Edge Town-City of Light

Jarl

Well, here we go. Jarl folded the letter and the PO box address and put it in his jacket pocket, making sure the cop was at least going to be somewhat comfy when he came to, and then rushed down the stairs, turning his head to the teenage girl.

"Well, I promised you an explanation. It can't be here, though. If any more officers show up, I might be in trouble. Don't worry, both of them are just sleeping - they will wake back up in a few hours, good as new." He whistled, and Tjalfe soon went to stand by his side. He'd taken off his gloves, and had his hands in his pockets, looking as non-threatening as he possibly could.

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Anne, Terry and Alex

Behind Alex, Aiden let out a sigh of relief. It didn't show for long - he evidently didn't want to give Alex the privilege of seeing him so thoroughly unnerved - but it was obvious he was also happy to see Bethany was alright. He turned away as soon as he saw she was safe and headed out the room again.

Freeloader, competing to see who could be the biggest attention whore in the Thorne household, immediately flopped onto his back as David came closer, paws held high, tummy exposed.

It said something about Annette's parenting ability when Terry managed to handle her little slip-up with more grace than she could manage. David bought his explanation with a small nod before immediately being distracted by kitten tummy, making a little squeak noise, and petting Freeloader with renewed excitement. Annette breathed a small sigh of relief. Which turned into a snort of laughter at Alexander's next few words.

This is going to be my life now, isn't it. Until this Samson ordeal is sorted out.

I don't think I've had a weirder boss than him.

"We j-just shook on it. You weren't coherent enough for, um, p-pen-holding." Annette took her seat again next to Bethany, and took a long drink of her coffee before she continued. "But...we also d-didn't discuss what I'd actually be doing for you, or payment. It was sort of a spur-of-the-moment type thing. So after food m-maybe we can hash th-that out?"

Terry leaned over to Anne and stage-whispered, "Say he promised you all sorts of things when you shook on it. If he can't remember what happened he can't contradict you." With an incredibly blatant conspiratorial wink, he went back to his pancakes. Which fortunately weren't buttered, as it wouldn't have melted in his mouth.

Jarl

De Goff's daughter was right where Jarl had left her—curled up on the corner of the couch, hugging her legs to her chest, tear-tracks down her cheeks. She didn't seem to register him at first when he came down the stairs, but when he spoke, she started, her eyes focusing on him.

"What do you want me to do?"

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Alexander

Alexander mock-glared at Terry, his panic having receded down to a barely-uncomfortable, stale chill in his gut. Damn, he needed food. And caffeine. And for his faint hangover to go the fuck away. The banter was welcome, though.

"Careful. Jesse monitors my expenses. This might be what finally crosses the line."

He gave Ms Wagner a flippant wave.

"Certainly. I've got some contracts pre-written that can be adapted. This isn't my first magical hire. We'll hash it out later. After caffeine. And dealing with your mob problem. For now, let's say we shook on it, and we'll help each other in Paris. Have you ever dealt with necromancers before?"

edited 16th Oct '17 9:14:36 PM by DrTentacles

"...as in a person with magic to raise the dead? And make zombies? No. No, absolutely no, never. Sorry." Annette spoke in a lower voice than before, careful not to let David hear this turn in the conversation. If he did then he wasn't showing it, having buried his nose into Freeloader's scruff and begun nuzzling. Her relief for that was overshadowed by the dread she'd buried last night. Right. Zombies. Alexander and Terry had fought zombies. Zombies were real. What next? Santa?

Actually she could do without that confirmation for a while.

"And are we t-talking, um, Romero or Edgar Wright zombies? Because I know which I'd p-prefer."

edited 16th Oct '17 9:34:05 PM by KeiranGold

Leon hummed to himself at the suggestions the siblings gave him. He had no clue what Bruno's suggestions meant which invalidated them, and naming it Little Leon just seemed wrong. "Manet? Dufy?"

He turned his attention to Tim in response to his cautioning against the naming of the paint entity. "Sure, names have power, but I intend to keep it, at least for the time being, and I have to call it something. Besides paint monster that is. It's not like I'm going to name it Deathbringer Destroyer of Worlds. I'm probably going to end up calling it like Painty or something."

Jarl

Crap, she's not taking it well. Jarl considered his options for a second. Then, he got what was either the greatest, or the stupidest, idea he'd ever had in his young life. And he had collected some stupid, stupid ideas over the years.

"I need you..." he started, in a grave, severe voice. "...To point me to the nearest pizza place. I'm buying."

And getting some Little Folk to watch over her.

Alexander

"Oh, I wish they were Shaun of the Dead shamblers. I'd consider keeping a few in my garage if that were the case. They are, unfortunately, the fast kind. At the very least, it keeps them interesting. Bullets work. So does massive blunt force trauma. I'm still experimenting with other things. Your first job can be to figure out something useful for that."

Alexander sat down, taking a bit of pancakes, giving a slight smile of pleasure. They were very sweet. Not bad. Just sweet. Next to him, Bethany looked over to Freeloader, able to pay attention to the cat for the first time since it arrived.

"Hey! Kitty! Alex look, it's our kitty. How did he get here?"

edited 17th Oct '17 8:33:13 PM by DrTentacles

"Do you need to keep it?" Tim said, the voice of a resigned parent surrendering to their little child in love with a puppy.

Wizard's Two

The heavy, limping clomp of footsteps coming down the stairs announced Rollo's arrival in the dining room. The grizzled old ex-warden looked unaffected by his efforts of the previous night, dressed in fresh, but still somehow rumpled tweed suit, a cane in his hand.

"Why not? Could be useful. At worse, makes a pretty desk toy." He growled in an unasked for response to Tim's question, faint humor in his eyes.

Rollo limped past the table, giving a grunt of greeting to Michele and Bruno, and started boiling a pot of tea, then slid heavily into a seat.

"The Council are talking to De Goff, and your friend—the artist, headed home early this morning to her girlfriend. Figure you two are still pretty banged up from last night, but that means we're waiting for both of them to come back to us with fresh leads."

Michele slid a plate of eggs in front of Rollo, giving him a fond smile, and the old warden started to pick at his food, gesturing with a fork while he talked.

"That leaves you with Fontaine, then. The industrialist. I've heard the name a few times. He's got his own damn tower in Paris. Makes the news from time to time. If anyone is likely to have a link with living Poisoners—instead of just being a descendant like your artist, it's him. Of course, that means it'll be hard getting an appointment."

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Jarl

Well. That got her attention. De Goff's daughter blinked, looking at Jarl as though he'd just grown a second head.

"What?" She sniffled, raising her hand to swipe at her eyes.

"I.."

She swallowed.

"Pizza? All this, and you want to go for Pizza? I...no. I want to be here. The police said they'd call mother and..."

All at once, Jarl felt the something shift in his chest. His heart skipped a beat, like he'd seen an old friend for the first time in years.

The girl didn't appear to notice anything out of the ordinary.

Behind him, from the the front window, came a crackling noise. Like shattering ice. Then another.

Then, someone knocked on the door.

edited 18th Oct '17 12:01:14 PM by DrTentacles

Tim scratched the downside of his thumb with a thoughtfull expression. "If he has really a connection to them, he'd be - by necessity - something of a collector. Maybe we could offer him something that would interest him enough to..make space."

"That, Bethany, is an excellent question I think we'd all like the answer to," Terry said. He glared sternly at the kitty. "Do you teleport, cat? Are you magic? Do you know better ways to deal with zombies? Tell us your secrets!"

The look of dread that passed over Annette's face was a stark contrast to David's glee when Bethany started talking to the cat. He turned towards her, still holding Freeloader like a baby in his arms. "What's his name? How old is he? He's so small—my cat's really big now, but she used to be just as little. And fuzzy!" All traces of nervousness were well buried under his bright grin, and it was a relief to his mother that he was talking to Bethany rather than sulking. Now if only her own conversation wasn't so grim. Hah. Grim. Zombies.

Fuck.

"...I'll...t-try, but I don't know anything about necromancy. I can't even, um, c-cast spells. I'm not a Wizard," Annette looked down at the tip of her nose, her bangs hiding her eyes for the moment, "I'm not sure h-how I'll be able to help if I don't know the...m-mechanics of it."

Alexander

Alexander mentally flinched at Bethany's questions, giving her a long, world weary stare.

"So you didn't bring the cat?" He sighed.

Bethany gave him a quizzical look, then turned back to David, a smug smile on her face.

"He's letting you hold him? He must like you! He's only a kitten right now, but Jesse says he's suppose to grow super big!"

Alexander turned back to Annette.

"We seem to have lost the children. I take it, then, you aren't the sort of mother that fantasizes about killing zombies in her free time? Shame. Well, my task remains. Someone who can raise the dead tried to kill me, and they will again. Let's see what we can do about it."

Ms Wagner was really taking it all too seriously. I mean, they were zombies. B-Movie horror fodder. Killing them was almost therapeutic.

"For the record, we've got pretty low standards on the zombie-killing front. I was running around lobbing rocks at the stupid thing. While buck naked, god I wish I could shift my clothes. If you can toss acid bottles or something at them while fully clothed you'll be at least a couple steps up from me."

Jarl

Jarl had a sinking feeling he knew exactly who'd just appeared at the door. Well, there were two possible candidates and, thankfully for him, both of them involved the exact same gesture. He raised a hand as if motioning 'give me a minute' to the girl before he went to the door and opened it.

"Oh, hey boss. I'd put the kettle on, but it's not exactly my house, is it?"

_______________________________________________________________________________________________________________

The Kitty Appreciation Squad (and Alex)

Freeloader briefly turned his head away from David to paw at Terry and, and this might just be his over-active canine imagination, wink at him?

edited 20th Oct '17 10:05:07 AM by math792d

Jarl

The door of De Goff's flat opened, revealing...no one. Well, no one animate. A battered pizza carrier—the kind used by delivery drivers world-wide to keep their cargo warm lay on the front step, gently steaming in the cold winter air.

De Goff's yard, however—and the entire street outside—was filled with a flurry of snow, a flat, white, blanket that blocked anything more than ten feet away from view. It was like it had been teleported into the heart of the blizzard, isolated from the rest of Paris by a curtain of snow.

Nothing stirred in the white curtain.

Then, all of a sudden, from out of the snowstorm, a giant snowball cannoned at Jarl's face.

"Catch!"

edited 20th Oct '17 12:59:47 PM by DrTentacles

David's eyes glittered at the image of the cute little kitten in his arms becoming a giant, fluffy feline in the future. "How big? Like as big as a dog? Or even bigger? My cat's name is Kitty, and she's just fat. Really fat," he giggled and came back to the table, trying to keep the kitten away from the pancakes and syrup, but also wanting to continue this very enjoyable conversation about cats.

Annette, however, was still not finding her side of this enjoyable. Sure Terry and Alexander were making light of the whole zombie-killing thing but she wasn't a violent person, and killing things was filed under 'violence'—even things that had been previously dead to start with. With one glaring exception. She did get momentarily distracted by the image of a naked Terry slinging rocks at zombies. And not for the reasons one might get distracted by thoughts of naked people. She burst into a fit of giggles. "O-Oh no, do you not, uh, k-keep your pants when you turn into a wolf? Like the Hulk? Maybe I c-can start being helpful by carrying a backpack with, heh, spare clothing?"

And as for killing things...

"...t-to be completely honest, the only thing I ever imagined harming was v-vampires. The blood-eating kind." Her smile hardened slightly, and though she didn't catch it David's eyes fell on her for an instant. But it passed as quickly as it had appeared. She placed a finger to her chin in thought. "If acid works on th-them, then maybe my faux-acid ones will work, too. If it'll h-help you figure out what else might work I c-can show you a line up of my wares?"

That might be easier to talk about than all of this.

Wizards Two

Rollo rubbed his bearded jaw, letting out a thoughtful grunt.

"Could work. In the supernatural community...mmm. Fontaine's wife was more of a player than the man himself. She hired seers, minor talents. Might have some dealings with Fae, Vampire Courts, and the Church. The family played it close to the chest."

He shrugs, clearly trying to recall something more useful.

"He's been pretty reclusive since her death. Not that I pay attention to rumors and tabloid crap."

edited 21st Oct '17 8:36:29 PM by DrTentacles

Tim gave Rollo an almost imp-ish smile. Almost. "Well, reclusive or not, if we offer him something interesting he may at the very least be tempted to take a look." The wizard gave an almost imperceptible shrug. "Especially if it is presented by someone who ought to have the authentic merchandise."

Terry made the "I'm watching you" gesture at the cat before turning to Anne with a grin. "I don't burst through them, I just have to ditch them before I shift or flail around awkwardly in clothes designed for a completely different body shape. Usually I get them back after, but that fight was kinda set to Yackety Sax.

"And yes, wares sound great. Definitely wanna have a good idea of what you can do if you're gonna be in this with us."

Leon munched on his food as Rollo and Tim discussed their next course of action. He poked at the jar that his paint monster resided in still contemplating what to name it, before deciding to join the conversation. The idea of using the paintbrush as bait seemed fine, but he was a little leery of someone else getting their hands on it after the problems De Goff caused.

"He may not take it well, if we don't actually sell the brush during the meeting. And we better not actually be selling the brush. De Goff caused enough havoc with it. Assuming you are of course talking about the brush, and don't happen to have another magical artifact laying about."

Jarl

Jarl wasn't really bothered by the snow itself. He'd more or less acquired total immunity to cold at this point.

However, a giant snowball still had mass and, crucially, still had momentum, which meant that as soon as a mass of snow in the vague shape of a ball slapped him in the face, he staggered back, waving white, frozen water out of his face.

"...Hey, Jack. How's Faerie?"

Jarl

With a soft crackling of creeping ice upon De Goff's cobblestone walkway, a young boy stepped out of the blizzard, right at the end of the path. He was dressed in a puffy, white, winter jacket, wool-knit mittens, jeans, and a bright red woolly cap, embroidered with the words "Frost's Fresh Za." His face was pale with the cold, except for his nose and cheeks, which were a rosy, frost-bitten red, and his eyes sparkled with both mischief, and an odd sort of seriousness that belied his youth.

Jack Frost. Formerly a changeling named Braden. Jarl's boss.

"You didn't duck fast enough! That didn't hurt, did it?" Jack asked, stepping up to Jarl, and dusting him off with a mitten. "Faerie's crazy. Crazier than it's ever been, in fact. At least, I think so."

Jarl hadn't ever gotten a real chance to know the old Jack. He'd met Braden, once or twice, though. Braden had been a teenager—fourteen, fifteen—right on the edge of maturity. Jack Frost was younger. A child. Twelve, at the most. Only his eyes were old.

"Sorry to....butt in. You're doing fine. Well, mostly fine. But I...felt like you needed help? Or at least-" Jack bend down, picking up the still-steaming box of pizza, and waving with a mitten at the house."

"She needs my help."

He flashed Jarl a grin, aware that he wasn't being all that clear.

"And I guess you and I probably should talk. Um. Can you call her to the door? She needs to invite me in."

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Alexander

So naked Terry is funny, killing zombies isn't. I can work with that.

Alexander leaned back in his chair, taking another chug of coffee, and resisted the urge to put his feet up on the table. He was technically a guest here. Even if it was his hotel.

"A tech demo! Very well, Q. Show me what you've got."

____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Wizards Two

Rollo nodded at Tim, a crooked smile on his lips.

"Yeah." He rumbled. "That might work. If he's still a Poisoner, magical artifacts will get his attention. He's going to vet you...but you shouldn't tip too many flags."

His expression turned to a scowl a moment later.

"Call me a vote against selling the brush, as well. That thing's too damn dangerous."

edited 23rd Oct '17 9:18:05 PM by DrTentacles

Tim gave both Rollo and Leon a look before folding his fingers before him. "As you know, before all of this...nonsense, my main occupation within the Council was in its Library and Archives. A significant part of those duties were the tracking down and securing of books that had gotten...waylaid."

He shrugged. "Magic grandparent dies, grandchild has a yard sale including some priceless first editions on magic lore. Private collector of magic gets robbed. War, Fae, you pick it. There are a lot of magic times out in the world and the Council would rather them be accounted for."

Not considering things like Das Blut, Der Geist and Das Herz von Kemmler which we'd really like to be out of circulation.

"As a side effect of that work, I have made an...good freelancing income looking out for comparable tomes in which the Council has no interest but are highly sought by collectors." Tim continued. "With a proper book, and my reputation in those circles, would this be...interesting for him?"

edited 24th Oct '17 9:46:03 AM by 3of4