Was It Okay?

[K. R. J.] [a'ight. let's do this.]
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 3, 4, 4, 4, 8, 10, 10 (Success x 3 at target 6)

[Ashley McGowen] [Oh yeah. Have I slept?]
Dice Rolled:[ 3 d10 ] 7, 8, 9 (Success x 3 at target 6)

[K. R. J.] The pavement is wet. The air is wet, too. When -- slam! -- K. R. J. shuts the door of her (monster [monstrous]) black truck and alights (hops [falls]) down to ground level the air is waiting, to wrap itself around her, river-soaked, lake-soaked, pool-soaked linen for the sacrifice, the hint of what it'll be later on in the week: a smothering piece of banshee laundry, a slap in the face, air as a strength-sapping blanket. Her hair is pulled up, pinned with express orders not to fall down today and tumble around her ears. The back of her neck is bare. She has a flat messenger bag, today, something in dull olive, which one would think brought out the green in her eyes, if one was thinking logically, and without factoring in the dark grey of the pavement, of the sky, the water in the air, in which case one realizes that her eyes are dark today, the inscrutable color, the not-quite-definable hazel, until she slants a glance just so, catches a stray shard of illumination from somewhere, and candesces.

Sort've like now. Kage, whilst walking to the door of Ashley's apartment building, snaps open her cellphone, puts it to her ear, Ashley's number dialed, dialling, ringing, and there are two girls and a skinny, scrawny-looking guy clustered by the stairs to the entrance, and when she raises her eyebrows at them, one of the girls grins (goofily [hello]) at Kage, gives the door the it's ajar nod, and she opens it. Goes up.

You'd think that this was a spur-of-the-moment visit.

It is not.

[K. R. J.] [and uh, awareness, I guess? just in case EVIL THINGS are lurking? we know they aren't, but they COULD BE.]
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 3, 5, 8, 10, 10, 10 (Success x 4 at target 6)

[Ashley McGowen] Up until today, Ashley had hardly slept since last Saturday night. It came in short spurts, an hour or two long, and generally she's been too upset, stomach tied in knots, chest weighed down by the world. K. R. comes calling, and Ashley is still asleep.

Zane isn't happy about this. The dog has been lying in front of his dish for the past few hours, his cold black nose pressed into the edge as though he, too, could Will his food to appear if he got Hungry enough. Nothing ever does, and the Hermetic is curled up on the couch, dead to the world. Peaceful, for the first time in days, regardless of what time it is.

It's only on the third or fourth ring that she hears the buzzing up on the armrest - feels it, more like, distantly, through the light haze of a dream. There's a tiny earthquake, in the dream world. Ashley startles awake, blinks, and then pats around for the phone.

The voice at the other end sounds appropriately drowsy. "Hello? Kage?"

[K. R. J.] Doesn't bother with a yes. Succinct. "I woke you up. Is this a bad time? Because I'm writing pithy messages in the grime on your front door, but I can cool my heels at the coffee shop instead." There may or may not be actual pithy messages being traced in the grime on Ashley's front door. Just as there may or may not be actual grime.

[Ashley McGowen] Ashley's front door is a solid wood one, and there is in fact no grime: the apartment was renovated last year, just before she moved in. It was one of the things that drew her to the place.

There's a silence on the other end of the phone, the sort of confused haze that envelopes one when they've been asleep for much longer than intended, out of normal rhythm. She's trying to remember what time it is, what day it is. A glance at the clock on the wall confirms that her sleep schedule is now fucked beyond measure.

"No. You can come in." So she gets up to go and unlock her apartment door for Kage, and in between the hangup and her arrival, rattles food into the dog's bowl. He's happily crunching by the time Kage walks in.

[K. R. J.] "Hungry?" she says, stepping across the threshold, into the Hermetic's apartment. The Orphan glances around. Her expression is pensive, unwary; as open as it ever is. Untarnished.

It's late afternoon. The light doesn't slant into the hallway outside Ashley's apartment, but perhaps it comes through a window, somewhere. The light'd be amber, like honey-wine; it'd fall against the glass, against curtains or blinds, like condensed milk -- a thick, curdling thing, where it manages to break through the [ominous] clouds. Zane crunching on dog food is a loud thing, heard in the hall. Naturally, the red-haired Orphan's gaze is drawn toward the intent dog. She doesn't slide her hands into her pockets. She stands at ease, neither sitting, or going to (her usual spot [she has a usual spot]) the kitchen's counter.

The cellphone's out of mind and out of sight, just like it never was. Technology: Kage? She's innocent, they'll tell you, innocent!

[Ashley McGowen] It's late afternoon, and the light pours like honey over the couches and chairs at the center of the living area, mixing gold into the browns and reds and creams that paint the place. It falls over the couch that Ashley had, up until a few minutes ago, been sleeping in, has left the worn leather pleasantly warm in some spots and sticky-hot in others. There's a faint sheen of moisture on Ashley's forehead lying beneath the fall of dark hair.

Ashley, who looks better today than she has over the past few days, though Kage wouldn't know it - she's slept, finally, managed to Will herself into something deep and lasting - just eyes the Orphan for a few moments. Grief hasn't etched itself over her features, or if it did, it's gone now, tucked away in a box somewhere. Partitioned and compartmentalized. She's good at that, Ashley.

"Yeah, a little," she tells Kage, without a great deal of enthusiasm. "Did you have something in mind?"

[K. R. J.] This isn't the first time Kage has come over when Ashley was (or should be [or was expected to be]) at low ebb. The first time she visited Ashley's apartment in Chicago, Ashley'd been Jhor-riddled and fresh from memories of Hell. Wharil'd told her that Ashley was doing poorly. Noone's told Kage that this time. They've eluded to a dead loved one. The let's call them informants have each been wrapped up in their own regret, misery, worries, and yet still, in their own way, they've each tried to be sensitive and respectful. A red flag, especially when it came to the Cultist of Ecstasy.

But even with that: Kage, while attentive, and clearly so: intent and watchful, but not intense, isn't looking at Ashley, trying to pick out salt-tracks on her cheeks, black bags under her eyes, lines on her wrists where she's been cutting herself. She isn't looking for the signs of grief, made clear on the one-eyed girl's face. She's looking at Ashley the way she always looks at Ashley: with attention, like a look could also listen, like clarity was a byword, a watchword, like a watchword was a glance, studious. Something like that.

She isn't trying to find a box, open it.

"That really depends," she says, mouth quirking. "Do you want to stay in, or go out?" A beat, and, "I know you've had a shitty week, so I'll leave the decision up to you, without undo influence from me." Her eyebrows flick upwards; maybe she thinks that Ashley'll jump all over going out, when it's put like that. Maybe she has food tucked away in her bag. Doesn't she always come bearing food-gifts? Even the few times she's gone to the chantry [that Ashley knows about] she's brought food: cookies, tea.

[Ashley McGowen] Ashley has always found Kage's food-gifts a little odd, really: it's like offering tribute, particularly when brought to the chantry. To the Traditionalists she stands apart from, stubborn bastion. Maybe that's why she offers it: she did package a memory, offer it up on a silver platter to draw Ashley's attention away from the rest.

Kage knows she's had a shitty week, and that means Kage knows. Ashley's gaze tracks over to her, finds her, and it isn't inquiring: Ashley suspects that people have been talking about a small woman in a glass cage, mousey and dark haired and with that same mouth, the same chin and nose. (Gone, now, went to Boston wrapped in one of Solomon's bodybags. It was like getting a glimpse of her own end in thirty years. Maybe she'll live that long.)

"I want to stay in," she tells Kage. Drops a hand down to Zane's head, his ears. She's been out all week: the dog is clingy. Dogs are. "We can order Thai or pizza or something."


[K. R. J.] "Do you have any left-overs or pizza-dough? We could experiment. This is a building full of college students, isn't it."

It's clear from the lack-of-questioning lilt to that question that Kage is considering raiding some of Ashley's neighbor's freezers and putting together who-knows-what. The oven works, doesn't it? In theory? Or are there books? There are books in Kage's fireplace when it isn't winter, and in Spring, her electric stove sometimes gets left open, plants put inside where they can get light from the kitchen window.

When Zane stops crunching on his food and comes over to investigate Ashley, and Ashley's continued presence in the apartment, Kage has one of her almost smiles, one of her not-quite-yet expressions, something imminent, something ready-to-dawn, but un-dawned.

[Ashley McGowen] "I don't have any pizza dough, but I have raw ingredients lying around," Ashley says, with a glance toward the kitchen. Usually they are eaten raw, or kept in the cabinet in the vain hope that some day she will learn to cook and use them. She never really has.

"I don't cook much, either. So experimentation might turn into us getting delivery anyway, just so you know," Ashley says, with a bit of a smirk as she heads toward her refrigerator to investigate. To see whether she does indeed have enough Things that could potentially become Food at a later date. Zane follows her, his toenails clicking on the floor.

[K. R. J.] [Because never get to roll this in Mage, stealthy!Kage? Ninja-ing it up?]

[K. R. J.] "But it will be more satisfying delivery," Kage says. "Worked for," she says, and, "Deserved." The red-haired woman walks into the living room proper, sets her bag down by the coffee table, on top of the coffee table, shoulder strap trailing toward the hardwood floors. Hardwood floors are difficult to walk quietly on. They meet each step a foot takes like it's a moment for sound, like it's a moment to say, hey, here, listen to be, listen to how I slide, listen to how I can whisper, listen to the music this dead tree makes, except not so much for Kage. The almost-carelessly composed, self-assured woman is a walking shadow, and she noiselessly rejoins Ashley in the kitchen. Not at her counter, but popping around Ashley's side, to also peer into the refrigerator for inspiration.

[Ashley McGowen] Kage and Ashley find: roma tomatoes, three. Two eggs. Some clementine oranges. A box of whole wheat pasta. Two percent milk. Some goat cheese. A small amount of frozen chicken, and a bag of Macintosh apples.

Ashley sets them on the counter in front of the Orphan and gestures toward them, amused. "All right," she says, "I'm going to trust you not to poison me."

[K. R. J.] [Come Up With Something Awesome, Kage? Intelligence!]

[K. R. J.] [Dex+Perf? Uhm. Badass Cutting-Stuff Flourish? Or hospitalization imminent?]

[K. R. J.] "There will be no more poison involved in this wholesome activity," Kage says, and when she finds a knife to cut with, she twirls it with ([un]muted flamboyance) rakishness. "At least, not on purpose. Should a test subject be needed in the initial 'taste' segment of this experiment, I don't think I've yet come around when there weren't people bumming around your apartment's front door.

"We'll, er, make a marinade for the chicken," Kage says, and the clementine oranges and apples'll do for that, with the judicious addition of some honey and spices, cloves and cardamom, "And uh, chop it up and put it into pasta after it's cooked. With the goat cheese. Apple slice son top, and it sounds fancy, yeah? Crack an egg over the pasta to make it rich." Kage is peeling an apple now, without breaking the skin. Careful of her thumb.

If Ashley isn't also cutting something by now, Kage raises an eyebrow at her, very, Come on, I know you have hands.

[Ashley McGowen] [Man, I don't ever use knives. Dex!]

[Ashley McGowen] "They're grad students, they wouldn't refuse food," Ashley says, of nefarious experiments on her neighbors.

The Hermetic looks impressed as Kage tells her what she intends to cook, like she might if Kage were telling her about some bit of magic or technique she'd never before heard of. Kage raises her eyebrows at Ashley before the Hermetic takes up one of the knives and assists in chopping. There are no flourishes: Ashley wasn't kidding when she said she doesn't cook much. She has to be careful.

Ashley's quieter than usual. This is a welcome break from the week, so she's not letting her thoughts stray: Kage already knows what happened, anyway.

[K. R. J.] Kage does know what happened. Nathan was almost exhaustive in his detail. The detail she's curious about, though; the detail she hasn't asked about, yet, but will eventually, as soon as she figures out how, well: that's the thing Ashley probably doesn't want to say again, doesn't want to talk about. Kage knows what happened, and has opinions; she doesn't know who Ashley lost. Just that she did lose.

This isn't like Emily, worried that she was too dirty, too besmirched, to join a Tradition she felt herself drawn toward now that she'd snuffed out a life [first time (no longer a civilian)]. That was comparatively easy.

"Heh," she says, after she has peeled a couple of apples, cut them like a Master-chef, more-or-emphasis-on-less. "When you were little, did you ever do that girly superstition -- throw an unbroken peel over your shoulder, it'll break into the initials of your true love?" She smirks. "My friend had a bang-up business in Apple Peel Interpretation"

There's more to do than just chopping. There's pre-heating and figuring out a substitute for a marinade brush and heating what-will-be-the-marinade up and making oven-appropriate dishes out of tinfoil. It's gotta be done, so it's done.

[Ashley McGowen] Ashley has to be directed to do such things, pointed at them and released, but she is at least aware of -how- to use things like the stove and the oven. She isn't quite that unfamiliar.

The apple peels and the apple slices are in rough, uneven chunks, with more apple clinging to the cast-away skin in some places than in others, but one gets used to using a knife. She looks up, glances at Kage, amused, as she mentions the apple peels and childhood superstitions.

"No," she says, "I haven't heard of that. Kids would just chase each other down with those little paper mouths - " she cups index fingers and thumb together, to demonstrate - "and write numbers and names on them and stuff. I always hid because I thought I could decide what my fortune was only until someone else told me."

[K. R. J.] "I remember those," Kage says, when Ashley cups her fingers together, demonstrates the shape. "They were like - puppet dragon mouths." A beat, and, not-quite-wry, corner of her mouth curving more: "Did anyone ever manage to tell you, or did they give up?" A moment, pensive. Then: "What about Light as a Feather, Stiff as a Board or Bloody Mary - did you ever play those?"

When one takes a moment to consider it, it's really amazing the number of [magical realist] superstitions that are still active, thriving, in elementary schools and junior high schools across the Nation. The Consensus has to work to rob them of their power.

[Ashley McGowen] "It sort of turned into a game with a friend of mine," Ashley says, her mouth quirking as she starts to peel one of the oranges. They separate easily, clementines, don't need a shell to tell them what to be. Or protect them, for that matter, though they're easy to pull apart into segments after that's done. There's a little pile forming near Kage. "She'd try to surprise me with it. I'd turn around during recess and it'd be crinkling next to my ear."

She hasn't considered the heretofore untapped potential of exposing children to magic. It's likely she won't: while many groups in the Order of Hermes do it, Ashley prefers that people fight to Awaken. It's the right way.

"We did those," she says, "and then there was this one game where there were ghosts, and they'd gradually be able to do less as you counted away from midnight? I forget how it's played."

[K. R. J.] "I used to have bad dreams," Kage says, end statement. But wait: "I stayed awake once for six days -- I was a stubborn kid -- because I saw candles burning in my Mom and Dad's bathroom. Which I wasn't supposed to ever go into, mind you. I couldn't find them right after, so I thought they'd got taken into the mirror by Bloody Mary. The fact that Dad made dinner like usual and Mom was there didn't really convince me otherwise."

Then: "Kid games were fun, although it's less likely I'd kick your ass so thoroughly at them." Man: guileless Kage is guileful. She says this deadpan, straight-faced. Less likely, than, say: a game of chess.

[Ashley McGowen] Kage offers up this bit of childhood horror and lying awake sleepless nights, and Ashley glances up and over at the Orphan, there on her right. She has never been afraid of the dark, or the things that might lurk there. "I was convinced there was a ghost in the hall closet," she says. "I used to try to go in and talk to it and convince it to come out."

Kage is guileful but that chess match (and losing it) is still a tender point with the Hermetic, apparently. She assures Kage, "We'll be rematching."

[K. R. J.] "What convinced you? The texture of darkness?" A beat, and: Kage hands Ashley the marinade-to-be for some last-minute beating, thickening: it thickens as she forks it up, whisks it into molasses, honey-clings to fork, spices are like devil-freckles. Kage separates the chicken, dutiful. Puts the goat-cheese off to the side, so that it'll be soft when needed.

We'll be rematching, Ashley says, and the Orphan raises an eyebrow. Then: "Maybe while the chicken cooks."

[Ashley McGowen] Ashley takes the bowl, takes the fork, and thrashes it together as Kage separates the still-frozen bits of meat. There's a whisper of fur against the floor, inaudible to Ashley's ears (too soft) but likely heard by Kage's: a canine shape inching closer in the vain hope that she's going to drop some, now that he's noticed what it is she's handling. "I think the way the light used to fall on the things inside at night," Ashley says. "My, um, my mother, she used to leave doors and cabinets and drawers open all the time while she went to go do something."

Who knows. Maybe there really was a ghost. This is, after all, the world they live in.

There's a glance to the side, a flash of blue indignance as Kage makes her reply. "It would take longer than that," she says.

[K. R. J.] [Uh, Dex? Not gonna drop chicken no way!]

[K. R. J.] "She and my mom can bond over that," Kage says, mouth crooking. "Mom left some drawers in the kitchen open one night, forgot to shut them, because she was doing something in the garage... and Janet accidentally dinged into one when she was sneaking back into the house, had to get stitches. I didn't find out until the next morning, because I was asleep. They'd left some blood on the drawer, though. I went all Nancy Drew."

Now, Kage. Kage is not actually a competitive person. When she's playing a game, when her work is to be shown against another's, she rarely thinks in terms of defeating the other person, in terms of being better than them. This isn't because she's a good person, because she just wants everybody to have fun. It's because they don't signify; the fact that it's a competition is nice, somebody to talk to, but it isn't the point to Kage.

That isn't to say there aren't a few people who, if she beat them at (their own, preferably) any game, she wouldn't be irrepressibly pleased, wouldn't make a few comments, wouldn't gloat.

Those people just happen to be very, very few.

So, It would take longer than that, Ashley says, and Kage says, "You think so, huh? We'll see." There isn't any real goading or real arrogance there. Her tone is mild; she's saying it to whip up Ashley's spirit of competition, probably.

[Ashley McGowen] [Ouch]

[Ashley McGowen] She and my mom can bond over that, says Kage, and it occurs to Ashley right then that she does -not- know the entirety of what happened last Saturday night. Maybe all her informants told her was that they went and met a demon, that there were people they saved and some they couldn't, maybe they told her Ashley was shot. There could be a lot of reasons why Kage would have concluded that Ashley had a shitty week.

Either way, the Hermetic manages to keep her face from falling. Lies might not be easy for her, but stoicism, confidence, is: it's through overawing and overpowering that she can manage these things. Ashley's throat clicks a little while she swallows, and she sets the bowl aside once everything is mixed.

"You got lucky," she says, after a few seconds.

[K. R. J.] [uhm. am I keen and sensitive, or is all my skill going into keeping Zane from getting the chicken?]

[Ashley McGowen] [You are not sensitive enough!]

[K. R. J.] [Too much on the mind to notice little tells like a topic dropped? Yeah?]

[Ashley McGowen] [Nooo]

[K. R. J.] [Eh? ... *WP TO END IT* *unless the WP gives a tie, then NO WP!*]

[K. R. J.] There are (generally) numerous reasons one might have to conclude that another mage in Chicago is having a shitty week, or has just had a shitty week, or is about to have a shitty week. Indeed, the weeks are getting darker, as summer waxes toward its own precipice [Independence Day, how fitting. How right.] and all the lightning-wreathed golden-haze days of before. The Orphan mentioned Ashley's mom without thinking about it; Ashley stays stoic. If Kage notices that Ashley didn't continue the topic, that there was something deliberate there, she doesn't mention it; it's likely she didn't notice at all. The stoics were an unspeaking bunch.

"Don't insult me," Kage says, mouth crooking, "Or yourself. Who wants to be done in by bad luck?" And Zane, big dog eyes, big dog heart, catches Kage's eye. She looks at him warily for a second, and then, "Er. Are there any dog treats, 'ley?"

[Ashley McGowen] Who wants to be done in by bad luck, Kage asks, and Ashley's expression doesn't waver. She's also not looking at Kage until the other woman brings her attention to the dog, who has sidled up next to them on the floor, whose enormous ears prick immediately when he hears Kage's mouth form the word 'treats.'

There's an expression that wants to be a smile struggling its way through a corner of her mouth. She gestures toward the cabinet in which the treats are kept, because usually people who ask these questions want to feed the dog themselves.

[K. R. J.] Ashley correctly deduces that Kage wants to give Zane a treat herself. The dog's ears prick and Kage's gaze returns to Ashley. She runs her hands under water, wipes them on the thighs of her jeans. Preparation-for-treat-giving, you know?

"Do you have any ziplock bags?"

[Ashley McGowen] "Yeah, I do." That's an odd question, one that gets a puzzled glance from the Hermetic before she reaches into one of the overhead cabinets, pulls free a small box of ziploc bags. She extends one of the bags toward Kage, casting a look from the redhead to the dog.

[K. R. J.] "Spoon all the marinade into it, then smoosh these chicken slices inside and, uh, close it, then punch it a few times, okay?" Those instructions given, she goes to the cabinet to liberate a treat for Zane.

[Ashley McGowen] Ashley is obedient about some things. The marinade is transferred inside the little bag, as is the raw chicken, and Ashley goes about sealing the bag, holding it up to make sure that it's tight before she...punches it as instructed. She doesn't want the marinade and raw meat all over the counter. The countertop rattles as her closed fist slams into it a few times.

Zane, who is not a dog that has been taught to dance for treats, to impugn his dignity, sits on the floor and waits with patient eyes. Once the chicken-mashing has been accomplished, Ashley leaves the bag on the counter for Kage to do with what she will.

[K. R. J.] As soon as Kage finds the box of treats, she takes one out, replaces the box where (precisely [exactly]) she found it, and crouches in order to give the dog his food. Her fingertips still smell like chicken; she trusts he shan't make a mistake. After the treat is gone, she'll give Zane a scratch behind the ears, pet his head, stand and say, "Chess?"

What they're going to do to the chicken now is, clearly, give it a few moments to get all soaked, before slipping it into the oven. This is probably why most people their age don't like to cook, unless they really like to cook. Takes a long time.

[Ashley McGowen] She's hungrier than she'd thought - after all, she was asleep for ten hours, and it's the early evening, when she would usually be going to get something to eat. Her schedule has spun out of control this week, and she can't recall when she last ate or what she had or how much of it. Stoic she may be, but Ashley doesn't cope with grief well, can't without losing track of herself.

Zane takes the biscuit rather delicately from Kage's fingers, no snapping or finger-nipping involved, and retreats behind the counter to go and crunch away at it. Ashley nods at Kage, retreating into her room to find her chess board and bring it back out, setting it down on the floor like when they played over a week ago.

The Hermetic settles onto the rug, arranging and placing the carved white and black soldiers in their corresponding squares.


[Ashley McGowen] [Grrrr. -Not- going to be a short match!]
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 2, 4, 4, 5, 8, 9, 10 (Success x 3 at target 6)

[K. R. J.] [Pft. Big words, short stuff! Big words.]
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 1, 1, 3, 7, 8 (Failure at target 6)

[K. R. J.] [er, and:]
Dice Rolled:[ 1 d10 ] 8 (Success x 1 at target 6)

[Ashley McGowen] The Hermetic takes the white side of the board, draws a knee up against her chest while they play and wraps an arm around it, almost idly moving pieces. She's intent, when it comes to games; unlike Kage Ashley is deeply competitive, takes losing as a personal affront, as a sign of inadequacy and inferiority. While she manages to do it gracefully (years in a cutthroat competitive house will teach one that), inwardly she never takes it well.

So while Kage can't guess at much of what she's doing, she knows when she's been checkmated: Ashley beams, lets Kage figure out that the king's been trapped. And it isn't a long game, after all.

"My honor's been restored," Ashley says, cheerfully, and then there's a glance toward the kitchen. "Do you think things are ready?"

[K. R. J.] Ashley wins, and it puts her into a good mood, at least for a moment. Kage regards the board: dissatisfied, not with Ashley, but with her self. "Well," Kage says, still studying the board, probably thinking, damn, if only I hadn't done, if I'd instead, "I didn't want to keep it." Her mouth lilts up, a half-smirk; something sardonic in the cant of her eyebrows. And: Do you think things are ready?

"Let's check. Want to play again?" The question is asked over her shoulder, on the way back into the kitchen. At some point during the game, which wasn't long at all, Kage had stood up and laid chicken slices out on tinfoil pan and put them in the oven, and at some other point not too long ago, she'd started boiling water for pasta.

"Another ten minutes, I think," Kage says. It smells good, at least. That's gotta mean something, right?

[Ashley McGowen] It does smell good, and the Hermetic's stomach rumbles, loud and demanding, as she moves the pieces back into place to play again. If Ashley is closed off today, not communicating with Kage, it's not out of the desire not to share, it's not because she doesn't think the Orphan would be hurtful or make the situation worse.

Last night she laid out on a rooftop next to an Akashic beneath the stars and said: I know, I'm tired of being upset, and like most of her Words she doesn't bother to say the ones that she doesn't feel to be true. Reality is full of enough illusions.

"Sure, rematch," Ashley says, with the sort of smug assurance that must have driven Bran Summers to madness every time she beat -him- at something.

[My flag! Defending!]
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 2, 2, 4, 5, 5, 7, 10 (Success x 2 at target 6)

[K. R. J.] [I can... totally waste the WP! Let's not let Ashley get cocky.]
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 3, 3, 5, 7, 8, 10 (Success x 4 at target 6) [WP]

[K. R. J.] [TEST!]

[K. R. J.] "I'll be reclaiming that honor," Kage says, once the White King is in check. Black Queen [once-pawn]. Her mouth crooks, and she presses her palm against her forehead. Then she winks at Ashley. While they were playing, Kage checked on the chicken again, gave it another five minutes, and after that five minutes, got up, took the chicken out, checked the water, brought it to a roiling boil, put the pasta in not long ago, now it's time for the pasta to come out, for the Roma tomatoes to be chopchopped, too bad there are no onions, for the egg to be cracked, mixed in, richness. All these last minute tells, done while playing. "Food?"

[Ashley McGowen] That smug grin has faded, but Ashley doesn't seem to be grousing, doesn't sulk and glower at the victor; she accepts the loss with as much grace as Ashley can accept the loss. Which is to say, she resolves to kick Kage's ass next time they play. There will be a next time. Preferably a lot of next times, and a lot of winning.

"You're a worthy opponent, Kage," she says, with an exaggerated air, as she gets up and follows the Orphan back to the kitchen.

[K. R. J.] "Did Casp...uh, Hannibal ever bring Natalee by? I beat her once," Kage says, with an air of false injury.

In the kitchen, "Hold this," she says, of a collander, and she pours the hot water and pasta in, steam rises, rises, Oracular, a veil, obscures the two Magi completely, then lifts. The pasta goes into the largest bowl Ashley has. If necessary, a couple of bowls. Then: the apple-and-clementine marinated chicken gets tossed within, the Roma tomato slices, the goat-cheese [starts to melt, contact]. "And now all that remains is to test it." Kage flicks an eyebrow at Ashley, a silent question: so-are-we-giving-to-the-bums-on-the-front-steps, or what?

[Ashley McGowen] Ashley holds the collander out with both hands as Kage pours the hot water through them, as noodles and steam cloud her vision for a few seconds, trusting that the Orphan won't accidentally douse her hands. "I met her once," Ashley says. "But I didn't know her well." Ashley's seen a lot of Hannibal, over the years. She's seen a lot of the associates he brought by, when she used to come and visit Bran (or sometimes Justine) after lessons.

"I'll test it," are the brave words from the Hermetic. Not the sort given to thrusting creations upon the unsuspecting: she will assume the risk of failure. So she takes a fork and a rather generous mound of it is transferred to her mouth, before Kage gets a nod. "Not bad, for salvage."

[K. R. J.] "Oh, good," Kage says, and then: "What are we drinking?" Kage doesn't suggest tea tonight. Maybe because it's just so damned humid outside. So muggy that she only wishes the mosquitos would realize how muggy it was and drown little bloodsucking bastards drown.

She takes her plate back to the living room and the coffee table, then settles down, ready to eat the fruits of their labor.

[Ashley McGowen] Kage asks what they're drinking like she doesn't want to drink tea, like she'd rather have something alcoholic, and Ashley glances toward her cabinet. Pauses for a moment. "I think I have stuff for sangria, let me check," she says, as Kage takes her plate out into the next room. A few seconds of rummaging in the refrigerator, and she's located club soda.

She spends a few minutes slicing fruit (which is mainly where she's gotten most of her experience with a knife, apparently - by drinking). Quiet, as she has been for much of the night. Several minutes later she returns with a pitcher and two glasses full of ice, the pitcher full of red wine and the sliced oranges and apples.

She's feeling quiet, and isn't generally the type to be bothered by silence, but it seems to be wearing on her today. So after she's poured and has taken a few bites, there's, "Settled well into being a Disciple?"

[K. R. J.] The question -- or perhaps just the topic -- surprises Kage. Disciple, now. Not just an initiate of the Mysteries; a disciple of the Mysteries (Mystery [Cult]). Deeper, deeper, and the scope of her horizons have become more liminal. Her eyes are dark, and liquid, and expressive; sometimes, what they express is clear, clearly readible, unambiguous. Sometimes not. Just now, pensive, something inward: musing.

" - settled well? Do you mean 'with grace' or 'with comfort'?" A beat. "I should ask you; after all, I'm not climbing a hierarchy. What do you think?" And then: "I feel Changed, but no different. Are you going to Seek again soon?"
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 1, 1, 4, 6, 7, 8 (Success x 1 at target 6)

[K. R. J.] [Er, I don't actually know why there are dice. *takes them back*]

[Ashley McGowen] "I think you were ready to be a Disciple before you actually were," Ashley says. There's no change in tone when she says it, and this is characteristic of Ashley sometimes: I think becomes more a statement of fact, a simple acceptance of how things are. She says nothing more to Kage on the topic of her readiness, her comfort, her grace. She seems to think this is enough.

"I'm hoping to Seek again soon," she adds. "But we'll see." She's no longer feeling that destructive pull from her Avatar, or at least, it's no more destructive than it usually is. If the truth is to be told, Ashley is a little apprehensive.

[K. R. J.] Kage is self-contained -- who has seen her temper snap? Nathan; once. But even then: it wasn't irrevocable; it wasn't a blaze, a flare of unthinking, incautious action; it burned, but like a cold star. Give lie to the redhair. Kage also has a few elegant, demure mannerisms; they're often edged in something approaching flamboyance, or irreverence, but they are essentially: reserved. More lie, to the color of her hair: aren't redheads supposed to be a little wild? A little unlucky? A little fiery? Shows what the world knows.

Kage is, however, a creature of deep passions, and she feels things: intently, intensely; that's probaby why, when Ashley surprises her again, her cheeks go all bright, and the brightness darkens her eyes, gives them a sparkle, a gleam, a glint. Or maybe that's the sangria, which she pours out, ice-caves, falls, and - yeah. Maybe it's that. She smiles - briefly - at Ashley, anyway, from behind her cup.

And then: "You don't have that blight any longer. I don't think it will be the same this time."

[Ashley McGowen] Ashley hasn't seen Kage angry. She's seen her upset, a few times. The once: coming into Ashley's apartment briefly after they'd just started speaking again, speaking of black-road beads and the fall of a Visionary, skin pale and her back straight like a bulwark against the darkness she'd found in what she calls the White Fence house. She napped on Ashley's couch that night before she was able to leave.

That said, Ashley has gotten passable at reading Kage in spite of how self-contained she is. Or, at least, she knows what is a smile and what is not, knows that a real smile lights up Kage's eyes and brings grace to her features. She catches the look from behind the cup.

She takes a sip from her own before she answers Kage. "It will probably be different," she agrees. "But I've...I mean. I've changed a lot in the past year. I'm a little worried that all that change is going to mean I run up against it and it won't let me pass on." She's worried, but her tone isn't that of someone that will bend: she does her own Will, after all. If it means she's consigned to life as a Disciple, well...

[K. R. J.] "Why? Because there's been so much of it? Because you don't know who you are now? Because it will say: No, you need to stay, go through another couple of revolutions?" A forkful of pasta and chicken and goatcheese, oh my. An apple slice, too. The peels were not thrown over her shoulder.

[Ashley McGowen] "All of those, really," Ashley says, after she's had a moment to chew thoughtfully. It's a different mix of tastes, the fruit with the pasta with the goatcheese, but it's not unpleasant by far. Right now her thoughts are cast over the past year, though, all of the changes there have been, all of the places she has gone and the ways in which she's become her Word. It's a different path than she'd anticipated.

"Like I...I don't know. When I think about who I was when I came to Chicago I barely even recognize that person. And I know that the change hasn't been -that- drastic, but given that it hasn't been that long it just..." A shrug, here. She has weathered a lot, but at the very least Ashley knows: she remains Hunger, and she will always be hungry, and while the nuances of that might change when broken down she is still the same person.

"I don't know if I've changed in the way my Avatar would want, is more it. But I've changed in the way -I- want, so it's a moot point."

[K. R. J.] "Your serpent is old," Kage says, after a moment's thought, a moment of quietude. Her glance stays on Ashley. "I think with age comes an element of patience, of cunning, that we aren't -- that's hard to compass. You still want to devour the world, don't you?" Her mouth quirks, no humor; an almost smile (almost moonlight). "You still want to know things? You're still driven to take them in? I don't think you're changing in a way that isn't what your Avatar would want, necessarily. Maybe you're limiting your Avatar; what it wants. Maybe it wants more than you've seen it want so far. That's what you need to find." A beat, a pause, and, "Maybe."

Kage: she mythologizes the world.

[Ashley McGowen] "Maybe," Ashley echoes, and she is giving some genuine thought to this. Her Avatar is a powerful one, but what it wants can be open to interpretation: Ashley doesn't always know, she just feels. She's just driven. Kage knows; she felt that hunger, that ache, for however long Ashley let her glimpse it when she told her the story of Catherine.

"I guess the only way to know for sure is to Seek and see."

[K. R. J.] [Doo-dee-doo?]
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 1, 5, 6, 7, 7 (Success x 1 at target 7)

[K. R. J.] There is a pause. The pause is long. The pause gets filled with: sangria, pasta. More sangria. The fruit is good. Kage glances down at her knee, at her jeans, leans against one elbow. The pause is a silence. The silence is a pause. There are things Kage needs to say, but she's reluctant to do the deed right now: so she doesn't. Yet still, the pause; she doesn't let it seem awkward. Or tries not to. No indication: just smooth sailing, like all those sailors, lost in frozen seas, going forward. Ahem:

"Last time, It came to you, didn't it? I mean, you didn't actually -- meditate or contemplate a word until you were in that place with the tower, right? Next time, maybe try to storm the gates."

[Ashley McGowen] There are things Ashley probably should say. She doesn't know whether Kage knows about what happened, that there's a demon out, that it's trying to close jaws on Chicago: another Disciple should know about this. Her friend should know about this. But she, too, is reluctant to thrust the blade, not when they've been having a good evening, when there's been chess and when they can triumphantly devour an experiment and say hey, this isn't terrible. Actually it's pretty good.

She would think that now that she's talked about it a few times this week, said those words a few times, it would have made them easier to say. Such is not the case. She keeps wavering, wondering which time will be the last time she'll have to say them.

"Yeah, it came to me last time," she says. "So you're probably right. I can call it when I want to - so maybe after all of this is taken care of," and a vague gesture out the window, "I'll chase it down."

[K. R. J.] "After July 4th, then," Kage says, after an infinitessimal hesitation. Her plate, she puts it aside.

[Ashley McGowen] July Fourth, says Kage, and Ashley glances up from her own plate, after forking the last mouthful up and into her mouth. That glance is uncomprehending for a few seconds while she chews, and then, a beat later, melds into understanding.

Her plate, too, is pushed aside.

A sip from her glass manages to keep up a facade of nonchalance, one that will likely fall away very soon. "What's happening July Fourth?"

[K. R. J.] Kage has a slim throat: feminine, lovely; sharp collar-bones. She could do with more meat on her bones. She swallows; shadows shift. "Well," she says, still poised. Her gaze goes abstracted for a moment -- distant; not pensive so much as occluded [full (brimming)]. "That depends," she says. "But money's on 'nothing good.'" A beat.

"So. I heard a lot of what happened on Saturday. T.H. is pretty detail-orientated. He didn't tell me who," a glance, for Ashley; then a glance away, at, say, Zane, or Zane's tail, something handy. Kage is cool, level-headed, steady. "But anyway, I started trying to figure out things for myself."

[Ashley McGowen] Ashley's eyes find the window, and the definition of the Hermetic's jaw wavers a moment, works, as though for a moment she might tell Kage who. But that is left aside, left in its box just for a little while, because Kage is talking about July the fourth, about problems the city is going to have, and that is more important than who Ashley lost.

She's the deacon now.

"What did you see?" This, careful. She assumes it was a Seeing and not a Finding, from what she knows of Kage and what she knows of what Kage knows. From that, and because the demon didn't invite her, hasn't troubled her so far.

[K. R. J.] "Heh. First what I found."

Kage isn't telling Ashley this because she is the Deacon. Kage isn't even telling Ashley this because she likes Ashley, because she respects her as much as she respects any Traditionalist. She's telling Ashley this because it's important. Because she doesn't believe that it should be a secret. Because Ashley is intelligent. Because it does no good bottled up, sealed beneath her tongue: a letter without a word, a word without breath.

"I was focusing on this object that he -- it? -- wants. 'Only you can prevent forest fires,' and all that jazz." A beat. "I found reference to the 'Twilight Star' in [obscure name: Kage is an academic like that]'s history in [obscure date: imperfect, placing it at ______] Crusade. A group of Semitics planned - supposedly - to wield its power, kick some Moslem and Christian ass, save the Holiest City. Another name, another reference, years later: La Siempre Sedienta, the Ever Thirsting, a relic of an indigenous people of Central America. Blood sacrifices offered.

"I dropped Wharil a line, actually. As I recall, he's good with that region of the continent. I thought he might be able to dig up more perspective. I mean, this thing: fleeting maybe-references to a lot of the infamous. General Karl Haushofer made reference to it. He may've attained it from George Gurdjieff. Another name: Danaergeschenk Seula." Her accent is better with the German than it is the Hebrew or the Spanish. "The Poisoned Chalice of Souls."

"Just lovely, right? Some of his contemporaries think he managed to acquire it. Some of his contemporaries think that he gave it to his son. His son, who escaped to South America at the end of the war. Next mention: some oil tycoon named Emile VanBuren who liked toys, interesting antiquities, things with power, he bragged about having it. Refused to show proof, so there's a lot of skepticism." Academics and collectors and internet trolls are alike in some respects.

"His son died. His estate was divided by a trusted friend - no name, yet - and that's where that trail runs cold. With me so far?"

It's only been a week. Give Kage more time.

[Ashley McGowen] They're both highly academic people. Ashley's focus is in sociology, in philosophy - but both of those things require a healthy knowledge of history. They also, from time to time, require a healthy knowledge of the obscure. She listens to Kage, gaze flickering while she takes it all in, absorbs it, does her best to stay on the trail through all of its twists and turns and zigzags. Relentlessly pursues the point.

"I'm with you," she says, giving Kage a nod. There's curiosity there now, of course, vast and insatiable, because as dangerous as this topic is, as painful as dealing with all of this has been, there has been a lot of room for discovery too.

[K. R. J.] "Okay. I also looked into the club." A beat. By looked into the club, she means: went there, inquired; hung out, saw some strippers, schmoozed. Kage does not have arcane, but she can get around. She doesn't elaborate on how. Of course, she doesn't choose this moment to ask Ashley what she was thinking, just meeting up with everybody ten minutes before, doesn't ask the pointed question. "But there was nothing there that I've been able to uncover there. No - no sudden changes in staff; no one who'd been sick; no regulars, unseen for a while. Just this general difficult-to-capture air -- not even a rumor, you know? Just a mood -- of things gone to ground, working. Working, under ground. You know? Does that make sense? A busy quiet."

Another beat. Kage loosens her hair. Presses the side of the glass against her cheek. Cool, cold ice and cold, cool glass. The ice is melting.

[Ashley McGowen] It hasn't occurred to Ashley to go back and check out the club yet. If the demon had intended to put her out of commission by doing what he did, if he'd intended it as a means of rattling them - it worked. Ashley has berated herself several times for this through the week, but in the end, sometimes she isn't as superhuman as she would like to be. Or maybe she doesn't really want it after all: maybe she doesn't Will it because she knows what lies that way.

Her ice is melting too. It makes her drink a little faster. "So where did you look after that?"

[K. R. J.] "I was going to use a map of the city," Kage says, distant; removed from the event. "But instead - "

This conversation happens on Friday; Kage found out about what happened on Monday. She spent Father's Day at her family's house, and a sizable portion of that time in the treehouse out back which had been her Mom's project back when Kage was nine or ten. The treehouse had almost burned down once when the tree was struck by lightning; the lightning didn't stay, though: it writhed, like a nest of white thorns, of radiant snakes, a crown of spikes, then blossomed into flame, and then was put out by Kage's dad, on hand with a hose. It had been a decent day. Ashley wants to know where Kage looked next.

"I learned this," she says: "This cup. This chalice. It'll be used to fill up with Shadow, to catch the Shadow of the Red Star. What this means precisely, I'm still unclear, but I don't think I'm jumping to conclusions when I say: Nothing Good. And it's a time crunch thing -- has to happen when the moon is just so, when the Red Star is just so, and the best time for this is July Fourth." A beat. "Also," another beat. "He already has it, 'ley. He just doesn't need it yet. But it's his."

[Ashley McGowen] Many people would scoff at such predictions, at these tellings of doom, at what might be a coming apocalypse. Not many of those people are mages. Ashley listens to what Kage tells her, gaze intent, and what -exactly- all of it means doesn't matter to her.

"Then we're going to have to get it from him," Ashley says, "before the Fourth." Privately she has a moment where she's berating herself for wasting time, for slumping around the city all week when she could have been figuring this out. When they could have been moving. She doesn't dwell on it long.

"Emily got a hold of one of the cards he gave to each of us at the meeting, and I was going to try to track him with it, but Solomon suggested against it. We'll have to use some other means of finding him."

[K. R. J.] Kage shakes her head. "I think the focus should be on where it is. Where he's keeping it. Do you think he'd keep it on him? If so, the one will lead to the other. If not, then: great. Steal it away, keep it the fuck untouched on July Fourth. So: on his person? Or hidden somewhere, protected?" A brief pause, and then: "It's an object in space. Perhaps Atlas would have some perspective on how to scan the city for something like that. Some, uh, weird invention that can hunt down the Powerful resonance beneath -- I don't know. I'm not a Gentleman Inventor for a reason, but," a shrug, then -- it looks easy. The glass, she finally puts that down, circling the lip of it with her fingertip.

[Ashley McGowen] Ashley nods, at this. A touch reluctant: because she wants to find him too. She wants to have a reason to go after him, beyond the reason she already has. She wants a reason to do something she knows is risky, is reckless.

She'll probably do it anyway. She just won't feel as comfortable doing it.

"You're right," she says. "We should find it as soon as possible. I could probably...if I could get an -idea- of what I'm looking for, I might be able to locate it with the Ars Conjunctionis. Maybe if I can figure out its True Name, then..." She muses, fingertips resting on the edge of her glass. "I'll see if anyone else knows anything and do some research on my own. But yeah. We're probably going to have to move fast."

[K. R. J.] Kage sees the reluctance (touch [slight]) and she doesn't disregard it. Her gaze goes studious, but the study is focused on Ashley. Another beat. And: "There's always information, somewhere." A beat. And, "When it's found, if it's found: this won't make the Demon disappear. He'll still be a problem." A beat. "Just, look: it needs to be done quick -- they're on a time schedule, then so are we -- but it also needs to be done smart." A pause, a sigh:

"I'm still looking. My resources are limited; I should expand them." That was absent. That was idle. That was mind, turning away: wandering down another path. She brings it back. "The only other thing I want to add. Uhm. I got the impression that -- well. That the idea of 'Independence Day' was pleasing because it was particularly fitting? And that would only be pleasing to -- well. To the chained, to something -- that wasn't free; that wasn't independent. So I think the ... whatever, the Ever Thirsting. I think it's a key to something's chains. That it'll open a door."

"So on that note, if you find anything out, or something happens ... Let me know." A beat.

"You want more ice?"

[Ashley McGowen] It needs to be done smart. Kage has said that before. Kage said it to Ashley and Wharil, when they showed up outside her apartment, Ashley thinks. Kage worries that they'll rush headlong into things as they have in the past, perhaps.

"Sure," she says, of ice. She doesn't dwell on that comment of Kage's very long because she's thinking about the rest. "Independence Day occurred to me too," she says. "I'll see what I can find out. Maybe someone I know knows something." Bran and Justine, most likely, but there are others. And there are others that -they- know, with the influence they pull in Boston.

As Kage gets up to get ice the Hermetic sighs and draws her knees up, hugs them, thinks about what there is to be done. "Thanks for telling me," she says.

[K. R. J.] The Hermetic doesn't answer one way or another about the ice, so Kage assumes that, as her ice is melted, is a pool of liquid, so she snags her glass too. Refills both; ice is good on a humid day like this. Right now, Nathan Spriggs is leaving a we-gotta-talk and a remember-that-lead-I-mentioned-offhandedly message on Kage's voicemail.

Thanks, Ashley says, and Kage doesn't answer. Just: ice, clinking, in the kitchen - and then the return.

When she resettles, she says, "Sorry about this."

[Ashley McGowen] There's more ice clinking into the glasses, making their high pitched song as the cubes rattle inside, as Kage returns with the glasses. Ashley takes hers, pours more of the sangria into it, but doesn't drink immediately.

"Don't apologize," she says. "This is the way things are. I'll deal with it." There's a glass between her hands, and she's looking down into the red liquid, watching the way the fading light outside filters in, shines through it like stained glass.

Then she says, "It was my mother he had. Which...it's...it's hard. But I guess taking the fight out of us for a while was probably part of what he intended."

[K. R. J.] The Hermetic guesses that taking the fight out've the six who were invited was part've what was intended. Kage says, cool, "Emily was pretty shaken when I spoke to her. So was T.H." Then: "But that kind of gambit is - " a pause. Not awkward, not helpless: just vast. What's a word for foolish; what's a word for wrong?

Kage turns the glass around in her hands. Was Ashley's Mom that died. There's a space between that revelation and this question -- possibly the only question she'll ask. Kage is arrogant, Kage is self-assured, but Kage isn't a saint, and she sure as Hell doesn't always know what to say or do: "Did she see you?"

[Ashley McGowen] Ashley knows that Emily was shaken. The girl offered her futon to Ashley that night, put pajamas in her hands, told her to go and have a shower to wash away the blood that splattered her hands and her stomach and chest, residue from the bullet that slugged into her ribs and lodged somewhere in one of her organs.

Nathan, she didn't know was shaken, but it doesn't surprise her: she's seen Nathan rattled. The man showed up on her doorstep drinking himself half to death after he saw Dylan Willis shot, he waved a gun in Ashley's face for a misinterpreted joke after he was possessed. Ashley does not think much of Nathan's resilience for such things, or his Will, and it shows in that momentary wrinkle of her nose, the huff of air through her nostrils, as she takes a sip from her glass.

Kage asks, then, about her mother. Lost for words. Ashley looks down into her glass, looks away at the floor. Not at Kage. "I don't think so," Ashley says. "She was really scared. Looked like she was praying. But Solomon...he summoned the ghosts, to find out what they knew, and I had a chance to talk to her on Monday. Just for a few minutes, but..."

[K. R. J.] Brief pause. Infinitessimal, again. And then: "Was it okay?"

[Ashley McGowen] Ashley doesn't answer, at first. If it was hard for her to recall that night, it's equally hard for her to recall Monday evening, speaking to her mother and thinking These are the last words she's going to hear from me. Making sure they were good words, that she knew that she wasn't going to be trapped forever, hungering after all the things she wanted to say but didn't have time for.

"It was okay," she says. "She was really scared, at first. She told me she didn't regret having me, and that she was sorry she didn't try to get to know me better. She told me that they were still trapped by the demon, but Catherine's sheltering her and kind of...is letting her sleep until we free them and they can pass on. She asked me if it would be okay." She's speaking slowly, the kind of speaking someone does when they're trying to talk around food.

[K. R. J.] Kage takes this in: her jaw (delicate) tightens. Behind the drink: she has stopped turning it around; has it in front of her mouth. Her breath is condensation on the glass; a fog, unrevealing. Why? Because it's wrong and it horrifies her. She doesn't say anything.

[Ashley McGowen] Her mother's soul is trapped: limbo, she'd heard it described, a place where they were just...stuck. No doors, no windows to elsewhere, no way to pull themselves out of that insubstantial prison. Ashley knows that simply dealing with whatever plans with the cup, the chalice, won't do anything: her reasons for wanting to go after the demon are more than just simple revenge, though part of her is indeed furious, wants to lash out at something that hurt her, something that took something away from her.

She also doesn't know how to react to Kage's silence. There's a wandering gaze, wandering around the floor and the room to the window, a wondering whether she's said too much, and it brings her composure back together. She doesn't say anything either.

[K. R. J.] Kage wishes she knew more. This happens; this happens a lot. This wishfulness, this yearning; it's as familiar to her as the act of opening her eyes in the morning [groggy with nightmares... Will this day be different?]. But she wishes she knew more. It's this that keeps her quiet. This, and what do you say to a friend who's Mom's soul is held in purgatory by a demon? They don't make a Hallmark card for that [there aren't any poems, either]. Finally, finally: exhale, heartbeat: ticks. Kage says - " - okay. So maybe we'll have to give Independence Day another meaning. I'll see what I can turn up."

But Kage is also - believe it or not - an optimist. There's always a way, after all. Always.

[Ashley McGowen] Kage says she'll see what she can turn up, and Ashley knows she means what she says, that she wants to help, that she will look. In spite of how aloof Ashley can be, how difficult, how headstrong, a lot of people have been kind to her this week, in their own ways: some simply tried to cheer her up, some tried to share her grief and lessen it, Kage is promising to help. It's not something she expected.

"Thanks, Kage," she says, swirling most of a glass around the melting ice and then setting all of it aside. Ashley can't rightfully be called an optimist; she's simply determined to do things because she can't consider other options, because she will fight her hardest until she can't fight anymore. And she will be determined, likely tomorrow. After she's had time to shore herself up, to come to terms with things enough to put them aside.

[K. R. J.] Thanks, Kage, Ashley says. Kage's eyebrows draw together for a second; a line appears between them. Then her expression smooths out (more or less), and she lifts her shoulders. Not-quite-a-shrug.

Then: "If you want or need to talk about it. I mean, the personal stuff." That's all. It's followed by this: "Or. And. Want to play another game?" Another game, before Kage goes; she doesn't say it. A game is focus, a game is rosary beads. All those moves, manipulations.

[Ashley McGowen] "It wouldn't change anything," Ashley says, of personal things, of things she could say to get off her chest but that would ultimately still be there. She'd still feel them. Ashley isn't the sort who draws any great comfort from other people knowing how she feels just to know.

"But we should play."

[K. R. J.] [Play Well? +1 diff 'cos, uh. Sangria + Doomnews.]
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 6, 7, 8, 10, 10, 10 (Success x 5 at target 7)

[Ashley McGowen] [Leeeeeeeet's see about this.]
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 3, 3, 4, 4, 4, 4, 7 (Success x 1 at target 7)

[Ashley McGowen] [Rematch!]
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 2, 3, 4, 4, 6, 6, 9 (Success x 1 at target 7)

[K. R. J.] [Re-match?]
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 3, 3, 4, 4, 6, 10 (Success x 1 at target 7)

[Ashley McGowen] [Ties are dumb.]
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 2, 3, 5, 6, 8, 9, 10 (Success x 3 at target 7)

[K. R. J.] [You can't tie in chess!]
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 3, 4, 4, 7, 10, 10 (Success x 3 at target 7)

[Ashley McGowen] [Argh! Just admit defeat, Orphan!]
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 3, 3, 6, 6, 7, 7, 10 (Success x 3 at target 7)

[K. R. J.] [-_- Whatchoo call me?]
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 3, 6, 6, 6, 8, 9 (Success x 2 at target 7)

[K. R. J.] [roll credits]