Hᴇx - ᴛʜᴇ ᴍᴏᴅ ᴍᴀᴄʜɪɴᴇ (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
modmachine) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
cityofhex2016-12-05 08:43 pm
modmachine) wrote in cityofhex2016-12-05 08:43 pm
WEEK 03
Preparation for the holidays continues at a steady - if slow - pace. Almost all traces of Halloween are gone by now, except for a few rotting pumpkins shoved into compost heaps, but with over a month until Christmas and the Day of Lights, nobody is yet in a hurry. Still, a few early holiday shoppers are out and about, usually in pairs if they aren't families with children, happily chattering about gift plans.
Weather forecast: The rain has passed, and days grow clear again for this week. Hex’s weather has been getting colder, and people are bundling up a bit more - even those who don’t need to, just in an effort to fit in. Hats and gloves are being prominently displayed in stores, even if they’re not strictly needed yet.
Moon phase: The moon is full on Monday the fourteenth, reaching peak fullness over the city at about 2AM. Afterwards, it begins to wane.
More employment: More decorations for the Day of Lights are going up, with some stronger-backed labor being recruited for the stockrooms in preparation for the incoming holiday rush. No one seems concerned about work history, a boon for people without a human paper trail. The park lights aren't finished yet, either, though things are on schedule to open next week.
Hitting the books: To prepare for the holidays, and raise funds for their community party, the library near the university is selling some of its used books. Most of them are fine, if an odd selection - you might find a cookbook, or you might find a book of poetry. There’s something weird about the books, though - a few of them smell faintly of mint. Watching over all of this is a sharp-eyed librarian. Don’t take a book without paying, or she’ll get up from her desk and try to block the door. She keeps having to chase away teenagers with dirty hands, too.
Bake sale: Some of the local schools are starting to take up donations for their holiday parties. One in particular in the residential district is holding a bake sale in front of the elementary school for an hour each day after classes let out. If you can fight through the sea of small children hoping someone will buy them something, you’ll find a variety of brownies, cookies, and tiny cakes. Many of them are lopsided, but a few look put together by expert hands. They cost more, of course, but it’s all for a good cause. A grouchy mother can be found near the cash box at all times, making sure no one steals the money.
Whoo are you?: Malin will notice that owls seem to be happening at her; they're hard to see, just shapes against the lesser-dark of the night sky, but they definitely seem to be watching her. They particularly seem to gather when she feeds. If she doesn't confront them, this will increase slowly but measurably throughout the week.
Time waits for no one: An old clock tower in the part of downtown leading into the Sixth has been restored to functionality... Mostly. The belltower stands empty, though there's a visible place where a bell should be hung, several stories above the floor. Ryoji might find the scene familiar. On Wednesday evening, there is some kind of reopening gathering at the church below it; the brief service and meet-and-greet is not particularly unusual, save that the young Acolyte handing out papers in the entry won't step into the congregation hall itself.
Like a dog with a bad...: In the Sixth, the construction is ongoing, still with the same handful of men, who rotate through almost like randomly generated NPCs. Lurking around outside is a thickly built man, who watches the whole goings-on with suspicion; strangely, he seems to be watching it mostly through the camera on his phone. On Friday morning, though it shouldn't be cold enough for frost, three of the strangely similar men slip on patches of ice and fall behind a half-finished wall... Where they vanish completely. They reappear after lunch, if it's even the same men, with no signs of injury. That afternoon, the man with his phone looks smug.
A touch of the season: And speaking of ice, passage into many of the city's Avernian Gates is blocked this week by a thick frost that seals the entries shut. An Unsettling Youth and his girlfriend can occasionally be seen investigating them; though they're constantly together, they don't seem much inclined to talk to each other. Occasionally, she'll drape her arm over his shoulders and giggle, while he looks confused; other times, she seems almost to shy away from him.
Weather forecast: The rain has passed, and days grow clear again for this week. Hex’s weather has been getting colder, and people are bundling up a bit more - even those who don’t need to, just in an effort to fit in. Hats and gloves are being prominently displayed in stores, even if they’re not strictly needed yet.
Moon phase: The moon is full on Monday the fourteenth, reaching peak fullness over the city at about 2AM. Afterwards, it begins to wane.
More employment: More decorations for the Day of Lights are going up, with some stronger-backed labor being recruited for the stockrooms in preparation for the incoming holiday rush. No one seems concerned about work history, a boon for people without a human paper trail. The park lights aren't finished yet, either, though things are on schedule to open next week.
Hitting the books: To prepare for the holidays, and raise funds for their community party, the library near the university is selling some of its used books. Most of them are fine, if an odd selection - you might find a cookbook, or you might find a book of poetry. There’s something weird about the books, though - a few of them smell faintly of mint. Watching over all of this is a sharp-eyed librarian. Don’t take a book without paying, or she’ll get up from her desk and try to block the door. She keeps having to chase away teenagers with dirty hands, too.
Bake sale: Some of the local schools are starting to take up donations for their holiday parties. One in particular in the residential district is holding a bake sale in front of the elementary school for an hour each day after classes let out. If you can fight through the sea of small children hoping someone will buy them something, you’ll find a variety of brownies, cookies, and tiny cakes. Many of them are lopsided, but a few look put together by expert hands. They cost more, of course, but it’s all for a good cause. A grouchy mother can be found near the cash box at all times, making sure no one steals the money.
Whoo are you?: Malin will notice that owls seem to be happening at her; they're hard to see, just shapes against the lesser-dark of the night sky, but they definitely seem to be watching her. They particularly seem to gather when she feeds. If she doesn't confront them, this will increase slowly but measurably throughout the week.
Time waits for no one: An old clock tower in the part of downtown leading into the Sixth has been restored to functionality... Mostly. The belltower stands empty, though there's a visible place where a bell should be hung, several stories above the floor. Ryoji might find the scene familiar. On Wednesday evening, there is some kind of reopening gathering at the church below it; the brief service and meet-and-greet is not particularly unusual, save that the young Acolyte handing out papers in the entry won't step into the congregation hall itself.
Like a dog with a bad...: In the Sixth, the construction is ongoing, still with the same handful of men, who rotate through almost like randomly generated NPCs. Lurking around outside is a thickly built man, who watches the whole goings-on with suspicion; strangely, he seems to be watching it mostly through the camera on his phone. On Friday morning, though it shouldn't be cold enough for frost, three of the strangely similar men slip on patches of ice and fall behind a half-finished wall... Where they vanish completely. They reappear after lunch, if it's even the same men, with no signs of injury. That afternoon, the man with his phone looks smug.
A touch of the season: And speaking of ice, passage into many of the city's Avernian Gates is blocked this week by a thick frost that seals the entries shut. An Unsettling Youth and his girlfriend can occasionally be seen investigating them; though they're constantly together, they don't seem much inclined to talk to each other. Occasionally, she'll drape her arm over his shoulders and giggle, while he looks confused; other times, she seems almost to shy away from him.
no subject
no subject
"Better than them finding another victim next. ...Is there a way to protect oneself against them?" Except for keeping one's will strong, which... she has no idea how one would do that. No alcohol, probably, but that's what she has been doing her best to avoid since last week, anway.
no subject
no subject
no subject
no subject
She leans forward a bit, curious now, which makes a few yellow scales poke out from under the shadows as the hood shifts, the fabric unable to fully follow her head.
no subject
no subject
She should probably focus on those ...things in the trees more, but she has no idea what else she could ask about them.
no subject
With all this time, he really hasn't had a chance to sit down and talk to a vampire like this. It's usually all business, if he does talk to one.
no subject
She's never sat down with someone and talked about something like this. Not that she can remember, anyway; maybe there was a time when Lars was around.
"I used to be almost exactly the same. I even still lived the same way." Until things got better, until she got off the street and worked to carve out a spot in the world for herself. "I'm not the same self anymore, but that came later. At first, the only difference was I wasn't entirely alone in my body anymore." She snorts. "...Now that just makes it sound like I got pregnant."
no subject
no subject
So she ...doesn't know. She'll probably not survive long enough to find out how she may be at four hundred, or hundred, or even sixty. She isn't sure if she'd like to, but she will still do her best to be around for it.
"What makes it a partnership? ...You seem to communicate a lot." That fascinates her. Every approach she has been taught was centred around control and mastery of one's beast; the thing that he calls horror seems to have more intelligence, but the relationship still seems to have vague similarities.
no subject
Rachel made the cut, he knows. She just... slipped up. But she was the most effective Beast he's ever known.
no subject
He may have witnessed someone when he was made, but thinking that she will return for a reckoning seems like the same difference as accepting that Kindred are cursed and thinking that all the stories about Caine and the Cities and Antediluvians are real and around and coming to get you.
no subject
"It's more of a fact, really. We do what we have to. ... You're... well. A vampire feeds. A werewolf hunts. Other stranger things do what they have to do. We teach our lessons, you teach yours."
It's not a matter of belief when it's a matter of fact.
no subject
When you're dead, you're dead, in her opinion. Unless you are undead of some kind -vampire, ghost, whatever-, but that's still kind of alive, in the larger picture. Final death is final, that's kind of the point. It just comes more easily to some than to others.
no subject
He's seen her. The great bird inside of him knows that she exists, that she still works in the world. Why does he have to explain that it's true?
no subject
"...Do a lot of your kind believe in 'doing the right thing'?"
no subject
no subject
You drink blood to survive. You try to not take more than the vessel's system can take so that you'll be able to drink from them again at some later point. It's not quite as simple as that now that she's been talking to people again for over two weeks, but that's still the gist of it.
no subject
"But going too far can get you killed. That holds true on your end too, doesn't it?"
no subject
Because they'll typically constitute as Masquerade breaches, not because vampires are people with justice and compassion in their hearts.
And because they may have killed someone's valuable retainer.
And some ways of feeding will do ...other things to you. She knows a few first hand, now.
no subject
no subject
At least words come easily again for the most part, now, thanks to Corwin.
"I had very little choice about feeding for years." And only marginally more since she managed to run, because the options were so limited. There's a bit more since she came here, but even then it's been mostly determined by factors that have nothing to do with ethics and all to do with staying unnoticed.
no subject
He only tangentially does, due to fighting the Strix for so long, but even then... "I know we all have to feed one way or another."
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)