i said a-MONAAAAY......CHANGES EV-REEEY-THAAaaang....[Closed]

[summertimeblues]

Who: Richie Tozier (summertimeblues) & Red (persistor), Boxer (desistor), Sandra the Unseeing (tutorb), and J.J. Leroy (underwhelms), possibly others
What: Mission stuff!! And a catch-all for January if need be
When: Early January
Where: Olympia, visiting Wyver for the lovely mountains and lakes and the profit they hold
Warning(s): Potty mouths, perhaps dirty humor, maybe a violence...also J.J. is a terrible embarrassment to dw rp and Canada as a whole, I'm threading with him so you don't have to. You're welcome.



Rod and Bexer - Disturbing the Dead

[Not a month ago, Richie would have outright laughed if you told him to hitch up his suspenders and drag his ass out for a tomb raid. The whole thing would have seemed ludicrous. Childish even, searching for buried treasure in taped off ruins. That's the shit you pulled when you were fourteen and bored and you hear a rumor that the old mill's light turns on by itself at the stroke of midnight.

But call him curious. Or suitably bored. Suitably irritated with how daily life in Olympia now means he's serving liquor to men and women who can't shut up about what a pack of ingrates the good folks of Wyver are. That insipid survey that'd been floating around ground his gears further. Though the two situations hardly co-relate, rising dissent versus hunkering around in caves for trinkets, some irrepressible madness was stirring in him. A need to dissent himself, the likes of which he'd abandoned in his early thirties when he cast off the picket signs and weekend marches. Get his head out of the puckered asshole Olympia was becoming and throw a middle finger to the air.

Also, his wages as a barkeep were fair, but he was used to far, far better. This had money involved.

He contacted Red on a whim for company (and for a moment doubted the choice — she was a mute, would that make it harder to navigate together? They'd have their phones but maybe she'd be stuck doing hambones and finger snaps to call his attention if there was a bat nest he might trip into) and she'd responded quick enough that there was nothing more to discuss. The pair were to meet at the mouth of the mountain and make the trip into the crypt together.

Except the pair's more like a trio.]

So I've gotta say, of all the coincidences I could have imagined, I wouldn't have sat you two down on a love seat if you paid me ten dollars to think it over. Don't I look the fool.

["Wally" is human now, the light from the flashlight catching his fleshy ridges and the leather of his jacket, but he's dragging the sword with him. The sword that he lives in, clinking over ancient stone as they pass into the dark world of the dead. The world's most solid hologram, folks, step right up and take a poke yourself! You won't believe your eyes!] I take it that you hitched wagons before all of that. Or you're a Super Freak the likes of which Rick James couldn't conceive. Congratulations Red, I'm impressed.


Sandy Crabs - A Day in the Life

[The second rebellion takes place on a deceptively more forgiving stage. There's no ghosts or trap doors, but there's pitfalls here all the same. This one is bordering on (or in fact, is) illegal. Something a sensible adult wouldn't have done, and he wouldn't have dared as a grown man in California. There was no risk worth taking it for. In Maine, maybe, but the snooping they'd had to do laid firmly outside of the realm of man and institutions. This was legitimate espionage.

Richie's only been here how long, now? Two, edging on three months? He can't decide if this sudden bout of daring is a healthy change or a stupid one.

This time, he enlists what he can only imagine is the perfect accomplice for the job. She's travel-sized, smart, a verified psychic, and easily hidden into small spaces. Hello Sandra, we're very impressed with your resume and we'd like to welcome you on board. Happy to have you on the team.

They slip through security with relative ease. Sandra's got a neat trick there: blind she may be, but unseeing is a damn lie. She confirms or denies the presence of approaching bodies, and only through her cheats does Richie slip through doors and around the right corners until they hit the office they need.]

You oughta do this full time, babe. You're a dab hand at playing dispatch for thieves. [Richie shuts the door behind them with his heel, and gently props the old gal on the sprawling desktop as he takes a quick gander around.] Maybe we can get you some wheels. Motor you around and you can zip in where man may not follow.


Jimmy Johns Leeroy - Preaching in the Material World

[After all that recklessness, he's ready for something a little more sedate. A trip to the country, so to speak. Luckily there's an option to earn some money there too, and as much as he misses swimming daily in pools or long California beaches, he can only shudder remembering that horking motherfucker that tried to bite his face off on the boat trip in. The lakes might be inland, but even so? No thanks.

He opts to get quartz from the Edrathe Ruins instead. Sets off early in the day so he has a bit of time to see the sights as well, admiring the graceful lines of ancient monuments and having a quick lunch on a snowy knoll. The weather has been downright amicable, even if there's no melt. While the sun is still high and he has plenty of hours to make it back to town, he treks into the dark.

It's some time before he comes across what he needs. He's careful to chart his way through the cave. While not labyrinthe, it's dim and deep enough that he feels caution is necessary. Richie hums, wedging the light between his shoulder and cheek as he pries the crystals off the wall.

There's a splashing sound from further ahead.

He freezes. Whips the light around with a hunchback's pirouette. His hands are still on his knapsack and the rocks so he has to tuck them away before fetching the light proper. Richie waves the light this way and that, but only sees the esophagus of bedrock stretching longer and longer down. How deep does this go?

What's splashing around in the dark down there?

For once, he opts to stay silent. He's alone out here, he's sure of it...]


((if you want to do something in our fair month of January, please feel free to shoot me a PM on this journal! Happy to throw up closed starters anytime.))

Comments

i can reverse it...

[tutorb]

[ Yeah, about as hilarious as watching Richie try to snoop his way in here without her guidance. She hasn't the foggiest what a motor is, or for that matter, a monkey. Honestly, on any given topic with him, the parse rate is at about 80% for her, but at least he usually leaves enough context in for her so she doesn't have to delve. She's been doing less and less of that on a whim, as of late. ]

What would I need a second for? [ she hums, as he begins to poke around the room. ] If the lice become too much of a distraction, I am sure we can have you shaved.

[ Well, now that they've reached their destination, she has nothing to do but talk, so talk she shall. She sighs, allows her apparition to shimmer into view for now, arms folded placidly, ]

Unfortunately, I can only go so far as to assure you that there are no people in this desk. Nor is there anything alive, moving, or producing sound. Should the owner of this desk happen along, I could offer a full report... Though unless you can fold yourself into a drawer, I would suggest you expedite your search before it comes to that.

no take-backsies

[summertimeblues]

[Probably for the best that she does less and less delving these days. People around here are all fit for the funny farm.]

Oh, you like a bald man do you? [Can she sense the eyebrow waggle that comes with that?] I could do a chrome dome if it really suits your fancy. I'm afraid it'll never shine as bright as your globe but I'll wax it just the same.

[She's elected to join him, that green glimmer sprouting from the crystal like a shot from steam whistle.] That doesn't sound like a half bad idea. Damn. Would you be all right hanging around solo for a while longer?

[He moves on to the next drawer. In here there is a small leather pouch, note clipped to the top. Richie pulls it out with a frown. It gives a telling jingle.]

"For you know what." Huhm... [He shakes the coins into his palm and does a hasty count.] Looking to be about one hundred silver, here. So not a big favor, but enough to look suspicious all the same.

[tutorb]

[ Just on you, Richie. Just on you. Grandma needs her soaps, she's just a little sick of jump scares. ]

[ Anyway, perhaps not technically, but there's only one thing a set of eyebrows can be doing with a tone like that, isn't there? Hers leap up appropriately. ] Oh, yes. Never am I quite so stricken with the vapors as when I gaze upon a smooth and shiny head. Why do you really think I have stayed within a polished orb all these years?

[ Not obligation, desire. Stockholm Syndrome isn't funny, Richie. No, she hates it. And doesn't give a damn how you look, dweeb. But at his next suggestion, she cocks her head, half curious and half doubtful. ]

And you will, what, go sneaking back through the halls on your lonesome? What if you are apprehended?

[ She doesn't sound totally opposed, but, you know. Doubtful. Appropriately doubtful, she feels. Rightly concerned. He follows instructions fine enough, but beyond for company, she hasn't had much of an opportunity to discern whether or not he's remotely reliable, and never has she once erred toward the benefit of the doubt in this regard. But then there's coins, and she has to scoff as he quotes. ]

You take the amount to be more suspect than the label, then.

[summertimeblues]

[come on you're an 800 yr old assassin, surely you've seen worse.]

I knew it, you saucy minx.

[She's giving it a consideration, and more gravely than he was. Richie does have to take a pause there. Would he really be able to sneak out as easily as all that? Much less return safely to fetch her? Maybe there was a broom closet to stuff into. Something suitably convenient that wouldn't require a full on evac and recon.

Not impossible. But without Sandra's help, a touch improbable.]

I suppose I'll have a handsome mugshot. Let's see what we can get through here first. Maybe there won't be a need if we nab something real juicy.

[He funnels the coins back into the pouch, taking care to nestle them back in the same spot among the clutter.] It could mean anything, couldn't it? A hundred bucks doesn't take you much anywhere, and we're getting paid how much to snoop around here? Probably gave someone a handy or dropped a name for promotion.

The rest of this is...oh. [He pulls loose a drawing. It's not bad though certainly not skilled, but all the same it's...leaving an impression.] It's my boss.

[Koralle in the buff, tits pushed up and on her knees. Several experimental poses line the margins. Christ, this was taking him back to high school.]

[tutorb]

[ Yeah, probably, but not in the middle of a fancy dress party and also she hasn't assassined since she was like 30. Give her a break. Your brain's gross. ]

[ She considers so thoroughly because she's a strategist at heart, and a strategist does not send a loud, average man on a stealth mission alone, but more importantly, because she cares... about not getting left behind. ]

You get digging, then, [ she nods, before leaving her head to tilt in the direction of the door for a moment, then rolling as if to regard the ceiling. Listening. Reading. Wholly useless gestures, but something to occupy herself with while he does his duty. Keeping tabs on the door and the hall outside in particular, if only to give him some warning to dive beneath the desk should the worst possible scenario arise. ]

Considering my living expenses, I admit I have not spared the value of a silver much thought. Once upon a time, a hundred sol would have seen me living quite comfortably.

[ But this is a chump change operation, she can identify that much. If they can be afforded a thousand pieces for snooping through desk drawers, a hundred probably wouldn't even warrant a good handy. Suspicious all the same, not something for the workplace, and therefore worth noting. At the shift in his voice as he rifles, she turns her attention back to him, sightless gaze angled to the sound of rustling papers quickly stilled. ]

What, a note? Has she signed some official paperwork? Made some solicitations?

[ Illustrate, boy. Use your good words you love so much. ]

[summertimeblues]

Inflation's a bitch, what can I say?

[Things to consider when speaking to Sandra: money is worthless when all you've got is a soul. Jot that down on the ever growing list.

Along with the fact that she was blind, which stymied most turns of phrase and forms of action. Though this is a bit funny.]

Solicitations might be a light term for what the artist is aiming for here. But hey, she's not afraid to do business with her top off.

[tutorb]

[ Maybe she'll appreciate the mindfulness, quietly. She doesn't seriously mind much of anything that's blurted out in spite of her condition, expectantly or thoughtlessly. After all, she's had a far longer time to consider her limitations than anyone else. ]

[ (So she hasn't exactly deterred herself from prying all that much, has she. Call it a force of habit, a tic. Unthinking as one might twirl their hair, or bite their nails, she finds herself curiously nestled against the shallow forefront of his mind again, like an imp bunched up against the sun-warmed canvas roof of the blackwagon. Probably because he's going through all this intriguing evidence she cannot see.) ]

[ But thankfully, he does offer somewhat of a description, not an official document, but some artwork. And that draws up a smirk of her own across her lips. ]

How daringly licentious. Will that be making its way onto your report?

[ Or will you permit the officer their private blasphemies? The query hangs on her tongue as her head cants sharp as a Harp's toward the office door. Voices, microscopic ones outside that deign to grow louder, and where she had been sprawling lazily in Richie's margins, she now slaps open their owners' pages and scans them with a calm, fierce precision for a single notion. ]

... Neither of them intend to enter, [ she concludes softly, even before the voices begin to distance, and she returns her attention to her partner checking out the lewds, all pretense of amusement scrapped. ] But I will reiterate: let us not dawdle.

[summertimeblues]

Oh, naturally. [Richie neglects to pocket it (perhaps if it were better rendered, or he was still in grammar school...), placing it carefully back in its hiding spot.] You've got to know where your perverts are lurking. Especially when they're driving a desk as high class as this one.

[Well. Close to high class. Captain of the guard they're talking here, not Secretary of Defense.

He halts when the voices start, fingers still tickling the bottom of the drawer as he turns into a live freeze frame. Sandra gives him the go ahead. He nods, but waits until the noise has dwindled to slip the drawer back shut.

More hastily and much less chattily, he tackles the remaining three drawers. There's a lot of supplies and bland notes, business cards, nothing quite so fascinating as the Playboy spread. Richie abandons the desk and casts his attention around.]

Locker? [He whispers. It's hardly a question, as he's already at the door and prying it open. A pair of boots peek from the bottom of a hanging coat, giving the impression of a child dressing in daddy's best, shoes flopping under the dragging hem.

His hand dives to the bottom of both boots, and he pulls a face and hisses as he gropes a crumpled sock.] Oh Jesus, who raised this man? [He wipes his hand on his trousers before continuing with the coat pockets. And there...]

...Hey, Sandy, this looks like a bad sign. I'm gonna, huhm... [As much as he marvels over the gadget, he's always quick to forget when to turn to his phone. He'd taken a step back to the desk for pen and paper before he remembers the camera. Richie huffs and fishes it loose instead, fussing with the focus to make sure the photo will remain legible.] I'll read it to you later, little note from a guard to mom. Sounds like the Wyver conflict's heating on the physical front. We should make tracks, though, before—

[Before someone else comes. There's a stern clip of boots making way down the hall again, in doubles. Richie thrusts the note back in and shuts the locker with as much softness as haste could muster.

On a hunch (and sweating some, as something about those boots clopping feels like a "Just let me peek in here a sec, forgot my smokes and my sock," rather than a smooth pass-by) Richie takes Sandra from the desk and tucks her behind a book on the shelf. For himself?

He looks left. Locker's too small. Looks right. Bookcase is too tight to the wall. Under the desk?

Fuck.]

[tutorb]

[ While Richie pokes around, Sandra continues her impassive listening and chuckling along to his observations and gripes, tuned mostly to the hall for his sake as much as hers, at least until he mentions her by name (sort of...). Whatever it looks like, that's his business. And whatever his little summary invokes will have to wait until they can study it further. Even before his voice cuts out, she can sense it, easily: the intent to enter approaching at a rapid pace, and multiple pairs of heels. ]

[ As soon as he scoops up the Crystal, her image dissolves into thin air, and she's quickly shoved into some spot on the shelf. Richie, however, has a great deal more of himself to hide, and from the sound of the sparsely decorated office, not many places to do it in. Certainly no time left to improvise on either of their parts. Except for... ]

Richie, touch the Crystal!

[ She's never used the Crystal in such a way before, but worth more of a shot than it is to have him caught with his ass sticking out of a half-shut locker. Should he heed her commanding hiss, as soon as his fingers so much as brush the surface of the orb once more, he'll feel his grip on reality loosen, head going light and inky blackness burning holes in his tunneling vision like flame behind a page before consuming him entirely, consciousness being pulled as if straight down a drain... ]

[ And he'll awaken standing on a dark plateau, roughly the size of a gymnasium, an isle in what appears to be a swirling green and black abyss that extends well overhead. At his heels, an inset of stained glass, loosely depicting an eye staring up toward the heavens, nestled in a knot of tentacles. Across the way, a similar setting, though bearing an image of a forked star, and standing mirrored before it: Sandra. ]

[ Though her clothes and hair still possess the faintest fluttering qualities of being underwater and her countenance emits an ethereal glow, she is, for once, entirely solid. However despite his abrupt entrance, her sightless gaze doesn't falter from the clouded sky, and the moment he deigns to exhibit any sign of life, she raises a finger. ]

If you must speak up, you will not be heard outside of this Crystal, but do try to let me listen for a moment.

[ Read: God, please don't yell... ]

[summertimeblues]

What? [Comes the response, ineloquent and likely a shade too loud. It's that sudden prick that sparks him to obey, knowing you've foul-balled a second too late to fix it. Any bailout seems like a good offer. Richie reaches back to the bookshelf and glances his fingertips over the crystal.

What a mistake.

His mind says, "You know what? I've had it with this stuffy old skull. I'm packing up and hitting the road. Hey soul, why don't you come with me?" And the soul is an agreeable fellow so he says, "Why not?" and the pair fuck off to leave the body tingling and loose and turning limp as a flapping flag. Then it too disappears, as if sensing it was no longer of use and thinking it might save everyone the trouble of picking up the mess left behind.

Everyone comes back from vacation sooner than expected. Richie's next aware of blinking. Solid ground under his feet. Sight returns to him, and the office has vanished.

He understands nothing.]

Shit and a shin splint, where in the goddamn world is...

[He trails off. Sandra's over there. Not the green cloud of sparkle and smoke he's used to, but flesh and blood and swaddled in linens. Her face is turned upwards and his gaze follows hers, mystified. All he sees is evergreen curlicues in a black chasm. Richie looks down and around them again. The platform has two symbols at each end (home team and the visitors, his brain supplies, and though it seems ludicrous the notion sits just right with the setup), and the perimeter of it has a sharp dip in the middle and curls up at both ends like book pages.

It's all so ludicrous, but he gets the gist. He doesn't want to, his mind is screaming at him with nails raking down cheeks, but the explanation is suddenly too obvious. He takes a step closer to Sandra, and is struck by her smallness. Was she even clearing five feet?

She speaks again, and his suspicions are confirmed. Richie's jaw opens.

It snaps shut.

His legs have given up the hard and thankless work of holding him upright. His ass hits the ground with a gainless thud and his hands, cold and clammy with shock, slap the cold stone behind him for support before his head follows suit. Richie looks skyward again. That abyss just keeps going onwards...and onwards...

His voice is rasping with fright.]

Did you...trap me in here with you?

[tutorb]

[ It requires a strange, dual discipline of concentration to register the sounds of the outside world. The void itself is a silent one, besides the occasional shift and rustle and faint foreign-tongue mutter, drifting an impossible distance from beyond the veil surrounding the field. And the noise itself—the one of a door swinging open and two mildly chatting voices over purposeful steps—seems to float down from the endless sky above, while simultaneously seeming not fifteen feet away at any given moment, as the Crystal would be from their entrance in the small office. It's to this that Sandra tilts her head, until it jerks instead toward the sound of a sudden collapse across the expanse of glittering black pages. ]

[ Normally, she'd snap forthwith, and it's unsurprising how easily it jumps to the tip of her tongue after 800 years of drilling, pick your sorry corpse off the ground, boy, you answer to me here. But he is not here for training, not even here for a friendly bout, he's here out of desperate necessity, and she hadn't had the opportunity to so much as warn him. He copes rather shakily with the mysterious to begin with (with far better reason than most), and considering her state of being baffles even the strangest of folk she has yet to meet, she can't entirely blame him for going liquid in the knees at the unprecedented capture. ]

[ But a capture it is not. And neither is this a playing field to keep sides on today. The woman standing cold and vigilant turns to close the distance between she and the human wad of pure panic sloughing off feelings of dread all over her floor, padding quickly and quietly in soft-soled boots that—for once—carry a whisper of weight, stopping short with about five feet left to fold her arms. (An aura's breadth apart. Though neither of them possess one.) ]

Trap you, no. I do know how I enthuse about my prison, sometimes, but to have you join me here for an eternity to spare you a simple trespassing charge would be rather hypocritical of me. [ The voices above are exchanged for the brief grind of drawers, and a gentle rifling, thoughtless and mindless enough to hold no suspicion that another set of hands had been through the lot of them not two minutes before. ] Besides, I haven't the power to do so. You are simply visiting.

[ Her attention shifts again, maintaining a careful multitasking dance between the rattled man on her ground and the spoken words outside, one of which has requested the other to shut the door in spite of their allegedly quick stop. ]

[summertimeblues]

[The world outside leaks in from above. Richie sweats cold, gaze stuck to the darkened heavens. It's a stunning circumstance. He's certain there are people who would be selling their babies, their limbs, their wives for the option to sit their keister where his rests now. They'd be marveling and investigating, snapping pics and rending indecipherable scribbles over notepads to gloat with fellow geeks over.

Richie is not one of those geeks.

He starts in with a soft giggle. Wide eyed and shaking his shoulders. Then the real mirth

(delirium)

sets in, and he's got his fist at his mouth as he tries to stifle the fit before it gets out of control. It's just so hard, you know, when the world's flipped upside down and you're sitting pretty in a prison realm with a girl you knew solely as a glowing green ghost. Did all the molecules of his body fold up like so much socks and shirts, slipping through some pore in the glass? Did it work the same as the teleportation that takes them up and down from Thesa? Was his real body limp on the ground in reality, and this was all a projection of the mind?

No no no, that'd be useless, wouldn't it? She'd brought him in here to hide.

His laughter takes a blissful taper. Richie wipes the tears threatening to spill from his eyes and tries a hand at conversing like a normal human person, like he wasn't turning loopier than a plane with one wing blown.]

Pardon my saying so, Madame Orb-etta, but I've had better visits to the proctologist. And that's a guy who makes a living checking your shithole for tumors, so make of it what you will.

[Gingerly he rises. He finally casts his gaze around sans the shock and awe, and is once again left with a stirring impression of a sporting field.]

This is...what is this?

[God, he wants a smoke.]

[tutorb]

[ As if the way his mind is beginning to race like a rabbit's heart on the brink of giving out from fright isn't distracting enough, as soon as the laughter starts, she returns her gaze to him, brow furrowed. He really is genuinely threatening to lose it, isn't he? Trying to justify it in his struggling little mind, with its elasticity of a brick. Her frown becomes an impatient scowl, which she smooths only slightly before he opens his mouth again, and the scowl becomes a sneer of disgust. ]

[ This is his idea of resuming a normal human conversation? Honestly, how dare you introduce the mental image of Richie Tozier with a hand up his ass into her life. Or mine. I'm reporting you. ]

If you would prefer, then, I shall be just as intimate with my foot, punting you and your tumors out of this place. I am sure the guards will be awed and delighted by your little party trick.

[ No, he's not going anywhere. They're still here to do a job, and that takes precedence no matter the personal issue he takes with magic, and if he can't at least try to be understanding, let alone appreciate that she's just yanked him out of trouble, her sympathy will shrivel right quick. ]

You remember when I said I shall make up the bizarre points with impact? Consider this my belated entry. You will have your answers, [ she raises another finger, slightly (much) more dangerously now as her neck cranes toward the tune of voices overhead that have begun to banter on the topic of their trinkets of the Temple. It's a vague enough discussion at first, but simple to tune into with her own encyclopedic knowledge of talismans... Small talk, but worth focusing on. Richie eventually snatches a sliver of focus back for himself, when her shushing hand flips palm-up, shrugging along with the rest of her arm. ]

This is the Crystal. This is where I stand all day and all night and play puppets with you in the physical world, I would think this would be obvious.

[summertimeblues]

[Yeeeesh. Not as abrupt or irritating as a Beep Beep Richie, but going three times more threatening at least. She's joking (he hopes) but the irritation reads strong, and he's grown enough to know when zipping lip is proper and not just a pain.]

It's a damn strong contender, I'll give you that.

[And now, he'll keep his trap shut.

Besides, he needs a hot five to reel in all the fishing lines his brain has cast out. About a dozen threads of "What's that? What's that? What's that?" have swept to varying points of interest. He leaves Sandra to her listening (he'd gotten the other evidence, having the advantage of hands and feet in a physical world, and now its her turn to abuse her talents) and takes closer gander at some of this strangeness.

The strength has come back some in his legs, thankfully, and perhaps some of that has to do with how stern her chiding had been. His walk first takes him to the edge of the platform. The stone appears to have been carved purposefully like an open book. A hint to something? Or a slap in the face to the blind woman forced to wander it. Richie prods along the edges, reaching down to brush his hands at the lip. There's even grooves to mimic the razor edges of pages. Richie frowns, then takes his exploration over to the symbols at each end. He takes a pause at each, crouching to run his hand along the fine and shining lines of the silver star, and standing with his hands at his hips for the charcoal skull. He frowns down at the emblem.]

I was meaning more the layout. It looks kind of like a...well, like a field or a court. [She's blind, but she's also been stuck here for several hundred years. Hard as it is to imagine. Would it be too patronizing to describe what he's seeing?

He decides on a middle ground for the query.] There's symbols at both ends. Do they mean anything?

[tutorb]

[ For as annoying as he is, at least he has the good grace to shut up and pull himself together when shutting up and pulling together is due. As he leaves her to her work, she'll leave him to his roaming. Let him at least ground himself however he needs to. The conversation outside, meanwhile, seems to have turned interesting, the topic of their trinkets veering toward the illicit. ]

[ Toward the sorts of things, from the sound of things, that creep serendipitously into the Slugmarket after favors have been paid. There really were no regulations on the terms of talismans in the lawless Downside—they were all hard enough to come by and even harder to make in recent years—but from the sound of their clandestine discussion, this is something one of the guards has obtained through venues warranting a closed door. Or at the very least, was special enough to be obtained through mysterious venues. ]

[ She hears Richie, and gestures him to hold for the third time, but before the guard can name names or place places, there's another shuffle, a sliding of drawers and boots stepping in double-time, as if their owners felt suddenly late for something. Difficult to discern, with approximately zero sense of spatial context, but plain as day to her: they're leaving. Perking up sharp and focused, her feet move reflexively toward the sound, across the field as if her placement within this tiny space would do her any good. ]

... Damn, [ she finally hisses, as their voices fade and their thoughts slip through her grasp, into the hall, which feels a great deal more crowded than it had upon their entry. A changing of the guard, perhaps? A summoning of sorts? In any case, shifts have switched, and lingering in hiding for the moment seems to be the best bet, here. And besides, this has been rather... enlightening. Just how long she can host a soul on the court without getting down to business. ]

They mean everything. It is not for my own amusement that I am able to draw people in to the Crystal, I told you, it has but one purpose... Had, rather. And that was to school the Scribes' triumvirate in the ways of the Rites. [ If I never got to those in passing in her TDM dump, she would have at least said the word. ] The sigils are those of such opposing triumvirates, and are to bear their Pyres. If you would call this place a field, then consider them goals, of a sort.

[ tldr: you're not crazy, Rich. This is definitely some mystical sports arena. ]

[summertimeblues]

[The voices have disappeared. Scarpered off to better offices, bigger duties. Richie had caught bits and pieces through those hollow echoes and wonders, absently, if there's some Indiana Jones bullshit going on here. Mystical item talk can't be drawing much more in conclusions than that, and though to Olympians the word Temple belongs less in pulp fiction and more to daily life, it's all he can think about. Harrison Ford down in that volcano was a hard picture to shake.

Could do with forgetting Willie and Short Round though.

Sandra's hackles are still largely up. He'd have to tread lightly here, it's obvious she thinks he's King Idiot and too distracting to deal with when trying to eavesdrop. All fair, all accurate, but even so, what could she possibly have expected after yoinking him in crystal-side? He remembers her talk, yes, and it was a lecture fraught with silly terms for silly things but he thinks he caught the gist of it. He'd looked up triumvirate in a dictionary soon after ("a group of three powerful or notable people or things existing in relation to each other") and came up with so much lint and moths for things like "Pyre".

From what she's saying now, though...

Richie fights the incredulous grin. Bites back the laughter, please behave yourself Tozier. Is this really that much more ridiculous than a plastic cast of Paul Bunyan pulling itself off the pedastal to swing an ax at little boys?]

You coach sports. [Aren't you blind? he wants to intone, but of course that wouldn't be a handicap, all bets were off around here. She can sense an incoming reprobate, why shouldn't she be able to sense an incoming pigskin?] Baby, pardon my saying so, but you deserve far better than this bottom end hand you've been dealt.

[He returns to her then, and is once again stricken by the astronomical difference in their size. She's at least nine inches skimped of meeting his eye, pardon the expression, but she cuts a regal figure all the same. And his initial impression of her wispier state holds even truer now. She is quite pretty, even with the scowl and the dowdy robes.]

But it's good, I think. There's a place where you're still a person. Free to smack the turds when they get fresh with you. [He bends slightly and turns his cheek, taking her hand and pressing the pads of her fingers into the soft flesh there.] I'm right here if you want to take your chance. Lay it on me sister.

[tutorb]

[ Mystical item talk is absolutely her department, and she'll be happy to twist the little chat into layman's terms when Richie is drafting their report, but for now, they've a far more interesting conversation to pass the time with before they make their daring escape back the way they'd come. Or, at the very least, a far more personal conversation. Like she hasn't explained this place a hundred times in detail before now. ]

[ At his admirably subdued outburst, she groans, half affronted by the simplification of her duties, half... itching to vilify them, now that she has the chance. The Rites—vital and sacred as they were in her world—were so much bull, and she is still, after all these months, catching up with her free reign to blaspheme. ]

For lack of a better term, [ she seethes, scrubbing a hand across her face before propping her chin in it, replacing the frown for a tired scrap of a grin that creeps into a chuckle. ] As if I could not sink any lower, hm?

[ That's all she is. A washed up basketball coach, and she hasn't the faintest clue as to what that means. Sandra vaguely glances his way, hearing his shoes click their approach, but what she isn't expecting is a warm hand to take hold of hers and press it to an even warmer cheek. Her skin is hardly corpselike, but acclimated to the chill of the Crystal as she is, his feels almost startlingly hot by contrast. ]

[ It's a startle all its own to be touched in the first place. And while apathy has withheld her from exchanging blows for hundreds of years, disdain has withheld her from exchanging kinder touches for hundreds more. Even if he is, technically, asking for a blow. For the first time without demanding silence, she seems, herself, at a loss for words, fingers touched to the side of his face. There's a tension in her wrist, as if outwardly gripped with a serious debate, whether or not to wind up and strike as the man intends her to. ]

[ After a moment's pause, her hand softens, palm flattening and fingers skirting the line of his jaw, thumb running along his cheekbone. Curiously. Silently. With a hesitation quickly fading, she moves to trace along his brow, over an eyelid, along the bridge of his nose, mapping the topography of his face for all it's worth. It's a long face, if neither a thin nor fat one, faintly lined... Unremarkable, but strange, if only by virtue of it being the first face she's touched in ten odd lifetimes... No, in that case, completely, utterly remarkable. ]

Are you getting fresh with me? [ She has no earthly idea what this means, but even if her own brow furrows, her grin still hangs on by a thread. By the time it catches its own Cheshire glint, Sandra has already drawn back and cracked Richie sharp across the cheek with the flat of her hand. ]

You're right. I suppose this place does have its merits, without its usual restrictions.

[summertimeblues]

[Funny that he should be making concessions for her inability to see, pulling those digits up to prod at his face, and then get stunned when she assumes it's an invite to see him through touch. Richie mutes his surprise, sound dying in his throat as her expression shifts from dry-cut grins to something fuzzed around the edges. Confusion for a moment, a bit of hesitation. He feels the tension in her hand too and frets that he's committed some breach of trust for the sake of a bad joke.

Then her hands make a map of his face and all that nerviness goes quiet. His eyes close as she swipes a thumb over them. It renders him silent. He's met blind people before this, but always in parties, public situations. Or by the campside with all the bones behind them, and he doubted Matt Murdock wanted to get close and personal with another gent. It's not altogether unpleasant, nor is it invasive. It's really quite sweet.]

Maybe I am. [He cracks an eye open and catches sight of the grin.

Too late. He takes the blow like a chump and barks in alarm. Richie pulls up and away, cradling the mark that's no doubt giving him an Avon blush from jaw to cheekbone.] Augh! It was a joke, goddammit!

[tutorb]

[ Her grin finally graduates to a quiet cackle as he yowls and yanks away, a noise half stifled behind a fist clenched around the resonant sting in her palm. There was something electrifying in the sensation; not of doling out pain, but feedback. Real, tingling feedback, not entirely self-inflicted, after an eternity of non-contact ritual. Apologies would be in order, that it had to be Richie's face that had gone and sparked it, had he not asked for it in as many words. ]

[ So perhaps, slightly for doling out pain. She would say he has built up some karma over the past few months. Simply by how he exists. ]

In that case, perhaps you ought not to tease something so tempting.

[ With one last huff, Sandra sobers herself once again and stands statuesque for a moment, before reaching out again. Not to lay her hands on him, just to lay out a hand, grabbing demandingly. (Beckoning a little hopefully. She can play nice.) ]

[summertimeblues]

[What a wicked woman.]

Yeah yeah yeah, you've been itching for it from day one, haven't ya? Now get out of the line, sister, there's about fifty people after you that want to take their crack at the Trashmouth while you got him softened up.

[Not that such a thing was a common bragging point, but he supposes he'll wear it as a badge of honor. Hasn't lost the touch, has he?

Yet curiously, she steadies up. Her expression casts even and this time she makes the first reach. No blows, no bluster, but a little rush in the way the hand comes for him. The chill of the dead air sweeps over his skin once more, and for the umpteenth time he is stricken by how lonely place this might be.

He can't make heads or tails of this sports shit (from the sounds of her first talk, whoever won got to leave some devilish form of purgatory? It was a jumble of hot nonsense even now) but he does know this: no matter how big of a misanthrope or a shut in you might be, it was human nature to stick together. People go mad left alone too long. Sandra may get visitors in her teammates, she may be able to speak and show up green and ghostly to any party she likes, but there's vital parts of living she's been sorely lacking in.

Richie takes her hand in both of his. He's not quite sure what else to do with it but rub the pad of his thumb over the soft skin of her hand. Give the palm a little squeeze.]

No more slapsies, capisce? My face is my bread and butter.

[tutorb]

Like you are poisoned oak to the soul. And wherever they are queued, they are not in this Crystal.

[ At least, most of them aren't. She could put her finger on a couple Sisters that would love to deck him flat on principle. But he's had enough for one day; she'll forego the fact that they are not alone. Mostly because she has him all to herself. Something tangible she isn't contractually obligated to put in its place. ]

[ When he acquiesces her reach, a brief smile hooks the corners of her mouth, rather like the owner of a pet who's raised a paw to shake than as if it's any favor to her. Of course now that she's got him, there's not... much to do with him, is there? Besides revel in the sensation and leave him standing awkwardly with their hands linked. Which she isn't entirely opposed to, but he speaks up, and there she can break her peculiar concentration with a snort. ]

Your voice, maybe. Your face hardly enters into that.

[ Unremarkable, maybe. She cannot rightly make a remark on it in the first place. 800 years dissolves most of anything, let alone the proper memory of a human face, though that the map of his leaves anything to be desired is not her true point. It is his voice, somehow, that is incredibly important to him. His childhood, his career, though she does not entirely understand what it is he does with it. Saving his life, she understands far less clearly, though at least it is a concept far more familiar than disk jockeying. But his face, she can stand to reason, plays little part in it. ]

[ Beneath whatever significance it has, it's quite the pleasant thing when he isn't using it for evil. Of that she has no doubt... Sandra raises her free hand gently and innocently toward that voice of his, patting his unmarked cheek before pulling back abruptly. ]

Well, I think we have wasted enough time hiding away in here. The hall seems to have cleared for the most part. Let us save this for another time and finish our business.

[ Out you go. With a touch much firmer than that she gave his face, she catches Richie in the sternum and shunts him back, and with an all-consuming hiss like a snap of the fingers, he'll find himself engulfed body and mind by a jet-black flame, consciousness fleeing the same way it had come. Whenever it pulls itself back together again, he'll find his body crumpled in an elegant heap on the office floor. ]