Lydia (Red Room SL)

Grace
The first time she found Lydia, the woman was in Colorado Springs, talking to some cops. Grace decided to leave her be, because she wasn't bleeding in the street or something horrible, and it was so definitely naptime. Sleep is important, sometimes. When you remember, and all.

The day after next, when her sleep schedule has been repaired, is when she decides to head out again, Chloe IV underneath the driver's side, on a small road trip.

We're going to Colorado Springs to chase down a newb. Or, at least, get close enough to help her out if needed.

First things first, though, she pulls out the bit of tape with Lydia's hair stuck to it. Got to find the newb again, right? Right.

Hair that used to be on her head. Hair that has a connection to her, that carries her DNA. It's just the thing that Grace needs to forge a link to this specific person she's never met.

[Corr 2, Life 1: Track this person! Diff = 5 -1 (Personalized instrument) -1 (taking time)]

Dice: 3 d10 TN3 (4, 4, 10) ( success x 3 )

flux
Grace doesn't have too much problem finding the young lady. She finds her outside of an apartment building. The apartment building itself seems to be a hazy location, difficult to really scry but it would appear that Lydia is far enough outside of the location that she's still findable.

She seems to be headed away from the apartment at that particular moment.

Grace
Apartment with wards, eh? Okay. They could be Trads. Or Disparates. Grace sighs. Okay, time to go meet the woman you've been stalking. No nerves, now.

She starts the car and heads out of the dentist's parking lot that had been her temporary hideout.

She's got Cheetos and canned espresso for the ride (because its suuuch a long trip). Let's do this.

flux
Oh god, and it is a drive. Colorado Springs is an hour and some change away, but with the sheer volume of morons that one has to deal with at any given time it feels like it's an eternity when you are driving. Worse than Missouri (and there's a reason that Missouri sounds a lot like the wordmisery.)

But, soon enough, Grace is able to get to the apartment complex and follow along with her little tracking knowledge to find the young woman that she has ever-so-gracefully been stalking.

Or, well, about where she is. When she gets to the location, she has to really focus. She's looking for Lydia, knows she's at the pool, but Grace no doubt overlooks the sunbather a couple times (despite the fact that she is the only one there). Like the girl is a blip in her memory, like the conversation they are about to have is going to be one that she has to really hold onto.

Grace
Arcane meet Arcane, eh? Grace doesn't want to be found out too often either. She knows how it goes. Still, it's annoying being on the opposite end, isn't it?

Grace isn't dressed like a pool-goer. Dark jeans and a blue jacket zipped up almost to her neck complete her ensemble today. That and a wild mop of hair she hasn't brushed.

She sits down on one of the pool chairs next to Lydia, clears her throat, and says "Hi. Sasha is looking for you."

flux
Grace clears her throat, and it does seem to be enough to get Lydia's attention. She pulls her sunglasses down, looks at her and it takes her a minute before she finally seems to register what the lady just said.

And she is immediately on her feet and trying to make a break for the gate. "ANGELA!"

Grace
"Wait! I'm here to help!"

Fuck it. Grace gets to her feet, pulls her phone out of her pocket.

Tries to make a run for it...

flux
It's a mess out here, ladies and gentlemen. Not a lot of people are home, a chick in a swimsuit is making a break for the gate. Grace is making a break for the gate, and from a nearby apartment, there is a lean Hispanic woman making a break out of her front door.

She's built like someone who has done more than a couple foot chases in her life, runs like she is most alive when she is running. Feels determined, more than anything. What detracts from her general aire of authority and strength is the fact that she has run out in a pair of My little Pony pajama pants and a tee shirt that is three sizes too big for her.

Grace
Run, Grace, away from the women who have gotten the wrong idea. Not hard to see why, in hindsight, but you know...

"Please, I'm not here to hurt you! I know it looks bad, I can explain!"

flux
[Angela- vault!]

Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (2, 3, 3, 4, 6, 7) ( success x 2 )

flux
The older woman jumped the fence, and while it wasn't graceful it was very clear at that juncture that Grace was in a situation that was about to go from bad to worse. Once she's cleared the gate, though, the Hispanic woman stopped.

Regarded Grace for a minute, and tilted her head to the side before something like recognition dawned on her. She nodded.

"... c'mon, let's go talk. You can explain, I can make tea."

Grace
Grace breathes for a second, because she wasn't quite ready to go sprinting today. Angela, she presumes, isn't ready to tackle her anymore, and that's a good sign.

She nods. "Tea. Tea is good. Okay."

Her phone goes back in her pocket, and raises her hands in a bit of a mock gesture of goodwill.

Please don't shove my head into the pavement, lady.

flux
Lydia makes her way through the gatequickly, and seems keen on keeping Angela between herself and Grace. She hadn't come out with anything at that juncture.

Angela walks at a pace that is leisurely towards an apartment whose door is sitting wide open. "So, where are you from?"

Her tone is conversational, and she waits until everyone is inside of the apartment before she shuts the door.

The place isn't terribly big- it's a one bedroom with a small kitchen and a dining room that seems to act as part dining room and part pantry. What should be the pantry has the door open- it looks like a small library/shrine. Books where the food goes, and a rather ornate set up with flowers and offering bowls and candles and an altar table set out for an effigy of a skeleton in green and gold robes. Cloaked in sunlight with roses at her feet. She looks almost like the Virgin Mary, but one would have to think better of it. The door to the pantry locks from the inside.

"And how do you know my guest?"

Grace
"Denver," she offers, when the question comes up. Grace walks along with them, because the only other option is to flee and let this thread of a mystery hang.

It does let some of the tension out of her shoulders though, when she sees that shrine. Okay, definitely not 'Crats.

"The name's Grace. I'm with the Mercurial Elite. And I know your guest, because I found her boyfriend trying to find her via a hack."

flux
The mention of Denver makes Angela's eyebrows knit together. Her mouth press into a line. She continues on with the heating of water and the brewing of tea, because they were going to have tea and this was going to be a conversation. Grace says she is with the Mercurial Elite.

"Angela Avella, Chakravanti," she offers. Takes another look at Lydia and seems to contemplate how to progress forward.

"What's a Mercurial Elite?" Lydia asks, cocks her head to the side and takes a seat on the couch.

"Reality coders," Angela replies, "what turned you on to Ms. Zharkova's case, Grace?"

She handles these matters like a police officer would. In fact, when her face isn't obscured by distance, it's clear that she is one of the women from the greasy spoon she'd seen when she was scrying.

flux
[Lydia, WP: totally not freaking out over that[

Dice: 4 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 8, 8) ( success x 2 )

flux
"Did you get anything about a location?" Angela asked, seeming to pass voer her own obvious confusion when she mentions something about the dark net- there are things she has no idea about. The digital world isn't her world.

"I heard something about Montana?" Lydia offered, "it was all really blurry... I was meeting with someone to talk about mission work."

flux
Lydia looks absolutely horrified by what Grace is implying- all soft hearted things are, "who would ever do something like that?"

There is a little more from Grace, how she says she's making sure that Lydia was okay before she proceeded, "but what about Grant? There's still people out there."

This seems to surprise Angela. brows raise, but she is in the process of managing tea, so she lets Grace lead the investigation here.

flux
"He said he used to live in California," she said, "Grant Kherrington. We had a couple meals together and then he went away and I went away. They seemed pretty pissed that he was talking to the girls there."

flux
"What makes you sure he hasn't already?" Angela quirks a brow, "how did he see what happened?"

flux
"If there is a video floating around of someone teleporting into Colorado Springs it needs to get buried or debunked so fast that the Technocracy's collective mirror shaded heads spin. We heard things were going down in Denver, and I do not want them here again."

Again, Angela said. Again, like they've had to deal with the technocracy in Colorado Springs (more times than she'd like).

"You understand, my only source of information right now is you and a girl who has become aware of the magickal world for about a minute. If you can deal with whatever is going on online, we can handle the offline repercussions."

flux
"Given that Denver has proven itself to be more reasonable than it has been in the past, you can expect to hear more and see more collaboration with the city of Colorado Springs," she says. Calm. Collected. Ready, "and if you could make sure this young lady gets paid for the time she's worked, that would be greatly appreciated."

Cabalists' Reunion

Kalen Holliday
Kalen could use a friend right now.  And thus, naturally, instead of calling his friends he has come to Washington Park.

There is no scarecrow by the lake.  There is almost never a scarecrow by the lake, but Kalen has yet to give up hope of seeing The Message again.  Washington Park is also where he runs into other friends and fascinating things happen.  It is largely for that first thing that he has spread a wool blanket over the ground at the base of a tree and settled down to stay awhile.  He's sprawled partly on the blanket and partly against the tree.

He's been in and out of Denver and he's running with no few projects simultaneously, so he is sipping at coffee.  However much he loves Washington Park and however much he would like a nap, this is not the place for sleeping.  At least not alone.  There are books in the bad that he brought, but he is not reading through any of them in an attempt to cling to productivity.  Instead, he watches the park through half-closed eyes.  Both he and the park are calm enough for that, at least for the moment.

[And, how distracted by Resonance are we?]

Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 6, 7, 7, 8, 8) ( success x 5 )

Alexander Brandt
[Awareapathy]

Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 2, 2, 4) ( botch x 1 )

Alexander Brandt
[Ugh...]

Alexander Brandt
One thing that an observer might have noticed about Alexander since his ‘release’ was just how much time he was spending outdoors.  He had always been an active person, preferring to be outside than stuck inside, but this was almost being taken to an extreme.  Home was somewhere to store things, to sleep.  He had some plans to change some things – those white walls needed painting, for one thing – but they were things that he was in no rush to get to.

The park calls to him for a similar reason to Kalen.  It’s somewhere peaceful in the city, and it’s a place with memories tied to it.  He comes here looking for the same scarecrow, although not really expecting to find it.  There had been…  maybe not a promise as such, but certainly an acknowledgement that travelling through the Umbra together was something that he and The Message could both get something from.  Alex had no way to get through the Umbra – yet, anyway – and so he returned from time to time to see if The Message had decided that it was time.  Not yet.

There is something he picks up on, though, close to the lake.  There’s a presence close to the tree line, something that makes him tense up.  He doesn’t turn to look, but it’s something he would always remember.  Something Potent, Incisive and Reflective.  He has a light jacket on, which he reaches into to check for something.  He doesn’t close, doesn’t turn to look.  He walks away.

Grace
Kalen, trusting in Fate, just brings another blanket as means to summon friends. If he were anyone else, if Denver wasn't what it is, this might not work. Fortunately for him, he is Kalen and Denver is Denver.

Denver sometimes likes to be a dick, though.

Grace is Grace. Taking straight lines through curving sidewalks, only moving for the trees, because the probably won't move for her.

She's in nature, yes, but distracted by her phone, because this is the kind of relaxation a Mercurial Elite enjoys. Get away from it all, and plug into the all.

Kalen Holliday
Kalen senses Resonance, but it isn't familiar.  Interesting, but unfamiliar.

There was a time when he would have gone to chase down this new Mage.  Evaluate them.  Offer them things.

What does he have to offer now?  Not Ginger.  Not the library.  He himself is hardly in a position to take on a student.  Friends?  He in't sure he's in much of a position for that either.

But then there is Grace, proceeding linearly through the park.  And so, he chases nothing, at least for now.  Instead he waits.  Perhaps Grace will get this new Mage.  Perhaps Grace will come alone.  Regardless, he stays where he is.

Alexander Brandt
[Totally trying again, given the new Resonance!]

Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (7, 7, 8, 8, 9) ( success x 5 )

Alexander Brandt
[I AM NOT SERAFINE!!  But at least we can get them talking now.]

Alexander Brandt
Alex walks around the edge of the lake, getting further from that unseen resonance.  It brings him closer to another, though.  Something familiar, someone who had come to see him out at the motel.  This time, no awkward semi-nakedness to get in the way.  He pats his jacket pocket again, reassuring himself that he has some kind of protection.  Hopefully it won’t be needed, but you never can tell.  He gets closer to her, skipping the niceties as he tells her, “I think I just felt a Technocrat.”  He jerks his head in the direction of the treeline, still not turning to look.

Grace
[Awareness!]

Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (2, 3, 4, 6, 8) ( success x 2 )

Grace
Grace looks up, smiles at Alex, until his serious face and words sink in, and that's no longer the appropriate response. The seriousness in Alex's face gets reflected, then.

"Kalen's here. We should get with him. Strength in numbers," she says, though she doesn't sense anything more than friendlies, herself.

She then sets off, quicker now, more alert now, in the direction she had already been taking.

Alexander Brandt
Grace starts to head off again, but Alex grabs her arm to stop her.  “If it’s who I think it is, he’s powerful.  More powerful than Sera is, or Victoria was.”  Now he starts scanning the treeline, looking for some sign of movement.  His hand goes pack into his jacket and stays there this time, a faint click of something metallic following.

“With you on the safety in numbers, though.”  He walks along side Grace when she sets off again, although does slow down if their route seems to be heading towards that feeling of resonance he picked up on moments before.

Grace
Their route is heading toward Kalen, if that is where Alex is afraid to go. But look, it's him, on a blanket, and Grace is undisturbed.

Well, maybe a little disturbed by the noises coming from behind her.

"Let's try using diplomancy first? If it comes to that. But I'm glad you're prepared."

Kalen Holliday
Kalen looks up to see Grace approaching with the new Mage, who appears not to be new at all.

Different.  Everything is different because of things that happened and Alexander feels different.  Kalen is used to reaching out and breathing in the solidity of Alexander's Resonance, but now Alexander is closer to the kind of infinite possibility that Kalen has always seen.  Closer to what he should be, perhaps.

Grace is with him though.  And Grace wouldn't bring him here if he was angry.  If she knew.  Would she know?

He sets down his coffee, rises from his sprawl, and heads slowly out to meet them.  They are wary of potential Technocrats.  Kalen is wary because abandoning him, one way or another, is basically what people do.

"Hey," he says quietly as he reaches them.  Just that.  And then he studies them, more Alexander than Grace, as he waits.

Alexander Brandt
Let’s try using diplomacy first?

“Right.  Sure.”  Because that’s totally what got him into the whole pile of shit two months ago.  Nothing to do with being shot in the leg with a tranquiliser, nothing to do with blacking out after having his knee destroyed by gunfire.  Either way, he isn’t planning on shooting the floor if circumstances ever repeat themselves.

He still slows as they close with Kalen’s rug, expecting… something.  “Oh, I’m the proverbial boy scout, right?”

It isn’t Kalen that he’s expecting to see.  He doesn’t immediately react to seeing him, instead turning to check the other parts of the park that are visible from where they are.  The bastard must have gone somewhere.  He is still a little paranoid in some ways, but now he knows that the bad guys really are out there.   He finds… nothing.  Nobody.  There’s a deep growl, followed by another faint click and Alex’s hand coming out from his jacket.

“Hey.”  The distraction fades and Kalen’s presence is registered more.  That much is obvious, as Alex closes the distance between them and pulls Kalen into a bear hug.  “I’ve missed you.”

Grace
Grace watches them hug, but more importantly, watches the people, keeps her senses open. And then, takes her phone out again.

"Alex thought he sensed a Technocrat. I'm going to set up some protection," she says, all business and focus.

[Corr 2: Stiffening space against Corr manipulation. Diff 5, -1 = taking time]

Dice: 3 d10 TN4 (1, 2, 4) ( success x 1 )

Kalen Holliday
Infinite possibility is a thing with which Kalen has at least a passing acquaintance.  And he has, on occasion, been accused of unchecked optimism and completely foundless hope.

Hell, he has tried to make peace with vampires and wants to make peace with the Technocracy.  He loves to live in the edges of the world where improbability and reality and faith and hope collide into something transcendent.

And Kalen Holliday, despite all of these things, never considered this possibility for his reunion with Alexander.  He does not, at all, fight with being hugged.  Kalen fighting against hugs is not a common occurrence, particularly from people he is close to.  It takes a second for him to process exactly what this moment is, because he expected something so very different.

"Missed you too."

Grace mentions a potential Technocrat, but Kalen stays where he is.  Grace with get them some kind of protection.  Alexander is there.  And most of what Kalen can do about the Technocracy he could do without stepping away from Alexander anyway.  And, from here, no one is taking Alexander without taking him.  There is, also, that.

"Welcome home," he says softly.

Alexander Brandt
Alexander has changed.  More than the simple (or not so simple) changing of his resonance, he had been given something of a wake-up call over the past couple of months.  Part of that is that he needs other people.  He’d pushed others away before, when things were going badly.  He might return to old ways later, but for now?  For now he doesn’t push, but pulls them closer.  Kiara had been the first, now Kalen.  Others, too, who are close to Alex may well get the same reaction when he meets them.  Other who may be equally surprised.

Welcome home.

“Funny that.  It finally does feel like home.”  He releases Kalen, turning back to scan the park.  “But, yeah.  I felt…”  A pause.  “Someone.”  There’s the flow of Grace’s resonance around them as she does something that Alex can’t, yet, comprehend.  With more experience, a greater connection with reality, he might be able to do something more to help.  His connection had strengthened, but it was something that he was barely beginning to scratch the surface of: that being able to make a change, rather than standing and watching.  But he’s never been one to sit and watch others do all the work.  So he looks around, concentrating on finding that familiar resonance again.

[Per+Awareness, WP because we’re really blood trying to find him]

Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (7, 9, 10, 10, 10) ( success x 6 ) [WP]

Alexander Brandt
[Third eye: well-squeegeed.  Bill Hicks would be pleased.]

Grace
Grace is still hard at Work. She clunks her phone hard across the side, because sometimes you need to do a bit of manual debugging, right? Not everything is going smoothly with this. But if she tries, really hard...

Oblivious to the rest of the world, she continues trying to weave the connections of the world in on themselves so that they cannot be used...

[Extending, with wp, because the code is being dumb]

Dice: 3 d10 TN5 (1, 7, 8) ( success x 3 ) [WP]

Kalen Holliday
Alexander releases Kalen and Kalen takes a half step away.  He stays close.  He has sensed nothing.  There is, even if there are Technocrats present, some chance that there may be no cause to fight.  No need to get aggressive and provoke anyone.  He tries to remember Ms. Grey and that Technocrat from the coffeehouse more than any of his other experiences with them.

Years of coming to the conclusion that more blood is not the way to the world he wants war against a decade of training that his enemies are clear and his responses are equally clear.

Grace is still working, so, for now, he waits.  Alert enough, but not quite concerned enough to be spooked.  His eyes scan over the park

"Once you're ready, Kit," he says quietly.  "I suggest a change of location."

Alexander Brandt
“Dammit.”  It’s a mild curse, quietly spoken.  Maybe the guy had moved on, or used some way to hide himself.

Experience shapes actions, and recent experience has perhaps made Alexander a little less tolerant in some ways.  Blood is, mostly, not the first option unless it can’t be helped.  But there are now certain circumstances where he is more likely to fight before talking.  More than standing between an Apprentice and her potential abductor, this is something more targeted.  Something that comes from fear that it could happen again.  And a very certain attitude that he wouldn’t be caught again.

Alex nods, though, at the suggestion of changing location.  “Being somewhere else seems like a great idea right now.”  He hasn’t completely shifted the idea that he’s still being watched, but there doesn’t seem to be an immediate danger now.

Grace
"Yeah," she says to Kalen. "I was making it harder for them to track us on the way to said location."

She sighs and lets her eyes scan the park again, a little upset at how weak her shield was, but what can you do?

"Let's go."

Go where? That's something she leaves unsaid, because there's more than one way to find out where people are going to go.

Kalen Holliday
Kalen glances between the two of them.  It takes him less than ten seconds to come up with a workable plan and then an alternate plan. He takes the few steps to pick up his coffee and his blanket, then looks back to them and smiles.

"My car?"  Apparently he isn't interested in broadcasting their destination, or potential destinations, either.

Alexander Brandt
“Works for me.”  Alex would normally offer to help Kalen carry something, but he doesn’t want to get his arms tied up with anything right at the moment.  He lets Kalen lead, knowing where the car is currently parked.  “I can drive.”  It seems sensible: he assumes that he’s had the most experience behind a wheel, and the others can do more if they’re not distracted by patty issues like not driving under an 18-wheeler.  Still, there’s no talk of location until they’re safely away from this one.

cricket
(My vote is they all rock up to Kiara's apartment at 10PM without warning.)

Alexander Brandt
[Partay!]

Kalen Holliday
["Hi, Kiara!  Haven't seen you in ages.  Brought my friends and maybe the Technocracy.  Got any whiskey?"]

Family Squabbles

Margot
Meet me at 3?  We can get coffee and talk about this?

Sure.  I know a place.

A link to a coffee shop's location in the Sante Fe Art's District was sent over through text messages soon to follow.  It was a Tuesday afternoon and the weather had been fairly chilly-- a hell of a thunderstorm swept through and brought a cold front along with it the day before.  Margot would have ordinarly sat inside on a day like this but at least the clouds in the sky were pale gray and high in elevation, not threatening to dump any more rain upon them anytime soon.  The winds from the day before had stilled too.

With a paper to-go cup from the shop in her hand, Margot was hovering outside in a hoodie and jacket with the hood pulled up over her head-- not far enough forward to hide her face like she was trying to mask her identity (that'd be the best way to draw attention, to look like you were actively hiding anyways), but just to keep the damp cool air off her neck.  Jeans, sneakers, nose ring.  All she needed was a cigarette to look the part of a proper coffee shop loiterer.

When Grace approached, the petite young woman nodded her chin up and lifted a hand to wave.  She would smile, but there was no pretense at play here-- while she was trying to keep Pen and Nick oblivious to the situation that was impossible with the request she was making of the Virtual Adept.  So, it was an expression of grim resolve that greeted Grace today.

Grace
Okay, grim resolve. Meet grim resolve. Grace wanders up in her jeans and grey turtleneck jacket, zipped up the neck, her hair messed up and her eyes tired, like she suggested coffee for a reason.

But when she finds Margot, her eyebrows raise a little. Hi there. She walks over, slides into a chair like it is comfort itself.

"So. You want me to trace someone for you?"

Margot
Following Grace's lead to sit at a table, Margot stopped hovering near the wall like a weirdo and sat down as well.  She slipped into the seat across from Grace instead of beside her-- not many people wanted to hang out on the patio, so there wasn't a need to huddle heads for the sake of privacy.

"Yeah."  A pause, where Margot's jaw set.  "My brother."

The coffee cup moved up, but paused as she thought to add a little more clarification.

"He just got out of prison-- or maybe rehab?  If he's out this early?  Anyway, he called me with a none too friendly message and I don't want him visiting unexpectedly."

Grace
Oh. Grace's head ticks up a notch at this new information. Finally, Margot has decided to provide some.

"Ahh. In that case... I could probably set something up for you. But listen -- would you like something else? To feel more safe perhaps?"

Margot
The question posed had Margot looking up into Grace's face.  With how her eyebrows were raised up, she appeared surprised.  She didn't expect an offer for protections as well, and after blinking a few times the surprise gave way to a softening of an otherwise grim visage.  Not entirely relaxed, but relieved certainly.  Appreciative, for sure.

"Grace, thank you.  Knowing where he is is going to be a big enough help."  She took a sip then lowered her hands to hold the cup nearer to her lap.  Seemed to consider the offer for a moment, then consider how to explain her own thoughts on the matter before finally she huffed a breath and gave an answer.

"This is going to sound ridiculous, but hear me out:  I think that I'm supposed to be facing him on my own, at least as much as possible.  My Avatar, she's a War Goddess, and I feel like this is happening as maybe a test of some kind?  To show my mettle?  It's... a dick move, I think, he's mybrother, you know?  But still."

Another sip, then a reassurance after a pause:  "Ned's helping me prepare to defend myself, and I've been staying at his place until I'm ready, where Luke won't find me."

Grace
"I would be careful about trying to literally interpret what your Avatar is saying," Grace says, looks up at Margot with a bit of worry in her eyes. "Once, my Avatar made me a contestant in the Wheel of Fortune with Pat Sajak and Vanna White."

Just, you know, let that sink in, Margot. Sometimes, Avatars are weird too.

"Everyone on set kept encouraging me to play, including my best friend and worst enemy. My Avatar was saying all these things to me -- do this, do that, do the other thing. The lesson was to say 'no'."

She looks up toward the ceiling, examining the room a bit for people within earshot. Keeps her conversation low.

"Every time, I've had to fight my Avatar, stand up to it, stab it, take from it what I need. You say she's a war goddess. What does she think about you surrendering to her all the time?"

Margot
"I think 'all the time' is a bit excessive," said Margot with a quiet tone of defense, the kind that came with a tiny bit of a sting to her pride.  There wasn't much pride built up in the way of Magickal affairs just yet, but when it came to the matter of the strength of your spine even bookish little things like Margot Travers could get a little touchy.

"I mean, think of it this way:  I've not really been much of a warrior up until this point.  I ran away from my problems and have shied away from violence when I can, either by avoiding the situation, running, or negotiating and talking reason.  I have dreams about Andraste, and when I see her in my dreams she has sharp black teeth and her hair is a literal river of blood.  She wants me to...."

The scowl got heavier here, because she was trying to interpret what her Avatar wanted again and she knew that Grace just cautioned her against it, but there was a loss of other ways to describe it.  She licked her lips, took another quick sip of her coffee, and tried again.

"I suppose I should say that I feel like I'm supposed to become more like her.  I don't feel like I'm supposed to worship her or copy her, but I'm supposed to be her Right Hand.  And I think that she needs to know that I can fight and find Magick in the battlefield instead of just letting my own blood and burning my own supplies."

Grace
"And you think she wants you to kill your brother?"

It's direct, her question. If Margot says yes, perhaps she won't offer guns and ammo...

Margot
At first the silence between them answered the question, filled only by the background sounds of the city surrounding them and the quiet sip that Margot made at her coffee cup.  Perhaps Grace had heard enough and was about ready to just let the Apprentice stew in her own poor choices before the girl sighed and pressed her lips together and looked down at her knuckles.

"I don't want it to come to that.  I want to be able to explain what happened to him and make him understand, but... I don't think that's likely.  I took his arm away.  He--.."

Her voice cracked and she swallowed against the sudden dry patch in her throat.  Took a breath and bit her lip.  Clearly this was a topic she struggled with.  She spoke of it fretfully, like walking on untrustworthy ice, unsure of whether she should bolt across it quickly and hope that she beats the surface cracks or if she should ease around it instead.  Apparently she just found a particularly thin patch of recalling events in her own psyche and chose to skirt around it instead.

"He might be out here to kill me.  And if prison didn't keep him away once it won't keep him away a second time.  I'm gonna... gonna try.  Gonna try really fucking hard with him, but if it comes to it...  If it's him or me, it's gotta be me."

Grace
"Try. Really fucking hard. You want to be able to tell yourself later that you didn't have a choice. You want to be able to mean it," Grace says, eyes Margot's coffee like she wants it. If it weren't for the prospect of sharing germs, she might just go for it.

"I can get you some light body armor," she says, still looking at the coffee, but tugging at her grey jacket like: 'See? This.' "Was going to offer a place to stay, but you've got Ned... Would you like a highly-trained dog?"

Margot
The words of caution about trying very hard, if for nothing more than the sake of her future self's conscience, were accepted with a serious nod.  Margot was listening, and she was taking Grace very seriously.  She wouldn't have reached out to the woman if she didn't think that her words and wisdom carried weight.  Ultimately the actions and decisions would still be her own, but guidance didn't really hurt.

Eyes hopped next to the gray jacket that was indicated, and she smiled.  "If it's not too much trouble, I think that would be handy for this and any number of other issues I'm probably going to come up against in this bright new world.  As for the dog..."  A shake of her head, and the smile turned into more of a grin-- humor, even if only a little, was a healthy thing.  "My apartment's pretty small, and Ned's is somehow even smaller.  I even found someone to keep my pet rabbit, there's so little room for extra bodies.

"I do really appreciate the offer, though, Grace.  I mean, I know we haven't, like, hung out much or anything?  But I trust you, and I'm glad that trusting you was a good choice."

Grace
Grace unzips her jacket down to the bottom, strips it off, revealing the t-shirt underneath. It's the one with the giraffe on the front who's wearing about 10 ties with the line "Trust me, I'm super professional" on it. She hands it over to Margot.

"Try it on, see if it fits. You look pretty much maybe my size."

So, literally the shirt off her back, she will hand over.

"It's cut-resistant. Not easily stabbed or bitten through. Got it for zombies."

Margot
Grace unzipped her coat and shrugged it off and Margot just stared at her in disbelief at first.  The coat had to be held out to her for a couple seconds, maybe even shaken to indicate that Yo, girl, you're supposed to grab this before she finally reached out and accepted the jacket.

"Jesus, Grace, thank you."  Really, the coat off her back.  Margot analyzed the jacket, feeling the material between her fingertips.  Then she set it over the back of one of the empty chairs cluttered around their table and stood up.  Unzipped her own brown jacket, not nearly as sturdy but it was a worn old leather and just a little bit big on her petite frame.  The lining was clean and warm looking, though.  This was also put over the back of the chair so she could try the coat on.

"You can replace it for yourself, though, right?"  Concerned, of course, but Margot was also checking the length of the sleeves, how the jacket sat about her waist and chest and hip when it was zipped.  She pulled the hood of her sweater back up over her head after tugging it free from the coat's collar, then gestured to the brown coat on the chair.  "It's not nearly as awesome, but it's warm...  Not a fair trade, but it's yours."

Grace
"Oh, no. Keep it. I can get another jacket. That's just for expediency's sake," Grace says, waving it off. "I could go for your coffee though."

Also, for expediency's sake.

"About your brother? If he enters Colorado, you'll get a birthday email from me, okay? Consider it the warning. I'm not going to be around for a while -- going up to Colorado Springs to do a thing. You be careful. If you need help, ask for it. Reinforcements are a part of warfare, after all, right? Being smart, tactical, all that."

Margot
The expression on the girl's face showed a measure of discomfort with accepting what she deemed to be such a valuable gift without providing something in return, but she didn't argue.  The coffee that was being requested out of her hand wasn't monetarily worth much but Grace looked as tired as she herself felt stressed, so the still hot drink was handed off without hesitation.

"I'll keep my  eyes on my email then.  And yeah, I have my back-up in place."  She didn't point out the fact that her back-up wasn't her dangerously mad scientist of a mentor, but rather her fellow Apprentice of a cabalmate.  She just smiled gratefully and gathered up the brown jacket in her arms, still wearing the one that Grace had bestowed upon her.

"Seriously, thank you again.  My favors aren't as big as yours yet, but they'll get there, and when they do or even before I'll owe you one, alright?"  She looked like she was getting ready to go-- no doubt Margot had a number of things that she was trying to get figured out and in order before her brother descended upon her.  Who knew how soon or how far away his arrival would be?

But before she went, she felt it prudent to add:

"Oh, and whatever you're doing in Colorado Springs?  I hope it all goes well for you."

Red Room (Part 2)

Grace
What Grace has seen so far is pretty damning, and she's pretty sure she doesn't want to dive into this rabbit hole to see how deep it goes. But she wants a mountain of indisputable evidence with names to go with it. She feels some sympathy right about now for Sam, who had to watch all night as The Artist's minions skinned people alive.

First, let's find out who is responsible for the .onion site. Let's see who is running 'Mortis Cafe' as the hex address reads. Let's read their email. And see what comes next.

flux
Grace, seeing as how she is not only with the Mercurial Elite but is also a brilliant computer person, only has to take a good twenty minutes while some program runs in the background and she decrypts the emails in the box. Public key? Private key? Pfft, when you're a mage data is data. Knowledge and power is a digital skeleton key that can unlock damned near anything with modern-but-mundane encryption.

The emails for the webmaster at Mortis Cafe are from the standard anonymous email service that anyone with a little bit of time and a lot of boredom can secure. The person who does most of the maintenance at the current happens to be someone who is currently going by "nomnomdead" (Or "Nomz" as people in emails tend to call them) and they put forth the requests to the execs at Vivid Xxxtreme to up the security on the site and bandwidth issues. Overall, the emails that this person gets are very standard emails that someone gets when dealing with any website- evenif that website livestreams torture and murder.

There's a rather heated discussion thread in one of the between Nomz and someone named DocBrad. It would seem that DocBrad was trying to convince Nomz to talk to the execs about moving their operations out of the states and into Thailand. (Aren't you sick of Montana yet?) The argument is that they would be able to operate Mortis Cafe with a little more freedom in Thailand and branch into other markets.

Nomz was having none of that, and has seemed to tell DocBrad to take his money and ideas and fuck off (No amount of coin is going to make me let Murphy know freaks like you want more than you're already getting. We cater to voyeurs, not monsters.) There are occasional emails from execs asking Nomz to survey a few emails, and a few more regarding IP addresses and ranges that needed to be blocked, and the occasional mention of reference.

Someone going by the name of Capricious seems to do the background checks of potential buyers in, and is new to the job. It would seem that DocBrad was doing it before he and Nomz had their falling out.

Grace
Voyeurs not monsters? That's what they call their snuff stream? Voyeurism? Monsters do what -- kill children on live video? Because that would be the market to 'branch into' in Thailand. Ugh. The banality of it all is sickening enough. Bandwidth issues and IP blocking and torture.

Okay. Chill. They're in Montana? Isolated place. And who are the execs here? Any financial or employee data that might lead to DocBrad, Nomz, or Capricious?

flux
As expected, Nomz isn't on any of theliteral payroll documents in the server though Vivid Xxxtreme seems to have an abundance of money tied up into miscellaneous fees and equipment costs- the kind of costs that would imply that they are buying a new piece of major filming equipment every month or, at the very least, buying a new car every two months. Many of the purchase orders and involices are for companies with either very generic names or for goods that are easily returned for cash.

Or, conversely, for goods that aren't actually goods.

The employee data is complicated for this particular company. Models, talent, financial advisors, HR- there are dozens of names. And interns. They have interns. Grace knows that when she looks through the employee and financial data that they are easily covering some of the cash made in their livestream shows at Mortis Cafe by saying they pay their infrastructure top dollar (even if she knows, with a little digging, that half of the people in company don't seem to actually exist).

She knows the payrates are wrong, the models she's heard complaints from online have said as much- they didn't see most of the money that they were promised, and they were promised enough that the offers were tempting. Savvy people would have seen them as "too good to be true", or perhaps just overinflated. Vivid Xxxtreme pays their talent on the higher end of average, even though most of their actresses don't see most of their money.

There is, however, a curious list of people in their internship program- one of them being a Lydia Zharkova (who exists in both their internship program and in the contract employees section under talent) and a Bradley Olliver as head of that particular department.

Grace
Lydia. And DocBrad? Do they keep all their victims on payroll in order to launder the money? Grace sighs. Bradley Olliver goes on her list.

It's time to go ask the internet about what she's found. They are creatures of the deep web here, there's bound to be some chatter, right? Ask about them. Anonymously. Carefully.

There's some key words. Nomz, Mortis Cafe, DocBrad, Capricious... Things she can look for in her own way.

[Corr 2, Entropy 3 -- Index the Unindexed. We're searching the deep web for things that should be unsearchable... except Magick, yo. Diff = 6 - 1 (personalized instrument) -1 (Taking time)

Dice: 3 d10 TN4 (4, 5, 6) ( success x 3 )

Grace
[Extend!]

Dice: 3 d10 TN5 (2, 3, 6) ( success x 2 ) [WP]

Grace
This shouldn't be possible. But Grace has a quantum computer with an ungodly number of qubits under her dashboard. The creation of the index is, as in all search operations, the hardest. She must invoke a quantum oracle and tie it to the data of the web. From there, a combination of partial quantum searches (fast, to probabilistically weed out the non-matches) followed by full ones (to get closer to an accurate result) allows her to get somewhere.

It's not easy. And it's still not fast. She'll get back fuzzy results. But what remains after the filtering is the best shot she's got.

flux
Say what one will about the data that she had, it would seem that Nomz (or nomnomdead) was a smart cookie when they picked out the handle to go by. They made a distinct choice, and one that is easy to get picked up and looked over. There's little bits of information here and there, but the most accurate thing she can figure out is that Nomz is young- younger than she is and younger than Samir and probably not old enough to drink. (Three years ago, from a forum thread relating to amateur film making. Wilhemina: U still grounded or RU ponying up 4 festival? Nomnomdead: hahahahafuckoffyes.) Doesn't spend a lot of time going other places. Had some ties with Silk Road and Evolution before they went down. (Lilyphobia: Thank god for SR3, I don't have to leave my house for weed now. TehEmperator: Whoa there, going Nomz on me? Lilyphobia: haha, Nomz couldn't hit the mailbox, I'm not that bad.)

There is other information there as well. DocBrad seems interesting enough. Some people think he runs a travel blog, goes along the world and experiences life and the world around him. Either a travel blogger or a talent scout, but he's as much a Doctor as Kesha's producer is and probably just as skeezy. Seems interested in fastest toys and best buys, purchased a few bogus passports and doesn't have any complaints against him. (Oberon22876: real fuckin' whale, this guy. Callas himself discerning. I'd say he can fuck himself but he always finalizes quick so why the fuck do I care?)

DocBrad aparently met Capricious on a trip to the Ukraine, said "If I'd known the fucker was going to steal my job I woulda dropped him in Chernobyl." Capricious is a shady figure. Doesn't dabble in much outside of moving money around for people. Is a person who knows people, and knows how to know people.

Mortis Cafe is an interesting one. There's rumors that float around about whether or not it is real. Some complaints about the buy in being too high to see nothing. Something about being accepted in sometimes but tossed out others. (The name "Capricious" really does fit. Took the cash and never gave the codes to get in.) Some people say it's the real thing. Other people say it's a hoax, there are some videos circulating around that are taped showings of what is there, but those tend to just be rumors.

Another rumor is an interesting one. Grace comes across this conversation on a forum:

u/killimanjango- Mortis is FAKE. Ten grand to get in to a cheap magic show

Justice: whoa, whoa, I know the real thing when I see it, this is real. 

Oberon22876: No, he's legit. Bought in twice. First was primo, 2nd- bitch just disappears. video quality cut out, no refunds and no moneyshot. lame. 

Isis: Never happened to me. MC delivers, sounds like someone has buyers remorse. 

Justice: Pics or it didn't happen. 

The integrity of Mortis Cafe has been questioned, given that the first videos seemed so good and then one video where their "model" literally seems to disappear. Nobody seems to have video of it, but the footage seems to be the stuff of urban legend now.

Grace
Grace has 'just disappeared' plenty of times, and her brow furrows at the thought of someone Awakening during torture. But, Awakening enough to escape.

She bites her lip and eyes Lydia2.jpg. Perhaps she can remove the Trojan, piece together the actual video underneath. That shouldn't be too hard. Watching it, however...

That's going to be hard. Maybe Lydia... got away? Only one way to be sure.

Grace
[Int + Computers, Diff 8 -3 (Chloe IV)]

Dice: 9 d10 TN5 (1, 3, 4, 6, 7, 7, 7, 8, 10) ( success x 6 )

flux
The other hacker who left the files might have been good, but let's be honest here: Grace was better. The average IT nerd would have been plugging away at this file for hours, converting it from its current format to the format it was supposed to be viewed in while removing the virus attached to it without accidentally letting the virus build in a back door and leave your system a zombie in a network of interconnected zombies.

She opens up the file, and it plays.

"I don't know why I'm recording this, it's not... it's not like I can do anything," the voice says. It's male, sounds like some Californian or someone else from the west coast. Like it's a voice overand the person has a dozen or more things running on his toolbar and he sure as shit isn't running an out-of-the-box operating system. "I don't-"

He sighs and turns off his microphone, clearly wearing a headset of some kind. It's just an empty room on screen and IMs are going off and there's a host of things that seem like distractions in the wake of this. The video is going on.

There is a brief interview when our person of choice comes out- she looks like she hasn't eaten anything in a couple days. She's still pretty, when she speaks she sounds like she's Russian. ("My name is Lydia... I'm twenty one... I live with my boyfriend and I am starting college in the fall.") There are other questions asked and she looks uncomfortable, doesn't want to answer some, but does anyway. Most of the questions are hard to hear, asked by someone off camera.

Instant message chat outside of the chat in the webcast comes up in the video.

nomnomdead: Please don't watch.
nomnomdead: I tried
wordsoffire: i can't leave
nomnomdead: sasha
nomnomdead: stop

His connection lags, the video in the room starts to fade out. Lag. It looks liek his connection is going to go dead.

wordsoffire: nomz, knock it off
wordsoffire: i have to see
nomnomdead: you don't live here, please.
wordsoffire: i can't leave
nomnomdead: neither can I

The video goes on, things start to become unpleasant. There is standard fare as one would expect. Faceless people and expect camera angles to obscure the right people and damned if that blood doesn't look real. Someone pays twelve grand to have them pull one of her teeth out- and that seems to be the catalyst for disaster. At one second she is obscured and the next there is a loud electrical pop. Half the lights falter, and in what looks like half a heartbeat Lydia is gone.

Just a pile of clothes and a confused man holding a pair of pliers.

The feed from the room cuts out.

nomnomdead: wtf
wordsoffire has logged off

The video ends.










Grace
This is... confusing. Not the woman disappearing, necessarily. Videos can be edited, and so can the universe. Maybe it was Lydia herself, or someone watching who decided to hell with the Rule of Shade. No. The social connections here are bizarre. Nomz -- a kid? In charge of this thing? And he doesn't seem to be doing so willingly.

Who is wordsoffire?

Who is it that she helped to deliver this payload?

Maybe the answer can be found within the virus. Botnets need a way to phone home, after all.

Grace
[Int + Computers, Diff 8 -3 (Chloe IV)]

Dice: 9 d10 TN5 (1, 1, 3, 3, 7, 7, 8, 10, 10) ( success x 5 )

flux
And it does go back. Grace has no problem navigating the complicated world of the online, because to her this is home. To her, there is no complication. She is here and this is simply the way things are. She travels forth, and within an hour she does trace the trail back through all of its loops and swirls (and my, what an impressive little network there is) to an apartment in Portland.

Leased to one Sasha Armstrong and Lydia Zharkova.

flux
She's done well enough that, if she wanted, she could easily tap in and see what he was doing via webcam or security system. He didn't leave the back door open per se, but to Grace Evans there is no such thing as doorways.

Grace
She's tired. This whole ordeal has taken its toll on her, despite all the cans of cherry soda and chocolate-covered coffee beans she took with for sustenance. But, it's not going to be over yet, is it?

Grace could look in on Sasha if she wanted to, but privacy is a thing.

No, let's just say hi. Hacker to hacker.

[Corr 2, Entropy 2: Secure Connection. Directly connects to a target device, bypassing networks entirely, and encrypting the transmission. Diff 5, - 1 (personalized instrument) -1 (taking time)]

Dice: 3 d10 TN3 (1, 5, 6) ( success x 2 )

Grace
[Extends!]

Dice: 3 d10 TN4 (3, 5, 8) ( success x 2 )

Grace
A message pops up on the computers hooked into the network for Sasha's apartment. No traceroute will be successful, almost as if the data just appeared directly at the port.

It reads:

Hi, Sasha.

Don't panic.

I saw what you just did. Call it fate, but I was doing nearly the same thing at the time. I want to help.

flux
What. The actual. Fuck.

And he goes through the motions, too. Checks the traceroutes and can't find anything that he can see going on. Grace can see the general processes and the pushback on something that isn't there.



hi, Fate. How do you know my name?

Grace
Short version? Trojan -> botnet -> network -> apartment -> lease records -> Sasha and Lydia.

I assumed you were Sasha, and Lydia was the woman in the video.

You're not about to be busted or anything. I'm like, the furthest thing from a cop.

flux
good, because i am way too pretty to go to prison. If the cops get this it will go underground again and pop up somewhere else. 

Do you know where she went?

Grace
He's looking for her. Lydia who disappeared into thin air. Does Grace know where she went? She breathes out a sigh.

I actually went and cracked their servers because I wanted to stop them. I would like to keep them from going underground again and popping up somewhere else.

That's when I found that someone had beat me to the punch and was fighting an admin. Admirably.

I don't know where she went. Do you know where she left?

flux
She was going to meet some guy about a travel blog or something. She said he'd done some mission work in Thailand and wanted to talk to her about maybe doing the same in Russia. I'll check the texts. 

(a moment later, he opens a picture of a business card- Dr. Bradley Olliver [phone] [docbrad@internationalcharitiesinc.org)

That's the guy's business card. It was supposed to be some big trip up to Salem, she took a Grayhound. Got off in Salem but she never got back on. 

Grace
Okay. Next question, who is Nomz?

Sasha seemed to know the guy -- kid. Nomz who tried to shut down Lydia's torture, but failed. Who seems to be in on this whole thing, but why a boy like him?

flux
IDK if he's just really sick or agoraphobic or both. He's into film making- we met because he was looking for someone to submit a project for him to the LA Indie film festival. He didn't want his name on it on account of who his mom was- Nomz was scared it would bias the judging panel. 

There's some silence after that, as if Sasha is trying to figure out what to type next.

We hacked together for the lulz (poor Scientology). He went pretty dead air on things about a year and a half ago. I know he lives in Montana now with his dad. 

Grace
Who's his mom?

And, who's his dad? That seems to be the more pressing issue. If his dad is making him do this... Grace, well, let's just say she's trying to find an out for Nomz. It's not that long ago that she was a kid online doing bad things for the lulz herself. If someone could be salvaged...

Maybe it's too much to hope for?

flux
Bunny something. She was some scream queen in the 80's and 90's. 

Grace
Anything else you can tell me about all this? About Lydia? About where she might have gone perhaps?

flux
She randomly disappeared on camera, IDK where the fuck she would have gone. 

A pause

She likes animals and hates thunderstorms. She used to go camping a lot so if she was out in the middle of nowhere she could actually last for awhile.  

Grace
Middle of nowhere is a big place, Grace thinks. She's going to have to trace the girl somehow, though. Ugh, think.... Maybe she has a hairbrush or a toothbrush or something in the apartment? Something to get DNA out of? Something to help Grace with the tracking?

I'll see what I can do, Sasha. Don't do anything too crazy -- not that that was crazy. Good job. Let the sickos burn.

And then, Grace is focusing on another task. She's looking around the apartment for XX chromosomes -- female DNA. Something Lydia used has got to be here, hasn't it?

[Corr 2, Life 1 -- Looking for a hairbrush! Diff = 5 - 1 (taking time) - 1 (personalized focus)]

Dice: 3 d10 TN3 (1, 5, 8) ( success x 2 )

flux
ANd she finds it! She finds it relatively easily at that because everything is exactly where one would think it would be. Sasha and Lydia seem to be tidy people. Hairbrushes are in a drawer in the bathroom and ne'er do the two's hairbrushes seem to meet.

It comes up easily enough, and is more than enough for her to find anything she needs.

Grace
A few hairs out of a brush shouldn't be missed. It's not like Sasha is going to open the drawer some day and go berzerk looking for hair that's gone. Her target's small enough that she can just reach through and grab a couple... But the universe isn't going to like it much.

She starts up the program again, having found what she needs, and it shouldn't hurt... too much?

[Corr 3, Life 2 -- Teleport some DNA samples! Diff = 6 - 1 (taking time) - 1 (personalized focus)]



Dice: 3 d10 TN4 (8, 9, 10) ( success x 3 )

Grace
She doesn't feel the ice in her veins as she reaches through a wormhole and pulls through a few bits of Lydia's information. It's something. Something to hone in on. She can ask the universe where the majority of this information can be found, can trace it back to the source.... hopefully.

[Corr 2, Life 1 -- Trace the strands back to an owner. Diff = 5 - 1 (taking time) - 1 (personalized focus)]

Dice: 3 d10 TN3 (1, 7, 7) ( success x 2 )

Grace
[Extends!]

Dice: 3 d10 TN4 (2, 4, 8) ( success x 2 )

flux
If the FBI had the kind of technology and skills that Grace Evans had, there owuld be no missing persons cases. That, or at the very least, they would be greatly limited. Grace is a very capable mage, very capable and very thoughtful. Had Lydia even been dead, she would have been able to find where her body was without a problem, if only because she has the adequate knowledge of both the living and nonliving to be able to make this work out for the best.

She goes through her motions, plays through the scenarios and follows the data to where it seems to want to go.

The location she finds is remarkably close- Colorado Springs.

Which, as Grace is well aware, is nowhere near Montana.

Grace
Ugh. Colorado Springs. Bastion of conservativism in Colorado. But whatever, it's close, right? If she wanted, she could drive there right now, except...

The sun is rising.

Grace has been up to this all night, and forgot to sleep again. But at least Lydia isn't out in the middle of nowhere. She rummages around in her laptop bag, and pulls out a bit of tape, which she uses to secure the hairs to. If she needs to find the woman again, she can. And she will. Tomorrow.

Just... There's a niggling thought. What if she's in danger? Usually, Grace wouldn't do anything like this, for fear of catching someone in the bath or mid-coitus or something, but... She just wants to know if Lydia needs help like, now.

[Corr 2 -- What's going on at that location? Is she on the street bleeding, is she asleep in a nice bed? What? Diff = 5 - 1 (taking time) - 1 (personalized focus)]

Dice: 3 d10 TN3 (8, 8, 9) ( success x 3 )

flux
What she does see when she tunes in is two people sitting at a diner. She knows that she's looking for Lydia- she knows that she's looking at Lydia, but even looking directly at her it is like her brain wants to forget that she is there at all. Wants to pass her off as some other brunette who is sitting across from a couple of off-duty cops. They're both Hispanic women, one decidedly more petite than the other. The smaller one looks serious, has her eyes trained on the door like she's expecting something bad to go down.

The other one is decidedly more calm.

Things, for now, seem to be relatively safe at this unassuming greasy spoon. One of the things that Grace does get, though, is the feeling of magick. The very distinct feeling of somethin g supernatual on the other side of that line and it doesn't seem to be entirely centered around Lydia. Grace knows how supernatural creatures seem to flock to each other.

... is this what's going on here?

Grace
Yup, definitely something Grace is going to prod at in the morning. Afternoon. When she gets up.

The connection drops rather immediately, now that she knows Lydia is safe, and what's more -- there were more people on the other side who might have an idea what Lydia is.

Shields. Up. Now. And then, to one of her temporary homes, to sleep this off.

[Corr2: Warding against what Grace just did to someone else, lol. Diff = 5 - 1 (taking time) - 1 (personalized focus)]

Dice: 3 d10 TN3 (5, 5, 9) ( success x 3 )

Grace
[extends!]

Dice: 3 d10 TN4 (1, 1, 9) ( success x 1 )

Grace
[grr!]

Dice: 3 d10 TN4 (1, 3, 7) ( success x 1 )

Red Room (Heather ST)

GraceThe first two, they were easy. Of course, when you have access to quantum algorithms for breaking encryption, just about any computer system is yours for the taking, right?

From the driver's seat in a Carl's Jr. parking lot on the outskirts of Denver proper, Grace has just set in motion the process that will net her more money than she's ever even thought of having. The only problem is that people care a hell of a lot about those numbers. They will be looking for her.

She's got Chloe IV set up under the dashboard of the passenger seat, empty save for her coat which serves to nonchalantly cover up the setup of lasers and hydroponics going on, because that's just not something she wants to have to explain. But, it's a bit necessary for all this. Don't want to take chances here.

No. In fact, let's make sure nobody... normal can trace her activities at all.

[Entropy 3, Forces 2, Corr 2 = Clean up the mess! Diff = 6 - 2 (taking time, personalized instrument)]

Dice: 3 d10 TN4 (4, 8, 10) ( success x 3 )

Grace[Extends!]

Dice: 3 d10 TN5 (2, 5, 9) ( success x 2 )

fluxIt was easy. Grace was done with covering her tracks and getting her goods and calling it a day by the time some irate woman with blonde highlights managed to call over the manager and complain that her Big Mouth Burger had an inadequate amount of mustard on it.

People were going to be looking for her- sure, no problem. A corrupt company had someone doing their IT work without a problem. A patent troll? He certainly thought himself savvy, but at the end of the day fell into the trap of thinking himself too clever (CorrectHorseBatteryStaple? We've all read XKCD, it won't protect you from hackers Mr. Patent Troll.)

That third target,t hough. That was going to be the interesting one.

GraceTarget number three. Vivid Xxxtreme. (Seriously? Yes, it's that awful.)

Grace has never understood pornography. It's not that she disdains it, or thinks that people who watch it are scum, no. It's just never done anything for her. Not the in-your-face type, not the kind used to sell handbags and perfume, not the bits and pieces that you find in novels, no. Human mating rituals are simply bizarre. And yes, she engages in them from time to time, but it doesn't make them any less freakish.

But people pay for that. Some pay more than others. Like the anonymous flood of women warning others against Vivid Xxxtreme, or how they're known in the model business, "Professional Model Management". The girls sign up, are flown out to California on a modeling contract, and told they have to pay back their travel expenses by doing way more than was initially agreed to. The rumors fly about this place, but their victims are poor enough, and they are rich enough for it not to matter.

Hopefully, not today. Today, the tables turn. Won't they?

She sets her sights on their servers. It's time for some paying back.

fluxShe sets her sights ont he serves and she knows that this place shouldn't be terribly hard. I mean, sure, they're a porn distributor, but they're not too much worse than some of the complaints lodged against Kink.com or a particular company that had a lawsuit levied against them on account of one of their directors ignoring the fact that the model was using her safeword to bail out.

When she was doing some of her digging, though, Grace would have found something. Some models lodged some complaints against the company or the way that they acquired their talent. Another thing she might notice was the fact that some of their models just....

Disappear.

Disappear like Bambi Woods disappeared after she did Debbie Does Dallas. It might have been common in the industry; sex workers are a vulnerable population, but one would think that models would be a little more protected from that sort of thing.

Grace sets her sights on their serves, though, and soon enough things would be underway.

(gimme your initial computers roll. Base diff 8, but her -3 totes applies here as do her specialties)

Grace[Int/Computers Diff 8 - 3 (Chloe IV), specialties count. Cracking open a server, yes!]

Dice: 9 d10 TN5 (1, 1, 2, 2, 3, 6, 6, 6, 7) ( success x 4 )

flux[because we are trying, too]

Dice: 8 d10 TN8 (3, 4, 6, 6, 7, 7, 9, 9, 10, 10) ( success x 4 ) Re-rolls: 2

flux(oops, mage doubles 10's not rerolls it)

Dice: 8 d10 TN8 (4, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10) ( success x 4 ) [Doubling Tens]

fluxThere's too much here. She knows that when the walls crack and give 'way, and she knows that for the size of operation that they have that the company shouldn't have servers this nice. She gets the impression that she got through a front door and a store face from the inside in the United States, but that the back end operations must be enormous.

Like going into a video store and seeing a small lobby and an enormous Employees Only section.

An Employee's Only section that looks like it just lost 17% of its operational capacity.

Someone else seems interested in her target, too.

GraceOkay, so this is interesting. Like going to rob a bank and running into the punks just climbing into their getaway van.

First things first -- hide. Abort mission. Cover tracks. And... maybe, watch? Because maybe great minds think alike and all?

She switches from her suite of personalized tools back to the flat black of the interface between herself and the universe, which soon explodes in data on her screen. Hooking into her own connection to the server, she fuzzes her own presence there, settles down into random bits that hopefully look like nothing.

[Entropy 3, Forces 2, Corr 2 = Clean up the mess! Diff = 6 - 2 (taking time, personalized instrument)]

Dice: 3 d10 TN4 (4, 4, 7) ( success x 3 )

flux[Maintenance guy-0 wtf our server noooo)

Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (4, 4, 6, 6, 8, 8) ( success x 4 ) [Doubling Tens]

flux(You assfuck, don't undo my work!)

Dice: 8 d10 TN8 (1, 2, 4, 4, 8, 8, 8, 10) ( success x 6 ) [Doubling Tens] [WP]

fluxShe doesn't have a problem with covering her tracks. Just cleans up the mess like she always has and her presence seems to be written off as little more than a server glitch or something of the sort.

So, she watches. Or at least gets to work. The sys admin seems to be patching things up as quickly as they went down. Grace gets to observe the servers take a hit and the load gets readjusted to a farm across South Africa, only for additional support to get reapportioned. Two more major data hosting services seem to go offline, and the load is again reapportioned to the same server farm.

This goes on for awhile. The sys admin is good, but whoever they are? That admin is clearly outclassed by the other hacker trouncing along on this particular farm.

GraceDamn. They are good, whoever they are. An administrator has caught on, which sucks. But Other Hacker keeps beating them down. Break out the popcorn time, huh?

Except, no. There's something extra fishy going on here. Vivid Xxxtreme shouldn't be big enough for this kind of technology, and the fact that someone else is already on the case is stranger still. It's riveting to watch, but more interesting to participate.

Let's go fuck with an admin.

[Int/Computers Diff 8 - 3 (Chloe IV), specialties count. FU, Admin.]

Dice: 9 d10 TN5 (1, 2, 4, 4, 4, 6, 6, 8, 8) ( success x 4 ) [Doubling Tens]

flux(Admin- ack! Noo! (gotta beat 4 successes to even attempt to stay in your own system))

Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (2, 2, 5, 8, 10, 10) ( success x 5 ) [Doubling Tens]

flux[Ladida break stuff]

Dice: 8 d10 TN8 (1, 1, 2, 2, 3, 9, 10, 10) ( success x 5 ) [Doubling Tens]

fluxGrace is capable of doing a damned good job, and she knows that she is doing a good job, but this is jarring. This is intense in ways that she likely wasn't expecting because she pushes to cause problems for the systems administrator and she- a person who knows the ins and outs of computers better than she knows how to breathe or order Thai takeout- couldn't even push this person off their servers.

There is something going on here.

She gave the other hacker enough room to work. But not Work, there isn't much magickal about this person's interference with the servers of Vivid Xxxtreme; this is a labor of loathing.

Operations seem to flicker and go out, only for them to be returned. The servers in South Africa are near to overloading, routes have been changed, damage has been done. The interesting thing is that, while the data has been mined, the company's accounts don't seem to be dry. A couple grand is missing, sure, but it didn't look like the person did much monetary damage to the company.

They seemed more interested in all of the processes and protocols related to an apparent sister site: 6d6f7274697363616665.onion

GraceHidden site, eh? TOR? If that is the interesting bit, let's look at that, shall we? After we've dealt with this Admin being a pain in the ass.

The good thing is, with this other hacker in the works being so very visible, Grace might just go without being noticed -- all her activity blamed on this other one.

Who they are is a good question, but so is all this other bullshit. What's that onion site? Something even worse than Vivid Xxxtreme?

[Int/Computers Diff 8 - 3 (Chloe IV), specialties count. FU, Admin.]

Dice: 8 d10 TN5 (1, 1, 2, 4, 6, 6, 7, 9) ( success x 4 ) [Doubling Tens]

flux[Admin: nooooo]

Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 10) ( success x 4 ) [Doubling Tens]

fluxGrace pushes the admin, which shouldn't be a big problem, but either they have a very good team or this is a world-class operation, certainly not the kind of IT department that a skeezy porn company should have.

She pushes and the admin pushes back, tries desperately to fundo the damages that have been done and route things away from the South African servers or at the very least get rid of this person who keeps trying to knock him (or her) out of the system.

Grace[Grace: Yesssssssss]

Dice: 9 d10 TN5 (1, 1, 3, 5, 6, 6, 8, 8, 10) ( success x 7 ) [Doubling Tens]

flux[Noooo!]

Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (3, 7, 8, 8, 9, 10) ( success x 6 ) [Doubling Tens]

fluxcorrect horse battery staple, motherfucker. 

GraceThis admin is serious business. They're drinking their Jolt Cola or whatever, geez. Grace has to work hard at shutting them out, but in the end, nothing stands up too well against someone who can break encryption within a few seconds.

At last, it looks like she's got the upper hand here.

But why on earth would a company like this have such a... competent IT staff? It makes no freaking sense. None.

fluxIt's password security every time. The very basics of keeping someone out or letting the right people in. And Grace, darling devilish Grace, successfully worked her mundane magic and managed to successfully shove the systems administrator out of the working space while, simultaneously, shutting doors and rerouting works in such a fashion that it would take the rest of the admin's shift to get back into the system.

Things are a right and righteous mess. Perhaps in not the wisest fashion, there were files uploaded to each of the South African servers, replicated across to the other servers when the loads rebalance.

Lydia1.jpg
Lydia2.jpg
Lydia3.jpg



GraceThe first thing that comes to mind is 'payload'. This is what that other hacker was trying to accomplish? Uploading files? Uploading a huge clusterbomb, perhaps? She's going to analyze those files first, to see if they are legit JPEGs or something... else.

Lydia. Hmm.

[Int/Computers Diff 8 - 3 (Chloe IV), specialties count. JPEGs?]

Dice: 9 d10 TN5 (3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 8, 9, 10) ( success x 8 ) [Doubling Tens]

fluxThe first and third files are actual .jpegs, but the second file appears to be a video with a pretty nasty trojan attached to it. The video itself three minutes and twelve seconds long.

GraceSo, she opens the JPEGs. The ones that are actually pictures, and not a virus.

They're probably of something horrible, she knows. But curiosity has its purposes. What would that hacker have risked all to upload this for?

fluxThe first picture is a collage. There's a young, pretty brunette with dark eyes with some blond-haired young man with blue eyes and a bit of a beard. Sometimes no beard. They look happy. There are pictures of the pretty brunette at a party, some pictures of her with some old woman. Her with a puppy. Her with sad, mournful eyes in some black dress but a smile anyway holding some envelope. The shock and surprise and utter joy taken not three minutes later when she's holding plane tickets.

A picture of her beaming holding a letter from a modeling agency that was linked with Vivid Xxxtreme's casting agency.

The third picture is a screen shot of a browser session. Inside the browser is what appears to be a shot from a low budget horror movie. There is a chair and there is some kind of smudge on the dark wall behind the chair. There's an abundance of horrible requests written in the chat, depraved and violent and awful at the very top followed by a hoard of praise and applause. Tune in next week- blonde or brunette, you decide!

GraceThis looks like revenge. Justifiable revenge. That .onion site is probably where they sell the really horrific stuff. That hacker was either Lydia or knew her. Maybe that blond-haired young man with the blue eyes? To be honest, Lydia probably disappeared.

Grace is going to keep the Trojan where it sits, where it can be downloaded by the assholes who visit the place.

If any company ever deserved to die a horrible death, it would be this one. And, she might be able to get some names for Mike to check out too. He lives in California after all. It wouldn't be too long of a 'business' trip.

She'll peruse their files, get names, get email, suss out their organizational structure.

Social. Almost.

Serafíne
The bright washing sun competes with scudding clouds for dominance in the April sky and you'd never guess from the raucous game of ultimate frisbee on one of the big grassy swaths of greening lawn that there's a winter storm watch currently looming over Denver and its environs, that spring ski enthusiasts will have another foot or so of fresh snowfall if they go high enough into the mountains.

Right now: shorts and t-shirts and a frisbee that looks like a pink-frosted donut with a bite taken out.  Fringe and beads and bare feet and painted toes and gladiator sandals and the musky scent of marijuana in the air and it's too early (she just woke up an hour or so ago and she's still nursing a particularly intense acid hangover) for a certain Cultist to join her friends chasing around the donut-frisbee, but hey, she can watch.  Or pretend to watch?  Who fucking knows, her glasses are both ridiculously dark and remarkably large and she could very well be napping behind them.

There's a big bottle of orange juice parked in the cool grass beside her.  It is early evening.  The sun is only just starting to fall.

Grace
Ahh, Denver. It'll be warm today, sure. Then, the weekend brings a high temp in the 30s and more snow. This is Spring, for you. It can never make up its mind.

Grace has dressed herself in jeans, sneakers, a t-shirt, and her bite-proof grey jacket today, although the jacket is unzipped to let the air in -- so one can see the giraffe wearing ten neckties on her tee, with the text "Trust me, I'm super professional".

There is, perhaps, more of a spring to her step than there has been, of late. Winter's melting, for now. Water's flowing in rivers. Things are breaking free, and soon Summer will make that a little more permanent. It's a good day. One that has Grace walking the trails here where monsters tread, with her attentions place firmly into the trees and sky, and not, apparently at her surroundings. Monsters should be afraid of her, not the other way around.

[Awareness?]

Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (5, 5, 7, 8, 10) ( success x 3 )

Nicholas
It's become a habit, walking in the park after work while he tries to process and decompress from the day.  Nick finds his home to be a pleasant place, somewhere he looks forward to going to at the end of the day, but settling into his office or having dinner isn't a substitute for taking a few moments of silence where he doesn't have to listen to anybody else or try to project this air of detached competence or quiet empathy.

There aren't any winter storm clouds looming on the horizon, just the soft wash of sunlight that speaks to approaching summer.  That, and the smell of marijuana that usually lingers around places like this, in Denver.  He still isn't fully accustomed to walking out in public and seeking people smoke; and it doesn't bother him - it just is, and does.

The sailing frisbee catches his eye as he makes his way down the path.  No shorts and T-shirts for him, just light gray pants and a pale pink shirt, the color of a first blush or of a drop of blood in a puddle, slight intimations of color.  His hair was cut recently, which is to say that it's no longer as wild and overgrown as it had threatened to become last month.  As is the style at present, the back and sides are shorn more tightly than the top, which spills out in front of him.

He watches people throw the frisbee back and forth as he walks, and he would have nearly passed them by had a familiar face not caught his attention next.  Sera is behind a pair of sunglasses, but he makes note of her nonetheless and his trajectory changes.  He lifts a hand as he approaches.

Serafíne
Well: see? Her eyes must be open behind the dark glasses, because the creature lounging on the plaid picnic blanket lifts a hand to return Nicholas' wave.  There is a hint of a smirk in the curve of her mouth, or maybe that is simply a grimace.  Some little protest against the movement required.

She is as she always is: or at least as she always seems.  Long and lean and lovely.    Or: the intimation if not the fact of length; the suggestion of hunger, of desire, of want in both the concave curve of her bare stomach; and - well.  Not lovely.  Arresting perhaps, in that way that Grace, and even some of the sleepers around them, must certainly feel.  What else can Grace sense?  That sun-drenched, soaring resonance that that eminates from old bronze ring that Sera always wears on her right index finger.  Nicholas, of course.  And no suggestion of monsters.

Other than that wave, Sera doesn't much move or acknowledge Nicholas' approach until he is within actual hailing distance.  Then she turns her head - gingerly, gingerly.  This is the day-after.  Every part of her aches.  Every part of her welcomes the ache.  The spread of her neat little mouth beneath her glasses: a wide flat smirk and Nicholas mirrored in the convex surface of her dark glasses.

"You look like you're about to sell someone some goddamned insurance."

So says the creature resplendent in British-flag bikini top beneath a faded black hoodie over denim cut-offs and torn fishnets.  She has, at some point, taken off her battered combat boots and her almost-bare feet rest in the grass.

Grace
Mmm. Sera. That gut-wrenching feeling has her attention now, drawing her sight, making her change course. The trees, no longer the source of her fascination, don't honestly care.

Sera might.

"Sera!" she says, strolling up, sitting down next to her on the grass. There is also a wave to Nick somewhere in there.

"Do insurance salesmen wear pink shirts?" she says, honestly curious.

"I've been meaning to talk to you," she adds, quieter.

Nicholas
Nicholas has a talent for mirroring other peoples' expressions, for picking up on their moods and reflecting them back and sometimes twisting them just so.  He makes use of it in his job: it's how children learn to identify what they're feeling, having an adult frown when they are saying something sad or smile back when they are happy.  It's equally important for adults.

So: he sees Sera, and there is this quick cut of his mouth, this way in which the corner snicks upward as though hooked.  "That's because I am.  Have you heard about our new life insurance policy?"  A thought, a beat.  "...I might actually consider that if I were terrible.  I'd make a fortune."

He has stopped in front of her, though always always with an eye on the frisbee as it cuts the air.  Nick got a black eye from a frisbee once, years ago.

Grace catches his attention next when she comes up on the two of them, and almost without thinking he shifts his stance to allow her space into the conversation and also to face her, or at least pull her into his line of sight.  His brow furrows at what she says.  "To me?"

Serafíne
Oh, here's Grace.  Asking a very honest question about a very wry quip tossed off by a very hungover Cultist and again that sensation of arrest, of cessation as she shifts the direction of her dark, reflective glasses from Nicholas to Grace.  A: very slow lift of one of her flat blond brows, expressive enough that it rises above the curving frame of the glasses.  And lingers, because she's not really quite sure how to take Grace's question about insurance salesmen.  For example: is it the sort of question that requires an answer?

Something in her decides that it is not the sort of question that requires an answer.  Or: that she is too something-something-something after last-night and this-morning and hell, the last few weeks, the last few months, the last few years to have to answer if it does.

Her attention cuts back to Nicholas.  Something about the cant of her head suggests that she catches the hint of that smirk carved back to her.  And he cannot see her eyes but he can still somehow almost feel that flick of her attention: minute and precise and animal: to his mouth, then back to his eyes.  The gleam of the dying sun in her glasses, his shadow long over the blanket, the grass.  Might make another quip in that moment, but no.   Sera mirrors Nicholas' question, though she does so wordlessly.  Inquiry stitched into the lift of her chin.

Grace
"Well, not... I mean, sure I could talk to you, but I don't have anything specific in mind," she says, to Nick, as though that question caught her off guard. It can be rather hard to tell who Grace is talking to, considering she so rarely makes eye contact.

"Sera. I had a run-in with a sysadmin. I got traced, but I'm not sure how bad. I'm no good at looking back in time to figure out what happened, you know? But you..."

Are totally unaware of what a sysadmin is, or why one would trace her... Right. Grace frowns, tries to figure out a better way to say this. "I felt something. Subtle. A hint of resonance."

Nicholas
Nick shifts his weight to his other foot as he glances between the two women.  He, too, is rather unaware in any specific sense of what a sysadmin is, other than what conclusions he can draw from the words themselves, and so: he listens.

Serafíne
And here is Sera who can very well unhinge time.  Pull it apart.  Reel it backwards.  Create within it currents as slow as molasses or as rippling-fast as some ever-accelerating black and white montage of a movie-bender and who does not know what a sysadmin is and who, on some deep and really rather important level, does not even believe in them.

When her iPhone works, it works by magick.

Sometimes, some nights, it does not seem to want to work at all.

Her attention hangs on Grace.  She has been leaning back on her elbows, but now - a ripple of her flexible frame - sits closer-to-upright.  Ow.  Her head hurts.

"Like - "  here a furrowed V of thought appears between the enormous discs of her glasses.  " - yesterday?  Someone was spying on you?"

Grace
"No. It was a while ago. Month or so. When I was trying to figure out what happened to Alex," she explains, hopefully that's enough. Not going to go into specifics here in the park, is she.

She seems strangely okay with this -- accepting of the fact. What's done is done, and all. But what was done?

"But yeah. Possibly spying on me. I fought it off, but..." she trails off, waves an arm in the air.

Nicholas
Nick looks between the two of them again, his eyebrows cutting a delicate arch as he listens to the talk of spying and figuring out what happened to Alex.  It occurs to him that he has not yet met the man.

"Should I give the two of you some time?"

Grace
"Why?" she asks Nick. "I don't mind you knowing. You're as welcome here as cupcakes, man. Stay. If you want."

Kiara
Washington Park was a sort of nexus for the athletically inclined in Denver, as it happened. There were no small number of them tonight as the sun began to dwindle and sink into the horizon, cutting pathways around the lake and appearing only to weave a steady track over inclines and down again; vanishing into the distance.

Joggers. There was something so mundane and expected to them.

Amidst a world of chaos and uncertainty, lying on the grass surrounded by Frisbees and dogs being walked and the occasional carrying cry of laughter or the smack of a ball hitting the backside of a distant basketball court - there was an easy comfort in the banality.

Breaking away from behind a young couple pushing a stroller down by the glinting lakeside is a familiar figure; tall and lean with long dark hair sailing out behind her. Another runner by any other name but also - a Witch. The pagan known to some here as anything but a nameless addition to the Sleepers. She's slowing to a clipped walk, the Verbena; breathing hard and holding her hands against her side; her pace directing her toward a bench to warm down her muscles.

She's a surge of the Springtime Kiara, as she sets her leg up and stretches it out; a sweatshirt laced around a narrow waist; navy workout gear encasing her form. If she notes the presence of the others up on a shallow rise of grass, she's yet to make it clear.

Though the presence of earbuds and a small MP3 taped to her arm would suggest she's unaware - yet. Here then, was one half of their rescue team that had extricated Alexander from the Union. Nicholas alone perhaps knew the current condition of the other half - for her part, physically at least, the brunette seemed to be coping with the aftermath reasonably well.

Serafíne
There is rhythm behind them.  The slap of plastic against strangers' palms.  Bare feet against that solid spring grass, the cold soil beneath, warming yeah but still somehow in the grip of winter.  The whir of the discs through the air: the twin miracles of propulsion and flight.  Aerodynamics or what the fuck ever.

By now Sera is sitting forward, legs crossed beneath her, the picnic blanket rucked up beneath "them from the movement.  Golden curls a messy tangle in the failing light.  She takes off her sunglasses here and gives Nicholas a brief, apologetic flash of a glance.  Neat little compression of her mouth.  Her eyes are a little bit bloodshot and her pupils are still rather-too-large.  This hint of bruising beneath them: dark circles, something.  That ache more evident without the shield of the glasses, but what the fuck does one expect?  She's hung-over.

Breathes out here, Sera.  Tried to order her thoughts for Grace and then: a flicker of something else.    "You asked to talk to me," Sera reminds Grace, though there is something gentle in her tone.  The bravado of her greeting to Nick earlier is long-since drained away.  " - remember?  Not him.  So, you haven't made him feel quite as welcome as cupcakes, Grace.  You know?  Nick may not want to be a spectator to our conversation.  He might even need to get home to start dinner."

Brief curve of her mouth here: the lilt of her chin, this neat, apologetic little gesture toward Nicholas before her attention cuts back to and rests wholly on Grace.

"Have you felt the resonance since then?"

Kiara
[Oh yeah, we should do this for our next post. Mage-dar.]

Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (2, 6, 7, 7, 9, 10) ( success x 5 )

Grace
"Oh," Grace says. It honestly hadn't occurred to her that she might be edging someone out. "I'm sorry. I'll just..."

She takes a breath. Sera asks her something. "No."

But, she's distracted, giving that no to Nick's face, as she radiates confusion with hers. This is one of those times, right? When the rules of social interaction seem to have been missed. It makes her uncomfortable. Makes her want to...

"I should go. You think about it, okay, Sera?" she stands up, gets the attention toward the trees again. Trees are easier to understand.

Nicholas
It doesn't take an especially perceptive person to note the confusion, as boldly as it has been sketched across Grace's features.  Nick reaches out toward her as she stands up, motions for her elbow and ends up not grabbing hold just letting his fingertips rest there on the back of her arm.  It's meant to catch her attention; little more.  "Don't leave, Grace.  I just stopped to say hello to Sera.  You two should talk."

Kiara
It's a slow progression up the hill when she does notice the others gathered.

The earphones curled around her neck; her face flushed with recent exertion. Kiara Woolfe approaches feeling like the whirl of energy she is, at her core. Thriving, pulsing with life and the promise of vitality and renewal. She smells like sunshine and sweat, the Verbena and somehow; the sheen of it; the essence of that - absolutely feels at home on her.

She makes a slight outward arc to avoid collision with the game at play nearby and approaches from behind a tree; her fingers chasing over the bark.

"Hey."

A breathless greeting that seems to encapsulate them all from the dark eyed female; her mouth bent into a small match for it. The corner curled upward. She settles back against the tree and resumes stretching.

Serafíne
Sera's quiet, as Nick stops Grace.  Doesn't pull her dark eyes with the too-large pupils from Grace except briefly, to greet Kiara with a wordless touch of her gaze as the Verbena approaches.  A flicker back, and the Cultist slides her dark glasses back over her eyes and rises.

"C'mon Grace, we'll go talk."  Except for the fishnets, her feet are bare.  Damp grass clings to her skin.  Tomorrow, they say, it will snow.  Tonight, the Cultist starts to walk, barefoot in the cool spring grass, ambling pass the ultimate frisbee game in the warm spring park.  She leaves behind: everything.  The orange juice and the plaid blanket and her favorite Doc Martens and her pack of unopened kreteks and her favorite lighter lost somewhere on the blanket, everything.

Maybe she plans to return.

Maybe she assumes: effortlessly, naturally, that someone will always be trailing behind her to clean that shit up.

Serafíne
(I am really sorry but as usual it is my bed time and I have to go to bed.  Sera will go off with Grace and talk.  Noel: IM me sometime and we can continue the scene.  Andrew and Jacqui: I want a real scene sometime soon!)

Grace
She doesn't tense up and tell him off, at least. There was a time when she would. But she does look down at her arm, still woefully unsteady about what's going on. Why is he touching her? Oh. He wants her to stay.

Well, right now, she just wants to get as far away from the awkwardness that is her attempting to interact with people and failing. These things have a tendency to snowball.

Then, Sera gets up to leave. Asks her to come with. No, no, no, this isn't right. Ugh, do they not understand at all? This is exactly what she wanted to avoid. Her hand goes up to her hair, like she's going to pull it out.

"Hi, Kiara. Bye, Kiara," Grace says, looking gut-punched. And yet, she follows behind Sera.

Nicholas
Tomorrow, it's supposed to snow; tonight, here is Kiara running into them while jogging.  Is there a chill in the air just yet, the way arctic winds will sweep down out of the north, a precursor to the gale?  Perhaps.  If so, Nick in the clothes he's wearing is probably better prepared than most of them.

His eyes trail Grace and Sera as they get up to go.  Nick: he can't imagine just getting up and leaving a pair of boots behind, in particular.  He'd caught that look Grace had flicked at him, read into it perhaps her uncertainty, whatever anger or irritation or frustration may be there to read, and his hand is quick to drop back to his side.

It is followed by a sigh, a furrow of the brow, a mouth that thins for a moment in what could be either concern or any number of other more subtle things.

"Hello, Kiara," he says, as the other two are departing.