.
"Only you would come up with the idea of avatars giving out hugs."
Wait a minute. Here comes a distraction.
"PENELOPE," he says as he springs to his feet. "HELP, THE CHILD IS TALKING NONSENSE."
noel-lurk
[I need to fix that soft return thing... someday.]
Grace
Grace is not so put-together as Pen, who walks (runs?) into the scene as if out of a painting. The slight woman in her jeans-and-black-tee getup would have run her clothes ragged if not for the intervention of others who keep supplying her with gifts.
Mostly this is Elliot's doing. Chances are he has a box full of copies of her favorite tee shirt that he keeps replacing as need be.
She also doesn't so much walk or run into the scene as much as stumble upon it, looking up from her digital reverie only because Dr. Sepúlveda has just shouted to Pen that the child is talking nonsense.
People almost
always talk nonsense. But it is sometimes interesting to hear what kind and style of nonsense it is. So, she heads in the general direction of the shout.
Margot
[Apologies for that delay y'all! I had company drop in for a minute and then went to put food in my face but my laptop died and yeah and *types*]
Margot
She wasn't so pale-faced as she was in the colder months when she hid away from the sun-- Northern European (read: white as hell) though she may be she was picking up a bit of a tan all the same-- rituals tied to the earth demanded more time outdoors, after all. Still, summer's signs did nothing to lessen the impact of her blush-- magenta cheeks and even those ears too.t
"I didn't say hug--," she started to insist, looking away from the frog (who would promptly dig itself away into the mud, out of sight, of course) and back to the man sharing the blanket with her (her professor? hopefully they weren't dating.). Penelope's calling to them cut her off, had her looking quickly to see who hailed them, distracted from whatever defense she was going to try to make from herself.
"Hey--," she began to greet, but was cut off by Andres leaping to his feet and yelling loudly toward the red-haired runner. She lifted one arm up to protect her side from any errant elbows or other angles that may have clipped her when he sprang, then sighed and shook her head and grabbed a fist full of yogurt-coated pretzels to munch on while waiting for the temporary and tiny stormcloud of teenaged indignance to dissapate quietly away.
Pen
Up springs Sepúlveda, Pen smiles deeply at him. Look; it carves dimples, long, into her cheeks; the color of her eyes is an uncertain one, today, difficult to decipher; the dark t-shirt, the heightened color of her cheeks, the sky as Phaeton puts the Sun's chariot through its paces - these all contribute.
Once she has reached the pair of them, Pen reaches out to take Andrés' elbow and, keeping a courteous difference because she is sweaty, will go in for a cheek kiss-by-the-air. "It's been too long, Andrés."
The smile is back - and easy, and wide - for Margot. An elegant loft of her eyebrows is also eloquent, see: is this the child? Good humor.
"I take it you mean you have a disagreement. Hello, Margot. How is Yorick? What were you two talking about?"
Approaching: Grace - who can't just approach, can she? Flutters like butterfly wings which'll shift and shake the city walls downward.
Grace
Margot is the child, a fact that, when Grace finds out, causes her to smile a bit. "He does like to claim that people are being nonsensical. I don't know that people have another way to
be, really."
"Hey, guys," she says, finally introducing herself in a way, after inserting herself into the conversation. "Nice to see you."
A bird catches her attention then, a quick flash, and her eyes dart to track it, such that she gives off the impression of someone not
present for the conversation... not really. She tries hard enough, but alas.
Sepúlveda
Sepúlveda doesn't do courteous even if he has, from time to time, executed distance as part of his social protocol. When she takes his elbow he mirrors the gesture, the opposite hand going to her shoulder like to steady himself against the mild height difference. If they're going to air kiss like Europeans, it's got to be bilateral.
"July, you know? Useless month."
The Hermetic and the teenager, by extension, are spared the Etherite's interpretation of the misunderstanding by the sudden appearance of Grace. Her proclamation has him pointing one skinny finger at her.
"I do," he says. Know, that is. They all have the distinction of being in the presence of a paragon of sense, don't you know.
Margot
Pen approached and asked what they were speaking about after greeting The Doc, and Grace appeared not too far behind. The sudden appearance of two other mages had her raising her eyebrows suspiciously. She pulled a spiral notebook from her messenger bag and tugged the number two pencil from its rings.
"Hey Grace, hey Penelope," she offered to both of them and turned about on the blanket, remaining the only person still seated on the ground and not appearing to have any intention of standing up anytime soon. Bare feet settled back on the blanket when she'd turned to better face the angle from which the two approached (that is to say, not the damn pond), and she propped the notebook up on her thighs to start writing a couple of words-- a thought for later.
She looked up to Penelope specifically to answer the questions that had been posed.
"Yorick's a happy handsome rabbit, he's well." The pencil moved to gesture to Andrés with the eraser. "We were talking about Avatars, mostly." You know, philosophical Mage stuff.
Pen
Pen smiles at Grace, too, one of those touch-the-eyes smiles, a candescent woman, who then while the hellos are happening takes a draught of her water bottle. The water becomes water-light when she lifts it; her long throat works. There are no necklaces today, or right now, only the many rings, only studs in her ears. Some water escapes; dribbles down the water bottle's neck when she swings it, traces a line over her Mount of Venus and then her wrist. When Pen brushes her bangs away from her forehead, she leaves behind a smear of water.
"What of them? Their nature and function?" Mage philosophical stuff, aka Order of Hermes catnip. Pen could just roll around in Mage philosophical questions in a frenzy of happiness, if she were a cat who could roll around in intangible concepts and abstract ideas.
Grace
Mind you, this is the guy Grace once caught stark naked in an invisible van performing blood tests. Sensical is
not the word she would use to describe Dr. Sepúlveda.
Unhinged, maybe. Confusing, yes.
Her eyes actually find him, and she smiles at him. "July isn't useless. It's about the only month where it isn't freezing here.
Tell me you don't love the fact that it's not snowing."
"And yeah, what about Avatars?"
Speaking of Mages and catnip...
Sepúlveda
"I don't love the fact that it's not snowing."
So there.
Margot
"Uhm...," Margot glanced up between the three people standing and blushed again. At least this time it wasn't the bright obvious reaction, but just a pink tinge. She looked down at the notebook again, wrote a little more, and then paused with the pencil point still on the page when she spoke. "Well, about their purpose. And nature. And how that nature could change but--," and she glanced briefly to Andrés here, as he was was contrary toward Grace (he was a hobbiest in the art, it seemed). Frowned just a touch, but continued with the faint tone of a student answering a question that they were only about 75% certain they were correct on.
"--but how the purpose can't and won't."
Perked and interested in the nuances of Mage philosophy though others may be, Margot didn't much care for being behind podiums, in spotlights, or really in or on any kind of 'spots' in general.
The notebook was closed back up again, whatever thought that was written down being sufficiently recorded for her to revisit another time. It tucked back into the messenger bag and Margot took a drink from her own water bottle before, at last, rising to her feet as well. She'd turned to give her left shoulder to the conversation and her right to the pond. Back to skimming the shore for frogs.
Pen
"Ooh. Interesting. And what do you believe, Andrés?"
He is a doctor in the Society of Ether, after all. What do they believe, if one thing? Pen has not had in-depth philosophical discussions with enough of Andrés's tradition mates to know, it seems - or she is interested in people on an individual basis.
Grace
"I don't even know what the purpose of my Avatar is, much less whether it's changed. I've heard they sort of travel from person to person as we live and die, but I don't know if I really... Well, I have no data to prove that."
Or
anything related to her Avatar, for that matter. It probably exists. She has had Seekings and all...
"Maybe
your Avatar's purpose hasn't changed, but that doesn't necessarily apply to everyone? Just throwing that out there. I know nothing."
Sepúlveda
Brave woman, Pen, asking the guy who can't shut the fuck up for longer than a few seconds what he believes.
While Margot and Grace discuss the purpose of the Avatar and whether or not it changes, Andrés scratches the back of his neck and aims his sunglasses up towards the sky. It isn't a beseeching posture but it sure looks like it from a certain distance. The moment passes and he returns his attention to Pen.
"I maintain--through science, Penelope, not belief--that the purpose of the Avatar, unless it's gone inverted, is to push the practitioner towards Ascension, and its nature is determined before the Awakening, and the only thing that changes is the practitioner's understanding and application of that understanding."
Pen
"Hmm." There is a gleam, see, to the eyes; the same Mystery that is under whatever is luminous on the surface of a dark pool; it could be pleasure; or mischief; or worship; or celebration; it is present; blooms into another curve of her mouth, something quick and - like most things about Pen - honest. He maintains through science, not belief.
"Grace, Margot -- how do you two define an Avatar's nature?"
Margot
What Grace had to say about her Avatar, how she barely knew it, drew Margot's curiosity and gaze both. Then, back to the Doc, who had the floor to answer Pen about his beliefs of Avatars. His answer, like every other speaking bit had here between the Awakened, was listened to and heard just as clearly. She looked at him for a few moments before blinking wide-set hazel-colored eyes and asking (genuinely, mind you, not testingly):
"What determines the nature of the Avatar before you even Awaken to it? How does that get shaped?"
She was still listening, certainly, but leaned down and went about the task of re-socking-and-shoeing her feet. Pen wanted to know what her definition of an Avatar's nature was, and all Margot could do was shake her head. "I just know mine. Anything else is a theory or a guess."
A short answer-- she wanted to hear what her mentor had to say about how pre-awakened life impacted Avatars and Magick.
Grace
Margot isn't asking her, and Grace honestly hasn't a clue. But she'll blurt out something anyway. "No fuckin' idea."
"It's good that you know yours. It's nice to know
somebody does. My Avatar once dumped me in the middle of Wheel of Fortune with Pat Sajak and Vanna White. I don't know what's up with it, honestly."
"But, I mean, the doc's answer does kind of ring true. I don't usually sit down and chat with my Avatar, I only really interact with it when it's in the middle of pushing me onward."
Sepúlveda
The fingers on Andrés's left hand waggle like he's about to conjure up something consensus-breaking. Those of you playing along at home will notice the wedding band has not reappeared since its removal prior to the Amaranthine Laboratory heist. At this rate, it's not coming back.
In a moment the waggling ends, and he points at his student.
"Pack up the pretzels," he says. "I have a book for you," the pointing finger starts to bob, keeping time with his thoughts, "back in the room. It's not Nietzsche, but I think it'll put some shit in perspective for you. Come on."
Pen is given a fist bump. Grace... well, they do better the fewer words they spare each other anyway. He's on the fast track to exiting stage... over there.
Pen
"Have you never learned about Essences then?" Pen is curious, see.
The question is directed toward both Margot and Grace, again, although her eyebrows flick upwards (good humor, again; a shiver of surprise, intrigue) when Grace describes one of her interactions with her Avatar.
A beat, and, "Andrés, you should take he to the ranch and show her that library, if you haven't already."
Her pocket vibrates, and she ignores it for a moment. Reaches up to fix the earbud still in her ear, and she absolutely fist bumps Andrés. Watch out for the rings. There is an explode-y finger twinkle, too. Pyooooo. Crshhh.
Grace
Grace doesn't get a fist bump, and Grace doesn't really care. She would probably stare at his fist, if offered, unsure of what to do with it.
"I've heard what other people say about Essences, yeah. That's a bit different than knowing it from first-hand experience, though. Sounds a lot to me like a personality test."
And, she knows, they are mostly wrong -- trying to categorize people who are spectral into binary boxes.
Margot
Let it be known that Margot can keep up with conversation. She kept track of what was being said and what needed to be answered fine. It was just the social pressures that she didn't fare especially well with. Luckilly things academic, like philosophy and 'what you know', were more her wheelhouse.
For Grace: A hard-to-place stare at the story about Wheel of Fortune as a Seeking. Disbelief and humor and confusion and curiosity.
What? "That's... strange. And ambiguous. That could be anything." A pause before she offered up more information about her own in turn. "My Avatar is the Goddess Andraste. It's all... ancient war and victory and divination and things of that like. Way more direct."
At this point the Doc gestured to her and advised that she gather her things, he had a book for her and apparently that meant they were going to get it
right now. She didn't disagree, though, and instead shrugged and finished pulling on and tying her shoes. The messenger bag strap was pulled across her shoulder and chest and as she did this she spoke to Pen's question.
"I have, I know what those are. I get that there are
types, but how people come to their Avatars and the relationship beyond is varied in big ways. My Avatar's nature is Victory and Prosperity-- that's what we strive toward. Chances are that Grace's Avatar's nature is just a little different, given its sense of pop culture." She glanced toward Grace, grinned just briefly, then lifted a hand to wave at the both of them.
"See you guys around."
Sepúlveda
[thanks for the scenes, you maniacs <3]
Pen
"I can understand why you'd think they sound like personality test answers," Penelope says, waving to Margot as well. "Give Yorick a carrot from me," she says, and then, "It seems as though it might be nice to have a seminar at the ranch sometime... well, perhaps 'seminar' isn't the right word. A kaffeklatch, a discussion group, topic: Avatars. Or a certain Sphere. Then we could all benefit from the different experiences and knowledge the people of this city have to bring to the table."
Grace
"I like that idea. The discussion group," she says, not really the seminar. Grace can't imagine herself going to a
seminar. "I can just sit and talk about Entropy all day long, I have to say. Might be hard getting me to shut up,"
This comes from personal experience. Mike never tries to get her to shut up when she goes on about it, though. On the contrary.
"Well. As long as people aren't like 'No, it is exactly like this, and no other way.' I can't say I've seen too much of that in Denver, though."
Pen
Pen grins. "Well, since you know your flaw, you can be mindful. Ars Fortunae is a fascinating subject -- I think we might have touched on it the first time we met, at that restaurant, now that I'm thinking of it."
Her voice drops, confessional, and she leans closer to Grace. "I have been considering getting little fliers out to some people about a 'Spirit Club.' 'Spirit Club: for Those interested in discussing the Cosmology of the Ethereal, Shadowy, and Otherworldly, and Denver's haunts.' Because a few of our brethren here have asked me if I have any skill with that Art -- I do not -- and ... I think Nicholas," and yes, Pen sounds, as she always does, besotted when she says his name; says it soft and special: a treasure, "would like to just get together with other people interested in the Art of Spirit and shoot the shit. I was thinking Alexander, Margot, Kiara, Nicholas. But I haven't yet hit upon the right way to anonymously set up this club and lure them all to it so they can talk."
The corners of her eyes crinkle, and she shrugs.
Grace
"Unfortunately, I don't know jack about any spirits save for Thakky, and that only because he... it? Tried to crawl out of a movie at me. Why does it have to be anonymous? You could just tell people: 'Hey, you know what would be a good idea? Spirit Club. Like Fight Club, except without all the fighting and hypermasculinity.' It would be great."
Grace, of course, is all about being blunt as a sledgehammer. She doesn't see the point in anonymous luring when one has the option of directness.
"Like, you want it to be a present? A surprise?"
Pen
"Right," Pen says, with a nod. Pen is: not sneaky, by nature or inclination.
Her phone vibrates again, and this time she takes it out.
"On that note, I need to keep running. We should get together for dinner soon, Grace, bring some things to the ranch house and share or something."
Grace
"Oh, sure! That sounds great. I need to get with you and talk about... stuff anyway," she says, eyes going far-off again. Now that she thinks about it, yeah, Pen needs to know some things.
"I will bring food, we can consume it. Cookies, at least, because everybody likes cookies. Except for those vegan carob ones I got once, ugh. Pen, do not ever buy vegan carob cookies, you won't get rid of them."
Not even vegans eat those things. She
tried to get Sam to, but no. Mr. I'm Currently Being Devoured By Unreality didn't want any. Figures.
Pen
"Noted about the vegan carob cookies. I'll see you later," Penelope says, her eyebrows shifting with amusement at the warning against vegan carob cookies. There is a hand lift; the rings glitter, lake-light - evening-light, shivering in their cold glamour; she brushes at her burnished color-of-burning bangs and then jogs off and away. The jog becomes, after a deep steeling breath, a loping run.
Strive, strive, strive.
