9 Guests viewing this page
Hidden 6 mos ago 6 mos ago Post by Estylwen
Raw
Avatar of Estylwen

Estylwen The Villainess

Member Online





The House on the Hill

@AtomicEmperor




"You're... Gonna end it then? No more magic for Layla? I mean... You're not so far into your oaths that you can't back out, as far as I'm concerned. If it's become too much for you, and you think you can't go on, then... I'm sure it's best for everyone then. So Void Heart stays sealed too, and we can all move on. But, this will be a sad thing for Her Grace to hear. I believe she would expect me to try changing your mind: But, I don't think it's right to keep you... Not when you're so hurt, Layla. So, I'll take it for you. Her sadness, her anguish. Don't worry, okay? I only ask that I be with you when you're sealed, so I can know for certain that you're kept safe."
Leon


Layla watched Leon’s face very closely as he spoke, refusing to jump the gun and interrupt him. That would be rude, after all. Pained sympathy mixed with veiled excitement, and the desire for a sarcastic eye roll.

“I’d never go back on my word, Leon. You’ll like what I have planned, then. It’s not as dire as you think. I’m merely, uh…” She gestured with her free hand, trying to find the words. switching my poisons.”

She vehemently shook her head, “My eyes are still affixed to Void, I wouldn’t do anything to jeoperdize that. But I can’t have more than one apparition adjioned to me, right?”

She gestured to her heart. “I’m… clearing the slate. Cutting out the weeds to make way for the crown. Sealing the two ghosts I have remaining, and having one un-adjoined, in ways I can still use them, safely. Maybe stuffing them in a necklace, or a broach. Skin contact, so I can still use their powers.”

Layla took a breath, squeezing Leon’s hand. “I’m trying to prepare as best as I can so I can be worthy of Void… coming back… That means being able to focus all my attention on him, when Her Grace deems me ready.”

A pang of worry rippled through her heart, something that she was certain appeared for a moment on her face. “I… I need this, Leon. I need Void.” She searched his gaze, hoping he wasn’t closing the doors on her.

“I can still be useful…”

She pursed her lips. "The Temple and its needs are in the forefront of my mind. They've already helped me so much... This is the best course of action I can think of."
1x Like Like
Hidden 6 mos ago Post by silvermist1116
Raw

silvermist1116

Member Seen 18 days ago



Tayla pulled her hand out of her pocket to give a thumbs up to Tsukino when she revealed she had information. Just like they talked about. Good. Get her in and maybe solve something about this shit. She removed her foot from the chair and motioned for her to have a seat if she wanted to. She said she'd stand with her, and she meant it.

The more and more people had shit to say about Tsukino, the more bored and uninterested she looked. She slipped on her headphones. It was all a ploy to make them think she didn't care passed what she mentioned. When really, she was in all their heads. It was so much easier to deal with after that battle. Being in everyone's thoughts during a fight definitely helped her manage this crowd, given how much worse that had been.

She got what she expected. Mostly everyone's convinced that Emily wants them all dead. She disagrees. She doesn't even know she exists. Everyone that decided it was a good idea to fight her and her cronies are on her radar. She's never done anything to Emily. If it wasn't for the fact the Coven's gotten back together, it would remain that way. She didn't care to argue with anyone that disagreed. It would be a waste of her time. She did flip off Lila though. She could go fuck herself. 8th Street wouldn't get far in the city with Wolfpack running around in the Dollhouse's pocket. Of course they wouldn't know that.

She thought the idea was good. Have her people do the dirty work and save them the effort. She knew Tsukino only had good intentions. She didn't need her headphones to tell her that. It was their plan after all.

Not everyone thought so. There was push back on Tsukino being involved with them at all. A lot of arguing and yelling. Why can't this group be peaceful? She's getting a little antsy with all the fighting on top of the thoughts. She couldn't pull the headphones off though. She still needed to collect information for the Dollhouse.

Greyson vouched for her by pushing her memories into everyone that volunteered minds. She didn't raise hers. Not point. Her headphones would block him and she didn't trust him enough to have him in her mind.

"If it helps, I vouch for her too. I'm not as good at it as Greyson, but I've seen her mind. She's sincere in wanting back in and doesn't have intentions to fuck us over. If she ever gets any, we'll," she motioned between her and Greyson, "see it."
2x Like Like
Hidden 6 mos ago Post by Atrophy
Raw
Avatar of Atrophy

Atrophy Meddlesome Kid

Member Seen 0-24 hrs ago




Interactions: N/A
Sloane’s Apartment



Sully let out a low whistle as he poked his head out of the driver side window of his car and craned his neck to look up at the vertigo-inducing pair of skyscrapers that made up the Harrisburg Towers Luxury Apartments. The afternoon sun reflected off of the mirrored glass window, making the building appear as if it were crafted out of solid gold and serving as a beacon to the trust fund babies and one percenters of St. Portwell. Sully suddenly felt extremely out of place. His rusty truck stood out in stark contrast with the waxed and polished luxury vehicles pulling out of the rounded drive, and he was dressed in clothes from the day before the day before while everyone else looked like they had stepped out of a Neiman Marcus catalog.

Sully let his truck idle for a moment at the turn into the apartments, taking a second to smooth out his hair and wipe a bit of campfire soot off of his cheek by wetting his finger with his tongue. He gave his shirt a sniff and heaved out a rough woof as his eyes rolled in the back of his head. Sully had taken Tayla’s advice to heart and hidden out at Greenwood’s camp over the weekend to avoid dealing with Dean, but the smell was nearly as deadly. He grabbed around in the plastic bag sitting on his seat and pulled out a can of spray deodorant, the car exploding in a sandalwood mushroom cloud.

Sully turned into the drive and got out at the valet, expecting the ladies to clutch at their pearls, the gentlemen to scoff at him with an upper crust, “my god!”, and the poor fucker dressed like a butler just trying to make rent being yelled at to remove him from their property. Instead Sully, backpack in one hand and plastic bag in the other, found himself just ignored by the valet as he approached his podium. He had to cough into his fist to get the fella’s attention.

“Hey Jeeves, I was told to leave my baby with you,” said Sully.

“Your what, sir?” said the man behind the podium. He was affecting some kind of posh, not-quite-English-but-nearly-there accent that caught Sully off guard. Surely it must’ve been a bit? Sully had been a valet before for a couple of weeks, and most of the valets he knew were either actors or comedians awaiting their big break.

“I meant my motorized vehicle, my good sir,” said Sully, unintentionally adopting the accent.

The valet gave Sully the ol’ up-down, looked at his truck, and then back at Sully. “Mm. Are you a guest of one of our residents, sir?”

“Oh no, milord,” said Sully, leaning into the accent now. He wasn’t good at it, unintentionally shifting from an English lord to a peasant shit farmer mid sentence. “I just fancy trying to have a bit of a laugh by giving away my baby, you see. Of course I’m a guest, you see, of the kind lady Sloane Faris who lives at the top of this here castle.”

“Why are you talking like that?”

“Talkin’ like what, bruv?” another shift.

The valet shook his head, went inside, and approached a man at a desk. A bead of sweat began to form on Sully’s brow, worried that maybe the guy was one of those dudes who took his job way too seriously, half tempted to bolt as he saw the other guy at the desk pick up a phone. A head was nodded and the valet came back outside, looking a little red in the face.

“Terribly sorry about that confusion, Mr. McPherson.”

“Aw now guv, ain’t no problem now innit?”

“Um, right. Your keys, sir?”

“Oh shit, right,” said Sully, shifting back into his normal tone as he pulled a small screwdriver out of his back pocket and waved the valet over to his truck. “You’re just gonna want to jam it into the ignition there and turn. You’re gonna feel like it’ll break but trust me it probably won't, so just keep turning until it starts up. This a bad neighborhood? There’s a wheel lock club in the backset just in case.” The valet gave Sully a suspicious look, which prompted Sully to add, “Don’t worry, it’s not stolen.”

“What happened to your accent, sir?”

“My what?”

“Your accent.”

“What happened to your accent?”

“It's been the same, sir.”

“Yes it has, sir, yes it has. Keep up with that commitment, man. You’ll get there one day,” said Sully, passing the valet the screwdriver and clapping him on the shoulder.

He left the man dumbfounded with a screwdriver in his hand and entered into the lobby, whistling to himself. Sully pulled out his phone and squinted to reread the text from Sloane through the spiderwebbed cracks on the screen, bypassing the first series of elevators to head to the one with exclusive access to the penthouse. He whistled along with the jazzy muzak as the elevator shot up to the top floor, the door sliding open into a private hall leading to Sloane’s apartment. Sully rapped his knuckles to the rhythm of “shave and a haircut” upon the door and stepped back, arching an eyebrow up at the security camera pointed down at him from the corner.

Moments later the door opened and Sloane stood in the entrance, her arms crossed. “You’re late, Sullivan.”

“Only by a little bit.” Nearly an hour. “What’s with your valet speaking in a fake English accent?” Dark eyes locked with his own and stared in unblinking silence for what felt like an eternity. “I mean, I assumed he was an act—”

“You assumed he was an actor before assuming he was English?” said Sloane.

“Well, yeah, it’d be kind of weird if he was from England…”

“How would that be weird?” asked Sloane. Sully rubbed the back of his head and sucked on his teeth, screwing up his face as if he were in deep, ponderous thought. Sloane held up her hand to stop him from saying something stupid. “Nevermind, I don’t care. Did you bring it?”

Sully pulled into his backpack and pulled out the Chalice, “Ta-da!”

The Chalice was plucked from his hand in a flash by Sloane, her lips curling in what Sully almost mistook for a smile on the normally dour woman’s face. She nodded her head and turned as she headed back into her apartment, the door being left open the only sign of an extended invitation inside. Sully kicked his boots off in the entrance, assuming Sloane would be furious if he traipsed about her place with muddy shoes.

He gently closed the door behind him and followed after the woman, his jaw going slack as he looked around her place. He’d figured that Sloane’s place would be fancy, but what he hadn’t expected was for it to look like his grandmother’s house, chock full of weird looking knick knacks. The only thing missing was the plastic covers on the floral couches and pictures of the Virgin Mary. Sully paused by a row of wooden toy soldiers, unable to resist the boyish urge that came across every adult man whenever he saw an action figure to have it fight the other one. He pinched the arm of the soldier and turned it so that his musket would aim at the soldier beside him, his face blanching as the soldier’s arm snapped when he moved it. Sloane, who was sat down at a coffee table, a few crumbs the only evidence of her usual tiny sandwiches that she had crashed in quiet fury about thirty minutes ago when she had assumed Sully had stood her up, her Channeler placed against the Chalice as she began to weave her dual Luxes together, did not appear to notice. He slipped the arm into the plastic bag, burying it along with a change of clothes.

“Hey I don’t want to impose, but could I use your shower? The water has been out at my place for the past couple of days and I’m starting to smell a bit too ripe,” said Sully, jangling his plastic bag with the clothes he’d snagged when he’d snuck in past his landlord to get into his apartment that morning.

If it had been warmer outside he just could’ve used the Chalice to give himself a hot shower, but he would’ve shriveled his bits off in this weather. Camping out at Greenwood’s hideout was starting to become unviable, too, but between Dean and the landlord he didn’t want to be caught hanging out in his studio apartment. Sloane looked up as if to say “are you serious” but before she could speak he hit her with his patented puppy dog eyes. She deftly rolled her eyes away from them, but still acquiesced with a sigh and a nod, informing him that extra towels were in the hall closet.

Once in the bathroom, Sully hit the fan then rushed over to the toilet, threw the arm down into the bowl, and flushed—or tried to, anyway, but couldn’t find a handle. He gawked at the panel beside the toilet, lined with a dozen buttons, and pushed the one that looked like the flush. Sully shouted in horror as a nozzle protruded out from the basin of the toilet and shot a mist of water in his face. He gagged and hit another button, ducking to the side a spray of water arced across the bathroom. Why were there two different types of sprays? He hit every button on the side panel, turning on and off lights, causing the lid to close and open automatically, playing the sounds of nature, before finally a flush, the dismembered arm spiraling down the drain. The arm was a fighter and did not stay down until the fourth flush.

What followed was the longest shower ever, partially due to wanting to purify his body of Sloane’s toilet water and partially due to not wanting to go back out into her living room knowing full well that she had to assume that he’d just blown up her toilet.

“Crazy dream the other night, huh? Is that what made you think about duping the Chalice again?” asked Sully, fresh dressed in new duds and smelling like whatever the fuck tumeric body wash was,acting as if nothing weird had happened.

“No,” said Sloane tersely.

Sully sat down on the couch across from her. “Anything I can do to help?”

“Do you have Orange Lux?”

“No.”

“Then just be quiet. I need to focus,” said Sloane.

Sully nodded his head, put his hands in his lap, and kept nodding his head as he looked around the room, part admiring all of the books on her shelves, part wondering why someone would need to hold onto so many books when the public library was a thing. Resting against the shelf was a seven-foot tall wooden staff with decorative blue butterflies atop of it. Hey, that’s Auri’s staff. Sully got up to take a closer look. Sitting on the shelf by the staff was a fancy looking pen covered in runes, a bizarre looking camera’s lens, and a—Sully laughed out loud in surprise, “Holy shit, you freaky bitch! Hell yeah, Sloane.”

Sloane’s head snapped up, the Lux that flowed around her hands fading away as she turned to see Sully standing near her bookshelf wiggling his eyebrows like a weirdo. Her eyes widened into a rare expression of panic as she saw Sully take the pen and use it like a crime scene investigator who was too cool to wear gloves to lift up his source of amusement.

“Wait, no—it’s not—goddamnit, you don’t know where that’s been!”

“Oh, I’m pretty sure it’s been in one of two places…”

“Sullivan!” Sloane let out a frustrated sigh as Sully laughed. “Just…just shut up and let me explain.”



Sunday Night

After the Preliminary Sycamore-Greenwood Meeting


An atrocity committed by @Shin Ghost Note that I was powerless to prevent.
Flowers and Canvases.




“So… let’s get work, shall we?” said Auri.

Sloane stared blankly at Auri’s smile, a smirk really, as she suggested that they get to work without even bothering to make an excuse for why Sloane hadn’t been invited to a meeting attended by half of the coven. Even after the others had departed there were still signs of her exclusion all around Auri’s flower shop—over a dozen chairs formed roughly in a half-circle and a few mostly empty boxes of pizza whose smell mixed unpleasantly with the pollen from the petunias and posies lining the nearby shelves as well as a lingering hint of skunk weed. Auri not only lacked the consideration to clean up after her little pizza party, but she had scheduled Sloane’s meeting with her to overlap so that Sloane could be embarrassed when she’d arrived.

“Yes, let’s,” said Sloane through gritted teeth.

She took the pizzas off of the counter and stacked them roughly on one of the chairs that had been placed out for anybody but Sloane. Decade old slights stung anew. Sloane remembered then and there how deeply she actually despised Auri, who had been unfairly involved in all of the decision making solely because she had been buddy-buddy with Ashley and would just side with her when what the Coven truly needed to stay functioning was someone who would’ve stood up and told Ashley no. Sloane heard Anya’s voice echo in her head and shoved the feelings of jealousy that she mistook for righteous indignation down, walked around the counter, and set her channeler down on it.

“I’m glad you were finally capable of having a meeting that didn’t end in disaster,” said Sloane as dry as a desert. It could have been a complement. It wasn’t, but it could have been. As much as Sloane wanted to continue to go off on Auri for her questionable leadership choices, both then and now, she gained nothing from getting distracted. She gestured to the counter. “The Butterfly Staff, please. This should only take about an hour.”

Sloane’s insides boiled. She shouldn’t poke, she shouldn’t poke, she shouldn’t poke, but, oh fuck it, she simply could not resist. The others had told her to give Auri a chance. She had and now five of them were dead and they were being terrorized by Emily and her goons. Sloane leaned against the counter and stared Auri dead in the eyes.

“I imagine that’s more than enough time for you to explain why you keep leaving some of us in the dark when it comes to making moves. The Void Heart, Greenwood,” said Sloane, counting on her fingers. “What did you say the problem with the old Coven was? Something about leadership making decisions without informing the others?”

Auri gave Sloane a narrow look, as she said,

“Now, Sloane,” Auri began. “In all fairness, the entire thing with Greenwood was dropped on me at the last second… I didn’t get a chance to gather everyone together! Jack didn’t inform me of the whole thing until earlier today...”

Then she shuddered, playing with her thumbs before she said, “As for the Void Heart… We just couldn’t risk the Void Heart catching on to our plan to seal him.”

She shook her head, “Please understand I didn’t mean to leave you all in the dark.”

“You still did a pretty good job of leaving the lights off after the fact. I don't necessarily disagree with the idea, but imagine if that fiasco with sealing the Void Heart had gone just a degree worse than it already did,” said Sloane, her voice cold and steady. They could’ve been killed by the Temple or trapped in the Void if Jack was taken out. “It’s not a big boost of confidence to see your supposed leader almost get herself killed because she went all-in on an idea that was undercooked.”

“But I-”

“And in all fairness,” said Sloane, a little snip coming in as she pulled out her cellphone and loudly set it down on the countertop, “A text isn’t that difficult to send. Seems like you had no trouble finding a way to get in touch with someone like Britney or Greyson.”

“It's Sunday, I didn't want to bother you, Sloane,” Auri simply answered. “Next time, I’ll remember to send you a message.”

It’s Sunday? repeated Sloane with a sharp, singular laugh as her hand slapped the countertop, unable to believe what she had just heard. Her mouth hung open as she stared at Auri in a look of horrified disgust. She raised her voice, “Is that some kind of joke or are you actually an idiot? Over a dozen of us are dead. What the actual fuck, Auri!?”

“Like you care about anyone but yourself,” Auri said with a roll of her eyes. “Now, you will not speak to me that way in my own store.””

Sloane sharply inhaled as she stood up straight, her hands tightening into fists at her side, her left eyelid twitching ever so slightly as she glared up at Auri. What a load of nonsense. Although she might not outwardly show it, there were plenty of people who could vouch for Sloane actually caring about others—Adora, Luca, even Linqian of all people. Yet there was no point in arguing with Auri about it because it was clear from her response that she was, in fact, just an idiot. An idiot wouldn’t listen to Sloane’s logic and an idiot’s opinion didn’t even matter in the first place, so why did Auri’s words sting so badly? If anything Sloane cared about others too much, way too much, overly concerned with worries about if they respected her, if they cared about her, if they even thought about her…

Sloane broke eye contact as she exhaled, her hands trembling, shaking her head in disbelief, as she muttered, “Just give me the staff so we can get this over with.”

“Now you want to get it over with?” Auri huffed, before she shook her head. “A minute ago you wanted-”

Auri said, before she noticed something at the corner of her eye, at the window. An orange mass. She whipped her head towards it to see Odessa Maxwell with her face and both hands pressed against the window.

… Then she licked it.

“A minute ago I wanted to get this started but instead, uhhhh…”

Sloane trailed off as she looked back up at Auri but got distracted by the strange woman running her tongue over the window like it was a lollipop. Sloane took a step back as her brain short circuited, the mental lag unable to compute, her eyebrows hopping to the top of her forehead as the clearly deranged woman gave the window another lick right above the decal sticker that read “Keep St. Portwell Weird” that appeared in almost every local business window. As a fellow small business woman, Sloane had also dealt with her fair share of weirdos who had taken the slogan too literally, but she’d never experienced a windowlicker.

“Do you have a backroom?” suggested Sloane, unable to pull her eyes away from the window.

“Oh! Um, this…” Auri put a concerned look on as her face went red. She gestured towards Odessa and said, “This is-”

Odessa was still licking the window.

“Odessa! My… Um, friend!”

Odessa licked the window some more.

“... She can pick the lock,” Auri sighed.

“You know her?” said Sloane, unable to hide how aghast that made her. If Auri had managed to scrape a single crumb of respect out of Sloane over the years the two had known one another then in that moment it had fallen between her fingers and disappeared beneath a floorboard to never be seen again. Tell her to leave, then.

“... If you insist!” Auri said before she walked outside. She chatted with Odessa for a bit… Before Odessa skipped past her all the way to Sloane with Auri in tow.

“... Wait, Odess-”

“Hello, friend!” Odessa greeted Sloane with a warming smile. “Why do you want me to go before I even get a chance to introduce myself?! I am so excited to meet you!”

“W-what?” said Sloane.

Sloane shot Auri a look as she took a reactive step back. Why would Auri even mention that Sloane had asked her to be sent away? She could’ve just made an excuse. Sloane squinted, a spike of pain shooting through to the back of her head as a migraine started to form. Never in her life before had anybody ever told Sloane that they were excited to meet her. It simply wasn’t a thing that was possible. Sloane wasn’t exciting. She didn’t want to live up to the expectations set by being believed to be a source of excitement.

Why? asked Sloane, genuinely befuddled, moderately alarmed, and slightly terrified.

“Because… you’re a friend of Auri’s - thus, you’re a friend of mine, friend - and I’m Sycamore’s biggest fan!” Odessa said with a wide smile before she said, “I heard you were an Artificer! I have some artifacts on me. Would you like to see?!”

“You’re deeply mistaken,” said Sloane, speaking over Odessa and rolling her eyes as she was about to correct the statement about her being one of Auri’s friend, a spark of life flashing in Sloane’s eyes as Odessa carved through her interruption and mentioned the artifacts. Sloane rubbed her hands together like she was about to feast upon a big meal. “It’d be more correct to say that I am a Counterfeiter. Now what are we working with?”

“Counterfeiter, counter-fisher, you make artifacts. Therefore, you’re an artificer, no if-ands-or-buts,” Odessa laughed as she dug around her robe, “Now, where did I put them - AH!

She pulled three artifacts out of her robes, a silvery pen with runes, a camera’s lens, and what seemed to be a condom covered in glowing runes. She pointed at the pen,

“This is the Quill. After you write an event down with it, the pen will take over and write down details you may have missed or overlooked!”

Sloane nodded along with a hand on her chin, curious about the extent of the Quill’s power. It could actually be quite useful in their investigation of Father Wolf. Still, her eyes drifted to the final artifact that Odessa had pulled out, but her attention was diverted when Odessa pointed at the Camera’s lens.

“This is the CameraEye! When looking through it, you can see people’s souls, what they would look like in different dimensions, and even through their clothes!”

Sloane stopped nodding and started blinking rapidly in confusion. What did souls even look like, and what would be the point of seeing them? Wait, did she say they could see through clothes? Who? Why? What kind of creep would make something like that? Besides, she imagined that most people looked bad without clothes alone and that they would look even worse if their clothing were smushing—wait, wait, wait, no, hold on, that implied that she was imagining people without their clothes on at all like some kind of pervert. Sloane blushed slightly and opened her mouth to protest an accusation that hadn’t been thrown her way as Odessa pointed at the condom.

“... And this is the magic condom. It's reusable and protects against magic STDs. Very handy.”

Sloane felt her migraine flare up as her jaw hung slack, silence permeating the flower shop, as her rapid blinking slowed until her eyes were completely closed, unable to believe that she was going to ask a follow up question. She asked, “What about normal STDs and unwanted pregnancies?”

Odessa shrugged.

“... You’re outta luck! But you don't have to worry about a demon baby, at the very least!”

Sloane’s hand slipped over her face as she made a sound as if she had been punched in the stomach. Her fingers moved so that she could peek one eye out from behind her hand shield as if she was gazing into the abyss, not wanting to know more out of fear of what she would learn but unable to move on from the subject. “And these demons are consensual partners that use protection?”

Odessa stared at Sloane, still smiling. It was probably ten seconds before she spoke, but it felt so much longer.

“... They’re demons.”

“So how would you ever actually use it?” asked Sloane, her voice hollow like a crestfallen soldier who’d spent weeks fighting in trench warfare.

Odessa put the other two artifacts on a nearby chair. Then…

“... Okay, first you open it up,” Odessa says as she cracks it open, “Then you either put it on the member or you stick it in because it's adaptiv-”

“No, I know how it worked, I meant—you two are friends?” said Sloane, turning sharply towards Auri.

“That is correct.” Auri awkwardly pulled at her collar.

“Everyone is my friend!” Odessa laughed.

“Like, close friends?” asked Sloane, sticking her hand out to stop Odessa before she spoke up. ”Not like that.”

“... Aw.” Odessa said.

Auri grabbed her chin before she added more context.

“I would say we’re somewhat close; it started as a business partnership - where Odessa found me the most beautiful flowers I've ever seen - but it grew from there.”

“Yes, it grew!” Odessa put a strange amount of emphasis on the last word.

Sloane gave Auri the blankest look possible, her ability to emote completely drained from her mind and body, the only hint of her disapproval the slight upturning of her nose as she merely said, “Okay.”

Auri walked over to where the Butterfly Staff was leaning up against the wall. She grabbed it, and handed it to Sloane who didn’t hesitate in snatching it from Auri.

“How about we get back on track here?” Auri began, before turning to Odessa, “... She won't interrupt.”

Sloane, who had been admiring the Butterfly Staff, gave Odessa a side eye, “Uh huh. This spell does require me to be focused, so if you two have to talk please do it quietly. Over there, maybe.”

Sloane dismissively gestured towards the other side of the store and turned her back on the two women, a thin smile appearing on her face as she turned her attention back to the Butterfly Staff. It had been a decade since Sloane had last held the artifact, the looming threat of what was to come after the Stygian Snake all Sloane needed to convince Auri to let her Counterfeit it. It was well-crafted, with a nice heft to it and a beautiful stain on the wood. Despite it being a family heirloom of the Auclair’s and the seven foot tall staff looking silly in the hands of someone as short as Sloane it just felt right in her possession, as all artifacts did. Sloane gently laid the Butterfly Staff down on the counter, giving a moment of silent reverence to the creator before she committed, what was in her mind, sacrilege.

Odessa had called Sloane an Artificer. Sloane had called herself a Counterfeiter, but deep down she thought of herself as something more than just that. Something rotten. She was a corrupter, a ruiner, a debaser. She took a thing that someone had poured blood, sweat, and tears in to make and crafted a bastardization in its image. She was unoriginal. A ripoff artist. A hack. Sure, a few of her knockoffs turned out useful, but those were the flukes. She had no real control over what came out once she started making a Counterfeit except for the option to stop making it, although she never did. She was scared to. It would be admitting the truth: she was bad with magic. Lacked the vision for it. Ten years and the improvement had been microscopic.

Sloane shook her head and grabbed her Channeler, shutting the negative thoughts out. She pressed her Channeler to the staff and began to cast, the Butterfly Staff swirling with Blue and Orange Lux. She closed her eyes tight in concentration, her lips mouthing words unheard, her brow furrowing. Lux like ink from the tip of a busted pen began to drip from her free hand as it started to form the Counterfeit of the Butterfly Staff. If it was her first time creating the Counterfeit her mind would be filled with flashes of inspiration from a source she could not cite, but instead she was left alone with the memories of how long it had taken the first crafting of the Chrysalis Staff. She guessed remaking it would take the better part of an hour, but the first Counterfeit was always the longest. Nearly an entire month, although there had been a very good reason for that.

Sloane winced. Already she felt her hand cramping up. She stopped her casting for a moment as she rubbed her wrist, her eyes opening…

… And saw Odessa standing directly next to her. Like inches away from her face.

Smiling.

Sloane reeled back with a start, “What are you doing?”

Odessa booped her. Sloane was immediately made so uncomfortable that her body essentially shutdown and entered into a near catatonic state as her mind was too busy trying to process exactly what the hell was going on to also send synaptic impulses to her motor functions.

“I think you’re beautiful,” Odessa began, before she walked around to Sloane’s back. “But, I know what will really bring your beauty out!”

“Um, Odessa!” Auri raised a finger.

Odessa began braiding flowers into Sloane’s hair. Sloane’s skin crawled the second she felt fingers run through her hair, jump starting her body as she turned swiftly and batted away Odessa’s hand with an indistinct yelp. Sloane’s hip stiffly collided with the counter as she had tried to back away, a sharp intake of breath the only acknowledgment of the pain. She rapidly combed through her hair with her fingers as if a spider had landed in it, tearing loose the stem that Odessa had managed to tangle up in her locks, as she shimmered alongside the countertop to get distance between herself and Odessa, her Channeler crumpled up against her pounding heart.

“What the fuck is your problem?” said Sloane to Odessa, her voice a meek whisper that exploded as she pointed and screamed at Auri for allowing this to happen. And what the fuck is your problem!?”

“I can’t,” Auri calmly said. “I’m afraid if I interfere, she won’t boop me later.”

Sloane believed the pain in her head wasn’t from the migraine but rather her actually being able to feel her brain cells being genocided. She gawked at Auri, her neurons lined up against the wall, facing the brick, and listening to the sounds of guns being loaded. Sloane fired off the fire shot instead of allowing the massacre of gray matter to happen without a fight as she coolly said, “God, you’re a joke. This is why nobody respects you or thinks of you as a leader.”

“... And you think they won’t feel the same way with you in charge?” Auri spat back. “Now, Odessa, please leave Sloane alone so she can work, please?”

Odessa stepped back.

“I hope this doesn’t ruin our future friendship, friend!” Odessa shouted with a wide smile. “Maybe as a peace offering, you can borrow those artifacts I showed you. As long as you bring them back to me after this blows over. So don’t lose them! Or break them. Or lose them, and then they get broken. Or break them, then lose what’s left!”

“Um, okay,” said Sloane, torn by the idea of borrowing the artifacts. On one hand, it meant she’d probably have to interact with Odessa again which might trigger a stroke and cause her to lose the ability to form sentences or breath with her mouth closed. On the other hand, it was probably for everyone’s best interest if Odessa wasn’t in possession of any of those artifacts. “Thank you?”

“And I didn’t say I should be in charge,” muttered Sloane quietly to herself as she turned back around.

She held her Channeler against the Butterfly Staff but did not start casting. Instead, she waited for a moment, shoulders tensed and braced in anticipation of Odessa creepily touching her again. It was only after a few beats that she exhaled, closed her eyes, and began casting again, the Lux weaving itself around the Butterfly Staff and then snaking up her channeler like she was siphoning it from the artifact. Sloane was a bit more rushed her second go around, heated from Auri’s insinuation and certain that there would be another interruption if she took too much time.

She pushed the Lux through her body as she formed the base of the Chrysalis Staff. Her right hand began to grow numb as a thin, shell-like coating of Blue and Orange Lux solidified itself around Sloane’s skin. Sloane ignored the tingling sensation and pushed on, the shell creeping up her wrist and forearm as the essence of the Chrysalis Staff began to spark to life. It was the other reason that it took her so long to properly Counterfeit an artifact—whenever Sloane was Counterfeiting one, her body would become subjected to the effects of the Counterfeit. With some it wasn’t so bad while with others, such as the paralyzing Chrysalis Staff, it was quite the frustration.

And, in some situations, quite the risk. Sloane took a break, the shell forming around her arm beginning to fade in luster as she tried to open her eyes but found them temporarily sealed by the Chrysalis. She started to flex her face in an attempt to crack the shell faster, a groan rumbling in her throat.

“Sloane!” Auri ran over and grabbed her by the shoulders. “Oh, lord, um, make noise if you need help!”

“... Welll, that escalated quickly,” Odessa laughed. “What if she can’t?! How are we going to help her? Chip away at her shell?!”

“I don’t know!” Auri said.

“I’m. Fine,” said Sloane. Tried to, anyway. What she actually said was something like, “Umbime.” The dulling shell began to fade and become translucent, vanishing into thin air as Sloane flexed her fingers and lightly brushed Auri’s hand from her shoulder. A sheen of sweat was on Sloane’s forehead and she felt some heat rise to her cheek as she turned to Auri and reiterated, “Really, I’m fine. Just part of the process.”

She looked down at the start of the Chrysalis Staff with a sneer. It still had a long way to go.

“Jack said something about bringing water?” said Sloane, her throat feeling dry as she checked her watch. “This is going to take awhile.”




Interactions: Tayla @silvermist1116 Anya, Luca @Fernstone Layla [@Estlywen] the Group
The House on the Hill



“Look, you’re at that age where your body’s changing and you’re starting to become interested in boys. I get it. Honestly, I’m just proud that you’re practicing safe sex, kiddo,” said Sully.

“Sully, another fucking joke and I’m going to grab the wheel of your car and crash it,” said Sloane.

She was sitting atop a towel in the passenger side of his truck. It was the most disgusting vehicle she had ever been in and even if it hadn’t become a hotspot for mildew after a Vashti storm had wrecked the upholstery it still would’ve been an absolute piece of shit. She had been so distracted telling her story—venting, really—to Sully that she had hardly made any progress on the Counterfeit Chalice. The actual Chalice was resting on her lap, while in her hand was a silver saucer shaped object that would become the bottom of the Sluice. Awkwardly jammed into the passenger side with Sloane was the Chrysalis Staff, making the already uncomfortable drive even more uncomfortable. It didn’t help that Sully listened to the same music her dad liked.

“This would be the song to do it to,” said Sully as the chorus hit.

Sloane didn’t feel so much like knocking on heaven’s door as she did like jumping out the car’s door. Sully was an idiot. A moron. Stupidly annoying and when she had highlighted how her evening with Auri and Odessa was proof that Auri was incompetent he wouldn’t hear a lick of it, barking like a loyal lapdog that Auri was trying her best. Well, if he thought this was her best then he should’ve been massively concerned, but of course he wasn’t because, again, he was an idiot.

But that idiot had saved her life.

“Thank you, Sullivan, for being there when Lu…when the Rot almost took me out,” said Sloane. “I’m pretty sure I would have been a goner if not for you.”

“Whoa, hey now, anybody could have done it. Now I know with all these dreams we’re having it’s becoming pretty clear amongst the group that I must be the Chosen One, maybe the Second Coming of the Messiah even, you know, their words, not mine, but I’m just a guy with a cup. Anybody would have done the same. Hell, anybody could have done it,” said Sully. “You should be thanking Anya. She knocked me out of my hallucination.”

“I know,” said Sloane. There was no point in explaining to Sully that he was one of the few people in the Coven who could actually use the Chalice. Most others were Adepts and without a Severance they wouldn’t be able to utilize it, and she doubted many would give up their magic for her. Anya probably would, although Sloane wouldn’t want that of her despite knowing that she’d do the same in a heartbeat.

Sully pulled into the lot of the House on the Hill. Auri had a knack for finding abandoned places for them to squat. Sloane didn’t get it. Couldn’t they just rent a room somewhere? They were much less likely to get jumped in a public place then they were in some desolate skid row. Where would the next meeting take place? In a cabin in the woods? She awkwardly hopped out of the truck, carrying too many artifacts and counterfeits, but was stopped by Sully.

“Hey, wait, can I have the Chalice back?”

“I planned on trying to finish up the Sluice. Nothing ever happens in these things anyway, so I could at least get some work done.”

“Man, maybe you should try coming at things with a little more construction and a lot less criticism and you might make things happen. Anyway, I’ll give it right back to you when I’m inside. Just go on ahead, okay?” said Sully. He could see Sloane hesitant. “Consider it paying me back for saving you.”

“Whatever,” said Sloane, going ahead of Sully.

For an abandoned bar it was actually quite nice. Sloane walked in with little fanfare, although she looked and felt ridiculous holding the Chrysalis Staff that towered nearly two feet over her head. She discreetly made her way through the bar. A good portion of the Coven was already present, discussing in tense tones things that did not sound relevant to what should have been on the agenda considering what Auri had texted them about. Wasn’t this the meeting to rub elbows and play nice with the other coven in town? She noted the presence of a couple of newcomers, perhaps representatives from Greenwood, and felt her shoulder sink at the thought that the others were clucking at one another in front of guests. She quietly slid into a seat by Anya, leaning her Counterfeit staff up against the table

“Busy weekend. I take it that we’re already off topic?” said Sloane to Anya. “Give me a second, I’ll catch up.”

She pulled out a pocket notebook and the pen that Odessa had given her and started jotting down a few notes. After a few lines Sloane stopped writing and allowed the Quill to take over for her, the automatic writing guiding her hand as it began to fill her in as if she was reading through the minutes of the meeting. Her hand slapped her forehead and by the time she was done catching herself up to speed her hand had slipped back to the top of her neck, her head having hung lower and lower and lower. See, this was precisely why Sycamore needed someone like her to pop the hinges off of doors and keep the course focused. Whenever they were given time to idly chatter they kept doing dangerous and harmful things like taking an impulse and calling it an actual thought. At least the other two weren’t Greenwood although…Vanburen? Ugh. Thank god it wasn’t Trisha.

”Our history shows that we’re more likely to get fucked over by ignorance and sheer incompetence than we are by ill intentions,” muttered Sloane to Anya, just loud enough that Tayla would've been able to hear if she wasn't rudely trying to catch up on podcasts during their meeting.

A boom rang out through the room as Sully kicked open the door. He was dual-wielding a pair of cheap pink water pistols with a do-it-yourself bandolier draped over his chest holding half a dozen squirt guns made out of duct tape and velcro. A flimsy, kid-sized cowboy hat barely held on to his head by a fraying piece of twine as he threw his head back and shouted, Yeeeeeeeeeeehaw, bitches! Reach for the skies! Your boy’s come strapped today! Lemme so those fucking hands if you’re not feeling one hundred. The Chosen One’s got you. Oh, Sloane, catch!”

Sully lobbed the Chalice gently over towards Sloane. It was a perfect toss that could have easily been caught if Sloane’s reaction had not been to scream, duck, and throw her arms over her head, the Chalice bouncing somewhat painfully off of her forearms. Sully didn’t notice as he did it a little spin, hollered at Luca and Layla, and blasted a stream of the Chalice’s healing elixir at the mouths of the two chronically weak members of the Coven. Sully then took a seat, spun it around, and stood with his foot up on it as he leaned forward on his knee.

“So what’d I miss? I reckon y’all were talking about them weird ass dreams, right? Anybody know what’s up with that book? I’m pretty sure I’m meant to have it,” said Sully, completely oblivious to the conversation beforehand.

“Case and point, whispered Sloane to Anya, grabbing the Chalice before it rolled off the table.
2x Like Like
Hidden 6 mos ago Post by Blizz
Raw
Avatar of Blizz

Blizz Grand Chancellor Supreme of the Wizard Council

Member Seen 1 day ago


Interactions: Sloane, @Atrophy Kenshiro, Greyson @AtomicEmperor
The House on the Hill



Jack allowed Greyson to beam the images of his proof into his mind. Perhaps there was a possibility that he’d do something strange to Jack’s head- Something he surmised would be a challenge- but Jack didn’t feel that unsure of Greyson’s loyalties. He was always a snake, but he was always their snake. So he paid close attention to the details.

Meetings with 8th Street, Blake Schmidt’s face, Kari’s notes being magically incapable of translation. Good starting points, all of it.

”You’ve improved since the old days,” Jack commented towards Greyson’s display. ”I believe you.”

"Why, so someone else can get their hands on her notes to sell for profit? I know the ways of your bōryokudan; you'll not convince me of your good intentions without assurances on your life that those notes will remain confidential and out of your reach!"


”Kenshiro,” Jack turned and looked him directly in the eyes. ”If anyone has a chance of translating those notes, would it not be you? Your closeness to Kari puts you in an advantageous position, does it not? We can recover the notes and translate them ourselves.”

Greyson and Tayla claimed that Luna could be trusted. Between the two of them, it wasn’t hard to tell what Luba was thinking.

”Fine,” he said. ”If-“

The door flew open, and Jack almost tore Sully’s head off as he came in shouting like a fucking cowboy. Something about that made Jack’s skin crawl for a second as his face scrunched up in a copious lack of amusement. And then he fuckimg threw the Chalice at Sloane, who didn’t catch it. Jack beat down the urge to shout at him, and just picked the magic cup off of the floor as Sully came in blasting people with the healing elixir from water guns.

”Second chances. Second chances,” he muttered to himself.

And then, Jack tried to change the subject back to something that wasn’t that. ”…If Anya can sneak into his dreams, then what should the rest of us do?” He asked Greyson, walking over and politely handing the Chalice to Sloane instead of throwing it at her like a barbarian… With an ominous black smudge on the rim of the cup just in case Sully happened to be fucking drunk right now. He clearly had a better understanding of this than most of them. ”8th Street may be actively reporting to him, they could attack us again in the meantime.”
2x Like Like
Hidden 6 mos ago 6 mos ago Post by FernStone
Raw
Avatar of FernStone

FernStone One Again Addicted to Pepsi Max

Member Seen 0-24 hrs ago



Interactions: Jack @Blizz, Ken & Edict @AtomicEmperor, Sloane & Sully @Atrophy, Everyone
The House on the Hill


Anya raised her hand to receive the vision, although she trusted the information from the moment Greyson confirmed it. An act, a play just like half the things she did. Her lips pulled into a thin line at his jokes, eyes rolling, but the images proved that what was said was trustworthy. Blake Schmidt’s face, committed to memory… a shame she couldn’t just use that to get into his dreams. And Kari’s notes? Incredibly impressive. No wonder she was so in demand.

”I can easily get into Schmidt’s head- and his dreams. It’s the lowest risk solution. As Greyson says, keeps us out of 8th Street’s radar, and anyone else’s. Nobody else can come into the dreams. And then, when he’s convinced, we’ll be able to get her notes back for the coven. Anya’s gaze turned to Ken, smiling again. ”Do not lump me in with those that would sell them for profit, Kenshiro. The notes would stay within the coven, be used for the coven, and then you can be the one to retain them.”

Of course, she would have to meet Schmidt first. But she had an idea of who to ask… After all, rich people all walked in the same circles.

Her smile turned more genuine when Sloane finally arrived, glancing over at the Chrysalis Staff. A busy weekend indeed. They would need to catch up later, if there was the chance. ”Correct assessment. Derailed before it even began.”

As Tayla said that she’d seen Luna’s mind - something Anya was sure she couldn’t do previously - Anya raised an eyebrow. It made sense she’d gone further with her Pink Lux. As Tayla spoke, Anya nipped any errant thoughts she may be having in the buzz. Her mind was coated in a light layer of static buzzing - simple pink lux covering up and making it more difficult for anyone to listen.

A precaution in case any stray thoughts couldn’t be kept away.

Anya let out a quiet laugh at Sloane’s comment, whispering back, ”I would rather untrustworthiness I can account for than incompetence I cannot predict.”

Another quiet laugh at Sloane’s final comment, Anya’s gaze moving to Sully. Of course, incompetence at its finest. It was a shame he was one of the few that could use the Chalice. Really, they could find someone better on the street to replace him. ”No, Sullivan, we weren’t discussing the dream - and the book that you’re definitely not supposed to have. But we should.”

Anya raised her voice, taking on a tone much like a leader’s.

”As I see it, there are multiple things at play here. Immediate things. First, retrieving Kari’s notes from Blake Schmidt. In the preliminary stages, I’ll take care of this, as Greyson suggested.” With Jack backing her doing this, it was unlikely anyone would argue against it. Thankfully. She would be much more limited with others' involvement - she couldn’t bring them into dreams. ”Second, 8th Street. They may be reporting to him, they may just attack us because of a grudge. Either way, they’re dangerous. We have to be prepared as a group. Some of us aren’t fighters, unfortunately. Perhaps we need something in place to ensure everyone’s safety. The alliance with Greenwood will help greatly with this. But…”

She glanced around the room, eyebrows furrowing. ”Some of our ‘front lines’ members aren’t even here for this discussion. Amara, Stormy, Britney, Linqian, Aryin, Drake… It will be rather difficult without them. Hopefully just late, rather than…”

She trailed off, grimacing as she didn’t finish the sentence, subtly glancing at Greyson. It would be a shame if it turned out Britney had fallen victim to Father Wolf on the way to the meeting… She was an asset. But she also made him weak. Her eyes continued, falling back on Sully.

”Third, the dreams. I don’t think we should dismiss or ignore them. They’re clearly important. It’s not a coincidence we’re dreaming of a book written by a man who worshipped the Stygian Snake. Whoever showed us that dream said it themselves - we need to find and seal the Pale Horse and the High Priestess. To do that, we need to look into Raven Jones.” She held up a hand, three fingers held up. ”As a third priority.”


Interactions: Sully @Atrophy, Everyone Present
The House on the Hill


Luca didn’t bother raising his hand - he didn’t trust Luna, but he believed her information. It would fit what Jacqueline and Miranda had told him.

But nobody seemed to understand how dangerous 8th Street could be - even after what had happened. But Luca knew what 8th Street was like. He’d been part of them, worked with them. Emily wouldn’t back down when she had a goal and everyone else, save a few, would just follow.

”I-”

Before Luca could say anything, Sully burst in… comically kitted out with water pistols strapped to his chest. He didn’t even need to ask, Sully already pinpointing him and shooting the healing elixir at him. Luca had to bend his knees a little bit to catch it in his mouth, but it was a routine they’d perfected ten years ago. The skill hadn’t left either of them.

It’d be needed. The elixir started to work his magic. Luca felt his broken ribs repairing, snapping back into place with a crunch that would be audible to anyone nearby, and the intense pain in his knees vanished. As good as new. Well, as good as he ever could be.

”Hey, Sully! Thanks!” Luca grinned, flashing him a thumbs up. He figured he might as well give him a quick explanation… ”We weren’t talking about the dreams… Tsukino told us where Kari’s notes are. Blake Schmidt has them.”

He then turned to the rest of the group, rubbing the back of his neck. ”Jack’s right about 8th Street possibly attacking us. We really can’t underestimate them. It’s not just Emily and Vashti that we need to worry about. George, Carol, Greta we all know… But all of their members are strong. They’ve worked together for years. We haven’t. Emily knows what most of us can do, but only some of us know what they can do.”

He waved a hand. ”Not to be negative! But we shouldn’t dismiss them. There is the possibility of negotiating… with some of them. But not with Emily.”
2x Like Like
Hidden 6 mos ago 6 mos ago Post by Mixtape Ghost N
Raw
GM
Avatar of Mixtape Ghost N

Mixtape Ghost N SOMETIMES EVЕN RICH NIGGAS GET LOST

Member Seen 0-24 hrs ago


Interactions: Luca (@FernStone), and da Coven.
The House on the Hill.




So, Greyson and Tayla came to Luna's defense, eh?

Adora didn't trust either of them, to be fair - along with that creeping suspicion, they were up to something, but unnecessary paranoia would only make things so much more complicated. Letting Greyson dig around Adora's head made her shudder, so she would let someone else take one for the team. Luna's information was correct; there was that urge to tell her they didn't need her because Luca found out what she knew—but, again, she wasn't trying to ride Luna. Adora crossed her arms as everyone, including their grandmother, spoke and added their two cents, making Adora chuckle. It seemed easy to get into Blake's head and convince him to give up the notes, but at the same time, Adora knew it wouldn't be that simple.

Nothing involving magic was ever simple.

The group gathered together here was proof of that.

Then Sully charged in with water guns and sprayed Luca in the mouth with water... Adora just chuckled, resisting the urge to make a dirty joke about Luca (She wasn't sure if he would take well to it). However, 8th St was being discussed yet again, and Anya had a few points: their heavy hitters weren't there, which was fair. Adora didn't want Greta to get hurt or die, however. However, she was sure everyone in the Coven was prepared to wipe the 8th St Coven off the map, but Adora wanted to help Greta before it was too late, which created a weird situation where she knew that 8th St deserved it... but she tried to help one person she knew was better than that realize that.

Adora sighed before she.

”... I spoke with Greta the other day, a lot of 8th St don't even like Emily or Vashti but roll with them for one reason or another,” Adora began, knowing that somebody was bound to give her shit for speaking with their rivals. ”What if we can get them to turn against Emily? At least some of them? Would make all of this easier, wouldn't it?”

Adora didn't speak on the dreams because she knew fuck-all about it anyhow. Surely, some one more versed in magic should help out there...


The Elite & The House of Cards Mafia.
Interactions: None.
Paragon Halls.




Phillis Schmidt’s heels clicked on the floor as she navigated the halls of the Schmidt Manor.

Getting Berlioz and his Sentinel Solutions was a huge help because now they could stop relying on Emily and her unpredictable band of goons and whatever Paranormal mercenaries they could contact (often having to get help from the other side of the country). That fight that took place outside of Christiansands merely two nights ago is proof of that, and now Jason and Jiao-Long are pushing for them to take action against 8th St - while the Schmidts and the rest of the Elite do not feel the need and think the Lius and the Valos should take better care of their kids. However, there is another issue on their mind….

... The House of Cards mafia is relentlessly hunting for Kari’s Notes, the Schmidt family’s treasure.

Now, Phillis has yet to learn why they want the notes in particular, but this could be bad news if they know that they have the notes. Phillis continued until she made it to Blake’s study, where he was smoking a pipe and wearing a robe against a warm fireplace.

“Blakey,” Phillis began. “We need to talk.”

Blake turned towards her, pipe in mouth, as he said, “What’s the matter? You look troubled!”

“I caught word from Isaac Kane that the Vorpals want Kari’s notes,” Phillis began, narrowing her eyes as she empathized with this next part. “... They know we have them.

“How!?” Blake asked, surprised.

“... From Isaac,” Phillis sighed.

“We should pay him off, but don’t worry!” Blake raised a finger into the air. “We’ll organize a meeting and get to the bottom of this! Find out everything.”

“Are you sure this is a good idea?” Phillis asked.

Blake grinned.

"... Of course I do! Why would I do it if it wasn't!?"




Paragon Halls, the Elite’s testament to fame, power, and wealth, was set in the heart of St. Portwell. Paragon Halls was selected for this very purpose! To foster alliances and meet with the other factions of St. Portwell and beyond! Blake and Phillis invited the House of Cards’s leadership to meet with them to discuss all of this! Indeed, it’s nothing, but Phillis suspected there was more to it. Blake and Phillis were set at the table with serious and focused expressions as they awaited the arrival of Valencia Vorpal…

The doors swung open, revealing Valencia Vorpal, Demos Castles, and a handful of black clad men. Upon crossing the threshold, Valencia gave a subtle gesture of her head, and the men waited outside, the door swinging shut, while her and Demos approached the table.

Both were dressed for the occasion, Valencia in a classy black outfit, and Demos wearing a black suit. They took seats opposite of Blake and Phillis.

“Quite the establishment you have here, Mr. Schmidt.” Valencia said in a smooth tone, placing hands on the table.

She turned to her side, gesturing towards Demos, a slight smile pulling at her lips. “This is my husband, Demos. One of my capos, and quite the charmer.”

Demos adjusted the sleeve of his suit, leveling a neutral stare at the two Schmidts. “Pleasure.”

“It's a pleasure to meet you!” Blake shouted.

Valencia settled in her seat, eyes glancing at the grandeur of the room before locking with Blake's.

“Well, right down to business? I'm honored you called to see us, Mr. Schmidt. I'm aware word travels fast when certain… effects... are pursued.” Valencia said, amusement in her tone.

Of course, it was no coincidence she was rooting around for Kari's notes, and the Elite just happened to call her in. Indeed, she had stopped believing in coincidence a long time ago.

Well, she would be an idiot to not make use of an opportunity.

She spread her hands out, gesturing to the Schmidts. “I understand you have a bit of a conundrum. A note that can't be read. And no one willing to decipher it for the price you want.”

She leaned back in her seat, swiveling on the axis side to side slightly as she pressed a gloved hand to her chin.

“Wouldn't it be wonderful if you could find someone who wouldn't bankrupt you to get you results, hm?” She said, her smile slightly growing. “We’d be willing to take on that burden for you, Mr. Schmidt.”

Blake smiled.

“Oh, that’s all?!” Blake began. “Splendid!”

“Wait, hold on,” Phillis put her hands up, as she asked, “What's your price?”

Valencia nodded. “What would half of what the 8th Street pitched be?”

Blake scoffed, throwing his hands in the air in astonishment before he complained, “They want ten million dollars! Just to decode it! And I wonder if they think I’m made of money! I mean, I can make it back in a month, but I refuse to be gouged by Emily G. Reed and her coho-”

“... That’s not what she asked.”

“Oh!” Blake laughed. “Five million is still a lot, though!”

“Twenty-thousand,” Phillis nodded her head.

“Fifty-thousand and you got a deal.” Valencia nodded back.

“Splendid!” Blake hops to his feet and extends his hand. “Phillis! Get her payment!”

Satisfied, Valencia moved to the next order of business. “I'll need those notes as well.”

“... Hold on here,”

A voice dramatically interrupted the meeting from the side: it was Jason Valos. Wearing a black suit, tie, and some dress shoes, he hobbled in on his cane.

“Ah, Jason, glad you made it!” Blake said.

Jason didn’t respond to him as he walked over to Valencia and offered his hand, “... Jason Valos, it is a pleasure to make your acquaintance.”

Valencia smoothly stood from her seat, a cool smile on her face as she firmly shook his hand. “Valencia Vorpal, but I fear you already know that.”

“Now, I overheard the whole conversation - well, no, I overheard most of the conversation, but trust me, I can put two and two together well,” Jason grinned. “... That, and I hit up everyone’s favorite informant, and he told me some things.”

Jason walked over to his spot on the Elite’s table, pulled the seat out, and sat down, placing his cane over his lap as he steepled his fingers. “Now, I have no clue why that bitch Kari has gotten so important lately - well other than her magic, of course - but I’m going to look at what I noticed…”

Jason took in a deep breath, then let it out…

“... You want the notes, and I know exactly who you’re with…,” Jason began. “Now, I’m going to be to the point; if ya’ll want it, they gotta be valuable somehow. We just don’t know how valuable yet, but hell, if we just put some time into figuring it out…”

He shook his head before staring at Valencia head-on.

“Bottom line is: why should we give them to you? Why should do you even need take the notes to decode them?” Jason asked. “I can have my boy bring them here right now, and we can decode it here and now….”

Valencia had sat back in her seat, a half-chuckle escaping her chest. “Well, ain't that something.”

She popped open her clutch, pulling out a pack of cigarettes. One was placed in between her lips, before Demos leaned in to light it. Smoke curled around Valencia's face as she took a puff, rolling the cigarette in between her fingers.

“If I may be so bold, Mr. Valos, if it were so simple to pull out the notes and decode them in one sitting, we wouldn't be here having this conversation.”

Another puff on her cigarette, before she smiled that wolfish smile of hers and gestured a small surrender with her hands.

“You got me. It was my design to sublet the notes to the Sycamore. But alas,” her smile widened. “It seems you don't want that information privy to them. I can respect that, but I can't help but ask why? What's the difference between 8th Street and Sycamore?”

Her head tilted. “Information is its own currency, Mr. Valos. We at the House of Cards love information just about as much as we love weighted dice or a loaded deck. So here we are: you still have notes that you can't understand.”

She leaned forward. “Bring the notes here. I'll call my brightest minds. We'll decode it right here, and no one else needs to know.”

“Look, I don't like anyone who bands together to call themselves ‘witches’,” Jason began, his expression flat. “It just so happens that 8th St is the more useful of the three ‘Covens’ that call our beautiful city of St. Portwell home.”

Jason laughed at his own joke before he continued to grin, “Why outsource to Sycamore? Dunno about them but they don’t have the bitch with the all-knowing book.”

Valencia's head rolled slightly at his comment, but she just kept that cool smile on her face.

He flicked his hand, adding, “Lemme just say, back in my heyday, I rolled with a lot of people like ya’ll. I know how you operate, how ya’ll think, and most importantly, how you operate.”

Jason leaned back in his chair slightly, “Are there any guarantees you won't try and fuck us over like, I don't know, take our money and run off with the notes?”

Valencia ran a palm over her mouth, before she gestured to the group. “You’re a wise man, Mr. Valos. Everyone with skin in the game knows how small this city really is. The Hearts Club Casino is not an easy thing to hide, after all. Easy enough to come knocking if I were to do something as foolish as ‘run off with the notes.’”

She shook her head. “No. This city thrives on cooperation. My most recent trade went well only due to the fact that there was cooperation, and trust involves. And, honored hosts at the table, we are nothing without our trust.”

She leaned back, taking another draw off her cigarette, before she offered, “Now, if you have a soul binding contract I can sign…”

Jason laughed, and kept laughing… He wiped away a tear.

“... A soul-binding contract should be a bullet with your name on it, sweetheart,” Jason grinned. “Cooperation my dick. We both know it's dog-eat-dog out there, especially here! I thought it was bad on the east-coast!”

He continued to laugh, before he stopped and menacingly said, “... Let’s just cut the bullshit. Why do you really want the notes? What’s in ‘im? And why is that bitch Kari so important all the sudden?”

Valencia stared for a moment, before the end of her cigarette glowed cherry red from her drag. A slow exhale, before she let out a half chuckle.

“Well, ain’t this something.”

Her wolfish grin was sharp, eyes leveling at Jason. “You don’t know, do you?”

She leaned back in her seat, grinning to herself, before she spoke again. “The notes… Kari… Well, Sycamore believes it's gonna save their little souls, whatever is written on it. Got a killer picking them off as we speak, and they believe this will give them answers. So… you can see why I’m interested as well. Protecting assets, if you will. One of my girls is a Sycamore.”

Jason just grinned.

“... Asset protection is a twenty-four-seven security detail,” Jason grabbed a cigar out his suit jacket and then slid it in between his lips. He lit it, and then took a deep puff, and pulled it out with his thumb and index finger. As he slid his lighter back, he spoke,

“I am aware of the Sycamore-Slasher because my kids are a target,” He sighed. “But, I just think there is more to it if the local mafia outfit-”

“... Oh! Maybe that’s why Liu’s kid wanted them so badly!” Blake heartily said, raising a finger into the air. “I could never figure out why…”

Phillis and Jason facepalmed.

“... Why would you tell her that, Blake?”

Valencia purposefully took another drag of her cigarette, delaying her reaction, hiding the glee behind her eyes.

Before she smiled. “Well. Seems we both have our assets we want protected. So do we have a deal, Mr. Valos? Or do you need to grill me some more?”

“... I think we do,” Jason took his hand from his face. “Except, we decode them on our grounds. In a room nobody but your experts, Blake, myself will be in. And we have our ‘security force’ there.”

Jason stuck his cigar in his mouth as he placed his other hand on the cane,

“And you get paid after the job is done,” Jason laughed. “Now, do we have a deal?”

Valencia raised an eyebrow at the vague mention of a security force. Her eyes glanced to Demos, who returned her stare with a neutral one of his own, before Valencia bit down on her cigarette, and shrugged.

“Very well. However, I would request my own men stationed outside of the room. Peace of mind, you see.”

She nodded. “Then yes, Mr. Valos. We have a deal.”

Jason grinned then extended a hand.

“We shake on it because God knows a paper to your people…” He laughed before he added. “No offense, though; far as St. Portwell is concerned, we’re honest businessmen.”

Valencia smoothly walked over and shook Jason's hand, that wolfish grin on her face again. “To a fruitful relationship, as honest as we swear we are.”

Jason laughed.

“Yeah, sure!
1x Like Like 1x Laugh Laugh
Hidden 5 mos ago Post by Estylwen
Raw
Avatar of Estylwen

Estylwen The Villainess

Member Online






The House on the Hill

Interactions: Luca (@FernStone), everyone gathered.




"Yeah, I mean it's great that you all want proof that she's not lying and stuff."
Greyson


Luna felt Greyson wrap an arm around her, and the tension she'd been unconsciously holding onto melted.

Now would the coven finally believe her…?

"I... Have reason to believe they're involved with a lot more than just them."
Greyson


Luna's eyes bugged out, and she spluttered a bit on her drink. A lot more? This was news to her. Mother never said anything about the strippers being associated with anything other than 8th Street.

That was worrying. Just who else were they associated with?

"I'd say someone like Anya is the perfect choice; get into the guy's head, convince him you're the one who can solve his problem?"
Greyson


Luna could feel the conversation drift away from her, and she smiled. It had worked. All the efforts the new Mother had done for her, despite having little care for this Coven… It'd paid off. They weren't chasing her out.

Luna took a sip of her drink, satisfaction written in her face, and continued to listen to the developing conversation.

"If it helps, I vouch for her too. I'm not as good at it as Greyson, but I've seen her mind. She's sincere in wanting back in and doesn't have intentions to fuck us over. If she ever gets any, we'll see it."
Tayla


Her gaze settled on Tayla, setting her drink down on the counter. Huh. Tayla had, in fact, been sincere when she said she would support her, help ease the process of coming back into the coven. A small smile graced her lips, re-affirming to herself that she'd hold up her end of the deal, when the time came.

That was when Sully came in with water guns, and shot Layla directly in the mouth. Luna watched the girl splutter for a moment before holding her mouth open, trying to drink. Already, vitality seemed to etch itself into every feature of the girl, and Luna watched Layla begin to remove her bandages, revealing healed skin underneath.

”8th Street may be actively reporting to him, they could attack us again in the meantime.”
Jack


”What if we can get them to turn against Emily? At least some of them? Would make all of this easier, wouldn't it?”
Adora


Luna considered their words for a moment, before her eyes latched onto Luca. Yes, poor little Luca. She was aware they had a history with 8th Street. Perhaps they could use that.

“Luca, how comfortable would you be inciting the 8th Street to mutiny. You and Adora would be best suited for it, given your… friendships.”
2x Like Like
Hidden 5 mos ago 5 mos ago Post by AtomicEmperor
Raw
Avatar of AtomicEmperor

AtomicEmperor Radioactive Frog

Member Seen 2 hrs ago

& &
Edict & Leon & Kenshiro

Mentions: Britney Williams, Lila Blackwood | Direct Dialogue: Layla Hyacinthus/@Estylwen, Anya Baksh/@FernStone, Sully Mcpherson & Sloane Farris/@Atrophy, Jack Hawthorne/@Blizz, The Gathered Coven | Location: The House on the Hill

Leon remained fixed on Layla, their participation in the meeting cursory with the attention it was being given. He listened to Layla's plan, and as it unfurled, he only felt more nervous about it. There was no way Lynette was just going to let her go about her business about the Temple without making herself a useful host.
“I can still be useful…”
Layla

"Well... Then you must be planning on taking another Charge, right? Another Apparition in place of them before Him? Because... Part of your training is...-" Leon gripped the bridge of his nose in frustration. "-The whole point, really was you having rowdy uncontrolled spirits! You're learning, we're trying to improve your control, right!? So that when... When you do, and please don't say his name around these people-" he whispered. "-but when you do, you'll be ready! Right? So, you... You need to consider that! You should consider that." he finished, not wanting to sound like some sort of taskmaster or pusher forcing this on her.

He had enough regrets about getting his friends involved with his family. Frankly, he had been hoping that Layla said yes, and that she would be done with all this magic. She needed therapy, real human therapy; not a Leech replacing the Vampires. And then Sully squirted her in the mouth. As much as he wanted to be the grouchy wolf, it was... It was Sully! He'd been disappointed in the guy a few times, but never so mad that he could have anything for him but genuine love and affection. A bit of the healing liquid spilled across his hair as well, making it grow just a little uneven.
"Oh, Sully! Bro, is one of those filled with JD? Jesus, watch where you're squirtin' your loads Brother, we're tryn'a have a private thing for a second." he chided playfully.

Edict was a bit distracted by the interaction, mostly by Sully. The always and ever hopeless gorilla. It was only endearing to a certain point, quickly becoming overbearing after a few minutes. But Sloane was with him, and he couldn't help but stir the pot a little bit.
"Oh, my fellow thief! Glad to see that dour expression is still stuck to your face after getting bug-zapped outside a Dairy Queen." he grinned, long since having gotten a drink for himself.

”If anyone has a chance of translating those notes, would it not be you? Your closeness to Kari puts you in an advantageous position, does it not? We can recover the notes and translate them ourselves.”
Jack

As Edict joked around, Ken scoffed at Jack's assumption that he had any clue about what was going on in that text. Even if there was Gamanese in it, he wasn't going to have the wearwithall to associate his own vague knowledge of the language with the beginning of a cypher.
"I'm a Soldier and a Farmer, Jack. I'm not some code-man or a Shiro user like Kari is. I wouldn't be able to help at all."

Edict took in the different suggestions, listening to what everyone had to say before a grin finally washed over his face.
"Alright, hear me out. I'm game for suggestions from anyone else, but... I think we should do what we do best! I think, maybe in this situation, being a group of disorganized dissenters can help us! The proposition is Absolute Chaos: If 8th told Schmidt that we're looking for the notes and didn't find 'em... Then we should make it look like it broke us! That this is the last meeting, and that everyone's just gonna separate and do their own things. So they think we're disorganized and that we don't have our shit together. All we need to do as a group is buckle down and agree on a plan to break their ankles!" he said, mimicking a basketball fakeout with the glass in his hand.

"We go underground as we can, and start pulling strings like how Adora said: Doin' shit like trying to get the good brains out of 8th and onto our side. If they see a little group, maybe headed by Luca or something, maybe they'd be more willing to go for it. Or, at worst, we can have different cells working different angles. And then rather than doing in-person meetings, we do them while we're sleeping. Anya coordinates." he rose his eyebrows.

"And I hate to say it, but we ask people like Brit or Lila to... Act as bait a little bit. Not now, but when we know we've got helping hands. In the mean time, we'll have other people working the Schmidt side, trying to get what we want before 8th Street thinks we're organized enough to pull this off."

Ken pointed a finger into the air, waggling it around.
"I refuse to be a part of plans involving the cooperation of 8th Street members. They all smell of Emily; even if their ideologies no longer align, they did at one point! Someone must be responsible!"
3x Like Like
Hidden 5 mos ago Post by Estylwen
Raw
Avatar of Estylwen

Estylwen The Villainess

Member Online














The House on the Hill

Interactions: Leon (@AtomicEmperor), Sully (@Atrophy), Nora (@Shin Ghost Note)




"-The whole point, really was you having rowdy uncontrolled spirits! You're learning, we're trying to improve your control, right!?”
Leon


Layla sweated a bit, a sheepish smile on her face. She had terribly wanted to skip the work and get straight to practicing with Void. But, she had to play by the Temple's rules this time. They knew what they were doing, specializing in apparitions and all.

So a new Charge? Layla made a face, staring at Leon. She had always had apparitions following her around. Now it would be the other way around: she would be the one seeking out an apparition. But who could she ask?

She felt a hand on her shoulder. It was Luna, leaning across the counter to shake her a little.

“Talk to me after this, I can help you with that.” Luna said with a wink.

Aislin immediately flattened her gaze at Luna. “I dislike everything you just said, girl. What if Layla doesn't like your brand of demon?”

Luna gave a shrug. “Can't be worse than the violent bloodsuckers she's dealing with now.”

Layla just gave a grateful smile. Yes, anything was better than Mr. Riil and his sisters. Well, sister. Having their numbers reduced by one had made her days just that much better. And she was happy to see it reduce to zero. She was happy to switch them out for something she could maybe tackle better.

Which raised the question, just what apparitions did the House of Cards have…?

Layla pursed her lips. It wasn't a question to ask here and now. She felt slightly admonished, staring at Leon as he hushed her. Void was a sensitive topic. Obviously, with how quickly Luna blew a fuse at it, and her mixed feelings towards Jack…

When Sully came out of nowhere, and shot her in the face with water. At least, she thought it was water, until she unintentionally swallowed some, and realized the delicious liquid was healing elixir. Immediately, like a baby chick seeing it's mama, she opened her mouth to take in the full flow of the elixr. With a satisfied sigh, she wiped her mouth, removing bandages and rolling her shoulders. She felt perfect.

“Sully, you're my knight in shining armour. Just give me a heads up next time!” She said, laughing after Leon.

Gesturing to Luna, Layla gave Leon an enthusiastic nod. “Sounds like I'll have a new Charge after this. So, no worries there!”

Aislin playfully rolled her eyes. “Hey, aren't we suppose to be thinking about what Nora's gonna make for us?”

Layla smiled smugly, looking like a prideful child. I've already put in my request. Now it’s your guys turn.”

Aislin puzzled over it for a moment, before she turned to Nora with a smile. “A never-ending metal staff! You can just keep extending it, and extending it. Imagine all the people I'd be able to restrain with easy material like that…”

Luna hummed as she pressed her glass to her lips again, before she spoke, “No gadget for me. Wouldn't feel right. At least, not yet…”
1x Like Like
Hidden 5 mos ago Post by FernStone
Raw
Avatar of FernStone

FernStone One Again Addicted to Pepsi Max

Member Seen 0-24 hrs ago



Interactions: Luna @Estylwen, Ken & Edict @AtomicEmperor, Everyone Present
The House on the Hill


Luca nodded as Adora spoke, smiling slightly. She was right that a lot of them didn’t like Emily or Vashti. There were a lot of reasons they went along with her - for some like Carol, it was false promises, for others it was the only place they felt they belonged.

But then Luna mentioned him directly. He turned his head to meet her gaze, eyes turning cold. Tendrils of rotting green flickered across the edge of his dark brown irises. A hint of what was inside, the rotten interior he normally kept hidden. Just as quickly, it was gone, and Luca smiled again.

Of course, for all of his positivity, Luca wasn’t stupid. He knew why Luna was (targetting) him. She was a spy, she knew he was part of 8th Street. It was an easy way to change the target. Make people suspect him, and Adora, for their friendships.

Unfortunately for Luna, Luca wasn’t someone to keep secrets… his own impending death aside.

”Yes, some of them are my friends. I’ll be open about it,” Luca turned to the whole group, smiling. ”Adora is right that a lot of them don’t like Emily and Vashti. Emily is lying to so many of them… a lot of them are good people. Some of them aren’t. I won’t excuse people like Emily, Vashti and George.”

He looked at Lila, and smiled.

”I can talk to the people I’m close to. I don’t want them to get hurt because of Emily’s actions. Maybe just me and Adora… they’re more likely to trust us. And I know who we have a chance with, and who to avoid.”

He didn’t mind if people questioned him for his friendships. He could defend himself, and there were people who knew he was only here to help others. There was no selfishness in his actions. After all, what was living another few years in pain over being killed instantly by Father Wolf.

"I refuse to be a part of plans involving the cooperation of 8th Street members. They all smell of Emily; even if their ideologies no longer align, they did at one point! Someone must be responsible!"
Ken

”Including former 8th Street members, Ken?” Luca turned to his friend, smile wavering slightly and gaze turning sad. He understood. Ken loved Kari, and 8th Street had ransacked her house after trying to force her to join them. Emily had bullied her closest friends. Luca understood better than most. He’d been close to Lisa, Ella and Saskia too. Kari had cut him off for it. It had hurt, but he’d understood. He’d understand if Ken did too. ”I was part of 8th Street too, for years. Longer than Sycamore existed. Our ideologies no longer align, but they once did. I tolerated Emily for a long time. Do you want to hold me responsible too?”

He held up his hands, arms spread slightly apart. ”You can if you want to. I don’t mind. I’ll take on the responsibility for all the other 8th members I don’t believe should.”
2x Like Like
Hidden 5 mos ago Post by Estylwen
Raw
Avatar of Estylwen

Estylwen The Villainess

Member Online





Sunday, 11:00PM


The Temple







Layla returned home briefly to pack an overnight bag, finding herself returning to the Temple's fold in under an hour.

They fed her, spent time with her, discussed her therapy, which would be starting as soon as possible, and sent her off to bed.

And so she sat here, at the edge of her bed in her Temple suite. The Void, the yawning ache in her stomach was eased, even if only a little bit, with their company and hope.

It made what she knew was coming a little easier to bear.

Her room grew unnaturally cold, and there was a tap-tap-tap, whether water or footsteps, she couldn't tell. But soon enough, a gloved hand was placed under her chin, and in the semi-darkness she looked up at the masked face of Kipnu.

Before a thwack of a gloved slap rebounded off her cheek. Layla's face twisted with the slap, but only a muffled whimper escaped her lips. She sat there, unresponsive, a frozen little girl sitting on her bed.

Kipnu was furious.

“We lost her. We lost Bahlaas, and it's your fault.”

Silence, before a half-chuckle. Layla wiped her chin, daring to look at Kipnu.

”...Good.”

Kipnu shook with rage, reaching over to grip Layla's collar. “You little-”

“What are you gonna do, huh? Cause I'll tell you right now, I don't care.”

Her eyes narrowed. “Your days are numbered. Mark me. Do what you want, but soon I won't be your little rag doll anymore.”

Kipnu stared incredulously. “You really think these people are gonna ‘save’ you? They're gonna save your previous little soul? Hah!”

He threw her to the ground, staring over her. “They're in it for themselves. They'll never give you back that pathetic ball of shadow.”

Layla glared defiantly from the ground, trying to half-sit up. “They will! And when they do, you're gonna be run outta town, or worse.”

Kipnu appeared to roll his eyes behind his mask, using his boot to shove Layla back on the floor. He knelt on top of her, half crushing her as he plucked up a wrist.

“You'll never escape me. You'll never escape being no more than a cursed child.” He said bitterly, pulling back her sleeve.

Layla glared weakly, struggling to breath. “...Do your worst.”

Kipnu stared, before sliding his mask to the side, revealing unnatural teeth. “With pleasure.”

And his sunk his teeth into her skin…










Monday, 9:00AM


St. Portwell Pier

In collaboration with @Shin Ghost Note




Bags under her eyes, Layla sat at the end of one of the piers of St. Portwell, docked ships swinging from side to side in the water nearby. There was a nearby seafood eatery she planned to walk to with Adora when she arrived. Layla wouldn't deny a friend food if they wanted to visit her so badly.

If they were friends. Sure, Layla had been non-combative and pleasant with everyone, but what was Adora's angle?

Had Layla done something wrong…?

She wore a simple white sweater dress, black leggings, and runners kicking slightly as her feet hung free at the edge of the pier. Her face easily betrayed sleep deprivation, and a mental hunger. She seemed unwell, burning the candle at both ends.

She'd given Adora the heads-up on where to find her. Now, it was just a matter of enjoying the cool autumn air and waiting. A few moments later, some footsteps approached, and Adora walked past Layla and stood there, with a red hoodie, and for a change, some jeans with some running shoes.

”... Hey there,” Adora said with a sigh. ”How are you doing, Layla? I know we didn’t have the best first impression of each other…”

Layla looked up at Adora as she approached, then shrugged, gaze sinking back to her fluttering feet.

“You haven't done anything wrong in my books, Adora. I was sad when you left, but you're back now. That's all that matters.”

She pursed her lips before continuing. “...Something, uh, on your mind? I figured we'd get a bite to eat down by the way. I just…” She took a breath, “Was enjoying the scenery.”

”Yeah, there is,” Adora said. ”I wanted to talk with you about that whole mess with the Void Heart - and before you get the wrong idea; no, I don’t think it was right for them to up and jump the gun without at least asking you.”

Adora shook her head before turning around to face Layla head-on finally. ”To cut to the chase, I wanted to hear things from your perspective. I wanted to ask you if you wanted their help. Or if you want help now.”

Layla stared for a long moment, before her head dropped. “...Just. Why? Why would they do that?”

She laughed weakly. “Jack made a whole deal about keeping me safe... When he just stabbed me in the back… They all did.”

She paused, before musing for a moment, smiling up at Adora. “Britney asked if I needed help, earlier. You wanna know what I told her?”

She stared at the waves, and muttered. “I didn't need any.”

Another short chuckle left her throat. “Now look at me. I've sold my soul to the Temple in the hopes they return what was once mine. I've let Edict in my head - the fallout, by the way, is horrible. Right now, I'm on a streak for accepting help.”

Layla grimaced, looking back up at Adora. “Though, I'm not sure what help you could give…”

”Look, I understand that the Void Heart was hurting people, and they were acting off of their emotions from Alizee’s death…” Adora sighed. ”But, like I told Jack, there is a world of difference between needing help and wanting it. And it’s just all types of fucked up to just up and make that decision for somebody. Regardless of how shitty their current situation.”

Layla allowed herself a half-smile at that.

Adora shook her head. ”Now, don’t take this the wrong way, but if you got hurt or something because of the Void Heart, that would have been on you. Because at the end of the day, regardless of how much they care about you; you’re a big girl and can make big girl decisions. And it’s nobody’s responsibility but you to save yourself.”

“Exactly.” Layla gave a nod of her head.

Adora put her hands up, closed her eyes, and let out yet another sigh. ”That said, I don’t know your exact situation, so I don’t know what help I can give you, really - but you know that whole fucking saying about magic? Infinite possibilities? There’s a way. There’s always a way.”

Layla mulled it over a bit, before realization dawned on her face, followed by grimness.

“...There is a way. Perhaps a way that is long overdue.”

Her eyes glanced up at Adora. “Would you… be willing to ask Britney if she can use her sealing skills… on me? My ghosts?”

”Consider it, done,” Adora nodded her head. ”Maybe she can teach us both how to seal… we’ll probably need it the way things are going.”

Layla nodded back, a grim look on her face. “You're probably right.”

She stood up from the pier, turning to face Adora directly. “I uh, don't know about you, but I haven't had breakfast yet. Do you feel like heading in for a bite?”

”Sure,” Adora just agreed with a shrug. ”I’m always in the mood for some food.” Adora laughed.

Layla nodded, and gestured to an eatery just a couple steps away. The Golden Lobster. “They won't be busy now. Let's grab some breakfast.”

And she headed inside.
1x Like Like
Hidden 5 mos ago Post by FernStone
Raw
Avatar of FernStone

FernStone One Again Addicted to Pepsi Max

Member Seen 0-24 hrs ago



Monday, Very Early Morning
Linqian’s House


Linqian once again dragged herself home in the early morning, with even less sleep than she'd had on Friday night (basically none). Last night had been really fucking good, and she was covered in the marks to prove it, but it had also been fucking exhausting. She had pretty fucking good stamina, but she was pushing herself to her limit right now. After three nights of little sleep... It was starting to take its toll. And she didn't even have time to nap.

Thankfully, this time, Henri was still asleep... Or not home, it seemed, judging by his open door as she went past into his own room. Hopefully he'd just slept at Louis' or something.

He was an adult. She had to trust him a little bit.

The bed in her tiny room was so tempting, but all she did was get changed out of the clothes she’d been wearing since yesterday, pulling on some comfortable leggings and a baggy hoodie. Then back out of her room and down the corridor, to the door past Henri’s room.

The master bedroom - originally her parents, but it had been a long time since they’d used it. Since the house had been rented out and it had seen a couple of people, before returning to a state of disuse.

It was where she'd put all of Jinhai's things - unable to bear going through them when she moved so close to his death. Instead, everything was thrown into boxes to transport in her car, and shoved in here to go through when she was ready.

She wasn't ready. But she needed to clear the room for Aryin to be able to move in.

Going through Jinhai’s belongings meant facing the reality that he wasn’t there to use them anymore. Each piece was some kind of memory. A reminder of him. It was difficult enough seeing him in her brother’s face, in all the memories the coven brought back up, his face smiling back at her from her phone lock screen.

But these weren’t things she had to sort out and possibly throw away. They weren’t clutter taking up a room she could no longer store them in. She could hold onto them. But she couldn’t hold onto all of his belongings, as much as she wanted to.

Linqian took a deep breath, and pushed open the door to what was once her parents bedroom, many years ago.

The bed itself was neat, stripped down after the last tenant they had moved out. The floor was covered in stacked boxes. Linqian bit her lip, and stepped around them. She stopped in front of the wardrobe against the far wall, hand hovering over the handle. She didn't want to open it. She really didn't want to.

She had to.

The door was pulled open, revealing a mostly empty inside. A couple of Jinhai's jackets were hung up, but it wasn't what she was looking for. She squatted down, reaching out to touch the simple wood box at the bottom. 韩进海 was burnt into the top messily.

It was all she had left of Jinhai.

It was difficult to look at. With a shaky breath she carefully lifted it up, backing out of the room. She couldn't leave it right next to where Aryin was going to sleep. She needed to... Treat him as well as she could before he could be buried. Before the funeral was paid for. Down the hall, she went into her own bedroom. It was the smallest room in the house, cramped with a small desk at one end and a single bed at the other. The rest of the space, what little there was, was taken up by a wardrobe and cupboards. She opened up the wardrobe, grimacing as she placed Jinhai on the bottom. She gently covered the box with a looser skirt he'd gotten her for a birthday one year that she could no longer bring herself to wear.

Now, she just had to start going through his things. Some of the boxes could be moved into Henri's bedroom, or downstairs, but there wasn't enough room for all of them. She'd decide what to keep and what she could throw away, donate, or possibly sell.

She really didn't want to get rid of any of it. But what use did she have for all of his clothes when Henri was taller than him, and she was much shorter? Perhaps she could keep some of the jackets...

The process of opening the first box was more difficult than going through it. Soon it became very methodical. Everything was sorted into piles, some reboxed to donate as soon as she had time. What she decided to keep was minimal. If she let herself get sentimental, she'd keep everything. But she couldn't. There wasn't the space, and what would she do with it all? It was easier to fall back into that state of emotional numbness and remain detached from what were generally just material goods.

Only items she felt genuine attachment to, things that reminded her of Jinhai, were kept.

She paused as she opened one of the last boxes. It was smaller and heavy - containing books that she knew Jinhai had cherished. They had always been too much for someone like her. Law books that she could sell were put in a pile, until half way through she paused. Her breath hitched and she bit down on her lip at the emotions trying to push through the numb veil she cast over herself.

It was an old leather bound book. Linqian knew that Jinhai had written down his spells in it - those he'd developed and was developing - because he was a fucking nerd. There were a few more underneath it, spellbooks he'd collected and other tomes on magic, but she knew this one was his. She'd seen him writing in it so often.

Teased him about it, too. She’d never bothered with something like this. Even if she’d had time to develop more spells, writing them down wouldn’t help her. She probably wouldn’t be able to understand half the stuff in here but…

She didn’t care. She just wanted to see what Jinhai had written. It was like a little piece of him left. Words from him she hadn’t heard before, even if they weren’t from her.

It was all she’d get now.

She quickly flipped through it. The spells she knew he had, some she hadn't heard about, ones he'd been actively developing. It was all there, written in incredible detail, going through all the steps he went through to develop each one. Her finger ran across the delicately written words. It was a barely existent connection to Jinhai. Written by him so carefully, now with no use. Maybe she could give it to Henri to study from.

The pages were packed with dense, but neat, cursive. As expected, she couldn’t understand much, so she went through them quickly. She only paused here or there on a side note that made her laugh - written frustrations about spells he was struggling to develop, the side of Jinhai very few got to see leaking out.

The brother she knew and loved, who’d worked so hard to not waste his natural intelligence, and pushed through everything that stood in his way. But he’d gotten frustrated too. Sometimes she’d come home from a night shift to him still awake, studying in the kitchen with tired eyes and a pen cap held between his lips. He would always pull his tight curls in frustration, messing up the perfect style he spent far too much time on in the morning just to put on a show. But there was no show around her. They knew everything about each other, and only she got to see these little moments.

And now they were gone. All that was left was the spellbook he’d put so much effort into. It wasn’t enough. It would never be enough. She raised a hand to wipe away the tears threatening to fall, tears that she couldn't afford to let ruin Jinhai's hard work. Then she kept going.

She stopped at a page when she saw her name.

'Spells for Linqian.'

Her chest clenched uncomfortable, breathing becoming more difficult.

There was a note in the top right corner, reading 'for when I can support her and she has time to develop her magic again.'

Linqian bit down on her lip, hard, corners of her eyes burning. She didn’t know Jinhai had been doing this. The whole time… he’d been thinking about her magic too? When she’d essentially abandoned it for them, he had plans to help her when she could get back to it? He…

Her head tilted back and she took a deep, shaky breath. She missed him so fucking much.

But she had to keep reading. He’d written this for her… it would be like shitting on his memory to not even try.


An alarm on her phone interrupted her reading, reminding her to get ready to go meet Britney and Aryin.

She’d made good enough progress. She put the spellbook back into this box - beneath it were various other magical texts Jinhai had collected over the years, likely useful for someone. She picked this one up and brought it out of the room with her, to her own. She’d look at it again properly.

For now, she had to get ready to train with her friends, and then for the inevitably useless meeting that followed.
1x Like Like
Hidden 5 mos ago Post by Mixtape Ghost N
Raw
GM
Avatar of Mixtape Ghost N

Mixtape Ghost N SOMETIMES EVЕN RICH NIGGAS GET LOST

Member Seen 0-24 hrs ago


Interactions: Luca (@FernStone), Edict/Kenshiro (@AtomicEmperor), Luna (@Estylwen), & Lila (@NoriWasHere).
The House on the Hill.




Thankfully, nobody jumped on Adora for having ties with 8th St. Though, she wasn't Edict! She knew they were probably harboring some deep-down feelings or thoughts that they were waiting to throw in her face at the perfect opportunity. However, that wouldn't stop her from doing the right thing, and this was one hill that Adora would die on. Though she was far from impressed by Luna, Edict had a more sensible plan/idea/whatever (even though she didn't trust him). However, there was one thing that she had an issue with.

"Lila to... Act as bait a little bit."
Edick


”... We're not using Lila as bait,” Adora added, crossing her arms. She couldn't care less about what Britney did because if she got hurt, she probably deserved it. ”I'm cool with working on the 8th St front. I doubt I'd be of much help recovering the notes.” She finished that statement with a shrug.

"I refuse to be a part of plans involving the cooperation of 8th Street members. They all smell of Emily; even if their ideologies no longer align, they did at one point! Someone must be responsible!"
Kenshiro


Adora turned towards Kenshiro. She had a lot to say, like how people need a second chance (and a third and fourth after that) or how people's past actions do not define them if they're no longer doing it. However, she kept her mouth shut as Luca asked him the tough questions, and she felt slightly proud of the little guy. Adora realized that a majority of these people, these magic users, have become so invested in magic that they have no clue about people.

”I think this is the most organized since I got here!” Adora laughed. ”But, let's take things slow. Like Anya said, we don't have all of our-”

Dramatically throwing the door open, like a bolt of annoying coincidence, was none other than Drake Blackmore. He strutted in, wearing a black leather jacket, jeans, and some black and yellow Jordans - naturally, shades indoors. He said, ”What's up, gang!? Sorry, I'm late! I had to watch the triplets until 'Toria got home from work.” His eyes then landed on Lila as he grinned and said, ”... How do you like the new jacket, bird-homie? I loved that thing so much it might as well be my channeler!” He laughed before he said,

”Take good care of it for me!” Drake said before he turned to Sully, and shouted, ”Sully! Did you forget... the... beer...” Drake slowed down as he noticed Luna.

Drake then pointed at her and looked around as he asked (no one in particular),

”... Why is she here? He tilted his head.


Lynette Domínguez
Interactions: I guess the Coven.
The House on the Hill.




Did Lynette want to attend a Coven meeting?

No, no, she did not.

She did more independently and heard about their amazing track record so far.

However, circumstances changed, and Lynette needed to speak with Sloane for help. Was it selfish to finally decide to attend a Coven meeting after she finally required them? Yes, it was, and it was also suspicious for the former third in command of the 8th St Coven to attend a meeting after they attacked Sycamore - Lynette wouldn't lie about that. She pulled into the House on the Hill parking lot in her black jeep with tinted windows and stepped out. She was wearing a black leather jacket, jeans, and some combat boots that she tucked into the jeans. Around her waist, she had a black fanny pack, not just any fanny pack, but a fanny pack with a holster. She kept her Glock hidden in there, just in case, along with some scraps of paper with some glyphs - in case she needed magic.

Speaking of which, she gently unzipped it and pulled out a scrap of paper with an earth glyph drawn on it. It began glowing with a soft, gentle blue glow as she pulled the back door of the jeep open, and a chunk of concrete was pulled out of the ground (she'll put it back later!). Lynette reached inside the jeep, pulled out donuts, chips, coffee, soda, and other snacks, and placed them on top of the rock. With a sigh, Lynette walked up the stairs to the House on the Hill, with the rock carrying her snacks behind her.

Lynette walked through the doors naturally. Most of the Coven hadn't assembled yet, but she saw Sloane, perfect. However, she would talk with Sloane about her little problem later since she didn't want to draw a lot of suspicion onto herself. Amara wasn't here, so that was good for her so Lynette stepped in and smiled.

"Hi, everybody! It's been a while," Lynette said. "Sorry, I missed the first... three get-togethers? It was three, right? I was busy with work, you know. "I got snacks for you all..."

Lynette stepped aside, and the chunk of concrete with all her snacks floated to a nearby table. Lynette gently placed all of the things she got. Before she turned to the group, "So, what did I miss?"



Interactions: None.
Cascade Pines National Park.





It was the morning of the meeting, where Britney, ideally hoped that the Coven would stop taking lame-ass digs at each other and devise a plan to handle the 8th St Coven. Britney never expected to ever run into Emily G. Reed and Vashti Nour again, but it seems like all hell is breaking loose, and all of her past mistakes are coming to haunt her at once. Not that she shouldn’t have handled them before all of this got out of hand, but there are sooooooooo many things that Britney should have done better.

There’s not enough paper on this planet to write them all down.

The fact is that, as it stands, their current capabilities aren’t sufficient to handle threats like 8th St. Britney knew that they weren’t ready to take on anyone beyond that - there was always someone better. She wasn’t like Jack or Stormy, who felt they could take on the world because they defeated the Stygian Snake ten years ago (with an artifact designed to defeat beings like the Stygian Snake). Britney knew that she was very out of her element because after mastering Floramancy, she just gave up on learning new spells. Looking back, this was an unwise choice, but she can’t do anything about that now.

What she can do is learn from the other Adepts and train in preparation for the next time they get into a fight with 8th St, the Wolfpack, or any of the other psychopaths that roam the streets of St. Portwell. Hopefully, it wouldn’t come to that, but Britney knew it would, regardless of how hard they tried. So, Britney waited in the Cascade Pines National Park… a location she’s trained in several times for her Floramancy.

Britney heard some footsteps approach.

Britney pivoted.

Britney smiled…

”Good, morning-” Britney’s jaw dropped, as she was utterly stopped in her tracks. ”... Why in the world are you two booty-out naked?!

”Don't act like you haven't seen it all before,” Linqian laughed, winking at Britney. She then held up her hands. There was a gentle heat radiating off her, her body
temperature manipulation stopping her from completely freezing. ”I can't afford to lose another set of clothes, so I left everything in my car.”

”Oh am I still naked,” Aryin joked as she looked over her body, ”and same. With the 317 going all hands on deck for some coming war I can’t lose any more clothes,” Aryin paused as she stared off in the distance, ”do you know how hard it is to find clothes that fit both bodies shapes, sizes, and still look good both ways?” Aryin

”... You haven’t met Bean, have you?” Britney chuckled. ”And, uh, I hope you don’t mind me asking but who are the 317? I know Greenwood’s leader lady brought it up when we met last night.”

Then she paused again. ”... And what war?”

”I have not, would she be able to help with my unique problem,” Aryin chuckled as she rubbed her arms with her hands. She wished she had more control over her green lux like Linqian to heat herself up. “The 317? We’re a supernatural art collective bro,” Aryin said with a raised eyebrow, “By day we sell our art and make money and during the night we’re usually busy training lately. We’ve been the group behind the industrial area restoration. We try to keep out of coven business when possible,” Aryin paused as she looked around, “I don’t know much, but we think something is coming our way. Trying to prepare ourselves for whatever it is before it gets here, you know. Thus, we’re friends with Greenwood now,” Aryin paused as she looked at Linqian. Aryin embraced Linqian in a tight hug to warm herself.

”Basically some kind of artsy nerd group,” Linqian laughed, hugging Aryin back to spread that warmth a little bit. She lowered her temperature a little so she could keep it going longer, and as the light glow off her skin reduced the marks all over her were obvious. Some were a few days old, but plenty weren't from the night with Edict and Britney… rope burns, bruises, bite marks (so many)… Linqian didn't seem bothered at all about how obvious they were. She turned towards Britney with a grin, patting Aryin's back. ”Maybe they'll help us with our little Emily problem?”

Aryin smirked as she looked back at Britney. “I think we have a few people who would want to help. If you wanted introduced to the leadership let me know and I can set something up

”Sure,” Britney said with a smile. ”We could use some more friends - though, I’m questioning how good they would be in a fight.” She laughed before playfully rolling her eyes.

”Okay, yeah, that’s rich coming from me, I know,” Britney laughed again. ”And yes, Bean can help you out. She’d be happy to - but let’s get to work already!”

Britney turned both palms upwards and shot a burst of various foliage, flower pedals, and pollen out of her hands.

”... Who’s ready to learn some Floramancy!?”

”Do we get to learn the cactus?” Linqian asked with a smirk, before laughing. ”Let’s fucking do it. I also got a spell I want to develop, I'll need your help with that, bitch.” Saying that, she slapped Aryin's back.

“Were not the worst fighters, but we have a lot who have not had to fight,” Aryin paused as she let go of Linqian, “which is why I’m ready to learn. I’ve fought George twice now and lost, fought Greenwood’s best and lost. I need to be better in this form, and I need to be able to fight back without swapping.

”No, you’re going to learn how to connect to Gaia and generate plant-life including the cactus,” Britney chuckled, though she continued. ”Now, listen up, Floramancy isn’t just wrapping people in vines and cactuses; it’s understanding life itself and channeling it.”

Britney gestured towards a cluster of flowers and smiled, ”First lesson, understanding life-force, now watch closely.” Britney extended her hand as a wheat-colored light surrounded the flowers… she hoped these two would understand what she’s saying, though sometimes, while she loved them, she felt like she was talking to a wall!

”With Floramancy, you’re not commanding the plants or forcing them to do anything but forming a bond between yourself and the plant. And with this bond, you can… command it to do whatever you want because I just ruined my own metaphor,” Britney slapped a hand on her forehead as the flowers began to grow much more significant than they naturally would.

”Just like, you gotta feel the energy between you and a plant - and I know that sounds crazy, but you gotta try it!” Britney began before she lowered her hand. ”Now, each of you try, just close your eyes and reach out not with your mind, but your soul. Form a connection. Feel the connection. Use the connection. Once you establish it, you can do anything.

Righhhhttt… Linqian raised an eyebrow. That shit sure did sound crazy. Feel the energy? Form a bond with… a plant? She could barely form that with fucking people! But it was worth a try. ”Don’t be too disappointed when this doesn't fucking work.”

Linqian stepped towards a different cluster of flowers, crouching down in front of it. She then reached out her hand and closed her eyes. Feel the energy between her and the plant… yeah she wasn't feeling shit. But it was kinda like temperature, right, something she could just sense in the air. She reached out a little further so her fingertips brushed the flowers. She could literally feel it, obviously. There was an energy or whatever… just try communicate with it? Grow. She concentrated before pulling back her hand and opening her eyes. Nothing. Still the same amount of flowers.

”Well that did fuck all,” Linqian rolled her eyes, gesturing with the hand she'd held towards the flowers… except it was now a whole fucking vine from the elbow downwards, with little flowers dotted across it identical to the ones she'd been trying to grow. She just hadn't realised yet because it didn't feel all the different.

Britney laughed, putting a hand to her mouth as she said, ”You’re a natural!” She pointed at the vines. ”When I first learned Floramancy, they just died a lot.”

Linqian looked heated though, ”But you have to let go of your anger, you have to replace it with a nurturing spirit. I know you see me hurting people with plants a lot but with Floramancy you gotta have ‘building’ in mind.”

"The fuck you mean natural- oh shit!" Linqian finally looked at her hand, eyes widening at the vines it'd turned into. It really hadn't felt all that different from when she changed her temperature, but now that she was looking at it… she wriggled the bottom of the vine arm, where it split into four, experimentally. "Right, lemme just conjure up a nurturing spirit right now, sure that's real fucking possible."

She laughed before furrowing her eyebrows, eyes closing again. Nurturing… She thought about Henri when he was younger. The warmth she'd felt raising him, the pride whenever he did well. As she thought about it the vine arm grew, extending out as it got longer. Flowers bloomed along it, and the split ends curled as if to grab something, even if it was only air. But then Linqian started to think about the danger he was in. All the ways she'd have to protect him, everything she'd have to do to not leave him worse than nothing if she died…

The vine arm retracted, Linqian's body heated up, and it burst into flame. Her eyes shot open. She twisted herself to hold the now flame coated arm away from Aryin and Britney. ”Shit.”

”Wow, you got a funny idea of what plants are!” Britney laughed as she walked around Linqian without fear and playfully laughed. She used her developing Aqua Bloom spell to splash some water on the fire and kept splashing water on the fire until it was all gone. ”Now, we have experimented, and we found out that plants do, in fact, burn when you set them on fire!” Britney teased, sticking her tongue out.

”I didn’t do it on purpose,” Linqian rolled her eyes with a groan, shaking her arm - even though it was a plant, she could still feel the water hitting it.

Aryin watched it unfold and was impressed with how easily Linqian was able to summon the vines. She knew that she wanted to show that she could do that too. In her own way. Aryin closed her eye and took a deep breath and reached out to the forest around her. She felt nothing. No connection, no feeling, and no sensation. She tried again, feeling out with her life force to try and connect with a more spiritual level but the forest did not budge. Shit. This was already harder than she thought it would be and that made her concerned for the rest of this training day. She knew she had another every source she could use for this, Leon had gotten her fully charged last night and some of the stored energy remained from that. Maybe she could use that energy instead?

Aryin exhaled as she opened her eye and looked at Britney and then Linqian. She took another deep breath and reached out but lowered her hands towards the ground more. The ground was her base, it was what allowed her to be this immovable force, and maybe it would hold a better connection with the fauna underneath. She reached out and pushed the connection and found something reaching back. Interesting. She could not tell what she was making a connection with but she could tell it was not that strong of a link, at least yet. Her hand trembled as she groaned. She sent commands of growth to the fauna but she could not tell if was doing anything. Aryin dropped to her knees and sat down on the ground below, placing her hand firmly in the dirt. She pushed for the plant life to follow her command, grown, and she felt it listen. A second later she opened her eyes and saw that she was now in the middle of a perfect mushroom circle. The mushrooms were a vivid red color and seemed to almost glow Not quite plant life but a close mistake.

“I think I made a mistake,” Aryin joked as she looked at the mushroom circle.

”Oh shiittt, you made a bunch of shrooms!” Linqian laughed. She squatted down just outside of the mushroom circle, narrowing her eyes at them. ”You think we can get high with them?”

As she asked, she experimentally moved the vine arm she still had, sending out a small tendril from the split end to tap one of the glowing mushrooms.

The glowing mushroom glowed even brighter at the tap before it exploded with a small bang, no louder nor bigger than a firecracker. “Oh shit!”

”Fuck,” Linqian laughed as the tip of the vine was caught in the explosion, the nearest bit burning off and leaving it gently smouldering. It hurt a bit, but not that much… thankfully. ”Good thing I didn’t just fucking grab it.”

Britney facepalmed, before laughing. These two goofballs really didn't get it.

“I am so so so sorry, I used some of the stored energy I had to fuel that connection so it must’ve made it explosive.” She put her arms back to the ground and, this time, tried to make the connection the way Britney intended. She reached out with her soul this time completely, devoid of intention or any other thought which was very easy for her to achieve. And then she felt the connection. It was the same network that bore the explosive red caps but this time she felt like the connection was more subtle. She gently pulled on it and guided it until, at long long last, another fairy ring appeared around her, this time the mushroom caps were as white as snow.

”Ahhhh, you’re getting it!” Britney shouted, shaking with excitement. A wide smile on her face as if she was a parent finally proud of her disappointment for a child! Though, there is a lot more to her magic than just making plants.

”You two are getting there! Making baby steps! First you begin with making plants that don't explode! Then you gotta learn how to materialize the exact plant you want, then shaping, then moving - then it’s all up to your imagination!”

Linqian rolled her eyes at Britney's over the top excitement and smile, clamping down on her more irritated reaction - she didn't really want to set her arm on fire again, even if it hadn't hurt… and could be useful in a fight in a different way. ”Y’know, just cause we're not academically brilliant or whatever doesn't mean we're shit at spell casting. We were the ones fighting in the front fucking lines before- I only stopped working on my magic cause I didn't have time around working multiple jobs.”

”I never said you were,” Britney calmly answered.

She took a step back, holding up her normal hand to her forehead, taking a deep breath. ”Sorry, barely slept last night. Let's keep going… different plants, right? I think I'll have to keep mixing it with green lux, shit just feels more natural like that, but I can still do all that.” To demonstrate her point, she flexed the vine arm, stretching out one of the four split tendrils. It shifted, growing thorns and blooming with blood red flowers.

“I was a much better student back when,” Aryin paused as she frowned. She was a much better student when she had her friend Ella by their side. Ella had helped Aaron develop his spells and they had hoped that she’d be able to help Aryin do the same. Yet fate had another path in store. “I had a friend back in the old coven who helped me expand my red lux. I am ready to put in the effort to do the same with my green.”

“I hear what you’re saying Britney but it just,” Aryin paused as she reestablished her connection with the fauna and commanded it to grow bigger. It responded by following her command, quickly erupting up to the size of a very small tree trunk. “How do you go from this, to bringing out something I want? Something that makes me more useful in this form?”

”You practice!” Britney shouted, walking over to Aryin and touching her shoulder. ”How did you make this form in the first place? Did you pull it out of your coochie?! I mean, I hope not but you took some time to develop these spells, right?”

“Well the kindling got me started about what I could do and this,” Aryin pointed to her body, “this spell came intrinsically from there. Felt like this was just another part that was ready to come out. Like I knew I was fluid young, and when I needed to swap for the first time she was the one that was waiting.”

”Your affinity,” Britney said. ”You didn't just make the spell, you felt it.”

”You could just fucking throw the exploding mushrooms at people,” Linqian suggested with a laugh. ”But maybe you gotta… combine it with your green lux? You don’t use red much in this form, do you? Like think of this shit as an extension of your body… that’s how I got it to work. Sorta.”

She held out her other arm, expression screwing up in concentration for a moment. From her fingertips to her shoulder, her skin turned green and hardened, sharp thorns pushing out through the new plant skin. Sap leaked sluggishly from where the thorns had pushed through, and it hurt, but she pushed through it. She raised the second, much thornier vine arm and elongated it to wrap around a branch well above her head and well out of reach. It snapped it and she pulled it down with a grin. ”Shit, I dunno how to explain it better, I just kinda will my body to change. Don’t you do shit like that with your durability?”

”You know, this is a random-ass thought, but what if you threw mushrooms that exploded into spores?” Britney began, letting her intrusive thoughts out. ”If someone huffs it, they start tripping balls. Wouldn’t that be nuts?”

”That would be so fucking cool,” Linqian grinned, twisting her head around to look at Aryin expectantly. ”Then you can give those 8th Street assholes a taste of their own fucking medicine.”

“Oooooh that is a good idea Britney, though I’d want that trip to be as bad as possible,” Aryin said as she cracked her knuckles. She looked to Linqian with a smirk. “I can also learn how to make the trip as good as possible.”. Aryin winked at Linqian.

”But, that’s an aside because mushrooms, technically, aren’t plants,” Britney playfully said, sticking her tongue out. ”They’re fungi. They just act a little bit like plants.” She pinced her fingers together.

”Ooo, Aryin failed the plant exam, gonna have to retake,” Linqian joked, laughing. ”... even if they're not plants, definitely make us some shrooms later, yeah? After we’ve mastered plants… like the cactus. Especially the cactus.”

“I just felt called to them shut up.” Aryin looked off to the side.

Linqian paused, turning to Britney. She raised her hands… except they were still vines, with one comedically more spiky than the other. ”Speaking of cactuses, I’m surprised Greyson isn’t hanging onto you like a fucking barnacle, all things considered. You abandon him in a ditch somewhere?”

Britney was silent for a moment… narrowing her eyes, and that smile erased itself from her face. She knew where he was; he was with Leon and the Temple. Despite their conversations, she still didn’t approve of them, and she didn’t want Greyson to hang out with them. However, she would stay out of Greyson’s business, just like he was staying out of her business (... when requested).

”... He said he had business,” Britney answered, and left it at that. Britney’s smile returned as she clapped her hands together and said, ”Let’s sate your obsession with the cactus in the meantime, yes?”

“I have heard about this cactus, I never saw the appeal but who am I to judge.”

”Don’t know it till you try it,” Linqian laughed, slapping Aryin’s shoulder, completely unbothered by Britney’s non-answer. She didn’t care that much about where Greyson was, there was just a bit of curiosity there. ”Wouldn’t do much for you, but the possible pain, you know?”

She turned back to Britney. ”Let’s fucking do it.”

Britney facepalmed.

”... You know I used a spineless cactus, you know? Key word here: spineless! Britney laughed.

”Fuck, that's kinda boring,” Linqian rolled her eyes good naturedly. ”But y'know, I ain't looking to use it on people like him, y'know what I mean.”

She winked, before looking down at her arms. With a frown, the less spiky one slowly turned back to normal. ”I’m guessing it's kinda similar to this, right? Just… trying to make a cactus.”

”Yes,” Britney said. ”But, I meeeeeeeean, sis, a cactus isn’t the best weapon you can use with Floramancy. Have you ever heard of the manchineel? Or you can just shank someone with a vine.

”I can already shank someone with this,” Linqian pointed out, stretching out the vine arm they had until the end turned into a sharp point.

“Can I turn parts of myself into a plant like that with this magic,” Aryin asked with a blank look on her face.

”I mean, you have Green-Lux, so you can turn your whole body,” Britney said with a shrug. ”I don’t know how that’s going to work, but hey, it’s magic!

”Yeah, just like you’re normal shit, y’know? You just gotta combine it… shit it’s hard to explain cause that bit comes naturally to me, it’s the separating I struggle with,” Linqian frowned, trying to figure out an easy way to explain it. ”Just like with how you got the shrooms, but use that energy on yourself.”

“Hopefully this training will allow me to bring a little more power to my kit,” Aryin focused on her hand as she tried to summon forth this undiscovered power. She felt the connection with the fauna around her and with a surge of focus and energy she forced a change to her knuckles. Out of the tips of her knuckles were a few of the vibrant red mushrooms. “Well that’s not a cactus,” Aryin joked.

”... They’re not even plants! Britney laughed.

”I don’t think magic cares,” Linqian shrugged, and laughed. She then turned to Aryin, turning her arm back to normal and holding both up in front of her. At the same time she started to cool down, trying to channel the coldness into a tougher exterior. ”Punch me! Let’s see if they explode too.”

”I care! But, let me get back!” Britney laughed, before she took a few steps back until she was a good distance away. She gave them the thumbs up. ”... Go crazy!

“Let’s see what they can do,” Aryin raised her fist up and sent another light jab Linqian’s way and on contact, the mushrooms exploded with more force than before.

Linqian’s attempted durability enhancement using the cold worked a little… that was until the mushrooms exploded. The coldness offset the heat that came with the explosion but it knocked Linqian back, her back hitting hard against a tree trunk. The bark scraped her bare skin, and the outer layer skin where they’d been hit had been torn away. She grimaced. At least her skin was cold enough it didn’t particularly hurt or start bleeding.

”Fuck, you know, I think you’re onto something with that,” Linqian commented, stretching out her arms. ”Now you help me with something - how the fuck do you do the hit tanking? I’m trying to fucking… make my skin tougher with the cold but as you can see, didn’t do shit.”

“It’s two things really,” Aryin paused as she looked towards Linqian, “the first thing is this form is a spell you know? I’ve made myself just incredibly durable within just the body. The second is I use my body to absorb the impact of attacks, and store that energy for use like these mushrooms. As long as I’m like this, and expend energy, it’s really hard to hurt me,” Aryin stuck out her tongue with a chuckle.

Linqian nodded, frowning slightly. How Aryin explained it made sense, but figuring it out in a way she could use it was the difficult part. She'd just have to keep trying. ”Alright, fuck, I think… I can use that. Fucking hit me again.”

She held her arms up in front of her again, temperature cooling down further. As it did she concentrated on how it affected her whole body - the slowing down of everything, using the loss of energy as a form of protection. More than just hardening her skin.

Aryin channeled her new found power again and, without problem, another row of mushrooms grew across her knuckles this time they were bigger. Aryin wanted to see how durable her friend could get, and while these would not be that much stronger than the last they would be noticeably stronger all the same. She punched out a moment later towards Linqian.

Linqian took the punch full on again. This time she felt the explosion ripple across her skin as the blow was spread out. It pushed her back, but nowhere near the same as before, and the damage wasn't as bad. Visible cuts still appeared all across her arms but… it was progress. ”Fuck, I think I can get it with more practice.”

She put her arms down and turned her head towards Britney. ”Brit, how much time we got till that fucking meeting? I want to grab food on the way first, haven't had a chance to eat since…” she frowned. ”Sometime yesterday.”

”It's at six so we got all day!” Britney playfully said, before she raised a finger and then added, ”But, one, we have to remember we on black people time, and two…” Britney laughed before she pulled it together,

”… And two, you know we ain’t getting shit done no how!”

”Fuck, you're right, can be on fucking time, that shit wouldn't be right,” Linqian grinned. ”Fucking miss me with the bullshit they always start with.”

“Did you manage to absorb any of that impact,” Aryin said with a chuckle.

”A bit,” Linqian nodded, stretching out her arms. ”Spread it out more than anything… fucking finicky this lux combination thing. But if I tried it without the cold it wouldn't do shit. I don't have that separation shit you got.”

She crouched again, arms once again in front of her, body temperature lowering even further as she channeled it even more across the surface of her skin. ”Just gotta keep practicing! You're favourite fucking thing, punching me- I quite enjoy the impact, y’know.” She laughed and winked at Aryin. ”Brit says we got the time, so beat me up till you're fucking exhausted! Maybe when you're done you'll be punching with some actual plants.”

“You forget, I never get exhausted,” Aryin winked as she once again summoned forth the new spell and this time instead of five smaller mushrooms she had one large on erupting out of the top of her wrist like an extension of the bone that connected to it. She raised back her fist and sent it flying towards Linqian.

Linqian crouched, stance widening as she took the blow with her arms. The explosion was even larger this time, once again knocking her back a couple of steps. She felt the damage rippling outwards across her arms as some of it was negated, some of it spread. More wounds opened up but they’d spread even further this time - all the way up to her shoulders. Just surface wounds, too. Nothing awful. ”Fuck, that was definitely stronger - but I’m getting the hang of this shit. It’s hurting less every time.”

She seemed unbothered by all the blood sluggishly dripping down her arms - she was. It didn’t really hurt. Honestly, compared to the bruising and bite marks all across her body it was nothing. But still… ”Lemme try something else. I, uh, found Jinhai’s spellbook this morning. He wrote down how he thought I could use his self-heal… may as well give it a shot.”

Linqian closed her eyes and tried to do what Jinhai had suggested in his spellbook. Channel her need to survive to protect her brother… combine it with heat. Her body temperature ticked back up to normal before continuing upwards, skin going from pallid to glowing hot. She concentrated the temperature on only her arms and the various wounds started to glow. Intense, burning pain seized her. It was much worse than when she got hit- it was so excruciating that her vision went black for a moment. Linqian knees buckled underneath her as she continued to heat them up. Fuuuccckkkk!

She cooled back down, and looked at the results which were… clotted up wounds, still there. Not healed at all. ”Fucking- alright, fuck that, let’s keep practicing the not getting hurt in the first place shit.”

“You got this Linqian. The stored energy is, like, apart of me? You know? I’m not storing the energy anywhere in particular but it’s like the energy infuses into my body at its deepest level,” Aryin paused as she held her hand up, “I’m not taking the energy and storing it myself, but my body is always ready to take in that energy at a moments notice,” Aryin paused as she made a fist with that hand, “and my spells are always ready to draw from that energy as well. You need to have your body ready before impact, and not try to make it ready during you know?”

”Bitch, I am, that wasn’t from your fucking punch,” Linqian rolled her eyes up at her friend - clearly not actually pissed about it. She pushed herself back to her feet. ”I was tryna fucking heal myself and it did the complete fucking opposite!”

She was more irritated by that failure, clenching her fists as her temperature came back down to normal. But it made sense. She had to do the cooling and the durability at the same time, rather than one then the other. It was all part of the same spell. But she held up a hand. ”I need a few moments. If I go cold now I’ll hurt myself more. But then, you can fucking punch me again all you like.”

”... You two have a weird friendship,” Britney giggled.

”Well we did become friends after beating each other to shit,” Linqian laughed. ”Which I won, by the way. Just someone’s in fucking denial about it.” She then grinned. ”Y’know what they say, friends that fight and fuck together stay together. Actually, that means you’re both fucking stuck with me.”

“One that’s lasted the decade since the coven,” Aryin smirked as she looked at Linqian. “How about we keep practicing the plant spells and once you’re ready we’ll get back to it?”

”Actually, there was an idea I had in mind for a Joint-Cast,” Britney said as she rubbed her chin before she pivoted towards Linqian. ”With her, though. Sorry, Aryin.” She gave Aryin a catty smile as she grabbed Linqian’s hand and turned towards the clearing…
Interactions: Jack (@Blizz).
The House on the Hill.

The doors were thrown open as Britney held them open for Linqian and Aryin. After they were through, Britney stepped in, a warm smile on her face as she saw the group assembled... and her eyes landed on Luna as she put on a bit of disappointment. Of course, she was here, and so was Leon... though, she went back to forcing a smile. Everyone here was probably looking for a reason to jump on her after the disaster that was Kari's house, so the last thing she wanted to do was pick a fight with one of them.

”Heeeeeeeeey everybody! Sorry, we're late!” Britney announced herself before she turned to Jack and raised the Noble Vow in the air. ”I still got Reza's sword, Jack! I didn't lose it!”

Then Britney grabbed the nearest sat and then said,

”What did we miss?”

Who am I kidding? I can already tell a pointless meeting when I see one.
1x Like Like
Hidden 5 mos ago 5 mos ago Post by Blizz
Raw
Avatar of Blizz

Blizz Grand Chancellor Supreme of the Wizard Council

Member Seen 1 day ago


The House on the Hill



Everyone seemed to have a decent plan in mind. Ghosting people in a coordinated way to hide from the Elite and 8th Street served as a way to protect their more vulnerable members and buy them some time. Adora and Luca could talk to the members of 8th Street that could actually be reasoned with. And that would make things easier with the plan that Jack had in mind. He didn’t need to jump on Ken’s ass, either, since the others already did. Good. This seemed promising.

”I don’t agree with using Britney and Lila as “bait,” personally,” he said. ”It is a logical thought. 8th Street is after them. But there is always that risk that they catch their bait. And 8th Street already knows we will protect them. We were lucky they retreated last time.” Even if Jack was able to teleport them out, there was always the risk that someone got to them before he did.

He would’ve kept talking, as he always does, but the door flew open.

Drake Blackmore walked in at last. He was tempted to scare the shit out of the Blackmore Family again to check on the man. To Jack’s bewilderment, he was still in half-decent spirits despite losing Jade. That bugged him, and he wasn’t sure how to really articulate why in a way that wouldn’t agitate Drake. Britney, Aryin and Linqian walked in next, along with… Lynette? She was still alive? Interesting…

”I’d hope you would not lose something so powerful, Britney,” Jack commented. There would be hell to pay if the Noble Vow was lost. Jack would snap his fingers and return it to his hand with a Blackout Shift mark that he made sure to keep on the hilt. And then he’s smack somebody over the head with it. With prejudice.

”All you missed was a tangible plan coming together. Greyson verified something that Luna brought to our attention,” he looked at Drake when he said that. ”We know how to move forward, how to find Kari’s notes.”

Two more people walked in. Stormy, who didn’t say a word as he stood posted up by the door. And Amara, who came in with her arms crossed. ”I put some phantoms outside just in case. Sorry I’m late… Had a thing.”

”I think we have two more things to discuss at the very least. Firstly, the dreams we are having… Regarding the Pale Horse and the High Priestess, I am familiar with them, somewhat. The Pale Horse is a multi-dimensional terror, who murdered billions across the All-Verse. And the High Priestess was once a benevolent entity, before she met the Pale Horse and descended into madness. She became obsessed with “purging the unworthy,” according to what I can access. What that means, I cannot say.”

Jack didn’t let it show, but the idea of having to face not one, but two threats of that level again made his soul ache. ”And then there is the matter of Raven Jones. Some of you may not know the woman she is related to in these dreams, but her name is Sunshine Jones. Just like the Pale Horse and High Priestess, she was feared throughout the All-Verse,” Jack continued. ”She is a green Adept who dedicated her life to horrific experiments on unwilling test subjects, created monstrosities capable of destroying worlds, and was banished to the Pit long ago. I do not know who is expecting us to deal with these Apparitons, but we cannot stand up to them. So we do not need to concern ourselves with them for the moment.”

Jack paused and let everyone take that in. In their current state, there was no way the Sycamore could put up a fight against monsters like them. They were barely able to keep each other safe on a good day, they were in no position to wage another war.

”Second… We need power and resources. We’ve made good strides in that sense, but there is always room for more. Kenshiro and I have been planning to travel into other worlds to find artifacts. Ones that we can use to our advantages to make up for the fact that we are struggling compared to the other forces in this city,” he explained. ”When we are not needed, the two of us plan to enter a world known as Gloom to retrieve an artifact known as the Brass Needle. It is known to sever the bond between Apparitions and their hosts, including those sealed within a human being.”

He looked to Lila and Luca, both of which have been struggling lately. ”We can use it to give you two a chance at moving on from the Rot and the Maiden, if you wish. And we can use it against other Adjoined who oppose us. We’ll likely look for other artifacts in the future. We have also built a pocket reality to store them, and just recently, I finished organizing it. We can use it for meetings from now on, if we need.”

”Finally, if anyone would like to join Kenshiro and I when we leave to recover the Needle, let us know. We intend to be back within twenty four hours, and will leave when we know we won’t be needed here.”

”Holy shit, you yap a lot.”
2x Like Like
Hidden 5 mos ago 5 mos ago Post by FernStone
Raw
Avatar of FernStone

FernStone One Again Addicted to Pepsi Max

Member Seen 0-24 hrs ago




Interactions: Jack @Blizz, Edict @AtomicEmperor, Sully @Atrophy
The House on the Hill


Before going inside, Linqian blasted herself with a quick self fix spell to remove the obvious dark bags under her eyes. Another on the way in, grinning thanks at Britney, made her skin look just a little less pallid. Overall, she no longer looked like someone functioning on only a couple of hours sleep.

”Yup, sorry we're late! Important shit, y'know.”

Linqian had dressed more 'conservatively' than normal with an off the shoulder, red fuzzy jumper tucked into wide legged black jeans. Her hair was pulled back into a bun at the top of her head, a few stray coils falling out of it and across her face. But as she took off her coat, her bare shoulders and neck were more than enough to show off the myriad of marks she'd gotten last night. Circular purple and blue bruising, and multiple, very obvious bite marks. She looked like she'd been mauled by a werewolf.

Which was a pretty accurate assessment.

She looked around... Almost everyone seemed to be here. Her gaze was naturally drawn towards Leon - he was so fucking big, for a start. But he was talking to Layla, and she didn't particularly want to draw her attention, so she didn't bother with a greeting. They'd seen each other that morning anyway... But then there was fucking Anya and Sloane. Feeling nice, Linqian ignored them. But after that was even worse.

Evelynn. The fucking bitch. Linqian couldn't believe she was still fucking showing up. How had she not died in a ditch somewhere? Fuck. She didn't want to deal with her today either, so she completely glanced over her as if she didn't even exist.

To Linqian she fucking didn't.

Linqian's gaze then moved to the back, noticing the drinks both Luna and Greyson had in hand. Her eyes narrowed as they passed Luna - not a particular fan of her, but Greyson was acting all buddy buddy with her, so what could she fucking do?

"Shit, the bar's still stocked?"

She patted both Aryin and Britney on the shoulder before making her way towards the bar.

”Sully, you look fucking ridiculous, what's with the water fight cowboy look? Gonna shoot some lava at Emily or shit?” Linqian laughed as she went behind the bar, passing by her friend who looked insanely fucking stupid with all the water guns strapped to him.

Obviously it wasn't fully stocked - just the shit that kept, bunch of spirits and the like. But she quickly found what she wanted and poured herself a shot of a coffee liqueur, knocking it back with a grimace. The buzz of the coffee would help keep her awake enough to offset the alcohol... And fuck did she need the caffeine.

She popped back up as Jack started talking and as soon as he didn't explain what the plan was and went into other things she stopped paying attention. Smart people shit. Not for her. That was for people like Jinhai, he'd-

Well, he wouldn't. But someone else would do the thinking.

She moved around to Greyson's other side, hand coming up to loosely rest over his shoulder. She used the leverage to push herself up, getting close enough to his ear to be able to talk quietly into it.

”Don't dock my pay for being late, alright? Or shit, charge me when I gotta catch up cause I'm not understanding shit that Jack's saying... I was working hard in other ways.” Improving her magic benefitted them all, after all. Easier to fight off 8th when they came from Britney again. She lowered herself back down, but left hand still draped over his shoulder. She held up her other hand with a grin. ”See?”

One finger turned into a vine, with sharp spikes all along it. She curled it inwards, still grinning. As she did her sleeve slipped down, revealing a forearm covered in grazes, from all the explosive punches she'd diffused across her skin over and over again. Even more obvious were the harsh red lines around her wrists - from hot metal pressing into them, maybe? They were incredibly suggestive of her being tied up in some way, at least. Her arm was close enough that Edict would be able to get a really good look at it. There was also at least one bite mark on her arm, matching the shit ton on her shoulders and the visible section of her upper torso.

”But you should see what we can do together now.” Her finger went back to normal and she dropped her hand to her side, turning her body to look more towards the group. Jack had finally stopped going on and on. Fucking hell could he talk.

”You gonna explain what that plan you mentioned is, Jack, or just leave us latecomers in the dark? I won't take any shit if I fuck up a plan I don't even know. Unless it's just beat 8th's asses, I can do that with my eyes closed.”
2x Like Like
Hidden 5 mos ago Post by Estylwen
Raw
Avatar of Estylwen

Estylwen The Villainess

Member Online













The House on the Hill

Interactions: Britney, Drake (@Shin Ghost Note, Jack @Blizz, Linqian @FernStone




[quote=Luca]”I can talk to the people I’m close to. I don’t want them to get hurt because of Emily’s actions. Maybe just me and Adora…”

Luna noticed that electrified look in Luca’s eye, and a sharp glimmered appeared in her own eyes.

“Like you, this one is not all what they appear to be.” The White Suit whispered in her mind.

Luna mentally rolled her eyes. “Tell me about it.”

”What did we miss?”
Britney


Layla’s eyes shone in excitement, and she looked over Leon to Britney as she entered the bar. “Hiii, Britney. Uh, can we talk later?”

”... Why is she here?
Drake


Luna smiled. Just smiled. With a quick movement, she tossed back the remainder of her drink, sighing as the burn washed down her throat. But before she could speak, Jack, surprisingly, stopped Drake where he stood.

”All you missed was a tangible plan coming together. Greyson verified something that Luna brought to our attention. We know how to move forward, how to find Kari’s notes.”
Jack


“Yeah, what he said.” Luna chimed, that arrogant little smirk never leaving her face.

She picked up her coat, draping it over her shoulder, before she stepped around the bar, wrapping an arm around Drake. Her eyes gleamed as she eyed up at him.

“Isn’t this great? You, me, and our friends? My, I really feel like I’m part of the team. It’s really great. And all done without you.” Her smug smile widened.

“While you were busy wasting the coven’s time, I found out key information that’ll push us down the right path. The path of the victorious, pushing us one step closer to that Father Wolf you hate so much.”

She laughed, pushing herself off Drake’s shoulders. She walked backward towards the exit, eyes never leaving Drake. Oh, she hoped she made him furious. Nothing would quite give her as much satisfaction now.

“And now I’m off to find a way to track down the Pale Horse and the High Priestess. Enjoy sitting around being useless.”

“Finally, if anyone would like to join Kenshiro and I when we leave to recover the Needle, let us know.”
Jack


Aislin was the one that piped up, raising a hand where she sat beside Layla. “I’m interested! That has me written all over it! My schedule is pretty free too!”

Aislin beamed to herself. Finally, an opportunity to hang out with the cream of the crop of the coven. A chance to be useful. And a way to help Luna, finally. She wasn’t as aware of Lila’s predicament, but if it had something to do with apparitions, she knew it was a sad story. Better to help. Besides, she was a week ahead of her poetry book, she could take some time to focus on what mattered most.

Layla watched Linqian walk in, and show off her new powers. An awed smile spread across her face, though she took some concern for the marks on her arms. “You must have been training realy hard, Jea-jee.”
1x Like Like
Hidden 5 mos ago Post by FernStone
Raw
Avatar of FernStone

FernStone One Again Addicted to Pepsi Max

Member Seen 0-24 hrs ago



Interactions: Jack @Blizz, Edict @AtomicEmperor, Sloane @Atrophy, Luna @Estylwen, Everyone
The House on the Hill


Anya pursed her lips at Greyson’s comment towards Sloane, hitting him with a look that screamed ‘really?’ As if things weren’t difficult enough without him inciting something. Honestly, she was hoping for a peaceful meeting, as far as Sloane damage control went.

Seeming less and less possible.

”That is a great plan, Greyson, except I can’t bring multiple dreams together… yet,” Anya brought out her fountain pen, spinning it in her fingers. It was certainly possible. She had a spell for it written down. But she was yet to practice it properly. It was something that was difficult to practice. The risk for errors, for hurting herself while bringing the dreams together. ”I can develop a spell to merge dreams together, but it’ll take a few days, and I’ll need volunteers for dreams to practise with. If I succeed, it will be much safer than in person meetings. Practically untraceable.”

She considered the rest, nodding. Luca and Adora working to get 8th Street members on their side made most sense, since they were the two with ties there. Just the two should be enough, seeing as it was a diplomatic job rather than something that required brute strength.

”I agree with the rest, bait aside. That… is up to the two in question. I can’t agree or disagree without their opinions,” Anya said neutrally, though not without surprise that Edict was even suggesting Britney be used as bait. Perhaps love didn’t hold him back as much as she thought it did.

Thankfully, all the latecomers dragged themselves in around the same time. The muscle, in Anya’s mind - at least, half of them were that. Surprisingly, Lynette appeared too. Interesting.

When Jack started talking, it was difficult even for her to pay attention. He just went on so many tangents during it that she had to concentrate to parse out the important information. Knowledge on the Pale Horse and the High Priestess, Sunshine Jones… who Anya wasn’t particularly worried about. Nothing in the dreams had pointed to her escaping the Pit.

”While I agree, Jack, that we aren’t equipped to handle the Pale Horse and the High Priestess right now, that doesn’t mean we can’t start researching them,” Anya pointed out with a smile. ”As a third priority. Ah, actually, fourth. Put gathering power and resources as our third. Artifact gathering would greatly benefit us all, especially those of us without offensive abstractions. I won’t go with you, because I’m needed here, but I hope you’ll keep me updated with your progress.”

”I’m not sure if I want rid of the Rot just yet,” Luca spoke up, rubbing the back of his neck, and smiling at Jack. ”I can’t help without magic, can I? But when this is all over, and we’ve gotten rid of Father Wolf… definitely.”

Anya raised her eyebrows before continuing with what she’d wanted to say. ”I’ll let the group decide whether we use your pocket reality, or dreams, for future meetings.”

Of course, Luna started going on again. Even Anya wasn’t able to keep up her well practiced smile. Was this really necessary? Even idiots like Linqian knew when to stop digging a hole deeper. A hand raised to the bridge of her nose, pinching it. She tilted her head towards Sloane, whispering, ”I take back what I said earlier. She’s both untrustworthy and incompetent…”

Then, louder, she said, ”do be careful, Luna. It would be such a shame if we didn’t see you again at the next meeting.”
2x Like Like
Hidden 5 mos ago 5 mos ago Post by NoriWasHere
Raw
Avatar of NoriWasHere

NoriWasHere

Member Seen 0-24 hrs ago



At the intersection of bad decisions and eventuality





The future was an unforgiving place.

One was more likely to get lost trying to track down the true possible eventuality than actually find the actual answer that they sought. There could be a thousand possibilities that change at a moments notice. A thousand possibilities that Lynn was quickly becoming a master at navigating. This trip to the possible future was one of the most important ones yet. Was it to see if the snake broke free of its prison? No. Was it to figure out who father wolf actually was? Not a chance, Lynn had spent many drunken nights trying to decipher that mess. Was it a anything that was actually important to the coven as a whole? No. It was something much more important. Finding a lunch place that Sloane might actually like.

And it was proving to be difficult.

Lynn had narrowed down the choice to two possible options. One was a new restaurant called The Olde Town Tavern that had just opened up in the arts district. It promised fine food, expensive wines, and a brunch menu that should satisfy anything that Sloane might want. As well, she was consistent enough with her order that Lynn felt confident that she’d be at least cordial to share the meal. Though upon looking up the reviews it seemed this place was an upscale, fancier version of a Cracker Barrel restaurant minus the gift shop. The other was a crappy dive bar simply called The Bar that may, or may not, have had several health code violations recently. Between the two Lynn picked the tavern, and hopped she picked right.

She waited for Sloane at the table, arriving some thirty minutes early to order the appetizers that the future suggested Sloane would like. If Sloane was as punctual as she was in these futures she would arrive just a minute before the food came out, and Lynn would prove that she could read the future well enough. This was important because Lynn needed Sloane’s help deciding which future was accurate with Kari. Lynn looked at her phone and saw that it was almost time. She leaned back in her chair, and took a small sip from her mimosa.

Sloane had been surprised to get a text from Lynn given their less than amicable history. She wouldn’t have even replied under normal circumstances, but then again under normal circumstances Lynn would never have reached out. Sloane was still tentative when she had accepted the invitation to brunch, having spent several minutes pacing around in her apartment as she failed to convince herself that Lynn wasn’t that small of a person to invite her out merely to rub it in Sloane’s face that she had been right about 8th Street attacking them, an argument made all the more easy by recalling what Lynn had said about Jinhai.

Yet in the end she still felt compelled to accept, surprising herself just as she was surprised as she walked in through the door of the Olde Town Tavern. The brunch spot was shockingly quaint, lovingly crafted out of vintage wood and forged iron that gave it a rustic feel despite being a new restaurant. The decor was a little hokey but strangely comforting, with rusted anchors and wooden ship wheels and fishing nets and old rods lining some of the walls as well as one great big fake marlin posted above a lit fireplace. Sloane caught a wave from Lynn out of the corner of her eye and made her way to where the woman was sitting, passing by a handful of couples in quiet conversation, failing to notice that the two of them were about half the age of everybody else in the restaurant.

Sloane slipped into her seat as she gave Lynn a simple, “Good morning.” She reached for the tiny pack of creamer to add it to the cup of black coffee steaming in front of her, stirred it, and took a sip. It was fantastically brewed. She let out a nearly silent hmph and closed her eyes as a sign of her satisfaction, unaware that Lynn had ordered the coffee for her after predicting which would receive the most favorable response, able to live the rest of her life not knowing the catastrophe that would have occurred if it had been a Bloody Mary made with jalapeno infused vodka waiting for her instead of a simple French roast.

“I predict that you didn’t just invite me out to have brunch. ” said Sloane, opening her eyes, looking around for a menu. “So, what’s going on?”

“Good morning Sloane,” Lynn said with a weak smile. While she had pushed herself out of the hole that Friday had put her in, she was still feeling very raw and emotionally vulnerable from the ordeal. If it wasn’t for Ken, Luca, Jasper, and Lila she was liable to be in a much worse spot. “You are correct, I didn’t just invite you out for the company, though all things considered you’re not the worst person I could be having brunch with at this moment,” images of Linqian flashed across her mind, “I need your help Sloane. I have ten possible futures, all equally likely, that I need to decipher.”. Lynn paused as she took a big sip from her mimosa. This was the hard part. Lynn knew she needed to do a few things, not to get Sloane to help but to be better than the false prophet she was to the old coven. Part of that was accountability, and the other was seeking guidance when the future was uncertain.

“I was hoping I could get your help in fixing that.”

“I see,” said Sloane slowly, thinking over the proposition. At first it struck Sloane as odd that out of all people Lynn would choose her. While it would be crazy for Sloane to believe that Lynn couldn’t see a future, Sloane had been historically dismissive of Lynn’s predictions—sometimes justifiably, sometimes not. Perhaps that was precisely why she was the one to have been chosen. Anyone else would just nod along out of politeness while Sloane was the kind of person who’d poke holes in the ideas presented by Lynn.

Plus, there was just something nice about being relied upon.

“Fine, let’s hear them,” said Sloane, pulling a pen out of her coat pocket and grabbing a napkin to use as a piece of paper. “Oh, but we should probably order first before we get too far off in the weeds and…”

A waiter arrived carrying a platter of dishes before Sloane could finish her thought and swiftly dressed the table, departing as quickly as they had arrived after checking if there was anything else the two needed. Sloane glanced at the smorgasbord before her: a platter of seasonal fruits drizzled with a honey, eggs benedicts absolutely dripping with hollandaise sauce, and razor thin slices of smoked salmon on top of a thin piece of toast topped with cream cheese, red onions, and capers. It was the kind of spread that brought tears to the eyes, in part due to how beautiful it looked as well as how strongly fragrant it was. It was only when the server returned to drop off a plate of spanakopita and stuffed mushrooms, some absolute personal favorites, that Sloane folded her arms and gave Lynn a stony, although not necessarily upset, look.

“Very cute,” said Sloane dryly. “But wouldn’t it have just been easier to ask?”

A sly grin crossed Lynn’s face. “It would have been easier to ask, yes,” Lynn responded as she crossed her arms, “but you never believed I could predict the future with any accuracy,” Lynn uncrossed her arms as she pointed towards the various tasty treats assembled before them, “and I had to show you that I’ve gotten better since the coven to get your help.”

“Right…”

Sloane plated herself a piece of spanakopita and sunk her fork into it, taking a small, delicate bite. A sudden spark of light shone in her dark eyes as the flavor exploded in her mouth as she smiled and attempted to cover up her delight by dabbing at her lips with a napkin. It was incredible. She cleared her throat and set the napkin back on her lap.

“Maybe I had been a bit harsh to you in the past,” said Sloane—a massive understatement. There was no polite way to ever call somebody a useless liability, but Sloane definitely had found some of the worst ways to do it back in the day. “I suppose I should thank you for warning us about 8th Street.”

Even if Lynn’s warning had, like many of her predictions before, been issued too late for it to actually be of any use. Sloane managed to keep herself from pointing that out by shoving another piece of flaky pastry into her mouth.

“I was to focused on what I was searching for, I nearly missed the threat right in front of us,” Lynn said with a smirk, “being back at Kari’s house, and hearing what they had to say about her grave I just had to see what the future held for her, you know? And it blinded me to the threat coming our way,” Lynn paused as she sighed, “just like before.”

Lynn took a big sip of her mimosa. A lot of people died because she got lost like that in the future. “Despite that, I was able to get ten possible futures. That’s it. There’s just ten possible futures involving Kari,” Lynn paused as she leaned back, “and it’s been five years since we…since we broke up and I don’t think I can objectively figure this out. I have too much skin in the game, you know? I can tell you what each future is, one by one, and you will tell me what you think of each one. Would you do that for me?”

Sloane nearly choked on a slice of persimmon when Lynn mentioned her breakup with Kari. Sloane had known that at one point Kari had dated a woman named Lynn, as Kari would always pointlessly bring her up whenever they were discussing something that at the time Sloane had thought was important, but she had never made the connection that Kari’s Lynn was the Coven’s Lynn. Or perhaps she had but had cared so little about Kari’s interpersonal problems that she had just deleted the knowledge from her brain, replacing it with things that she’d thought were more important.

Sloane looked down into her coffee, feeling a strange sense of shame in how uninterested she had always been in Kari’s dealings. Suddenly Lynn’s explosion at Linqian was so much more understandable. At the time she hadn’t known that their Kari might still be alive. Sloane frowned. There was something cruel about the hope that Lyss’s foggy information had given Lynn and Kenshiro.

“Go ahead,” said Sloane, clicking her pen, wishing she knew how to say something comforting.

Lynn held up a single finger. “Kari is Father Wolf, and she is seeking revenge on the coven because of a grievance against part, or all, of the coven.”. Lynn let that sink in for a moment. She also grabbed some of the spanakopita and took a bite and her eyes rolled at the taste. Sloane had exquisite taste, and Lynn was glad that the possible future was so right with this dish. “I know right? If it was just a dead end of a possible eventuality I’d chalk it up the randomness of the future but I saw this one many, many times.”

“It is a possibility,” said Sloane, jotting a note. She still had her suspicions that Father Wolf was previously a member or associate of the Coven. “Her spells would allow her to spy on others and find them when they were at their most vulnerable, making up for her small size. Although I couldn't imagine what reason would push her to murder. She was one of the few members of the Coven that could be considered levelheaded, and I don't remember anything bad happening to her that didn't happen to the rest of us.”

“So in this theory,” an unintentional use of the wrong word that was slightly disparaging. She should've said future, “Kari somehow managed to go to an alternative reality and then murdered her double so she could fake her own death? Seems far-fetched.”

“That’s right, she used her spell to locate an artifact that allowed her to pull another version of herself over just to murder herself. She knew we would investigate and did that to slow us down,” Lynn paused as she took another bite of the food. “It is far-fetched, but so are some of the other possibilities.”

“It just feels convoluted, doesn’t it? Kari’s smart enough. She would’ve realized that killing her double would make her look like the prime suspect. Did you ever see any specifics regarding what these grievances that motivated her were?” asked Sloane.

“Sadly nothing concrete. In one it was because we let her best friends die, in another it was because someone took the last donut at a coven meeting, and so on. Infinite variety of reasons, one singular outcome,” Lynn took a sip of her mimosa as she leaned back.

“I would like to think that we're being murdered over more than a bear claw. What else do you got?” said Sloane as she put down her fork and picked back up her pen.

Lynn held up two fingers with her free hand as she put the mimosa back down. “Kari is alive, but she’s hiding out in another universe to save herself from Father Wolf,” Lynn responded with a sigh.

“And in this version, she found this artifact and offered her other self up as a sacrificial pawn?” asked Sloane, looking up from her note at Lynn. “And she didn't warn anyone or offer to take them with her? Not you? Not Ken? You'd know her better than I, but that doesn't seem like something the Kari I knew would do.”

Lynn held up three fingers, agreeing with Sloane with a nod of her head. “Kari knew something evil was coming, and suspected the snake was involved. She went searching for the tree it’s sealed in and found it. The snake then took control of her mind, and took up the disguise of father wolf to free the snake,” Lynn paused as her head twitched slightly at the thought.

Sloane took the opportunity that a bite of smoked salmon allowed her to ponder over this one. It reminded her of something Drake had suggested some time ago, the idea that the Stygian Snake had implanted hooks in all of their minds and were able to tug at them from its vessel and even call upon them like sleeper agents. Except the only thing that connected the Stygian Snake to Father Wolf was that both of them were against the Coven. Regardless, it was really just a variant of the first idea, except in this one Kari wasn’t so much a psychopath as a hapless victim. It also conflicted with the second one, serving as a damning indictment of the unreliability of Lynn’s foresight.

“So we’re too assume that Kari either severed her Lux and has no Emotional Field or the Stygian Snake was somehow able to bypass it while trapped inside of its prison despite not being able to penetrate ours while at its most powerful? Obviously my memory regarding the subject is blank, but if Kari’s goal was to free the Stygian Snake she should just be able to do so by destroying the sycamore tree,” said Sloane.

“Also, hold on for a moment,” said Sloane, leaning forward with her chin propped up on her hand. “How can you have visions of one future where Kari is Father Wolf and another where she is not Father Wolf? This isn’t some quantum Schrodinger’s Cat thought experiment. While the future is malleable, the course towards it is still set by the past. Father Wolf already exists. They have murdered over a dozen people. Now I can grasp the concept of alternate realities and parallel universes. Maybe there exists a world where Kari’s Father Wolf, or you’re Father Wolf, or I’m Father Wolf, but when Ripley was the first one killed by someone that we likely know it set in stone for our timeline which person our Father Wolf is. So all futures should just be that Kari is Father Wolf or all futures should be that Kari isn’t Father Wolf. How can they vary so drastically?”

“That’s why I call them false futures,” Lynn said as she crossed her arms and raised an eyebrow, “and that’s also why this is a curse and not some bloodline magic,” Lynn sighed, “I can see into possible futures, but I can never tell if it is our actual future or some bullshit. At least on first glance. And that’s why I look at so many,” Lynn paused as she leaned forward and slipped into the possible future. This time, she did something she very rarely, if ever, did. She projected the future out and allowed Sloane to see a glimpse of what the immediate future had in store. Whole conversations were had in a blink of an eye, some of them turned violent between the two where Sloane cursed a knife and held it to Lynn’s throat while in others they would hug. In a few of these possible futures the waiter came over and asked for Sloane’s number, and in others they would ask for Lynn’s. Sloane would watch as hundreds of possible futures were explored right at this table. Lynn pulled herself back from the possible future and looked to Sloane.

“You’re right. The truth is set in stone, but the path to the future is not,” Lynn paused as she took in a deep breath, she reached into her bag and grabbed a large piece of paper with a intricate drawing of a tree at the bottom of the page and ten trees upside down on the top. The artwork was incredible, with a realistic but artistic take on a forest and each and every branch was carefully placed for maximum effect and every color was masterfully applied to create a wonderful piece of art. There were various animals and critters that hugged the stump near the lone trunk at the bottom and at the top each of the ten trunks had a small ecosystem of creatures around it. In the middle the branches branched off and interlocked with each other.

“Here,” Lynn pointed to the singular tree trunk at the bottom of the page, next to the initials of Jasper denoting the artist, “this is the present. There is nothing we can do to change the outcome of what has happened and what led to this point,” her hand traced up to the interlocked branches, “this is the immediate future. I can see the results of any action I wish, and either get the truth or a false prediction. I can follow those actions, reactions, and move,” she flipped the page so that the ten upside down trees, “to the far future. In this case, I showed ten possibilities hence the ten trees. Now, any action I take will result in change, one way or the other,” Lynn paused as she traced her finger to the side following the ever growing mess of branches, “and I searched far and wide to see if there was any more variation,” she looked at Sloane, “but no matter how far or wide I looked I always led back,” Lynn traced the branches towards one of the ten trunks at the bottom, “to one of these outcomes.”. Lynn paused as she passed the paper to Sloane.

Sloane’s eyes lingered on the initials marking the illustration for a second longer than they should have before she handed the paper back slowly and deliberately, careful to avoid reaching anywhere near the butterknife that was resting on the table. If Lynn was capable of churning through so many immediate possibilities so quickly then Sloane could barely hazard a guess at how many variants she had gone through—hundreds of thousands, millions, more—that all ultimately led back to her ten ultimate outcomes. Lynn had done her homework, but even then there was a creeping doubt in the back of Sloane’s head. She would’ve said snide comment about how Lynn’s future sight was what others would call imagination, but Lynn had already shown her that conversation. It hadn’t been fruitful. Sloane sighed.

“Thank you for illuminating me,” said Sloane, carefully choosing her words to deviate from the paths laid out before them by Lynn’s projections, following along the unmarked route that became the only way forward the moment Lynn had shown Sloane their future. Her lips drew tight and Sloane glanced across the dining room, as if checking to make sure that their server wasn’t approaching with a nervous but hopeful look in their eye. “It must be frustrating, given the uncertainty of all of it, knowing that even if you were to draw upon a conclusion that you were positive was the truth there would still be people like me to question its validity.”

Her tone wasn’t apologetic or sympathetic. Merely factual, almost dismissive if not for the four fingers that Sloane held up to prompt Lynn forward.

“It’s good, the skepticism,” Lynn smirked, “healthy even. My curse is a curse at the end of the day, I’ve gotten more adept at using it but I will never be able to say for certain what the future may hold. The skepticism keeps me grounded,” Lynn paused as she leaned back, “I don’t want to do it alone though, we’ve tried that before and the results weren’t pretty.”

“Sometimes with foresight we see what we want to see, but hindsight’s always twenty-twenty. Maybe at the time going alone made the most sense,” muttered Sloane, folding her arms. It sounded like Sloane was making an excuse for Lynn, but really she was thinking about the emptied out vaults and stolen artifacts that was only the tip of the iceberg when it came to her colossal fuckup. How much damage it would do to the hull of the city remained to be seen.

“It is easy to blame you for the mistakes made back in the day,” said Sloane, her eyes downcast, knowing that her voice, while never one of the loudest, had joined in with the chorus when it came to blaming Lynn when her predictions had done harm. The harder thing to accept was that the others were equally if not more so responsible for what had happened by choosing to listen to Lynn’s unproven prophecies in the first place. Sloane cleared her throat and looked up at Lynn.

“But that doesn’t make it right. You might find this funny, given how skeptical I am when it comes to your foresight, but I practice a little divination of my own. Tarot, mostly. Just about every morning. The thing is that whenever I do a reading I don’t suddenly assume that it's the word of god. They’re just cards, after all. I’m the one choosing to believe in them. So, it’s not the cards fault if they turn out to be wrong. It’s my fault for investing too much faith in them, you see,” said Sloane, taking a sip of her coffee. “Anyway…”

“I get it,” Lynn frowned. This was the only downside to asking for help from Sloane. “And I do not doubt your own divination ability, I did not know that about you but I suppose it only makes sense,” Lynn paused as she took a deep breath, “but this is precisely why I asked for your help. You will not sugarcoat your distrust of my predictions, you will not have the same emotional investment that I or others have. Hell, I told Ken my predictions and he told me he was willing to open up his relationship with Kari to let me back in. I need help figuring this out, and I am confident one of these ten is true. More confident than whether you would like the food I ordered, anything involving the snake, and more confident than what the future holds for anyone else in the coven,” Lynn paused as she took a deep breath. “I can talk to anyone else and get coddled, told that the future I want is the true one, and that there is no way for Kari to be a monster. I don’t need that, I need you.”

Sloane nodded curtly as if she were accepting some great responsibility and took another sip from her coffee, hiding a little smile. “So, future number four then?”

Lynn held up four fingers. “One of our former coven members is trying to do something evil, and to stop them Kari has adopted the disguise of Father Wolf to kill them and their associates.”

“Ridiculous!” Sloane let out a sharp, bitter laugh. [color=silver]“There’s absolutely no way that one is the case. I’d be the first to admit that some of our former covenmates have questionable moralities, but I was close with several of Father Wolf’s victims. The only thing slightly dubious about Jade was her taste in men.”[/close]

Her own personal basis refused to allow her to accept the idea that Jinhai had also been a part of some shadow cabal, but Sloane kept that to herself.

“For the argument’s sake, let's say that this was the case. There’s some grand conspiracy that Kari discovered and, considering my knee jerk reaction, she knew it was futile to try to reveal it to anyone. Why go through all of the theatrics with the wolf idol? Why make all of the murders directly linked together and risk exposing yourself sooner? Why fake your own death? The conspirators would realize that only their faction was being targeted, so one outlier would immediately be alarming,” said Sloane with a shrug, noting the idea anyway.

“Honestly I did not even think of it like that. If it was this one it would be painfully obvious to the rest of them that Kari was on the hunt,” Lynn smirked as she shook her head, “I think your analysis is spot on.”. Lynn held up five fingers. “Kari faked her death to stop something worse. The worse was a variable and there was never a clear rationale behind them in the far future. One time it was to stop the snake from being released, another to stop something called The Great Old One from being summoned.”

“Kari was one of the earliest victims. Third or fourth, I think. It's hard to believe that she was aware of Father Wolf as a concept at that point to kill a copy of herself similar to how his other victims were murdered, but even still,” said Sloane. Her pen came to a halt with a scratch. “Kari plans to do this alone? This threat is so bad that she's willing to get her alternative self killed and then let the people who could help her be hunted down like animals when she could easily solve the Father Wolf case and get some backup? Even if she didn't want our help, did she seem like the kind of person to turn her back on everyone else? You'd think she'd anonymously drop a lead if this were the case.”

“Unless it was more risky to bring us into the fold, but I agree. In this possible future that is what she told me at least. She told us that she thought it was better to work from the shadows than to help us fight in the light you know?”

Sloane shook her head. “Riskier for who? Her, obviously, since we’re already dying. I think I much prefer the realities where she’s trying to murder us over the ones where she just doesn’t care.”

Lynn thought long and hard at the response. Sloane was right. If Kari was fighting from the shadows why hasn’t she asked for help? Why hasn’t she done more to stop these deaths? Her power was never one that was offensive, and unless she suddenly found access to some powerful artifacts she would not be able to fight all by herself. She would need help. Which would beg the question, why not ask for it? And if she did, and those who did not return to the coven were at her side fighting this father wolf, why not bring everyone else back into the fold? Lynn held up six fingers.

“Kari accidentally swapped souls trying to survive father wolf. Her body died here but she lives on in another universe.”

“How?” asked Sloane flatly, setting her pen down without taking a note and answering her own question before Lynn could get a word in edgewise. “I suppose she had a possession of some kind of artifact that allowed her to do this?”

“She could always sense when death was coming for someone, herself included, and she found an artifact right before Father Wolf got to her, and she spent her time in the other universe trying to get back.”

”Sacrificing her other self yet again,” said Sloane with a tsk.

Lynn held up seven fingers, “She saw death coming for her and swapped bodies with another universe’s Kari to get a second chance at life away from the drama of our universe. She was tired of us, our infighting, and simply gave up on us and is happy in the other universe.”

“Same as the previous one, only intentional instead of accidental,” said Sloane. “If those were the realities we’re in it would be quite difficult to suss out without a White Lux user. Impossible, maybe, if Kari swapped on purpose instead of accidentally.”

Sloane went to make a note then paused, looking up at Lynn with a blank expression that hid a growing uncertainty.

“It’s also quite similar to the second future. Almost identical, really,” said Sloane, curling an arrow on her note from the seventh point to the second. Something else about these theories were similar. A set of recurring themes, swapping between abandonment and selfishness. If Sloane were a psychoanalyst she might’ve prompted Lynn with a few leading questions regarding her relationship with Kari and how things had ended. Instead, she just leaned into an assumption as she asked, “Have you ever noticed if personal biases or preconceived beliefs ever influence some of the futures you see? Or are they random draws formed from something more nebulous?”

“There’s always personal biases in choices,” Lynn added as she took another drink of her mimosa finishing it with a heavy chug, “less so when we deal with finite endings. If there was a never ending supply of possible futures I’d be willing to say that there’s a strong chance of my own opinions and beliefs tainting the results. With ten futures I think we can filter out what those may be.”

“It's just that most of these futures paint Kari as being extremely selfish or callous. It doesn’t quite gel with the Kari I remember, but I suppose we weren’t very close. It’s possible that I only saw a superficial version of her that she wanted me to see,” said Sloane nonchalantly. “Still, we’ll need the full sample before we start filtering. I rather we not give unneeded value to what could very well just be a string of coincidences.”

“Rapid fire,” Lynn held up eight fingers, “Father Wolf is swapping people when they kill, bullshit, the other ghosts would have revealed that,” Lynn paused as she held up nine fingers, “Kari is working for father wolf for the greater good. Some corruption lingers in us from our fight with the snake, and we’re all ticking time bombs. The ones who are killed are those who fall to that corruption and Kari does not know who is and isn’t compromised,” Lynn paused as she held up all ten fingers, “Lyss summoned the wrong Kari spirit,” Lynn smirked at the idea.

Sloane was grateful that Lynn was able to eliminate the obvious dud of the next three theories. There was something worrisome about the ninth idea, seeing as how it echoed with something Drake had suggested that night at Dairy Queen. It was already something that Sloane didn’t like thinking about considering how that evening went, but the idea that the Stygian Snake had essentially planted something in them and was using them as sleeper agents was disturbing. That theory was still muddy—Kari would be as vulnerable as the rest of them—but it held more weight than the last one. Sloane shook her head as she noted it down, gave them a once over, and then drew a conclusion, albeit not a final one.

“Boiling these down, there are three basic ideas,” said Sloane. Like Lynn, Sloane introduced each point by raising a finger, tapping her pen against each one as she presented the summary. “Kari is Father Wolf or working with them, Kari is innocent and in another universe, or Lyss somehow fucked up so hard that she developed a new spell.” Sloane twirled the pen between her fingers and added, “I’d be curious to see which one you believe is the most likely, but first I’d like to ask you to indulge me for a moment. I listened to ten of your futures, so I believe it’d only be fair if you were to shut down one possible future that has only just occurred to me.”

“Is it possible that none of these futures are correct due to your search being based upon misinformation?” asked Sloane, leaning forward as she propped her chin underneath her hand. “Say that instead of Lyss talking to the wrong Kari, Lyss actually talked to the right Kari and we were just fed a lie by Auri and Adora?”

“You know me, Sloane, I usually always add a disclaimer like ‘this may happen’ or ‘there’s a possibility that this could happen’ you know? Because I don’t usually talk with complete certainty but this time I know one is right even if I can’t find the words to get the point across. This time feels different,” Lynn said as she looked to the table in frustration.

What Lynn called disclaimers Sloane called outs, ways for Lynn to wash away any responsibility if a prediction failing to come true left someone in dire disrepair. Whatever they called it, the point Lynn was making still worked. It didn’t outright remove the fear that they were all being played—Lyss being the one killed by Father Wolf instead of someone else in the Coven still made it feel like their enemy was someone who knew them—but it kept it from stepping into the foreground and blinding Sloane of other options. It also eased the pain in her stomach that had started to form when she realized she had potentially just given a powerful Counterfeit to someone who could not be trusted.

“I believe you,” said Sloane. Whether she believed that one of these futures were right or she simply believed that Lynn was certain that was the case she did not clarify. Sloane too stared at the table, studying all of the delicious food that her fleeting appetite no longer found appealing. Sloane sighed. “For what it’s worth, I hope that of these possible futures the truth is one where our Kari is living a life somewhere else.”

“However, given the two we can exclude, we’re basically left with a coin flip between two scenarios: Kari is gone, or Kari is working against us. No matter what we want to be true, we should proceed forward with the belief that Father Wolf has access to Kari’s abstraction. Which means…”

They’re fucked. Sloane put her head in her hand. That scrying bitch. It was the easiest explanation as to how Father Wolf was so effortless with their assassinations. Sloane tried to think of a more elegant way to express that idea to Lynn, doubtful that she would even need the picture to be painted for her, when the waiter appeared with the bill.

“No rush on that,” said the server, shuffling away quickly before Sloane could even start to reach for the bill. Then suddenly he was back, a shine of sweat on his forehead and a hint of blush on his cheeks, desperately holding on to the tray as Sloane’s fingers touched it. “S-sorry, um, it’s just, um, it’s for her. O-okay, enjoy your meal, I mean, thank you from coming, um—”

Sloane snatched the tray before Lynn could try to pay for it and the waiter bolted again. She read the receipt, her eyes narrowing and her nose wrinkling as she scoffed and handed the bill to Lynn. Scrawled at the bottom of the check in jittery, thin handwriting was the following:

Can I Have Your #? accompanied by a phone number.

“He seems a little timid, no?” Lynn chuckled as she made a mental note of the number. He could be her latest mistake for all Lynn knew, and she was not having any luck up to this point with the men and women on the dating apps. She slid the bill back to Lynn, knowing full well that Sloane would have the cursed knife at her throat if she tried to pay. “It would mean we are more fucked than we already are,” Lynn paused as she leaned back, ready to draw Sloane into the real meat of the meeting, “We need to find Kari’s Wayfinder.”

Sloane, her neck craning to look behind her so she could catch the eye of the server and admonish him for his unprofessionalism, snapped back to look at Lynn. It wasn’t immediately clear as to why Lynn thought they needed the Wayfinder, but Sloane knew it would be just the thing to be able to track down parts of her missing collection. Her lips curled up into what someone could argue was technically a smile.

“Yes, absolutely!” said Sloane, her sudden enthusiasm was like a convict bursting out of a maximum security prison—riddled with bullets and left to bleed out in the yard. She sunk a little in her chair. “But wouldn’t it presumably just be on Kari’s person?”

“Oh for sure. If she is alive, that is with her at all times. So we need to find one of the mass-produced versions, Goro to make another, or,” Lynn leaned back as she smirked, “find someone to make another artifact to help us do the same.”

Sloane frowned. If Lynn was referring to her then she really needed to stop daydreaming about the future and consider taking a look into history. Sloane couldn't do it with just raw Lux, and if they got the materials she needed to make a Counterfeit then by then it'd be a moot point.

“Well, we'd have to find someone else then,” said Sloane, dropping her credit card in the tray and setting it on the edge of the table. “Goro’s missing and unless you have a manifest showing where the copies are we wouldn't have anywhere to really start looking.”

“The future has told me, with confidence, where we might find one of the replicas is, though I was hoping to avoid it,” the color drained from Lynn’s face, “Goro’s replica can be found on Yoko who is currently in the Pit looking for her brother.”

“Lynn—”

Sloane held back her tongue, instead rolling her eyes as she shook her head in disbelief. Sloane knew very little about the Pit outside of what they had seen in the shared dreams,but she knew enough that going into it was absolutely fucking stupid—hench why someone like Yoko would apparently do it.. Sloane realized that in her own excitement over the Wayfinder she had failed to receive a key piece of information.

“You must really believe that finding the Wayfinder is a necessity to even consider an option as suicidal as that. Why do you want it so badly?” asked Sloane.

“Scorched earth. If Kari is alive, she’s either fighting for us or killing us. If it’s the latter we need to find the one thing that can get us on an equal plane as our killer,” Lynn paused as she made a fist, “Plus, tomorrow’s meeting will be filled with terrible ideas that lead nowhere, infighting, and a lack of direction. We’re all going to die if we don’t solve this,” Lynn paused as she stared at Sloane with a fiery intensity, “we need to even the odds and the wayfinder is how we do that.”

“And we do that by, what?” Sloane let out a derisive laugh. “Telling everyone it’s time for a little romp through the Pit?”

“Yeah, yeah when you say it like that,” Lynn sighed, “it sounds like a terrible idea.” Lynn sighed as she leaned back again in her chair. “But what do we have to show for any good idea? Have we gotten any closer to solving this mystery? Have we found out who is murdering us? Have we functioned at even a tenth of the organized chaos that was the first coven? The future may be unclear about which side of the fence Kari is on but it is clear we’ll need to take some huge risks soon,” Lynn paused as she considered bringing up the possibility of fighting, war, and death coming towards the city but she knew she could not. The future was clear that if she revealed things out of turn it would deviate the group away from the path of success. “I do not want to go to the pit, I do not want my friends to go to the pit, I do not even want my fucking enemies to go to the pit. But the pit sits at a crossroads for us, and I feel we’ll have to go through it at some point soon regardless.”

“Well, at some point in my life I am also going to die but you don’t see me rushing off to jump in front of the first bus I see or weighing down my pockets with stones and going for a swim. If we have to cross the Pit to get through this then we can, but that’s most certainly not the next step,” said Sloane. She had said if, not when, revealing clearly how skeptical she was about Lynn’s crossroads idea. “The next thing we need to do is follow up on this lead with 8th Street. They took something from Kari’s, and perhaps that something is what we’d need to finally start making some progress. Because you’re right, we haven’t really accomplished anything except to prove that it was a good idea for the Coven to dissolve.”

“But it is a relief to me that you realize the current iteration of Sycamore is absolutely dysfunctional and because of that it isn’t working,” said Sloane, casually gesturing to Lynn. “Try to remember that the next time you think about starting a fight with Linqian.”

“Oh,” that bitch, that unrelenting cunt, that unforgivable piece of shit who forgot that Lynn was also a person who lost, lost, and lost some more well before the first fucking kid died to the snake. “I’m working on that,” Lynn said as she averted her eyes to the waiter who was sneaking glances at her from across the restaurant. Maybe a mistake was what she needed to forget the mention of the worst person that this planet ever put forth. Just a week, maybe a month, of just fucking meaningless fucking. Anything would be better than spending even another moment talking about that fucking cunt Linqian. “I am sorry for what I said, Sloane. I wanted to hurt Linqian, but I said something unforgivable to hurt her. And I did not think of how that would hurt everyone else,” Lynn knew that Sloane cared for Jinhai, “and you. I’m sorry Sloane. Truly.”

A genuine, real apology was not what Sloane had expected. She shifted uncomfortably in her seat as a succession of what-ifs where Jinhai was still alive flipped through her mind. It was pointless to think about. He was nothing more than ashes hidden away in Linqian’s cabinet now. A stab of guilt hit her in the chest. It had been about a week since she’d promised Linqian to help fundraise for a memorial service for Jinhai. She looked up at Lynn. There was no point in presenting that to her.

“Whatever. If you want to apologize to someone, you should apologize to Linqian. I get that she’s an idiot and a bitch, but she isn’t the enemy. Or don’t, I don’t really care. Anyway, we’re all going through hell as it is, no need to turn up the heat,” said Sloane. The advice was to herself as much as it was to Lynn.

No. Never. Absolutely not. That cunt did not deserve the satisfaction of hearing Lynn say she was sorry. She was not sorry for forgetting about Lynn’s past, Linqian took the first shot across the bow and it would only be fixed by sending the first apology across it. “I’ll see what I can do. Anyway, based on the possible futures and the themes I’ve told you, if you had to pick one option that you considered the most likely, what one would you pick? Curious to see what you think.”

“It’s difficult to say. If it had been a few years ago, I would find the idea that Kari abandoned all of us without saying anything to go live a better life in another dimension impossible to believe. Now I could be convinced. Kari was one of the few people in Sycamore I still kept in contact with, but this summer she essentially started ghosting me. So maybe she did just give up,” said Sloane, her teeth gritted.

“It’s also possible that she’s trying to stop something worse , but I don’t know. When I consider Father Wolf’s efficiency and ability to skirt any surveillance it’s easy to imagine that something similar to Kari’s Observation spells is being used. While she could strike with surprise, I don’t see Kari being able to overpower almost any of Father Wolf’s victims—and I don’t think she’d fake her own death if she was Father Wolf either, as that would make it more difficult to approach her victims. So,” said Sloane, pausing before saying that she believed Kari was working with Father Wolf for the greater good.

And in that pause doubt crept in. Sloane found it difficult to throw herself behind the idea that Father Wolf’s actions were justifiable in any way. She couldn’t accept a reality where Jade or Jinhai deserved to die, nor did she want to believe in one where she was just as likely to fall to the influence of the Stygian Snake after they had already beaten the damn thing. Perhaps it wasn’t doubt that made Sloane pause after all, but a fear that this reality had a decent chance of being the truth. A reality where their attempts to thwart Father Wolf was the wrong course of action, where they were little more than just puppets waiting to be pulled by their strings.

No fucking way.

“So…”

Unacceptable.

Lynn was wrong. Simple as that. Sloane had said it herself earlier: It’s my fault for investing too much faith in them. This had all been another waste of time. Right? Right! Right. Sloane stared at the spread. The slices of pears had begun to brown at the edges while the filling of the stuffed mushrooms had begun to congeal, the starting signs of rot, rotting away like her skin in Luca’s embrace, rotting away like her willpower against the influences of the Stygian Snake. Sloane blinked, shook her head, and deflated with a frustrated exhale, catching her head in her hands as her eternal migraine began stirring itself free from its slumber

“I don’t know,” said Sloane but what she had meant to say was, “I don’t want to know.”

The future was an unforgiving place.

“That’s okay. The conversation alone has helped me focus on it more, and I am not going to put my eggs into this one basket. I made so many mistakes before trying to figure it out on my own, having someone think things over is more helpful than you know,” Lynn was telling the truth. “If I ever need another interpretation, can I give you a call?”

There was the slightest bit of hesitation before Sloane nodded her head.

“Yes, of course,” said Sloane, sitting back up right, unable to resist her desire to be involved despite her apprehension towards what might be revealed next. Her eyes lingered on the receipt paper with the waiter’s number before looking up at Lynn. “Speaking of calls, you aren’t planning to, are you?”

“Not at all,” Lynn said confidently despite the fact that she had committed the number to memory. “I should get going, Lila will get her wings under control soon and I want to be there for her. I promise, I won’t bring up too much stuff at the meeting tomorrow regarding this. Unless someone brings up a crazy idea first.”




“Speaking of journeys, the future points towards one filled with horror and tribulation,” Lynn finally stepped forward as she looked over to Sloane and mouthed a sorry. “There is one artifact that can answer all our questions and needs for security. One that would tell us where Kari is, one that would find all of the stolen artifacts, one that would reveal the location of each and every member of 8th street in case a war to break out, where farther wolf truly is,” Lynn paused as she looked to Britney then to Auri, “Kari’s Wayfinder. That, or one of its replicas. I know where they are, I know we will be able to get them,” Lynn took a few steps forward as she looked to Lila and Jasper. This was a pivotal moment. One that would surely start a war amongst the members. But enough should see the logic behind it, and with their support she should be able to lead the support element.

“Do you all remember Goro? They have a sibling named Yoko. Goro has been missing since searching for the abberation killer in New York. I believe he found it, but can’t get away from where he is at. As such, his sister has departed with the Wayfinder and several replicas and we will be able to get one or the other. And we will find all of them,” Lynn paused as she took in a deep breath, “In a place where hope goes to die. The Pit, ” Lynn paused as she looked across the group letting the revelation settle, “and in each ten possible futures I’ve narrowed down it is a vital piece of the puzzle to solve this Kari drama.”

“Are you insane,” Aaron going a gasp as he took three steps forward in quick succession, “the pit? Where we might die simply by walking the wrong way at the wrong time? Where we will be hunted by monsters every second of every day and never know a moment of peace while we’re there,” Aaron paused as he took another few steps forward, “that Pit?”

“The very same.”

“And how do you suspect we navigate this hellscape?”

Lynn paused as she felt the question weigh on her. It was l a daunting task. Yet they had a few options up their sleeve, ones that would make the struggle that much more bearable. “The spy,” Lynn paused as she pointed to Luna. “the wolf,” she pointed towards Leon, “the storm,” she pointed towards Drake, “and the false prophet,” Lynn paused as she took in a deep breath and pointed to herself. “You do not survive the horror of the pit by being the fastest, or the strongest, or the bravest. You survive by being versatile, being able to see the threats before they come. And you survive by knowing what comes next each and every moment you’re there.”

“You are-”

Insane if you think any anyone would do, why are you.. youre just.. Stop you asshole.

Lynn and Aaron paused as they locked eyes. Aaron’s betraying the building rage, Lynn’s calm and collected and filled with confidence for the first time in a decade.

This doesnt prove anything. Just because you can see a future that is more than likely bullshit, doesnt mean youll be able to protect everyone in the mother fucking Pit.

“The future is ever unclear, but it’s easy when it’s a predictable,” Lynn paused as she looked at Aryin, and then Linqian, “I can do this. With Luna we have a strong scout who has so much to prove to us,” she knew that they were going to try and leave but giving her the carrot that was a path to redemption would be a newly irresistible draw. “With Leon we’ll have a fighter who will be at home ripping, and tearing the monsters to shreds. With Drake we have powerful spells to send even the most crazed of the pit inhabitants running, and with me you’ll have knowledge of-.”

What? Something that might happen but may not and to. Fuck you. After what you said to Linqian youre lucky I

“Not only will we find the Wayfinders, we have the chance at finding other powerful artifacts and those who embark on this journey will return forever stronger,” Lynn paused as she sighed, “one thing is certain. We’ve tried, and tried, only the good options to keep us safe. We need to take a risk like we did when we fought the snake. Greenwood is about to walk through the door.”
2x Like Like
Hidden 5 mos ago Post by Mixtape Ghost N
Raw
GM
Avatar of Mixtape Ghost N

Mixtape Ghost N SOMETIMES EVЕN RICH NIGGAS GET LOST

Member Seen 0-24 hrs ago


Interactions: Layla (@Estylwen), & Lynn/Aaron (@NoriWasHere).
The House on the Hill.



“Hiii, Britney. Uh, can we talk later?”
Layla


Britney noticed the hesitation in Layla's voice but disregarded it as Britney just smiled at her and said,

”... Sure thing!”

However, Jack began a long-winded yapping spree, and Britney rolled her eyes as Jack went on and on. Man! For all his genius, Jack never heard of the word brevity, now, did he? She chuckled at her joke as she sat by Greyson, though she zoned out for a bit. A lot of it was shit she already knew, except for their expedition into Gloom. She would volunteer herself to go, but she and Kenshiro... yeah, they don't get along, and it probably be would be best if Britney remained in Shimmer. However, the next person to speak up was Lynn...

“Speaking of journeys, the future points towards one filled with horror and tribulation. There is one artifact that can answer all our questions and needs for security. One that would tell us where Kari is, one that would find all of the stolen artifacts, one that would reveal the location of each and every member of 8th street in case a war to break out, where farther wolf truly is. Kari’s Wayfinder. That, or one of its replicas. I know where they are, I know we will be able to get them. Do you all remember Goro? They have a sibling named Yoko. Goro has been missing since searching for the Abberation killer in New York. I believe he found it, but can’t get away from where he is at. As such, his sister has departed with the Wayfinder and several replicas and we will be able to get one or the other. And we will find all of them. In a place where hope goes to die. The Pit, and in each ten possible futures I’ve narrowed down it is a vital piece of the puzzle to solve this Kari drama.”
Lynn (Who's now a Moderate Liability!)


So that psychopath did yeet herself into the Pit… Britney spoke out loud to nobody in particular. Britney tried to get Yoko to realize that going down there was suicide, but she wouldn’t listen. That was on her - though Britney couldn’t help but admire Yoko’s dedication to her brother. However, Lynn suggested they go into the Pit - taking Blackmore, Luna, Leon, and herself down there for the Wayfinder. While Britney could care less about Luna or Leon, she wouldn't send Blackmore down there (woman-beater or not). Now, Britney had no clue what the Wayfinder was or what it did, but from what she could infer, Kari and Goro made it. Britney stared at Lynn like it was the dumbest thing she’d ever heard….

”…. That’s the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard.

It was. Lynn had no clue what she was even suggesting! Were they all so desperate that people were throwing out crazy ideas just because? Britney tilted her head at Lynn. Unfortunately, Aaron entertained this craziness instead of just treating it as one of Lynn’s intrusive thoughts that she let out. This meant the others would join soon, but Britney wanted to tell Lynn why it was a lousy idea politely. So, it was time for the Coven’s magical expert to magical expert.

”I mean, look, Lynnie, I know you probably put a ton of thought behind this,” Britney lied through her teeth because it was just the most head-empty ideation she ever heard, ”But, it’s not going to be that simple. You know the Pit is not just full of monsters, right? It’s big, like huge. It’s the fragments of several worlds colligated. Going through it hoping to find one artifact is like looking for a needle in a haystack, but the haystack’s on fire. And the needle is infected with HIV.”

Britney then clapped her hands together, hoping that Lynn would finally get it. Get what she meant, and stop wasting ”But, let’s say you do find the Wayfinder or Goro or…” Britney visibly cringed, before she said, ”... Yoko. How do you suppose this ‘expeditionary party’ gets out? The Pit redirects any teleportation back into it. Meaning it's going to be next to impossible to get out.”

She shook her head before she added”Look, I don’t know what makes this ‘Wayfinder’ so special, but all we have to do is find a half-decent Artificer, and we make our own version of it. I know Goro's work was special, but it can't be that hard to imitate.”

Then Britney turned to Aaron.

”Aaron, let’s stop humoring this,” Britney began. ”Like Jack said, we finally have a tangible plan. Let’s stick to that then start coming up with these crazy-ass ideas if they don’t work out. Which I doubt, but I don't think we'll ever be desperate enough to enter the Pit.”
Hidden 5 mos ago Post by Blizz
Raw
Avatar of Blizz

Blizz Grand Chancellor Supreme of the Wizard Council

Member Seen 1 day ago


Interactions: ₜₕₑ Cₒᵥₑₙ
ₜₕₑᵣₑᵢₛₒₙₗywₐᵣₜₕₑᵣₑᵢₛₒₙₗywₐᵣₜₕₑᵣₑᵢₛₒₙₗywₐᵣₜₕₑᵣₑᵢₛ



Amara was watching the conversation unfold, a pounding headache tempting her to just turn around and leave. The rhythm of her heartbeat was sounding through the base of her skull, like an axe trying to cut her open. It was a miracle she hadn’t crashed into a tree on her way here, but Amara looked stone-faced. To everyone else, it looked like she was just a little impatient right now. And deep down, she absolutely was. She had an infinite choir of voices in her head telling her no at this very second. Among other things.

Bad fucking day.

”The Pit? Absolutely fucking not. Lynn, did you go insane or something? Nothing good comes out of there,” She interjected, having pieced it all together from listening. ”You go there, you’re gonna see shit like the Stygian Snake left right and center. If you somehow survived, you’d go mad. Fucking insane, psych ward, straight jacket and everything.”

”We could-“

”Shut your discount Eric Draven looking ass up, Hawthorne,” Amara cut him off real fast. Amara looked at Lynn with a noticeably bloodshot look in her eyes. ”Aaron’s right. That just ain’t an option. I mean… Just, how the fuck are you even getting there?”
1x Like Like
↑ Top
9 Guests viewing this page
© 2007-2024
BBCode Cheatsheet