Lola Hawkes
To say that Lola had been anxiously
awaiting this night was to put it lightly. She'd been taut as a piano
wire for the several days following the initial meeting with this
mystery 'Nina' woman, and only after a good talk with Hector did she
manage to unwind. But even then, she was on edge and ready, waiting for
the day that she could wrap up the mystery of 'some bitch is snooping
into my world'.
Eva had expressed that it would be a good idea to
bring a Theurge, and at first Lola resisted, worried that this Nina
would recognize a Garou, somehow, and that would blow the whole thing.
But then Lola visited Calden and his family, and after talking with
Calden and having him vouch for listening to whatever advice Eva had to
give, Lola finally reached out and made some calls.
She knew of a
pack of Theurges, and reached out to them. They thought Sophia would
best suit the job. Lola provided a time and place for the Silver Fang
Theurge to meet them. She gave a time and an address and a date, and
said that Sophia should just keep back as much as possible. Lola's
precise words over the phone call were:
"We're not supposed to
have Garou with us, and I'm worried that if this bitch figures out we
brought one anyway we're not gonna get to the bottom of this. I'm not
okay letting this woman roam around with all of our information,
alright? So, just tell her to be... subtle."
Well, here's hoping the advice was taken.
Friday
night rolled around and the moon was hanging fat and heavy in the sky.
There were clouds here or there, peppering the world above, but they
didn't do much to blot out Luna's light-- only obscure it from time to
time. Lola had her truck parked down at one end of the strip mall's
stretch of parking stalls, a big ancient white truck with dents and rust
but a reliable engine. She, herself, was away from it, standing on the
curb with her hands in her coat pockets and looking around, appearing
some mix of pissed off and vigilant.
The night wasn't dreadfully
cold, overall it was quite mild really, but it sure wasn't sweater
weather. So Lola dressed with her hair in a thick braid that was tucked
down the back of her tan canvas jacket, with jeans and running
sneakers. She didn't wear a hat or earmuffs, not wanting her hearing
muffled even a little. There was a satchel whose strap crossed her
chest and back, the bag itself at her left hip.
You can't really
see it from the bulk of the coat, but rest assured there's firepower
hidden away in a holster at her side, and some spiritually-amped herbs
in her satchel in case shit goes down.
Treads-the-Ashen-Path
Lola
reached out to the Theurge pack and they responded, unfortunately, they
must be angry at Lola or something because they decided to send Sophia.
To some this might be seen as some kind of punishment, a sign from the
heavens that the gods do not smile in their favor. However, sometimes
you must take what you can get, and Sophia, for her part, was at least
capable of not dying in the face of extreme... Death.
She was
holding a flower in her hand, eyes closed, nose pressed close to the
flower. "They're dead..." She whispers softly with a smile on her face.
"They're all dead, but not you little one... Not yet! Soon, but not
yet." She whispers, an ominous tone in her voice as she seems to speak
to the flower as if it were a dear friend.
She was here to help,
which was good. Sophia never was a Take Charge sort, which was almost a
good thing when one considers her breeding, she seemed content to float
through life as if she were part of a dream.
Subtlety, unfortunately, would be difficult with this one. Fortunately, she might have a trick or two up her sleeve.
Alexis Theron Lambros
Alexis
has very close ties to that Theurge pack as well. He is associated
with them through his relationship with Phoebe; he stood next to them
when judgment was levied against the Elders of the Cold Crescent. He
told Phoebe about the situation as soon as he'd left the place and as it
turned out, Sophia was already put on the case. And so he got
information from what Sam and Eva had uncovered, and was heading toward
the meeting spot.
He pulls his car up to the strip mall, dressed
similar to how he was before. The only addition, much as he was loathe
to bring it, was a gun underneath the windbreaker. He is looking at
Sophia as they get out of the car and look around, his expression a
bit...wary. They've worked together once before and it went well enough
though, so who knows?
"It might not be best to be talking like
that when we do this meeting." He looks around the vicinity to get a
sense of the area. "She's expecting kin only."
zeal
The
parking lot in the strip mall is cracked in places like poverty itself
had stomped through and dented the tarmac and the majority of the signs
are in Spanish or Vietnamese. LIQUORS is one of the only English words.
GPS
if not rudimentary map-reading dumps them in front of a unit at the
very end of the strip of stores. Metal shudders secure the front window
and the entrance hides behind a metal gate-door. The sign identifies it
as Phones & More. Their hours are 9am to 6pm every day but Saturday
and Sunday. Saturday they open at noon. Sunday they aren't open at all.
With
the exception of a white Honda Civic parked outside of LIQUORS no other
cars populate the place and stood out here in the cold one could see
interlopers for miles. The gathered Kinfolk and Sophia can hear laughter
in the silence between waves of cars. Teenagers loiter in the parking
lot of a fast food restaurant across the street and down a way.
Like
most teenagers they don't pay any attention to their surroundings and
they don't give two shits about the congregation happening outside
Phones & More. They're busting each others' balls and jumping off of
things. They have better things to worry about than the rest of the
world.
Two minutes past seven o'clock a dark sedan with
out-of-state plates pulls into the strip mall and drives around the side
of the lot to park by the dumpster where the street lamps don't reach.
The more observant among them see a person or the shape of a person in
the passenger seat and hear the dinging of the driver's side door
hanging open before the keys leave the ignition. They cannot hear the
words the driver speaks but she does take the keys with her and clap
shut the door before she turns to walk towards Lola and Alexis.
Nina is wearing a windbreaker instead of a peacoat this time. It isn't that cold out tonight.
Lola Hawkes
Lola
has been here for about twenty minutes, standing impatiently and
scoping the place out. She wanted to be there early, to make sure that
traps weren't getting set up before time, that no one unfamiliar showed
up to try and lurk in the shadows and get the spring on them. No such
thing happened, though, so the uneventful time until vehicles started
rolling into the parking lot was spent watching people across the street
and on the sidewalk in front of her. Thankfully Lola is, overall, just
surly and imposing enough to look at that no one bothered her. She was
plenty brown enough to fit right in, too.
First a powder blue old
Buick rolled up, and Lola's sharp eyes cut through the windshield and
side windows until she was able to recognize the profiles-- Alexis that
Black Fury Kinfolk that had come to the summons of the letter last time,
and he was bringing Sophia along with. She relaxed, just a little, but
was on the alert once more when the second car rolled in. Her jaw set
and her shoulders hunched and her spine tightened when she realized that
there was a body in the passenger seat.
She's even more terse
when Nina comes walking up without that second person in tow. Prior to
Nina's arrival, though, Lola had nodded her head over toward Alexis and
Sophia and waved a hand for them to come join her. When they were near
enough, she said: "She's here," and gestured with that same hand toward
the dumpster and shadows where the dark car rested.
When Nina was
within earshot, Lola's chin hiked up and she stated, bluntly: "Who'd
ya bring with you? That your sister in the car?"
Alexis Theron Lambros
Alexis
knows this location from the information that had been passed to him by
the other kinfolk. Based on what he knows, it's not the safest
potential location for them; nothing about it seems legit from what he's
been told. It's a front. And when he hears the teenagers that doesn't
make him feel better. It means potential for Veil breach, or just more
blood.
So let's add up the totals here: two armed kinfolk, a
Garou who wasn't supposed to be here by their blackmailer's decree, kids
who can be collateral damage, that blackmailer who seems to have a
sordid history of sorts (with lots of trauma, anyway) and who has
several handguns.
Oh yeah, this is gonna go great, he thinks.
He
walks over to Lola and gives her a short nod before turning his
attention to Nina. He frowns a little bit, but he just gives her a
little nod. It's her move first, as far as he's concerned.
Treads-the-Ashen-Path
Sophia
leans in closer to Alexis on the drive and a smile appears on her face
as she breathes in his scent, as if comparing it to that of the flower.
"You smell like home..." She whispers gently to him. "Just like Phoebe."
She frowns slightly, "but I don't think she's ever been home."
"She's
probably right to avoid us... My kind aren't the most forgiving to
those who threaten our kin." She says softly as she settles her flower
somewhere in the car and she steps outside. She breathes in the cool air
and a smile appears on her face. "So much cold. I don't like the cold!"
One might half expect the Silver Fangs to be the fondest of all, but
Sophia has spent the better part of her life on an island in the middle
of the Aegean, basking in the sunlight like a reptile... Naturally, cold
winters were not her friend!
She needs to be subtle, got it, don't say anything someone else wouldn't say, and you'll do fine!
She
keeps with Alexis, follows his lead, it was so much easier to float.
However the presence of the teenagers does draw her attention and soon
puts a smile on her face when she remembers those teenagers Lola shot,
and then they helped, not too long ago.
zeal
Nina
comes to stand a safe distance away from them although it's up to them
to decide if it's her own safety that she keeps in mind or theirs. She
does not appear to recognize either Sophia herself or what Sophia is.
With
all the noise and the metal and the concrete around them they are not
the only clandestine meeting occurring in this part of town at this time
of day. Night falls fast so close to winter and with the added hours of
darkness all manner of fringe-dwelling denizens make use of the time to
fill their stores. The opposite of humans.
Law enforcement will
respond to shots fired but they won't materialize. They're looking at a
six-minute response time on a Friday evening. More if something major
happens somewhere else.
A question garners an answer:
"Yes."
Nina
sucks on an eyetooth. Sophia can pick up traces of an Eastern European
accent on the woman's voice. She is of average height and weight, with
long dark wavy hair and pale freckled skin. Her voice is flat but not
lifeless. She sounds exhausted. Looks it, too. Since last week dark
circles have formed beneath her eyes.
"So what is the plan, then?"
Lola Hawkes
If
the Theurge and the Black Fury Kinsman were expecting Lola to confer
with them before making decisions, that was their mistake. People ought
to know by now that Lola's a very take-charge kind of woman. Alexis,
perhaps, not so much, but his first encounter with the Uktena Kinswoman
was to see her lunge at this Nina like she was going to attack and shake
her by her coat.
If Sophia was so kind to share the story in the
car when told that they were going to meet Lola, he'd also know that she
blew a teenager's brains out without batting an eyelash because of a
problem with being possessed by some spirit-infused token or another.
The
question of what the plan is comes out, and Lola at least has the
courtesy to glance back briefly, first to Sophia (this a flicker-fast
glimpse), then to Alexis, where she holds his eyes for a second and
raises her eyebrows in a 'Do you believe this shit?' kind of
way. It's soon enough that she's looking back to the woman with dark
hair, dark bags under her eyes, and pale skin to contrast.
"Ain't
you the one who dragged us out here?" Lola scoffed and folded her arms
over her chest, then jerked her head toward the Phones & More
storefront. "If you got keys to this place, going inside wouldn't be a
bad start."
Alexis Theron Lambros
He frowned and
actively leaned away from Sophia when she got close to him. She's a
Garou, and he's respectful of that always. It's not a forced respect,
either...it's a sincere, inborn respect of her status within the
nation. But respectful and tolerant are two different things; his
personal space is his personal space, and while he isn't the kind of
kinfolk who disrespects the Trueborn, neither is he the kind of person
who cowers and fails to stand up for himself.
"Don't do that again, please." He had frowned, and left it at that.
-------
But
now, they were here, and Nina had approached and asked what the plan
was. Alexis was not a dishonest man. Not only was he not inclined to
do so...well, let's be frank. He couldn't do so to save his life.
There isn't a chance in hell that he was going to be able to carry off
Eva's misdirections and pretend that they could fix Nina's sister. And
he didn't think Sophia or Lola would be inclined to take that route. So
he instead spreads his hands and looks at the woman opposite the two
kin and Garou, shrugs.
"Before we get into how this is
going to work...I want to know some things. Such as, 'How do you know
so much about us?' for starters."
He nods to Lola when she
suggests going inside. That seems like a good idea. "Inside would
definitely be a better place to talk about this. I don't like the idea
of handling this matter in public."
Treads-the-Ashen-Path
The
bright side of the matter was the fact that Sophia was likely one of
the least violent garou they would ever meet. Her rage was present, but
at times she was simply so detached from it, and herself, and the things
around her, that it didn't even feel as if it was a part of her. It
could be a weakness, but it also allowed her, more than most Garou, the
ability to see through eyes which were not clouded by rage.
That
distance proved to be an advantage even now, as she managed to not say
much at all as they discussed the matter of going inside. She gave a
little smile towards the group and a nod of her head to show her
approval of the idea of going inside. She was cold, and she didn't like
being in the cold for too long, it was annoying!
zeal
"We're not talking about anything. We had an agreement."
She
doesn't sound ruffled by the terseness in Lola's tone or Alexis's
proposal of agenda items. She doesn't have much reason to be ruffled. It
isn't her life and loved ones hooked as bait to bring her out here.
Even in the low light her eyes are not hard. The woman looks as them as
if she pities them more than anything else.
"I said: if you can
help my sister, you meet me here, I'll give you everything, you'll never
hear from us again. It's the same time, next Friday. You're here."
Her eyebrows lift and she looks between the three assembled. Doesn't repeat her question and makes no move to lead them inside.
Lola Hawkes
Sophia
was doing a fantastic job of not drawing attention to herself. It
should be called out that Lola noticed this specifically, and some small
part of her that was wound up with tension found relief with this
fact. Sure, plenty of the rest of her was still strung tight and ready
for action. She had a water bottle half-full in her satchel,
specifically half-full so it would be fast and easy to dump the
strength-giving spirit-imbued herbs that her
man/mate/boyfriend/Tribesman/don'tgivethisatitlejustletmebehappy
provided for her on the last mission she went on, shake to mix, and
drink. She hoped she wouldn't need them, but then again a part of her
kind of wanted to all the same. For the sake of adventure if nothing
more.
Alexis wanted more information first-- he wanted to know why
Nina was able to know so much about them. Lola's eyes hopped to his
face, then back to Nina, awaiting an answer. She wouldn't step on the
question because she, too, was quite invested in the answer.
But Nina points out that they had a deal, and refuses to budge on details.
Lola
sniffs loudly, interjecting herself with that sound first, then cut in,
sounding impatient with a hint of a growl trailing on her words and
cutting at her teeth. "Yeah, sure, but can you get us inside or am I
gonna have to go exorcise your sister in the passenger seat?"
Treads-the-Ashen-Path
The
plot thickens and Sophia's eyes suddenly move towards the woman. This
wasn't a threat... Well, it was a threat, but it seemed as if she also
needed help, this much caught Sophia's attention. What did she need help
with? What was wrong with her sister?
That is when her eyes more
curiously shift in the direction of the car, and the passenger within.
Someone was in trouble, and this was something that easily seized
Sophia's attention and pulled her back to reality.
Then came
mention of an Exorcism, and that is when Sophia's attention snapped back
to Lola for a second, and then back to the other woman. Was she
possessed? This... This could be a problem!
Alexis Theron Lambros
Lola
picks up the deception and Alexis doesn't add to it
because--again--he'll just fuck it up. While the Uktena kinfolk may
have released by small degrees, Alexis hasn't. Not because he's
concerned about what Sophia might do really; what will happen there will
happen and there's no sense worrying about it. He's simply remaining
in a ready state. If a fight breaks out, he absolutely wants it
inside. And if it doesn't...
Well, explanations need to be done
inside in any case. Alexis can't lie, but he is rather good at being
persuasive when he needs to be. And that's what he tries now.
"We're not doing this out here, Nina. That's all there is to it. If you think we can help--and we can..." Explanation is help
"...then you have to give us some level of trust here. If you weren't
willing to accept our help, you wouldn't have gone through all of this
trouble. But help in a matter like this requires some trust, so..."
zeal
"You want to go inside? Talk about trust?"
Now
her tone turns sardonic. One corner of her mouth twists up and her
exhaustion and pity become stronger as they mingle together. Her breath
huffs out at a yet-unspoken notion but they don't have to wait long for
the woman to find her words.
"Let's get one thing straight: I
don't know if you can help or not. I told you what I'm prepared to do if
you can't. She's getting worse."
Lola Hawkes
"Oh
holy fucking shit," is all that Lola has to say, and the sound is a rush
of frustration and impatience rolled into one outburst.
She
doesn't shout it, at least, but she is clearly done with this banter.
She's talking still even as she's moving to walk around Nina, away from
the others that showed up with her, on a direct path for the dark car
parked in the shadows next to the dumpster.
"If you don't have the fucking keys just say so, god damn. We'll do it at the car in the shadow of a fuckin' trash heap instead, then."
And unless stopped, Lola rolls her way on over to the car.
Alexis Theron Lambros
He
frowns and looks at the car, then back to the woman. "Okay, if you
don't want to go in, then tell me what specifically is she exhibiting?"
And
then Lola's walking to the car, and Alexis' eyes widen in surprise.
The expression is only momentary though, and he keeps his attention on
Nina to see what she's about to do in reaction: answer him, go with Lola
or try to stop the kinswoman.
zeal
[ignore this]
Dice: 8 d10 TN6 (2, 2, 3, 3, 5, 5, 7, 9) ( success x 2 )
Treads-the-Ashen-Path
She
frowns at Nina, and looks towards her sister, and then back towards the
woman. It was becoming apparent that Nina cared for the woman but had
no clue how to deal with this situation. She was emotionally volatile,
and why shouldn't she be? Her sister might be turning into a monster.
She
wasn't supposed to say what she was, she wasn't supposed to reveal her
expertise, but it also made it difficult for her to find out what she
was looking at. Luckily, Alexis was smart enough to ask the question for
her and Sophia gave a slight smile before looking back towards the
woman in the car, studying her!
zeal
Lola has to
walk around the side of the line of buildings to double back to the car
and she leaves the two women and Alexis to do so. No fear in her form.
She has her handgun and her talen and so many years of experience that
even a brush with death was not enough to sway her from her path.
As
she goes Nina's dark eyes leave Alexis to watch her and the cynicism
leaves the woman's freckled face. Her lips set into a thin line but she
does not go with her.
"She hasn't been the same since our father
and Luka died. I never was so interested in this as they were. Maybe I
should have paid less attention to our mother and more to my sister? But
I thought..."
And Lola keeps walking. Stray crunching gravel
beneath her sneaker soles audible for a time until it drops off. She can
see the form of the passenger in the seat. She has Nina's profile and
her thick dark hair. She does not have Nina's stillness. In the confined
space she is chewing her nails, or her cuticles, or something. The
fingers of one hand are up near her mouth.
"... I don't know what I
thought. She told me it was one of your friends that bit her. Maybe I
just don't know anything. She hasn't been sleeping. She has a temper she
didn't have before, a bad one, and... appetites I don't care to speak
of. The things I've caught her doing at night... maybe I should have
just shot her. But I thought you could help."
Treads-the-Ashen-Path
Sophia
frowns when she hears the story, and she very much hopes the poor girl
is, in fact, simply a lost True-Born. However, there is more to uncover
before she can decide! She needed to speak to this person, examine her,
and for that to happen she needed to be close.
"If anything can be
done it will." She says to reassure the woman. It was the first thing
she's said to her, before she leaves her spot behind and she goes to
examine her sister. Curiosity was powerful for this one, and the thought
of uncovering a long lost cousin excited her to no end! She didn't want
to get her hopes up too much, however, because if the woman was bit it
was also quite possible there was something far more dangerous going on.
So she followed in Lola's tracks soon after, in search of the woman in question! She needed more information!
Lola Hawkes
Lola
had reached the corner of the building before she bothered to glance
back at the others, to see if they were moving along with her or not.
Lola saw Sophia pause to hear what Nina had to say, but start to come
along with after that pause for information-soaking had passed. Alexis
and Nina stayed put, though, Nina telling whatever story she was telling
(Lola couldn't hear at this distance), and Alexis listening because
this shit was probably going to be important.
Lola's eyes met with
Sophia's, just for a moment, and the Kinswoman huffed, nodded a little,
but didn't wait for the Theurge to catch up. Not there at the corner,
at least.
She would stop and let Sophia catch up once she was able
to see the car, though. Lola stood squarely in the clear pavement,
back on the side of the building in the shadows where streetlamps didn't
like to hit. Her feet were spread comfortably enough apart that her
posture was planted and strong, it'd take a linebacker to tackle her
over when she stood like this.
It made for a fairly imposing
silhouette against the shadows in the rear-view mirror if Nina's sister
cared to glance back, for the Uktena Kinfolk stood square and
unflinching, like she was calling her out.
Warriors, come out to play-aaaaay.
Sophia
will be catching up in time to spy Lola pulling a ziplock bag from some
pocket in her satchel and work to unscrew a bottle lid, dump the mashed
and ground herbs (is that weed?) into the bottle. The ziplock baggie
is tucked back into her satchel, the lid is screwed back on, and the
contents are all shaken up until there's about ten ounces of murky
opaque fluid floating about in there. It's somewhat frothed from the
mixing, shaking motion. Lola doesn't cringe at the thought of drinking
it, though, and is unscrewing the lid once more by the time Sophia's
near enough to speak with.
"So, I'm gonna drink this and then go knock. You wanna put the scan out to see if she's Wyrm-touched when I do?"
While waiting for an answer she tips her chin back and chugs the (probably) awful contents from her clear plastic water bottle.
[Spending WP to activate Hero's Mead]
zeal
[Lola's Strength is 5 for the rest of the scene. I suggest no one else stand in front of her until it's over.]
Alexis Theron Lambros
Alexis
is caught just a little bit off-guard by that. Because frankly, it
made sense that she was just completely misinformed. She kept saying One of your friends bit her and now she's becoming like them. She made reference to his mother, who had died half a country away this year. It all added up to make sense.
Now,
suddenly, it was becoming something very different. But Lola and
Sophia are looking into it and Alexis has another job to do, so he does.
He nods a little, and tries to be reassuring. "Listen, if they
can fix what's wrong with her, they will. I can promise you that. You
were right to ask us. Wrong to blackmail, maybe. You could have just
asked first. But we're here now."
zeal
Nina
tosses her head to free her shoulders from the weight of her hair and
looks over her shoulder at the departed women and the space where their
shadows fell as they went and then she turns back to Alexis. She is in
no hurry to walk after them.
"Thank you," she says, a week late. "If you can get her to come inside, I will unlock the door."
Meanwhile
Sophia and Lola approach the vehicle. Darkness cloaks the vehicle and
the woman inside the vehicle. As Lola downs her drink she loses sight of
what the woman inside is doing. After she is done and wiping the herby
ancient drink from her lips she feels a surge come down from the sky as
the bound thunder-spirit rolls out of the herbs and finds a temporary
home in her bones. Her hands look no different but she could flip over
that car with one of them. In her tiny human body she has the strength
of a Garou not yet grown into its war form.
When she focuses on
the car again Nina's sister is staring through the darkness at her with
wide unblinking eyes. Something about her skin looks wrong even from
this distance.
[doo de doo]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (4, 6, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10) ( success x 6 )
Treads-the-Ashen-Path
Sophia
nods in response to Lola's question, and moves to follow her, but not
too close. If the other woman was Garou, and sensitive right now, she
wouldn't want to get too close and potentially leave her feeling
threatened. So she got as close as the hood of the car and stood there
quietly watching the interaction between Lola and the other woman, ready
to step in if there was any trouble, but she really hoped there would
be none. In the meantime she begins searching for the presence of the
Wyrm.
[Sense Wyrm, rolling at diff 6 but it could be lower or higher depending on the ST]
Dice: 3 d10 TN6 (2, 5, 8) ( success x 1 )
Alexis Theron Lambros
"We'll get her inside." He says it with a little nod, a quick glance over to the side of the building, and a thought of Please don't turn me into a liar here guys.
Because
let's be honest here. Alexis is a kin and he doesn't know much about
the spiritual stuff. But he's certainly learning being attached to a
pack of Theurges, and he knows about nasty Wyrm creatures because his
mother was an Ahroun. And he has a very good idea that this is turning
out very poorly. He just hopes that either a) he's wrong or b) Lola
isn't gonna shoot Olga in the car.
"Go unlock the door. I'll keep
an eye out here and make sure they get her in. Unless you'd rather I
go with you. This is all your set-up, after all."
Lola Hawkes
Most
things that Lola approached, she walked toward with confidence. If she
didn't have enough real confidence within her, then she'd approach with
enough swagger to mask it. It was a seldom thing that Lola didn't feel
sure of herself and the actions she was taking, though. The drink
tasted like a lot of dried up plants dredged in water, which was
precisely what she'd anticipated, so she stomached it pretty well
(thankfully). It was well worth it when the reward of sky-given
strength dropping down through the top of her head and spreading through
her bones came, though. Sophia could see when the spirit-charged herbs
took effect because Lola's shoulders rolled and her head tipped back,
putting her face toward the sky for a moment, and she sucked in a full
but quiet breath through her nose.
Her hands clenched and loosened
themselves a few times over, then the plastic bottle she'd had in her
hand was stashed in the satchel once more. As Sophia circled around to
the front of the car, Lola walked along with her. For a small length of
distance they were shoulder-to-shoulder, but then Sophia went around
the driver's side of the car to stand in front of the hood and watch,
and Lola went to the passenger door.
The woman inside the car
looked off, but Lola expected that. She knew the woman was affected in
some way, negatively for it scared her sister, made her convinced she
was turning into a werewolf or something. That didn't necessarily mean
that there would be immediate violence, but Lola was prepared none the
less. Her muscles rang with brand new strength that she never felt
before, and frankly she was itching for the chance to test it out.
I wish a nigga would.
Although
she was sure that she could tear the car door from its hinges if the
need came to be, Lola instead came to stand at the passenger door with
her spine straight and posture nothing but square and space-filling and
impressive. Her hands were at her hips, but one moved to gesture with
two curling fingers: Come on out.
zeal
With
Alexis's delegation of tasks Nina all but sags with relief. As if she's
been hoping for someone to come along and make this burden easier to
bear if they would not take it away from her altogether. The pity gives
way to fleeting guilt. This is her sister. She should be fighting harder
to save her.
She's seen too much and she knows the world these
people belong to. Their promises don't mean a goddamn thing but they're
out here. If that doesn't change anything it at least gets Nina to nod
her head and pull a ring of keys from her pocket.
At the car
Sophia confirms what they had begun to suspect. Between the mystic wash
of corruption and the sight of her they can rest assured this woman is
possessed if not already morphing into something else.
She was
peeling a scale off of her finger when they arrived and she tore it like
a hangnail whose depth she did not plumb properly. As they lingered and
approached Olga's eyes locked onto Sophia and she released the seatbelt
strapping her in the passenger seat.
Lola itches for a fight.
Olga pitches out of the car wild-eyed and screaming like she's just escaped from Malfeas.
[doo de doo]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 2, 3, 5) ( fail )
Lola Hawkes
One
ear was turned toward the Theurge who stood near the headlights,
waiting for a verdict for the scan for Wyrm influence on the woman.
Just seeing her through the glass in the window, though, with wide eyes
and flaking, scaling skin that seemed off and discolored and not
textured appropriately, Lola was pretty sure she had a good idea of what
was to come.
Sure enough, when the seatbelt came undone and the
woman reached for the door handle, she was met by a barrage of motion
and noise. A scream rasped and clawed at Lola's ears, and her molars
ground together at the sound. While her expression was determined but
overall relatively neutral before, now her eyebrows hunkered down and
her forehead creased and her lips twisted into a scowl.
Olga flew
forth from the passenger seat, screaming, but she didn't make it very
far. Lola's shoulder and body jerked forward, and a hand came up to
catch her by the throat. This could be a contributing factor to why
those vocal cords didn't complete the job that they set out to do,
because a hand with strength that Lola was still gauging and figuring
how to handle had smacked into the throat, fingers curled about and
under the jaw, and the woman was straightened back up to stand straight
on her feet whether she liked it or not.
Lola's nose is crinkled
up due to the way that her lips peeled from her teeth. She did not yell
or scream back, but ground her words out into the woman's face instead.
"This is the one chance that you're going to get to behave yourself. Understand this: I will fuck you up. Are we clear?"
[Charisma 2 + Intimidation 3]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (2, 2, 6, 8, 9) ( success x 3 )
Alexis Theron Lambros
Alexis
understands...really, he does. He knows family obligation, and he
knows feeling responsible for someone you care incredibly deeply for.
He knows what it's like to let that person down and no matter how poorly
this started off, he feels for Nina. And so he's watching her as she
heads off to unlock the door, both out of concern and--well, let's be
frank, to make sure it's not a trick. Trust isn't there suddenly
because she put on a few sniffles.
Of course, then there's the
sound of screaming. And he's shooting his attention that way, and
moving laterally to get a better view without just running around the
corner. "Stay there a second, Nina. I'll see what's going on."
Treads-the-Ashen-Path
Sophia
frowns, and that look on her face reveals her outright disappointment.
She had been hoping for a lost cub, she had been hoping they had found
someone whose only crime was not knowing what had happened to them...
Nothing disappointed her more than the discovery that followed. However,
Sophia wasn't entirely without hope... There were options,
possibilities, it wasn't as if they were being attacked. Maybe, just
maybe, if they could get her somewhere safe, somewhere she could be
restrained, they could drive out the taint, and genuinely help her?
However, that would also, likely, mean breaking her cover, and revealing to Nina that she was a True Born.
For
the moment, so long as the other woman wasn't violent, they didn't need
to let on to what they knew. If Sophia had to... Her claws and teeth
would deal with the problem, but as long as she behaved there was no
reason to strike, not if some other solution could be found.
"Be careful..." She whispers to Lola.
~Combat
the Wyrm wherever it dwells, and whenever it breeds~ was their rule,
their law, it was a sacred task which Sophia took seriously, but many
garou took it literally to such a degree that they needlessly threw
their lives away, or needlessly sacrificed lives which did not have to
be sacrificed. It might be easy enough to call her decision foolish,
even misguided, but Sophia did not feel like playing into what she saw
as the Beast of War's trap. She was not a killer, she was a healer, and
if this woman could be cured she would be.
Sadly... The woman's
response was not What Sophia had hoped. She loses control... She leaps
out of the car like a Bat out of Hell. Sophia sighs when she hears the
woman's voice, trying desperately to scream at a much higher pitch than
her body is capable of no doubt. It was that scream that set Sophia on
edge. "Cover her mouth! We need to restrain her..." The theurge says
sharply wish a sigh of disappointment pushing past her lips.
"We
need to get her inside... Now." She snaps at Alexis. "Get her sister to
help." She says as she moves to find something to stuff in the woman's
mouth. Her gut tells her nothing can be done at this point, but... Then,
it wouldn't be like Sophia to just give up because it's impossible.
Sophia
can't perform an exorcism, but there are things she can do... Given
time and patience, she might be able to help the woman. Might...
It
was probably fortunate for Olga that this particular Theurge was sent
along. Most would have simply killed the woman and moved on.
zeal
No
nod this time. Nina flinches at the sound of her sister screaming and
draws a breath and straightens her shoulders and unlocks the security
door.
Whatever the warped thing inside of Olga had hoped to
accomplish by loosing that noise it failed. The kids across the street
have faded into the periphery of the Gaians' awareness but they are not
there anymore. They would have been too far away to feel the blow of
Olga's shriek even if it had had malice and threat in it.
Lola's
hand catches her under the jaw and stops her from hurling herself at
Sophia. With her fingers latched so the Uktena kinswoman can feel how
her skin has toughened. The scales are not exactly reptilian but it will
become a hide soon.
Are they clear.
Olga has cold eyes the
same color as Nina's. The twins are not entirely identical but their
bone structure and coloration is so similar they appear so in the
moonlight. Her windpipe is compressed too much to facilitate speech so
she curls her lips back from her teeth and hisses at the kinswoman. It
is an inhuman sound come from a human throat.
Her eyes are locked on Sophia.
Lola Hawkes
Most
people would have just killed this Wyrm-infected thing and simply moved
on, this is true. You can count Lola up at the top of that list. If
she had her way, Lola would have put a bullet between Nina's eyes the
first time that she met her, and then gone on the hunt for this
mysterious sister through other means-- she would've pulled a Garou into
the hunt if she needed, for use of their nose to track the sister
down. Then she would have killed Olga too.
But much of the advise
she had was to hold her cards close to her chest, to bide her time, and
to learn what she needed to learn from the situation before killing off
the only places that information could come from. She requested that
the Pack of Theurges lend one of their own because a wise woman told her
it was a good idea. She considered, even if for a moment, that this
Nina woman was actually in need of help and not full of ill intent as
Lola was convinced.
It is for these reasons that Lola didn't just
crush the woman's windpipe in the palm of her hand. It would be so
deliciously easy to do. Instead, though, Lola forces the woman's face
to turn by pushing pressure with her thumb and forefingers, examining
the skin of her face, the color of her eyes. She could tell that a
change was in effect, but it hadn't settled completely yet.
Sophia
urgently insisted that they cover the woman's mouth, and Lola shrugged
her shoulder at the Theurge and said: "I'm not putting my fingers
anywhere near that mouth-- I've seen what those infections can do. Nina
said she got this way by a bite, and I don't plan on letting it spread
further than that. She'll keep quiet." Lola's eyes went from Sophia
back to Olga, and her hand squeezed just enough to add discomfort but
not to bruise or damage or inhibit actual air flow yet. "Won't you?"
The hiss might be the closest confirmation she gets.
"Come
on," she says to the Theurge, and starts pulling Olga along by her
throat. The other hand goes for her shirt, coat, sweater, whatever it
is she's wearing, and bunches the fabric between her shoulder blades up
to help march her along toward the Phones & More storefront.
Alexis Theron Lambros
Sophia
barks out an order to get the sister to help, and Alexis would be happy
to accede...if not for the fact that someone needed to open the door,
and Alexis was more thaan capable of helping on his own. So it is with
some regret that he disregards that part and instead moves to help Lola
get the woman inside. He is sure that the kinswoman has the situation
in hand, but Olga could have all sorts of surprises and now would not be
the time to find out.
And so instead of just leaving off, he
moves to the opposite side that Lola's on and locks in the hissing
woman's arm in a non-painful but firm hold. "C'mon, let's go."
Treads-the-Ashen-Path
She
looks back at the restrained woman, her frown showing. "You're scared,
lost, you don't know what is going on. Shhh, I understand. I am going to
help you." She says back to the woman, not caring if the woman
understands her or not. At the same time she is pulling her sweater off
in order to wrap it around the woman's head, more specifically to cover
her mouth.
Nina opens the door, and she is quick to assist Lola in
getting the woman inside. They would need to be out of the public eye,
possibly for several hours, and this seemed as good a place as any to do
it. So once they were inside Sophia would direct them towards a mostly
enclosed, or fully enclosed, area, where they could do this without
anyone peeking inside.
Garou weren't supposed to be on this trip,
however, keeping that secret no longer mattered so much to Sophia. They
were going to try to give this woman a chance in hell of surviving. If
Nina had a problem with this she could file a report with the Garou -
Human affairs commission.
Treads-the-Ashen-Path
[Rolling to Pierce the Gauntlet first! Fuck you Weaver! -1 diff for Natural Channel!]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 9, 10) ( success x 4 )
Treads-the-Ashen-Path
[Taking 3 hours on the summoning! Assuming it is diff 9 for this Incarna that will lower diff to 6!]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 3, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9) ( success x 4 )
zeal
[That'll do, pig.]
Treads-the-Ashen-Path
[Will
use 2 Gaia's breaths to heal the woman over the course of the exorcism!
Meaning, at the end, she should have 2 agg, and... Well... For that I
will mother's touch! So -3 gnosis total]
Dice: 5 d10 TN5 (9, 9, 9, 10, 10) ( success x 5 )
zeal
If
Alexis had not kept his calm in the face of Nina's desperation and fear
this could have gone poor from the start. He does nothing to manhandle
her sister into coming with them but Nina unlocks the door and she waits
until she hears the Kinfolk coming with her sister.
If Lola had
not been able to grab the possessed Olga by the throat and ensure her
compliance by strength alone they would have had to take her down with
tooth or talon or trigger. As it is the raw-throated screech draws
Alexis around the side of the building and between Lola's spirit-granted
power and Alexis's martial arts training they are able to march the
woman back in side.
In the heat of battle with her sisters beside
her Sophia was able to summon the Incarna of a powerful cleansing spirit
to blast Beloved Horror's totem right out of them. It weakened their
spirits and their bodies and drove them out of the pit with their
numbers halved. She has time tonight. She has Lola guarding the door and
Alexis keeping Nina occupied.
While they wait for the spirit of
Unicorn to make the journey from the land of dreams and love Nina smokes
cigarettes and explains what happened to Alexis. Seeking absolution,
maybe. It isn't much of an explanation. They've found out as much about
her as she has found out about any of them.
Their paternal
grandfather was KGB. Their father brought his hatred of the supernatural
over with him from the old country. At first they sought leeches, her
father and her brother and her twin sister, but then a year ago her
father and brother were killed by a creature with fangs and fur. Olga
became obsessed with hunting down and killing any lupine she could find.
Nina
offers to fetch something for Lola to eat. Doesn't say why. Doesn't
have to say why. She used what she knows to get her to come out here.
But she wasn't lying. She wants to get rid of everything she knows.
When
the great and ancient spirit completes the journey and joins Water in
the list of spirits to whom Treads the Ashen Path is now indebted Lola
has to move away from the wall to hold down Olga. Olga had remained sat
against the wall twitching and staring her dark stare at them the entire
time Sophia bid the Incarna forth. Her hide toughens and turns a color
unholy and impenetrable. She keeps baring her teeth like she aims to do
something with them but they do not become fangs. Hatred stains her gaze
when she looks at Sophia but Lola has checked her back to the floor
enough times that she doesn't try again.
It takes some convincing to get the Unicorn Incarna to do as it is asked, but not so much as Water would have required.
That's
when Lola's strength is necessary again. She has to hold down Olga
while the exorcism forces from her a Bane who had had the last three
hours to grow accustomed to its new home. She screams and she screams
and she screams and this is not the Wyrm's roar but a scream of the
Wyrm's anguish and the Wyrm's ire and it sets hair on end and brings
water to the eyes to hear it but Lola is strong in both mind and body.
Sophia has gourds and the touch of Gaia to keep her from dying as the
Bane plucks loose muscle and tendon and her will to live as it is beaten
back.
Alexis has to grab Nina to keep her from throwing herself
into something she does not understand. No one hears the screams. This
strip mall is abandoned by ten o'clock when the exorcism begins. LIQUORS
locked up at nine.
And it wears on them all. As the Bane's hold
loosens at the end at a last the darkness goes out of Olga's eyes and
the hardness of her skin recedes and the scales go with it and left in
its place is healthy if recently deprived of sunlight. Olga lies still
and dazed on the floor and Nina brings a hand to her mouth to stifle a
sob.
When Alexis lets her go she races to Olga and grabs her by
the face and starts to cry in earnest as she berates her in the language
they spoke as girls. It sounds like Russian but they are twins. They
have their own language. Olga blinks and her face becomes a mask of
anguish before she clutches her sister into an embrace.
It passes
as everything does and Nina is the one to help her sister to her feet
and to the car. She does not lock up after herself or the Gaians. This
place is a front anyway.
---
The moon shines pregnant
overhead as whoever walks with Nina back to the car stands there in the
wake of the clapped-shut passenger side door. Nina does not thank them
again. She walks around to the trunk of the car and unlocks it.
Inside
is a laptop computer with the charger. A cardboard file box filled with
flash external hard drives. Another file box containing several
handguns. Another file box pushed full of photocopies and handwritten
notes.
"I burned most of the paper," Nina says in a dull voice. "You'll just have to trust me. Everything else she had on you is here."
Nothing
else to say after that. She helps them load the contents of the trunk
into whichever vehicles will take them and then she gets into her car
and she drives away.
Lola Hawkes
For some reason,
Lola had it in her head that this would be a quick mission. She'd go,
she'd find this girl that needs 'saving', she would evaluate her and
deem her one thing or the other -- redeemable or needing to be put
down. If redeemable, she figured they would take her to the Sept and
let them deal with it. If not? Well, that's what Lola figured she was
there for, after all.
Instead, this ends up being a task that eats
well into the night. They go inside of this empty hollowed out front
for a store where there's no electric light to glow overhead and draw
attention through windows. Bringing a Theurge turned out to be the best
idea, and Lola would need to make a point of telling Calden and Eva
this both later on. Sophia was able to see that this was not yet a
fully-made Fomori, that the Bane could still be pulled out, even if it
would take some work. She said she needed someone, some Unicorn, to
come and help. She said it would take time to get there.
Lola didn't anticipate that three hours was what she meant.
Still,
she stays. She wanted to go home, to stretch out in bed because she
knew that as soon as this spiritual energy filtered its way out of her
system the body left behind would be exhausted in its wake. For a long
time things are quiet, and Lola is stationed near the door, but well
within easy eyesight and a quick dash to reach Olga if the need came to
be. Her shoulders were squared against the wall, arms over her chest,
and her chin had started to bob down and eyes threatened to become
heavy. It was at this point that Nina had addressed her directly and
offered to get her food. Lola looked up at Nina, and for the first time
the gaze wasn't pure suspiscion and dislike. Instead she looked
surprised, taken aback. The offer would be declined, but Lola at least
sounded sincere when she added: "Thanks, though," at the end.
Then,
when it seemed that this fucking Unicorn would never make its way
through the densely-knitted webs of the Gauntlet, it appeared, full of
light and love and warmth and splendor. And hell would break loose in
Olga's world, and that's where Lola needed to step in.
She was the
muscle here, so each time that Olga tried to charge forward to contest
the summoning Lola would put her back down. First she simply pushed the
woman back by her shoulders and moved her body in between her and
Sophia. The next time she pushed her back by her forehead. The third,
she put hands on the woman's shoulders and pushed to force knees to
buckle and strike ground. When the time came to hold her down
physically while she writhed and screamed and cried in pain, Lola was
there to keep her from flailing and bucking up off the ground and
clawing her way free from what was happening. The sound was terrible,
the strain exhausted her mentally and physically, and when she was sure
that it would be all for naught and that the woman would die a gourd was
broken and healing waters flowed and it all just kept on going.
Going,
going, going, until it was done. The would-be Fomori was a woman
again, and the sisters came together to embrace and weep and Lola would
back away to give them their space to reconnect, respectful of Family if
of nothing else.
------------------
Olga's back in the car,
and Nina's pulling things out of the trunk to be disposed of. You'd
better believe that Lola steps forward to say (nay, insist)
that she will take care of it personally. After watching her physically
batting around a mini-Fomori all night, it's easy to understand why no
one would be inclined to fight her for the privilege of destroying
evidence.
Once all of those cardboard boxes have been loaded into
Lola's truck, weighed down and covered up so they don't fly or flap out
the back while she drives, she'll bid her farewells. For Alexis, he
gets a shake of the hand and a parting clap on the shoulder. Sophia
gets respectful compliance to whatever boundaries she sets for herself--
if the Theurge allows Lola will hold a hand on her shoulder while
telling her that she was impressive. If not, then she'll tell her the
same thing but without touching at all.
Nina? Nina gets some clear advice:
"We
helped you this time, because your sister was in need and, frankly,
because you didn't leave much choice. I'm letting you walk away 'cause
you kept to your word, far as I can see, and haven't hurt anyone. I
don't want to ever see you again, though. Take good care."
The last they'll see of the Uktena is the flash of her tailights as she drives her beat up truck back out of the city.
Alexis Theron Lambros
Alexis
can thank his Zen teachings for keeping his calm. Because in truth he
was far from it for most of the time; it isn't that he didn't hope it
would turn out, but he's seen these things before and they don't
typically go well. But his extensive martial arts training had given
him a sense of discipline that allowed him to stay even-keeled, because
he had known that is the bets way to promote such in others.
He
has his disagreements with some of Lola's tactics, and Sophia creeps him
out sometimes. But they work together quite well tonight and all fit
the portions of the job that is required of them. He stays with Nina,
listening to her story about hunting down creaturs of the Wyrm and then
creatures of Gaia. He lets the others do their thing and he does hold
Nina back, telling her to stay calm and trust in them. They know what
they're doing (as he prays that it works out).
And then it's done
and there's reunion; not all happy, but then they never are. This is
not a fairy tale, nor is it a Hollywood movie. It's more of a Coenesque
noir where resolution is simply that: resolution. In the end some
lives have been lost and their is pain and suffering, and some survive
and move on. There's no sunset here to drive off into; just the night.
Nina doesn't give thanks, and Alexis doesn't expect it. There are no apologies, no you're welcome. This is a moment beyond words.
Once
Nina has driven off, it's the business of the information. Alexis asks
whose information is on what and says they should distribute it that
way. They don't need to know each other's secrets (if there are
secrets). For his part, he will keep his because it contains
information on his mother, and he doesn't have a lot of his old pictures
here to remember her. He wishes he did.
The guns, Alexis will
let Lola take. He has one; he doesn't like having it. They can go with
Lola, though he suggests they be distributed among the kin who live in
the city still. They are far away from a Sept (until/if Cold Crescent
is back up and running) and they could use the protection.
And then he heads off to take Sophia to wherever she wants, than then head home after a phone call to Phoebe.
Treads-the-Ashen-Path
Sophia
was tired, but she was pleased. Sophia was pleased because she didn't
have to kill something to help save someone from the Wyrm's clutches.
She doesn't wait for praise, or thanks, she doesn't need anything from
the mortals. To know she helped someone... Sophia lives in a world of
violence, where war has become so ever present that most Garou don't
think twice about killing something before even bothering to understand
it or help it. She lives among a people who, from where she sits, sit
dangerously on the precipice about to leap blindly into the arms of the
Beast of War.
~ Combat the Wyrm Wherever it Dwells, and Whenever
it Breeds ~ was a rule that the garou lived by, and so too did Sophia,
but hers was a different battle. Tonight she drew a line in the sand,
and informed the Wyrm that she would not let it take a step closer.
However, ultimately, Sophia knew that this war they fought wasn't a war
for land or territory, it was a war of the soul and spirit of all
things... Their enemy, like the woman who was just cleansed, was
suffering, the agony in her screams an echo of the pain of the Wyrm. She
did not hate the Wyrm, she pitied it... Because, like the woman she
just helped to cleanse, it too was a victim, and you don't help the
victim by killing it... Not if you can find some other way, and that is
what Sophia sought most of all in this world, another way. Of course,
that too... Was likely just another sign of her mind's instability!
She
did have something to say to Nina and Olga first, however. "She must
put the past away, she must learn to bury it... Both of you. Or it will
only take her again. Go, and leave your old lives behind you here, and
never look back, please... For her, for both of you." She says with a
little smile to the woman.
She was proud of herself, and she
allowed that to show in her smile. She even accepts Alexis' offer of a
ride! However she has him drop her off somewhere in the desert, where
she disappears into the darkness almost as quickly as she appeared. She
had some frolicking to get to!
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