Topiaries in the Shape of Sabre-Toothed Tigers

Grace
So, the scene today is much like the scene has been for several days. Grace sits in her chair, hunched over the desk, and it really is a good desk for this sort of work isn't it?
There's a setup of three disemboweled calculator kits, their innards thoroughly exposed and peeled and ultimately set aside once she'd managed to wrest from them the initial parameters of The Wall -- that cryptographic nightmare that keeps turning off any technologic calculating machine she attempts to use.
Scattered around the U-shaped desk are also papers, some weighted flat with whatever she had on hand (like calculator pieces) with diagrams of circuits and translated binary ones and zeros.
But for the past few days, Grace has seemed preoccupied with one notebook in particular, alternately scribbling and staring, scribbling and staring.
Sometimes, she gets so lost in the figures that she looks angry. But she always looks a little mad. (Granted, the strange apparatuses she created with those calculator kits in order to map them out do not help any with the 'looking mad' part.)
It's a good thing Kalen always makes sure she eats, even though some days, she only murmurs that she's 'not at a stopping point'. Still, it's appreciated. As is Kalen's almost prescient furnishing of the (deep blue, constellationed) room with a couch.

Kalen Holliday
Kalen would be the first person to tell you that some things he does and he does not know until later.  There are some things he can logically predict and some things he sees in visions but there are huge portions of his life dictated by nothing but what seem, on the surface, to be whims.  He caught a bus to Denver with a backpack full of things and came back from the dead by running into people who had known him before.  Lazarus.
Right now he arrives at Grace's office with sushi and soba noodles, a bottle of sparkling mineral water, a bottle of sake, a thermos full of green tea, and a bag of mail from the PO Box of someone he fabricated once and still keeps up just in case.  He maintains that these people he has been are like ghosts, but this one...this one he still gets very real letters for.  Postcards.  If Grace pays attention, mostly in Spanish.  This time there is a package with foreign stamps all over it.
He sets the mail beside a nice leather chair he helpfully brought in, and tends to take possession of when he visits.  He only joins Grace on her couch if she invites him.  It is a strange nod to her privacy perhaps.  There are things about Kalen which can be baffling.  He starts to unpack all of the food from bags onto the counter in the tiny kitchen, whether Grace indicates she is at a stopping point or not.

Grace
It doesn't seem to be one of those days, as Grace peeks up above the leather-bound notebook and watches dinner arrive. "Hey, you've got stuff," she says, and yes, Grace, how very specific.
She puts down the notebook and stretches with what sounds like a pop and a creak from sitting in one position for way too long, her pencil jabbed up toward the ceiling like she's trying to kill some invisible thing up there somewhere. And then, a yawn.
"I think I'm getting somewhere," she says, with a little smirk of a smile. "Whoever did this though? This Anarchyangel? Pain in the ass. Could have picked a better time. Spring break maybe? Why not then?"
Because, Grace, you're getting fucked with. That would be the point, right?
She gets up, wanders over to hover by the kitchen. Someone's hungry. And at a stopping point, apparently.

Kalen Holliday
"Well, if you get stuck, I can always ask my other Kit-because-it-is-short-for-Christopher if he has any useful books on cryptography."  He offers Grace a plate, so that she can cover said plate with sushi and noodles.  And rice paper rolls with shrimp and greens with peanut dipping sauce.  These, Grace has probably figured out, are one of Kalen's favorite things.
"I will endeavor to impress upon the cosmos how it is inconvenient," Kalen says with a faint smile.  "But I think that inconvenient is sometimes just how the cosmos rolls."  His eyes roll and he gives a dramatic sigh.  "That bitch is lucky she's pretty."

Grace
"Kit-because-it-is-short-for-Christopher?" she asks. "I don't think I know him."
Which is odd, because she seems to know everybody, despite not being the perfect social butterfly.
The plate she accepts, and begins filling with sushi and noodles (lots of noodles, because they are fun) and she takes a roll too, just because it works as a nice conveying device for delicious peanut sauce.
She snorts at Kalen's comment about the cosmos. "Tell me about it."
"How's things been lately? I've been all wrapped up in this tedious shit, and with no way to actually contact the outside world. What's going on?"

Kalen Holliday
"Gallowglass.  You texted me about him.  We Hermetics...so many names."  Kalen pauses.  "You did do that already, right?  I think?"
"Mmmmmm...I went to visit Pan and we ran into Alyssa.  It was delightful.  Alyssa and I made a date for the inevitable fighting.  It should be delightful."
He starts to fix a plate when she is done.  Summer rolls.  Barely any noodles.  A few bites of sushi.  He takes his plate and the bottle of sake over to his chair.  He assumes Grace isn't drinking, but he certainly will share if she seems interested.  He brought other things for her, but she can have what she wants.
"When this is over, and maybe spring break, we should do something fun.  Something that we can talk about.  In public.  Because there is almost literally nothing I can talk about in a restaurant that I don't make up.  How do you feel about skydiving?  Or white water rafting?  There are places we can fly where it's warm enough.  What about the Amazon?  Have you seen it?  Do you want to?  We could try Antarctica, but seriously, I hate the cold.  I was thinking warmer."

Grace
"Oh, Adam?" she looks up at the ceiling and huffs. Hermetics and their names. "And yes, Kalen, I have already texted you about that. Geez, you're as bad as Sera," she jibes, and heads over to crash on the couch with that fixed-up plate.
Grace pauses and squints at Kalen when he starts talking about exotic places they could go. Sometimes, she cannot tell whether he's joking or not. Like, for instance, when he invited her to Chile for Christmas, like that's just a thing that everyone does. It turned out to be a quite honest actual trip to Chile.
This time, however, she's suspecting he's bringing up Antarctica as a possible vacation locale for other reasons. "So, you're saying you want to get that far away from her?"
There is a little smirk, and then she seemingly reconsiders. "Sorry. I couldn't help it. I mean, if you're serious, I'd love to go somewhere fun. I've never even been outside the states. Mexico doesn't really count, does it?"
She picks up a roll of sushi and rolls it around in the noodle sauce, and then pops it into her mouth whole. A few seconds later, mouth still quite full, she mumbles out, "Wa? you mave a dae for fighdeen?"

Kalen Holliday
"Oh.  I think we'll have already handled this by the time we can go on a trip," Kalen says with a laugh.  "Well.  We did agree that we needed to have a discussion and that it should be at the chantry and soon.  I'm not exactly planning on candles and roses.  Perhaps tequila."
He takes a sip of the sake.  Grace has rarely seen Kalen drink, despite the fact that there is a considerable store of alcohol around.  She has never seen him drunk.  The closest she's ever seen him to completely unrestrained was at the carnevale.  It was definitely something, all luminous pale eyes and wild, reckless joy.  Until it wasn't.
"I am serious though.  I think we should possibly have more things than this."  He takes another sip of sake as he considers that statement.  "You have school.  And a writing career.  I suppose I should have something other than this.  The last something other than this I came up with was a library collecting and scanning project which is...still this."
He laughs, and sets the sake down so he can pick up his food.  "I'm really just no good at everything else."

Grace
"You have school too," she says, trying to cheer him up. Last she knew, anyway, he was still going. Perhaps that has changed. "And I don't so much have a writing career as I have a writing disaster area. I mean, isn't that what got me into this mess?"
Mmm. Spring rolls. She digs in again, of course she does. This time, though, she doesn't talk with her mouth full. Sometimes, she remembers the little things. Most of the time, not, it's true.
"What about... uh... Australia. It's summer there. New Zealand? Oooh, we could go see the kiwis, they're so cute. And the penguins. They have penguins there, did you know? We wouldn't have to go to Antarctica at all." Besides, it's a lot more likely she'd get wifi in Auckland than in the middle of a rainforest. Not that she's going to bring up that as a positive, but damn. She's been completely without the internet for so long now...

Kalen Holliday
"Okay.  Australia.  Sure."  He shrugs, swipes a piece of sushi with his chopsticks while seeming to barely pay attention, and pops it whole into his mouth.  Like you do.  Sushi and noodles are not for people overly concerned with their dignity.
"I do still have school," he says, once he's done chewing.  "But you actually care about yours.  Mine is just to stave off boredom and amuse Garrett.  It's not the same."

Grace
She sighs, leans her head to the left while maneuvering noodles around. "I might not have school for long at this rate. I doubt they're really going to accept the 'I have a deadly contagious illness' excuse around midterms for a third time."
"But you know," she says, lifting a wad of noodles up with her fork and staring at them like they're something far more beautiful. "It wouldn't be that bad. I could still get a job somewhere."
Get a job somewhere, like she doesn't already have something-like-a-job here -- even has her own office. Just, there are no bosses, just Kalen. And sushi. Technically, she could live here or at the Chantry, and never need pay for an apartment. She knows that, it's just...

Kalen Holliday
"We do often have trouble with maintaining mundane lives, yes.  It does tend to explain why I never really bothered."  Except that there is a bag of mail beside his chair that says that is not entirely true.It may not be true in this country.  But somewhere there are people who know Kalen as someone with a mundane life.  And a job.
"Can you make your own job?  Or do programming work for the security company?  I'll understand your scheduling demands.  That could be a real thing."

Grace
"I'm trying to make my own job with the writing, but sadly it doesn't pay nearly enough to live on," she says, munches noodles, nods with eyes opening a touch wider at the job offer.
"Well, but... you're my friend, Kalen. Couldn't that put a strain on our, you know, friendship?" She pauses, head tilting the other way. "Maybe that's just me though. I never met a boss I couldn't despise."

Kalen Holliday
"I don't understand what you do.  I think it would go...so there are electronic things and maybe you can write programs or find better equipment or whatever.  Do that.  And then I would walk away and let you do what you do until you had something to show me.  And then we could show our clients.  I think we'd be fine.  You can set your own goals.  I wouldn't even know what they should be."  Kalen shrugs and trades his food for the sake bottle again.
"I can sell ice to Eskimos, but there is no way I can really design a functional security system.  And for what this is, better one of us, really.  We have...special needs.  And it would be nice if our cover business was viable."

Grace
"So, like, a partnership?" she smiles. "I think I could deal with that. You handle the talky crap with customers, and I make cool stuff. Sounds... better than every other job I've ever had," she laughs. "Lots better."
How the hell did you luck yourself into this one, Grace?
"Blackberries. We should go somewhere with blackberries. Can you imagine? Just all those drupes sitting there unawares, minding their own business, and then we pounce!" She makes motions like a pouncing animal with her fork substituting for claws.

Kalen Holliday
"We can plant blackberries, I bet."  Kalen says with a smile.  "Sculpt them into dinosaurs fighting robots or something.  I was thinking of planting some kind of edible or medicinal or ritually useful plant garden on the grounds anyway.  I've just never had plants before.  But there are books, I suppose."
"But you're right.  There are important considerations.  Like it being a partnership.  I have a guy.  I'll have him draft us some stuff.  Which brings us to the next important consideration."  Kalen raises an eyebrow.  "Sabretooth tiger made of a collection of dwarf peach trees?"  He grins and takes another sip of sake.

Grace
"Yes. Definitely yes. To both things. Also, Sid is good with plants, we should talk to her about gardening, I'm sure she knows lots of stuff. She's a biologist, even." So yes, Sid probably knows a thing or two about plants, at that.
"Now... assuming I ever get my tech back, I might actually be able to do something for our company," she says, casting a weary glance at the notebook over there on that cluttered desk.
"I swear, Kalen, it's like someone went and cut my arms and legs off, and then said I had to run a marathon to get them back."

Kalen Holliday
"As a Knight of the Order who can barely walk, I sympathize."  Kalen smiles.  "You'll figure it out.  Adapt.  Learn new methods.  Continue to defeat all the monsters.  Because that is what we do.  Even when the monsters are puzzles."  Another sip of sake.  "I have complete faith in you."  And he does.
"Intermission puzzle.  Reasons I should not bring a bottle of whiskey to Pan's office and get drunk enough to demand he guards everything in existence for me while I sleep.  Do they exist?"

Grace
Grace looks down into the plate of sushi, but there is still a smile on her face. There is something to that, isn't there? Here in the office, guarded by biometric locks and the typical presence of Kalen, it is a bit easier to sleep. Especially when she's got a fucking stalker she can't even keep tabs on.
Hopefully with all her equipment dead, her adversary can't keep tabs on her either.
"Well, Sera went to confessional once and asked him to make out in the booth, and he didn't call down any judgement of God on her or anything. So I don't think he'd be so offended he'd do something horrible to you. There is that."

Kalen Holliday
"I threatened to bring a bottle of whiskey and get drunk in his office and all he said was that I should do it after the day care was closed for the day."  He smiles faintly.  "He hugged me the other other day.  It was the strangest thing."  By which Kalen means strange, but not unwelcome, clearly enough.  He simply cannot comprehend how hugging came into any interactions between himself and Pan that did not involve people dying or something.
"Pan and Sera have something.  I'm not surprised.  It's a good thing to have.  I'm glad."  He glances at the padded envelope in the bag next to him.  Trades the sake for food again.

Grace
She huffs a little, "I guess he can be cool sometimes."
Sometimes. Because Pan is a priest. Badass all the time, perhaps. But not cool exactly.
"I personally don't see anything wrong with you getting drunk in his office and sleeping," she says, and of course she doesn't. Propriety means about as much as a hill of beans to Grace. She just nods at her flawless logic. Getting drunk only really harms Kalen's liver, so long as he doesn't drive or get angry and hit someone. Sleeping harms nobody, so doing either of those things somewhere where you're unlikely to get stepped on? Why not? Very few moral qualms. Although perhaps the bible says something about 'thou shalt not get drunk in priest's offices', who knows.
"I got fairly good sleep last night myself, this couch is comfy," she says, sidestepping the real issue with their sleeping habits entirely.

Kalen Holliday
"Well.  We'll see about sleeping.  Or getting drunk.  But I may stop by."  He smiles.  "I'm glad you liked it.  I flopped onto many couches before I found you that one.  It was very scientific.  I evaluated them."  He looks at her steadily, managing not to start laughing,.  "There may have been parameters."

Grace
Snort. Hah. Parameters. "I'm sure there were parameters. Squishiness, for example. That's a parameter. Width and height of course, but that's boring. Ability to fit in a staircase, though, that's a better parameter. Oooh, TTS: Time To Sleep. We could write a journal article on this thing..."
She smirks, and downs another sushi roll. By now, she's starting to get full, and starting to get itchy about that notebook again. Breaks like this are few and far between these days, with the exception of Carnivale, since Kalen was so incredibly excited about it. Looking back on it, that hadn't been much of a break, really.
"Thanks for giving me something else to focus on. Needed to chill out the cerebellum a bit."

Kalen Holliday
"Time for more work?"  Kalen asks, glancing at the notebook.

Grace
"Yeah, maybe. It's like the most complicated mathematical crossword puzzle ever, and if I just had my computer, this would be over by now. I don't understand how they're supposed to be judging my skills, if I'm not allowed to actually use them," Grace says, griping for what must be the umpeenth time to Kalen about how much it sucks that her computer is dead.
"If that's even what all this is about. Could be that weird stalkery person behind all this."

Kalen Holliday
"Could be.  It doesn't seem to quite fit, but it could be.  Soon enough, we will know."  He smiles.  "I'll leave you to your work."
He rises, and packs up the food they didn't finish, putting it in her refrigerator so she can have more food later.

Red Fox for Carnivale

carnevale
[hit me with your percept+awareness rolls, plz!]

Alyssa Solomon
[[Awaredar!]]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (2, 5, 6, 7, 9) ( success x 3 )

Kalen Holliday
[P/Awareness!]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (3, 4, 6, 7, 9, 10) ( success x 4 )

Kalen Holliday
[Oh!  Dammit!
Nightmares!]
Dice: 6 d10 TN7 (1, 2, 4, 4, 9, 9) ( success x 2 )

Grace
[Nightmares!]
Dice: 6 d10 TN7 (1, 1, 2, 4, 9, 10) ( success x 2 )

Grace
[Perception+Awareness!]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 9, 9, 9, 10) ( success x 4 )

carnevale
Snow.  Only a few inches of the stuff will have Denver residents begging off their early morning commutes, but it never stops them from going out and having a good time.  Take tonight for example.  The air is crisp and bitter cold and there is just enough of a dusting of white on the ground to make some of the roads slick and barely manageable, but the streets of Santa Fe are lined with cars.  There's a party going down on the one-way street.  It started on the north end of the artistic alley, originating at Interstate Kitchen & Bar.  That was a couple of hours ago.  People have since spilled out from the restaurant to fill the sidewalks.  Someone's set up giant speakers on the corner of an intersection and is currently blasting Lorde's "Team" into the street.
About ninety percent of the people crowding up the sidewalks, making it almost impossible to pass on the narrow strip of brick walkway on the east side of the street, are wearing masks.  Half masks, full masks.  Some delicate and complicated as a snowflake, some clunky and homemade.  Some are in costumes, but many are dressed in jeans and coats and flannels.  These people are in the spirit of the event, though.  Carnevale.  A several day celebration of excess and intoxication (with art, with substances, with alcohol, with lust, with...) leading up to the Christian fasting holiday.
Our heroes are on the strip somewhere, but they can all feel it.  A tingle in the air beyond the bitter, lung chilling cold.  It's faint, the warping of reality a faint thing for who knows why, but it seems to be drifting on the wind with the music, or perhaps from it.  It moves like a charge, lifting the small hairs on the backs of arms and tingling up spines in a finger of electricity.  It yearns and craves and seems to whisper in the ears of those with the sense to feel it.

Alyssa Solomon
It's a Saturday night, and of course Alyssa is out.  She's not the partying type; she doesn't really go to nightclubs (anymore) and she certainly isn't the kind who hangs out with a posse of happy-go-lucky barhoppers.  But she does enjoy, in a sort of perverse way, being around humanity.  She's on the outside looking in and it lets her watch what people think their lives are like; what she could have been if not for--
Well.  If not for a thousand different things, starting with her birth.
So tonight she's out on the street, a heavy black wool longcoat on with the collar flipped up to protect against any surprise chilling gusts of wind.  Her hair falls free as it always does, over the shoulders of the coat and down to her mid-back.  She's put enough care into her makeup to make it attractive, with her black-and-red lips and a little Egyptain-esque spike to the the outer edges of of her eyes.  Only the lightest of foundation, to make her a touch pale without being overt about it.  The smell of burning clove oil trails along from the cherry of her cigarette as she moves through the crowd with that odd coppery smell and whoosh of feathered wings registering in the minds of those who may pick up on such things; even those who don't know there's something different.  She may even get a double-take or two from those who don't see her reflected in a window here and there.
And then she feels it.  There's a sudden, complete stop as the eletric charge hits her vertebrae, her chin rising and her eyes narrowing.  Those made-up lips pucker thoughtfully, eyes narrowing in suspicion.  And then, without any more hesitration, she reaches into her pocket to come out with a pin that she can press into her palm.  Not much blood....just enough to wet the tip.  She steps back, out of the middle of the stereet and into a doorway so she can not be in open view of everyone, then takes the bloodied pin and traces the fifth pentacle of Jupiter to grant her vision.  Then her eyes open and she starts looking for a trail to follow.
[[Corr 1/Prime 1: Watch the Weaving!  WP]]
Dice: 2 d10 TN4 (1, 1) ( success x 1 ) [WP]

Kalen Holliday
For Kalen, this is magical.  Even considering that he's in some arctic mountains instead of in Venice.
And, even it being the arctic, Kalen is dressed up.  Of course, gold velvet brocade coats are warm enough to qualify both as costuming and necessary protection from the elements in those situations where twisting them into your will is not appropriate.  The rest of his clothing, pants, boots, gloves, even his cane, is gold.  His mask is a golden (and considering this Kalen might have actual gold leaf) lion, with slender bits of metal dangling feathers and amber beads like a mane.  He has made no attempt to dye his hair, but he (or possibly some impish accomplice) has gotten golden glitter all over it.  Very close attention through the mask reveals his eyes are outlined in metallic gold.
And-this is perhaps the most amazing part-he is absolutely delighted.  He can practically taste the energy of the music and the crowd.  One day-one day so soon that it seems to drift in with each little tease of spring in a warm breeze, he will be able to taste the energy of the crowd.
WAIT!
He does taste the music.  All vibrant and alive and it tastes like possibility and electricity and---and what?
His eyes widen a little behind the mask and his breath catches and even as he starts shifting closer through the crowd, one hand on his cane, one hand wrapped around Grace's wrist to pull her along with him and not lose her in the jostling crowd he really tries to see what that energy is.
[Arete! Watch the Weaving  WP!]
Dice: 2 d10 TN4 (4, 6) ( success x 3 ) [WP]

Grace
Grace has been dragged here against her will. Okay, so that's a bit dramatic and untrue. It didn't take too much to get her to say yes. But that's just because everything is so *fucking* *wrong* with all her equipment turned off.
She should be working on The Wall. Instead, she's out here with Kalen in a ridiculous mask (which thankfully covers up the fuming fussy face of hers). It's a delicate, laser-cut thing made of coppery metal that hugs the contours of her face (because she mashed it into place). It's supposed to look like a curliqued and sweeping and elegant fox head, but it makes *her* look like an elegantly carved android with metal ears because someone thought it would be cute.
She has to go outside, in the crowd. The mask is a bit of a comfort here. It lets her look around without everyone knowing who and what she's looking at, or what she really looks like.
Kalen was *not* able to convince her that she needed a full costume to go with. But she accepted the offer of a coat that would go with the mask, a red suede thing to keep out the cold, cut in fox-like ways, all pointed and sleek.
She feels it just as he does, the taste of something not quite normal in the air, and Kalen's excited, taking her with him as he goes, and she just tries to hang back a bit. She can do nothing without her computer after all. No seeing, no warding her mind like she'd really love to be able to do right now. Not all such impressions on the wind are good ones...
"Kalen, what is it?" is all she can do... Ask someone else. And her voice isn't excited as much as it is concerned.

carnevale
Doo de doo
Dice: 3 d10 TN4 (1, 8, 9) ( success x 3 ) [WP]

carnevale
Mind 2: Free your mind
Dice: 2 d10 TN4 (3, 9) ( success x 2 ) [WP]

Alyssa Solomon
Alyssa is fortunate that she's a determined woman.  Not enough blood, perhaps, or maybe her hand shook just a bit as she traced the seals into place.  Either way, it very nearly went wrong and only her hubris (I control my fucking destiny) gave her the strength to enforce her will on reality.  And even then, it's brief.
Of course, she also sensed those Resonances she's familiar with, somewhere around here.  She knows people by Resonances almost better than their faces.  Kalen and Grace, and sensing those two near each other doesn't surprise her.  But she doesn't have time for that this moment, and the pin is pocketed with an annoyed look.  Time for the big guns, she thinks, and she reaches inside her coat to withdraw the ritual dagger that's kept at her back.  It's simple in design and yet ornate as well; it's well above the quality of the items she normally has.  Luckily, in a street party like this a dagger might not seem like anything more than a costume of some kind.  She gives a quick glance around and then braces herself before jamming the tip lightly into the back of her forearm.  The blood is quickly traced once more as she pushes her Effect to hopefully greater length.
Assuming all goes well, she's then slipping the dagger away and moving out into the crowd, to find Kalen and Grace.
[[Extending!  Using unique foci so diff 3.]]
Dice: 2 d10 TN3 (4, 6) ( success x 3 ) [WP]

carnevale
The Awakened feel that tingle in the air and go to seek the source, but they aren't the only ones being drawn toward something.  There aren't many, the feeling isn't overpoweringly strong.  Kalen and Alyssa can tell there is nothing currently in the air acting to pull everyone together.  But there is that charge that tingles.  There is that craving, that yearning.  It's faint, but those most susceptible to it find themselves pulled toward it.
That changes soon enough.  They all feel the increase in feeling.  People crave more, yearn for more.  The charge becomes more electric.  The sense of someone whispering feels closer, the words almost but not quite understandable.  The crowd closest to the giant speakers shifts as a few more people start to find themselves wanting, no yearning to go over in that direction.
Alyssa and Kalen's resonances fill the air.  A storm coming, a flap of wings and the presence of blood that is more a sense than it is a real thing.  They notice that the Tapestry is being bent and twisted, and spheres they are only marginally familiar with are about to come into play.
[awareness 1]
Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (1, 4, 5, 8) ( success x 1 )

carnevale
[awareness 2]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (2, 2, 6, 6, 7, 10) ( success x 4 )

carnevale
[extension #1, -1 because reasons (should have been higher diff initially but it would've been the same outcome)]
Dice: 3 d10 TN5 (5, 7, 8) ( success x 4 ) [WP]

carnevale
[extension #2]
Dice: 2 d10 TN5 (4, 8) ( success x 2 ) [WP]

Kalen Holliday
"It's nothing but an echo yet.  Possibility!"  Because possibilities echo backward.  Of course they do.  Time is not simply some line.  Not even a complicated series of lines.  No.  Things come into being like raindrops into water, their effects spread outward in all directions.  Organic.  Whole.  Circles.  Eternity.
Perceptions...well.  Those can be limiting.  They don't have to be.
Can be.  And he remembers.
"It's-"  Transcendent.  Sacred.  Dangerous.  Indescribably beautiful.
"Going to be a wild night."  And that is...at least marginally more serious.  He pauses, releases Grace's wrist, reaches into his pocket and withdraws a closed hand.  "Shall we?"  And then he grins, unfolds his hand, and gently blows a handful of gold glitter out into the night air.  He's still watching the glitter, even as he reaches out to offer his now sparkly gloved hand to Grace.
['Oh most bewitching Cosmos...let us see where we should be going.'  Time 2/Entropy 2 - Basically find an auspicious path through the crowd. D=5 WP]
Dice: 2 d10 TN5 (1, 4) ( success x 1 ) [WP]

Grace
Kalen, the golden lion, says it's going to be a wild night and blows glitter into the air. She takes his hand (not something she'd do for just anybody) and lets him take her where he will (definitely not something she'd do for just anybody).
She picks up on another thing, another touch of magic in the swirl, but how could she not? This one sticks out like a sore thumb -- sore because it's just been pricked and bleeds. It's that mild sense of nausea that always  preceeds a certain someone's arrival.
"Alyssa's here," she says, loud enough to be heard over the crowd.

Alyssa Solomon
Alyssa feels that sense of craving creeping up, and she groans.  "Oh, fuckin' Hell."  She might be falling prey to it herself, if she weren't such a stubborn little shit.  She starts to make her way through the crowd, pushing people out of the way when she can't maneuver around them.  She's not starting any fights, but she's not entirely gentle either.  She doesn't have time for civility.
On the plus side, the advantage to stabbing yourself in the arm a little bit is that she still has some blood leaking out.  A little dab at each temple, below the cerebellum and just inside her hairline at the crown, connecting all of the important parts of her mind.  It's visualized as a line, keeping unwanted influences out as she spots Kalen and Grace, recognizing their forms and Kalen's willworking even if their faces are hidden.  She shoves her way through the crowd to catch up with them.
"It would be too fortunate for me to guess this is a friend of yours?"  She gestures toward the air as she completes the visualization in her mind, hopefully completing the shield on her mind.
[[Mind Shield!  Diff 4, -1 for Quint to 3, Spending WP #3]]
Dice: 2 d10 TN3 (8, 9) ( success x 3 ) [WP]

Kalen Holliday
Kalen, with one of Grace's hands in his, guides her through the crowd.  People move and shout and even push around them, but Kalen walks into little openings and eddies that seem to rise up for him and then slide closed as they pass.  There is a passing remembrance of sliding through a crowd like this while dancing, of skin on skin and colored lights and....
"We were just on our way to find out," Kalen says.  He is glitter-smudged and breathless and smiling.  "Join us?"

Grace
"Oh Kalen seems to like it. I don't know about friend, though" Grace says, trying to avert her eyes from Alyssa. Something about knowing that the blood leaking out from behind her hairline is no costume.
"Hi. Nice, uh. Makeup."

carnevale
It's going to be a wild night.  Kalen has no idea just how right he is.  Or maybe he does.  He conjures up his own brand of magic, using the glitter to map out a trail for them to follow.  It falls in a little trail that dusts shoulders, lights on masks, catches in hair.  As they walk toward people so touched and now sparkling, those people just happen to move forward, to the side, back, wherever.  They create a path unknowingly that Grace and Kalen follow knowingly, a path that leads them to wherever it is they're wishing to go.  Toward Alyssa, maybe, or toward the source of the bending Tapestry.  Perhaps by now they're the same thing.
And somewhere in the shadow between buildings, just beyond the speakers currently blasting "Come With Me Now" by the Kongos.  How perfect.  The thumping of the beat and distance disguises voices, figures hidden in the shadows.
One says to the other, "Now."  It's 9:57, not quite time for an auspicious clocktower ringing in the 10pm end to the night's festivities.
Almost as one they release the effects they've been weaving over the crowd.  A change overtakes the crowd, subtle but noticeable.  Warmth settles in around the speakers and emanates out (I need to move I need to fight, I need to love myself tonight (You don't need those coats)), and people do indeed begin to feel warmer.  Their body temperatures begin to rise and a number of people begin to undo their coats, remove their gloves.
Fainter, but no less felt, moving, is a sense of release.  Minds easing, relaxing (Come with me now, I'm gonna take you down (Let go let loose free your mind)), and those unguarded and those most susceptible to suggestion begin to lose their sense of inhibition.  People begin to dance on the sidewalk as winter garments are discarded to the pavement, bodies gyrating to the melody, feet stomping to the beat.
And, just as Alyssa and Kalen and Grace form a little cluster of storm and blood and wings and something shifting, two figures appear at the opening between two buildings.  One, a man, tall and broad and covered in tattoos that flow down his arms and over his abdomen (shirtless? in this weather? well at least he's no longer the only one stripping down like it's a warm summer day), hair short and light.  Beside him a woman, petite, long blonde hair pulled up, wearing a white dress with a tight bodice and a single strap over one shoulder, white gloves to her elbows, lace leggings and white high heeled shoes.  They are both looking out into the crowd, but it's the man who seems to hone in on the Awakened.
[[The deets!
Warmth of the Sun (modulate internal body temperature), Life 3, 7 suxx
Free Your Mind (let go of inhibition), Mind 2, 4 suxx
With the obvious exception of Alyssa with her Mind shield, I'll leave it up to you if/how your PCs are affected by either of these rotes.]]

Grace
Grace likes the coat Kalen picked out for her, but only because it's warm and the day is cold. Even though she knows that this isn't right, that someone is making her feel this way, it wouldn't do to bake. She strips off her coat, but leaves on the turtleneck jacket underneath. For now. It's still a bit uncomfortable, but like hell she's going to take *that* off.
And then, their magics wrap around her, making even that protection seem unnecessary. Just relax, it tells her. And she does, even though a faint whisper of her own fights back, telling her that that's just what they want you to do! It's not winning.
"I'm... I'm feeling very... nice." Grace says, in a weird voice, her hand reaching up to unzip the (armored) turtleneck jacket she wears everywhere. "Why am I feeling so nice?"
She's got on a plain white tee underneath all those layers, at least. Some modesty will be preserved. But the song and the magic combined lead to Grace beginning to tap her feet. Even carrying a coat and a jacket, she wants to dance. She never wants to dance, mind you. This isn't a normal anything for her.

Alyssa Solomon
She can feel her body temprature rising, and even her Mind shield is getting battered at.  She groans, though this is a little less controlled.  She's holding, but still.  That's some mighty powerful mojo.  "Oh great.  This is how fucking orgies start."  She glances at the two.  "If this all goes south, then what happens on Santa Fe stays on Santa Fe.  And that's all I'm saying about that."
She sighs and drops the wool coat, which is now entirely too hot for this.  On the plus side, most people probably aren't paying attention to her and won't notice the gun in her belt clip or the dagger in the belt sheath.  On the negative side...she really likes that coat, and she's not going to be happy if she loses it.  Underneath the coat was a black fitted top with leather-look shoulders and a purple-trim image of a corset screened onto it, black jeans and her boots.  She squeezes and presses at the little wound, encouraging more blood to flow which she coats her fingers in.  "I can only stop part of it," she murmurs to the others as she begins tracing a seal of protection in the air.  "Somone else might wanna stop the Life work."
The next words to come out are Enochian--not perfect, but perfectly servicable--as she starts to try and undo the Mind work.
[[Countermagicking!  Diff 8, she has Mind & is throwing some Prime in there in case she has enough to turn it back on the others.  WP #4.  She's gonna have to stop spending WP very soon, but she's a stubborn one...]]
Dice: 2 d10 TN8 (4, 10) ( success x 2 ) [WP]

Grace
[Retract the bit about the dancing. Grace never wants to dance hah]

Kalen Holliday
Kalen laughs, rich and warm and real.
This is almost exactly what he wanted.  Warmth and a crowd that wants to shift closer to something blissful and real and full of raw, dangerous beauty.  Truths that shiver and hide beneath the skin exposed.  All of the little lies, all of the distance people lay between each other shed like so many coats dropping to the ground.  This is the kind of unity with humanity he loves.
"Are you saying, if it comes to it, you wouldn't take us home with you, Angel?"
His voice softens a little, and he leans close to speak quietly enough only Grace can hear but does not touch her.  "It's magic, Kit.  It wants you to Be.  But, you can fight it, if you want.  Alyssa can likely help you.  The only advice I give you about tonight is to hold onto the coat."  She can fight it, if she wants.  He has no such intention.

carnevale
[Watch the Weaving]
Dice: 2 d10 TN3 (1, 5) ( success x 1 )

Grace
"I can't. Do anything about the Life work," Grace says to Alyssa. "Someone took my tools."
It's the barest explanation. She wouldn't even know the first thing as to how to tun back someone else's magic, but if she had her computer, she might well be giving it a try.
Alyssa says this is how orgies start, and even in this relaxed-as-hell state, Grace can see the danger in that. Kalen doesn't seem worried at all. The only thing he says is that she can fight it if she wants, but could she fight a crowd? Could she fight off some random dude if he got it in his mind that what he wants is her, and has no inclination to stop himself?
Even those fears are hard to hold on to, slippery fishes in all this relaxation and warmth. Nobody will hurt her. She's got friends to look out for her. It's all cool. Even the loss of her computer, it's all perfectly okay. A lazy smile leaks out from under that fox mask.

carnevale
Magic drapes down over the crowd like a blanket.  A nice warm snuggly blanket that has more than a few people wondering why they bothered with a coat tonight.  It's not that cold, or if it is their bodies are immune to it.  So people strip down to sweaters, t-shirts, some tank tops.  One man feeling particularly free at the moment strips off his shirt, tossing it to the side as he leaps foward to throw himself into something approaching the beat of the song.  There are others with him, others dancing, some closer together than others.  A couple toward the back, admiring each other in their state of ordinary-dress, bodies no longer hidden by the covering of winter coats, hold hands and walk away together.
There are still masks worn.  A lion, a tin fox, someone's face looks like the moon, more than a few look like dolls.  The song changes to something by Airborne Toxic Event and more people start to get into the groove and dance.
And once they start, even though Alyssa begins working to undo the magic opening up the minds of all these strangers, encouraging them to cease holding back, they don't want to stop.  It's a freeing thing, liberating, dancing faceless in a small crowd, losing themselves to the magic of magic and the magic of music.
Over behind it all, the strangers watch their handiwork unfold.  The man is leaned against the corner of a wall, his head poking out, smoke curling upward from the lit cigarette dangling from his mouth.  Ash falls as he bobs his head to the music.  Beside him the woman's eyes widen.  She leans in close to the man, puts her hand on his shoulder and whispers something to him.  He looks at her, looks out at the crowd, and he nods before pushing off from the wall and moving toward the crowd.  He is tall and powerfully built, the bones of his face creating hard flat planes in his cheek and jaw.
Behind him, the woman bites her lip.
[Free Your Mind again, just hoping to maintain it.]
Dice: 2 d10 TN4 (6, 6) ( success x 2 )

Alyssa Solomon
Kalen's comment about not wanting to take them home does draw a wry smile from her, and she answers when she has a break in her spell.  "I'm saying, Kalen, that it's probably for your own good.  You couldn't handle me, and it's a long walk back to your place from mine.  Probably not best in this level of cold."
Grace says she can't help, and Kalen doesn't want to.  And as much as she feels the effect start to ebb, it's pushed back up.  "Oh, for fuck's sake," she mutters as her efforts are undone. She stops her unweaving and, as she sees the man starting to come her way, she starts to close the distance, walking with purpose.  One bloody angel, striding forth.
"Seriously tall, dark and short-sighted," she calls out as she approaches.  "I promise you...right about now, you really don't want me to stop holding back from what my id is telling me to do."

carnevale
Alyssa walks with purpose, but the man meets her at a leisurely stroll.  Once he's out in the brighter light of the street they can see the way the cold air of the night rolls up from his body, coiling as steam less distinct than the smoke trail the bright red cherry of his cigarette leaves in his wake.
He stops, clasps his hands behind his back, and leans toward her as if daring her.  The smile he offers is devilish, the smile of a rake, a dandy, someone with perhaps more confidence in themselves than they probably should.  As he draws closer Alyssa feels that charge tingling through her skin, and she hears the sound of whispers rattling on the wind.
"And I assure you," he counters, "that I absolutely do."  His eyes lift to her hairline like maybe he can see a physical manifestation of her shield.  He can't, but he knows that it's there, and he tips his head curiously before looking down at her her again.
"You shield yourself from letting go, and that's one thing.  But I wonder do you shield yourself from all of life's pleasures, too?"
Behind him, the woman does not increase her efforts to empower her effect, but she watches, leaned against the wall her partner left.

Kalen Holliday
Kalen moves toward the man as well.  He is potentially a threat.  His place is between that threat and his friends.
He slides his gloves off and into the pockets of his coat, then the coat off and over his arm.  He's wearing loose silk pants and a shirt so sheer that you can catch glimpses of scars through it.
His pulse is the backbone of the song, is united with the pulse of the crowd.  Their fates tonight are unfolding like a lotus blossom.  One flower.  Many petals.  One shared destiny of infinite possibility.  If only Alyssa and Grace could see what he did.
There is nothing about his posture that indicates he intends to confront instead of greet.
They could all touch the world he'd build instead of fight the world they have tonight.  The chance is right fucking there, shimmering and perfect and barely brushable with his fingertips.
Grace
Grace tags along, because of course she doesn't want to be alone, wants to be with friends. She keeps a hold on the coat, though.
And what does Grace's id very much want to do right now? What is it that she holds back from doing?
She walks right up to the man with the tattoo, the one with a purr for a voice, and says, "I feel really good. Did you do that? How did you do that? It's all in the local field potentials yes? I do feel some moderate excitation. Do you know what I mean by local field potentials? Please say yes. What's your name?"
Apparently, Grace wants to ask all the questions ever. She wants to know.

carnevale
Kalen comes up with Grace in tow.  The man's eyes shift to look at them, acknowledge their existence with a nod, but his face remains turned toward Alyssa.  And he looks curious as he looks at her, wondering what her answer will be, or if she'll try to sock him in the jaw.  Maybe she'll pull that gun with a crowd of people so close.  The dagger would be more intimate.
His smile turns into a grin at Grace's questions, but he gives a slight shake of his head.  He doesn't know what that means.  He can guess, but, "My magic doesn't work like that."  Not in scientific terms.
"My name is Basil Jardine."  That rumbling purr of a voice doesn't carry an accent to go with a name that sounds like it originated in Spain or France, but then Alyssa doesn't sound like she comes from the Middle East and Grace doesn't sound Welsh.
His eyes are back on Alyssa.

Alyssa Solomon
The man asks her if she shields herself from all pleasures in life, and she can't help but quirk a grin as she looks up at him.  "You know, that's an interesting debate.  The difference is that I find those pleasures, I don't have someone else mucking around in my head."
The grin is fading quickly now.  "Just because you're not pouring something into the punch bowl doesn't mean you're not roofying the lot of these people.  And if someone decides that going out to drive while having seven too many is fine, that's on you.  What if someone really wants to see what it's like to shoot heroin even though they have no idea how to do it, and end up dead?  And that's just the start of the kind of consent issues you're causing.  No means fucking no, asshole."
She doesn't seem too concerned about the height difference between them; her irritation and ego are enough to make her feel at least his height, no matter if she's actually at eye level or not.  "So put a stop to this.  Now."

carnevale
"You're very cynical," he says, amused as he stands upright.  Twisting back he holds out his hand to the woman in white.  "Come on, Rose, they're not going to hurt us."
The woman comes closer now and they can see as she steps from the relative safety of the sort-of alley that her dress comes with a train of lace that drags along the pavement.  Its ends are greyish and brown and littered with leaves and scraps of things.
"Look around," he says.  "No one is doing anything they don't want to do tonight.  If it will soothe your concern for others," he all but purrs, is that mockery?  "once they're outside the range they'll no longer be under the effects."

Kalen Holliday
Kalen shifts closer.  He can't really physically interpose himself between the two without getting dramatic.  And whether those dramatics were practically violent or involved trying to slip his tongue in Basil's mouth, neither of those would bring about what he most desires at the moment.  (Though, let us not lie, upon reflection both would be practically violent.)
Instead he rests one hand against Basil's arm (or tries).  It is not really a friendly touch.  The world is electricity and danger and a storm about to break.  It is not, in this instant, friendly or gentle.  Sure, it could have been.  Or it could have been for balance, but you need trust for that.  Truthfully, he wants to read the what the man will do before he does it.  Wants to be close enough to get between them if they start fighting.
"Angel...no one is hurt here.  But you're right about what might happen.  But thing about what happens if we turn this to violence now.  Think about what happens if you turn their thoughts from dancing to blood.  Do not do something we will regret here."

Grace
"Oh, that's so sad, Basil," she replies to his statement that he doesn't work like that. Sad for her, perhaps, that she can't sit down and discuss the finer points of holonomic brain theory with *anyone* tonight.
Or maybe she means sad for him, that he will never understand it. Who knows. Maybe both.
Alyssa speaks of consent, and she has a point. Kalen speaks of a riot starting should these people change their minds in just the slightest, and he has a point. Grace has seen that before.
"Oh yeah, like at the theater... We don't want that. They wouldn't do something like that, would they?" she says, half to her friends, half to Basil and Rose.
"Your names are both plants. That's cool! Did you know that plants think using quantum calculations?"

Alyssa Solomon
Come on Rose, they're not going to hurt us, he says.  He also says that no one is doing anything they don't want to.  And she could argue that it's not a matter of people doing what they want to, it's a matter of those having things done to them that they don't want to.  She could argue that whatever's happening here, they don't know what's going on in side alleys, or behind walls where the effect might extend to and where they can't see, or so on.  She could even argue that they need to have a lesson taught, here and now, or they'll do it again and again and eventually someone will be hurt, and probably badly.
Kalen's argument about blood turning this into a big, violent mess does cause her to look over at him.  It flickers back and forth in her mind, before she decides.
And that's when the steel-toed boot is flying up, toward Basil's crotch.  The only blood there, if any, will be internal, she hopes.

Alyssa Solomon
[[Init +7]
Dice: 1 d10 TN8 (5) ( fail )

Kalen Holliday
[Init +5]
Dice: 1 d10 TN5 (10) ( success x 1 )

carnevale
Basil:  +5
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (1) ( fail )

carnevale
Rose: +5
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (2) ( fail )

Grace
[init +6]
Dice: 1 d10 TN6 (9) ( success x 1 )

carnevale
Round One: FIGHT
Grace 15
Kalen 15
Alyssa 12
Rose 7
Basil 6
Declare in reverse, roll the other way
Basil:  Dodge!
Rose:  Mind 2: Crowd Control

Alyssa Solomon
[[1: Kick Basil SQUAW IN DE NUTS.  Cause de nuts is where it hurts]]

Kalen Holliday
[Step in front of Basil with lovely force effect to use heavy coat to block kick.  We hope.]

Grace
[Hide! Disappear! Go away!]

Alyssa Solomon
[[Kick.  Diff is 7]]
Dice: 5 d10 TN7 (1, 8, 8, 9, 10) ( success x 4 )

Kalen Holliday
[Forces 2: Protective coat flourish - WP]
Dice: 2 d10 TN5 (4, 5) ( success x 2 ) [WP]

carnevale
[Blocked!  Still could probably use that Crowd Control.]
Rose does not step in to help the taller man.  What she does is focus on the crowd.  There are safeguards in place to keep things from turning violent in one way or another, but that was before someone tried to kick someone else in public.
One rote gets dropped in favor of another.  Calm.  Soothe.  Everyone be peaceful.  Think happy thoughts!  That sort of thing.
Mind 2
Dice: 2 d10 TN4 (1, 5) ( success x 2 ) [WP]

carnevale
[And Basil is still getting out of range, dex+ath (fluidly moving)]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 3, 5, 7, 7, 10) ( success x 3 ) Re-rolls: 1

carnevale
Grace and Kalen are enjoying themselves, but if Alyssa is going to insist on her own conclusions she's going to find herself mocked.  Basil doesn't have a chance to answer Grace's question, which would be no actually, they didn't know that.
What happens instead is Alyssa aims a booted foot for Basil's groin while Grace goes to make herself scarce.  Kalen blocks the kick, but Basil still dances backwards, out of the way, because
"Are you always such a buzzkill, Angel?"
"Bey!"  This is the first that the others have heard the woman speak.  She turns her head to glare at him.  "Stop making it worse!"
The music plays on but the dancing stops as the crowd begins to calm down.  They lose interest in dancing as a peace begins to settle over them, at least over any who saw the violence and felt a spark.  Everyone else dances to the end of the song before they start to look for their coats, their gloves, their things.  A few people push their masks up as they start to walk away, talking in excited but breathless tones.
Rose continues to keep the people calm.
[Extending once (I keep messing up the level 2 diffs!)]
Dice: 2 d10 TN6 (3, 8) ( success x 1 )

Kalen Holliday
Kalen raises two fingers to the bridge of his nose and sighs.  The crowd is dissolving and the music will fade and their glorious chance to commune with some greater unified purpose is melting into nothingness like smoke rings.  At least, for now, the cold is still held mercifully at bay.
"I know that of all the people to be making the request that we talk about this before we start hitting each other I am in some respects the least likely candidate, but would it be possible to try to do this in a non-violent fashion?  Please?
"And then we can escalate to violence and blood feuds and whatever else if we must?"

Grace
Grace's first response when things start going south is to disappear. She takes off her mask (too noticeable) and slips into the crowd of oblivious, peaceful people.
She's still *around*, but her presence fades as quickly as she does from sight. Eventually, she decides it's safer to be away from other people right now, and goes for the protection of a little shop along the street advertising financial services. Apparently nobody really had the inclination to check on their retirement accounts all the sudden, thanks to Rose (What I've always wanted to do! Set up a Roth IRA!), so it's practically dead.
Still, from where she is, she can at least see what's going on. Notices that Kalen intervened, and the other two don't seem like they're interested in fighting back. Good.
Grace will just stay put for now though. Just in case.

Alyssa Solomon
Alyssa expected several possibilities.  She expected to perhaps be dodged or blocked, and to have Basil kick her ass.  She expected violence to maybe sprout up.  She expected Basil's friend to hop in and for her to have to fight a two-on-one battle.
She did NOT expect Kalen to get involved.  And she especially did not expect him to get involved for Basil's side.  There's a moment where she pauses there, completely stunned by that.  And the look hardens, eyes narrowing to a glare, which itself becomes a look of death shot toward Basil when he keeps it up, turning Kalen's cute little nickname into a mocking term.
"You know what, fuck this.  One way or another, my job is done here.  If you pick it back up or whetever, I did my part."  She points at Basil, looking like she really, really wants to jab that finger right through his eyesocket.  "You'd best keep the hell out of my way.  Hufflepuff here may not save your balls next time, and I may not use my boots."
And another, withering look at Kalen, before she starts to stalk off, back toward where she hopes her coat still is.

carnevale
For what it's worth, Basil did stop trying to provoke Alyssa after Rose spoke up.  He smiles at the Hollower, biceps bulging as he crosses his arms over his chest.  That look continues to be an invitation.  He really does want for her to follow her passion, even if it leads to her trying to claw out his eyes.  But she doesn't intend to stick around any longer and he doesn't stop her.
What he does is call after her back, "I look forward to it!"  Rose gives him look and he shoots one back, innocent and wide-eyed, What?
"Thanks, man," he says to Kalen.  "I'm s--"
"We wouldn't have let anything bad happen," Rose snaps in, defensive.  Of the two she is the younger, but they share a certain look about them.  Same nose, same cheekbones.  "We just--"
But Basil puts his hand on her shoulder and she quiets as she loses some of that tension.  He looks around, remembering something.  "Did we scare away your other friend, too?"

Kalen Holliday
He winces a little at the glare.  That will be an interesting conversation later.
His expression relaxes a little as Basil starts talking and then his attention snaps to Rose and now that he isn't trying to have some transcendent moment of harmony with a jubilant crowd that defensiveness sets him just a bit on edge.  Basil stops her and then asks about Grace and for a second the strain of trying to both prepare for and stop a fight that mostly lost its traction when Alyssa started walking away holds him still and silent.  Living in the moment is glorious, but there are so many possible moments this one could be it is dizzying.
"She might be back.  I doubt she'd have abandoned me entirely.  I'm not sure when she'll decide to come out though.  She's generally cautious, but sometimes she surprises me."

carnevale
Grace is cautious, Alyssa is a cynic.  But Kalen, Kalen seems cool, even through that moment of edginess.  Basil looks him over, really looks him over.  Alyssa resisted, Grace let go, but it was the Hermetic who seemed to really be in the moment with them.  He's the one who seemed to feel the beat wash over and through him.  Rose catches the look and she rolls her eyes dramatically before shoving him hard in the arm.
"I want eggs."  And with that she starts walking away, but she stops short.  Looking around, if she sees Alyssa (with her coat, the Santa Fe crowd is not overly full of greedy people looking to take things that aren't theirs) she starts walking away in the other direction.
"It looks like I'm going to get eggs," Basil announces to Kalen.  He tips his chin down, lifting his brows as he starts to go.  Not before a card is exchanged, which Basil looks over and grins that rouge's grin.  Tapping its corner against his temple he flicks a salute.  "I'll be seeing you around," he promises.
Then he starts off after Rose at last.  When he reaches her he drapes a heavy arm over her nearly bare shoulders.  She turns her head to look up at him, and whatever she says causes him to laugh, and then look thoughtful.  With a last glance back over his shoulder to the dispersing crowd, he releases his own effect.
Suddenly a whole bunch of people start digging frantically for their coats.

Quantum Physics and Interpersonal Relationships

Grace
[Nightmares!]
Dice: 6 d10 TN7 (2, 5, 7, 7, 9, 10) ( success x 4 )

Grace
[Perception+Awareness!]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (4, 5, 5, 7, 9) ( success x 2 )

Grace
Grace is expected, or should be. Who knows though, with Sera -- could have caught her during a time when time makes so little sense that 'expected' doesn't either. Or maybe she expects everyone at any time, and therefore it doesn't matter.
In any case, it's Grace at the door, knocking, in her jeans, black coat, sneakers ensemble, looking very much like someone who doesn't want to be looked at. Stares just don't stick to her, like the very opposite of a Sera whose very nature demands one to stare.
She can feel that need to be enthralled by Sera, just standing on the house's porch waiting to be let inside (probably doesn't have to knock or wait, but whatever, Grace is Grace).

Serafi­ne
Perception + Awareness
Dice: 7 d10 TN5 (3, 3, 4, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10) ( success x 5 ) Re-rolls: 1

Serafine
Usually one of the housemates or hangers-on opens the front door when it requires opening, and it requires opening tonight because Grace is the sort who knocks, no matter how many times other people have wandered on in.  It is a rather remarkably warm weeknight and although Colorado seems to recall that it is still February when the sun goes down and Sera does very little until the sun goes down so Grace, standing on the porch, likely gets a bit chilled out there, waiting.  She can hear the rumble of bass from a stereo or something inside and the rush of traffic and the laughter of a couple all bright and sharp in the air, half a block away or more on this residential street and she can feel Sera all familiar in there and something else, too, which might remind one of thresholds, of places where things change.
So, usually one of the housemates, but tonight it is Sera herself who pulls open the door.  She's wearing this complex combination of a cropped leather jacket and something that seems to be silky and sheer beneath it and a floaty, hi-low black skirt that hits her a few inches above her knees in front and then cuts downward to be a bit longer in the back and really rather conservative for a Sera, Grace might note, until that Sera opens her arms, as she does, and hugs Grace, as she does, and murmurs some greeting into Grace's hair, and smells like cigarettes and pot and has some of that bright cold clinging to her skin-and-hair because she was out back smoking, not in the house, and as Sera pulls away and the embrace skims from embrace to hand-holding Grace can see why Sera is wearing such a conservative skirt -
- it is entirely sheer.
Beneath Sera has on these calf-high combat boots wrapped in leather straps and buckles and bare legs and she grabs Grace's left hand with her right and Grace can see the glint of a small ring of beaten gold on her right index finger and lo Sera leads Grace down the hall and into the kitchen and through the kitchen to the living room and asks her if she wants a drink and procures any such drink as necessary and the housemates have already shooed or perhaps they just aren't around and that is why Sera is playing at being the butler in her very-own-house.

Grace
You never really know what to expect in Sera's house. There could be a party going. Or just a grouping of the regulars -- the band, the closer friends -- all bending over backwards to please Sera at the center of it all, whether they realize that they're doing it or not.
But tonight, there is just the Sera, in a sheer skirt and combat boots that are wholly unsuited to combat (all of which Grace ignores as being someone else's fashion sense, as if she understood fashion to begin with). Harder to ignore is the hug, which Grace accepts in that stiff, unbending, robotic way. Yes, hello, Sera, ye of the hugs and hair ruffles.
It's easy to smile, even though she's not here to speak of happy things.
She waves off the question of a drink, though this will probably make Sera sad. "Nah, I'm just here to talk," she says. "I saw Lena the other day..."
And she lets that last sentence hang in the air. The sadness on her face must declare about how well that went.

Serafi­ne
Grace might wave off the offer of a drink but that does not mean that Sera is teetotaling.  Far from it.  Sera deposits Grace in the living room, full of artfully mismatched furnishing, where Grace can choose to curl up in a papasan chair, or on a slightly threadbare green velvet sofa with scrolled arms and artfully carved wooden feet, or in this delicious wingbacked chair, or so on.  Deposits Grace and decamps for the kitchen and returns with a reuseable Nalgene water bottle for Grace and then both a cup-and-saucer for herself and a pot of freshly, fragrantly brewed Darjeeling for herself.
Spiked liberally with Stranahans, because this is Sera.
There is a hearth in this room and an actual fire crackling therein and that new-feeling sense of places-where-things-change is also in the room.  It comes and goes when Sera comes and goes, recedes and rolls back in like the tide.  Sera circles past the fire and pours herself a teacup full of her spiked tea and settles into the embrace of one of the corners of the sofa and listens as Grace tells her that she saw Lena.
Sera can read the sadness hanging like an aura about Grace, of course she can, but she does not comment specifically on that.  Just lifts the mug to her mouth and murmurs, quietly, with that wholeness of attention that so often defines her, "What happened?"

Grace
Grace takes the water bottle, despite not really being thirsty, and then? Well, let's not look at Sera. The fire, let's look at that. It's easier, isn't it? And fires provide such great excuses to stare into them.
"I went to one of her shows. She makes great music, you know? And afterward, we went to a bar, and we talked, and she seemed very happy that I wanted to know how she wanted to be helped."
Grace sighs then, because well, that's the good news...
"But how she wanted to be helped was for me and everybody else to stay the hell away from her."

Serafi­ne
"I'm sure she's good.  She's always moving, you know?  She feels like music, too.  A bit: the beat?  Though electronica has never really been my thing.  I wanna hear skin against guitar strings.  I want people to play until they fucking bleed."
The teacup in Sera's hand is the old fashioned sort.  Bone china, painted with a delicate spray of roses, gilded around the lip and handled, meant to be elegantly sipped.  Sera settles the saucer on her left knee and holds the teacup by its base rather than its handle and watches Grace watching the fire.  This is how it goes: Sera's dark eyes and Grace's sigh.  Sera's warmth and the warmth of the alcohol in Sera's veins and Grace's sorrow.  Quiet, as Grace tells what she tells of the encounter, and then, just as quiet -
"What do you think about that?

Grace
"It's not going to help?" Grace offers.
She runs fingers through her messy hair, not to try to un-mess it, just it's a way to defuse the frustration a bit. "I told her that she wants two things that can't happen at the same time, you know? She wants people to know her and care about her and she also wants everybody to stay away from her.
"Then, she just got mad and told me never to track her down again."

Serafi­ne
Sera lifts her tea-cup to her mouth and inhales the fragrant scent.  The whiskey mostly-overwhelms delicate notes of the steeped tea, but whiskey is a good scent.  All smoke and amber, a supple sort of imbibing fire.  The gesture is quite nearly meditative which is strange because Sera isn't the sort given to meditating and her eyes are shadowed by half-lowered lashes and the surface of the tea vibrates with her exhaled breath.
She is just thinking, quite internally, her mouth quirked upward at one corner, the leather of her little cropped jacket creaking a bit when she shifts her left leg and upsets the saucer but not the mug.
"So."  Quiet.  Strangely steady, Sera.  "What are you gonna do?"

Grace
Grace's eyes start dancing from coal to coal. "It was a mistake, me ever going there, trying to talk to her. I'm the worst possible person for that sort of thing. I just, I don't understand people sometimes, and I can't..."
But that really wasn't the question asked was it? What are you going to do about it eh? Grace turns to look at Sera. "I'm going to stay away from her. I just don't want to fuck things up worse."

Serafi­ne
"Grace."
There's a certain command in the way that Sera says Grace's name.   A certain substantiality, a certain quiet weight.  Something in the tone that wraps around the spine and requires attention, because this is Sera and this is how Sera is.  Beneath that, an open and rather unrequited compassion - the dark yaw of it damp in Sera's eyes and Sera shifts on the couch and the saucer is now lost between cushions and spine and someone else will find it three weeks hence, perhaps Dee, and then she will know why one of the teacups has been without its saucer for weeks.
But,
"Grace."
And Sera sets her more-than-half-finished tea aside on the coffee table and shifts herself up to one knee and edges closer to the Virtual Adept-to-be.
"People are always fucking opaque.  No one really knows what's going on behind someone else's eyes.  We're as much mysteries to ourselves as we are to each other, and that's okay.   And I don't know what the hell is going on with Lena, but it wasn't a mistake for you to try to talk to her.
"You're saying that right now because you think that it didn't work, that you didn't fix it, that you didn't fix her, that you didn't turn her around."
A small lilt of her shoulders beneath the leather.
" - but you know, people aren't things-that-get-fixed.  We're just people, and we're all fucked up.  We get things wrong and we get them right and we get them in the middle and we get turned around and sometimes - most of the time - those definitions hardly matter.
"Tell me this.  Why'd you go see Lena in the first place?"

Grace
"Because, I... I don't know. Just, all of the rest of us, we've had people watching out for us. I've had Kalen -- you know he still makes sure I eat?
"But she's so alone, and it's not fair. I just wanted her to know that she didn't have to be. But I guess she wants to be. Or, I don't know, maybe she wants to be alone because everyone keeps fucking it all up when it comes to her."
Grace returns attention to the fire. Forgets for a moment, in the dance of flames. But it's only a moment's reprieve. But yes, there is that sense that Sera is so likely to pick up on, that Grace feels in some way responsible for the current loneliness of Lena. If only she could be what Lena needs, but no...

Serafi­ne
"So you went because you wanted to tell her that you were there if she needed you, and she didn't have to be alone?"
So Sera quietly interpolates, listening to the crackle of the flames and the pulse of guilt beneath Grace's skin.
The edge of a smile ghosting across Sera's mouth.
"Did you tell her that?"

Grace
"Yeah. I did. Maybe not in those exact words, but yeah," Grace says. She curls up in her chair, looks into the fire. "You think she's going to be okay?"
The words have hardly left her mouth before she's certain it's not the right thing to say. If Lena's not going to be okay, what could anyone even do about it anyway?

Serafi­ne
"I think she's magic."
Sera doesn't speculate on whether or not Lena's going to be okay.  On some level, Sera might not even believe in okay as a reasonable generalized state of being for a mage and a Cultist of Ecstasy.  Isn't okay a middling sort of ground, a flat and undifferentiated plane of existance full of even-keeled ships and second-rate lunchs in third-rate cardboard followed by an afternoon of paperwork and fourth-rate sex in a worn and familiar bed.  The sort of flat and undifferentiated ground where the magic inherent in any of those things; the miracle of sunlight, the gravity defying power of a goddamned elevator, the quiet comfort of sex with someone you love, in space that you have created together, is lost to the dulled sameness of the rote.
So,
it hardly matters whether or not Lena is going to be okay, right?  Though Sera knows what Grace means and gives Grace a smile and a look and exhales.
"And I think she has the right to a will; she gets to make her own choices.  She has to work her way through them. You know?
"You are not responsible for the choices she makes.  Just the ones you make.  You have the right to keep making them.
"I think you should respect her wishes.  You shouldn't track her down.  But if you want to talk to her, see how she's doing, you should give her a call."

Grace
"Oh I'm not going to take away her right to choice. She's chosen. But choices don't happen in a vacuum. It's not like there's Lena over there, and everyone else over here, and we don't affect her at all when she goes and makes choices. Environments matter.
It's like... ugh," Grace starts to say, stops, keeps going (because Sera's unlikely to completely understand this part, but whatever). "It's like quantum mechanics. You can't just isolate yourself completely from the outside, because all interactions entangle you with the rest of the universe. I mean, you'd like to think that you are just you and you're all in control of you. But you're not you. You're everything. And entangled with everything else.
"Something like that virus, man that's an interaction for you right? We're entangled. No matter what I do, I can't stop affecting her, or she me. I just don't know if I'm affecting her in the right way."

Serafi­ne
"I have no fucking idea what quantum mechanics are," returns Sera, with this slow-curving smile that feels full and ripe and on the edge; on the edge of something, right?  Maybe even something new.  "And if it's science shit, man.  I don't think I wanna know."
Like she's holding something on her tongue.
Like she's holding some secret everyone in the world knows in and on and under her tongue.
The smile spreads like molasses, slow and rich, and she moves her head on the fulcrum of her neck like a drunk girl does: keen to the pleasure of movement.  "But you're right.  We're all entangled and everything's connected and there's no fucking way to sever yourself; to build a wall and cut those ties because even the act of fucking excision is different sort of connection.  You, Grace, you just can't know what the right way is."  A small shrug.  "Even if you were a seer.  Even if you were a prophet.  The future's this smear of shifting possibilities and now's now and then's then.  Sometimes you just have to accept uncertainty."

Grace
A sad smile forms on Grace's lips. "Don't wanna. Accept uncertainty. But then, there's another piece of science shit for you. It's a fundamental principle of the universe that things are uncertain, that there are some things that you can't know."
Unless, of course, you cheat.
Gadfly used to do that, with her even. He sometimes didn't have the social wherewithal to know what to say to another person without gleaning clues from their brainwaves. A little creepy perhaps, but Grace understood. If there were anyone who would understand, it would be her. Loneliness can become self-regulating after a time. You forget (or never learned) how to interact with people and so when you do, it ends in disaster. And the cycle continues.
"Some people are better at knowing what the right way is than others, though. I'm not one of those people, Sera. I can be downright oblivious, and I know that. I didn't pick up at all that Lena thought I was pitying her and hated it. Hell, every time I saw her, I ended up happy, thinking it was a great time and we had a nice talk. I was such an idiot."

Serafi­ne
"Uncertainty makes us possible."
And Sera tastes like it now; the new resonance in the air since last Grace saw her is almost wholly defined by uncertainty.  The space between, right?  One definition and another; one identity and another; one space and another.  The threshold.
The open door.
Passion in Sera's voice is painted and vivid and there's something about it that feels, well: unbounded and unbound.  The edge of a smile and the coiling of Sera's bare legs and those heavy boots wrapped around her calves as she shifts position on the other side of the couch and drains her cup of tea-and-whiskey nearly at a go, and then she sets aside cup and saucer on the coffee table and settles back on the couch, the heavy boots tucked beneath her rather small frame, an arm flung across the back of the couch, this open energy about her that reads as masculine to most of the western world because Sera expects to be able to take up as much space as she wants, and a certain species of compassion in her eyes.
"Isn't that three-quarters of what's wrong with everyone out there?  All that certainty.  The loss of mystery.  Refusing the challenge of not knowing what the fuck you're doing.
"Near as I can tell, Lena would've thought that no matter what you did.  You've gotta let that go.  Misunderstandings are part of the territory of being human, you know?"

Grace
"Perhaps she would have," Grace says. Perhaps Lena would have seen pity everywhere in anyone, and no matter their actual state of mind. "I didn't really think about it like that."
There is something to blaming yourself, isn't there? We do it because we'd like to think we could do something about a situation that's not actually in our hands. We'd like to think we have control over our lives, or even other people's lives. Blaming oneself, even if it hurts to do, is a way of grabbing at power that was never handed over.
Lena certainly didn't want to hand that power over to Grace, nor to anyone. Maybe that was the point.
"Uncertainty. Hmm. Yes. Part of the territory of being human. Right," Grace says, repeating words, off in thought. "Sometimes, I don't know. I write a lot of stories with questions about what that really means -- being human. I guess I never really figured that one out."

Serafine
Sera is leaning back into the embrace of her couch now.  Lounging, with her feet in those heavy boots curled beneath her ass.  Which has to be uncomfortable, although she does not really appear to be uncomfortable.  The fire is in her periphery.  She can see it through the scrim of her lashes when she turns her head aslant.  She can hear the pop and crackle as the flames find some bit of resin in the old dry wood.  She can smell the sharp, rather clean scent of the dead wood burning, burning.
The house is mostly-quiet but there is music somewhere.  There is music from-somewhere and the sound is low, background.  Sera might not talk quiet so openly about magic and mage-things if Dee and Rick were around, so it must be Dan somewhere in the house.  Working, maybe.
Rather unconsciously, Sera thumbs the ring on her index finger, rests her head cushioned against the spine of the couch.  Watches Grace, through half-closed eyes.  Listening as Grace repeats her words; watching the thoughts drift across Grace's features like clouds against the sky.
"Who really has?"  Sera asks her, rather quietly.  "Figured it all out."  Her eyes a sort of sloe-dark, full of something.  "Tell me about one of your stories."

Grace
"Okay, sure... There was this one -- I wrote it for Eleanor, but that was a mistake. I figured something out though. I should never write stores for a person. Should just write them for everyone. You write a story for a person and... well, it's out of your hands what they do with it," she says, stares off into the fire for a bit. "I mean, that's always the case with stories, but you don't want to make it personal."
"Right, so about it. I wanted to write something about reincarnation. So I wrote about life extension technology, removal of the aging process. What happens when people are granted the ability to live forever? Something totally unnatural to the human condition, right? How they'd sense, at some point, that a reset is necessary. To keep everything new and exciting and interesting, and keep people going in good directions, they need to have... Uncertainty. Yeah. Which is why we forget everything when we die."

Serafine
Sera listens; see?  Her head turned a bit away, so that she can see the fire in the grate, the leaping shadows it casts over the hearthstone, which is old and scuffed but clean and well-polished, and which sits a neat inch-or-so above the level of the old hardwoods.  There are Persian rugs scattered about, beneath the furniture, warm underfoot.  Deep burgundies and blues, and they are worn, the fringe messy and incomplete, eaten up by errant vacuum cleaners one too many times to remain intact.  Art on the walls, all around, though this is something Grace may remember about Sera's home and Sera's room: how many things she collects, nearly all of which someone, somewhere, made with his or her own two hands.
There are curtains and the curtains are velvet and they are a rather rich brown instead of the crimson Sera wanted, only because Dee objected that crimson curtains with a green couch would look like Christmas all year long.  Some of the Christmas lights are still wound around the curtain rod.  Short, squat little Edison bulbs, and as the darkness deepens outside the rather cheery strand of lights seems all the more present.  The visible filaments glowing against the dusk outside.
"I know fuck-all about writing stories.  Dan and I write songs, but they're not story-songs.  Even so, I just write them for me.  And I figure, maybe as a side effect, they'll mean something to someone else, and once they're outta you that's all you have.
"It's always outta your hands what they do with it.  What they get from it.  What they hear in it.  Why they love it.  Why they hate it.  Every bit of it, no matter whom you write it for, or why or when.
"That's pretty okay with me.  But I'm a fucking weirdo.
"Anyway, we can live forever.  Or close to it.  Hawksley has this book, written two hundred years ago by an Ecstatic born in the 1960s, who may or may not have been a hermaphrodite.  Which may or may not have been deliberate choice.
"I can stop time.
"Slow it down.  Rewind it.  Live it again.  Want to see?"

Grace
Sera talks about an Ecstatic born in the 60's who wrote a book two hundred years ago, and the thing that immediately jumps to Grace's mind is Dr. Who. Because of course it would. Speaking of immortals who 'reset' every now and then, and leap around in time...
And she's about to respond, when Sera says she can stop time. And asks if Grace wants to see. Grace's eyes bug out.
"Yes. Yes of course I want to see!"

Serafi­ne
Sera is one of those rare individuals who has managed to befriend a nerd and/or geek who has never heard of Dr. Who so she can hardly begin to read Grace's reactions, to consider the leylines of awareness and cultural references and so on that spring from Sera's brief description of that particular book in that particular Hermetic's library.
And she is likely going to escape her initiation into the world of Dr. Who because yes, of course Grace wants to see.  So yes, of course Sera - smiling rather indulgently - is going to show her.
Not here, apparently, since Sera is uncurling her bare legs and shaking out that see-through high-low skirt and nudging that teacup on the coffee table a bit back from the dangerous edge and standing and opening her hand to Grace and it appears that Grace is meant to follow.
As Sera is not wearing heels tonight, Grace and Sera are nearly of a height.  Naturally, bare-footed Sera would have no more than an inch on Grace.  The combat boots probably add another inch but still: they are closely matched.  Sera opens her left hand and it is sort of trailing behind her and Grace can take it or not, at her leisure.  She has known Sera long enough to guess that Sera would not likely be offended by a refusal.
And anyway Sera is on the move; sliding past the spot Grace occupies on the couch, expecting Grace to rise and follow her out of the living room, through the kitchen to the sliders from the breakfast room facing onto the patio.  There's a hardly-singed joint in an ashtray parked on a parquet plantstand just inside the sliding glass doors, and the bright burst of cold from the winter evening outside, and Sera explains on the way that she probably needs to be a bit more high in order to do it.
By then they are in the kitchen and even if Grace took her hand in the first place they have stopped holding hands because of the layout if nothing else, and Sera explains that she needs to get stoned to do magic and glances over her shoulder at Grace, this lashed and sweeping look, and says, "Unless you wanted to make out with me, but I didn't think you'd volunteer."
This smile.  She's at the door between the kitchen and the breakfast room then then, has unlatched the slider grabbed joint-and-lighter and opened the slider just enough for the two of them to slip outside.
Where Sera lights the joint, takes a long, deep drag that crackles her lungs, and holds it, and holds it, and holds it -
- then exhales, and passes the joint to Grace, while they huddle in the leeside of the building, watch the dark and quiet garden.
Maybe they share the joint in silence.
Or maybe Grace gives her an education in the ways of Dr. Who after all.

Grace
Grace takes the hand offered by Sera. Grace isn't exactly afraid of touch, just doesn't so much like it when people do it unexpectedly. When they get grabby hands and when those touches are laced with social meaning that she cannot fathom. Like handshakes and hugs and all those other human rituals. Like making out, for example -- a thing that has only ever felt to Grace like she's being eaten by whatever highly unskilled amorous person she's allowed to try.
And she has. For the sheer need to understand what humanity is. To try to be normal. It wasn't the right reason.
She never did it because she wanted to.
Still, the comment about making out with Sera brings a smile to Grace's face. Maybe she's just happy to have the subject changed to magic, away from how horribly bungled the whole Lena thing went. "Let's just get high. No offense."
The first hit brings the tickle of cough to her lungs, with the mix of sharp cold air and smoke. But this time she holds it down (okay, maybe with a leetle cough or two at the end). "So this is part of the process huh? Have to get stoned first?"

Serafi­ne
"The easiest way," Sera returns, and there's an it's that is sort of elided at the beginning of the sentence.  Swallowed with the smoke and held inside her lungs and kept there, as blood flows through and picks up the intoxicant along with the oxygen her body requires, and carries it out, and out, and out.  Sometimes Sera imagines she can feel them, each little - what the fuck ever, molecule, nascent and bright with possibility.  All these connections inside her body; all these connections in the universe.
She's smiling and it's a sidelong smile as she takes another drag; a deep one, because that is the way she works.  She doesn't say anything to Grace about the cough though she does stand ready to pat Grace on the back or the shoulder if the spasms come too hard and too fast and become too eyewatering.  Just some steady reminder to the body of its functions, right?
" - it's like it zips open your brain.  When I'm playing with time."  Sera is smiling in a way that feels like it hurts; she can feel the muscles in her cheeks, the way they move and the way they curve and right now she is just very simply and very plainly happy.  "Helps to remind me that my skin is just a membrane.  Pourous, you know?
"Other pieces seem to work better with other focii.  Mind's always been music for me.  Life is touch."
Sera's standing there with her arms crossed, goosebumps on her limbs, teeth set against chattering when she's not taking another hit and passing it back but still: see the lazy way she swings her head back toward Grace, using the glass door as a sort of sliding fulcrum, this drunken arc of movement that has her looking at Grace all slantwise and unfocused, eyes gleaming in the darkness.
"Maybe a little more - " a supple shrug, wry and a bit aware.  " - sensual than just plain touch.  It's like, a frame that you harness yourself to - it just, I don't fucking know.  Any of them can work.  Pain.  Pleasure.
"Some things just fit," and her eyes fall; and Sera looks a little bit far away.  " - like a needle in the groove of a record.  You know?"

Grace
Grace lets out a little huff of laughter, like already things are getting a little too just-this-side of funny. "No, I don't know. Honestly, for all you try to recruit me, I cannot even fathom how all that works."
She takes another hit when it's offered, of course, and lets it soothe the tired mind, well worn out in worry and guilt. "I use my computer, but honestly if I think about it, it's more that I use the computer to do all the math. I know you don't want to know about all the science, but it's so beautiful, Sera," she says, passes the joint back.
"The first time I saw my little desk plant thinking about where to store its little pieces of captured sun. Thinking. With green pigments all superpositioned on top of one another, making little amazing calculations.
"And then, you know, you can see the connection between everything in the code. In the math. It shows you just how close we are. Like, I could know what it is to be that plant if I tried hard enough, because in some ways I already am a part of it, and it of me. Well, you know. If you wanted to know what a plant feels like, I suppose."
A little sigh there, watching the smoke in the air. "Just so... beautiful."

Serafi­ne
Time 3.  Difficulty: 7 (Vulgar without witnesses).  -1 (focus);  -1 (taking time);  -1 (resonance).
Dice: 3 d10 TN4 (4, 4, 5) ( success x 4 ) [WP]

Serafi­ne
"That's what I do," Sera is telling Grace, with this silly, liquid smile.  The joint is spent or near it and while she doesn't waste that shit is legal now in the state of Colorado.  More legal than the clove-spiced cigarettes she favors, certaintly.  So, there's no searching about for a roach clip or struggling to smoke the last bits of seed trapped inside the last slips of rolling paper because Sera takes one last inhale and then opens her hand and lets the last miniscule less-than-an-eighth-of-an-inch of the joint drift down to the damp pavers of the patio.
Then Sera slings an around around Grace's shoulder, and the gesture has these limits that are not parabolic but maybe Grace can see the math in them; the motion of the arm, the limits of the movement, the ricochet that is built in from the drugs they have consumed.
Sera's smokey mouth against the fringe of Grace's hair, and Sera rolls her into a bit of a hug and Sera's smiling and cold, so COLD, but her breath is warm as she laughs against Grace's temple.  "I just don't need fucking math to do it.
"Come on."
Grace is released.  Sera pulls open the door and there is a blast of warmth inside and they dash in and close the door behind them and stand there bright and high and shivering and Sera is stamping her feet a bit to get warm and then she is just stamping her feet to feel her thighs move and somehow they are sliding all sinuous back through the kitchen and oh hey, there's the bottle of whiskey and here's a bag of organic pretzel crisps and does Grace want anything they can make chocolate later.
They can get someone to make them hot chocolate later because Sera does not cook when high (or anytime, really.  Not her wheelhouse), and Sera's leading Grace back into the living room, holding the bottle of whiskey in one hand and this whole time they've been winding their way back in through the house Grace has felt Sera's magic at the back of her throat; against her skin.  The rising resonance - and what is strongest just now is the new resonance that stamps Sera - and they are just inside the door of the living room and Sera takes that bag of pretzel crisps and tosses it across the room, see.  Another arc of movement that Grace can calculate, can see, can know -
- which is arrested.  Abruptly.  The bag of pretzels is frozen midair.  The fire does not move.  The music barely audible drifting from someplace up the familiar stairs is - well, it's just a droning not now, isn't it.  Like a needle stuck on a certain groove, the record unmoving.
Sera still has her fingers wrapped around the neck of her bottle of whiskey, neat and loose.  It swings a bit as she reaches back for Grace's hand.  They are moving; the both of them.  Their hearts are beating.
Everything, everything around them, is
just
stopped.

Grace
"Fucking math," Grace giggles into Sera's hair. "Rigid body mechanics," she says, and there's another giggle at a joke that Sera's unlikely to get.
Grace is high, and forgetting and looking forward to the show that Sera's planning, and everything is so much less sad and more funny now. They go inside, and there's a burst of warmth which is nice oh yes.
Sera beams with something in-between, something not quite there, doesn't she? And why hadn't Grace picked up on that before, but yes there is something different today about the way Sera feels, as she fills the surrounding space with herself literally and figuratively.
And then stops time, just to show Grace how that works. And it's all so silly and wonderful, that she laughs -- barely even registers it when Sera's hand slips into hers. "Oh, wow Sera! This is awesome!" Grace says in the most honest of ways. Couldn't change the way she said those words if she'd tried, so excited and awed and...  "Can we touch stuff? Like, rearrange the pretzels into a happy face or something?"

Serafi­ne
"I don't know," Sera returns, inhaling deeply and satisfyingly through her nostrils.  The world feels strange and each second is accumulating beneath her skin, isn't it?  She can feel everything shearing outside of her, where the thousand tender hooks that connect her to the ordinary forward movement of things are beginning to pull in the wrong direction.
Sera's thumb skims across Grace's knuckles and Sera is still smiling as she draws Grace into movement, tugging her forward to walk toward and around the frozen pretzels.  "You can try."
A small squeeze, Sera's hand to Grace's.
"Everything'll start up again.  I can only do this for so long.  But if you wanna make a smiley face in the pretzels - "
Well, go ahead Grace.  Go ahead.

Serafi­ne
Extending.  Difficulty +1
Dice: 3 d10 TN5 (2, 9, 9) ( success x 3 ) [WP]

Grace
Grace -- gleeful, oblivious Grace -- she works fast (extremely fast, considering all this is truly happening in a blink's span) at taking pretzels, frozen in time, and making a little smiley out of them. Two eyes, a little curve of a mouth. Laughs at her work, doesn't she? Oh yes.
And also, thinks about what some passive observer might see. Two blurs, perhaps? Instantaneous pretzel and human teleportation? When it stops, will the frozen snacks continue to have the same momentum, or will they just drop to the floor? So many questions, and none of them being: is this the right way to use our power over the universe? To have a little fun with it? And she doesn't question how Sera's doing either, pulling the threads of fate such that they might snap and hurt her back.
Grace just doesn't have all that much experience with the universe's ire.
No, she just points at her little smiley masterpiece and says, "That's so cool."

Serafine
Paradox.
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (1, 5, 6) ( success x 1 )

Serafi­ne
Soak!
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (1, 5, 8) ( success x 1 )

Serafi­ne
Sera watches Grace with an obvious and rather indulgent pleasure.  Sera is high.  She is fucking stoned and the world moves around her like a wheel and now she is stopping the wheel,  arresting its movement.  No, no.  Here.
It feels right to her, correct and natural, that she should be divorced from the proceedings of ordinarily.  The future and the past have always, always come to her, unmoored, for quite as long as she remembers, though the truth is - and here is another truth that Grace does not know - that Sera has not remembered for long.
But here; her living room.  Time stops and a would-be Virtual Adept apprentice is re-arranging pretzel crisps into a smiley face.  Sera breathes out, bright and bemused and follows and ruffles fingers through Grace's hair and all too soon the moment ends.  Perhaps even Grace can sense it at the farthest edge of her awareness: the kinetic energy of reality snapping itself back into shape.  The paradox blow.
It hits Sera like an uppercut; her head jerks back from the force, but her body absorbs it.  And then they are in time again.  The pretzels are falling and there's likely not enough time to figure out how.  Did they remember their momentum from before?  or shift - or fall.  Everything in a blur so it is almost impossible to say.

Grace
There's another giggle when the world blurs itself back into place, the whole snap-shut-slipping feeling of sliding back into time. But then, Sera's head snaps back, her body jerking with it, and seriousness washes over Grace again.
"Woah... you okay?" she asks, lazily.

Serafi­ne
"Course I am, Grace," Sera demurs, with this half-lazy smile.  "That's just Paradox.  You do something - obvious, it all snaps back at you.  Find a way to slip it beneath the skin of things, to explain it to ordinary mortals, and you're fine.
"Now c'mon.  I bet you're gonna get the munchies soon, and some of these pretzels are still in the bag."