[Drew Roscoe] Drew's got her cellphone pinned against her ear with her right shoulder, held tipped down to help meet partway. Top floor of a busted up apartment building, surrounded by half-demolished boxes of similar shape and design-- this was going to be a revitalization project one day, when the city found spare funds to finish its work. For now, though, it was a ghost of a street. Out front there was a vehicle blocking one side of the street, having collided with a parked, old, rusted abandoned looking thing. The trail of blood that went from the vehicle to the front door of the building is pretty much dry by now, the overcast skies never delivered the rain that it promised would wash the stain away.
Drew gives shaky directions to Roman into her cellphone, gathers children to her best she can, and moves them over to Eli's side with her.
Get them out, he'd struggled to tell her. That could wait, she couldn't leave her Kin like this, absolutely couldn't. What if her bullets weren't as sure as she thought? What if one of the monsters came to and decided to finish their work with Booker while he was paralyzed and unable to defend himself? What if he stopped breathing? She'd be gone, unable to defend him, to perform CPR, to do anything. So she'd stayed, and after hanging up with Roman she'd shushed quiet comfort noises to the children while keeping one hand at Eli's chest, having to feel it move up and down when he breathed to be sure.
The side door is where she'd told Roman to go, the one with the boards torn off. Upstairs, they were impossible to miss.
Please hurry.
[Eli Booker] They are not hard to miss. The muffled cries of terrified children, the scent of blood and gun powder that lingered in the air and the trail of blood outside that led upstairs...they were all like a trail of bread crumbs leading Roman to where they were.
Eli breathed like a man deep in the throes of nasty asthma attack. His chest struggled to lift as his lungs strained to take in and hold a breath. When he exhaled, it always seemed like it'd be for the last time. He's shaking - muscles twitching and trembling in response to the poisonous toxins released into his system by the Fomori they fought only a handful of minutes ago.
They are in a dark room - what would be this apartments living room - and behind them is a bedroom. One glance would tell Roman bad things happened her. Unless he physically looks, he'd see a foot laid out and still peeking from behind the corner of one wall.
[Janis Ian] Janis is still a prospective member. She isn't bound to the totem as of yet, though, she's around the church as often as she can be, picking up the patrols through the pack's turf. It isn't the bat signal that snares her attention to something going on.
It's Roman himself - the reactions of his body when he skids to a halt at the doors of the front stoop of the Church and starts to run down them, a phone in hand. The Rotagar side-steps out of his way as she was walking up the steps to the church, watching him run like a wild bull. Red brows furrow together, the one sided conversation plucked out words that she recognizes as 'wounds' and 'Drew'. Her nostrils flare as she looks up at the Church and then to the fading form of the CoG running down the street.
It doesn't take much for her to spin on the ball of her foot to turn, it takes even less effort for her to break into an urgent run to follow after the other no moon.
[Roman Turner] It was a dead run that passed in a blur for him. Once he'd knocked a man clean off his feet, making it so Kora had to leap over the man. His Alpha had responded right away, so as they ran Roman acted as blocker, knocking anyone out of the way that didn't move fast enough. His coat tails flew out behind him, hat long forgotten.
It wasn't too hard to find them, he found the car, found the trail of blood and what might seem like life time for those waiting passed in minutes for him. Soon enough the sound of boots came as he ran up the stairs two at a time to burst in on the scene, panting like a dog.
[Drew Roscoe] What they find is a mess, the kind that suggested there really ought to be casualties on both sides. There's blood all about the place, the smell of gunpowder as thick in the air as the blood is. There's a body whose foot is poking out of a back room, still as the grave. There's another figure face down at the back of the room, near a corner filled with shadows and the scent of despair and children, blood pooling from its head. A lump of deformed lopsided muscle and pink flesh is on the floor with its brains painting a picture on the ceiling above and along the back of his shoulders. The last body visible is that of what appears to be a vastly oversized, mutated scorpion, exoskeleton cracked with multiple gunshot wounds and vibrant yellow-green pus leaking from these wounds, while blue venom only recently stopped leaking sticky goo from the tail.
Near the door that Roman burst through first, followed close behind by Kora and Janis (who the fuck's that? whatever, if she's with Last Watch she's fine), some odd number of feet to the right, are five still-warm, still-breathing bodies.
Eli's on his back with his head near the wall, Drew had moved him so he wasn't slumped back but laying flat instead, aware that this would make it easiest for him to breathe. She's on the ground, beside him, with a four year old in her lap and a six and nine year old at her sides. They're all crying, quiet hoarse sounds now, unable to process what they'd seen, what had happened to Mommy and Daddy, clinging to the pretty woman with the blood-speckled face, the warm coat and the long hair that smelled of floral shampoo and gunsmoke alike.
Her eyes fly up to the cavalry, wide and bright with fear but without tears (just yet, she'd have time for that later).
"He's worse," she informed Roman.
[Roman Turner] "Holy cow. We got youngins in here. Lord have mercy."
He thought quickly, pulling his cell phone back out and with one thumb had a game up and going in a flash.
"Here,come over hear and play. See? Angry birds. Ya just have at it and Uncle Roman will buy ya some icecream and suckers when it's all better."
He was hearding the kids out of the way so he could get a good look at Eli. Kneeling next to the Kin to examine his wounds.
"Oh man, tell me ain't no stings below the belt, cause if poison's gotta be sucked out, I'm afraid ya might not make it unless one of the girls is feeling adventuresome."
[Janis Ian] Roman wasn't alone. The redhead was on his heels, following behind him as her breath remained steady, unlabored - as it rolls out in a stream of mist, her heartbeat thundered in her ears. Her eyes narrow as they pass the car, the scent of blood pulls a growling rumble from the pit of her stomach.
She looks to Kora and then to Roman as the CoG is the first to burst through the door, she skids in behind him. Brown eyes scanning still-warm bodies that were laying close by, until her head turns and the Rotagar stops - dead in her track. "ELI!" It's the first panic-stricken thing she utters as her eyes move to the fallen kin, and then to Drew and back again.
There were kids crying, huddled together as they were being herding out of the way. She blinks once, "Roman, can ye heal 'im?"
[Drew Roscoe] The six year old is bold enough out of the three to accept Roman's invitation, they allow themselves to be ushered because they're shellshocked, they're too young to know to retaliate, to run, to do much of anything really. Authority's what they seek, promises of ice cream and suckers are lost upon them for the most part, the game is barely paid attention to, but the kids will leave Drew and Eli when she lets them go and huddle together elsewhere so the Ragabash Medic can do his thing.
Janis yelps Eli's name, this earns her a snap of a glance from Drew, a startled blink, and a moment's worth of a stare. Then she's shaking her head and moving one hand to Eli's shoulder, the other to tug down his shirt, down to the point that a kevlar vest is able to peek out at his collarbone.
There are two sting marks at his neck, one at the side the other more centralized on his throat. They look as awful as they should to do this much damage. "There. His armor, it did it's job, but it only covers so much..."
[Roman Turner] "I surely hope so."
He heaved the biggest sigh of relief when the wounds weren't belong the belt in the "No man goes there on another bro, zone." Calmly he reached for his belt, flicking open a small Gerber pocket knife which he moved to the wounds with.
"Ya with me Mr Eli? I'm gonna try and suck some of this poison out, so don't start to thinking I'm just trying to give ya a hicky. Hold still if ya can."
[Eli Booker] He wheezes. His breath whistles through his lungs in a sound that could very nearly pass for the infamous death rattle old people are said to posses before they pass away. Whatever toxins were introduced to his system are effecting his muscles, because they twitch and his respiratory system, because he cannot breath easily and Eli was no asthmatic.
Janis yells his name, Roman asks if he's with him and Eli can only make his head move slightly - enough that Roman can just barely see the motion.
He was talking before, albeit with great effort. Now, he says nothing.
[Roman Turner] It was just the pointed tip of the knife and he worked quickly to score across the stings. In a moment he was bending over Eli, sealing his mouth the wounds to suck. And no, he didn't suck and swallow, he was more the suck and spit sort. Inwardly he gathered himself. One hand was splayed flatly on Eli's chest, the other across the wounds he worked on.
"This might hurt some. Gaia please bless me, be with me on this."
[Janis Ian] There is a moment's stare that is shared between Janis and Drew - the kin gives a startled blink, Janis' mouth flattens into a thin line. She's moving quickly to the other side, sliding into a crouch at Eli's legs on the same side as Drew. She watches with a soft furrow of her brow, her nostrils flaring.
Eli's head moves slightly - Roman has the assurance that he's still there. Janis skirts her eyes away to try and assess what happened, the children taking into regard, but her attention keeps returning to what Roman's doing - arching an eyebrow at the other no moon.
[Roman Turner] His breath deepened with his eyes closed as he drew on his own spirit and the Gift of Mother's touch. He leaned down close to Eli's neck, just where he had been sucking poisoning out and pressed his lips against the wound with a faint whispered breath of sound. Giving it his best go at using Mother's Touch on the Kin.
Dice Rolled:[ 3 d10 ] 2, 4, 5 (Success x 1 at target 6) [WP]
[Kora] The truth is: Kora doesn't run as fast as Roman. Not on two legs. Not any longer. And so she sends the young Ragabash running ahead of her, Rotagar in tow. Roman bursts into the door a solid minute or three ahead of the pregnant Skald, but arrive she does. She's developed the beginnings of a waddle, all things considered. All her weight forward, now, heavy on her tall, narrow frame. The reflexive twist of rage in her blood is good for neither her nor the child she carries now - but there is nothing to be done for it.
When she sees the children, her mouth tightens. She breathes out, once, sharply. "They cannot see any more." Kora says, sharply. A lifting glance toward Janice, then, a movement of her chin toward the children. "Move them. One of the other apartments. No names, no words in their presence, understand? Nothing more."
The healing work she leaves to Roman, but while he works - after a shooting glance toward Drew. Pulling her aside with a brief, moving glance toward Eli, her generous mouth a thinned line across her sharply defined features. Low, the question. She asks it only when the children are out of the room. "I want to know what they saw."
[Roman Turner] What passed from Roman in to Eli might not be much, it might feel like a tickled that started out soft and warm, but them it might burn as it reached the poison to do battle with it. And Roman knew it wouldn't be enough. He whispered near Eli's neck. I'm gonna have to try again. Stay with me partner."
[Janis Ian] Her hand drops to Eli's calf, squeezing it as Kora's breath draws out once, sharply, gaining the redhead's attention. She wears a similar tight mouthed expression, her head turning over her shoulder to regard the children.
Auburn hair falls across her shoulder as she slid back up to her feet, withdrawing her hand, and moves away. It distracts her - the task. She swallows the lump forming in the throat, offers the children a rueful smile as her voice drops into a crooning sing-song voice, the brogue accentuating her words sweetly, gently.
"C'mon, my darlings..." she says to the children, trying to herd them away so they won't continue to watch, like a mother goose herding her ducklings into a pond. "C'mon o'er 'ere."
[Roman Turner] He didn't much like how quiet Eli was, nor how labored his breathing was. It was one of those times you wished you had one of those adrenaline shots. All he had was a minor gift that took every bit of his spirit to work. He spoke softly to Eli, just as he had to Drew the time he held her and sent healing through her body.
"Ya ain't getting out of working on the Kin house this easily. Just remember that."
Once more he bent to the wounds to breath out against them so close his lips touched open flesh.
Dice Rolled:[ 3 d10 ] 8, 9, 10 (Success x 4 at target 6) [WP]
[Drew Roscoe] Drew slides away, to give Roman space, and after a moment of hesitation she pushes herself up onto her feet and watches what Roman does. He flicks the knife out and works to suck the venom from Booker's wounds, and Drew furrows her brow some, thinking that perhaps she should have done that herself. But then, if she had maybe she'd have wound up on the floor twitching and struggling for air too? No, no, she did right.
Janis kneels down by Booker's legs, Drew's eyes bounce off the female Ragabash again for a second, then she's leaning down to pick up a couple of guns off the floor-- hers first, the big heavy Dirty Harry revolver, which goes right into the holster at her back, under her coat, and Eli's smaller handgun second. This she checks for a second, the flicks the safety on and sticks in the deep pocket of her winter coat.
Kora arrives and takes charge. Roman is left to do what he's doing, Janis is told to move the children, and Drew is pulled aside to explain what the witnesses saw. Her answer takes a moment to surmise, but it given after she licks dry lips that taste like splashed blood and brain matter.
"I don't know... not all of what they saw, not for sure. Their screaming and crying is what made me and Eli take notice and come looking in the first place. Heard a man pleading and a woman crying-- I haven't gotten to check for them yet. Safe to guess that they're dead, 'cause they sure didn't leave." She shivers a bit and presses on, gesturing to each dead body in turn.
"Saw this one take several shots to the head before it died trying to choke me out. Saw this one stab and lash at Eli and try to come after me before I put it down. This one--" to the gray thing sprawled out face down in a corner, "Came out of the back room, I expect it took the parents. Tried to grab up one of the kids and make a break for it, but I put it down before it could touch them again.
"They saw me and Eli bust in with guns, saw us kill some monsters, and saw Roman suck some poison out of Eli's stings...."
Another moment of quiet, and Drew's eyes drift after the kids. Her arms wrap tightly around her chest, clenching back the crushing sensation within it that tended to follow evenings such as this where loss came so close to home. "You guys... you have a way to fix their memories, yeah?"
[Roman Turner] He was checking Eli's breathing, coloring and responses with each warm thrust of his Gift in to the Kin. "Ya with me still? I can't work on another hicky, ya can tell all the fellas some kinky story on how ya got them."
[Eli Booker] Kora's face is as grave as the situation had been.She ushers Drew to the side and instructs Janis to move the children away. They had seen their mother and father drained dry. Should Kora look in the room just behind them, she'd see the mother splayed on the floor next to her long dead husband. There blood is drained, though the floor isn't coated in it.
While Roman works, Eli's breathing becomes less haggard - less forced. His heart races in his chest with the force of both adrenaline and fear. A finger twitches, then a foot. Eventually, Eli is able to move his extremities, and lifts his eyes toward Roman.
"I...usually only go to first base...on a first date..." He says quietly with a voice full of gravel.
[Janis Ian] [persuasion gift?]
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 1, 1, 2, 7, 9 (Success x 1 at target 6) [WP]
[Roman Turner] "Son, for another nuzzle against your neck, I'd bring flowers and the ring."
His chestnut head lowered again and this time as he breathed across the wounds, he poured the last of what he had in to healing.
Dice Rolled:[ 3 d10 ] 1, 2, 2 (Failure at target 6) [WP]
[Roman Turner] "I'm afraid I'm drained. I owe ya a better date than this one."
[Janis Ian] The three children have seen horrors that they shouldn't ever be exposed to. Janis does what she can to keep their attentions, divert their focus to something else. She keeps talking, asking simple questions to the youngest, or watching the six-year-old with Roman's phone.
Her voice is as soft and pleasant as she can keep it, drawing on more persuasive gifts to aid. She takes them away into one of the apartments, out of sight and out of mind, not once breathing a word about what just happened.
[Eli Booker] Roman's remark earns him a smile that doesn't quite work itself into a full fledged smart ass grin. Eli can move, his body aches in places still though. Dragging himself up, he leans against the wall and flexes his fingers, hands, into fists and then relaxes them.
"I owe you kid." He says to the Child of Gaia.
[Kora] There's a dark moment in the nascent seconds when Drew has finished her story where Kora is closed off from the pack. She cuts a glance back over her shoulder, out into the hallway in the Janis' wake, considering the whole of the story Drew has just offered. Something hard about her face in that moment, something steely in the depths of her dark eyes. Her left hand clenches into a fist, and her nostrils jaw sets firmly, grinding, as she considers What Is to Be Done.
Her first thought is death.
She is still with it, stark with it. Holds it inside her like she could swallow it herself, make it whole if she were to consume it somehow. Then, the moment passes, she breathes out all at once. It's not relief, but something else. Some easing that comes with decision.
"We'll look for them," says Kora, of the parents. Lifting her chin toward the place Drew indicated. "I need you to take the children out of here before there are cops anywhere close. I want you to take them to Hill House. Have Janis help you keep them in line of out of sight. Don't get pulled over, don't be seen, and don't get caught. Give them to Mary Alice and make sure she knows they are going to be cared for by kin and only kin; kept out of the public eye until whatever search the police make for them is over. And then sent away, someplace quiet and rural, adopted into the family.
"The only way to keep them from being a veil breach is to raise them as kin."
[Drew Roscoe] Drew doesn't question Kora's choice, doesn't protest the fact that her truck isn't outside-- it's only a short two blocks away, she was sure that she and Janis (a name to go with the face, there we are) could manage walking the three back to her house, find a way to pile them into the truck and get them to the Hill House like it was ordered. Sure, her truck only had the bench, but she was sure she could squeeze her own petite self and three smaller children in without any trouble. Two would just have to share a seatbelt, and Janis would either hang behind for clean-up or ride in the back of the truck, whichever.
Drew's attention is split, though, when Roman leans back and Eli's voice grinds to join the teen's in the air. Her posture straightens, back stiffens, and weight shifts forward some, indicating that she was about to move but stopped herself.
Instead, quickly, she glanced up to Kora and flicked her eyebrows up, like asking permission to deviate from the task set before her for a moment to see the Gaia-given recovery herself.
[Roman Turner] "You're not kidding ya owe me."
He helped Eli prop himself up against the edge of the sofa.
"I need ya for your painting skills. Besides, after sucking poison out of ya, I think we're engaged. So ya sit here and I'l find ya some juice, then we'll see if we can get ya out of here."
[Kora] Drew's raised eyebrows are met by another lift of the pregnant Garou's chin. It's like permission. Go on.
[Janis Ian] Roman's phone was retrieved from the six-year-old as Janis finds a trinket from her pocket to distract the child with. A brightly polished piece of brass shaped like a coin. The print minted on it long faded. She tells the child it's a good luck piece, lets him hold on to it and motions for them to stay there.
She reappears in the hallway, making her way towards the others as she caught a portion of what Kora says. Brown eyes quickly fall to Drew, her tongue slid inside her left cheek. "Roman, I 'ave yer phone." She says, offering it up to the Child of Gaia as she casts Eli a look.
[Roman Turner] "Thank ya kindly."
He held up his hand from where he had retaken his seat next to Eli on the floor. At that moment he'd been trying to encourage Eli to drink orange juice.
[Eli Booker] Eli doesn't quite laugh. Rather, he huffs out a breath of air that would of been a laugh if only he had more energy to behind it. Roman helps him and he is accepting of it.
"Those kids ok?" He asks, dark eyes shifting around the room. That's when his eyes light on Kora's face for a beat. Just a beat, because he can't make himself catch her eyes and hold them.
"You're alright in my book Roman...I'll paint the fuckin' city for you if you need it..." He groans and shifts, plants the sole of one heavy boot on the ground for leverage as if he's testing his legs to see if he can stand. Instead he just sips the orange juice and tries not to throw it up as his stomach churns.
[Drew Roscoe] The Kin doesn't rush over or fall so her knees crack the floor so she can drop down beside Booker once he's sitting up and talking, she isn't one for those kinds of dramatics. Instead she walks over, sneakers quiet save for the occawsional squelching noise when she steps in a bit of carnage, and remains standing while Roman helps Eli sit up and get propped so he can lean back against something sturdy. First the Kin's fingers push through Roman's hair, a quick and thoughtless gesture.
"Thanks, Roman. Two of our lives you've saved now. Can't thank you enough."
For Eli, she fishes his gun out of her pocket and leans down, tucking it into the vest pocket she knows he tends to keep it in. "Janis and I, we're gonna see those kids into the right hands. I guess you, Kora and Roman have clean-up duty." A bruise is already blossoming about her neck and throat, up close to her jaw as well. That she'd withstood the beast of a misshapen man trying to squeeze the life out of her so well was a testament to her ancestry, really, or just her stubborn determination to live. That didn't mean she'd escape without any marks, though. Frankly, she considered herself lucky that she could speak and it only hurt a little to breathe.
[Roman Turner] "We'll get ya home. Maybe I will call a cab this time. And get ya some rest, you'll do ok. But them youngins are gonna have a hard time and will have to be kept sheltered while working through this stuff.
[Roman Turner] 'Just doing what I was born to do Miss Drew. I had a little more in me I could tend to ya too, but gonna take a bit to recover."
[Eli Booker] "You ok?" It's spoken to Drew, quietly, as a heavy hand reaches out and touches her calf. She was bruised, she'd be sore, but she saved his life and Eli is more than aware of this. There's a familiarity to his touch with Drew, it lingers for longer than it should
Eli's face falls when Roman speaks. There are lines at his mouth, creasing his brow. It ages him considerably. He is worried after the trio of youngsters and it couldn't be more obvious on his expression.
"Thanks Roman..." He says again and uses his back against whatever he's against to try and leverage himself to standing.
[Janis Ian] Janis tilts her head in a nod to Roman, her hand falls back to her side, nearly disappearing under the cuff of the sleeve to her leather blazer. Her shoulders roll back once, straightening her frame as the Rotagar turns her head at the sound of her name coming from Drew. Her throat ripples, swallowing quietly - "Aye," is all she can say about the task to handle the children.
She shakes her head, casting her head down as a fall of red bangs shadows the expression of her eyes. She steps away to move back towards the apartment where the children were waiting - "Best get them out of 'ere while we can, Drew."
[Drew Roscoe] "Goddamn peachy," is her answer to Booker, accompanied by a grin that was as warm as ever, accented with a bit of wild that makes teeth look sharp and lips stretched a bit too far-- adrenaline was kicking in, and she was smothering the sort of hysteria that followed nearly dying, others nearly dying, and the rush of victory to boot. Booker puts his hand on her calf, she lays her hand on top of his, then moves it and tucks her other hand under his armpit to help him regain balance while he tries to stand. She can't lift him, no, she's not nearly so strong, but she can at least help with balance until he finds it on his own.
Once he does, she nods and lets him go with a squeeze of his hand, and flashes that grin to Roman in turn. "Nah, this is nothing, just a mugging story for work and extra foundation is all." She sounds like a battered wife-- Kin usually do when trying to explain battle wounds no matter where they came from.
From there, her attention is on Janis, and there's a solemn kind of nod before she moves to join the No Moon, to go with her wherever she'd taken the children.
"C'mon kiddo's, we're gonna get some hot chocolate and meet one of the nicest ladies on earth."
[Kora] Kora cuts a glance back over her shoulder as Janis comes back into the apartment. Steps back, turning to following the curl of gunsmoke through the half-finished rooms, considering the next room. Corpses - human or otherwise - laid out on the floor. She holds herself just apart here; that sense of inhumanity sharper in this moment than it ever is on an ordinary day. There's nothing close to a smile on her generous mouth, the sense of the animal is clear, alive underneath her skin, the monster in her - now - not just the wolf.
"She'll recover," Kora corrects Roman with a quiet sort of stillness, after a narrow, critical sweep of Drew's bruises; the way she moves. There's a question subsumed in the statement, which Drew is left to answer or not as she pleases.
"They'll live." The Skald tells Eli, taking a step back into the hall, watching the next room over as Janis returns. Her arms are crossed, beneath her breasts, over the swell of her stomach, underneath that is a feral tension imprinted on every muscles of her body.
"We're not calling a cab here, Roman." She contradicts her packmate, brief, quiet. "Don't want someone investigating this scene finding about a cab run. Call the Doc and Izzy. See if the Detective can run interference with whatever investigation comes next." She's still talking as Drew and Janis leave to round up the children, but she steps them both for a brief, quiet look. And a serious, direct, "Thank you." - before she lets them go.
[Roman Turner] He nodded, listening to his Alpha and makes the calls. First to Imogen, then to Izzy.
"This is Roman, we could use a ride and some help on clean up if ya could come."
[Eli Booker] The apartment is a 'shotgun' style unit. When you enter the door you're in the living room. Were you to turn to your left, you'd be faced with the dead and crumpled bodies of two middle age, middle class parents. They're dressed nicely - a wrong turn, bad directions on the GPS, probably brought them to this place. Most might say fate. Eli would just say their luck was just fucked today.
Turning to the left is a hallway. A bathroom is on the right. The kitchen is straight ahead. Kora and Roman and Janis can smell death. This place stunk of it. Nothing here, in this space, has died naturally. Not even the rats.
The strongest stench seems to roll from the bathroom...though neither Drew nor Eli had managed to venture that far into the unit.
Janis and Drew are taking the children to the nicest woman on earth. He watches the two Fenrir, then looks at the children before nodding to what Kora has said.
"I'll be fine." He says. And he would, because he had too.
[Roman Turner] If Eli wanted a ride with him, he'd beg it off Izzy or Imogen to get them back to the church. Either way, he would come back to help clean up. And they'd have to get hold of Linus for a cleansing.
[Janis Ian] The Rotagar can hear the rumble of noise in the back of her mind, the questions that want to know answers to what just happened, how Kora was going to handle the mess, the clean up, and then there are others when she peers back at the faces of the three children Drew and Janis must sneak three blocks to the kin's house to take them to Hill House.
A part of her is relieved that death does not have to come to such young faces - that she doesn't have to kill them.
She stops when Kora stops them with a brief quiet look. "Any time, rhya." She replies and leaves with Drew.
[missing some]
[Roman Turner] If Eli wanted a ride with him, he'd beg it off Izzy or Imogen to get them back to the church. Either way, he would come back to help clean up. And they'd have to get hold of Linus for a cleansing.
[Roman Turner] ((And I have over stayed my sleep time. Sorry so short, but appreciate the play. Thanks folks!))
[Eli Booker] Thanks Blu!
[Janis Ian] The Rotagar can hear the rumble of noise in the back of her mind, the questions that want to know answers to what just happened, how Kora was going to handle the mess, the clean up, and then there are others when she peers back at the faces of the three children Drew and Janis must sneak three blocks to the kin's house to take them to Hill House.
A part of her is relieved that death does not have to come to such young faces - that she doesn't have to kill them.
She stops when Kora stops them with a brief quiet look. "Any time, rhya." She replies and leaves with Drew.
[Detective Montoya] It's an odd thing, really. No one would guess that she would answer such a call, let alone make her way to come to their aid when it was asked. No one, of course, expects her to do anything but be trouble. Of course, she fosters such beliefs with her attitude, because it works for her. It keeps them at a distance. It makes it easier - for her.
She does, however, say three words into the phone. "On my way."
She's already in motion, getting the directions as she slips on her coat, long strides carrying her down the hall, out and too her car. By the time she's unlocked the door and settled inside, she's already flipped on the radio, to dispatch, to hear if she's going to have to do any interference before arriving, pulling out into traffic smoothly to head toward the apartment in question.
[Kora] "This place is deserted, yeah?" Kora asks Eli, dark eyes flickering ever so slightly up at Eli when he makes it to his feet. The height different between them is negligible, and she has a way of standing - a way of looking up - that makes her seem taller than she is.
Roman is dispatched downstairs with a moving though to await the arrival of reinforcements necessary for clean-up. She herself remains in the room, walking down the hallway toward the kitchen, feeling her gorge rise with the scent of death in the air. It's enough that she lifts a hand to her mouth, presses the back of her hand against her lips as she walks, puts her free hand on the door of the foul-smelling bathroom and listens as she holds herself away from the foul scent that comes from underneath the door.
"You and Drew heard something and came up?" A glance back down the hall at the kinswoman, dark eyes in a pale face, reflecting the ambient light spilling in through the windows. Head tipped then, meditatively considering whether the sirens she hears in the distance are coming here or just part of the urban landscape.
"I'm trying to figure out whether this is a rush job," that twist of her mouth, dry and distant. The clean up, she means. The inevitable grotesquerie of it. "Or if we have time to take our time."
[Eli Booker] This apartment building houses two units - one up and one down. It's empty and by the looks of it has been for some time. Every window is covered with plywood and the only light that bleeds in comes from cracks and gashes in the wood. She walks into the kitchen and there are dead rats, sucked dry of their blood and discarded like so much trash across the kitchen floor.
The bathroom, where Kora has to hold a hand to her mouth and nose to keep from taking in the reeking smell, is awful. There are two bodies in the bathtub - both pale with a lack of blood, their once dark brown skin faded, their mouths twisted into a grotesque grin. They are young men, dressed in common street attire and complete opposites from the family ambushed in front of the building.
Eli is standing, broad shoulders pressed to the wall bracing him up. His palms are rubbing his face as he listens to her walk ...bears her gaze on him and processes her words.
"Heard screams...then a car crash." Roman left him juice and Eli drinks it now finding his throat dry and sore. "We made it here but...we were too late for their parents I think..." Dark eyes cut toward where Kora should be, down the hall at his left.
"No one was here...this street was like a ghost town."
[Detective Montoya] There doesn't seem to be anything on dispatch - but that doesn't mean their won't be. She calls in and tells dispatch she's going to dinner, is thus off duty for a while, perhaps even the rest of the night. Then, she lights a cigarette, and takes a round about route toward the place in question. Just in case.
Soon enough, however, she arrives at the building in question, dark eyes sweeping the area as she parks the car. She pulls out a pair of gloves from the glove box - latex, blue [hands of blue, two by two] - and takes a final drag off her cigarette. She gets out, pausing to tuck the gloves into her pocket, before heading up the walk.
[Kora] Kora gives a dry husked laugh. There's no humor in it, nothing light. Just that grim certainty as she walks back down the hall, careful of the debris in the room now, alert but not rigid with it, as she steps over the debris, booted feet making a quiet, solid noise on the floor with each careful footfall.
She's back in the room now, at the end of the hallway, hands in the front pockets of her jeans, arms close to her body - mostly concealed by her dark gray hoodie. It's cold in here; the night coming in through the plywood boarding over the windows, cold enough that they can see their breath. Not cold enough to keep the dead from rotting, though. Sinking into themselves, deliquescing in the stark, cold air.
"Probably for the best," she says, of the parents. A winnowing sort of certainty there. "The parents would've been a problem, if they'd lived." Another flicker of her gaze - not precisely to his eyes, but over his face; the lines of care in it; or rather, the lines of care underneath the skin, evident only from this angle. From that expression.
"I'll have Izzy give you a ride back to the church, then. See if you can can get the parents' car out of here. Find someplace to dump it so this disappearance doesn't come back to this neighborhood, yeah?" A flickering look, up and sidelong, gaze shearing away toward a shuttered window. sO there aren't implications. So there's no investigation - not a close one, anyway.
"That tow truck of yours will come in handy." She pauses, quiet - that hint of a far away look - before she refocuses on the immediate. "You're alright, then?"
She pauses, waiting for the affirmative that is sure to follow. "Good, I'll have Linus check you out. We'll do a cleansing if necessay before the night's over. I'll want to hear the story too, you know."
A twist of her mouth, straightening her head as hidden communication writes itself across her face. "Izzy's here." Roman tipping her off.
[Kora] alright darlings, I need to sleeeeeeeeeeeeeep. :) but lo! there is a scene where izzy and eli can keep playing and/or hook up with drew/janis later. while kora roman and NPC imogen clean up.
to Detective Montoya, Eli Booker, Peek
[Eli Booker] Thanks Liz!
to Detective Montoya, Kora, Peek
[Detective Montoya] [Sleep well! :) ]
to Eli Booker, Kora
Drew gives shaky directions to Roman into her cellphone, gathers children to her best she can, and moves them over to Eli's side with her.
Get them out, he'd struggled to tell her. That could wait, she couldn't leave her Kin like this, absolutely couldn't. What if her bullets weren't as sure as she thought? What if one of the monsters came to and decided to finish their work with Booker while he was paralyzed and unable to defend himself? What if he stopped breathing? She'd be gone, unable to defend him, to perform CPR, to do anything. So she'd stayed, and after hanging up with Roman she'd shushed quiet comfort noises to the children while keeping one hand at Eli's chest, having to feel it move up and down when he breathed to be sure.
The side door is where she'd told Roman to go, the one with the boards torn off. Upstairs, they were impossible to miss.
Please hurry.
[Eli Booker] They are not hard to miss. The muffled cries of terrified children, the scent of blood and gun powder that lingered in the air and the trail of blood outside that led upstairs...they were all like a trail of bread crumbs leading Roman to where they were.
Eli breathed like a man deep in the throes of nasty asthma attack. His chest struggled to lift as his lungs strained to take in and hold a breath. When he exhaled, it always seemed like it'd be for the last time. He's shaking - muscles twitching and trembling in response to the poisonous toxins released into his system by the Fomori they fought only a handful of minutes ago.
They are in a dark room - what would be this apartments living room - and behind them is a bedroom. One glance would tell Roman bad things happened her. Unless he physically looks, he'd see a foot laid out and still peeking from behind the corner of one wall.
[Janis Ian] Janis is still a prospective member. She isn't bound to the totem as of yet, though, she's around the church as often as she can be, picking up the patrols through the pack's turf. It isn't the bat signal that snares her attention to something going on.
It's Roman himself - the reactions of his body when he skids to a halt at the doors of the front stoop of the Church and starts to run down them, a phone in hand. The Rotagar side-steps out of his way as she was walking up the steps to the church, watching him run like a wild bull. Red brows furrow together, the one sided conversation plucked out words that she recognizes as 'wounds' and 'Drew'. Her nostrils flare as she looks up at the Church and then to the fading form of the CoG running down the street.
It doesn't take much for her to spin on the ball of her foot to turn, it takes even less effort for her to break into an urgent run to follow after the other no moon.
[Roman Turner] It was a dead run that passed in a blur for him. Once he'd knocked a man clean off his feet, making it so Kora had to leap over the man. His Alpha had responded right away, so as they ran Roman acted as blocker, knocking anyone out of the way that didn't move fast enough. His coat tails flew out behind him, hat long forgotten.
It wasn't too hard to find them, he found the car, found the trail of blood and what might seem like life time for those waiting passed in minutes for him. Soon enough the sound of boots came as he ran up the stairs two at a time to burst in on the scene, panting like a dog.
[Drew Roscoe] What they find is a mess, the kind that suggested there really ought to be casualties on both sides. There's blood all about the place, the smell of gunpowder as thick in the air as the blood is. There's a body whose foot is poking out of a back room, still as the grave. There's another figure face down at the back of the room, near a corner filled with shadows and the scent of despair and children, blood pooling from its head. A lump of deformed lopsided muscle and pink flesh is on the floor with its brains painting a picture on the ceiling above and along the back of his shoulders. The last body visible is that of what appears to be a vastly oversized, mutated scorpion, exoskeleton cracked with multiple gunshot wounds and vibrant yellow-green pus leaking from these wounds, while blue venom only recently stopped leaking sticky goo from the tail.
Near the door that Roman burst through first, followed close behind by Kora and Janis (who the fuck's that? whatever, if she's with Last Watch she's fine), some odd number of feet to the right, are five still-warm, still-breathing bodies.
Eli's on his back with his head near the wall, Drew had moved him so he wasn't slumped back but laying flat instead, aware that this would make it easiest for him to breathe. She's on the ground, beside him, with a four year old in her lap and a six and nine year old at her sides. They're all crying, quiet hoarse sounds now, unable to process what they'd seen, what had happened to Mommy and Daddy, clinging to the pretty woman with the blood-speckled face, the warm coat and the long hair that smelled of floral shampoo and gunsmoke alike.
Her eyes fly up to the cavalry, wide and bright with fear but without tears (just yet, she'd have time for that later).
"He's worse," she informed Roman.
[Roman Turner] "Holy cow. We got youngins in here. Lord have mercy."
He thought quickly, pulling his cell phone back out and with one thumb had a game up and going in a flash.
"Here,come over hear and play. See? Angry birds. Ya just have at it and Uncle Roman will buy ya some icecream and suckers when it's all better."
He was hearding the kids out of the way so he could get a good look at Eli. Kneeling next to the Kin to examine his wounds.
"Oh man, tell me ain't no stings below the belt, cause if poison's gotta be sucked out, I'm afraid ya might not make it unless one of the girls is feeling adventuresome."
[Janis Ian] Roman wasn't alone. The redhead was on his heels, following behind him as her breath remained steady, unlabored - as it rolls out in a stream of mist, her heartbeat thundered in her ears. Her eyes narrow as they pass the car, the scent of blood pulls a growling rumble from the pit of her stomach.
She looks to Kora and then to Roman as the CoG is the first to burst through the door, she skids in behind him. Brown eyes scanning still-warm bodies that were laying close by, until her head turns and the Rotagar stops - dead in her track. "ELI!" It's the first panic-stricken thing she utters as her eyes move to the fallen kin, and then to Drew and back again.
There were kids crying, huddled together as they were being herding out of the way. She blinks once, "Roman, can ye heal 'im?"
[Drew Roscoe] The six year old is bold enough out of the three to accept Roman's invitation, they allow themselves to be ushered because they're shellshocked, they're too young to know to retaliate, to run, to do much of anything really. Authority's what they seek, promises of ice cream and suckers are lost upon them for the most part, the game is barely paid attention to, but the kids will leave Drew and Eli when she lets them go and huddle together elsewhere so the Ragabash Medic can do his thing.
Janis yelps Eli's name, this earns her a snap of a glance from Drew, a startled blink, and a moment's worth of a stare. Then she's shaking her head and moving one hand to Eli's shoulder, the other to tug down his shirt, down to the point that a kevlar vest is able to peek out at his collarbone.
There are two sting marks at his neck, one at the side the other more centralized on his throat. They look as awful as they should to do this much damage. "There. His armor, it did it's job, but it only covers so much..."
[Roman Turner] "I surely hope so."
He heaved the biggest sigh of relief when the wounds weren't belong the belt in the "No man goes there on another bro, zone." Calmly he reached for his belt, flicking open a small Gerber pocket knife which he moved to the wounds with.
"Ya with me Mr Eli? I'm gonna try and suck some of this poison out, so don't start to thinking I'm just trying to give ya a hicky. Hold still if ya can."
[Eli Booker] He wheezes. His breath whistles through his lungs in a sound that could very nearly pass for the infamous death rattle old people are said to posses before they pass away. Whatever toxins were introduced to his system are effecting his muscles, because they twitch and his respiratory system, because he cannot breath easily and Eli was no asthmatic.
Janis yells his name, Roman asks if he's with him and Eli can only make his head move slightly - enough that Roman can just barely see the motion.
He was talking before, albeit with great effort. Now, he says nothing.
[Roman Turner] It was just the pointed tip of the knife and he worked quickly to score across the stings. In a moment he was bending over Eli, sealing his mouth the wounds to suck. And no, he didn't suck and swallow, he was more the suck and spit sort. Inwardly he gathered himself. One hand was splayed flatly on Eli's chest, the other across the wounds he worked on.
"This might hurt some. Gaia please bless me, be with me on this."
[Janis Ian] There is a moment's stare that is shared between Janis and Drew - the kin gives a startled blink, Janis' mouth flattens into a thin line. She's moving quickly to the other side, sliding into a crouch at Eli's legs on the same side as Drew. She watches with a soft furrow of her brow, her nostrils flaring.
Eli's head moves slightly - Roman has the assurance that he's still there. Janis skirts her eyes away to try and assess what happened, the children taking into regard, but her attention keeps returning to what Roman's doing - arching an eyebrow at the other no moon.
[Roman Turner] His breath deepened with his eyes closed as he drew on his own spirit and the Gift of Mother's touch. He leaned down close to Eli's neck, just where he had been sucking poisoning out and pressed his lips against the wound with a faint whispered breath of sound. Giving it his best go at using Mother's Touch on the Kin.
Dice Rolled:[ 3 d10 ] 2, 4, 5 (Success x 1 at target 6) [WP]
[Kora] The truth is: Kora doesn't run as fast as Roman. Not on two legs. Not any longer. And so she sends the young Ragabash running ahead of her, Rotagar in tow. Roman bursts into the door a solid minute or three ahead of the pregnant Skald, but arrive she does. She's developed the beginnings of a waddle, all things considered. All her weight forward, now, heavy on her tall, narrow frame. The reflexive twist of rage in her blood is good for neither her nor the child she carries now - but there is nothing to be done for it.
When she sees the children, her mouth tightens. She breathes out, once, sharply. "They cannot see any more." Kora says, sharply. A lifting glance toward Janice, then, a movement of her chin toward the children. "Move them. One of the other apartments. No names, no words in their presence, understand? Nothing more."
The healing work she leaves to Roman, but while he works - after a shooting glance toward Drew. Pulling her aside with a brief, moving glance toward Eli, her generous mouth a thinned line across her sharply defined features. Low, the question. She asks it only when the children are out of the room. "I want to know what they saw."
[Roman Turner] What passed from Roman in to Eli might not be much, it might feel like a tickled that started out soft and warm, but them it might burn as it reached the poison to do battle with it. And Roman knew it wouldn't be enough. He whispered near Eli's neck. I'm gonna have to try again. Stay with me partner."
[Janis Ian] Her hand drops to Eli's calf, squeezing it as Kora's breath draws out once, sharply, gaining the redhead's attention. She wears a similar tight mouthed expression, her head turning over her shoulder to regard the children.
Auburn hair falls across her shoulder as she slid back up to her feet, withdrawing her hand, and moves away. It distracts her - the task. She swallows the lump forming in the throat, offers the children a rueful smile as her voice drops into a crooning sing-song voice, the brogue accentuating her words sweetly, gently.
"C'mon, my darlings..." she says to the children, trying to herd them away so they won't continue to watch, like a mother goose herding her ducklings into a pond. "C'mon o'er 'ere."
[Roman Turner] He didn't much like how quiet Eli was, nor how labored his breathing was. It was one of those times you wished you had one of those adrenaline shots. All he had was a minor gift that took every bit of his spirit to work. He spoke softly to Eli, just as he had to Drew the time he held her and sent healing through her body.
"Ya ain't getting out of working on the Kin house this easily. Just remember that."
Once more he bent to the wounds to breath out against them so close his lips touched open flesh.
Dice Rolled:[ 3 d10 ] 8, 9, 10 (Success x 4 at target 6) [WP]
[Drew Roscoe] Drew slides away, to give Roman space, and after a moment of hesitation she pushes herself up onto her feet and watches what Roman does. He flicks the knife out and works to suck the venom from Booker's wounds, and Drew furrows her brow some, thinking that perhaps she should have done that herself. But then, if she had maybe she'd have wound up on the floor twitching and struggling for air too? No, no, she did right.
Janis kneels down by Booker's legs, Drew's eyes bounce off the female Ragabash again for a second, then she's leaning down to pick up a couple of guns off the floor-- hers first, the big heavy Dirty Harry revolver, which goes right into the holster at her back, under her coat, and Eli's smaller handgun second. This she checks for a second, the flicks the safety on and sticks in the deep pocket of her winter coat.
Kora arrives and takes charge. Roman is left to do what he's doing, Janis is told to move the children, and Drew is pulled aside to explain what the witnesses saw. Her answer takes a moment to surmise, but it given after she licks dry lips that taste like splashed blood and brain matter.
"I don't know... not all of what they saw, not for sure. Their screaming and crying is what made me and Eli take notice and come looking in the first place. Heard a man pleading and a woman crying-- I haven't gotten to check for them yet. Safe to guess that they're dead, 'cause they sure didn't leave." She shivers a bit and presses on, gesturing to each dead body in turn.
"Saw this one take several shots to the head before it died trying to choke me out. Saw this one stab and lash at Eli and try to come after me before I put it down. This one--" to the gray thing sprawled out face down in a corner, "Came out of the back room, I expect it took the parents. Tried to grab up one of the kids and make a break for it, but I put it down before it could touch them again.
"They saw me and Eli bust in with guns, saw us kill some monsters, and saw Roman suck some poison out of Eli's stings...."
Another moment of quiet, and Drew's eyes drift after the kids. Her arms wrap tightly around her chest, clenching back the crushing sensation within it that tended to follow evenings such as this where loss came so close to home. "You guys... you have a way to fix their memories, yeah?"
[Roman Turner] He was checking Eli's breathing, coloring and responses with each warm thrust of his Gift in to the Kin. "Ya with me still? I can't work on another hicky, ya can tell all the fellas some kinky story on how ya got them."
[Eli Booker] Kora's face is as grave as the situation had been.She ushers Drew to the side and instructs Janis to move the children away. They had seen their mother and father drained dry. Should Kora look in the room just behind them, she'd see the mother splayed on the floor next to her long dead husband. There blood is drained, though the floor isn't coated in it.
While Roman works, Eli's breathing becomes less haggard - less forced. His heart races in his chest with the force of both adrenaline and fear. A finger twitches, then a foot. Eventually, Eli is able to move his extremities, and lifts his eyes toward Roman.
"I...usually only go to first base...on a first date..." He says quietly with a voice full of gravel.
[Janis Ian] [persuasion gift?]
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 1, 1, 2, 7, 9 (Success x 1 at target 6) [WP]
[Roman Turner] "Son, for another nuzzle against your neck, I'd bring flowers and the ring."
His chestnut head lowered again and this time as he breathed across the wounds, he poured the last of what he had in to healing.
Dice Rolled:[ 3 d10 ] 1, 2, 2 (Failure at target 6) [WP]
[Roman Turner] "I'm afraid I'm drained. I owe ya a better date than this one."
[Janis Ian] The three children have seen horrors that they shouldn't ever be exposed to. Janis does what she can to keep their attentions, divert their focus to something else. She keeps talking, asking simple questions to the youngest, or watching the six-year-old with Roman's phone.
Her voice is as soft and pleasant as she can keep it, drawing on more persuasive gifts to aid. She takes them away into one of the apartments, out of sight and out of mind, not once breathing a word about what just happened.
[Eli Booker] Roman's remark earns him a smile that doesn't quite work itself into a full fledged smart ass grin. Eli can move, his body aches in places still though. Dragging himself up, he leans against the wall and flexes his fingers, hands, into fists and then relaxes them.
"I owe you kid." He says to the Child of Gaia.
[Kora] There's a dark moment in the nascent seconds when Drew has finished her story where Kora is closed off from the pack. She cuts a glance back over her shoulder, out into the hallway in the Janis' wake, considering the whole of the story Drew has just offered. Something hard about her face in that moment, something steely in the depths of her dark eyes. Her left hand clenches into a fist, and her nostrils jaw sets firmly, grinding, as she considers What Is to Be Done.
Her first thought is death.
She is still with it, stark with it. Holds it inside her like she could swallow it herself, make it whole if she were to consume it somehow. Then, the moment passes, she breathes out all at once. It's not relief, but something else. Some easing that comes with decision.
"We'll look for them," says Kora, of the parents. Lifting her chin toward the place Drew indicated. "I need you to take the children out of here before there are cops anywhere close. I want you to take them to Hill House. Have Janis help you keep them in line of out of sight. Don't get pulled over, don't be seen, and don't get caught. Give them to Mary Alice and make sure she knows they are going to be cared for by kin and only kin; kept out of the public eye until whatever search the police make for them is over. And then sent away, someplace quiet and rural, adopted into the family.
"The only way to keep them from being a veil breach is to raise them as kin."
[Drew Roscoe] Drew doesn't question Kora's choice, doesn't protest the fact that her truck isn't outside-- it's only a short two blocks away, she was sure that she and Janis (a name to go with the face, there we are) could manage walking the three back to her house, find a way to pile them into the truck and get them to the Hill House like it was ordered. Sure, her truck only had the bench, but she was sure she could squeeze her own petite self and three smaller children in without any trouble. Two would just have to share a seatbelt, and Janis would either hang behind for clean-up or ride in the back of the truck, whichever.
Drew's attention is split, though, when Roman leans back and Eli's voice grinds to join the teen's in the air. Her posture straightens, back stiffens, and weight shifts forward some, indicating that she was about to move but stopped herself.
Instead, quickly, she glanced up to Kora and flicked her eyebrows up, like asking permission to deviate from the task set before her for a moment to see the Gaia-given recovery herself.
[Roman Turner] "You're not kidding ya owe me."
He helped Eli prop himself up against the edge of the sofa.
"I need ya for your painting skills. Besides, after sucking poison out of ya, I think we're engaged. So ya sit here and I'l find ya some juice, then we'll see if we can get ya out of here."
[Kora] Drew's raised eyebrows are met by another lift of the pregnant Garou's chin. It's like permission. Go on.
[Janis Ian] Roman's phone was retrieved from the six-year-old as Janis finds a trinket from her pocket to distract the child with. A brightly polished piece of brass shaped like a coin. The print minted on it long faded. She tells the child it's a good luck piece, lets him hold on to it and motions for them to stay there.
She reappears in the hallway, making her way towards the others as she caught a portion of what Kora says. Brown eyes quickly fall to Drew, her tongue slid inside her left cheek. "Roman, I 'ave yer phone." She says, offering it up to the Child of Gaia as she casts Eli a look.
[Roman Turner] "Thank ya kindly."
He held up his hand from where he had retaken his seat next to Eli on the floor. At that moment he'd been trying to encourage Eli to drink orange juice.
[Eli Booker] Eli doesn't quite laugh. Rather, he huffs out a breath of air that would of been a laugh if only he had more energy to behind it. Roman helps him and he is accepting of it.
"Those kids ok?" He asks, dark eyes shifting around the room. That's when his eyes light on Kora's face for a beat. Just a beat, because he can't make himself catch her eyes and hold them.
"You're alright in my book Roman...I'll paint the fuckin' city for you if you need it..." He groans and shifts, plants the sole of one heavy boot on the ground for leverage as if he's testing his legs to see if he can stand. Instead he just sips the orange juice and tries not to throw it up as his stomach churns.
[Drew Roscoe] The Kin doesn't rush over or fall so her knees crack the floor so she can drop down beside Booker once he's sitting up and talking, she isn't one for those kinds of dramatics. Instead she walks over, sneakers quiet save for the occawsional squelching noise when she steps in a bit of carnage, and remains standing while Roman helps Eli sit up and get propped so he can lean back against something sturdy. First the Kin's fingers push through Roman's hair, a quick and thoughtless gesture.
"Thanks, Roman. Two of our lives you've saved now. Can't thank you enough."
For Eli, she fishes his gun out of her pocket and leans down, tucking it into the vest pocket she knows he tends to keep it in. "Janis and I, we're gonna see those kids into the right hands. I guess you, Kora and Roman have clean-up duty." A bruise is already blossoming about her neck and throat, up close to her jaw as well. That she'd withstood the beast of a misshapen man trying to squeeze the life out of her so well was a testament to her ancestry, really, or just her stubborn determination to live. That didn't mean she'd escape without any marks, though. Frankly, she considered herself lucky that she could speak and it only hurt a little to breathe.
[Roman Turner] "We'll get ya home. Maybe I will call a cab this time. And get ya some rest, you'll do ok. But them youngins are gonna have a hard time and will have to be kept sheltered while working through this stuff.
[Roman Turner] 'Just doing what I was born to do Miss Drew. I had a little more in me I could tend to ya too, but gonna take a bit to recover."
[Eli Booker] "You ok?" It's spoken to Drew, quietly, as a heavy hand reaches out and touches her calf. She was bruised, she'd be sore, but she saved his life and Eli is more than aware of this. There's a familiarity to his touch with Drew, it lingers for longer than it should
Eli's face falls when Roman speaks. There are lines at his mouth, creasing his brow. It ages him considerably. He is worried after the trio of youngsters and it couldn't be more obvious on his expression.
"Thanks Roman..." He says again and uses his back against whatever he's against to try and leverage himself to standing.
[Janis Ian] Janis tilts her head in a nod to Roman, her hand falls back to her side, nearly disappearing under the cuff of the sleeve to her leather blazer. Her shoulders roll back once, straightening her frame as the Rotagar turns her head at the sound of her name coming from Drew. Her throat ripples, swallowing quietly - "Aye," is all she can say about the task to handle the children.
She shakes her head, casting her head down as a fall of red bangs shadows the expression of her eyes. She steps away to move back towards the apartment where the children were waiting - "Best get them out of 'ere while we can, Drew."
[Drew Roscoe] "Goddamn peachy," is her answer to Booker, accompanied by a grin that was as warm as ever, accented with a bit of wild that makes teeth look sharp and lips stretched a bit too far-- adrenaline was kicking in, and she was smothering the sort of hysteria that followed nearly dying, others nearly dying, and the rush of victory to boot. Booker puts his hand on her calf, she lays her hand on top of his, then moves it and tucks her other hand under his armpit to help him regain balance while he tries to stand. She can't lift him, no, she's not nearly so strong, but she can at least help with balance until he finds it on his own.
Once he does, she nods and lets him go with a squeeze of his hand, and flashes that grin to Roman in turn. "Nah, this is nothing, just a mugging story for work and extra foundation is all." She sounds like a battered wife-- Kin usually do when trying to explain battle wounds no matter where they came from.
From there, her attention is on Janis, and there's a solemn kind of nod before she moves to join the No Moon, to go with her wherever she'd taken the children.
"C'mon kiddo's, we're gonna get some hot chocolate and meet one of the nicest ladies on earth."
[Kora] Kora cuts a glance back over her shoulder as Janis comes back into the apartment. Steps back, turning to following the curl of gunsmoke through the half-finished rooms, considering the next room. Corpses - human or otherwise - laid out on the floor. She holds herself just apart here; that sense of inhumanity sharper in this moment than it ever is on an ordinary day. There's nothing close to a smile on her generous mouth, the sense of the animal is clear, alive underneath her skin, the monster in her - now - not just the wolf.
"She'll recover," Kora corrects Roman with a quiet sort of stillness, after a narrow, critical sweep of Drew's bruises; the way she moves. There's a question subsumed in the statement, which Drew is left to answer or not as she pleases.
"They'll live." The Skald tells Eli, taking a step back into the hall, watching the next room over as Janis returns. Her arms are crossed, beneath her breasts, over the swell of her stomach, underneath that is a feral tension imprinted on every muscles of her body.
"We're not calling a cab here, Roman." She contradicts her packmate, brief, quiet. "Don't want someone investigating this scene finding about a cab run. Call the Doc and Izzy. See if the Detective can run interference with whatever investigation comes next." She's still talking as Drew and Janis leave to round up the children, but she steps them both for a brief, quiet look. And a serious, direct, "Thank you." - before she lets them go.
[Roman Turner] He nodded, listening to his Alpha and makes the calls. First to Imogen, then to Izzy.
"This is Roman, we could use a ride and some help on clean up if ya could come."
[Eli Booker] The apartment is a 'shotgun' style unit. When you enter the door you're in the living room. Were you to turn to your left, you'd be faced with the dead and crumpled bodies of two middle age, middle class parents. They're dressed nicely - a wrong turn, bad directions on the GPS, probably brought them to this place. Most might say fate. Eli would just say their luck was just fucked today.
Turning to the left is a hallway. A bathroom is on the right. The kitchen is straight ahead. Kora and Roman and Janis can smell death. This place stunk of it. Nothing here, in this space, has died naturally. Not even the rats.
The strongest stench seems to roll from the bathroom...though neither Drew nor Eli had managed to venture that far into the unit.
Janis and Drew are taking the children to the nicest woman on earth. He watches the two Fenrir, then looks at the children before nodding to what Kora has said.
"I'll be fine." He says. And he would, because he had too.
[Roman Turner] If Eli wanted a ride with him, he'd beg it off Izzy or Imogen to get them back to the church. Either way, he would come back to help clean up. And they'd have to get hold of Linus for a cleansing.
[Janis Ian] The Rotagar can hear the rumble of noise in the back of her mind, the questions that want to know answers to what just happened, how Kora was going to handle the mess, the clean up, and then there are others when she peers back at the faces of the three children Drew and Janis must sneak three blocks to the kin's house to take them to Hill House.
A part of her is relieved that death does not have to come to such young faces - that she doesn't have to kill them.
She stops when Kora stops them with a brief quiet look. "Any time, rhya." She replies and leaves with Drew.
[missing some]
[Roman Turner] If Eli wanted a ride with him, he'd beg it off Izzy or Imogen to get them back to the church. Either way, he would come back to help clean up. And they'd have to get hold of Linus for a cleansing.
[Roman Turner] ((And I have over stayed my sleep time. Sorry so short, but appreciate the play. Thanks folks!))
[Eli Booker] Thanks Blu!
[Janis Ian] The Rotagar can hear the rumble of noise in the back of her mind, the questions that want to know answers to what just happened, how Kora was going to handle the mess, the clean up, and then there are others when she peers back at the faces of the three children Drew and Janis must sneak three blocks to the kin's house to take them to Hill House.
A part of her is relieved that death does not have to come to such young faces - that she doesn't have to kill them.
She stops when Kora stops them with a brief quiet look. "Any time, rhya." She replies and leaves with Drew.
[Detective Montoya] It's an odd thing, really. No one would guess that she would answer such a call, let alone make her way to come to their aid when it was asked. No one, of course, expects her to do anything but be trouble. Of course, she fosters such beliefs with her attitude, because it works for her. It keeps them at a distance. It makes it easier - for her.
She does, however, say three words into the phone. "On my way."
She's already in motion, getting the directions as she slips on her coat, long strides carrying her down the hall, out and too her car. By the time she's unlocked the door and settled inside, she's already flipped on the radio, to dispatch, to hear if she's going to have to do any interference before arriving, pulling out into traffic smoothly to head toward the apartment in question.
[Kora] "This place is deserted, yeah?" Kora asks Eli, dark eyes flickering ever so slightly up at Eli when he makes it to his feet. The height different between them is negligible, and she has a way of standing - a way of looking up - that makes her seem taller than she is.
Roman is dispatched downstairs with a moving though to await the arrival of reinforcements necessary for clean-up. She herself remains in the room, walking down the hallway toward the kitchen, feeling her gorge rise with the scent of death in the air. It's enough that she lifts a hand to her mouth, presses the back of her hand against her lips as she walks, puts her free hand on the door of the foul-smelling bathroom and listens as she holds herself away from the foul scent that comes from underneath the door.
"You and Drew heard something and came up?" A glance back down the hall at the kinswoman, dark eyes in a pale face, reflecting the ambient light spilling in through the windows. Head tipped then, meditatively considering whether the sirens she hears in the distance are coming here or just part of the urban landscape.
"I'm trying to figure out whether this is a rush job," that twist of her mouth, dry and distant. The clean up, she means. The inevitable grotesquerie of it. "Or if we have time to take our time."
[Eli Booker] This apartment building houses two units - one up and one down. It's empty and by the looks of it has been for some time. Every window is covered with plywood and the only light that bleeds in comes from cracks and gashes in the wood. She walks into the kitchen and there are dead rats, sucked dry of their blood and discarded like so much trash across the kitchen floor.
The bathroom, where Kora has to hold a hand to her mouth and nose to keep from taking in the reeking smell, is awful. There are two bodies in the bathtub - both pale with a lack of blood, their once dark brown skin faded, their mouths twisted into a grotesque grin. They are young men, dressed in common street attire and complete opposites from the family ambushed in front of the building.
Eli is standing, broad shoulders pressed to the wall bracing him up. His palms are rubbing his face as he listens to her walk ...bears her gaze on him and processes her words.
"Heard screams...then a car crash." Roman left him juice and Eli drinks it now finding his throat dry and sore. "We made it here but...we were too late for their parents I think..." Dark eyes cut toward where Kora should be, down the hall at his left.
"No one was here...this street was like a ghost town."
[Detective Montoya] There doesn't seem to be anything on dispatch - but that doesn't mean their won't be. She calls in and tells dispatch she's going to dinner, is thus off duty for a while, perhaps even the rest of the night. Then, she lights a cigarette, and takes a round about route toward the place in question. Just in case.
Soon enough, however, she arrives at the building in question, dark eyes sweeping the area as she parks the car. She pulls out a pair of gloves from the glove box - latex, blue [hands of blue, two by two] - and takes a final drag off her cigarette. She gets out, pausing to tuck the gloves into her pocket, before heading up the walk.
[Kora] Kora gives a dry husked laugh. There's no humor in it, nothing light. Just that grim certainty as she walks back down the hall, careful of the debris in the room now, alert but not rigid with it, as she steps over the debris, booted feet making a quiet, solid noise on the floor with each careful footfall.
She's back in the room now, at the end of the hallway, hands in the front pockets of her jeans, arms close to her body - mostly concealed by her dark gray hoodie. It's cold in here; the night coming in through the plywood boarding over the windows, cold enough that they can see their breath. Not cold enough to keep the dead from rotting, though. Sinking into themselves, deliquescing in the stark, cold air.
"Probably for the best," she says, of the parents. A winnowing sort of certainty there. "The parents would've been a problem, if they'd lived." Another flicker of her gaze - not precisely to his eyes, but over his face; the lines of care in it; or rather, the lines of care underneath the skin, evident only from this angle. From that expression.
"I'll have Izzy give you a ride back to the church, then. See if you can can get the parents' car out of here. Find someplace to dump it so this disappearance doesn't come back to this neighborhood, yeah?" A flickering look, up and sidelong, gaze shearing away toward a shuttered window. sO there aren't implications. So there's no investigation - not a close one, anyway.
"That tow truck of yours will come in handy." She pauses, quiet - that hint of a far away look - before she refocuses on the immediate. "You're alright, then?"
She pauses, waiting for the affirmative that is sure to follow. "Good, I'll have Linus check you out. We'll do a cleansing if necessay before the night's over. I'll want to hear the story too, you know."
A twist of her mouth, straightening her head as hidden communication writes itself across her face. "Izzy's here." Roman tipping her off.
[Kora] alright darlings, I need to sleeeeeeeeeeeeeep. :) but lo! there is a scene where izzy and eli can keep playing and/or hook up with drew/janis later. while kora roman and NPC imogen clean up.
to Detective Montoya, Eli Booker, Peek
[Eli Booker] Thanks Liz!
to Detective Montoya, Kora, Peek
[Detective Montoya] [Sleep well! :) ]
to Eli Booker, Kora
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