Mivuli

Ink On Your Soul - New Beginnings

Wow, pretty cool to see so many new CSes, gotta read them all. And welcome to those who joined! I'll readd Mia now

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Riley took Nihil's glower for an answer, and was prepared to shrug it off. She could have reacted worst. There was a guy who had tried to throttle Riley while groping for his gun back in the day because of something Riley had said. She couldn't quite remember now, but she guessed - going by the way his face had contorted in blind rage - it had been a joking insinuation at his possible lack of endowment. Most people who hadn't been in the same circle Riley used to run around with hadn't seem to be able to stomach her, which made it easier to smear them away when the time and assignment with their name on the hitlist came, come to think of it.

But instead, Nihil approached Riley on her way to the door, and caught her shoulder in a grip, spilling words into the shell of her ear. Riley tensed, feeling the breath of another down her neck. Proximity was something you forgot in prison, and personal space became a permanent valuable rather than a respect. Riley listened, and when Nihil made to leave, Riley slid off the chair. She hadn't abused substances before, but she had an absolute addiction for challenges. It was why she had thrived in the gang that posed her task after task, why some part of her had died of crippling boredom while lying around in that cell.

But she certainly wasn't bored now, and god help her when her interest was piqued.

Riley followed after Nihil, and smoothly slipped between her and the door. "Are you going to ask a question and not hear the answer?" she asked, one eyebrow arched while an impertinent smile played over her lips. She kept her voice quiet, the words for Nihil to hear. "You feel contempt, I feel bored." She reconsidered, a thoughtful look passing over her face. "Well, either that, or I laugh." And she cracked a splitting grin before that too fell. Expression after expression like a rapid slideshow with no transitions. As for the gratitude," Riley raised her palms as though in defence, "you can forget it. I know I'm hoping to. The point though, is that there is no point.

"We're all stuck here, Rogue and Rogue. Yeah, bet you're not too thrilled about that but neither am I. So to answer you, Nihil, nah, I'm not looking for friendship - it's a weird thing, limits the size of your prey-pool - just a little light banter now and again. So relax a little, not gonna force you to be my pal. I'm just a human who happens to like to laugh the same way some Rogues like to hear people scream. I'm human." Riley clapped Nihil's shoulder twice, figuring that bit of familiar contact might rankle her, and tipped the corner of her lips upward. "But that ain't necessarily bad."

She took a step backward. "See you around then." Riley cocked two fingers at her, lighting the tips of them with fire as she did so, before she loped out the door easily. She slid out the yawning warehouse entrance with her belt jangling with the knives she had pilfered, and walked into the bright glare of the sun, baking the ground.

There was bound to be blank wall at the side of the warehouse where she could see if her aim had gotten rusty yet.

Harry Potter: 2017-2018

I have exams coming up too, so I might not be very active in the next three weeks or so. But I'll try to keep up!

Harry Potter: 2017-2018

Kina gave a small smile as the girl on the table snorted at her cousin's polite introduction, and took Andrew's offered hand. "The pleasure is all mine," he said quietly to the two of them, and made towards the table. While he swung the strap of his satchel off his shoulders, a girl Bella who seemed to be quaking in her shoes and another Ravenclaw boy Morgan who looked like there was something weighing on his mind entered the room. By the time Kina had settled into his seat by the desk - taking care not to sit too close or else risk getting between the exchange between Hero and Morgan - with his satchel tucked neatly between his back and that of the chair, there were plenty of other kids who had come to join. Kina felt his eyes widen in bemusement, his mind scrambling to keep up with the stream of names that came paired with faces to place.

When the flow seemed to ebb - though Kina had an inkling there would be more to come - he began to take out one of his textbooks from his satchel to lay it on the desk. His fingers grazed over the spine of A History of Magic by Bathilda Bagshot, feeling by memory the smooth hardback it had been before becoming the crinkled surface it now was. Kina had cracked it open in his bedroom after the trip to Diagon Alley, and then stayed up the entire night reading it until his eyes were dry and in pain but eating up every word they traversed upon. Even then, he hadn't been able to finish the book. The hours between sunrise and sundown of that day had been spent by the windowsill in a feverish attempt to know everything he could have possibly missed. He didn't think there had been any other day better spent than that, flipping the last page with the last sliver of dying light, almost winded by the years of heritage that had blown past him in a flurry of words and paragraphs.

The toes of Kina's scruffy sneakers swung lightly over the floor. He flipped the book open on his desk, never mind if he might be re-reading it. He knew with some odd certainty that the tales woven together in the text would come back to him as an old friend might - unfamiliar, and yet no stranger, illiciting odd memories that Kina could never distinguish from dreams. A second read would do Kina no harm.

One of the boys - Iorweth, was it? - mentioned in a thick cadence Professor Hagrid's lessons. He seemed to have a type of affinity to the class. Kina had come to Hogwarts expecting classes in stuffy rooms with PowerPoints on a screen, projecting images of fantastical and beautiful creatures like unicorns or perhaps an elf and slideshows with walls of information and facts about their biology and adaptations to the wild.

Instead, they had stood outside a hut with a smoking chimney as Professor Hagrid - a large man, who towered over them with an untamed beard and who might have been intimidating by size alone if he hadn't also had eyes that twinkled and crinkled when he smiled, which was often - told them about sphinxes, and pesky pixies; mentioned a herd of centaurs he could invite to class one day (as long as the planets were aligned and the stars didn't wink too ominously on the day itself, of course); waved to the sky as a silhouette flew overhead with a shrill echoing cry, casting a shadow on them, while Kina craned his neck to catch a better sight of the hippogriff before it disappeared.

It was a class that looked to be positively splendid, if Kina could begin to recognise the creatures by name before the end of the term. He looked down at the textbook before him, eyes catching onto words that sprang up from the page to him, bidding his distraction. Perhaps he should have brought the one by Newt Scamander instead. Or maybe he should start asking students like Iorweth for help in the subject. His sparse knowledge of Biology didn't stand to be applied much in Hogwarts.

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Sorry I've been a little quiet. Been thinking about how to write Riley's response. I might be a little unresponsive the next three weeks or so, my exams are coming up.

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Riley's wolf's grin widened at KB's invitation to dine, and she whistled lowly. "We got ourselves a gentlemanly Bastard, eh?" Even though she wasn't hungry yet, she shrugged. "Hm, why not? You don't look like you're about to murder over the dining table." Pushing herself from the counter, she walked over, and took the chair he had gestured to. Three years in a cage, and the slightest politeness bemused her to no end.

But he didn't seem the bad sort, even kickstarting this alliance with some sweet words. Riley wasn't charmed effusively by the praise, but she was beginning to think there was some potential for cooperation in this patchwork squad. Even if he used a slang that was all but Swahili to Riley. But the gist was quickly caught, and Riley laughed, an even chuckle. "Preach it, Blackwell," she said. "You're not too bad with those martial arts either. Though you should think about covering up your torso now and then," added Riley with a little chortle.

"We could both learn something useful. I mean, a bloke never knows so much he can't learn more." As Blackwell dug in again, Riley raised a brow. Now a cup that wasn't overbrimming yet with confidence and cockiness. She had missed bare-faced humility, especially when she had had only herself for company. She smiled across the table, and gave a quick wink for a handshake. Yes, Blackwell would prove tolerable yet. "Absolutely. Ring me up anytime, and we'll throw some blades around."

Deciding not to interfere with his eating, she looked up to see Nihil had entered. She still looked surly and put upon, but she had changed too into something that had Riley doing an internalised double-take. But she glanced away, after tossing a careless grin and giving a waggle of her fingers in greeting. Nihil however looked absolutely determined not to take too much notice of the other two occupants of the lounge, lest the attention be rebounded back onto her.

Riley looked over her tablet again, refreshing Nihil's information page as she heard the woman assemble a meal and find a seat - well away from them, she noted with a small smirk to herself. She found nothing on her tablet to indicate how Nihil could have possibly survived those bullets, and Riley had never been good at relinquishing a question before she found its partnering answer. For all intents and purposes, Nihil appeared to be human, a mercenary from a former life, with impeccable posture and a back stiffened as though in preparation for some hail of socialism. Riley stifled a laugh. She really oughtn't; it was just beckoning Riley to needle her more.

Riley glanced apologetically at Blackwell, hoping the conversation she was about to attempt to bridge wouldn't interrupt with his meal. "I'm still waiting for your autiobiography," Riley said in a jesting voice that carried. Oh, it was downright rude to pester someone for a past, a history, especially among Rogues with less-than-savoury backgrounds, and - for many of them - blood on their hands. But she'd be damned if she didn't find out what she wanted before her allocated nine lives ran out.

But, she reconsidered, certain formalities had to be put out of the way first. Her tone and demeanour shifting slightly - like an edgy child rustling his shoulders - she spoke in words that came in a choppy flow, "Should have said this earlier, but the chance never came about. The foam...thing, and the bullets." One hand gesticulated, as though to paint a swirling portrait of what she was trying to get at, before rising to ruffle her sheared hair - a hallmark for restlessness - as she continued stiltedly, "Thank...you, for that. Even if - nah, 'specially 'cause - it meant taking a couple shots to the back."

God, shows of gratitude were just the worst.

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Riley ground her teeth as Jenkins spoke. Her skin crawled at the mention of nanites, running through her veins and tying a noose around her neck. She tried to seek comfort in the thought of their removal after the mission, but a man who would dangle a knife over their heads from the get go was just as likely to lie and double-cross. She wasn't about to take Mr Sinister's delivered word for anything. The rat.

Once Jenkin's left, Riley made her way to the bunk while some headed to the lounge. An intoxicaing drink sounded delightful, but she didn't like the idea of going on a mission tipsy. Highly unprofessional; potentially fatal too. Finding her bed, Riley plucked up the tablet Jenkins had mentioned. The technopath was a technophile too, it seemed, as Riley looked over the sleek design. A bit more digging unearthed a thick belt with small pockets sewed in a line, a rank of soldiers. Hopping back to her feet Riley quickly cast off her prison uniform, threw on a cotton singlet and pulled on boxer-shorts. Now in a decidedly comfortable outfit, she walked out the bunk, crossing some of the other Rogues but noticing no faces as she bowed her head over the screen of the tablet.

Letting her feet walk her across the warehouse and to the lounge, Riley heard some chatter - and some screaming - as her eyes slid from corner to corner, ingesting lines of information of her new comrades. Some came from scandals, from crimes. Riley rummaged noisily through the drawers with her free hand, picking out knives. She threw them upwards to watch them cartwheel, and caught them each by the handle before sheathing them in the belt slung around her waist. She smiled down at the screen as she felt her lower half grow heavy with her spoils. Ah, looting. She was back to her roots, wasn't she? Once each sheath was filled with a blade, Riley turned to lean against the counter, to commit the remaining profiles to memory.

The lounge was relatively quiet, with a muscled man filling himself with food and drink, and a blonde woman Riley recognised as Natilaya - a kind of femme fatale who'd been killing her victims after bedding them prior to prison-life - made several trips for an impressive amount of liquor. As she walked out the lounge, Riley arched a brow at her. Russian? She had the features for it.

Snapping her fingers absent-mindedly to spark them out of poor habit, Riley reached the last of the profiles and looked up from the screen to watch the blond ravenously devour his food. "Worked yourself an appetite, huh?" Riley said from her counter. She referred to the tablet again. "Karate Bastard." Riley looked at the man with a raised eyebrow to convey slight reprove, and then switched expressions to one of grimaced confusion. "I'm sorry." The apology wasn't very sincere, but Riley wasn't trying to convince him otherwise. "Can I call you Keith instead? Or Blackwell?" A sharp grin spread over her face, smoothing back the creases of the previous wince. "It's just that my mother always used to tell me not to swear."

Project Rehab

@Jig Ahhh and the fact that it's not traditional or related to plants makes it all the more interesting. Yes, Lian Hui will definitely try to explore its qualities.

Project Rehab

@Jig Ohhhhhhh now that's a fun parallel. But she's got limitations; her specialty is poisons and beyond that she may not be very accomplished XD Then again, if she can get her hands on a sample and a microscope when there's nothing to entertain, I think she could be inclined to study what it is that Leon secretes just for the heck of it. Haha, and you're right, it's Lian Hui. But if your character wants to shorten it to Lian because of cultural differences, she probably wouldn't be bothered by it enough to correct him. She'll just...raise a brow and leave it at that, I guess

Project Rehab

@CutUp Haha, it's fine! Thanks