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[lizardtits]

It was a hell of a day.

The ladies had a grand adventure chasing down Oscar and accidentally zombies, and the guys nearly got murdered by an eldritch horror. Again.

So now the dudes have to rest because going to the super-dangerous mines when tired is a terrible idea.

They've got a day or two to kill, so this is for what happens while the guys (mostly Malcer because holy fuck dude) are recovering.

Comments

Bowen, the Amateur Necromancer

[gogodwarvenranger]

It's Bowen. I ended up getting a ticket (not my fault, just a bit of magic gone wrong) and the officer wanted me to give you his regards


And then, having second thoughts, Bowen taps the delete key on her C.E.L.L. until the message window is clear again. She's been standing out on the balcony for a while now, fussing with the strange little rectangle, pausing periodically to look out over the Boneyard like she's still trying to decide if she's going to start calling this city home.

Most of that depends heavily on one thing in particular. And now that they have a few days of downtime, she might as well give this another try.


Richard, I'm sorry I brought up a difficult subject during dinner. Is there any way I could make it up to you? Let me know?


... delete, delete, delete. Yes, she had a lot to regret about what happened, but apologizing felt strange. She had meant well at the start, trying to find some common ground in their interests (and maybe show that she wasn't completely stupid, even if she was never going to impress a genius like him). And as soon as she had found out the Stormcrusher family wasn't just a bit of news for him...

Well, that's the part she regrets. As soon as she knew the conversation could only end on a sour note, she didn't even bother trying to be careful about it, nevermind try to salvage the evening. Instead, she tried to get through the worst part as quickly as possible, and it may have done more damage than she intended in the process.

Which, in a way, is sort of touching on what she's most afraid of.


This is going to sound weird, but when we were drunk, did I mention that I'm a convict? Or the kinds of monsters my friends and I have been fighting? I know what you said, but I feel as though I must have lied to you somewhere, that if you knew


... delete, delete, delete. With a sigh, she settles on a simple How are you doing?, sends it off, and then steps back inside the hotel room. She should probably stop worrying about it for now. If her husband didn't answer, there was still plenty of other ways to burn through the next few days. After all, they had a lot of alcohol in the room, and it wasn't gonna drink itself.

[thewinemom]

Nin's not exactly spying on Bowen, but she's also not exactly trying to 100% ignore her, either. It's just one of those shared space situations in which you sort of absently or actively take note of what your companions are doing, even if you're not nosing into the details.

Gorudak is reading a book. Varis is baking a million muffins. Naeris is playing with Malcer's tote bag. Velo is probably in the middle of something that's going to make the penthouse explode. Those kinds of things.

Bowen is spending a lot of time staring pensively out over the Boneyard and tapping at the screen of her C.E.L.L. There are a lot of things she's likely doing, and Nin has no way to know what it is without looking over Bowen's shoulder, but...

"Have you managed to talk to him, yet?"

...She thinks she can make a pretty good guess. She's curled up against the arm of one luxurious sofa with a heavy book, at a very bad angle for seeing literally anything that might be happening on the screen of the device in Bowen's hand. This is all mom intuition.

[gogodwarvenranger]

It's fine, Nin. Bowen isn't even thinking about whether or not you're eavesdropping, because it's not something that worries her. You get nosy because you care, right?

"Nnn... no. Not yet." And she looks off to the side, evasively. "But I haven't been buggin' him much, not while we've had the mines and Wobblesprocket to look into. Pro'lly nothin' to worry about."

Nin's Wisdom is probably high enough to show that last line is mostly to try and convince herself.

For a moment, Bowen starts reaching for one of the bottles of liquor sitting around the hotel room. But then she takes a look at Nin, and remembers that she's avoiding alcohol. ... and strategically places the bottle out of sight, and pours herself some water instead.

"What about you? You've had that deal you made with Varis, and all that community service... are you holdin' up all right?"

[snackattacks]

As the resident healer, Naeris spent a good chunk of her time poking and prodding at the guys prior to her current state of relaxation. Or, well, as relaxed as one can get when mulling over things that could've gone better and how they outnumber the things that could've gone worse. It doesn't help that preoccupation with a certain mimic mistake (not her words!) is weighing heavy on her heart.

Could she have done anything to help more? What would have happened if the others didn't have their own forms of healing magic? What kind of disaster did they just barely avoid?

She should've been more vigilant. She shouldn't have been stupid enough to allow Oscar the chance to escape, and therefore an opening during which Varis, Gorudak, and Malcer were alone outside of Velo's watch.

Her mop of red hair covers her face as she dangles an arm from her place on one of the far too many comfortable couches, gently patting Oscar on his little bag flap head. At least, she's pretty sure that's his head. Oh well. She can't even bring her natural curiosity up to the forefront of her thoughts. If she's not beating herself up over her lapsed duties as a cleric, then it's her revelation to Gorudak.

Naeris trusts the half-orc, even more now that they know without a doubt that Helm has chosen him as a representative (if Gorudak didn't possess the highest moral fiber, the god wouldn't waste his time nor his effort), but that doesn't mean their talk doesn't pose a risk. Never mind the very real possibility that her past could be uncovered by the rest of the group (she's not ready for them to know about her moral and integral failures. Not yet. If ever.). She could've compromised her fellow (as far as she could consider herself one) Mummers and their widespread operation.

But what's done is done, and she can't take it back. She did the best she could, given the circumstances, and she'll have to stick by those decisions, even if they're making her a bit less cheerful than usual.

That's what Githal taught her. Hopefully, he'd be proud of her conviction.

[lizardtits]

That sure is a somber-looking red mop. At least, it looks like it. It's hard for Velo to tell, really, but after travelling together for so long she can kind of get a sense that something's up. She might not know what, exactly, but she's not about to leave Naeris to stew in the abyss of her own hair.

Velo sits herself down next to Naeris, close enough so as to not be subtle about the fact she wants to talk.

"Are you holding up alright? The guys didn't tire you out that much, did they?"

...Wait that came out wrong.

"-H-healing them, I mean."

[snackattacks]

Wow, Velo. Good to know where your mind is!!!

Except there's no reason to worry--the slip up goes completely over Naeris' head even as she turns and lifts it up to answer her Dragonborn buddy.

"No, it's fine. I'm not tired."

Naeris stops petting Oscar (a tragedy for everyone involved) and pulls her hair back.

"Just thinking, really."

[thewinemom]

Of course Nin has noticed that Naeris is far less cheerful than usual. And of course she wants to do something to help, though she's not sure what.

"Hey...Would you like a brownie? I have boring ones and special ones."

When in doubt, offer food and/or a sweet herbal buzz, right? Right.

[snackattacks]

Who could ever say no to a brownie? Probably people who are allergic to chocolate, but at that point why even bother with living.

Naeris immediately perks up (something to be said about her voracious sweet tooth) and shoots a smile at Nin. Totally not forced or overcompensating for some low vibes.

“I’ll take one! Regular, please. I’ve had enough of the special ones.”

All those philosophical questions that kept popping out of her mouth reeeaaallly got to her.

[daddyissuesdrow]

Hey you wanna know what's better than one mopey, depressed elf? Two mopey depressed elves!!!

Really Varis is less depressed and more pissed off at the entire world, and himself and Ian and pretty much everyone except the people here with him in this fancy hotel room. Just piss everywhere. The cranky levels would probably be annoying for everyone else to deal with if it weren't for the fact that Varis was too exhausted to do much by way of interacting with other people. That and he really didn't want to interact with other people.

Unfortunately, he still gets hungry, which means venturing out of his room and into the kitchen. Varis in the kitchen always turns into a two or three hour cooking adventure no matter how exhausted he is. Cooking while exhausted isn't the best idea. Despite his amazing dexterity, he's managed to cut his finger open like a dumbshit, and since he doesn't feel like bleeding all over whatever he was trying to cook, he decides to seek out the team cleric.

"Heeeey, Naeris. Can I like, borrow you for a second?" That sure is Fuckhead Varis rolling in with a hand towel wrapped around his finger. OOOPS.

[snackattacks]

Double the elf, double the mope, double the... not anything useful, really. But that's okay.

Naeris' head pops up from the arm of the couch, but her face is still covered by her way-too-long hair. So it kind of looks like the ginger cousin of the swamp thing is talking to Varis right now. That's cool, right?

Her tone is a bit more cheerful, at least, now that it sounds like she could be of use to somebody.

"Yeah! What's up?"

Velo

[lizardtits]

Velo, for her part, is spending the downtime just trying to help out where she can. Unfortunately, there's not much for her to do. She can't heal like most of the others, and while it seems that Varis and Gorudak had some sort of huge bonding moment, they were keeping quiet about it. She's curious, but it's better not to pry. If there's a way she can help, she'll have to trust that one of them will bring it up. Until then, she'll have to be satisfied sitting here in the dark doing her own thing.

"Her own thing" being artificing. If nothing else, working on her projects gives Velo some manner of distraction from the everything else going on, with the Archive and Percy and the nonexistent lines of trust... So instead, she can be found in the common room, going back and forth between looking through the classified ads in the local papers and her CELL and putting together what looks to be some sort of... fancy bra? That or she's just left her underwear out on the table.

[daddyissuesdrow]

As for Varis, he'd been doing a lot of bumming around lately. To be fair, for a couple days it had been because of the whole Stabbed by a Turbo Satan thing and he'd been recovering from a pretty extreme case of mega exhaustion. He'd been too tired to even cook anything, which was annoying because that was his favorite thing to do to distract himself from bullshit. Then after recovering he'd been too depressed to cook anything, so now, he was flopped down on one of the couches staring at the ceiling, occasionally glancing over to see what Velo was up to. It was usually something fucking nuts and/or awesome, but apparently today was laundry day or something but just for the one bra???? Like why is it here? WHY?

It's the first time in literal hours that Varis has opened his mouth to say anything (which is fucking insane), but even in his emo state he has to say something fucking stupid.

"I could fit my entire head in there. Like, twice. Like four of my heads would fit in there."

[lizardtits]

Velo has to stop and just... look at Varis for a moment. How does she even respond to that? First time he's spoken to her all day and that's what he says?

Well, two could play at that game.

"When I'm done with it, I'll be able to put the entirety of you in there."

Velo

[thewinemom]

"Sooooo...On a scale of one to ten, how likely is it that whatever you're working on today might explode this entire penthouse?"

This is how Nin asks curious, casual questions. She can see that it's a bra. But since it also belongs to Velo, she's also aware that there is a chance (though probably only a very small chance, honestly...it's a bra) that it might explode.

[lizardtits]

Velo responds without looking up from her work.

"Zero for now, six if anyone else has or brings another extradimensional space into the penthouse. Nine if they try to come over here while waving it around."

So yeah. Good odds, right?

Nin, Actual Team Mom

[thewinemom]

After the Grand Archive Death Chase Adventure, Nin divides her time between reading, fulfilling her community service with the gnome Funky, and checking in on her stupid boys. She's in and out of Varis' and Gorudak's rooms each morning, afternoon, and evening, just for a few minutes at a time each, checking for fevers, making sure they're comfortable, and silently berating them in the privacy of her own head for being so irresponsible, willful, and stupid.

Alternately, she very carefully and vigorously ignores Malcer, because if she goes into his room she's as likely as not to pick up the biggest, fluffiest pillow she can find, put it over his face, and press.

[daddyissuesdrow]

Varis should probably like 500% still be in bed right now, but he is also 500% bored and laying around all day is driving him out of his goddamn mind. There's nothing to do but think, and unfortunately, he doesn't have anything at all to think about that isn't just horrible and depressing. He's kind of tired of feeling like shit on both a physical and mental level and really just wants some kind of distraction. So, after at least recovering a little bit, he's zombie shuffled his way into the kitchen to find something to cook.

This may or may not end well. He's a great cook, but he's also turbo exhausted and distracted by his uncool brainthoughts. The bigass chef's knife he's using to chop veggies with is probably just as likely to take a finger off as it is to dice the shit out of some onions. Save this fool from himself, Nin.

[thewinemom]

Varis should definitely 500% be in bed right now, but this is Varis, and if Nin knows anything about Varis, she knows the reason he's out of bed is that he's bored, and that he gets really antsy when he's bored. So instead of scolding him, she joins him.

"What're you making? Can I help?"

Her goal here is to get that bigass knife out of his exhausted hands before he loses a finger.

Actual Cryptid Malcer

[inkytalkstoherself]

You're walking in the apartment. There's no one around and it's late at night. Out of the corner of your eye, you spot him--

Shia LaBeouf

Malcer?

It's probably Malcer, anyway. Who else could it be? He's got a blanket around his shoulders and his hair is piled up in the messiest sort of bun, just kind of thrown up there and precariously held in place with a hair tie and a prayer, and he basically looks like a sorority girl after finals week. He has just emerged from the refrigerator with a pint of ice cream, the spoon sticking out of it, and when he turns, there's a long moment that the light hits his eyes just right to show eerie green eyeshine.

He says nothing. It's just you, and Malcer, staring at each other. Then, slowly, out of the messy pile of hair on his head, another pair of green eyeshine eyes opens up.

[daddyissuesdrow]

"FUCKIN--!!"

This is the second time Varis has come face to face with the creature he's come to know as Bad Hair Day Malcer. The first time he hadn't been quite so startled by it, probably because he'd been far too exhausted to actually give a shit, but this time he had a little more energy, which meant a lot more yelling.

"Jesus fantasy fuckoff Christ, Malcer! Turn a light on or something!"

[inkytalkstoherself]

"Why are you yelling?"

Jesus fantasy Christ, he's too tired for this shit. Malcer shuts the refrigerator door by nudging it with his hip, then pulls the spoon out of the grip of the ice cream and starts trying to pry a piece out. It's pretty cold, he should probably let it thaw a little or something.

"And I'm not putting on a light, we can both see just fine in the dark."

Ugh, this ice cream is being too difficult for his current ability to give fucks. Malcer sets it on the counter, it'll get better if he waits. While that's doing its thing, he goes to get a kettle and heat up some water. Tea-- that'll make him feel better.

"Why are you even up? It's... gods, I don't know, fuck o'clock in the morning."

[thewinemom]

As an elf, Nin doesn't need to sleep. And she doesn't really need a lot of time to meditate, either. It's always quietest in the common room after midnight, when the party members who do sleep are sleeping, so she likes to sit on one of the big, comfy couches with a pile of books and read.

In the dark.

Like some kind of creepy witch from a swamp or something.

She grew up surrounded by eerie green eyeshine lurking in the dark hours of the night, so encountering it in the common room isn't even a big deal. Even when it's four eyeshines.

Nin just stares for a moment or so, taking in the majesty of Malcer with his tub of ice cream, wrapped in a blanket and looking like a sorority girl after finals week. Then, since they're making uncomfortable eye contact, she figures she should probably say something, since that's what civil beings tend to do.

"...You've got someone in your hair."

There, see? Nice and neutral.

[inkytalkstoherself]

It takes Malcer a minute or two longer than he would admit to recognize just who addressed him. He chalks it up to the fact that like a day ago he had five giant fuckoff holes in him, he really can't be expected to think properly after something like that. He's tired, okay, give him a break.

"Oh." Eloquent, Malcer. Mouth, words, make them happen. "Yes, I know. It's Oscar."

There's a noise from within the depths of Malcer's hair that sounds kind of like mrrrrerp, presumably from the aforementioned tiny mimic. He just likes to be included.

This is made even more evident when one dark, vaguely paw-shaped limb extends down from the darkness of Malcer's hair and just slowly. Pats. Him on the face.

"...Thank you, Oscar. Yes, that's you, we're talking about you."

[lizardtits]

Velo is also up at ass o'clock at night for food because everyone in this penthouse is hot garbage. It takes a moment for Velo's non-darkvision eyes to spot who it is and what they're doing, but the light of the fridge door just before it closes is enough for her to get an idea.

"...Did you take the ice cream? Aw, I was planning on having that."

[inkytalkstoherself]

"There's more," he says, because that will totally justify the fact that he's taking an entire pint. That's probably more than his fair share, but he also had five holes in him? He feels like that entitles him to a larger share of the ice cream allotment. He's so tired, Velo, and he just wants the cookie dough ice cream. He is also exactly the kind of person who pries the cookie dough out, so no one wants the pint after he's done with it anyway.

"Isn't it..." he tries to find a clock and fails. "Late? Early? I don't know. Both?"

He sighs and makes a valiant attempt at prying out a piece of cookie dough. He succeeds, but it's a pyrrhic victory because the piece goes flying out of the pint and lands in some unknown location on the floor. He sighs again, but heavier this time.

"I'm too tired for this."