I Don't Do Acid, So I'm Seeking

Kage R. Jakes] Let's go get a drink, Ashley'd said, and Kage had replied, I know a place.

And then she'd added, something like suppressed amusement in her voice, it's not too far from a cartographer's sea-serpents and devils, by which she meant the bar was by the lake and there was a view of the water to be had by any who were standing outside, smoking. A view of the water to be had by any who were upstairs, by one of the windows, or up upstairs, in the beer garden, away from the torches that were lit so that heat scraped 'gainst soft skin like a match and made it rosy if you were cold but wanted to be outside.

The lowest level of the bar is the one that's most restrictive, most claustrophobic and most attended by shadows and old men. The age group gets progressively younger, rowdier, louder, so it looks less like an alchemist's secret hideout and more and more like a place for twentysomethings to come and enjoy themselves. There are a lot of quiet nooks, however. And a bouncer, big and bald and female, a ship tattooed across her cheekbone, sketched blue, the mast striking through her eye and onto her forehead.

It was crowded. Kage was upstairs, in the fresh air, leaning against the guardrail and looking out over the dark water and the expanse of citylights while she waited for Ashley to find her.

[Ashley McGowen] "...That bouncer is terrifying," is the first thing Ashley says to Kage as she comes up behind her and around to her other side. Here the Hermetic stops, finding a spot next to the (slightly) taller woman to lean against the rail and out over the water herself.

It's a comfortable place for her, out looking over the water. Given the tone of the dreams she has one would not imagine this to be the case; one might imagine her to be uneasy at best, perhaps fearful that she would see a head crest the waves and feel the cold press of coils about her body. But she does not find the Serpent a cause for fear, except in her most reflective moments (and then...)

She seems content to hang half of her frame out over the water for a few seconds, let Chicago's ever-present wind tousel and tug at her hair, and look at the city lights across on the opposite shore. Then, "How have you been? Had the good fortune to escape most of what's been going on with Blue Horizon?"

[Kage R. Jakes] "If I was a bouncer, I'd cultivate a similar air," Kage says, with a brief smile. The smile sketches lines around her mouth and around her eyes (smile like you mean it [does]). The idea of Kage as a bouncer: it doesn't make sense. The red-haired woman is too slender, too slight; too weak. And yet, wouldn't she make a good one? Sashaying up to brawny, foolish troublemakers, asking them firmly to leave? They'd be surprised when they did leave. "But I wouldn't tattoo a ship on my cheek. I bruise easily -- what else do I need on my skin? Probably wouldn't impress the customers if they were visible though and -- hm. I've already had a beer," she offers, perhaps as explanation for the way her thoughts are scattered.

But really: they aren't scattered at all. These thoughts are related: often, when Kage is having a conversation, there's an annotation to the conversation, there's a third party whose voice is heard but ignored. This isn't the case now: not precisely, but memory is a bitch. The wind that kicks up off the lake is cold, and Kage turns her back to it, the better to watch the Hermetic as they talk (and to watch the crowd beyond, leaving them alone).

"You mean the spill Henri's goop came from? Beyond that public notice down at the White Fence House and picking Henri up from the site, I haven't stuck so much as a toe into that pool. Does it need more hands? Seems messy. Toxic sludge that's got ideas. I ask you -- what the hell next?"

[Ashley McGowen] There's a twitch of amusement at the corner of her mouth at Kage's scattered thoughts. It goes without saying that Ashley would not tattoo a ship on her face - would probably not do it anywhere else, either. People are just really as bookish as they seem, sometimes.

Kage says she's already had a beer, and there's a contemplative look from the Hermetic up toward the bar, but she doesn't move to get anything just yet. She's content to stay at the water's edge for now.

Then Kage has mentioned the notice that was posted up at the chantry, and this draws a nod from the Hermetic standing next to her, slow and considering. "I'm not sure if we need more help yet," she says. "Except to maybe get the sample away from Henri, since it's obviously dangerous, but even then there's still a lot more of it out there. It's kept me pretty busy lately though." If she's resentful at the sudden influx of responsibility, it doesn't show: at least when Ashley decides to embrace something she does so wholeheartedly.

[Kage R. Jakes] "And what would you do with it, once you got it away from Henri?" the Orphan asks (neutral [inscrutable]). And then, corner of her mouth curving upward: "I doubt she'll want to give up something so interesting; hell, I don't blame her. Have you two worked out your differences?" The half-smile doesn't echo itself in her eyes, not this time. Instead, Kage's expression is considering (pensive). Ashley is eying the bar, and the bar is across the beer garden (what a name), through air that wavers from the heat like a mirage, as if this entire place were unreal (surreal), were uncertain of its own solidity.

The wind isn't whipping her hair around like she was some sort've Maenad or Virago, because her hair is contained in two buns (wild [otaku]), a strand snakes across her throat (red ribbon [off with her head]), and her coat flares, flamboyant, at her thighs. That's it. She slides one hand into her pocket, weighing the coat down, and, not coincidentally, closing her fingers around Something. Maybe this is when Ashley finds herself Betrayed, and that's the name of this painting, and that's what you get when you trust.

Except, no. "Got you something in California," she says.

[Ashley McGowen] "You went to California?" Ashley asks, and there's a furrowing of her brows. She didn't know. Though, of course, she would not have a particular reason to; they are beginning to have something like a friendship, but they aren't really the type to talk needlessly, much less keep each other updated when they leave or go on trips. Probably won't be even if things continue in the same vein.

Then Kage's hand is going toward her pocket and Ashley's eyes follow. Curious. Kage asked a question, though, and a beat later Ashley remembers to respond. "We haven't really worked out our differences, no. I'd be willing but whenever she sees me she just yells at me and throws shit. Almost broke my nose after I said hi to her in Barnes and Noble," she says, with an exhale that is partially a sigh and partially a wry laugh.

"What did you get in California?" A second look of inquiry.

[Kage R. Jakes] "I did. I left a note in my apartment, just in case anybody decided to investigate," she says, and it isn't actually in jest, although her tone is touched by wryness. Her apartment's sanctity has long since been compromised (no more sanctuary [no more anything]). Kage may not be exactly the kind've mage who lets the Others know where she is at all times, but the way the city of Chicago has been, the way they've all been treated, what happened: well, she's not quite so blithe about vanishing, leaving no signs (it's okay), riddles that people who really know her will understand, be able to unlock, disentangle. The sort've riddles they'll only find once they've already grown suspicious.

Kage takes her hand out of her pocket and, like a magician -- the kind who's actually magick, like her True Self, she conceals what she has with her fingers, then opens them all at once, revealing a little brown cardboard envelope-box tied with a bit of purple rafetta. "A sunburn," she says, "And this. This is the thing for you."

[Ashley McGowen] "If I'd really been worried," Ashley says, amusement touching her voice as she looks sidelong at the Orphan, "I would have just called you." Not that there aren't likely magi in the city that would think to check Kage's home before they utilized something like a cell phone, but Ash is not one of those.

Then there's a package being drawn out of Kage's pocket, and a surprised (somewhat guarded) look from the Hermetic, flicking up toward the other woman's face. She isn't really used to presents, wouldn't have expected one from Kage, certainly (half the time she isn't even certain whether they are actually friends - bu this is true of her interactions with many other magi. Respect, she expects. Friendship is another realm, nebulous.)

"I, um. Thank you," she says, accepting the little envelope-box. The ribbon is unraveled, and she's careful, the box opened (of course Kage would wrap it.)

[Kage R. Jakes] "MmHmm. I'd be lying if I said there weren't some Looney Tunesesque traps left behind, just in case anybody decided to stop by, without warning," Kage says, smiling. There it is, then. That smile. The one that's a spark, makes her eyes darkly radiant; makes her, briefly, a creature of gorgeousness, something nearly lovely [burn for me]. The box is like the Edna St. Vincent Millay poem about the candle, but instead of burning, it opens at both ends, and inside there's a wad of tissue paper, something that the beer garden's nightdarkness says is gray or green or blue or purple, something that the uncertain light turns in indiscriminate hue. And inside the wad of paper, there's a necklace, lightweight, and Kage says, "You should hold it under the light," and when Ashley does, she'll see this: antiqued gold oroborus, snake-eating-his-tail, around an image of a[n illuminated] musical note, pressed underneath glass that can spark when it touches the light, soap-bubble iridescent, color of an ice-chopped sea.

[Ashley McGowen] Kage suggests that she hold it under light, and she withdraws something from the pocket of her jeans: a metal lighter (though Kage has never seen her smoke). She flicks the top back and the necklace in her palm is illuminated by the glow from the jet of flame, the glass wavering beneath the dancing light.

Ashley looks at it for a moment, lying cool in her palm, at the (illuminated) musical note. As though Kage had been there when the Serpent's jaws opened and devoured song like some kind of tithe, sacrifice she would have perhaps refused had she known what she was offering (does anyone ever?) But that Kage thought of her and that there's understanding, that what she said to Kage was not brushed off heedless, there's a quick smile. They never quite light up Ashley's the same way: hers are always something almost shy, retreating.

"Thanks, Kage," she says, and then the necklace is dropped past the thick crown of dark hair on her head and settles around her neck. The ouroboros settles over the faint ridge created by the links that she keeps hidden beneath her shirt, the chain she so often uses to produce acts of Will. "Where did you find it? And what did you go to California for?"

[Kage R. Jakes] The traditionalist coaxes fire from a lighter although she doesn't smoke and doesn't smell like smoke and has never smoked. This doesn't surprise Kage, and while Ashley looks down at the gift, Kage glances over at the bar, watching the way the crowd eddies against it as if it were the only shore to break against. There's a reason that Kage, who is a social smoker, one of those rare people who really can seem to take it or leave it (she took it a lot more just before the nameless 'crow finally died), occasionally holds an unlit cigarette, as if that were enough. She has known those who play with fire, has seen what they can do, has seen someone consumed. But to consume, it helps to have a spark, something to light those votary candles with.

"Welcome," she says, and then, "Some festival down by the water. I don't know what it was for, but I liked this one woman's stall and I thought you should have it." And Ashley wants to know what Kage went to California for, and the Orphan gives the Hermetic a faint smile, "Alchymical Marriage," she says. Then explains further: "Work. Some, for the sequel to that movie I told you about. The rest, for the chance to paw through some papers the GRIs just acquired."

[Ashley McGowen] The cap of the lighter shuts with a snap, cutting off the gout of fire, depriving it of air (it too devours.) It is returned to her pocket where it settles, square against her hip. She's accepted the gift without any sort of suspicion or apology for not having something to give in return: perhaps she just takes it for what it is. More likely she just isn't used to getting honest gifts and isn't sure how to respond. "Thank you," is what she says again when Kage says she thought Ashley should have it, and then she allows the conversation to be moved on to Alchymical Marriage.

Ashley leans back into the railing again, turned to face Kage now instead of looking out over the water. She mentions the GRIs and Ashley has to think about that for a moment before there's a nod of recognition. "Anything interesting?" she asks, of the papers. Curious, because most things that would be of interest to Kage are likely to also be of interest to Ashley.

[Kage R. Jakes] [Well, let us see. Was there anything interesting? Intel+Invest!]
Dice Rolled:[ 8 d10 ] 1, 1, 6, 7, 9, 9, 10, 10 (Success x 4 at target 6)

[Kage R. Jakes] "Actually, yes," she says, and now they've both got their backs to the water (here there be dragons [here there is cold and icewater and storm]). When people ask Kage what her job is, or when people become the recipients of her business card, they learn that she is a freelance researcher. The number of times this has been mistaken for private investigator are more than she can count on both hands, but that's just fine: she's good at learning things, whether they're academic, book-riddles, song-riddles, riddles-in-a-building, or the more mundane sort've learn-things one does when they talk to people (interview [comb over]) or take a look at a scene [crime (act was pepetrated here)]. She does it because she enjoys it. Because she enjoys gaining access to Mystery.

"Interesting, but not valuable," she clarifies, after a moment's consideration. Not valuable, she means, to mages like herself and Ashley. Then Kage gives Ashley a brief, and enthusiastic, summary of the dreamtime images the papers had included, maps of nowhere, names of medieval maguses (human [alchemists]), a long-unsolved murder mystery buried away by the government of Queen Elizabeth I. And: "There was a reference to someone I think was one of Simon's, though, and I'm going to chase that down further when I've got some freetime; you never know what you'll find. Speaking of finding things, you wanna go grab us a couple of drinks? I'll hold our spot against the mindless hordes."

[Ashley McGowen] Ashley listens with rapt attention to these accounts, the forgotten maps and names and the solving of a murder mystery. She's fascinated by bits of curio, by odd little facts and by stories in particular: after Awakening they are the thing she has found to connect herself to other people, to feel as though she is still part of the rest of the world. "That's interesting," she tells Kage, when her account is done, and means it.

She nods when Kage asks about drinks, asking what Kage wants before stepping up to the bar. There she remains for several minutes, waiting for the bartender to take notice of her (it takes a while) and then returning, drinks in hand. She extends Kage's toward her, sipping at her own once the other drink has been taken. And, once returned, she says, "How much do you know about the spirit world, by the way?"

[Kage R. Jakes] Kage asked for an ale (light [mellow]), something that looks like honey-candescing-into-light (sans the light). While Ashley is gone, she watches the crowd, again, studying people with quiet (cool [aloof]) thoughtfulness. A certain style, see. The red-haired Orphan has it, whatever it is: call it confidence, pride, arrogance; it doesn't show itself against the egos of some of her associates, but against crowds, it'll out itself (break, like foam). It's the way she removes herself, lets herself become a shadow, just another person like it was a Mystery being just another person.

When Kage takes the ale, she lifts it (cheers), and her eyebrows draw together. "A little. I know that f'ing ghosts don't get pissed off when you set off fireworks. I can watch it if I've offered up the proper libations. Why?"

[Ashley McGowen] Ashley returns with something much darker than what Kage has, nearly black and topped with a paler foam. One of those varieties of beer that is like drinking a loaf of bread. Her elbow lifts, rests against the rail, and she turns the blind eye out toward the sea so that she can watch and hear the crowds.

She returns the raise of the glass before drinking from it, taking a large mouthful even though it's heavy and bitter. There's a laugh when Kage says that ghosts don't get pissed off when you set off fireworks, surprised and darkly amused. "You heard about that too, huh."

Kage asks why, and she thinks about this for a moment; she'd meant to ask Gregor about it, initially, but she can make little sense of what he says, most of the time. "A couple of weeks ago, I stepped through into somewhere Else," she says, "and I'm sort of just...curious about how that happens. Or why it would. Just a thin spot in the Gauntlet?"

[Kage R. Jakes] "Really," she says. There is something to the inflection of her voice: she may as well have said me too, because there is a shadow of those words underlying the one she really said (flatlined). Then: "It really depends, 'ley. Where were you when you stepped through? And how did you get out again? Why do you think it has to do with the Spirit World at all, and wasn't just," ha, just, "a hole from one place to another? It could be a thin spot in the Gauntlet; people disappear, and sometimes, that's why. But the otherside's all fucked up layers of fucked up, you know? There's the storm between all places, like, I don't know - some kind've mold between each layer of an onion, I guess."

[Ashley McGowen] "I was out walking Zane," Ashley says, "and I heard a song that contained a riddle for how to enter that place." There's a pause as she looks up, looks toward Kage and meets her eyes for a few seconds - Kage knows, and she doesn't have to explain why it held significance, why she couldn't just continue on home and leave it alone.

"So I followed it into a restaurant, and then I went down a hall and met a leopard and went through a door. I didn't pass through a storm or anything like that, just..." A shrug here, because she isn't sure of the nature of what happened, exactly. Whether it was the other side or whether she was inside her own mind, or exactly what happened. "I kept hearing the song. It gave me instructions for how to go farther in, like...I walked with the leopard, and then I had to find a green coat in a room of gray ones, and then to go into the next door I had to speak my greatest lie. Things like that. Too abstract and odd to be anything -here,- you know?"

Kage had asked how she got out again, though, so after a sip at the beer she continues. "I went into a grassland, and eventually the leopard and I got to a group of revelers. Playing instruments, and I could...sort of hear it. The song said I should cut myself and offer blood in order to tithe to Hunger, but I stopped and wanted to play because I thought it might be the last chance I got to..." A momentary trailing off, then, "So I did play, and the leopard told me it was a different sort of blood and that I could pass on. We just...walked, for a long time. He told me a legend and eventually I met Latitude and Longitude, and they sent me home."

A momentary quirking of brows, and then a glance back in Kage's direction. "I don't do acid, so I'm seeking some other sort of explanation."

[Kage R. Jakes] Her mouth quirks (a smirk), and then she touches the collar of her coat, flipping it up against her bare (open) throat, fingers straying beneath that one loose strand of hair, tugging it away, letting the wind take it again. Kage takes a sip of the ale -- it isn't bitter, middling sweet, light as air and dew. "When you walked out, did you take anything with you? I mean, did it feel as though you'd passed a test? As though they wanted something from you, all these creatures?"

"Because it sounds to me like they called you for a reason. Wanted you, probably got what they wanted from you. As for what they are, I just don't know. Maybe you walked out of time, as well as out of this world. My experiences tell me that there are pockets, like -- oubliettes, I guess, where things like that stay, wait, and call."

[Ashley McGowen] "It wasn't a Seeking," Ashley tells Kage, after a moment's thought. Solomon had asked her the same question, and her response to the boy had been much the same. She might have thought so herself, if it hadn't been so utterly dissimilar to every other Seeking experience she's had, to the dreams that occasionally plague her sleep.

"When I left," she adds, a bit slowly now, "the little boy I met in the shop gave me an instrument to take with me. The one I'd played when I was there, and I still have it. I would guess that I did walk out of time, though. Zane hadn't been there for very long when I got back but it felt like I'd been walking for days."

Her brow furrows as she glances down into the depths of the glass and the oblique liquid within. "I guess the thing that felt closest to a test was when it asked me for blood and I played instead. That was just a segment, though. But maybe you're right about them just sort of waiting in...pockets, or whatever. It's strange."

[Kage R. Jakes] "I wasn't going to suggest that it was," she says, seriously. Her voice is low, but not so low it's difficult to hear over the dull roar of the crowd [late, later, latest]. "But I do think that, when you're touching the spirit world, there's always some sort of want involved. They want or you want. And it sounds as if you were drawn -- as if you were unspooled into their game. Maybe that's all it was, too; a game. Just because it's what they do. Sorry I can't name what you ran into. I wish that I could," she adds, meaning it (fervent [curiousity]).

"I had a similar experience, although it wasn't nearly as involved. I was walking home -- the walk that makes me by St. James'. And I noticed this shop called Oddities which hadn't been there before. Well, no. That isn't right: first, I noticed that something was wrong; it was snowing, but the snow wasn't snow. It was like ash, instead. I thought maybe it was the ghost of a fire. The shop seemed to be the source of the wrongness, somehow? So I gave it a deeper look, and it talked to me. It sort of talked to me. It called me the demon lover's child, and, like, read me."

[Ashley McGowen] It called Kage the demon lover's child. That draws a curious look, something evaluating: Kage has spoken of her Avatar to Ashley, but as Him, as a man with many faces and masks. This is different, and so it causes her to wonder (many things about Kage do, which is perhaps part of the reason their friendship works: it keeps her guessing.)

"What else did it say?" Ashley asks, after she has raised her glass thoughtfully to her mouth, rested the rim against her lower lip. "And did you end up going in?" This is more to invite Kage to expand than because she doubts that Kage went in. -Of course- she went in; the woman invited a Marauder back to her apartment.

[Kage R. Jakes] "It asked me why I was there, and implied I was an arrogant toddler," Kage says. You fey thing you, it had said, you Demon lover's child, you, and: "So, yes," she says, solemn and grave, as though it were a real question Ashley'd asked just there, not just an invitation to expand. "I went in. The shop had no fate. It had no -- you know, how everything does? Not this place. So I went in, and there was a shop boy, and behind the register there was a whole host of interesting things.

"Frankly, I'd have happily taken the lot of them. Instead, we chatted, and it became a riddle game, which I won. I think I won, anyway," she adds, her smile turning wistful (yearning [gentled]), "Because he showed me a trick, which was, essentially, a lesson in Forces. I became the storm and was the storm and also the fire that lightning brought and also the frisson of gravity and it was bizarre. He said that's who he was. That he was the storm. It was an unusual experience, and he knew my name.

"I don't give out my whole name, but he knew it. And the next day, of course, the shop? Not there. But it hadn't been in the spiritworld; I'd checked. I have no idea what to make of it. I walked out empty-handed, though. Maybe a little more knowledgable, but empty-handed. Or else," she lifts her glass to her mouth, speaks over it, "I'd've used whatever I'd taken to find that place again, whereever it is now."

[Ashley McGowen] [Friends aren't condescending to friends, even if they didn't learn -real- Forces!]
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 1, 3, 5, 5, 9 (Failure at target 6)

[Ashley McGowen] Kage says she had a lesson in Forces within the shop, and there's an expression that tries to be polite. It must not try very hard, though, because Ashley's inevitable skepticism breaks through, visible like the ripple of coils beneath. "Ars Vis takes years of study, especially to produce something like a storm," she says. "Seems kind of odd that a spirit would know it. Not that what you learned isn't useful."

She gives thought to the rest, to the riddle game and that the boy there knew Kage's name. "That's...really strange. Though I'd say coming out with knowledge of some kind meant you didn't come out empty handed. I'd just have to wonder what those things would be, if not spirits." She's heard of fae, and that they used to occur, and she wonders at that briefly but puts the thought aside.

[Kage R. Jakes] Kage looks noncommittal when Ashley says (explains to the pleb) that it takes years of study to learn Ars Vis. The Hermetic may've tried not to sound as condescending as she sounds, but it doesn't phase Kage; after all, Ashley is a Hermetic. If they're not occasionally condescending to your face, they're doing it behind your back. "Maybe," she says, still noncommittal. "But I walked out of that shop with more questions than answers."

"So what will you do with the goop if you get it away from Henri?"

[Ashley McGowen] "Yeah, I sort of...feel the same way about what happened to me," Ashley agrees, thoughtful, looking down once more at the glass, at the imprint her thumb has left near the base.

Then they're moving on to the talk of Henri and the sphere and she shakes her head. "I'm a little stuck on that," she says. "When I talked to Gregor, he told me it was basically a manifestation of creation and stasis that shouldn't even -exist- here. So we thought maybe we could add an element of entropic magic so it would stop expanding, but that's all theoretical. Wharil thinks the whole thing is a field test, so chances are even if we pull an Old Yeller on Goopy we're still going to have problems."

She shakes her head again, lifting her glass to drink from it. "I feel pretty bad about taking it. Henri seemed really excited to have it. But the kid is crazy. She fed it an iPod right in front of Wharil and I and it started replaying all the noise."

[Kage R. Jakes] [and by the by]
Dice Rolled:[ 3 d10 ] 3, 9, 10 (Success x 2 at target 6)

[Kage R. Jakes] "By whole thing, you mean how it's come to the attention of wakeful people in particular, or just whatever it's doing to the mundanes who've come in contact with it? Because the former is a lot more sinister, and a lot more hopeful, too. That said, I definitely see more problems. Heck: has anybody talked to whoever was in charge of the cleanup?" A brief pause, because there is still ale to drink, to let coat her throat like sunshine [and stoppered shadow], and a pleasant buzz, knotting itself at the bottom of her stomach, easing through her shoulders. Buzz, that's all: like a note that rhymes with fa.

"I don't know if adding an element of entropic magic is a good idea. Do you really want the Goop Weapon to be stablized? Then again, what did that e-mail say; something about 100% kill rate?" Another brief pause, caesura, breath, inhale, cock of an eyebrow: "Do you know how to pull an Old Yeller on Goopy? Uh, what happened to the ipod? You say 'fed.' Was it never seen again?"

Kage looks thoughtful. "Maybe it can be programmed to find and destroy the rest of itself."

[Kage R. Jakes] ooc: stablized should, clearly, be stabilized.

[Ashley McGowen] "What it's doing to the mundanes," Ashley says, shaking her head. "I don't know if they intended for it to be found by us. I'm not even sure who the mother company is. I thought at first that it might be a Syndicate front, but I don't know."

Ashley, too, seems buzzed, or at least a bit more relaxed. It's a combination of factors really: the water and being able to speak freely help to some extent. Companionable chatter in between all the talk of work isn't something she often gets. "I don't think Henri got the iPod out, no. And we're...trying to figure out how to kill it, at present."

Kage's thought gets a raised eyebrow, a few thoughtful sips at her glass. "Maybe. It wants input, so maybe by channeling what input it gets, we could..." She trails off, perhaps planning ways to condition Goopy, contemplating whether it's possible. "It's a thought."

[Kage R. Jakes] "I believe I read that it was being used -- or that it could be used -- to replace people's organs. Right?" Kage's lashes kiss. Her eyes aren't quite closed. She can see, but the world is blurred. "That's a good thing. If it's something that, when you get right down to it, is a huge benefit, maybe it's wrong to worry about how to kill it. At least, until it starts trying to kill, like some sort've awful B movie. I suppose it's best to be prepared for that eventuality."

[Kage R. Jakes] [ignore this!]
Dice Rolled:[ 4 d10 ] 5, 7, 8, 9 (Success x 3 at target 6)

[Kage R. Jakes] [dmg - still ignore this!]
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 2, 2, 3, 5, 7, 7, 8 (Success x 3 at target 6)

[Ashley McGowen] Kage brings up awful B movies, and it draws a wry smile from the Hermetic, who is bowing her head slightly, dark hair falling forward into her eyes as she looks down into the glass. "I find the fact that it's also being cultivated as a weapon a lot more worrisome," Ashley says. "Because if this -is- a Technocratic weapon, the next steps after it's been tested aren't hard to guess at. It attacking people to try to get input out of them besides."

Unspoken is something Ashley herself might not be fully aware of, a bit of caution she has been eying the sphere with: the goop Henri has found is unbridled hunger in its search for new experience, for data. She can't help a simultaneous fascination (a kindred, of sorts) and worry. Of course, it also doesn't have her restraint. "I have to admit up until Chuck sent me that email I was sort of tempted to go and find my own sample."

[Kage R. Jakes] "Mm. I rather hope there aren't more samples still lying around near the site of the spill." Beat. "Maybe it shouldn't be kept at the White Fence House. Just in case it gets out and somehow gets in contact with the node." The word node is diminished (lower than low), and the wind, the sound of some fabric flapping in the wind, the sound of thunder from away, across the dark water, across the bright (luminous [radiant]) city, keeps it safe and hidden: a secret, just for they, women that most wouldn't look three times at. "Is she keeping it there?"

"I suppose it. I mean, hm. I suppose it can't communicate -- as far as you know -- with any sort of central intelligence. That its memory isn't shared with all other ... Goops." Her mouth quirks, although the humor doesn't reach her eyes, just stays there, at the corners of her mouth. "I don't know, 'ley. Part of me feels strange, thinking about sabotaging the research for something that could potentially be so beneficial to sick people. Has anyone taken a look at possible futures; at the things fate?"

[Ashley McGowen] "I checked," is the somewhat sheepish admission, of the spill site. "And it's not being kept at the chantry. Wharil and I tried to tell Henri that she should let us have it so that we could figure out what to do with it, and she got pissed and stormed off to the university."

Kage says that she hesitates to destroy something that could help sick people, and here Ashley frowns. Looks at Kage for a few moments, and there's something conflicted in her expression. Something that can only be guessed at. "No. No one has. But it's another good idea. I don't think it has a central intelligence, though. Either that or it's so well protected that I couldn't get through to it."

[Kage R. Jakes] [I shall try... to guess at it? Percept+AwarenessasEmpathy!!]
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 1, 4, 5, 7, 8 (Success x 1 at target 6)

[Ashley McGowen] Based on the things she knows and can put together about Ashley, the line of thought might be easy to guess at: she could be helped by the technology they're talking about, but on the other hand, also believes it's better for her to overcome it on her own. There's some conflict from that and because she isn't sure whether that sentiment is appropriate to translate to Sleepers.
to Kage R. Jakes

[Kage R. Jakes] The red-haired woman pays attention when the short-haired (just short) woman looks conflicted about something. When she's read what there is to read, guessed what there is to guess, she exhales quietly: "I'm full of good ideas," she says, half-smiling. "I am a good idea factory, and might I also add, on fairly good terms with good sense too. That e-mail said that there were no safeguards. I mean, don't want to rely too strongly on that; but if that was in with the rest of the information that guy found, then I'm guessing whoever made the stuff doesn't know how to handle it any better than you or I do. If the goop can be programmed to go out and get information on its maker," a shrug, as if to say, useful, maybe or what could they do that wouldn't be useful. Then: "Looks like you're almost out of whatever you're drinking. I'll get this round. What are you drinking?"

[Ashley McGowen] Ashley nods, and it's slow, contemplative. A nod that suggests that she is taking the idea seriously, will mull it over, will probably attempt to experiment with it if she can get her hands on one of the samples. (Because she will look, now that she has some reason to justify it, some veneer of good reason beyond mere curiosity.)

Then Kage asks what she's drinking, and she says, "The house milk stout, it should be on the board up there," and gestures up toward the bar. And when Kage returns, the topic meanders elsewhere, to something that is not danger and hidden wounds and scrawny Etherites: and perhaps it does lend them mystery, that they could be two ordinary woman sharing a drink and discussing trivia and books.

Or maybe it just means they go home tipsier than they would have liked.