alderwitch

"Excuse you," Talya said primly as she went to settle herself in a chair that had the added benefit of being out of the direct line of fire. She settled herself with an easy sort of grace despite the fact that bending at the waist was starting to become a little more tricky these days. She flicked her gaze from Dimitri to Klara but didn't seem overly concerned at the tension as she focused on what really mattered. "Some of us are still famous in the modern era. I've had three full on careers now - four if you count the time as a spy but I don't get half the credit I deserve for the 1950's. Feh." The ease might have been somewhat feigned as it was disconcerting to look at Hank's - Henry's - face, "He's just jealous, you know. Never could pull off a pair of go-go boots like I could. Don't mind them. No one's thrown anything yet and the liquid in the room is all still liquid. Plenty of time to have a nice chat before they finish arguing in Russian. Dimitri says you sort of remember us. Science or magic?"

Nighthawk exploded into sudden violent motion the moment one of the Ferals turned at her display, slamming one sneakered foot into the Feral's face with the full force of her body behind it and bowling that Feral into the one behind it. The Fens native had always fought with a lethal brutality to her her movements born of all the techniques she'd cobbled together fighting in the back alleys of the Fens but never with such power behind it. She well knew what was lethal and what was simply effective and for once, she made no effort to make sure the people she put down were able to get back up again. Dodging and weaving between filthy clawed hands, Nighthawk delivered another quick strike to the throat before the hands ripping at her leather jacket could yank her down. She had the very real fear that if she was pulled under the tide of cannibals, she'd might never get back up. Still, deadly though she was, it was with an economic efficiency, exerting enough to put the Feral down but in the quickest manner possible. Nighthawk took no pleasure in any suffering she caused - she merely wanted everyone else to walk out of the room alive at the end of it. Her own safety, though, remained a negotiable point.

Nighthawk will use her movement to close and take out the minions this round and hopefully paint a big target on her back in the process. That's the goal!

"Well, these charming individuals never did have the whole puritanical bent so selling sex was never criminalized," Talya provided as she linked her arm with Erik's, "And while I haven't been to THIS particular bacchanal, I'm familiar with the culture to take a guess at what its going to be. Think more, oh, hedonistic pleasure garden than strip club for our world. There will probably be increased nudity from what everyone's wearing on the streets, yes." Talya gave his arm a slight pat, more concerned about the possibility of losing layers of clothing than she might otherwise be. "But its early in the day still so it shouldn't have gone all, ah, orgiastic. Probably."

"Thanks," Ray commented to Jessie at her compliment. He glanced up towards the walls from the semi-noxious paste he was making, "I've been painting for, oh, centuries now I guess - although obviously not with synthetics until the mid 1940's. But, yeah, that's all my work. I get bored sometimes and the wall's cheaper than canvas." His eyebrows did raise a bit at the effusive insistence that Dagon and Hydra were not 'bad' but Ray didn't comment. Generally, he tended to prefer avoiding theological debates where he could. He wasn't that sort of angel, after all. "Hmmm, well, we're not all bad either," Ray pointed out, misunderstanding the Deep One's slightly mangled English. "Though I certainly have to agree that people have done bad things in the name of the Almighty. But that's the advantage to you all being mortals. You can choose what to be, and that's a gift really. Good, bad, that's all up to the choices you make."

Ray snorted at the question the sound one of sharp amusement, "I know who that is and, no, he is certainly not Abrahamic. Islam, Judaism and Christianity are the largest of the Abrahamic faiths. The Egyptian pantheon is its own thing," Ray said with the bemused humor of one who'd been alive for the exodus. "They're also a pantheistic faith. Mine has one divine entity - or one in three if you follow that tenant. But Set's on instagram. He - or she - is a little difficult to miss." He reached forward to touch the tattoo that Aquaria indicated and drew the plant from his skin pulling it from ink to reality with a shine of holy light. "And ash - probably volcanic..." That too Ray pulled from his own skin to set about on the counter where he normally kept his tools. "Anything non-sentient," Ray answered Aquaria's question first before he twisted on his stool to answer Jessie, "Oranges are usually the first thing you practice on to get a feel for the needle. Its a good way to learn how deep to push. There's an art to putting ink into skin. Too deep and the tattoo will blow out and scar. As to being good, no one starts 'good'. The only difference between an amateur and a master is putting in the time." Ray said and then waved one hand towards the walls as he slipped on black latex gloves. "If doing it makes you happy, that's all that matters."

Like well a well orchestrated dance, Robin leaned to the side as her partner fired, dropping the most urgent target. Her lips curved into a cool hard smile. She was faster than any human had right to be as she charged down the hallway, providing Woodsman the cover of her leather clad shoulders. "Hey. Assholes." Nighthawk snarled as she landed on sneakered feet between the guards - as menacing as any teenager could manage. "Wanna dance?"

"Huh," Ray agreed with a small frown. "It's a pretty area - though I haven't been down there since I had a human body. Shame. I bet the Caribbean is nicer when you can feel the sea and sand. With those bracelets, though, going to be a bit before you two can travel, I imagine." A few more clicks and he was browsing through the various plant life looking for the 'blue plant'. Eventually, he stuck one tattooed arm in front of Aquaria. The ink on his skin swirled, the flames and chains vanishing to be replaced by curls of blue waves and various stylized plants. "Anything look close to this blue plant of yours?" Ray asked before he turned to look at Jessie. "You like art, huh? Wanna learn how to do a tattoo?" He offered as at least that much normalcy might be welcome. "I got an orange in the back."

"The blue plant... that grew in the ponds." Ray repeated and then looked up towards the sky, waving his hands wide, "<You think you're so funny.>" The angel muttered in the liquid syllables of Enochian to someone clearly not in the room. With a resigned grunt, the tattoo artist turned to get a much battered laptop and drag it over to Aquaria as he fired up google, "What kind of pond?" Ray asked, patient for all of his muttering. "Do you know where the pond was?" Because, for all of his other issues, the man was an artist and if he was going to inscribe an Elder symbol on the deep one then it was going to be perfect, dammit. A few clicks brought up google image search to start paging through the various plants in question. "And what sort of 'pond'? Like a wetland? Or a freshwater pond?" Pushing the laptop towards Aquaria, he finally answered Jessie's question. "It'll hurt more than a typical tattoo - which doesn't feel pleasant - because I'll have to use a different sort of needle with this, uh, concoction."

After looking from one earnest human face to the other equally earnest but certainly not human one, Ray sighed. Heavily. "Hell," he pronounced finally as if it were a much more grave curse word than most people used it. "More servant than worshiper but sure, we'll go with that. Go one, take a seat. What's your name, kid?" Ray wanted to know as he gestured towards one of the tattoo chairs and mentally ran through the list of books he had upstairs. He was reasonably certain that none of them covered this particular eventuality. "You know what plant's mixed in with that ash for the ink there? I can do it with conventional ink but its not gonna look the same." He said that as he dropped back down to his seat by the desk and pulled over a fresh piece of paper to sketch once more, drawing the sigil in question with sure, quick strokes before discarding it for another and another. When he had one that Ray thought might fit in the place in question, he crossed back to Aquaria to hold it up against her skin and eye the fit. "So who's the therapist you two kids are going to?" Because that self actualization thing, that had all the hallmarks of self-help.

"Can, yes. Sure. Should, that's a whole other question," Ray said as he took in the swirls and spirals with more interest than the amphibian body revealed beneath them. He circled Aquaria slowly, a faint frown on his face. "And, really, I'm not sure that you'd want me to be the one to do them - though I doubt that there's anyone else in the city limits that could do a proper job of it. I might know a guy in London... unless he's dead by now." Ray gave a short shake of his head as he plopped down on his stool once more, one lanky leg tucked up against the bottom rung of the stool. "First thing's first, before I take a trip down wrestling with whether I really ought go inscribing elder sigils on an Innsmouth kiddo. Do you know who I am, though? Well, what, actually. Do you know what I am? It's a different pantheon, which might actually matter to you since pretty sure those have religious connotations. I'm Abrahamic - even if I am sort of on a time-out, so to speak."

"I know they do a lot of weird testing and stuff in the Woodsman training but, its, well, frowned on I guess here to do stuff just to see how people react." Robin explained, although she wasn't agitated any longer. It took a lot to rile Robin and even when something did, she exerted an iron control over her reactions. At this point, she was relaxed against the trunk of the tree, her hands lightly folded in her lap. "Head games, people call it, and its, I dunno, wrong? Most of these kids aren't even gonna be super heroes, let alone risk their lives on a regular basis. There's no need to know who's gonna break under pressure." Robin scrunched her nose up as she tried to find a way to put it. "I guess its kind of like putting someone you know is never gonna leave the reactor into full on woodsman training just because you wanna know what makes 'em tick. Does that make sense?"

"Hunh," said Ray as he took in the woman... frog... with an almost bemused look on his face as he pushed away his sketchbook. Still, it wasn't abject horror or screaming, so that was something. He examined Aquaria with an interest not dissimilar from the level that Jessie was currently taking in his walls. As for what Jessie saw, there was all sorts of designs and styles although done by the same hand. In some areas, the walls had clearly been repainted and then the work done over that. Standing up to his full height, Ray gestured towards one of the chairs as he went to lock the door and close the blinds. "Not what I was expecting. You have no idea how rare that is. So, what sort of tattoo did you need?" Ray asked as he'd not missed that particular word-choice.

"Indeed," Talya said, one hand scribing faint circles in the air as if she were dutifully paying dues to their 'lady'. The other she left linked with Erik as she did her best to look pale, wan and suitably chastised. The former were easier to manage as her color was only now returning to her cheeks and she still felt put through the wringer. Talya was not looking forward to the return trip home. Hopefully they'd quickly snatch Ace and shove him into his niece's waiting care. Hah, unlikely at best. "Thank you ever so much," Talya agreed with an innocent look that would never have flown very far in cities she was better known in. "We'll be heading home right along. Post haste." She agreed giving Dimitri a sidelong look at that point. After all, if anyone was going to find the disreputable part of town...

The resemblance was startling, to say the least. Seeing a long dead friend, even braced for it, was painful but it didn't flicker across Talya's very elegant features. "Ah, Klara," she said, instead, her tone almost hesitant before Talya resolved herself to the situation as it was beginning to unravel and continued to take off her bulky overcoat to hang by the door. "So nice of you have us over," Talya said, all smooth grace to Dimitri's blunt force personality. She made no mention of it but there was no hiding her pregnancy in the black dress she wore. Still, she offered her hand delicately, "We're not exactly sure, Klara, but still thought it was past time to come and say a proper hello. Hello," she added to Henry with a red lipped siren's smile. "Natalya Browning. How do you do?"

http://orokos.com/roll/380026 = 13. Ouch, well glad to get out of the way a 3, I guess :D. Smoke arrow sounds good. Nighthawk has no tricks but the punching so she'll probably just be taking her movement to close.

Nighthawk: 1d20+10=30

"Huh. Sure, come on in." ------ Ray wasn't sure what he was expecting but he was generally an open minded sort. Still, it was just the blonde man inside when Aquaria and Jessie arrived - not unusual as he didn't run that many chairs out of his shop. Eternal Ink was bright and clean, the large glass windows had bars on the inside but it was still easy to see even from the outside, the amount of artwork decorating the walls. It wasn't so much typical tattoo art as there were no large posters with sample designs to choose from. Rather it looked like - and actually was the case - that Ray had taken up decorating the walls when there was no available skin to work on. At this point, every scrap of wall and counter space was covered with various work and designs and it appeared that in some areas, art had crept up onto the ceiling. The proprietor in question was leaning on the counter, blonde head bent over a piece of paper as he sketched - clearly engrossed in whatever he was doing and paying little attention to those passing by his shop windows on this rainy day.

Robin heaved a deep sigh, it sounded frustrated although not, perhaps, with Casey. Folding her arms over her chest until her leather jacket protested, Robin frowned down at the alley below, her grey eyes fixed on some point on the ground. "There's a lot, Casey, but I don't have anything like money, or skills. I mean, every family's got its own thing. Some folks need pipes fixed, or groceries, or their dad to just get off the drugs. Everyone's got problems and in the Fens there ain't a lotta solutions. I don't think I can fix the world. I don't think I can fix the Fens - not even if I had all the powers of the Freedom League. Maybe especially then." Her chin tipped up then, "I just got one goal and I ain't come close to managing yet. Probably never will. Everyone in my city gets home to the people that love them. No one waiting at doors for people that ain't gonna ever come home. If I ever manage that, maybe then I'll come up with another one." Robin didn't glance back over at Casey, tension coiled in her tight frame as she stepped off the roof to drop like a stone towards the alley below. Four stories would have broken most teenager's legs - if not their neck, but Robin landed on silent feet in the alleyway, shielded from any passerby by the clutter of trash cans and refuse.

"<Mitya,>" Talya said, her voice soothing as she reached up to defrost at least enough of the window to peer through it. She leaned forward to let the warmth of her breath help clear the ice, only to watch it refreeze in short order. "<I feel as if I really ought to protest on behalf of my children, who are at least some fraction American. Half? A third? One-sixth?>" Talya pursed her lips and gave a wave of her fingertips to dismiss trying to do the math of the Espadas lineage at this point. "<But I while I am happy to utilize my feminine wiles to get the answers you want, if he's anything actually like Hank, one of us will have to dangle him out the window... and we'll still get nowhere.>" Talya reached for the doorhandle, "<And I am certain holding anyone by their ankles is probably above what I am supposed to be lifting.>" She didn't actually know, though as Talya had avoided anything like a doctor's office thus far. "<Lift his wallet, though... Maybe run a few background checks.>" Now Talya sounded downright cheerful. They were perhaps a ten minute conversation away from her suggesting breaking into some governmental office to lift records. Maybe five if it was all reruns tonight on the television.

"Hhn?" Robin's soft noise was clearly an acknowledgement that she'd heard the question. It took her a few more moments to answer as she tried to find a way to put the issues the others had into some semblance of order. She shifted on the branch, drawing one denim clad leg up under her butt to get more comfortable in her spot against the trunk. Robin grimaced as the bark snagged over a thin spot of her jeans and ripped a small hole. One more to patch. Absently, her fingertips found the threads of the fraying denim to pluck at as she tried to answer Riley's question. "Well, everyone kinda had different things that torqued 'em over Archer's latest head game, but mostly kids are just frustrated, I think, that we can't ever do anything right in the Danger Room. I 'unno. It's just... it's messed up to present something without showing you how t'go about solving it." Her breath huffed out in a soft sigh but it was clearly more the agitation of trying to put feelings into words rather than renewed aggravation over the scenario itself. "Like, so, I get that they want to toss us in and make us think and all but the heroes that made their call about not getting involved in Cuba and what have you - that choice they made isn't sacrosanct. Like, if you want to do the thought exercise then have it go all the way through. Let us go to Cuba and see what we do - and then have a talk afterwards about what WE thought we did and what the heroes did and why and then discuss what worked and what didn't. I could see that being a good learning experience but what Archer does... it's like he just wants us to doubt ourselves. They cut the scenario off the moment we agreed to act - we didn't even have a plan. And yeah, it could have blown up in our faces but its like... I dunno. Half the time, it seems like we're just being tested to see if we're to dangerous to be let out among the public. It feels too much like being a rat in maze, hoping that you'll get the cheese and not zapped. Does that make sense?" Robin paused then in what was really a rather long tirade that certainly showed the Fens native rampant mistrust for the adults in her life.

Talya dutifully accepted the vodka without bothering to point out that she wasn't about to swallow anything right now, as she really did want to clear her mouth of the taste. At the official sounding voice, Talya groaned, the sound soft but very heartfelt. It really didn't matter what the dimension was, she never had good luck with the police. She mutely held the flask back to Frost as she turned around and pasted on a smile that would fool almost anyone. Certainly, she was still a little too pale under the makeup that she wore and the hand on Jack of All Blade's wrist had the sort of tension in it that spoke of intense internal focus. She was, by all the gods, not going to make her day worse by tossing her cookies on the Amazon-cop's lovely golden sandals. "Thank you, no. Celebration?" She asked, lilting her voice up into a question. "We only just arrived, you see. I don't travel well, t'all, I'm afraid," she offered the lie smoothly. "Motion sickness. Dreadful thing. We're looking for Ace Danger. Perhaps you could direct us towards where we might find him?"

Things Left Unsaid (Nighthawk: February Vignette) The little girl was sprawled on the floor of her bedroom, toys strewn around as she lay on her stomach. “Don’t worry, miss, I’ll save you,” Robin said, pitching her childlike tones deliberately low to mimic Darkstar. She swooped the clear black figure into knock over her stuffed teddy bear. “Fwoooosh! Take that, Captain Knievel!” “Robin, honey, we’re going out now…” Her grey eyes flicked up to the door and she scrambled gracelessly to her feet to pelt out after her parents. She laughed - the high pitched, carefree laughter of a child who knew she was loved unquestioningly - as her father scooped her up in a wide circle. “Be good, baby. I love you.” “I love you too, Daddy! I love you!” ————————————————————————————— The whole ‘L’ word thing hadn’t come up again since the incident in the Fens but it was there, lurking at the edge of conversations. Robin could feel it, catching in the back of her throat when Riley glanced up at her over lunch, smiling that quick sharp smile as he tightened the mechanism of his crossbow. I love you. It went unsaid. Instead Robin offered one of her own rare smiles, tight around the edges from the tension she always seemed to carry but one that warmed her usually cool, grey eyes. When Riley bumped her shoulder when they passed in the hall, communicating without words that there was time in his schedule to meet on the tree in the quad, Robin said nothing but she bumped his shoulder back in tacit agreement. Gestures were easier for her. Motion was clean, simple and she could trace fingertips along the archer’s bicep or touch the back of his hand when words would catch in her throat, leaving it tight and aching. Sometimes, Robin put the effort in to at least try - turning her usually relaxed mannerisms into short, staccato bursts of fragmented sentences that only increased her tension over the next attempt. Late at night, when the nightmares of gunshots in twisted back alleys blurred into shattered teeth and hungry chants for human flesh, Robin found herself yet again fleeing her room for the cold, moonlit rooftops of Claremont’s Academy. Without thought, she raced from pitch to peak, her feet silent and her muscles pumping as if she could out run the nightmares. She wasn’t surprised, really, to catch sight of a familiar silhouette against the dorm’s chimney. Relieved, perhaps. Without thought, she altered course to land on light, sneakered feet next to Riley. “I…” Robin’s breath caught, a faint hiccup that could easily have been attributed to the way her breath came in short, sharp pants. “…I’m glad you’re here.”

Agape (Renegade: February Vignette) Saturday, February 16, 2015 Eternal Ink was always closed on Saturdays, it had been for as long as Ray’d been running the place. They closed shop, without fail, exactly at midnight on Friday evening and then didn’t reopen until Sunday mid-morning. So, it was unusual to see the heavily tattooed owner fumbling with his keys in one hand and mumbling curses as he tried not to spill coffee on himself with the other bright and early Saturday morning. “I, uh, really appreciate it, man,” his companion offered in a voice long run ragged by smoke and worse as he shuffled past the blonde tattoo artist. “I mean, I know that y’don’t normally do stuff today but, uh-“ “Hey, one year is a big deal. I get it,” came Ray’s mellow response as he dropped his things on the counter and went to get the chair set up. “We agreed that I’d do this piece for you if you managed a full year. How’s the baby?” The harsh lines of his client’s face eased and he began to extol his toddler’s many virtues with all the passion of a religious convert. All Ray had to do was make the occasional appropriate noises and prompt a question here and there. He’d long ago found that people sat better under the needle when they were distracted from the sensation of being poked with a needle countless times. The piece in question was an addition to work that he’d started a year ago, exactly. Eventually, if Jerry could keep his sobriety going, he might get a full sleeve from Ray for free. At the moment, though, Ray was merely adding the next band to the half sleeve. His concentration was momentarily disturbed as Jerry shifted topics to ask a question of his own. “So, the not working on Saturday? Is that, y’know, like a religious thing?” Ray paused briefly before offering a reluctant smile. “Sort of,” he agreed as he pulled back to examine his handiwork rather than the client. “But more it’s about reflection and reconnection.” Jerry laughed and Ray was glad he’d stopped the tattoo before the man’s shoulder jiggled. He waited until he was still once more and leaned in to put the delicate scrollwork of Jerry’s daughter’s name into this year’s marker. “Sorry, man, it’s just - you’re not the Sunday school sort, y’know?” A bemused smile curved Ray’s features and he bent his head over the tattoo. “Well, no relationship is perfect, Jerry. They’re all just… works in progress. So, same time next year?” "One day at a time, my man. One day at a time."

The world lurched and it somehow managed to be more unpleasant than even normal magical dimensional travel for Talya. The blood magic that was infused with her body never played nicely with other magical sources at the best of times and today was clearly not her 'best'. Talya snatched her hand back the moment the world stopped swimming enough to coordinate her limbs to manage it - almost mid ritual and wouldn't that have been disastrous - and bolt to her feet. She swayed for a moment in place, the blood draining from her already pale features. Nope, there was going to be no 'breathing through it'. Not this time. With wounded dignity, Talya took a few steps away from the men and towards a lovely gilded urn at the side of the road at which point she threw up into it: as quietly as one could really manage. Hopefully, it wasn't anything sacred to the locals. "I..." Talya pronounced in between heaves, and with as much menace as she could muster, "Am going to kill Ace Danger."