[b]Fiona:[/b]

Fiona holds Pink underneath the butt like a saddle-seat, and [i]runs [/i]for the stairs down as fast as she can. If lingering and stalking is just peeling a bandaid off of all of this, then she better let it rip. If she’s got a plan to talk to John of the Snake Eye, she’ll talk to John. And if the party is the best way to work out how to exorcize this, then skip to the party. 

Pink pulls when she sees a floortrap Fiona didn’t, and Fiona steps aside. She kneels like the penitent and leans sideways out of the way of a spring-loaded coatrack with the arms filed into stakes. She’s always conscious that she has less head space than she’s predicting, wildly overcompensating for it. 

She takes her hand off Pink’s butt for a second to jump the bannister of the stairs and skip to the first landing, then bounces off that to skip to the floor. John has to navigate this house too, and now they’re on the first floor where it’s safer - he wouldn’t risk hurting the lizards down here. 

John is a man of average height, shuffling about the mansion in crocodile-paw slippers and a green bathrobe with a lizard hanging out of one pocket, and an egg being kept warm in the other. His old-leather face droops a pair of thick-framed bifocal glasses - those are new - and a wiry mess of white hair that fits his head like a motorcycle helmet. He was about to take the stairs up and now Fiona is nose-to-nose with him, and Pink by extension.

“Hey John!” Fiona sticks her hand out firmly for a handshake. “I really love what you’ve done with this place. You’ve got no reason to know me, but my name’s Fiona Weiss? it’s a pleasure.” 

John puts a lizard he’s cradling in his arms onto one of his shoulders so he can pump the hand enthusiastically, the biggest smile. He has no idea what’s happening, but the devil knows his own. “Just John, yes, hello young ladies.” He glances upstairs, “I have made it a bit hard for guests to come in through the front, haven’t I?” He is at once wistful and proud, with a reedy Australian accent that makes it sound like he’s speaking entirely from the back of his nose. 

“We were just wondering- Pink?” Fiona prompts, jostling the saddle to encourage her. John squints through the bottom window of his bifocals trying to see if he recognizes Pink - he clearly hasn’t, yet. 

This wasn’t a step you could skip to, really. One must be nearly murdered by a clothesline to understand the specific nature and flavour of insanity one is dealing with and act accordingly. 


[b]Black:[/b]

Adrian Dudekov, born Hungary 1998. Age 82. 

Masters degree in International Affairs, B.A in Economics and Intelligence, with extended minors in a range of disciplines that kept him in university until 27. Most of his Masters saw him taking internships and placements in Viktor Orban’s administration, specifically as it related to the EU. 

Dudekov was profoundly influenced, enthralled and disgusted by the power of a single belligerent nation to entirely gum up the gears of the entire union. He learned a lot from assisting the people that did it and argued it, his opinions on this coming out only in memoirs written decades later. 

So there’s a minor insight. Either he started lying about that after the consequences swung the other way for him, or he’s such a devoted civil servant that he’d do it regardless and keep his mouth shut for decades. 

From there, a bit more than a decade of obscurity climbing the greasy pole of international politics as a civil servant. It’s doubtful his time or work in this period is unimportant, only that it’s unrecognized. 

Major member of the UN council from the years 2040-2055 as the EU delegations lead intelligence analyst. Now there’s an interesting title and job description. His role was understanding the capabilities and capacities of the European nations to better co-ordinate them in the role on the construction of the space fountain and mitigating the effects of the ongoing climate catastrophe.

That is to say, his job was to make sure member nations weren’t lying about their taxes and coughed up what they actually owed, pretending it was in the names of optimizing efficiencies in a wartime economy. 

And then it’s just… Blank. He’s one of the first up the space fountain into Aevum to be positioned as an interim non-democratic governmental body to assist the construction and foundation of the interior, to ensure the early stages of colonization and habitation went smoothly, and then the body was peacefully dissolved with their charter and all its members went happily into a wealthy retirement and never did anything again. 

For a bit less than four years he - and a handful of others - held total dictatorial power over Aevum, and then more or less disappeared from history. 

No, this isn’t a factor of them all being in the same conspiracy that’d be far too convenient. Probably. Maybe. It’s far more likely the nature of [i]who[/i] this council was made up of - old career civil servants who knew better about keeping their mouths bloody shut after holding a position like that, lest people start asking questions. 

These people wield the state, and their crimes must always be the crimes of the state. The decisions of a war minister must be the actions of Britain. So it goes. 

His home is less protected than the Costa-Silva compound, with the simple retinue of Secret Service the retired head administrators were all given like Swiss guard. Just a scenic two story chateau style with direct jetty access to the river. He’s not expecting you. 

Wife: 7 years dead. Kids: 30 years no-contact.

[b]Elsewhere:[/b]

Dragon stirs, and numb limbs dragged as if sleepwalking, makes two broad flaps of their wings towards Ox. 

Flying for such a large gravity well, it’s like shuffling your feet towards home after a double-shift. 

[b]Also:[/b]

Mostly to Orange, but;

[b]TarotRootBiscuits:[/b] I just read the article!
[b]TarotRootBiscuits: [/b]I feel like a superhero!!! Oh my god!!!!!
[b]TarotRootBiscuits:[/b] I just feel really bad though about
[b]TarotRootBiscuits: [/b]The kids? 
[b]TarotRootBiscuits:[/b] We kind of blew their mum up and everyone is going to hate her now like, I kind of doomscrolled the comments a bit and it’s… really bad. 
[b]TarotRootBiscuits: [/b]I was thinking of sending them something as an apology for them getting caught up in it
[b]TarotRootBiscuits: [/b]Let them know Caliban and Ariel are thinking of them too
[b]TarotRootBiscuits: [/b]… maybe a copy of Tangled? Since it’s about being locked in a house and it turns out even though you love your mum she’s kind of evil?