On Critics and Plays.

[Martin] For two people who can't be bothered attempting to celebrate the holidays anymore, there is not a whole hell of a lot that one can do during the season where one will not encounter thousands if not millions of consumer-culture zombies who haven't managed to break out of the cycle of ennui and overspending that happens every winter. They're everywhere, invading perfectly quiet avenues that would normally be tolerable if not preferable to an evening spent at a bar--or, in their case, a restaurant that happens to serve alcohol, thus making it easier to ignore when one half of the party happens to be a recovering alcoholic who has chosen complete abstinence rather than a more slipshod moderation approach.

He doesn't even consume caffeine anymore. The only illicit substance he indulges in is nicotine, against his doctors' advice and his best friend's and daughter's pleas for some common sense to trickle in. Smoking, they figure, can kill him just as harshly as cocaine addiction and alcoholism would have if he hadn't quit, but that's a vice that far predates the initial onset of the vices he's eradicated.

Besides, it's almost unheard of for anyone to work in journalism and not smoke.

At any rate, it has been several weeks since their paths last crossed, and they somehow managed to find the one theatrical performance the week of Christmas that isn't a musical, a comedy, or somehow related to the Nativity or an overplayed Dickensian classic. Ilari Martin is the one person working for the Chicago Sun-Times who has expressly refused to review a single goddamn Christmas movie this year, and he'll be damned if he's going to fold in his personal life, either.

It's late in the evening when the show lets out, and Martin is not bitching as soon as they leave their seats. That's either a decent-enough sign that the performance wasn't terrible, or that he recognizes in his companion a lack of desire or drive to analyze everything that she encounters in this world. Whichever it happens to be, he is silent as they traipse out of the building with the sea of other bodies. The night is chill but not blisteringly cold. Despite the lingering tan coloration of his skin, he is originally from upstate New York; he stopped complaining about the weather years ago.

"I'll walk you to your car," he offers, reaching into his suit jacket for a pack of cigarettes.

[Slaughter] It is perhaps a relief to go out without the trappings of Christmas or the holidays, or even the suggestion thereof. Lately, it has seemed that even those of the Blood have been caught up in the furor of the human holiday. They are memories of a softer time, perhaps. With Mum and Dad and a Christmas tree and presents and no one shirks from your rage or tries to explain the terms stud or mare and how they might apply to you.

They are both silent as they exit the theatre, pausing at the coat checks to retrieve their outerwear. Imogen finds her ticket easily from within a small clutch, right where she recalled she had left it. He's rarely seen her unable to find something, to have misplaced an item and forgotten it.

She wraps her scarf about her throat and begins to do up her jacket the hem falling several inches above the hem of her skirt which itself falls an inch or two above the knee. There is a variety of theatre goers here - from the jeans to the over-dressed. The doctor falls somewhere in the middle. He says - but does not offer - he will walk her to her car and she casts him a glance before reaching into her own handbag to retrieve a small cigarette case and lighter. They begin to walk, the kin's heels clicking on the sidewalk. She's parked on W. Lawrence Avenue, she says at some point.

"I am sure this is a great secret among critics, but is it me or does your kind tend to laud anything that contains only characters with absolutely no redeeming qualities?"

[Martin] "There are a number of storytelling themes my kind laud, Miz Slaughter."

The film critic has opted to dress on the more tailored end of the spectrum, somewhere between couldn't-be-bothered and overdoing-it: he's paired dress shoes and a suit jacket with dark jeans and a solid-color dress shirt, the top half of the outfit inevitably hidden beneath the gray peacoat that protects him from the harsh Midwestern winter. With a not-insubstantial amount of mass added to his frame since 2009, he is not in any greater danger of freezing to death or even suffering discomfort than anyone else living in this city. Health has been returned to him, fought for, even, almost as hard as he fought to regain custody of his only son.

That only son is attempting to have as normal an adolescence as he's liable to be afforded before he undergoes his First Change. Peter knows he isn't normal, and he knows that given the life he's had, he's going to be thrust into the War sooner rather than later. Anyone who could be a fly on the wall for those conversations would find the teenager almost helplessly accepting of what's coming for him; it's his father who is ridden with anxiety, hiding it behind carefully-crafted sentences and sarcastic humor that wears thin after a while.

There is genuine love and affection between the boy and his father, but he's fourteen years old and they're sharing a three-bedroom apartment. They're driving each other crazy. He's out with his friends tonight, and despite his father's insistence that he send some sort of electronic communication when he's in for the night, nothing has been sent, and Martin isn't going to check until he gets in the car.

"The utter destruction of a character's life due to lack of common sense... irredeemable assholes doing absolutely vile things to one another for three hours... cute if somewhat precocious teenagers struggling against the oppressive nature of high school tedium while grappling with and ultimately embracing The Meaning of Life without emulating John Hughes or causing one's gorge to rise..."

[Slaughter] With her legs bare but for a thin film of hosiery, the air is immediately cold against her skin. She welcomes it this year in ways she did not the year before. It is not a fact she examines, much.

Martin begins to rattle off the different themes that his kind might appreciate and Imogen permits it to continue for a while before raising a leather gloved hand in an attempt to silence the deluge. There is a cigarette between her fingers, the ember burning. "Sorry," she says, not meaning it, "I didn't mean to suggest it was the only trait yeh appreciated. Certainly didn't mean t'ha' yeh start to list 'A Critic's Favourite Themes:The Unabridged Version'."

A smirk graces her mouth, suggesting her humour at this, wry though it may be.

[Martin] Without a word of protest, a verbalized suggestion that he ought to stop while he's ahead, Martin could have very well spoken over her or simply ignored the muted expression of a desire to have this nonsense stop. While he does find himself strapped with a compulsion to fill silence with speech and profound difficulty keeping his opinion to himself, it isn't so much out of his control as it is something he's simply chosen not to work on. He could, if he wanted, apply the brakes and make a concerted effort to work on his communication skills.

It's not for his own amusement, either. When Imogen requests that he stop without so many words, he putters to a stop, then takes a perfunctory sip off of his cigarette and awaits her undoubtedly razor-sharp response. Her not-apology and her explanation of what it was she was attempting to do has him grinning a lopsided rapscallion grin, and he gives a facial shrug before exhaling a breath.

"You have to admit," he says, "it's not a very long list."

[Slaughter] "No," she agrees. "You're a rather curmudgeonly breed."

[Martin] "'Curmudgeonly,'" he echoes, pausing to take another drag.

Around them, theatre-goers are clamoring about the performances they just saw, the stage design, the lighting, whether or not what they witnessed was deserving of the accolades and attention it's been receiving. There is a range of reaction and emotion that is almost reaffirming, if one happens to have any real great love for acting as an art form and not simply an entertainment venue.

Blowing out his breath, he concludes, "You know, as a whole, we can't possibly all be curmudgeons. If we are, then there is no logical explanation for how well True Grit was received."

[Slaughter] "Statistical anomaly," she retorts without pause between Martin's comment and Imogen's response. "It was bound t'happen at some point."

She lifts her cigarette toward her lips, taking a drag before she adds, "It's the only possible explanation."

The crowd is beginning to thin about around them, as people take turns at side streets or begin to get into the cars or call cabs. Imogen, for her part comes to a stop at the intersection, waiting for the light to turn or for there to be a break in the traffic. Around them, theatre-goers pass, and some pause, like Martin and Imogen, waiting to cross the street.

[Jesmond Krutova] Late Thursday evening and all the stores in Lake View still have windows blazing.

It's the night before the night before Christmas and shopping has become a more deadly sport than ever before. Women no longer allow another to purchase the shoes they've been eying, they turn predatory stares on the other and credit cards are snatched out of wallets like pistols being drawn at dawn. It was every last human for themselves in supermarkets to battle trolleys laden with foodstuffs against others in the bid to lay hands on the last Turkey, the last pudding; that final bottle of carbonated water.

Luckily, for those without many to buy for, or who simply did not possess the monetary means to spend hours trolling designer stores for the perfect gift, it was a relatively painless experience and one that the dark-haired female now moving along the sidewalk; stopping occasionally for bustling, impatient shoppers had completed in little over an hour. Jesmond Krutova was a slender woman made of fine parts; her wrists and ankles were delicate; and her face was the sort that drew admiration if only because it seemed to have been made with some loving attention to its detail.

The nose was long; the lips quite wide and prone to smiling and the eyes a fierce dark blue; like a stormy sky drawing near to storming. It made sense of course, such a comparison given her ancestry. Storms were a part of the bargain, after all. But the young woman, no older than her mid to late twenties but no younger than twenty-three was not precisely the atypical Kinswoman to the Shadow Lord tribe. She was not in possession of a particularly violent nature, nor did she ever seem the sort inclined toward deceit.

She was, quite frankly, sweet.

Without being boring; polite without the lack of spine to speak up against what she did not agree with. It was hard to dislike Jesmond Krutova because she worked very hard at giving little reason for such a reaction to her presence. She was tolerable, and calm and rather like a placid lake; put against the choppier waters of some of her relations in the city at present. Presently; she's approaching the intersecting streets where the shoppers tapered off and were replaced by those pursuing other endeavors -- such as the theater.

[Kristiana Coleman] She's feeling homesick, and after some high end shopping, she's busily wandering the streets of a strange city alone. Since the shopping was all for herself, she's loaded down with bags and is considering trying to find a cab or maybe a small neighborhood child to ferry her packages back to her car.

[August] A few moments before, August had stepped out of a popular resturant on the same side of the street. No, it didn't appear as if she were out for a night on the town, but perhaps that she'd just gotten off work. Her blonde hair was neatly pulled back and makeup tasteful. Her black peacoat was left open and thus the black shirt with a logo upon it and apron over a knee length skirt could be seen. Yes, it seems Miss August has taken a second job. Not really because she had to, but because she wanted to have more social interactions. And yes, she wanted interaction with normal, sane people (read: no crazy werewolves).

She'd only meet Martin once, and for a very brief time before their arranged meeting had been derailed by some sort of conflic between himself and the one she knew as Lukas. They'd meant to meet again, but in most happenings of 'we'll reschedule' neither party calls and thus it just doesn't happen.

One earbud is in place and the blonde woman seems to jammin' to the beat as she approaches the stoplight on her way home.

[Remy] [don't wait on me, folks, i'm juggling two scenes! i'll post in when i'm ready]

[Martin] "It has to be."

Now, while Martin is certainly not old enough to even be considering retirement, still has at least a quarter of a century before he can cash in his Social Security on the off-chance that such an option continues to exist by the time he hangs up his keyboard and relegates his opinions to his grandchildren instead of millions of readers, his memory isn't what it used to be. When he first encountered August Grant, it was via a plaintive notice left on the noticeboard of The Brotherhood of Thieves. He had called her; they had attempted to meet; the conversational equivalent of a flying tackle had occurred.

They haven't managed to meet up again since, and Martin will be damned if he can keep straight and separate all of the blondes in his life. There is one who is of the utmost importance, and the rest tend to fade into the background unless they make the attempt themselves. Whether he has wanted to meet up with August again is irrelevant: they just haven't had time.

It's the holiday season. One of them has a teenage son; the other has a nearly four-month-old daughter. They have jobs. Circumstances have imposed themselves, and it would appear as though Martin is either committed to the conversation he's having or else has simply forgotten who August is, because he doesn't pick her out of the crowd and call out to her.

"However," she had to have known he wouldn't let this go, "I find your original comment very interesting: were you offering up commentary on the nature of critics, or were you attempting to state, in a roundabout fashion, that you weren't satisfied with the play?"

[Kristiana Coleman] Her days since arriving have been a whirlwind of sleeping late, shopping, and people watching. Unfortunately, none of this has gotten her any closer to the Sept, or to meeting those who will determine her future in her new home. Making her way through the crowds on the street, she juggles her packages and tries to make room for just one more bag.

[Slaughter] "I was offering a commentary on both the nature of critics and the theme o' the play," she answers with a smirk, lowering her hand to tap cigarette ash toward the ground. "Though I'll admit tha' cuttin' the ears off th'other bloke's dog was a bit ham-handed, don't you think?"

Her eyes move briefly about them, a steady awareness that goes just an inch beyond what might be natural to a human. She has a keen memory; she recalls August and catches Martin's attention with a brief gesture. Imogen does not speak when a flick of her fingers will do it for her.

"Half-blood," she says, quietly, deliberately, "Her name is August."

Jesmond approaches from behind. Kristiana is as yet unfamiliar, so far, merely a human face in the thinning crowds.

[Jesmond Krutova] Typically, the way such encounters like these operated was they would all converge on the same precise location at the same precise moment and presto; instant connections established. But then, it was easier when one of them was a Garou, they could simply halt the progress of any one of these women and man and say --

you are family or i can sense you're like me

Right now, nobody is doing such but then there were also people like Jesmond around; who glimpse a young woman overburdened with bags and put a little extra speed to their steps to come up alongside her; the flash of red hair ahead of her not yet noticed as one Imogen Slaughter. "Do you need a hand?" The Shadow Lord Kinswoman had a genteel voice; clearly educated, though its origin is hard to place, somewhere mid-western, perhaps.

[August] August shifted her weight from one foot to the next as they stood at the light. Her gaze was upon the phone in her hand. She typed a few things and then dropped it back into her pocket, and set about actually buttoning her coat (it was colder than she'd anticipated).

She wasn't really expecting to see anyone she knew tonight. In fact, she did her best on most days to completely avoid those that she knew who had 'family' ties as it were. Thus, even though Martin was nearby, he blended in quite well with the rest of the men milling about.

[Kristiana Coleman] Kristiana is obviously a girl used to getting help when she needs it, and unloads a few of her packages on the woman with little more than a flashed smile. A little too trusting, this one...

"Can you believe that the stores here won't send packages to your hotel? What kind of uncivilized disaster IS this?"

[Jesmond Krutova] Luckily for Kristiana, Jesmond is the sort of woman who doesn't seem to mind terribly much that her offer is so readily and enthusiastically taken up; packages piled into her arms. She stoops a little to accept them all; and glances at the stranger in passing as she mentions delivery to her hotel.

"Well," Jesmond offers, as they begin to walk somewhat slower paced, now. "It's Christmas so I imagine they're either too busy or there's some other reason. Which is your hotel?"

There were many in Lake View, and none were within Jesmond's price range; but, that didn't mean much since she currently drove a car that had a taped up rear window she'd been meaning to replace for half a year, almost. For this, her attire was neat, and rather on the elegant side. A simple black coat with a buttoned front and dark slacks. There was some suggestion of a white blouse beneath; but it was mostly hidden by the scarf; tied around her neck securely.

[Martin] Martin doesn't exactly 'blend in.' It isn't that he is outlandishly attractive, that his physical appearance causes belts to come undone and garments to fall at the ankles of all those who lay eyes upon him, but for being short and being mutedly dressed, he doesn't shut up long enough to accomplish much in the way of clandestine movement. He doesn't have a magnetic personality, doesn't have an overwhelmingly charismatic aura that draws eyes to him, but he's difficult to ignore unless one is either utterly distracted or purposefully doing so.

His attention is directed across the intersection to a blond server, half plugged-into her mp3 player and fidgeting at the light, and Imogen identifies her. That's when a lightbulb hits him.

"We've met," he says, simply and just as quietly, and ashes his cigarette. The lot where they left Imogen's car isn't too great a distance from here; they'll be gone soon.

[Kristiana Coleman] "It's the Doubletree. Just up there"

She gestures with one of her bags, and it doesn't really help as much as intended.

"Where are you staying?"

[August] When the light changed, August would cross the street, smiling and still bopping along with her ipod. She looked quite happy and content, despite recent events. She'd pass on by the other kinfolk with only two of them being the wiser to the situation. Things were more complicated when the garou weren't about in pointing out relations.. but really, things were more complicated when they were around too. You had to take the good with the bad sometime.

The young woman rounded the corner just across the street and disappeared into the holiday crowds.

[August] {Almost fell asleep with my laptop in my lap in bed.. so.. it's bedtime! night all}
to Jesmond Krutova, Kristiana Coleman, Martin, Slaughter

[Jesmond Krutova] "Oh, I don't live around this area," the young woman walking carefully alongside her notes; her eyes now captured by the sight of a flaming red head standing alongside the smoking form of an as of yet unknown gentleman. The last real occasion she'd had to glimpse Imogen Slaughter had been as she passed by the site of a Wyrm creature's demise at the Fenrir Jarl's hands.

She had a sense then that perhaps Imogen had assisted.

She'd stood guard while they scooped up the remains, and had not much considered the oddity of how she spent her evenings. Then again: Jesmond was also a Nurse, she saw more blood on a daily basis than some of the Garou did. "I'm over toward Cabrini Green." A beat, she doesn't sound terribly ashamed of where she lives, but then she doesn't look the sort for gossip, either.

"So you're just passing through for the holidays, then?" It's the aimless chit-chat of strangers; and Jesmond treats it quite as it is.

[Kristiana Coleman] "No. I just moved here, actually. My parents thought that I might do well with a change of scenery. Where is Cabrini Green?"

[Slaughter] The light changes. They step forward. August goes her own away, and Imogen and Martin go their own way. They cross to the parking lot, where the red-haired kinswoman walks around a sleek, mean looking Aston Martin to the driver's side, offering her companion a drive with a gesture, an arched eyebrow.

He takes her up on it. They get in the car, which roars when she turns the ignition. Perhaps there is conversation. Perhaps there is not. It is more likely that Martin speaks, than Imogen.

Rest in Peace, Little Police Care.

[Slaughter] She takes the back staircase, her car parked in the alleyway, out of sight. The staircase leads her directly to the upper room where Garou and their kinfolk make their home, and as she places a hand on the door, she wonders, not for the first time, what kind of protection might be on this place that is beyond her ken. For certainly, according to her own eyes, it is less protected than even her own apartment.

From there leads to a consideration of logic - what kind of protection might there be. How might it work, in a place such as this. Does it recognize her by her blood? Or because she came here once in the presence of a Garou? The thoughts flicker absently through her mind, a half-distracted game she plays with herself, an answer she will never know, because she will never ask. This will never go beyond idle musing.

It barely lasts seconds, from the time she opens the door to pushing it open and stepping into the domain the Garou, outwardly distant and inwardly reluctant. She is dressed in jeans, a woollen overcoat, a scarf around her neck. She reaches up with one leather gloved hand to undo the buttons as the heat begins to seep through her clothing, but she makes no move to take it off. She has one hand in her pocket, and it remains so, leaving her one handed to open her coat and shut the door behind her.

Her eyes flicker over the common room. Should Night's Reprieve be there, she'll approach him now - if anyone else is there, they might receive a polite but distant greeting, but only in response to their own. Otherwise, she will head for room 5 to knock on the door.

[Night's Reprieve] Night's Reprieve cannot be found in the common room because he isn't usually very sociable. It isn't because he lacks the care or skill to engage in social activities, but simply because he is a busy man. How can he sit on the couch and watch TV when the spirits of the Caern are asking for so much? Oh and they do ask. They bitch and moan and whine, and always do they ask for more. They have it about as good as a spirit can have it, but they are ungrateful. It is the way of spirits to be so, it is nothing personal towards the Godi.

So he isn't curled up on the sectional like so many of the other occupants of this brotherhood tend to do, he is in fact in his room and Imogen doesn't have to wait long after knocking to find the door swinging open and NR standing in the doorway wearing a thick woollen shirt of red and black tartan. Oh there are jeans of course, and socks - thick warm socks - and also a strange look on his face. It's surprise.

"Doctor Slaughter." He says, as if to confirm to himself who has come knocking on his door. And then, rather more relaxed, "It's good to see you, what can I do for you?"

Past his shoulder she can see a made bed in a rather clean room. There is a bottle of clear liquid on the bedside table along with an upside down open book.

[Slaughter] The surprise has no impact on her - Imogen is self-aware, and that she is the least likely person to enter the Brotherhood voluntarily and knock on a Garou's bedroom is hardly a fact which requires much self reflection.

He says it's good to see her, and there's a flicker of amusement - the smallest suggestion of a smirk across her mouth. If her expression were to be given a dialogue, it would be: is it? in a tone of mild wryness. It is only transitory, however, and not long enough or intense enough to require speech or conversation. There is only the expression.

"Hello," she greets him. The kinswoman does not use his name, and it is questionable if she even recalls it.

"I seem t'recall tha' you're a Godi," the apparent Fianna asks, using the Fenrir term familiarly. Her hand remains in her pocket, "ha' I got that right?"

[Night's Reprieve] There is so much about Imogen that Night's Reprieve fails to grasp, the thing that makes a difference is that he is aware he has failed to grasp it. So hello she says and he crosses his arms over his chest and lets out a breath, but remains otherwise unchanged.

"You recall correct, you are familiar with my tribes language." He states, once again more to himself than her, like he is making a special folder of information with Imogen Slaughter written on it.

[Slaughter] The phrase is innocuous, but it provokes a brief tension in her jaw, a tendon shifting as she tightens it; there, then gone. "I'm familiar with your tribe," she says, almost as if it were a correction.

"I ha' somethin t'show you," she says. "May I come in?"

[Night's Reprieve] And this is where Night's Reprieve does something rather strange. He steps forward, possibly invading her personal space but it's not to her that he looks. He peers down the corridor to the right and then straight ahead. After a few moments he is apparently satisfied and turns his back on her to make way into his room.

"Shut the door if it is required." He states after turning to face her again. There is a single seat pushed up near to the bedside table which he indicates to with a raised eyebrow and a movement of his hand.

[Slaughter] Night's Reprieve steps forward invading her space - and Imogen, she steps back, her movement as smooth as silk, unhurried, perfectly comfortable in her avoidance. As he looks both ways, her eyebrow arches, the smirk flickering back to life across her mouth.

"Worried about gossip?"

She does not wait for his answer, stepping into the room. When he offers that she may shut the door if necessary, she pauses a moment, glancing at the open doorway, then choosing to shut it. She does so near silently, in control of the door's sway toward the frame as she is of her own movements.

He offers her a seat, which she declines by not taking it, instead removing her hand from her pocket, flattening her fingers so he can see what she had been holding.

A small car sits in the flat of her palm, a toy police vehicle with a broken siren light, and tires completely and utterly worn to nubbins. The paint on its hood and bumpers have been re-touched with a colour that is not quite a match to its original. To any human, the next moments might be startling, but to a Godi, it is perhaps merely telling.

The car whirs its tires with a tinny, high pitched whoop of a siren, trying to scurry up the slope of the heel of the Doctor's palm.

Imogen's dark eyes are on the car, studying it with an absent, distant expression. She keeps her emotions under her skin, so deep as to be invisible.

"Another Godi made this," she says. "To protect her packhouse. It sought me out even when she was alive." A brief pause, as she chooses her words.

"The pack it used to serve is disbanded and she is dead," she says, her voice steady. "I think it deserves its rest."

[Night's Reprieve] Worried about gossip?

A grunt, if that, is all the response she gets to her question which is not quite a question and more of an observation. The seat is not taken and Night's Reprieve doesn't seem phased. Maybe it's because the offer was merely a formality or because she has something far more interesting than her polite denial of a polite offer to share with the Godi.

The car is alive. Well, technically not alive, but in motion. It is inhabited. Made by one such as him. He reaches out an upturned palm and asks, "may I?" And if he may then he takes a closer look at the small car, even making himself more comfortable on the chair previously declined by Imogen.

"You say to protect her packhouse? As a scout I take it? If I am not mistaken that is usually the purpose of awakening something like this."

She thinks it deserves its rest.

"Is it of no use to you?"

[Slaughter] The car makes a sound of dismay as it is picked up by the Godi, its wheels spinning as if, even airborne, that might allow it to return to the red-haired doctor. Imogen watches the car, her mouth tight, the only betrayal of her tension.

She shook her head, "I don't know," she says. "I never asked its purpose. But I had the impression it was defencive, not offensive."

He asks if it is of no use to her, and her mouth moves, an expression which is entirely mirthless. "It wants t'be with me all the time. I ha' to lock it in the laundry room when I go to work, or I ha' humans over. S'hardly the respect a spirit deserves."

[Night's Reprieve] She speaks of respect for spirits, this kinswoman from another tribe. Perhaps she has been familiar with those of his moon, or perhaps she deserves more credit than that.

"Unfortunately I cannot remove the spirit from within, at least not in a way that would constitute rest. All objects contain spirits, most are asleep or inactive, this one has been awoken and apparently is a rather lively spirit. Most objects continue to behave more or less the same once their spirit has been awoken. My spear for example.."

And he holds out his palm face down above his bed in which the spear appears.

"Ugh." He grunts and his face loses concentration for a moment.

"I'm sorry he talks a lot, and is rather distracting. He is also rather rude. But as you can see, as awake as Gungnir is, he performs the task more or less the same as he did before being awoken."

And the spear disappears.

"This one however." He indicates by looking towards his other hand in which the car rests, "This one is something else."

"Do you wish to rest?" He offers in spirit tongue to the car, because after all, Imogen sought help based on the spirits wants and needs.

[Slaughter] She would like to tell him she does not need to know these things - that spirits inhabit every object, that they can be awakened, and so on. But she is here for a favour - and thus stifles her natural inclination to remain in the dark.

The kinswoman's expression might be described as intense - even turned toward the bed, his hand out, he can almost feel the the weight of her gaze with a predator's awareness. She watches the spear materialize the tendon in her jaw flexing again.

The spear appears to slide from his skin, a blue ephemeral glow slowly washing from his palm and gaining cohesion. Air becomes wood, becomes metal, becomes leather. She wonders if she were to put her hand near the forming weapon, would she feel the air rush away, as its displaced? Or would it rush in, the air molecules changing and becoming something altogether different? Would it be warm with the heat of the energy required to perform this feat of apparent magic?

It is supernatural - beyond the knowledge of humans, and beyond her scope of experience. She has never felt a talon or fetish leave her skin, though she has seen it - an axe drawn from the arm of a Fenrir warrior, and laid her hand on the tattoo that had replaced it while the weapon slept.

Still, her mind seeks the science of it, refusing to believe that it is not there.

When he speaks to the spirit, she cannot hear it. Even if she could, she could not understand. Nor does she hear the car's reply, much as she had not heard the rudeness of his spear, or from any object as he claims that each contains a spirit.

What Night's Reprieve hears, however, is hardly intelligible.

Rest? Rrrr. RRRRRRRRR. Reeeeeeeeeedddd haaaair. Pretty pretty pretty! vroooooommmmmmmmm! the latter as the wheels spin, and the vehicle propels itself toward the Metis' maimed fingertips.

Red, red, red!

[Night's Reprieve] The act of drawing forth his spear from his skin is something the Godi has become accustomed to over years and years of use. It felt natural to begin with, but still strange and unfamiliar. Now it is like walking or breathing or talking, he doesn't need to think about it. Imogen on the other hand does. She needs to rationalise it because otherwise she has to come to terms with the fact that she will most likely never know what it feels like for the skin beneath the tattoo to send signals of tension where there is none, through axons in the brain only to be turned around and ushered down different pathways to end up in a waiting palm.

It isn't natural for her, and it shouldn't be. She stands different and changed among kinfolk that are remarkably similar to each other and yet she is still just that. Kinfolk. But the car likes her, the car wants to be with her and it makes it known through it's movements as much as it's spirit ramblings. Red hair it says, pretty.

The Godi nods his head, agrees with the car. Yes, he says. Pretty. But he has another temptation for the car. Power. Fuel.

And it's what sets him apart from a Theurge of another tribe, he doesn't talk to the Car about it's feelings or try to persuade it that the red haired girl needs a break because what's a car to do? It won't make the car feel any better about being left alone simply because it has the knowledge that the recipient of it's affection requires time alone.

"This." he says to it, and it can feel the trembling of his inner essence, his spiritual power. The Gnosis at his core. It can feel it just out of it's grasp, tempting, teasing. "If you sleep.. This time during the Luna cycle I will awaken you, feed you. And the red haired woman will play with you. Once on the full moon. Do you accept?"

[Slaughter] The car abruptly stills. Night's Reprieve can feel its wheels trembling with restrained motion, can hear the hush of its anticipatory silence.

No more closed doors and tiled floors? it asks, its voice lilting with hopefulness.

Imogen watches in silence. She is preternaturally still, in her motionlessness, more like an animal than a human.

[Night's Reprieve] "You will never see a tiled floor again. You will know only sleep and red hair and energy."

[Slaughter] The car does not truly answer, not in words - it is a simple spirit, its mind filled with its purpose and simple pleasures. It whirs a happy escalating sound, far different than its siren whoop of alarm earlier.

Near the closed door, Imogen's eyebrow arches, but she does not yet speak.

[Night's Reprieve] "You should say goodbye for now, I will explain after." He speaks and his eyes find Imogen, handing her the car in all it's whirring glory.

[Slaughter] Imogen's expression is unfathomable as Night's Reprieve gets up and hands her the car. It is a moment before she actually reaches out to take it.

She is no Theurge. She is not even Garou. A kinfolk. Just that.

She does not speak to the car, or reach out and stroke it. She merely looks down at it, expressionless as it makes chirping sounds. Night's Reprieve with his gift can hear it telling her all about the promise, and swearing it will play with her every full moon, so don't be lonely. The words are disjointed and not quite full sentences, but the Godi, with his awareness of what has already been agreed to, can understand.

It is only after its silent and slowly rocking back and forth in her palm, that Imogen hands it back, wordless and expressionless.

[Night's Reprieve] "Take it, and sleep. Until the next full moon."

He can feel that vital essence of his slip away from him and part of him protests. He closes his eyes. No it says, it isn't worth it, she isn't worth it. But that part of him is silenced and outnumbered. Now to the explanation for Imogen. The now seemingly normal toy car gets looked at for a moment before being placed upon his bedside table.

"Doctor Slaughter." He says, and turns back to face her. "The car will sleep, but I will awaken it at this time of the full moon so it can keep you company. It told you not to be lonely, and promises it will awaken again for you. I shall help it keep that promise."

He purposefully leaves out the part where he is giving away a vital resource in order for this plan to work. Imogen doesn't look like the type who would relish being in that sort of debt to a Garou.

"If you wish you can take it with you and bring it back to me. Or it can stay here."

[Slaughter] When he opens his eyes, Imogen's gaze is on him - watching him, her expression illegible, her eyes sharply direct. That she noticed the effort, whatever it is, is clear.

He relates what the spirit said, and the arch of her eyebrow belies the sudden flicker of tension across her mouth. He puts the car on the table, where it sits, still and broken, worn tires and cracked sirens and poor paintjob.

"Leave it here," she says, quietly, her gaze flicking toward it, before she starts to turn toward the door. "Thank-you."

[Night's Reprieve] He is silent for perhaps a heartbeat while he tries to gather the courage to ask what has been troubling him. He isn't sure why he asks her and not someone else, maybe it's because he doesn't have anyone else to ask or because he thinks she might be able to offer advice.

"Wait." He grunts, and turns away from the car. "I, uh.." And he rubs fingertips over the back of his own head, looking towards the ground for a moment.

"Okay, just to be certain, this isn't about you despite what the facts I am about to give you might tell you. But I have a question for you, that would usually be answered by my cousin. He isn't around anymore, I don't really know who else to talk to about it."

He raises an eyebrow, obviously waiting for some sort of go-ahead.

[Slaughter] Wait, he asks, and she does so, stopping midstride, and before turning back, and returning a half step. He speaks, and says it's not about her, though she might think it is, and her eyebrow lifts.

It lowers by the time he's finished. There is the space of several seconds where she is silent, unmoving, her gaze on him, studying him, before she makes a gesture with a long fingered and delicate hand. His go-ahead is received.

[Night's Reprieve] "Okay, logic tells me that maybe it is about you, but it is more about your kind than about you specifically." He is rambling, getting caught up on semantics.

"You may have noticed.." A pause. She most definitely noticed. "My caution earlier when you asked to come in. I shouldn't.."

A frown and he is obviously unhappy with the way he is wording this.

"I shouldn't be alone with your kind. It would be looked down on. But I have been, and a part of me wishes to be."

A hand gets rubbed across his rough stubble lined jaw in frustration.

"If say, someone such as you --" A pause, "Not you, but one of your kind--"

This isn't going well at all.

"Should I make certain that all female kinfolk I am around know what I am? Is that something you think your kind should know?"

He asks her like there is no question in his mind that she knows what he is, and he obviously doesn't just mean a Garou.

[Slaughter] Night's Reprieve's explanation receives a rather long stare from the kinswoman. It is unrehearsed and frankly, a ramble. Then suddenly her expression clears and she blinks, once out of place. He realizes then, that she did not know, not until this moment, exactly what he was. However, it does not seem to come as a shock or a disappointment. It comes as nothing at all.

"I presume you mean Metis." Her eyes go deliberately to his bandaged fingertips. She puts it baldly while he has couched it in vague terms.

Perhaps he answers. Perhaps he does not. Either way, his answer or his silence is responded to be silence of her own. A stillness. Her gaze cuts away, to the floor, hardwood and battered. A tendon moves in her jaw.

Then it lifts again, meeting his gaze. "Yes, it is," she says. "And yeh should tell her the challenges and shame that carnal knowledge wi' you would bring her. And you."

[Night's Reprieve] Where before he was rambling and incoherent and vaguely excited about the prospect of discussing this, now he is simply crushed and with that crush comes staunch indifference. His jaw clenches and ticks, eyes narrowing, and his body tenses. He stands perfectly still and after a moment he simply nods his head.

"Thank you."

Of course he knew it already, he just sometimes lets hope destroy knowledge of hopelessness. Then he turns, he sits in his chair which he faces towards the small desk and picks up his book.

Their meeting is obviously over.

[Ivers] Their meeting is obviously over, and Night's Reprieve is obviously sharing a communal living space with a bunch of assholes--or, more like it, one in particular, the rest of them don't seem to share this blight upon their personality--who have no respect for things like closed doors or quiet.

Someone knocks on the door with both sets of knuckles, producing a percussive effect that isn't entirely unlike the drumline of a marching band.

"Oi, gat!" he yells through the door. "When you borrow a fuckin' lighter you're supposed to give it back! Jesus Christ some of us have addictions around here!"

[Slaughter] She watches him a moment, though he is not watching her. And then, she nods, though he is not looking. She reaches out to open the door, and the unmistakable voice of Howard Ivers comes through. Her back is turned to the Fenrir and there is several inches of door between her and Ivers. Her expression is seen by no one.

After a moment, she opens the door, the redhaired and slight kinwoman looks at him, before reaching into one coat pocket, then another, retrieving a bic lighter.

"Keep it," she says, before stepping around him and starting down the hallway.

[Night's Reprieve] His head raises from the book as soon as he hears Howards voice and he lets out a little groan of displeasure. Seriously, now Howard? Right now? You have to come ask for a god damn lighter right the fuck now?

Of course he does. It's Howard.

He half hopes the Fianna Theurge will go away, but Imogen opens the door and Night's Reprieve puts down his book and pushes himself out of his chair in time to see her give him her lighter.

"See you next time Doctor Slaughter." Night's Reprieve says, as if to make it clear to both of them that even if they wanted to never bump into each other again, they still have a promise to uphold.

And then he stands there with his arms crossed. Waiting for the inevitable onslaught from Howard.

[Ivers] He's standing in the hallway looking like--well, like a tall, skinny dickhead who has put on the bare minimum of clothing necessary to go two doors down the hallway without being charged with public indecency. When Imogen opens the door, the Fianna Theurge is wearing white boxers with little red hearts on them and black aviator sunglasses. Clearly he has recently rolled out of bed, making his hair an even bigger affront to Gaia than it normally is, and his normally thin face is filled out from sleeping sprawled on his stomach.

Rather than the Godi, he gets Imogen. Thick eyebrows fly up over the frames of his sunglasses, and he covers his mouth with his left hand, stuttering laughter leaving his sinuses even as she's handing him a lighter and telling him to keep it.

"Hey, cheers," he manages, his speech muffled by his palm, as he's stepping back to allow the much smaller woman passage. Without making any attempt to hide it, Howard turns his head to watch her go. It isn't until she's reached the threshold between the hallway and the common room that he looks back at Night's Reprieve with a look of amused shock on what little of his face is visible.

Pointing at the Godi with his lighter, he yells, "And you said I'm disgusting?!"

[Slaughter] Though she can clearly her him, and perhaps even guess his response. She does not turn back, she merely turns the corner, and enters the common room - from there, the door leads her to the outer stairs, and her car.

Within minutes, she is gone.

[Night's Reprieve] Night's Reprieve does not look at all amused, he points a finger at Howard and when he speaks it is most certainly a threat.

"Not another god damn word about it."

And after that, he pauses breathes, calms himself. It takes time to prepare oneself to deal with Howard Ivers.

"Lets go get high."

He reaches for his desk to grab the bottle of clear liquid and sees the toy car sitting there. With a grunt he picks up the awakened vodka in his right hand and moves towards the door.

"I'll meet you on the roof. Don't come empty handed."

And he's already walking down the hallway towards the stairs.

"And put a god damn shirt on."

[Ivers] He doesn't utter another word, but he does crow a "HAh!" as he steps back further, bumping his backside against the opposite wall in an apparent loss of orientation with the world around him. The sweetest words he have heard all day leave the Godi's lips, and Howard rolls his shoulders, the vertebrae between them crackling like dry firewood.

Don't come empty-handed, he says. He waits until Night's Reprieve has his back turned before he makes an obscene and somewhat unhygienic gesture involving his hand and his crotch, then swiftly lets go and starts to pad down the hallway after him.

"Just a shirt?" he asks, even as he's pushing into the room he shares with his brother. "I'm good to go with my cock half hangin' out?"

[Night's Reprieve] The moon is full, and Night's Reprieve can feel it despite the fact that he isn't an Ahroun. So when he hears Howard calling after him about his cock he does the only thing that is appropriate: He punches the wall with his left hand.

"You son of a whore."

He calls out, but to the roof he goes with bottle in hand. And when Howard gets there he will find him sitting on the ground against the barrier, eyes staring at blood stains that simply refuse to be swept away by the weather. Much blood has been spilt on this rooftop, his own included. He wonders if Howard has had the pleasure yet.

The Drive Home.

[JB Cavanagh] The night outside is bitterly cold. The morning news will bookend reports about homeless men and women freezing to death under bridges, in damp, derelict squats with bright pieces about choosing the perfect Rolex for that special man in your life, or wrapping your gift in sheets of uncut bills from the treasury. Now, though – there’s just this cold, dark night. The clouds are clearing away, allowing the bitter arctic air to settle over the city. There’s nothing to keep what warmth remains in, just that unconscious challenge of that great darkness over the lake and the snowcharged glow of the city behind them.

JB carries Lucy the whole way to Imogen’s car. The girl is stiff in his arms, wary, bright and the shock of cold air just charges that sense of alertness further, but she’s tired enough that she is finished talking for the moment, and just watches the Brotherhood recede into the shadows around it.

Here, the snow is loose, powdery. The sidewalk outside the Brotherhood has been shoveled, but the winds send sprawling drifts that crunch beneath their feet. “Be great skiing if there was a hill anywhere within a hundred miles of Chicago,” he says once, voice rumbling from somewhere deep in his chest. Small talk, really. The night is vast around them with the austere promise of winter.
It’s the only thing he says until they are settled in the car, Lucy buckled safely in the back seat, shivering again, holding her jaw sharp and tight. As soon as the heat cranks out, she’s be drowsy, asleep by the time they make it home, but now she’s making that humming sound underneath the chatter of her teeth and blowing on her mittened hands.

He’s a big man, though he lacks the presence of garou, the sense of incipient violence that crystallizes the air around them, and he fills the seat without overwhelming it, knees bent awkwardly against the dash. As the engine rumbles to life and the heat begins to blow, he reaches out and tests the vents in front of him, then shifts the louvers upward so the heat will blow over him, into the back seat.
The shadows are soft in the car, muted by the cut of the streetlights through the windshield, dirty from salt and snow. As Imogen begins to pull out, he looks out the passenger’s window, up at the city, quiet in the distance, the lights bright, distinct points in the shockingly clear, cold air, like some new undiscovered galaxy lowering itself to the earth.

Then he glances at her, brown eyes briefly touching her porcelain features. “ – you going anywhere for the holidays?” is what he asks, in the easy gracenotes of someone comfortable with small talk.

[Imogen Slaughter] The Volvo is old and not Imogen's style. Faded paint and rust, a vehicle that likely was sold for less than the repairs would cost.

The heat in the Volvo works, thankfully, but the engine is cold, and at first the air that comes out of the vents is unpleasant. She pulls out of the parking space and heads for the parking lot exit, flicking a glance to her rear view mirror as Lucy begins to hum.

The engine runs a little choppily, beginning to smooth out as she accelerates down the street, headed toward a red light.

Though she had not truly responded to JB's first attempt at small talk with little more than a sound, one which could be taken for agreement or neutrality, when he asks the question, she has little choice but to speak.

"No," she says absently, casting him a glance before turning her attention back to the road. "I'll likely work. You?"

[JB Cavanagh] "Booked solid for two seatings on Christmas Day," he tells her, voice wry. Or maybe rueful, though his attention is now fixed evenly on her profile, tracing the blur of her pale skin against the shifting shadows of the city beyond the driver's side window, the glare of sodium vapor lights on big drifts of snow, scoured and sculpted by those big northern winds until they resemble the elegant forms of sand dunes beneath a scouring moon. "Doing a traditional, family style meal rather than the usual service, though. It's easier to plan for, don't need as much prep time so we'll have the morning and first part of the afternoon. Hope it means an earlier night than usual for my crew, too."

He pauses there, cuts a look up at the rearview mirror, studies his daughter's reflection there. as the heater coughs to life, the chattering I'm-so-cold hum stops and drowsiness - the aftermath of all those stress hormones in a small body in so little time - begins to set in. Lucy has her face against the cold glass, breathing out little clouds of moisture against the window, but her head is gradually lolling forward, until it's held up more by the shoulder belt than by any conscious will.

"You every get back home?" he asks, after another pause, voice framed by the engine's hum, the crunch of the tires over ice and snow.

[Imogen Slaughter] His wry voice, or his rueful voice draws a smirk from her. "I'll take that as a no," she inserts, before he explains his plan. To this, she has little to offer. He has never had any hint as to whether or not Imogen is much of a cook; though that may be a remark on the brevity of their relationship rather than anything else.

While he studies his daughter in the rearview mirror, Imogen drives, coming to a stop at a stoplight, Snow has begin to fall and she turns on the windshield wipers. They begin to squeak rhythmically across the glass.

She cuts a glance to him at this question, her expression carefully contained. The question, for all its innocuousness seems too personal to her.

"I used to," she says finally, "I don't anymore.

"How's business, then?" the change of subject is deliberate.

[JB Cavanagh] She says, I used to.
She says, I don't anymore.

Then she changes the subject. He's watching the city move now that his daughter is warm enough that she has stopped chattering, has started nodding off. Ahead of them, a snowplow fishtails on a side street, narrowing avoids plowing into someone's white range rover, pristine under its white blanket. There are few enough people out on the streets. Just the drug dealers, the most desperate prostitutes remain outside. People on the late shift at some non-union window factory in the guttered remnants of an old slaughterhouse, trudging wearily home through the snow.

And everywhere, the glitter of lights, illuminated snowflakes on the streetlamps, windows and balconies wrapped in chasing strands of moving light, charms against the darkness only half remembered by humans, in this age of electric light. "We might make it - " says JB, of business, with a low sound at the back of his throat, frustration wrapped in a skein of humor. "I'll know by April or May."

Then he shrugs, and continues as if she hadn't changed the subject. "Lucy's going home to visit my folks over New Years," he says, " - The 27th to the 3rd. Then school starts again on the fourth. We'll have our big meal on the 21st. The crew, their families, a few friends. You'd be welcome, if you wanted to come."

[Imogen Slaughter] Imogen allows her mouth to curl, but it's not quite humour. "Thank-you," she says, casting him a glance. "But I'm not particularly fond of strangers. And I would imagine most would be human." As if most kinfolk did not consider themselves human.

It is at least a statement of her beliefs.

Her mouth twists further. "Yeh keep invitin' me to do things, and I keep refusin'. S'not personal."

[JB Cavanagh] "No?" he returns. His voice is still quiet, but it isn't wry this time. There's a harder edge underneath, something like bedrock. Dressed for the weather - a down parker, solid leather gloves, not fine like a lawyer's gloves, but rough like a workman's, and a short knitted scarf double-tied around his neck with the hood of the parker half-way up, he's muffled, expression lost in the shadows, the sound of his voice dampened by the cold weather gear.

" - then what the hell is it?" The tension isn't lost, though, this sudden, abrupt burst of anger underneath, so abrupt it surprises him, the way it burns the back of the throat. Hands fisted in his lap, he wouldn't mind punching something.

Strange, too. He figured his brawling days behind him.

[Imogen Slaughter] His reaction was unexpected - the force of it. She looks at him out of the corner of her eye as the car decelerates, trapped behind the slow moving, some what erratic snowplow. Even behind it, the roads are slippery, the snow pushed away to reveal the black ice beneath. The tires slid for a split second before regaining control.

She does not speak for some time. And when she does, it is unsatisfactory, even to her own ears.

"It's-" a hard stop, then a start again, "complicated."

[JB Cavanagh] "Tell me what isn't - " his voice is flat, is low. Then he opens his gloved hands - and he does this deliberately, reminds himself to open his fists rather than close them a solid inch above his thighs, the sort of gesture one makes when negotiating with a violent stranger, except that he is negotiating with himself.

"Complicated." He breathes out, the flat of his palms falling solidly against his thighs. He glances back at Lucy, her pale cheek against the cold window, mouth slack, cheeks rosy, her eyes closed, face haloed by the staticky strands of hair that have escaped her ski cap. And he glances back, watching the brakelights come on behind the snowplow, bracing himself for another brief slide. "Jesus fucking Christ."

[Imogen Slaughter] Until now, she's been calm. Usually, she is ice. It does much to add to the frustration of others: barely containing their anger, while she coolly regards them while revealing nothing.

At first, the only hint he gets is a muscle moving in her jaw as she clenches her teeth. Then releases it through a deliberate effort.

"I did," she says, "I'm not fond o' strangers. If yeh need me to elaborate, I am not good at small talk, and I don't particularly enjoy it. Nor do I enjoy sittin' in a room full of people feeling entirely alone." Her lips compress suddenly, her jaw clenching again.

When she speaks again, she is closed off once more. In control, though chastened by saying more than she had intended. "I don't get the warmth o' the holiday glow that most seem t'get. I've never been much o' one for them: Christmas, Easter, whatever."

[JB Cavanagh] She finally unclenches her teeth, recites her reasons - not fond o' strangers has his open hands curling again. The snowplow ahead releasing the brake lights, the red glow fading. He turns away, looks out his window at the sidewalk, the dark storefronts moving along beside them, the gleam of lights reflected in the picture windows against the darkness beyond.

Then he looks up, back at her and shakes his head. Says, with feeling emphasized by a quiet flare of his nostrils. "You wouldn't be." He starts to say something else, but thinks better of it, and closes and compresses his mouth when she continues, says something about the holiday glow. It makes him breath out, sharply again, not wry now - something else.

"Well," he returns at last, with a philosophical shrug, " - if you change your mind, you know where we'll be."

[Imogen Slaughter] You wouldn't be, he says, and she nearly fires something back, but then restrains it with an effort - betrayed by her hands tightening on the steering wheel.

She wears fine leather gloves, smooth as a second skin. They may cost nearly as much as this car did.

Instead, she says what she did. That she is not much about the holiday glow, as this is less 'complicated' then anything else she could explain. And he responds, philosophically.

With this, the conversation ends. Imogen only nods. "I do," she says, and lets them lapse into silence. They reach an intersection and she turns down the street, away from the river and further into downtown toward JB's restaurant and home.

A Busy Day at the Brotherhood.

[Howard] "Focus?"

As if that's the most absurd thing he's heard since he woke up. It's hard to quantify 'since he woke up,' given the fact that Howard didn't wake up until roughly fifteen minutes ago, but it's at least the most absurd thing he's heard in as much time that he feels the need to affect profound shock at the notion of trying to concentrate on something like a speedometer when there is a pair of breasts in the equation.

He whips off his sunglasses for affect, as though he's attempting to impersonate a television detective. He immediately regrets it, visibly so, but unlike when he is attacked with or without warning he doesn't scream or curse or make an overt attempt to draw attention to himself. The Theurge ends up squeezing his eyes closed, blinking several times, then holding up his finger as if to say That was a bad idea, please hold as he, much more slowly, returns the aviators to his face.

Clearing his throat, he continues his train of thought without the benefit of eye contact.

"Man, you've got your priorities all mixed up. Did you at least get her number? Tell me you got your number. Girl can stand to be around you long enough to try and get you to look at your boobs? That's worth investigating."

[Quinn] The Fianna kinswoman wanders up the stairs shortly after Patrick does. Her steps on the stairs are light, the wood barely creaking beneath her tread. When she emerges onto the second floor, one of the Theurges has been replaced with a Galliard without her knowledge. It's magic, one might say. Truth is, Quinn just wasn't paying any attention when she was rinsing out a bowl in the kitchen.

She stands there for a moment, dressed in a navy tee over another white long-sleeved shirt, black lounge pants hiding longish slender legs, looking from one Calderan to the other, brows lifted. Then her mouth quirks into a grin.

"Speedometer, eh? That's a new one."

Crossing the room to return to her place in the L-space of the sectional, Quinn folds herself into it again, drawing up her legs and wrapping her arms around her knees. She, like Howard, looks like she hasn't been up for long. Her hair's still a bit of a mess as she reaches down to grip the grey toes of her white socks.

"What'd I miss?" she asks, inclining her head to the space once occupied by a Godi.

[Patrick] "Dude," Patrick says this a lot to precursor his thoughts. It would sound stranger had he in fact carried a hint of his Welsh parentage in his voice, but as his accent was in fact a gentler version of most found in the Boston region, he simply sounded like he was channeling a surfer. That being said, when he spoke in Welsh, as he had their first night in the city to Bridget, he in fact adopted a trace of a life in Wales he had no memory of.

"I was working. I start staring at some girl's chest I'm liable to stab myself with something. Besides," Patrick's eyes leave his Alpha as he hears Quinn's footsteps on the stairs; inhales the familiar scent of breeding. "You know I'm not ..." This was verging on dangerous territory. He was two seconds from concluding he was not dating, or trying to bed anyone since their former Alpha passed.

As it is; Quinn appears and Patrick's blue eyes cut her path in her wake; he tries for a smile. It's fallen to one side, but it's genuine enough. "Hey, Quinn. I was telling my honey-bun about my day at the office." This is punctuated by the Galliard leaning over and socking Howard in the arm.

[Howard] The sound of Patrick's fist connecting with Howard's arm makes a dull thudding noise, and unlike when Patrick is hitting him to try and correct his behavior or send a message, it doesn't result in a yelp of pain from the skinnier Garou. Despite Quinn's reappearance, her sitting on the sofa not far from him--there is no sign of the Godi, but given where he was sitting before and where Howard is currently reclining it's safe to say that the Fiann had sat down awfully close to the heavier man--is not enough of a distraction that when his brother nails him with his fist that he just ignores it.

"He sure was," Howard counters, anchoring himself on the arm of the couch with one hand so he can lean over and smack Patrick on the cheek with the other. "He just got to the part where he was remindin' me that he isn't sexually attracted to females."

[Quinn] So far, Quinn hasn't seemed to mind the stares. It's doubtful she even noticed, given that she made her way down the stairs without a coy look over her shoulder for the Theurge, or that she didn't slant a glance toward Patrick. Truth is, she doesn't care. She's a pure bred kinswoman of their tribe who rolled into town alone as far as anyone can tell. She'd be surprised if they didn't watch her as she cut her way across a room. Let them look at her without make-up, with her hair a mess, and wearing a Doctor Who t-shirt. Whether it's because they're interested or because they just can't help the way her blood calls out to them, she simply does not care.

She sits and watches them as they begin to gear up for a tussle, apparently oblivious to what this might mean to her as she sits in the room with them. "You aren't?" she asks, turning to look at Patrick. "How are you attracted to females, then?" Her own accent is faint, will likely be lost to Chicago in a few weeks. Though not as adept at blending into her surroundings as Howard no doubt it, Quinn has every intention of erasing every trace of Baltimore from her person.

[Patrick] Howard smacks his cheek, and Patrick's hands snap out and grasp his pack-mate's wrist which he then uses as an anchoring point as he rises to his feet and starts to bend it up behind his Alpha's back. There's deliberate gentleness in the way he does this, while maintaining enough pressure to make it felt that speaks of how aware he is of his capabilities should be actually let go of his control and want to injure the Theurge he's scrapping with.

"Yeah," he remarks, casting a highly cynical glance at Quinn, his mouth twisted in amusement. "Because I'm just so into guys. I can barely restrain myself, like right now. I just can't let you go."

[Howard] There is little question which of the three of them is the superior fighter. Hell, even looking at Quinn, one would think that she has some sort of talent in self-defense that would ensure that she is in little to no danger of being hurt if she's left alone with someone like Howard, who seems incapable of not harassing his packmate whenever they occupy the same space together. Patrick, while being slightly shorter than his Alpha, is much more powerfully built. If Howard were to apply himself, maybe lift something heavier than a joint occasionally, he could be a decent fighter.

He could be a lot of things, if he applied himself; if he took anything seriously. Night's Reprieve, who has had to fight his entire life to be considered worth living, even, has to look at someone like him and feel nothing but disgust. For all he can tell, Heir of the Ruined Day has skated through life owing to the fact that both of his parents were humans. Without scars on his body, without anything but that flippant attitude, it's hard to imagine that Howard has ever had to deal with and overcome hardship.

When Patrick doesn't just punch him, when he actually grabs him by the wrist and works his arm behind his back not to hurt him, not to even restrain him, but to remind him of the fact that he is not the dominant wolf despite his station in the pack, Howard starts laughing. He half-heartedly tries to break out of the hold, the "effort" visible in the twist of his lips and the noises he makes, but quickly realizes he isn't going to break out of this easily.

This realization comes to him, and he stops fighting. He stands theatrically panting for a moment, as though attempting to break loose from a weak grasp was too much for him. A palpable pause, and he turns his head to lick Patrick's cheek. It isn't a tentative little flick of his tongue; he slathers the other man's flesh, complete with sound effects, and if he's let go, he takes off running out of the common room, yelling something about needing to put on pants.

If he isn't let go, we're going to have a fucking problem because his player has to get ready to go to work.

[Quinn] Quinn doesn't move, not immediately. Until Patrick moves to twist Howard's arm back, she stays parked right where she sat herself down into the crook of the sofa. If this were Baltimore, it'd be a different situation for her. She'd know the Garou better, for one thing. She'd know how violent this tussle was likely to get, and whether she should duck out to avoid being accidentally crushed by a shifted werewolf. And she'd know not only if she could join in, but also who to help and who to sucker punch in the stomach.

Chicago is different, though. The boys at the other end of the couch are Family, but they're not family, not yet. So when Patrick bends back Howard's arm, Quinn's grin changes to show a hint of concern. Planting her hands on the couch cushions, she starts to slide back. When she has her feet under her, she stands and perches on the back of the sofa, ready to observe, join in, or flee at a moment's notice.

"Hey, I don't judge, just oh." Howard licks all over the side of Patrick's cheek, and Quinn laughs even as she scrunches her nose. "Oh man, how can you not be into that? That was dead sexy."

[Howard] [Okay, my estimated return is an hour and a half. If you guys disband before then, thanks for the scene! Otherwise I'll be back around... uh... 9:15 chat time. *zoom*]

[Patrick] "Oh, you are a such a dick." His Galliard cohort groans -- not lustily, either -- but rather in abject disgust. He half lets go, half shoves Howard away from him as he breaks free to go running off, shouting something about his pants. Patrick is busy wiping the coating of saliva off his face with his arm, he glances down, grimacing, then shouts.

"Payback is coming your way, Ivers. I'm a Galliard, I could write stories about you that'll last eons."

There's no menace to it, though. Patrick shakes his head, and nods in the direction of the shower. "I'm going to scrub Howard's spit off my face as well as engine grease. Wanna get some beers after I'm out? I don't feel like we got much of a chance to talk the other day, with my running back to the Garage." A beat; "I'm also a little concerned about what Howard has been telling people about my sexual orientation."

That seemed to be a joke, though only the slightest of twinges to the corner of his mouth told so.

[Quinn] Howard's unconventional tactics work to set him free, and leave the Galliard calling after him like brothers do. Perched on the sofa, hands dangling between her knees, Quinn just chuckles. She rises, about to hop off the sofa when Patrick's attention is back to her once more. Angling her head, she listens to the offer, and she smiles.

"I'd like that. And you should be," she lands on the carpeted floor with only a little wobbling, "worried about what your wife says about you," she finishes, reaching up with both hands to tuck her hair behind her ears. Pulling her hands back, she looks at her fingertips and wrinkles her nose. "I should shower, too. I'll try to make it quick!"

And with that she half walks, half trots past him and into the hallway and, perhaps to his surprise, perhaps not, she disappears into room 4. When she emerges again she has some clothing tucked into her arms and a basket with toiletries dangling from her index finger. She hasn't been in the Brotherhood long, or at least hasn't had to use the bathroom yet, because she goes to the closest door she can find and slowly peeks her head inside. Taking a tentative step within, she stops short and looks around. She'd expected there to be something like communal showers, but evidently this is a unisex bathroom. So she'll be washing up at the same time as Patrick.

Fabulous.

Once acquainted with the idea, Quinn decides that, rather than making a fuss, she'll just go with it. So she'll be wet and naked in a room with a young, hot-blooded Garou? They wouldn't let Kinfolk stay here with the Garou if they thought there'd be problems. And she really does try to make her shower quick, washing herself over as fast as she can. When she finally emerges, she's dressed in jeans and a green cardigan over a white button-down, her hair wrapped up in the towel. Patrick's probably already been done and waiting for her by now, so she doesn't bother with much make-up, just a bit of liner and a quick swipe of eye shadow over her lids. Dumping her clothes into her room, she finds socks and a pair of her sneakers rather than heeled boots. When she finally feels ready, her wet hair brushed back and bound at the nape of her neck with an elastic band, she goes in search of the Galliard.

[Patrick] She finds him downstairs in the restaurant sitting at a table with a sweating bottle of Heineken before him and another set across from him before an empty seat. His blond hair was wet, and Patrick had brushed it so it stood in little pale spikes atop his skull. His wardrobe had gone from dirty coveralls to a steel gray hoodie and white wife-beater paired with black track-pants. The hoodie's chest bore the words BOSTON in bold lettering when zipped up.

Showering in the same space as Quinn hadn't seemed to bother the Welshman at all, he'd entered with a towel flung over his shoulder and glanced in passing at the stall behind which the brunette washed herself; but he didn't attempt to sneak a peek at her naked form. The glimpse was cursory, he was evaluating something in his mind, it seemed and clearly decided on his actions peeled off his work-gear and left it in a compact pile beside his stall.

As far as battle scars went, Patrick was blessedly bare of them. His back however, carried several smaller nicks and cuts; and his left calf had an ugly scar that traced the muscle exactly. His right shoulder blade bore the black dragon of his Welsh ancestry with the words Til 'r Darfod beneath it. Rare was the Fianna Warrior who carried no mementos inked to his flesh; even Patrick followed this trend.

However, all this is beside the point, for unless she had been peeking to watch him secure a towel around his waist and pad from the showers, such details as tattoos and scars are not visible when she joins him downstairs. The Galliard has forgone shoes; she can tell this when a bare foot emerges beneath the table to push out the chair across from him. He watches her as she settles herself; and clinks the neck of his bottle against hers, still looking as he takes a sip.

Then, setting it down, he clasps his hands around it.

"So, what do you think of the city so far?"

[Quinn] When Quinn peeks out into the dining area from the kitchen, she's not just looking for a particular Fiann. She's taking notes. Serving as a bartender in Baltimore gave her some experience with how running a bar worked, but to be honest she hadn't really been paying attention to the business aspect. Ever since word came that her uncle was looking for someone to take over The Winchester, though, she's been keeping her eyes open, and making notes. Details stick to her memory like flies stick to paper, she just hopes she can string them all together in the correct sequence to make a proper go of her own business.

That's not to say she's not looking for Patrick at all. When she sees him, her face brightens and she makes her way across the dining room. When she gets to the table she says, "Oh you meant here. I'm so glad I didn't try to grab my coat first, I'd be so embarrassed." The way she smiles as she says this, though, it's clear that it's probably not true. Quinn doesn't seem the type to be easily embarrassed.

Settling into the chair across from the Galliard, she lifts her glass, inclining her head slightly. The other day she toasted new beginnings. Today, no words accompany the clinking of glass against glass. Leaning back in her chair, stretching out her legs a little, Quinn takes a sip.

"Ah," she sighs and sets the bottle down. "Hm. Cold. I'm glad I haven't opened The Winchester officially yet, I'd hate to go outside today. And the rules here are different for us. Well, for me," she amends. Shaking her head, she asks, "What about you? You guys're new, too, right? Think you'll stick around?"

[Rain] For a girl that wouldn't espouse any particular belief in fate or coincidence, she happened to end up on this side of Lady Luck's good graces more often than not. Likely because she was capable at a few things, and friendly enough to smooth over the rifts created by the things she couldn't quite handle on her own. How she'd become one of Miss Doctor Slaughter, Ma'am's acquaintances was anyone's guess. That Rain remained in her good graces hinged, in part, on her ability to tone down Roman's slew of titles and honorifics to a well mannered Doctor Slaughter.

Somewhere between Cabrini and The Brotherhood, the second (or third- or fourth-) hand car that Rain occasionally had enough money to drive (but not insure) broke down, leaving the Gaian girl stranded with the change in her pocket -- Eve's fifty-seven cents from dumpster diving -- and a couple phone numbers. Imogen's number was among them. At this time of night and for this sort of problem, she was the most likely contact to help out.

So there was a phone call, from a pay phone, in the part of town with flickering-dim streetlamps and broken and uneven pavement. Possibly the sort of place where Imogen might tell Rain to sit in her car, with the door locked, and just wait. And Rain wasn't the kind to argue with sound advice, so there she'd sit, watching the staccato pattern of the overhead lamp, waiting for the shadows to present either salvation or a concern greater than a passing bum. See, Rain wasn't afraid of the other homeless and she certainly wasn't unprepared to defend herself if needs be.

But that is all a good half hour ago, or more, by now. Now is the sound of footsteps mounting an assault on The Brotherhood's doors. The warmth and slow Southern touch of Rain's voice, chattering along in good-natured drifts of words to fill up the void that Imogen's quiet and stoicism left. Now is the sweep of the door as she pulls it open, wide enough to let the cold roil in around their feet, wide enough for Imogen to proceed before her and Rain to follow her in, already unwinding the scarf from about her neck and pulling her hat off.

She tugs a glove off with her teeth, tucks it into her pocket and runs her fingertips through her hair before tugging off the other glove and stowing it likewise. She did not grow up in the cold, so the static of being bundled up, swaddled like a babe, always startles her. She frowns a bit when it snaps into her fingertips as she touches the door handle, making sure it shut firmly behind them.

"Ouch," Rain says, quietly, but loud enough that Imogen likely heard her. "I will never get used to that." Rue. Rue for this low-humidity, high-static, cold and wintery weather.

[Imogen] The phone conversation had been brief, and Imogen had suggested the other stay in her car with the doors locked, though the advice had been off-hand, almost wry when it had been offered, on the heels of the cross streets which Rain had given her.

The car which had picked Rain up seems incongruous with Imogen's refined taste. It's a beater, an old Volvo held together by rust and prayer, the engine sounding rough about the edges. Still, it drives, which is more than can be said about Rain's second (or third or fourth) hand car, at the moment.

The red-haired doctor allows the young kinswoman to chatter on, offering little by way of opinion, though from time to time, if it suits, she might offer something sardonic, or even ask a question. It is bitterly cold outside, and Imogen wears a woollen coat and leather gloves, which she removes, finger by finger, one hand at a time. No teeth are involved.

There is very little similarity between the two in mannerism or appearance. She glances back as Rain muffles a complaint of pain, her gaze moving from the Child of Gaia to the door handle. "Yes, you will," she says with a faint smirk, before turning away to glide her eyes over the restaurant. They move on Patrick, and still there a moment, glancing at him, at his companion before she says to the other: "Do you know who yeh're lookin' for?"

[Bridget] (Open or not?)
to Imogen, Night's Reprieve, Patrick, Quinn, Rain

[Imogen] (open, I hope, since Rain and I just dropped in here and started posting. hah.)
to Bridget, Night's Reprieve, Patrick, Quinn, Rain

[Quinn] [totally open! though NR is AWOL]
to Imogen, Patrick, Rain

[Patrick] The way Prayers to Broken Stone looks at people sometimes makes them wonder if he's actually seeing them or just looking clear through them. He doesn't always get the hundred yard stare, but every now and then his eyes seemed to just -- drift -- a little, as if someone, somewhere were speaking with him on another visual and auditory frequency. This was rare, though. Typically, he just looked at you with a quiet frankness that could be considered to be rude.

Could be.

It wasn't judgmental; but given his auspice, and his degree of Rage, it was easily misconstrued by the wrong people.
Patrick was aware of the way he made the humans feel, which was part of the reason why he liked working behind the scenes; or beneath cars. The mechanics of it was fine, he understood it and there was no way the tools and car parts were going to be offended by his looking too closely at them.

When Quinn first pokes her head in, and before he pushes that chair out for her, Patrick is sitting quite still with a hand around his beer bottle; staring ahead of himself with a face devoid of any emotion whatsoever. Captured in still-life like this, it was painfully easy to see the young man's despondency with the world around him. He was not even attempting to conceal it, until Quinn saw him and his eyes flicked over.

His expression thawed.
He asked her how she liked the city after watching her some.

It was a good, safe, general question. Predictable, yeah. But he didn't have to think overly long on it and it let Quinn guide where she wanted the conversation to progress toward. "Nah, it's different for us, too. Howard and I aren't exactly what you'd call shining examples of how its done." He waggled his fingers, suggesting quotation, lifted a shoulder in the barest of shrugs. "But yeah, I like it here as well as anywhere."

He glances for a moment toward the door, clearly seeing something that holds his interest for a moment, then continues speaking as his gaze slides back. "You need someone to sing on your opening night? I can bend Howard's arm." Literally, as she knew.

[Bridget] The bitter winters of the Albertan mountainside can surely be a test of will, but vicious Chicago winds aren't exactly a cakewalk either. A three-dog-night the ancient townies would call it. Another Stag kin makes her way out of the cold, towards the warmth of light, and the promise of food and drink. Bridget makes her way through like she knows the place, giving a warm smile to the redhead and her companion. Since she's expecting the heaviness of Rage, the Canadian doesn't seem too alarmed to go searching for the source.

Gloves come off and the heavy canvas bag gets hurled on a bar stool. Immediately, a harmonica is retrieved. The shiny object looks as if it was dropped in the snow, wet and covered with a bit of debris. Bridget tucks some of the static flyaways behind and ear, her hands occupied in polishing the instrument.

[Rain] They each brought a presence in the door with them, unique, and very poignantly their own. Rain's was warm, and inviting, the sort of good-natured sweetness that touched more on Summer than this particularly apropos chill. She could lighten a room, if not light it up. It was within her, that sort of captivating charm. It had been easing itself out around her edges, now, for a few weeks. Something had restored this broken vessel of a kin, at least enough to let her shine a bit more certainly in these cold nights.

Imogen asks if she knows who she's looking for an Rain just shrugs affably. "Nope," she chimes, bright-eyed and utterly unconcerned. "Miss Kora said they might need help, and I've two hands, y'know? I came up here a time before, but Mr. Harmony and Mr. Aiden were here and..."

No, really she wasn't going to get used to shocking herself on every last metal object she touched. Rain tapped her fingers again on the nearby chair back. Grimaced. Paid Imogen's wry smirk no mind.

"Well, Miss Slaughter, I do admit I got a little side-tracked." Rain doesn't say what about they'd talked, or where to she'd been side-tracked. It was enough that she'd lost her direct purpose in the moment. "And I've got jobs, you know, singing here and there for the holidays, stage crew for a few events --"

Funny that the Fianna were talking about singing, just now, weren't it. These things came together by happenstance. Rain's car broke down (and someone is a mechanic); they were talking about singers (and a little brown-eyed someone had a voice).

"But it's not really enough to get by, and it's not like I'm helping family much with any of it. If I could do something here, maybe it would fit it all together. Kind of nice like, don't you think?" Her rambling had an optimistic touch, it was hard not to smile or at least humor Rain's attempts at thinking the best of the world around her.

[Imogen] Imogen's regard, as Rain explains her purpose is neutral. She watches the younger woman speak with a direct intensity, but offers little feedback on the other's words.

She pockets her leather gloves, but does not move to undo her coat yet. Her vibrant hair is pulled back and twisted up into a clasp, several strands falling free at the temple. She brushes them back with a hand, her fingers chilled from the cold outside.

She tilts her head slightly toward the bar, "Yeh likely want t'speak wi' Reuben," she says. "He's a cousin."

Bridget passes them by and offers a warm smile. In return, Imogen offers a nod. "Hello."

[Quinn] The way she's sitting, Quinn doesn't have an easy view of the entrance. To see what's caught Patrick's attention, she'd have to swivel around and be obvious. And what if the young man's just seen a pretty girl, one who stirs his heart and pulls him up from the depths she caught him sinking into briefly.

Oh to hell with it, she thinks, and angles herself back to get a peek. Just in time for several someones to file through almost on each other's heels. She has no way of knowing which of the three caught at Patrick's attention. It could've been all three of them, to be honest. Or something else entirely. If she catches any of their eyes, they receive an apologetic grin for being caught being a looky-loo.

Turning back, Quinn leans forward. That crescent moon pendant swings forward on its chord, and tonight Patrick can see another pendant, which isn't really a pendant at all. Hanging from a delicate looking chain, a ring rests against Quinn's sternum. Done in white and yellow gold, Celtic knotwork runs around the band in an unbroken chain.

"Good," she says of him liking it here as well as anywhere. Though not exactly a five-star review, it's better than nothing. "And I'd love for you guys to play the grand reopening. What's your style?"

[Bridget] It's true. Fate draws the Garou and kin alike with impeccible timing. It's like gravity... invisible force manipulating their positions entirely. Bridget, who has scarcely even seen another Fianna (kin or not) in months has had more interactions with her own in the last week than in over a year. After all the times she's actively sought them, hung around the Brotherhood, it just so happens she's run into more of Stag's own after she's stopped looking.

Bridget's ears prick at the conversations around her. Watching her, it's like she was born to the wrong mother. She could have been just as content as lupus kin picking at bone marrow just as she is tinkering with a tin whistle at the bar.

And essentially, that's the reason for Bridget's rambling. Her part feral nature makes the kinfolk think she's got a death wish, while she's not nearly good enough to fit in with their blessed cousins. But she does what she can.

The Canadian finally seems satisfied her instrument is dry and clean enough to notice the bar. She takes out a roll of dollar bills from her pocket and asks one of the unoccupied staff members for a bourbon straight.

[Rain] Bridget wanders by, catches Imogen's attention long enough to nod. Rain, on the other hand, waggles her fingertips in a friendly fashion. This juxtaposition could easily sum up most of the differences between them. And while she doesn't know the Intently Staring Guy at the table, or the pretty girl he's with, she'll waggle her fingers in a friendly hello at them, too, of those side-long looks linger long enough to be noticed.

Rain is in a good mood, broken down car aside, crappy neighborhood aside, bitter cold winter weather aside. It's actually pretty hard to put the Gaian in a bad mood these days. She's got a place to sleep, warm food most days, and no one's really left an (physical) impression on her, for worse, in weeks.

"M'kay. Just go up to the bar and ask for 'im then?" Rain asks, and she's already wandering up that way as she asks. It pulls Imogen further into The Brotherhood; this path will bring her past Quinn and Patrick's table. It's coincidentally like that. Convenient, but true.

"Or should I ask around the kitchen?" She doesn't seem abashed by the idea of sticking her head into the back room and just asking for someone she'd never met.

Of course, dragging around her jacket and assorted layers (because it was now too hot to wear them inside) meant she brushed up against the table a bit as she wandered past the Fianna. Maybe it was her jacket against Quinn's back; or her hip against the corner of the table, or her scarf, trailing along, that got underneath someone's foot and caused just enough of a lurch -- but that just brought about a good natured Oh, so sorry! and Happy Holidays! from the effusive brunette.

Unless, of course, she happened to accidentally meet Patrick's eyes. And then her shoulders would sit a little straighter, and Rain's gaze would go downward to the floor very, very quickly. That was just about the only thing that could catch up her cheer and good will, sober her toward something more somber in less than a heartbeat.

[Rain] [Grr. Edit: ..."if" one of those side-long looks...]

[Imogen] "Just ask at the bar," she says. "Though if yeh truly want to, I'm sure yeh can ask in the kitchen as well."

Rain bumps against the table, or the occupants of the table, or her scarf does or any number of potential mishaps that can occur in small quarters with tables closely set together and pedestrians making their way between them. There is the politeness, and then perhaps somberness, a spot of tension in the kinfolk.

Imogen steps forward, not quickly, but with purpose. "Rain, meet Patrick. He's a -" she pauses a moment. They are not in the private part of the brotherhood. Though humans shy from Patrick's rage, they have not all left the pub. She is standing, and there is background noise and therefore, she is not whispering, even if her voice is low.

"A first class citizen among us," the way she says it is with irony. There is no sense of bitterness or reproach or even passive aggressiveness. She chooses a phrase she guesses might be easily understood by them, and merely ignored by others.

"Unfortunately, I've not met his friend," there is a dark eyed glance to Quinn.

"Rain's new in town, much like yerselves."

[Patrick] In all honesty, a five star review from Patrick was probably pretty decent. He was not exactly renown for his upbeat and joyful swagger. No, that was far more his pack-mate and Alpha's style. Howard may not have seen the world the same way that everyone else did; but neither did Patrick, precisely.

Oh, he knew the songs and tales, he knew courage and had witnessed valor first hand. He'd stopped Wyrm monsters in their tracks and he held a great amount of esteem for those of his own birth moon who stood up and recited sagas as if it had happened only that morning, rather than centuries ago -- he just, quite frankly, didn't care. Not personally, not about his own story, certainly not about what he was or was not doing for the War.

War was endless, you fought one, you rose up and fought another.

What did they do but fight wars, what did humanity do while they scrabbled to save the world -- they made their own wars; between nations. Over fuel, over money, over religious preference. Prayers to Broken Stone was half convinced that when the day came, he'd get up and tell a story to nothing more than dust in the wind. Quinn turns to look at whatever Patrick had been, and his eyebrows rise a little, he's surprised perhaps, that such a casual glance required first hand confirmation.

Believing her to be wondering who the females were, he nods toward them, encompassing each with a flick of his eyes.

"That's Imogen Slaughter. She's Fianna, too. Bridget is by the bar, another of ours." Rain catches the edge of the table, and Patrick's hand darts out to stop his beer from toppling from it. He does indeed look up at the Gaian; but she looks down, and he looks away, clenching his jaw a little.

It's so easy to read that as anger.

"It's alright." He says, rather, when she apologizes. He hasn't answered Quinn yet, about their style. He does so now, his focus shifting back again and recapturing the thread of conversation. "Folksy, I suppose. That's my own style but I can do blues, some covers." His eyebrow quirks. "I know some Welsh ballads."

[Howard] He could just announce his triumphant return from wherever the hell it is that he went over the totemphone like a normal person, rather than he ends up doing, which is just about the exact opposite of a subtle, unobtrusive return to the fray. After slobbering on his brother and running out of the room, he was relatively quiet; Patrick could not hear him over their link, couldn't hear his running commentary as he went wherever it is he goes when it's freezing cold and dumping precipitation on the city below. The roof is about the only place he can go where the smell of smoke won't interfere with someone's day.

When he comes back downstairs, he has managed to find a pair of shoes and some pants. Black Converse sneakers squeak on the tiled kitchen floor as he plows through, not at all like a force of nature or a massive piece of locomotive machinery. He is, for a child of Stag, a son of Volcano, for a Garou, period, very human. Were not for the influence of their eruptive totem he would have little connection to what makes them them. It's a wonder he can even shift forms, that he doesn't attempt to survive run-ins with the Wyrm by standing in his human skin and hurling insults until they surrender due to the sheer futility of attempting to deal with him.

He's changed his shirt. The young man who bursts through the swinging door of the Brotherhood's kitchen is familiar to everyone but the Child of Gaian kinswoman, and the immediate impression he affords is one of a histrionic, someone who is used to being the center of attention: he wears red corduroys, a black U2 t-shirt that is likely older than he is, black aviator sunglasses, and has a number of tattoos on both of his arms that are not visible when he's out in public wearing a jacket.

"Oi, gat!" he shouts across the dining room, as though he's using echolocation to find his packmate. They aren't the only ones in here, and the members of the Nation aren't the only ones who look over at him as he lets the door swing shut behind him. Seeing the gaggle of women currently clustered around him, a beaming--read: shit-eating--grin creeps onto his features and he diverts his course, going for the lone Welsh-speaking Canadian at the bar.

The Theurge hoists himself onto a stool with an exaggerated groan, then peels off his sunglasses and sets them down on the bar. He blinks a few times, squints; the light in the restaurant is nowhere near as harsh as it is upstairs. To his credit he doesn't appear hungover or high, nor does he smell like an alleyway or a bar. He glances down the bar to get the poor schmuck responsible for the register in his sights, then turns green eyes towards Bridget as though he's just seeing her.

"Well fancy meeting you here," he says.

[Imogen] "And that," Imogen says after Howard has shouted across the dining room, "is Howard."

[Rain] Imogen says first class citizen with a little wryness in her tone, but it's not the mirth or amusement in it that Rain hears. There's a shadow on the younger woman's features, faint but unmistakable by contrast, when she glances back up to the (monster) man at the table.

"Hi," she says, and there's less all-encompassing good will to it. It's not cold, Rain couldn't really be cold, and it's not harsh, no not even when she wanted to be was she off-putting or dismissive. It's just telling of stories that were not his and should not have been hers but that sat, between them, just by way of his being True.

And Fianna.

More by his way of being Stag's than trueborn, if truth were told. She misses that he's handing out his musical preferences like calling cards. Just like that, they've switched roles. Imogen seems rather verbose compared to Rain, for a moment.

[Quinn] When Rain bumps the table, or her clothing catches it, Quinn's head snaps up and much like Patrick, her hand darts out. Except rather than saving her beer, which is held safely in one hand, her free hand goes out to stop...something. Rain from toppling over, maybe, or a coat from smacking her in the face. However it happens, the Garou and three Kinfolk are now a knot by Quinn's and Patrick's table.

"Hi," she returns, looking up at Rain with incredibly blue eyes. Her smile is warm and friendly. "Quinn," she offers by way of introduction. "Nice to meet you." It's bright and sunny and just shy of being over-the-top. She glances over when Howard bursts onto the scene, much like he had at IHOP. It earns a grin before the brunette turns her attention back to the group around her. "Are you guys going to stay a while? Do you want to join us?"

[Bridget] The fair, dark-haired beauty gets a chuckle from Bridget. Her slow, easy smile could be taken for cattiness easily. But that's not what it is. She leans against the bar and waits for her bourbon, patient as ever. She crosses her wiry arms over her long, lean torso and merely watches as Rain nearly knocks over Patrick's beer. Bridget could have said something about it-- she had the time, but instead, she's merely observing.

Either like a humble kinfolk, or a wolf cub watching a mouse scurry away through the snow. Simon said something about the new taking the place of the old, and suddenly Bridget felt a little older. The adorable chit reminds her exactly of herself before she left her father's "den", the relative safety of the bawn in Red Deer for all the promises a big city has to offer for a young lady.

Ears prick again at Patrick's mention of blues, which she seems almost ready to interject until a blur of motion catches her brown eyes. She has a split second to decide whether to back off or grab her bag from the barstool before it gets claimed. Her arms reach out to grab the canvas bag, but it doesn't stop her from making a slightly startled, soft yelp as Howard very abruptly enters her personal space.

"Eep!"

And then she lets out a sigh of relief and drops her bag on her own feet.

"Sacre Mere. Howard, you like scaring the shit out of your cousins?"

[Patrick] The Kinswoman with the fiery hair calls him a first-class citizen and he lets out a sharp breath that perhaps passes for some sense of ironic amusement. "Hardly," he contradicts, lifting his beer to his lips once more and taking a deep swallow. He does nod over at Quinn and seems content to wait for a moment to see if she introduces herself.

She does, fantastic. Patrick adds: "She's a second-class citizen." A decided counter to Imogen's title for him. Howard erupts into existance. Patrick's voice mirrors the Doctor's for tone, perhaps. "He's an illegal immigrant smuggled aboard."

[Rain] Quinn offers them seats and Rain's immediate answer, despite her wariness for all things Fianna and Rage-bearing, is to answer, "Sure!"

Followed by a little pause, and a glance to Imogen, as if she might have just committed them both to a thing Miss Doctor Slaughter might rather not do -- and then a glance away as Rain remembers that Miss Doctor Slaughter would not be talked into anything she'd rather not do by a single syllable uttered by an overly friendly acquaintence.

"But first, I gotta see a man about a gig," she adds cheerfully, whilst remaining rooted to the spot and not itching to leave just yet. "Or a job, rather, since I doubt I'll be playing." Quinn is easier for Rain to talk to, so she focuses there. That shadow lifts, easily, when talking to the other kinswoman.

"And you can call me Rain. Nice to meet you, Miss Quinn."

She glances toward Howard. She does not head his way. Possibly because of the echolocation, and abrupt entry, and erratic sort of something he seemed to have wrapped around him. Rain didn't need to wander near or into the envelope of uncertainty surrounding him. Not yet. Not even to ask Reuben for a job.

[Howard] "Well..."

Beer is going to require funds. Howard pauses in his answer to pull a face and lean further into Bridget's space to get at the pocket of his corduroys. He extracts a wad of one-dollar bills, nearly losing a lighter and Christ knows what else in the process, and throws it onto the counter with as much force as his skinny little arm can manage.

It's not much.

Sitting straight again, he goes on, "When you find something you're good at, you keep at it. I think I'm gettin' the hang of scarin' the shit out of my cousins. Can add that to my list of proficiencies. 'Masturbating' and 'drinking away my woes' were looking pretty lonely."

[Imogen] Patrick refers to Howard as an illegal immigrant and Imogen exhales a breath. "I daresay the metaphor has stretched far enough, now," she observes, quietly, smirking.

Quinn offers her name, and Imogen says, "Imogen Slaughter," unaware that she's already been pointed out. They're offered to take a seat, and Imogen casts a brief glance toward Rain, the other looking distinctly uncomfortable. There's a moment where the red-haired considers the brunette. Before she has the chance to speak, however, Rain does, and takes Quinn up on her offer.

She moves her head slightly in brief agreement and moves away to grab a chair to add to the table. Such things are fluid here, ever changing by the groupings of friends.

[Quinn] Some people might find it rude to be called a second-class citizen. Quinn's brows just hop up as she looks at the mostly stoic young Galliard. Chuckling, she says, "Thanks, hon." Looking up at Imogen and Rain, Quinn lifts her bottle and takes a swig.

She's still mid-swallow when Rain says Sure! so brightly Quinn has to smile at her enthusiasm. She perks visibly at the word "gig" and sets her bottle down at "I doubt I'll be playing." The blue-eyed kinswoman's attention on the brown-eyed song bird, Quinn looks like she wants to say something, but stops and follows Rain's wandering eye.

"Ah, I wouldn't be scared of him. He might lick you, but I'm pretty sure he doesn't bite." A brief, thoughtful pause followed by a questioning glance cast Patrick's way. "Does he?"

[Bridget] "Well, we all have our talents. Some are more useful than others," she says.

Bridget leans into Howard's space in order to turn around and look at Rain and Patrick. "I'm always looking for gigs. If you guys play, maybe we should have a session sometime?"

The Canadian tucks the flyaways behind her ear again. Her bourbon comes back to her. The part-feral kinfolk grabs the glass and slams it instead of sipping it like she normally would.

Quinn's remark gets a laugh out of Bridget, who nearly chokes on the bourbon. She manages to keep it down, however. "Sacre Mere. That's all we need."

[Patrick] For a mostly stoic Galliard (that there seemed a contradiction all its own) Patrick seemed to be the axis by which activity spun presently. His once solitary table was now occupied with three women, two of which were his in the Nation's eyes, though classifying anyone as Fianna was as owning as he ever tended to get. He's somewhat affected by the Gaian's fear of him and her reluctance to address his eyes, or even glance his way for longer than a few seconds has Patrick's features closing off.

He takes another, finishing drag from his beer bottle as the brunette notes that Howard will lick, but not bite.

"He does on request." Patrick says, rising and taking cast of the women around him. "I'm getting another beer. What can I get you, ladies?" The enigmatic Bridget at the bar asks about a gig; Patrick lifts a hand, idly swatting away a drop of water caught on the tips of his drying hair, now running down his neck.

"Uh, yeah. Sure. I play guitar, and I can hold a tune."

[Howard] When Bridget picks up the shot and slams it down like that, Howard takes a visibly deep breath and makes a show out of fanning himself. The question of whether he bites has him showing his teeth in a grin that makes more of a play at predaciousness than he's actually capable of pulling off; the Theurge is about as threatening as a declawed kitten.

He does on request.

That earns Patrick a chomp of teeth near his shoulder when he draws close enough, and then he turns away from his packmate to look back at Bridget.

"We're lookin' for a sitar player. You play sitar? What about the Hammond organ?"

[Rain] Rain settles herself at the table. By now she's managed to keep her layers from reaching out to attack or get fresh with anyone. It's unweildy, having so much clothing to keep track of. It's all draped or folded across the back of her chair, and she's not wandered over to get herself anything to drink just yet. Rain is always aware of where the Rage is in the room, it's an instinctual thing. It's like her heartbeat is somehow twined with that awareness; like she's had a reason to cultivate it that was deeper than just unveiled fear. It doesn't drag her down, even if it mute her interaction with Patrick (and Howard) noticeably.

"It's just a hobby now," Rain tells Bridget, with a little sadness tripping up those words. Playing for her supper and setting up other people's shows is as close as she gets to performing in any real way. There's a but... a little bit of openness that threatens, burgeons, almost breaks through. "But I wouldn't mind..."

Then Howard saves her from offering, so Rain doesn't say she plays this or that. She run her fingertips through her hair and sits back in her chair and finds a comfortable way to be where she can keep this one (Patrick) and that one (Howard) in her line-of-sight without being too obvious about it.

[Night's Reprieve] Anyone near the bathrooms will hear a distinct popping sound. And it's unique, it always is. It sounds effortless, like crossing is just like breathing. And sure enough, within moments NR emerges. He looks confused, like he's taken a wrong turn or crash landed somewhere he didn't intend, but the likelihood of that happening is beyond small. He once played Umbral peekaboo with a pack of Spirals in Grant Park. It looks like tonight he tried to play it again because there's a nasty looking gash running vertical down the top of his forearm, another smaller one on his cheek. Both will be gone by morning, but there all the same.

He's wearing exactly what he was wearing when he disappeared early that morning, and he looks cold. His jacket is still in his room so people best keep that god damn door SHUT! He flicks his eyes towards it with a crazed stare as it swings closed after a patron exits for the evening. But shit you me there is a lot of fucking people in here tonight. Lots of faces and lots and lots of blood. Quinn he knows, Patrick too, and Howard. Of course there is also Imogen and it's actually her that his eyes linger on the longest. It has been awhile.

There is a table, surrounded by blood that screams at him. Indeed this is like the death trap of all death traps for NR, he should just cover his eyes with one hand and feel is way over to the staircase, just to get the hell out of here. But he doesn't, he drags and seat and plomps himself down, lets out a long breath and then smiles. But he doesn't interrupt, conversations are surely going that he has no business breaking into. At least not verbally.

[John Brendan Cavanagh] The front door swings open with a blast of bright, cold air and a small burst of that arctic dry-as-dust snow that has fallen over the city over the past two day. The dry little snowflakes swirl in strange little eddies, driven by the winds that blast down onto the city from the northern prairies, buffeted by the blast of the furnace vents before melting in the heat of the bar. Two figures - one over six feet, broad-shouldered, obviously male, the other rather - well, child-sized, both bundled against the cold. The child is wearing a down parka in a deep fushia, with matching scarf and ski cap that, between them, conceal nearly everything about her except the straight strands of her dark brown hair made flyaway by the weather and the static electricity generated by winter gear. The man is bare-faced, his nose and cheeks red from the cold, his eyes watering from the bitter blast of the winter wind.

He reaches behind to pull shut the door with one hand while gently directing the girl forward with the other, planted firmly, gently, at the junction of her neck and shoulder. He stamps snow from his boots,with the familiarity of long-practice. The girl stands just inside the door, stiff as a zombie, tired, cold. A strip of between the muffler and hat shows her bleary eyes, a gray blue bloodshot from the cold. As the warm interior starts to melt the snow caught in her eyelashes against the warmth of her cheeks, her teeth begin to chatter. The man pulls off his gloves, stuffs them into the expansive pockets of his practical winter coat, a drab color somewhere between brown and green, not military-issue but serviceable for weather extremes. He's about to push the girl forward - gentle pressure - when he hears the chatter of her teeth from beneath the muffler.

And so: he sinks to a crouch, wraps an arm around her waist, and picks her up, easy as breathing, carrying her toward the bar.

[Quinn] At Hammond organ Quinn has to lift the back of her hand to her mouth in a vague attempt at hiding a snort. When Patrick asks after what the ladies will have, Quinn just shakes her head and indicates her still mostly full bottle. That'll last her for a little while, at least.

Frowning suddenly, she tugs at her left sleeve to reveal an analog-faced watch. Those blue eyes widen. "Shit. I have to go make a call. It was nice meeting you all," she says, pushing her chair back from the table. Quinn doesn't run, but her step is swift as she makes her way through the restaurant and back into the kitchen, where she disappears.

[sorry guys i cannot cope! thanks for the play!]

[Bridget] "Whiskey straight. Diolch yn fawr." She answers and thanks Patrick. Her Welsh sounds foreign, like she's never really had the practice.

"That's great. Looks like we can all carry a bit of a tune. I don't play sitar or whatever the hell a Hammond organ is, but I play tin whistle."
Bridget reaches for a cigarette before she remembers the smoking ban. But she leaves the cigarette between her lips for a second.

"Mmm!" She lights up, picking up on the increasing energy of the throng. She lets the cigarette drop into her palm and she tucks it behind her ear.

"That reminds me! I was trying to find my way around Bronzeville when I ran across this pile-up at a stop light. There were all these gawkers standing around, right? And suddenly I ran into Mama... Mama Anklebiter. Short gal, great blonde curls, good watcher."

Bridget hops onto a bar stool at this point, getting a bit more animated in her tale. "Anyway, we ran into these little critters... It was like something out of Gremlins. These little buggers were driving these cars, crashing into each other, messing with the lights. And out of nowhere, this adorable thing with big eyes and huge ears is tugging at my pant leg."

"But then he runs off and the others chase him down the street into this little cafe. Mama and I run into the cafe to figure the whole thing out, and these little gremlins have torn the whole place apart. Throwing dishes, lighting things on fire. It's like a bunch of destructive three year olds with enough sugar to go into a diabetic coma. Mama takes off trying to find that really cute one they were after. I'm supposed to distract them, so I take out my harmonica."

Bridget reaches for the tin whistle, but realizes it's in the bag on the floor. She waves it off anyway. "Oh, alright. Bye Quinn."

"Anyway..."

[Rain] There are a lot of people in the room, and while Rain can manage a room with her personality this is not her stage and these are not her people. There are plenty of other Personalities here, too, capitalized and all, and that makes things a bit more difficult. So the newcomer to their table captures her attention, offers her a bit of respite from the press of charisma. Rain's attention lingers on the long cut on his arm. It pulls the shape of her mouth into a concerned purse.

That look lingers, long enough to be pointed, and it's hard to miss that the kinswoman would do something about it if she were only given leave. About the frown, about the gash, maybe. Rain placed her hands on the edge of the table, near her stomach, and glanced down at them once she realized she'd been staring.

Then back over at Night's Reprieve. Quinn leaving got her attention long enough for her to look over and smile. There's a measure of fascination in how she looks to Bridget, listens to her story for a bit, but her attention pulls back to his arm, and then Night's Reprieve again.

"If you'd like..." she says, quietly, a bit shyly. Gestures to his arm a little, looks up to almost meet his eyes. Rain never quite makes eye contact with a Cousin.

[Imogen] Imogen shakes her head slightly at Patrick, "I'll pass," she says, simply.

The others speak of music, of sessions and instruments. Howard begins to ask if Bridget plays the Sitar. Imogen speaks not at all, her thumb on her left handabsently rubbing against her fingertips, tracing the skin near carefully manicured nails.

"Good-bye," she says, absently as Quinn leaves.

"Bridget -" Imogen interrupts the story mildly.

"This is a better tale told upstairs."

[Patrick] Howard snaps his teeth at Patrick as he accepts any drink orders from those gathered around him, and as he goes the Galliard nudges against his brother in a way that is at once fond and boyishly aggressive. Then, on his way, Quinn has to make a phone-call and leave and the Galliard ensures he catches her long enough to add his farewell before he slips behind the doors to the kitchen for a moment.

When he returns, he's holding a glass and another beerbottle, and he's coming in on the conclusion of Imogen telling Bridget her story belongs upstairs. The member of Caldera simply glances between the two women and sets Bridget's drink down on the counter; turning with the swirl of snowflakes as the door is opened once again and a man and child come in; the man stamping down his boots before sweeping the child up in his arms and headed toward the bar -- where Patrick currently stood; one hand absently resting on it; observing.

"I recommend the hot chocolate." He says, quite out of the blue, his voice serious and his eyes rather too blue, far too bright and focused. "I don't know what they put in it, but it warms you up like it starts a fire in your belly."

[Howard] "That's the whisky, man," he tells Patrick, piping up from out of nowhere.

[Bridget] Bridget stops at Imogen's behest, smirking. "Ah, well... I guess."

It's hard for her to contain the excitement; however, and she gitters while looking around for something to occupy her. After a few moments, she sighs and collapses into her chair. She spots Patrick heading back and glances in the direction of what holds his attention. The sight of the bleary-eyed little girl keeps the spark of Bridget's current energy alight.

"Hot chocolate and lots of whipped cream."

[Simon Zahradnik] Simon enters quietly enough, hoodie over his head, and heavier coat over that. He was dressed for warmth, and mostly covered, even his face had been covered by that black bandanna as he made his way through the city streets. Fortunately he was safe here, somewhat anyway, free to get out of several of his layers and strip down to something better suited for the room.

He was quick to peel his backpack off his shoulders and toss it down in a chair and soon enough he was peeling those layers off his body. First his gloves and then his coat, and finally his hoodie. Each one was dangled from a chair as he got himself out of the outer layer.

[John Brendan Cavanagh] The space between the pair is intimate - brother and sister, parent and child, family - and as they walk, the make swipes the ski cap from the girl's head. Her straight dark hair stands out around her little head in all directions, full of static, waving in the heat of the interior, crackling loud enough to make her laugh convulsively in a way that stops her teeth chattering.

The girl is young - elementary school age - up late on a blustery, snow-filled evening. At the bar, he sets her the bar proper rather than on a barstool from which she would have to strain to reach anything. The man gives Patrick a look, brief and direct, even - dark brown eyes set in a plain enough face, with a nose that has been broken at least once before, and stubble over his strong jaw.

"Thanks - " he says to Patrick; and "No - no whiskey for you - " to the girl with the static-filled hair. " - hot chocolate, though," to the bartender. "And the phone book, if you don't mind."

Unlike the man, the girl stares briefly at Patrick with open mouthed fascination - the sort of delighted revulsion one might feel mid-horror story. The signs of sleepiness dissipate almost immediately within the Garou's presence, and although she looks at him longer than most children would, it is not a look she sustains. Bashful, she drops her chin and looks away, back over the her father's shoulder, the protective shell of his body as he orders her hot chocolate.

Bridget suggests hot chocolate, and the girl looks at her, before her gaze travels to Imogen. She pushes her chin up over the edge of her scarf and waves this constrained, mitten-handed wave, then leans forward to say something into her father's ear. Whatever it is is enough to get him to look back, over his shoulder, and lift his chin and brows in acknowledgment of the folks seated there before turning back as the bartender brings out the phone book.

[Night's Reprieve] Upstairs would be good, he might not feel so uncomfortable upstairs. But down here? Amongst all these mortals and half bloods? He barely wants to speak, not out of fear but more out of a lack of something to say. It's hard enough for him to talk about normal every day human goings on without all the noise and confusion around the place. But there's a kinfolk looking at him, staring at him, and finally she speaks up though her voice is almost lost in the racket created by the other bar patrons. If you'd like.. she says.. and he blinks once, blinks twice, then his eyes follow her gesture to his arm and he looks at it like he's only just noticed the wound is there.

He can't feel it, bears gift does that for him, but he's no stranger to looking at cuts that he can't feel. This one isn't too bad, but he has never been offered.. well he's not entirely sure what she is offering come to think about it.

"If I'd like what?" He asks, though the words don't bite nearly as strongly as they could. They almost seem kind. A smile curls into his lips at how shy she is, and he can't keep the animal out of it. He never can. There isn't much human about the Godi.

"Hello Doctor Slaughter." He offers to Imogen, though it's a rather belated greeting. Social interactions move slowly between a kin like Imogen and a Garou like Night's Reprieve. His attention doesn't linger though, and soon returns to Rain.

"I didn't catch your name. I'm En Arr." He won't tell her his actual name in public, but he does reach a hand across the table to her. Each fingertip is wrapped in white electrical tape like always.

[Rain] She breathes out a bit, through her nose, almost huffy at the feral cast his smile takes. He can't help it; she can't either. Rain glances up just long enough to take in the color of his eyes, to cast them in her memory. Hers are wide and brown and warm, but not entirely innocent. She knows him for what he is, knows the monster beneath his skin, and yet... she offers.

"If'n you'd like, Ennar," she says it like a name, not like consonants strung together. Perhaps she'd heard him wrong. "I could dress that up for you. Upstairs. I'm sure there's a kit, or something." She smiles a little. Rain is certain that a kin-and-True establishment has a well-stocked medical cabinet somewhere. She'd never known one that didn't, even in River Fork.

"And I'm Rain," she says, offering a hand to take his in greeting. There's no skittishness in how she shakes his hand, but it doesn't linger. Perhaps Rain isn't shy, but rather overtly cautious.

After he answers, then Rain's attention might stray to the bar, but she has her reasons for why her attention lingers on the Godi. One is the gash on his arm. A second is the mixed company that they keep, and that not everyone (she imagines) in the Brotherhood just now is Nation.

[Imogen] Imogen's attention has shifted to JB as he and his ward enter the pub. As Night's Reprieve speaks to her, she flicks a gaze back toward him, her gaze moving to the gash, on his arm, then up again. Her attention is direct - a stark contrast to Rain's aversion.

"Hello," she says and she does not use his name. She never has, though it might be easy to think it is because of the public locale, this time.

The little girl waves at the most unlikely person in the room - the recalcitrant and reserved doctor. Imogen does not quite wave back, but she is moved to raise her hand to the dark-haired child. JB nods, and the kinwoman nods back, getting to her feet with a fluid, easy motion and crosses the room, moving between tables toward the kinsmen, the bartender.

She passes Simon as she does and the shadow lord gets a glance of greeting, but little else.

"Alright?" she asks a one word question as she reaches JB, following it up with, "Hello, Lucy," the former a serious greeting, omitting the usual shift in tone one most often gives to children.

[Bridget] The little girl receives a friendly wave from the brunette Stag kin. And suddenly, another force of Rage has overwhelmed the room. It might be the man who approached, or whoever just brought in another gust of bitter air. The crowd parts a bit and the woman spots an old friend. Bridget nearly pounces through the crowd as the target provides an outlet for this energy.

The blur of a young woman moves through the crowd as easily as she might move through shrub in a deer run. Her arms go up a second before she lets out a greeting yelp to Simon.

"Hey, you!"

Nearly tackling an Ahroun... another shining example of Bridget's utter disregard for normal human behavior.

[Night's Reprieve] She'd like to help him with his wound, dress it. Well, it doesn't particularly need dressing - oh sure if he were human he would need it stitched up, but he isn't - still there is something to be said for accepting help offered because it doesn't happen very often. It takes him a few moments to respond but when he does he nods his head. No words come out of his mouth, at least not to Rain, and why it is exactly that he stands up from the table and moves towards Howard after surveying the room is anyone's guess.

"Hey Howard, look I'm just going upstairs with Rain here so she can bandage my arm, the medical kit is up there." He looks him right in the eyes, maybe there is understanding or maybe the shithead is just a shithead and he should be talking to Patrick instead. Either way, he adds a second statement, perhaps to make it seem more casual.

"I have a bottle or two of uh.. lively.. Vodka, if you're interested in a glass or two later." And then he motions to Rain, shall we?

[Patrick] So, Patrick knows he's Kinfolk. But -- and he hates that it's a part of the job and Howard probably won't think to do it at present with so many diversions -- he still gets the words out; even though at first he's looking down at the little girl as she stares back at him; fascinated yet wary. "Patrick," he says by way of introducing himself.

Waves behind him. "That's Howard. We're family, you and I."

He takes a sip of his beer as Imogen joins them; quiets.

[Simon Zahradnik] Simon was a big guy and there was no way in hell he was gonna let a girl tackle him. He was quick to respond, adjusting his weight accordingly to stop her dead in her tracks and catch her. Spinning a little with the tackle to take some of the kick out of it before settling her back on the floor. He gave a little laugh as he settled the kin down and a smile down to her, his hands lingering just a tad on her frame a sign of affectionate familiarity."Haven't seen you around much. I did see your note in the Broho though, you found a roommate yet?"He asks her curiously. His grin stil bright he was definitely pleased to see her, he usually appeared to be.

[Howard] For whatever reason, Howard has decided to stop talking and has been sitting, mostly silent, at the bar once his beer has been acquired. Like an infant with a bottle of formula, he sits drinking it without complaint or fuss, watching the interactions between the Kinfolk and the Garou without comment. There's a time and a place for it, apparently, or else he's thinking; if he were thinking, Patrick knows, he'd have more of a pained expression on his face, so the only logical explanation is that the Theurge has zoned out.

A moment later, and the Godi is addressing him. Loud green eyes flick to him, heavy eyebrows rising, and he takes an extended, lazy swallow of beer. He scoffs, as though he can't figure out why that information was necessary, and says, "Yeah. Okay. 'Bandage your arm.' Make sure you wrap it up."

Yep. The shithead is still a shithead.

And then his player scrambled to catch up and figure out what the conversation between the Imogen/JB/Patrick looks like! Someone's introducing him! Oh shit! He lifts his beer in a silent toast, heedless of the fact that there is a small child present, and stands up to move closer, belatedly snatching up his sunglasses.

[Rain] Nearly tackling an Ahroun... Rain's glance toward Bridget says a lot. That the other kinswoman has balls, that she might not have much restraint. It's broken off when Rain gathers up her coat and scarf to carry upstairs with her. Her eyes follow NR's to Howard's, just momentarily, as the Godi announces his intent unambiguously. She glances past Howard to Patrick, and then back to the neutral planes of the bar.

Which is convenient, because the look she would have shot Howard otherwise would be... inappropriately withering. Rain can feel her cheeks pink before she even dares to look up at either the Godi or the offending Fianna. It's an impressive flush, enough so that she bites hard on her tongue to keep it still.

When the heat drains a bit from her cheeks, or NR starts toward the stairs, wherever they are, Rain moves with him, lips pressed into a thinner line, but not rescinding her offer in any way. Even if it hadn't been the offer she meant to make.

[Bridget] Were Simon not a Garou, Bridget still might not be able to properly tackle him. So he could easily catch her and set her down again. She entirely misses the hilarious interlude at the bar-- and a sad thing, too, because she would surely be laughing her ass off at it.

Instead, Bridget looks Simon directly in the face without the instant cowering reaction. It takes a few seconds for the Rage to remind her of what she just did. Color comes to her cheeks, but she doesn't say anything. The kinfolk looks away for a moment before she can observe some part of Simon's face other than his eyes.

"You did? Oh, not yet. I told you I was trying to get out of Bronzeville."

[John Brendan Cavanagh] Lucy watches Imogen as she rises and approaches the bar, keeps her gray-blue eyes on the kinswoman the whole time now, a familiar stranger, a calm center in a buffeting sort of storm. Patrick's rage she bears well enough - with evident stress in her eyes and mouth, but nothing more than this - but the addition of Simon's to the room changes something fundamental in the child's mien. "...hello - " she says back to Imogen in a voice as small as all that rage makes her feel.

JB looks up, looks directly at Lucy as she returns Imogen's greeting. "Yeah," he tells Imogen, " - frozen, but alright," quiet, even wry - or maybe it's just concern that softs the gruff edge of his voice, keeps the volumne low here. "El's down. You'd think this fu - " oh, he thinks better of it, though, the pressure of the girl's toes against his abdomen, maybe. " - this damn city would be better prepared for weather like this."

"Damn's a curse word, too."

"I know, Luce." He responds, hands on the bar now, on either side of her narrow body, protective. To Imogen, " - we're getting a cab home." So much for low carbon footprint.

Then he shoots a look back at Patrick. We're family - the kid says and JB gives him a more thorough once-over. The trace of pure blood evident in the man is even stronger in the little girl. A brief dart of the man's deep brown eyes toward Howards serves as both acknowledgment and greeting. "JB," he says, briefly. " - and if you don't mind, I'll save the formalities for another day. Someone's up past her bedtime." The teasting note normally sunk into such a statement is absent, here. He can feel Lucy's stress, the physical fact of it as clearly as Imogen can see it.

(Sorry! Lost mah first post!)

[Night's Reprieve] Yeah. Okay. Bandage your arm, make sure you wrap it up.

Night's Reprieve turns to look over his shoulder at the Fianna and there is utter confusion on his face. He wonders if the man-child is drunk or just being dense for show.

"She is going to wrap it up for me." He says and the words sound obscenely normal.

But then his gaze wanders to Rain and the look she has for Howard and pieces of the puzzle begin to fit together. It's shown in the way his striking blue eyes widen and then narrow, the way his jaw clenches along with his fists. Later, now is not the time. Especially not now with him blushing the way he is.

Instead, he just turns away towards the stairs and offers an apologetic little smile to Rain. The trip is brief, up and around the corner and then they are there. The common room is deserted, along with the corridors.

"There's a medkit in the bathroom I believe, I can fetch it if you would like."

[Howard] [Etiquette+Charisma]

[Imogen] Imogen glances at both Fianna Garou, nearby, and Lucy, stiff in the barrier of her father's arms.

"C'mon," she says simply to JB, "I'll gi' yeh both a ride." A flick of her gaze toward Patrick, "Tell Rain I'll be back fer her, alright?"

Apparently, Imogen was the cab driver to the half-bloods, tonight.

[Patrick] Patrick can feel the affect he's having on Lucy, as he's heard her called and his jaw tightens, his eyes briefly drop to the floor and he seems less a young man of twenty-three and far, far older. A Garou who knows too well the burn of his presence and how it ruins -- well, everything. When JB gives him a closer once-over, Patrick glances up and shakes his head.

He'd forgotten he had no shoes on; it's suddenly so obvious, he wonders where his mind has been.

"No, it's done. I just had to make sure you knew." He seems keen to pass that, on. "If you need help, just remember it." Then Imogen is offering them a ride, and the Galliard's eyes flick over her face; regard her for a length, he just nods. There's commotion behind him and he's almost wary to turn around.

[Imogen] When Patrick regards her at length, Imogen meets his gaze head on, steadily, unwaveringly. As a beast of such rage, it must be an unfamiliar sensation.

Patrick nods, and Imogen merely looks away, reaching into her coat pockets to retrieve her leather gloves.

[Simon Zahradnik] He nods slowly back to her. His eyes meeting Bridget's own as she looks back, there was a certain flare in those eyes warm and at the same time frightening to those who are unaccustomed to the stare of a full moon. She watches him back without fear, and that alone is enough to delight the full moon in its own little way."It's a horrible place so yeah, but I don't wanna try to force you or anything. However, if you need a place to crash in the interlude Mila and I have a spare room and I could always check to see if she minded a kin staying for a bit. Don't wanna force you to remain under the watchful eye of a full moon though we can get annoyingly protective."He adds with a little laugh.

He was oblivious to what the others were laughing at himself though he likely wouldn't have noticed it either way since he found himself distracted by Bridget's presence. It was curious, and left him wondering sometimes if she realized the effect she had on folks or if she was entirely oblivious to it.

[John Brendan Cavanagh] The bartender has just retrieved the phone book, and slides it onto the bar beside Lucy's right flank. "Thanks - " JB says, with a glance at Imogen, and then the bartender as he reaches to push the book back. " - we've got a ride. C'mon, Luce," he continues, reaching to push her striped fuschia ski camp down over her frizzed out hair before sliding her off the bar and into his arms, as if she were a toddler of three rather than a child of eight. Lucy settles her chin over her father's shoulder, stealing a wary glance at Patrick, studying him from beneath a scrim of lashes only when she knows he's looking away.

With Lucy in his arms, her legs around his waist, her chin resting on his shoulder, JB pauses, turning to Patrick, briefly. "You two staying here?" He asks, pausing just long enough for an affirmative response. When (if) he gets it, he just turns, and turns to walk with Imogen toward the door.

Lucy is left staring over her father's shoulder at the Garou, watching them like she's dared herself to do so.

[Howard] Last night the Godi had had to have Howard explain himself, while he was stoned, because he'd made the shameless claim that he "got" the toaster that the female Ahroun had been working on. It seems as though a few run-ins is all one really needs in order to "get" Howard: he's not all that intelligent, yet he acts far less intelligent than he actually is because for whatever reason he finds it hilarious.

Granted, he also engages in all manner of antisocial behavior that the rest of the Nation can't begin to wrap their heads around. His utter refusal to take his duty or his auspice role seriously is one of them.

Night's Reprieve appears to be grasping the concept that Howard is dense for entertainment purposes. The quickness of his mouth, his quips, is enough of a concealment. He is capable of acting as though he's not a complete barbarian.

Unfortunately, tonight's not that night.

As he takes another mindless swallow of beer, the Godi informs him that the kinswoman is going to wrap it up for him. Normally he would have burst into raucous laughter and shouted some sort of encouragement after him. Now, either Howard really doesn't care about keeping his nostrils clear, or he tries and fails to properly swallow, because he ends up sending a mouthful of beer not down his esophagus but up his sinuses, which ends about as well as one would expect.

It's Howard. That actually hurts, and he doesn't end up screaming and making a scene. He claps his free hand over his nose and mouth as he coughs and chokes, and sits down, heavily, as he growls "Whoaaaaa Nelly!"

[Imogen] "Goodnight," she might be saying this to the two at the bar, or perhaps Simon and Bridget - it is absent and careless. Politeness, little more.

JB leads the way, and Imogen follows. She catches sight of Lucy watching the Garou all the way to the door - but there is no one to see her reaction, brief as it is. Her back to the Garou, JB's back to her, and Lucy's eyes on the monsters as they leave them.

She shuts the door behind them, and leads the way to the parking lot and the ancient Volvo that brought her here.

[John Brendan Cavanagh] (thank you all for the scene! I am now a frozen pumpkin. to bed with me!)

[Bridget] Another thing about Bridget's take on life is that it's rarely boring. Honestly, she's not dead yet, so she's not so worried about safety that she's forgotten to live. Her glance shifts back and forth before going back to his eyes. Her good mood almost takes the edge off, but it's not quite enough. Whether she knows her effect on others is not really that obvious. Bridget knows the way she acts and what she gets away with around the Garou make some kinfolk so uneasy they want nothing whatsoever to do with her out of preoccupation for their own safety.

Bridget grins coyly and looks down at last.

"Sounds great," she mumbles, shuffling back towards the bar.

She looks back over her shoulder, "And you're not annoying."