Assault and battery.

[Linus] (Temperament: Gnosis. diff. 6. WP)
Dice Rolled:[ 4 d10 ] 4, 5, 9, 9 (Success x 3 at target 6) [WP]

[Drew Roscoe] The Ragabash performs the human equivalent of a nuzzle. She was certain that if there was a wolf face there instead of a boy one he'd be licking her cheek and nudging his snout to her neck and chin. Instead his cheek, still soft with youth, scrubs lightly at the top of her head, back and forth, and his breath stirs the hair at her forehead and temple. The warmth returns, fuller now, proper, the whole cup of joe instead of the teasing sip. Her belly stitches itself up tighter this time, muscle weaving and nicked organs restoring themselves fully. She feels this under her hands, and it's surreal and a little scary all at once. Different from the gourd from so many months ago, closer and warmer.

The warmth fades away, the wound little more than a scratch now, angry red surrounding small breaks in the flesh. There's a moment left where Roman's arms stay about her, she's still curled into his lap, and words are starting to make sense again. Linus is yelling orders, insisting someone get her her shotgun (thank god for that, she felt awkward without her gun, the pistol was left in the truck as well), Eve is... somewhere, and a girl introducing herself as Rain is leaning forward and finding her eyes.

"I think...," she starts, unsure, and leans forward, moves her hands to look at the hints of flesh visible through a torn up jacket and shirt underneath. "...Think I'm okay." Her eyes, a brown to match the other Kin's, jump back to meet a face similar enough to suggest that they could be sisters, though their blood sung different tales. They hold for a second, and she's being pushed out of Roman's lap gently, but rather than leaving herself on the floor she stands up while he does. She watches him race toward the door, grab the shotgun from the truck, then come back after sniffing the air (and finding nothing out of the ordinary on it).

She's taking a deep breath and shrugging out of her jacket, tossing it onto a pew. The shirt underneath was a simple but nice green sweater, it was stained from the belly down, with four tears across the abdomen. War was gruesome, it was difficult to be reminded of how easily the Kin would lose their lives, how little they could do to defend themselves.

She looks to Eve, to Rain, then nods her head to the other bloodied woman. "Oughta see to her..."

[Eve] Something finally tells her that, even though she can't feel her insides, the likelihood that they are going to get in the way dawns on her. Roman slips off, and she spends time. Not a lot of time, though. Eve's worked through a system. She shifts, and it does take an effort, but eventually there isn't a blonde female standing there-

There's a wolf, instead. She's leaner than she needs to be, and the lack of fat and padding doesn't serve to make her look so much mangey as it does hungry. The wounds do nothing, save for making her appear more desperate. She's more reds than greys. She's blood splattered and vicious and the stuff of less-than-pleasant dreams.

She needed to be in a state that is more comfortable, and that she's more readily capable of being a protector.

Of course, she can see muscle tissue easier, here. She is more aware, and for Eve, that's a great asset.

[Rain] Drew says she's okay, and Rain holds that look a moment longer before letting something warmer break through. There's a smile there, now, where only gravid worry had hung before. It's a little daybreak through the clouds. Fleeting, but sunny enough. Hopefully.

"Alright, then. When it gets quiet, I got some clothes you can borrow," she offers, as she pushes herself up to standing and moves over toward Eve. Rain doesn't stop to think if this offer will sound odd to Drew, she hopes it's received well enough.

"Eve? You gonna let me--?" she calls to the Half Moon as she moves closer -- then the familiar homid woman is gone. "Oh... alright then."

Rain stops moving toward her, and instead stands still. Her hand goes behind her, so she can have her firearm ready if Roman comes back with a call of trouble. It's eerily quiet, just now; too quiet for Unicorn's kin. Who has nothing to do but wait, and be watchful.

[Roman Turner] When he rushed back through the doors, it was with weapons and a shirt stained in blood that wasn't his. He'd put his coat around Drew but he still wore the beanie cap Rain had given him for Christmas. He set the weapons down on one of the pews and skidded to a halt with the sight of Rain talking to a shifted Eve. Immediately he was taking stock of Eve's condition even as he moved to step between the pair with his palms displayed in a sign of being unarmed.

"Well now, let's just take a look here Miss Eve. I need to know just how bad off ya are. Can't have ya staining the floor up too much, it makes Kora cranky in her current state."

[Linus] The Godi slips into the Umbral domain, settling into place within the familiar confines of the Church's reflection, all stone gray walls and the eerie silence that comes with Earthen patience. The weeks had been diligently spent, pulling together comfortable alcoves and niches in which things could roost, from the small Sparrows that had roosted within their Home for a time to the Pigeons that made places like this a Nesting ground to the Ratlings that hid in basements, cracks and corners.

Deals had been minimal. None of them were Fenris' brood and he'd only been marginally comfortable seeking out their favour and help. Now, though, something needed to be done. Eve's wounds were too severe to allow her to fight and until Kora returned, it left them vulnerable to potential attack on the outskirts of the Turf.

So he did what he could. Two birds with one stone:

"Two of yours in our House tonight and the wyrm's crashing our Door. I need some help and I normally wouldn't ask but swift feet over power in this instance. I need you heal someone. I'll drop your price-" A grimace. He wasn't familiar with what Unicorn demanded often. "In exchange. Here in the Church, with us..."

A contract. A binding. With a Unicorn. This one would be hard to live down.

(Rite of Binding: Wits 4 (Negotiation) + rituals 2. Diff. 7 - 1 for spirit gnosis.)
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 3, 4, 8, 8, 8, 9 (Success x 4 at target 6)

[Eve] She takes a few steps forward, and she bridges the gap. It's slow, but intentional. She inhales, and takes in all of the smells of the church. She isn't looking at things, not primarily. Eve is listening. Eve is waiting for some indication that something might be coming.

What is clear, though, is that injured or not she doesn't want to leave Rain's side.

Roman gets her attention. She doesn't bare her teeth, but she doesn't seem too pleased with the idea of leaving Rain's side. She takes a few steps forward. Her ears are back, her tail is still, and so is the rest of her. He just needs to see. There's a low half-chuff, and something said with little more than the slightest twitch of her tail and minute vocalizations.

Don't waste the effort, I don't heal like you.

[Drew Roscoe] Drew's eyes cut to Roman when he returns through the church doors. She doesn't check behind him to make sure all's well before he comes in, she's sure his judgment does a fine job of that on its own. Rather, she watches him set the shotgun and pistol down on the bench, and almost immediately seizes the magnum from where it lies. She sits, breathes, ignores the squish at the heel of her boot and what it's coming from.

She's checking how many bullets she has left, counting and calculating. Closing the gun up and setting it down when she accepts that she has no ammo in her pockets and a box of shotgun shells in the glovebox of the truck, but not the kind of bullets that feed her handgun.

With a bit of a shiver she looks to Rain, to Roman stepping before her with his palms out to Eve, and then to the scratched up and bitten Wolf herself. Drew sniffs some, touches at her nose with the sleeve of her sweater to stop the running, then tugs a spare hairband off her wrist to pile her hair up at the back of her head and secure it. She smooths stray hairs back with her palms while addressing the young man that had stitched her back up with comforting words and the touch of a cheek.

"The other guy said not to." Her voice was more resolute, more stern than it probably ought to be when she's addressing a True Born. "He's right, you can't be burnt completely out." Her eyes hop to Eve next, and she's rubbing her hands together in an attempt to flake the blood off of them, then scrubbing them on the hips of her jeans next. "She's strong enough, saw her fight. The light didn't leave her eyes once. She'll be alright 'till He gets back with whatever he's getting."

[Roman Turner] "Neither do the Kinfolk."

It was very subtle but he knew a bit of the history between Rain and Eve. For a moment his attention went back to Drew as he spoke as calm as asking after what was for dessert.

"Where were ya when ya got jumped? How many were there? How many fell and how many remained standing? Can ya recall?"

[Rain] Rain's attention is for Eve just now. And partly for Roman. There's concern and familiarity to it; they are close, or were not so long ago. There's also an edge of wariness. Eve won't think it strange, because Rain has been wary of Trueborn for as long as the Philodox as known her. Any sort of comfortable ease she has around Roman -- and to some extent, with Linus, too -- is a new thing. That's the oddity here.

Roman steps between them, but neither Rain or Eve back away. It's a cozy little knot of Rage and people, then, for a few moments.

"Mr. Roman's good people, Eve. You can trust him," she says, talking through the Ragabash to the wolf beyond. "I'll take a look if you let me, and if it's alright with him. I can help, but not so much when you're like this, 'member?"

She doesn't understand what Eve said to Roman, or what prompted his reply, so Rain lets it slide by without realizing it might have been about her.

[Linus] ...The air begins to feel a touch heavier, imminent moment and sign that new volume is about to occupy previously untouched space.

Pop

And Linus is back within a few minutes of leaving, Spear clutched in one hand, scrubbing at his features with the other. He lifts his gaze toward the gathered. An eye at Drew, quick appraisal and a flash of a grin is cast at Roman- "Nice work" before he's glancing at Rain with a nod.

"Need you to pull what med supplies we have together and prep a...uhh..." He pauses, looking for the right word "...Sort of nursing...station...thingy, somewhere in the Church. A place we can put the injured to be looked at freely." He motions around the Church, more trusting Rain's experience to choose and set up (given she'd probably be one of the first to use such a thing).

"We're probably going to need it. After that, drag some garbage bags up and you and-" He snaps fingers, pointing at Drew "-The Hells your name...Go with Rain and try to keep things prepped. We're gonna need your Truck out of sight of the street. Put it in the back of the Church for the time being-..." A pause, almost as if the girl's former wounds (and decided loss of blood for that matter) had only just occurred to him.

"...And take it easy-" And finally around toward Roman "-Need to get her-" A nod at Eve "-on the Flip side. Your totem should be back from grabbing Kora soon. He'll heal Eve up and we can start looking for these Fuckers." The last word is said with something akin to vehemence. A rare allowance of actual Rage passing off the Godi's shoulder.

"Eve..." He looks down at the Bone Gnawer, brow furrowed slightly, lips pressed to a line.

"Gonna get you fixed up so we..." A pause. "...So we can go deal with the Ones that did this. Alright? Need you flipside-" He flicks his head toward one of the nearby mirrors on the wall.

[Drew Roscoe] Drew clears her throat some, but doesn't spit what's cleared to the side as others likely would. This was once a holy place, and that aside it was now home to the people that would have to be the closest to her heart now that the places for that had been cleared. She's glancing down at her stomach, flat with the athletic kind of muscle, suggesting that what ever her career or hobbies were they had to be physically active. She plucks at the tears in her sweater, pulls it out enough so she can see what's left of the wounds. They looked a lot better than what they'd felt like before. This she would barely even need to bandage.

"About a dozen blocks to the southwest, give or take. I know the address, could take you back if you wanted. I was viewing the place, thinking about renting it--"

and Linus popped back into the room with a sound like a cork being pulled out of a bottle. He's giving orders as soon as he's oriented from the switch between Realms (which was in no time flat, truth be told), and Drew's looking at him evenly. She's healed up, the blood's not seeping anymore but the stains are still there. She's still pale, but at least she's alive. In any pause he gives, she gives a name to replace 'Hell's your name' with.

"Drew."

And she snags the heavy revolver, tucks it into the holster that's visible at her back now that her winter jacket's off, and heads outside to move her truck. Apparently forgetting she was in the middle of the 'what went down' story.

[Roman Turner] He spared Linus a smile that he soon turned on Eve after listening to Linus.

"Ya heard him, let's take a little stroll. There's someone wants to meetcha."

It also meant the injured Wolf wouldn't be too close to the Kin and that suited him just fine. He waved towards the mirror, inviting Eve to go first.

[Linus] "...Wait." He wasn't thinking. Not fully. This sort of stuff was...New.

"Roman, maybe you should stay here with the Kin. I can take Eve..." He looks after Drew heading for the doorway, a frown on his face. So many decisions...What the Fuck was Kora on, doing this all the time?

[Eve] [ladidah]
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 1, 2, 3, 5, 6, 6, 9 (Success x 2 at target 6)

[Eve] [No, seriously, get there]
Dice Rolled:[ 9 d10 ] 3, 4, 4, 6, 7, 8, 8, 10, 10 (Success x 6 at target 6)

[Rain] Her ears cracked every time the Godi slipped through the space between worlds. It was uncomfortable, but very familiar. Rain yawns against that cork-popping sound and then her expression hardens a bit as she's given direct orders and a task.

"On it," she tells him, as succinctly as possible, but she waited for Roman and Eve to step away before she went back to moving quickly again. Sudden movement around an injured Eve -- not the wisest course of action. Once again, Rain's firearm is tucked into the waist band of her jeans, at the hollow of her back. It was uncomfortable and hard, but she knew where it was.

"Don't lift anything heavy," she tells Drew. "Uses the muscles here," one hand swipes across her own stomach. "And I'll get you some juice or somethin' once we've finished this. Helps with the shakes." With shock, she means.

Rain starts to gather up the med supplies again.

"I'm usin the dinner table for this," she calls to Linus. It's the only sturdy table height thing she knows of in the entire packhouse.

[Eve] Her head cocks to the side, and her fur bristles for the time being. Once that feeling subsides, all that is left is a whine- high to low. Her tail swishes back and forth. there's sensory input. There's Rain telling her that she needs to not be on four legs for this and whatever comfort was born of being on four legs was to be shucked away.

She takes a few steps away.

There's tension, though. Obvious, intense discomfort. She walks away, and takes as much time as necessary to stand in homid. She is no less tense, no less inhuman.... She lingers in Crinos a little longer than one would think should be comfortable- she seems most at ease there. Reluctance to shift down before, finally, she's left in homid.

She looks at the mirror, and just takes a few steps towards the mirror. When she looks at Roman, her attention is too pointed, "you take care of her."

Eve cocks her head to the side to Rain.

She heads to the mirror to cross over.

[Linus] ...And Linus takes a glance at the collective, a brief bout of uncertainty washed away with Eve's sudden acquiescence. He steps into place not far from the Bone Gnawer and makes the trip over with her into the Umbral domain to await the Arrival of Unicorn and the Skald he was sent to retrieve.

[Roman Turner] He didn't bristle easily and he tried to keep in mind that Eve had looked over Rain for a long time. Problem was, Eve was giving him orders to watch out for his own Tribe's Kin. For a brief moment the tiny flame if his rage surged up like a flower bud in fast motion in one of those films on how flowers bloomed. It was shoved down as soon as Eve vanished, but the stewing look in his eyes remained till he forced himself to blink.

"You lovely ladies stay in here. I will move the truck around back. Ya need anything else out of it Miss Drew?"

Fresh cold air would clear the flash of rage from his mind he hoped.

[Kora] There's that - suggestion of soaring heights in the umbra, this strained memory of the lofty aspirations of whoever built the church still imprinted on its solid umbral shadow. The walls are high. The ceiling whole. The stained glass windows are intact here, all of them, and sometimes there even shine with faint light, dappling the interior in manycolored shadows.

Eve and Linus slip back through the gauntlet, and Linus finds that the unicorn spirit with whom he negotiated has returned. It has slender legs, an irridescent mane, a mother of pearl horn, and soft gray-black markings around its fetlocks. Beneath the white coat, the suggestion of dapples, the barely suggestion, as if only a good, solid brushing could bring bring them light.

The spirit is not breathless, but the gray wolf who streaks into the sanctuary in its wake is panting from the effort of an flat-out run through the hard, gray lands of the pack's territory. Her feral form seems - younger than her human form, slender and light-footed enough to be no more than an adolescent, except for the thickening at her flanks.

Inside the church, her pace slows; when Linus appears in the umbra, she circles him once, weaving around his legs, this physical greeting, entirely animal, her human mind wrapped up in the immediacy of instinct, lips peeling back from her teeth a moment later, at the scent of blood and gunpowder they bring with them. She shifts then, Sorrow. Frowns at Eve, and looks back to Linus. "What happened?"

[Linus] Linus flicks a glance up toward the brilliant spirit, nodding briefly and offering a Spirited appreciation that is both succinct and passing. He glances at Kora, even as he makes ushering motions at Eve to approach the Unicorn who's hooves clop the stone with thrumming echoes. Linus attention remains on the Philodox and the Unicorn, a brief mention-

"-This one" at the Totem Spirit, before he begins to divulge for Kora's sake.

"Spirals on the outskirts of the Turf. Ambushed Drew, one of ours" A brief question perk of the brow, as if to ask if Kora is familiar or not, because Linus obviously wasn't. "Eve waded in. Both came here in Drew's truck pretty banged up. I'm getting Eve healed up as best we can, but no sign of the Spirals yet and we're blind. Roman's on the flip, taking care of the two Kin and making sure things are comfortable but we're still in the dark on the Spirals and their current whereabouts..."

There was a certain amount of relief under Linus' tone. Glad for the solid presence of Kora, Jarl and Alpha. Her bag, now. He made motions for Eve to settle to the ground and allow Unicorn to attend her wounds...

[Drew Roscoe] Roman catches her at the door after a flicker-flash of Rage warms the back of her neck briefly (but not enough to draw her attention too sharply, it was muted and the sounds of violence hadn't followed), and Drew looks back at him. She seems to think on what he says for a second, like she's considering telling him no, that he's done enough and she should at least take some semblance of responsibility. But she feels like her head is too big and too light, and sitting down before a space heater didn't sound like a bad idea at all.

So she steps back from the door, drags it open to hold it for him. "There's some shotgun shells in the glove box and my wallet's in there too. If you could bring those and the keys...."

And once he's out the door, she looks back to the only person left in the Physical church with her. Her pants are sticking to her thighs and seat, and her sweater's a ragged mess as well. She doesn't seem to pay a whole hell of a lot of mind to this just yet, though. She may look at the clothes tomorrow and have a five-minute meltdown of precisely how close she'd come to dying, how she would surely be gone if Eve hadn't hockey-checked that Spiral into her truck and drawn her attention.

"Kitchen's still where it used to be, I'm guessing?" Her smile is weak, but genuine. She's pointing to where the kitchen used to be before walking back toward it. That juice, or any other sort of glucose to get her head right and help with the blood loss made a whole lot of sense.

[Eve] "Pack of four," she says, "there's a dead one in the bed of the pickup. They took residence in a rent house a few blocks over."

Business. Facts. Straight and to the point.

She pays attention to Unicorm. She turns, she sighs, and she settles. There's a sort of disease with the whole of it. Eyes on the horned horse, as though she can't be entirely certain what to do with this spirit. Eve relays what information she has.

"I don't know if they are planning something or regrouping."

[Roman Turner] He was out the door sniffing around in the next moment. The doors of the church closed behind him. If nothing jumped him, he'd get the old truck moving and stashed behind the Church. He'd retrieve the wallet and ammo along with the keys. He'd use bags of trash, old broken bits of wood and anything else he could find to cover the remains in the bed of the truck. And before he came in he'd patrol the outside of the Church for signs of others coming to find that body, despite the frigid cold and loss of coat.

[Rain] Linus and Eve disappear across the divide again. Rain's ears crack once, twice. She yawns against it again. Frowns a bit.

"It's about where you'd expect it," she tells Drew. "I put water on to boil. There's cups to the right of the ... stove thingy. Some packets of apple cider and hot cocoa in the same. I've got some juice in the cooler -- I'm not sick, so just go ahead and have the rest of it."

Rain's able to give clear directions on where to find things in their kitchen, despite the hectic to and fro of the last ten minutes. She's also headed in the same direction, so she can help if Drew gets stuck for anything.

In a few minutes she'll have the long table pulled to one side, and the sheet draped over it. The towels folded on one end. Once Drew's set with something to drink, Rain'll go out to the section of the church that Roman's remodeling and get one of the shop lights -- better light always helps. She'll set up that first aid area, just like Linus asked.

Drew's bloody clothes won't make it until tomorrow. Rain'll find a way to get them packed up and elsewhere. She'll replace them with some of her own until Drew can get better for herself. She knows far too well that horror of waking up to see what had happened, echoed in the rends and bloodstains. There's no reason to put someone through that, no matter how much they'd paid for their pants.

[Linus] (Unicorn charm: Healing. 1 Essence. Diff of Eve's Rage.)
Dice Rolled:[ 8 d10 ] 1, 2, 3, 6, 6, 7, 8, 10 (Success x 6 at target 2)

[Drew Roscoe] There would certainly be a song of momentary horror to wake up with your own blood dried into your clothes and making them stiff like they'd been starched too severely, but this was something that Drew was growing calloused against. You wash so many bloodstains out of so many items of clothing, you have a couple of people heal up in your living room or bedroom, you pluck the gravel out of your own wounds and wash them with rubbing alcohol (never seems the brightest idea for the five minutes following, but is a good one in the end), and bloody clothes make less of an impact afterward.

Drew knew where the kitchen was, she remembered it from when she'd toured the place when it had been under the watch of a different Alpha and Jarl. It was arranged a bit differently, more complete and put together, but it was still the same.

The juice mentioned was fished out of the cooler, and Drew dragged a chair off to the side, out of Rain's way, and set it up close to the doorway into the cooking and eating room. She did as advised by a few voices tonight and took a load off, leaned back in her chair and sipped at her juice and let her head fall back against the wall. Her eyes closed, and she was still. Were it not for her picking that juice bottle up off the top of her thigh every couple dozen seconds or so to take a sip you'd think she'd passed out from all the 'excitement'.

[Eve] It heals. Realistically, it should heal nicely. It should knit all wounds and return her to a functioning, normal garou. This is Unicorn we are dealing with, here. Eve isn't phased by the grandeur. She isn't shaken, she isn't anything except... there. Wounds knit, her stomach closes, her shoulder doesn't look to be an awful mess but, at the end of it all, there is still damage. There is still some lingering clawmarks in her torso, the damage is still there.

Eve, for her part, regards the spirit and smiles. It's not natural for her- typically baring one's teeth is an aggressive gesture, but she seems to have gotten the hang of this whole smiling thing to show pleasure

"Thank you," she says. Like she had to say it at all. She doesn't seem to pay whatever lingering damage is left any mind. She regards the Fenrir, both of them, "I'm fine now. Thank you, Linus."

[Kora] "Drew's one of ours," Kora confirms, brief and quiet to Linus. "She was mated to my old Alpha. Not Truth-in-Frenzy-rhya. War-Handed." The creature goes silent, then, a crease appearing between her brows as Eve speaks up. "I'll need to know what they hit you with. How they attacked, but I'll want to hear it from you and Drew both.

"Li - " next, Kora's looking up, frowning at the lofted reaches of the church. " - we have a deal with the scab birds in the belltower. We keep the broken windows open so they can fly in, keep the bell clean, and keep them in seed. They're our eyes and ears. I want you to rouse them, and then them out on wing, yeah? If they need extra thistle or another damned bell - I'll get it for them. When you're done - both of you - meet me on the other side."

With that, Kora pushes her way back through the gauntlet. She's humanskinned when she steps into the nearly empty sanctuary, coatless, wearing just her dedicated things - new jeans, old boots, and an old t-shirt and thermal that stretch now, too-tight over her changing figure.

[Rain] (A quick summary round-up for you!)

In the Sanctuary, one of the pews is askew. Drew's jacket is in another. Rain's is on the floor somewhere between the kitchen and the sanctuary. Her gloves and scarf and hat are a blue-knit puddle not much further along the walk. Everything smells acutely of blood. The two kinswomen are in the kitchen area -- which Rain is hastily turning into a medical station at Linus's behest.
to Kora

[Kora] that is very helpful, thank you!
to Rain

[Linus] Linus gaze follows the healing pattern, narrowed against the brilliance of that Horn dipping down to touch almost tenderly against the flesh of Eve's wounds. It isn't until that glare has lifted, a soft hum in the air and Kora's orders ringing in his ears that Linus pays the remaining wounds a glance of what might be disbelief but is more than likely concern. His jaw clenches and he flicks a stare at Unicorn, who confirms the Metis' deformity with something akin to sorrow. How something so Equine could possibly look so pained, is a difficult thing to muster...

...But the totem of the Gaians does. Is. It shifts in place, something of the spirit passing between Linus and the Jaggling (negotiation) even as it clips and clops and moves about the Church's interior with graceful strides and infinite patience. He frowns darker now and turns to look at Eve, nodding after the space where Kora once was.

"Go back over and help out as best you can. We'll no doubt be on the hunt soon enough."

and he's pulling back to his feet, muttering under his breath, heading out in search of the Scab birds Kora mentioned. Recon and Report.

[Roman Turner] He paused in his patrolling outside, paused just long enough to call Imogen.

"We got trouble over here, but handling it. Still if ya feel like shooting something Miss Doctor Slaughter ma'am, we might be able ta give ya someone to shoot. Either way, it's always nice to have ya come a calling. I'll meetcha outside, if'n ya can come?"

[Rain] One of the kinswomen is bloody, her clothes rent; the other is clean, with her shirt sleeve pushed up and her hair bound back in a tight-yet-unruly spiral. One is sitting near where the table usually stands, drinking from a bottle of apple juice. The other is working at putting together a draped table, and a sense of organization and cleanliness, a bright space like the kitchen hasn't seen in quite some time.

If one catches sight of their faces in quick succession, or in the same moment, perhaps out of the corner of one's eye, they look close enough to call sisters. Drew's blood sings out to her Tribe. Rain's Family glyph is carved into the small gold heart that flashes at her neckline whenever it catches the light. These Tribes are not the same.

It's quiet here. A calm between waves of the storm, no doubt. Any calm they garnered did not last near long enough. Still there's a moment, when she stands, hands on her hips, studying the station and then letting that attention slip back to Drew. There's a small smile that fills that moment -- apologetic, and warmingly pleased that Drew seems to be doing better.

"Can I get y' anything else?" she offers. There's not as much immediacy to it, just now. There's not as much worry, so it's easier to hear the warmth in Rain's voice, the welcome. "While it's quiet, I mean? I'm serious about those clothes -- and if you want, I'll defend the shower for you, so you can clean up."

Gallow's humor, maybe, but if it makes the other girl smile a bit then Rain will be grateful for it.

[Eve] (okay, loves, I love you but I have to flee! I'm really sorry!)

[Drew Roscoe] Drew's eyes are still closed, her head's rested back against the wall, turned so her face tipped more to her left shoulder instead of straight forward, making room for the knot of hair looped through a ponytail holder at the back of her head, not at all unlike how Rain had hers pulled back. These were a pair of Kin that knew when it was time to hunker down and get into work mode-- hair and sleeves couldn't get in the way. But Drew was still chilled, feigning off the effects of losing half your blood on the seat of your truck. Her sleeves were still down.

Rain looks to her, offers her new clothes and a shower, and Drew's answering smile is faint, pushed to the surface by a low chuckle.

"No sense in that just yet if there's gonna be more blood tonight. Gotta wait 'till we've got the all clear, don't you think?" Her voice is low, like she's just a skip and a hop away from falling asleep (or passing out, depending on who you asked), and her eyes don't open. She takes another drink of juice and sets the bottle back on her thigh.

[Rain] "Hey, don't go sleepin' on me. Mr. Roman's good at what he does, but you're t' bedtime yet," Rain cajoles. She also crosses to the stove and pours some of that hot water into a mug, mixes in one of the cider packets, brings this all over to Drew.

"This'll help with the chills. It won't be so stupid-sweet after the juice, either. You want a sweater? Don't worry 'bout the blood. It's from good will. Coulda gotten it for a song if I wanted," She offers a broader grin, and it's likely that -- with Rain's voice -- she could have.

"This'll sound dumb. But it's nice to meet ya. Will be nice to meet you properly, and possibly share a meal, when this is all over. Yeah?"

[Drew Roscoe] Drew's answer to Rain is a deep breath, almost inconvenienced that she's going to be forced to keep awake. But the Kin understands, she'd be doing the same thing were she in the Child of Gaia Kin's shoes. So she moves her free hand to scrub at her face and massage her eyelids with forefinger and thumb, then opens her eyes and kills off the juice. The empty bottle's traded for the cider, and she holds the mug with both hands, breathing in the smell and the warmth of the beverage.

"Nah, this is fine. I'd probably be shaking a little no matter how many layers I put on. I'll be alright." There's a sip from the mug, and she looks up to Rain again. The smile she offers this time isn't quite so weak. It's got plenty more light behind it, not as strong as it would be were she at 100% but still notable. Probably about as warm as Rain's too. The pair were similar in an eerie number of ways. "Not dumb at all. Met most of my best friends in chaos like this."

[Kora] The sanctuary is silent, empty. There's a moment of stillness - the usual vaccuum pop. There are cobwebs on her eyes, in her hair, none of them real - and that brief sense of weightlessness before the world resolves, reasserts itself all around here. One of the old pews is askew, and the sharp scent of blood is in the air. Kora reaches for the bond she shares with Roman, but with just two their connection is now too weak for anything but this: she feels him, knows he is close, senses the immediacy of his presence outside the church.

--

That kitchen's a real kitchen, too. The cabinets and table are from the 1950s, and there's not enough electricity for the antique fridge to function, so they make due with coolers and hot plates, a single electric kettle and the like in the space where the church ladies once warmed up their casseroles for potluck suppers and prepared huge cauldrons of burnt coffee to serve with donuts in the chilly social hall after morning service, as the aging congregation dwindled to nothingness.

Kora doesn't bother to hide her footsteps down the long hall, the peeling linoleum in the social hall an ugly counterpoint to the soaring space of the sanctuary proper, with its granite and marble. She's more deliberate than normal, her footfalls louder so that the kinswomen will hear her; that they won't be startled when she follows them into the kitchen.


"Drew," it's a greeting and a question, both. In that first glance, the echo of their voices down the walls, she's has a certain - picture of the situation. "Rain," there's a warm not, there, something like gratitude. " - thank you." A brief glance toward Rain, a sort of inquiry to the medic - like some detective in a cop show checking with the ER doctor before questioning some victim, before she just plows onward.

" - Drew, listen. I need to know as much as you can tell me about the ones that attacked you. What I want you to think about for me is - what tricks they pulled. What you can remember of it. Can you give me that?"

[Linus] ...Linus and the Scab birds is a short story. A thing of quick anger and assurances (You're dealing with me now, not Sorrow. Yes I know it's different. No I'm not going to go get her to- Just do the Fucking job!) and he's coming down from the belfry with something akin to annoyance riding his skin and teeth. The umbral reflection is solid stone and strong (and also sticks out like a sore thumb to anyone traveling umbrally for that matter). Despite the amount of time that's passed, he doesn't hold out much hope of being overlooked.

The spear remains in hand and he descends toward the Church floor once more, already reaching for the Physical through the painful glare of some nearby reflective glass.

[Roman Turner] He came in through the back this time, following the sound of voices to the kitchen where he handed over wallet and ammo to Drew. He deliberately brushed against Kora to hand over the things to Drew. His face was flushed from the cold though he still wore that beanie cap.

[Drew Roscoe] Drew looks over to Kora when she enters the room, sips the cider and keeps the mug up close to her chest and her face. She stays leaned back in her chair, head rested against the wall when she's not taking a drink. Her stomach was sore as a son of a bitch, but it was a welcome relief from what it had been twenty-or-so minutes ago.

The front of her green sweater is shredded, claw marks gouging out the fabric and making tears in it. It's plastered to her body with blood, thick and sticky but not completely dry yet. The front of her pants down the insides of her thighs and legs is stained and soaked with the stuff as well. She'd bled out a considerable amount, there's a reason she's not up and about-- Kora has a pretty good notion of the fact that she would be were recovery not a factor, getting a rest not relevant.

Questions are launched spitfire fast, one after the other, and Drew's shaking her head at Kora, lifting a hand to stop the questions.

"Not really, no. See, I was viewing this house to rent, and a woman strolls up, the realtor. She and I go into the house to check it out, but... nothing felt right. It was all off, all wrong you know? I'm about to leave, but I hear fighting up the hall. Eve was back there with however-many others there were, I don't know how many... The woman I was with goes to that Half-Man form and I go for my gun. Get one or two decent shots off before I make a break for the truck-- shotgun'd do a better job. I could go get help. But she's faster than me, she gets me turned around and pulls my guts out.

"Probably I'd be dead if Eve didn't show up. She comes running outta nowhere and hockey-checks the bitch into my truck, and they hit the ground. I get the shotgun, put a pair of shells into her, and Eve finishes the job. There were... two or three of them coming from behind the house. Eve tossed the body in my truck, got in the cab, and we came here."

She takes a deep breath, then nods to Roman as he hands over her truck keys (complete with a key ornament that says 'Long Shot' and has the Fenrir glyph carved into the opposite side), wallet, and a box of shotgun shells. She leaves the lot of them in her lap, and looks back to Kora. "I don't know if they followed. I don't know how many there were total or what kinda tactics they have. It was hard enough keeping awake to drive here."

[Rain] Kora's gaze flicks over to her and Rain stands a little straighter. This is not the same wariness she shows around Eve. If anything, it's closer to a galvanized pride. Something about she who offers sorrow made Rain want to be harder, stronger, more capable. She wanted Roman's alpha to be proud of the kin that cleaved to her pack, not view them as a struggle or an anchor-weight. That there was warmth there, for Rain, pleased the kinswoman.

At the end of Drew's report, she is sure to make a single clear appraisal: "Roman helped Miss Drew when they got here. Linus asked me to set this up," she gestures with a lift of her chin toward the medic area.

The credit was not Rain's to take, and she knew it.

[Imogen Slaughter] The old Volvo parks on the street and practically disappears into the background so well suited is it to its surroundings. The same cannot be said for the driver, the slight and attractive redhead who gets out of the car and walks around to the trunk to retrieve a heavy looking brief case.

She's dressed in jeans, a sweater beneath an open jacket, her red hair a flare even in the poor lighting of this Cabrini ghetto. The front door creaks as she pushes it open, but the kinwoman's steps are silent as she walks down the hall toward the kitchen. When she approaches the sounds of voices, she deliberately scuffs a foot along the linoleum; her arrival is not a surprise.

Her breeding is heavy, like spice. It weights the air around her.

[Simon Zahradnik] Simon was different lately, if anyone had been paying attention, he was far more focused and intense. Those eyes of his burned with the passion one might expect from a Full Moon. It was as if something inside him was pushing just a little harder and further than usual. He could feel the thrumming of his heart racing within his skull and his senses were on high alert. On any normal night Simon might have simply lost track of what he was up to... But some had seen him lately. Scouring the dark and filthy sectors of the city in search of them. Breaking whatever he had to break to get the information that he needed. Simon was at war and to him war was total, complete, and absolute.

It wasn't random chance that he just so happened to be trailing the Black Spiral dancers through another packs territory. In fact his investigations had uncovered a couple interesting leads, and he had spent the last several days aggressively pursuing those leads. That he happened to be pursuing one of those leads when he came upon the crash sight was a bit coincidental but it didn't take long before any concidence was brushed aside when he caught sight of the others searching... Scouring the area. A slight smile took shape on his lips and he decided to see where this would lead.

His eyes were alight with hatred, and the icy chill of the outdoors did absolutely nothing to calm the inferno that burned just behind those eyes. He wore a little smile under the bandanna that kept his nose and lips from the biting cold, and his attention shifted towards the hunt. This was another pack's territory but this was a war and in the end he would hope the other pack didn't mind.

[Linus] (Rolling this time due to imminent combative measure. Gauntlet Cross.)
Dice Rolled:[ 3 d10 ] 1, 6, 8 (Success x 1 at target 7) [WP]

[Kora] Kora has her hands in the front pockets of her jeans, now. There's something deceptively casual about the posture as she listens to Drew's account of her encounter with the Spiral pack, and Rain's addendum. Kora's mouth is still, serious, her dark eyes gleaming in the dull shadows of the kitchen. There's a flicker down at Drew's weaponry, wordless.

When Roman arrives she gives him a gentle sidebump with her hip in response. " - you didn't see anyone outside, did you? I want you watching the door, anyway. There's that crack in the window there, like an arrowslit. Be ready for anything."

Her attention narrows briefly, consideringly on Rain then. "Can you shoot?"

"Doc." Kora's voice is low, tight. There's blood everywhere. "Drew was attacked by cursed ones at a rental house about a mile from here. We've got a dead one in her truck hidden behind the church. I don't want to alarm any of you," a glance shared between Drew and Rain, even and steady. " - but if I were them, I'd hound my wounded prey to the ground. If you hear anything, feel anything, taste anything strange, I want to know."

[Kora] "Fuck, Johnny - I told you you ain't got a clue how to work that thang."

"I'm gettin' it Ed, I'm GETTING IT. LOOK." Two filthy boys on the sidewalk, one with blood on his mouth, trusting his menace to clear the way for him, hyped up, furious, still raw with the ripping loss of his packmate, with the seductive promise of that slip of a thing that escaped them, just -

He has a stick in hand; a filthy stick, carved with runes that seem to crawl when Simon watches them too long, that sometimes seem to smolder, to catch and glow and send that kid - he's fifteen years old, a bruiser of a kid, some hulking linebacker down to the sloping brow, nevermind his moon - when he holds it out just soon.

" - and by the fucking father, Johnny - " this is quieter, a line of snot accompanies it, a great big snort of strange sorrow. "I can still feel her, I swear. She's fucking close. We're gonna bring it down on them. I'm'a make them bitches pay."

"SHUT UP - " it's not Eddie that cuffs Johnny from behind, hard enough to make him see stars. It's Karla, hard-eyed, hard-mouthed, her jaw split grotesquely down the middle, blunt teeth going two directions. Only her eyes are pretty, this pale smoke-green color, like the depths of the fucking bogs that border their homeland. "Stop making a - " She's furious, she can feel the blood and rage in the back of her throat like green dragon's neverending fire.

Then Eddie's arms rise up of nearly their own accord and the old, cursed dousing rod seems to drip with venom. "I GOT IT." he says. "I GOT IT I - " his hands are smoking from it, but he doesn't let go. He just starts off in a stiff-armed, stumbling run toward down the narrow block. In the distance, he can see the gray squat of the church, another ruin like everything here, but not his sort of ruin.

There's an old black patched pick-up shadow the trio of kids, driven by a mushmouthed old man who spits out a stream of tobacco juice into the filthy snow in the gutters, unimpeded by teeth of any sort. With an sigh, he puts the truck into gear. "I knew that was a stupid fuckin' plan - " he says, quietly to someone in the shadow of the cab. "Fucking real estate. Damn shit gets us ever'y time."

[Drew Roscoe] Kora's asking if Rain can shoot, asking Roman if he saw anything, explaining to Imogen-- oh hey, it's Imogen. "Hey, Doc," Drew interjects with a lift of her cider mug in greeting. --Kora's explaining to Imogen what's happened, and to everyone as a whole to be ready because animals don't stop hunting wounded prey, they track them down to the ground.

Drew takes all of this, listens carefully enough, then rises to her feet with something of a sigh mixed with a grunt. Her hand flies, catches the corner of the counter and holds there while her balance slips sideways for a second before catching along with her hand. She was terrifically lightheaded standing up like that, the world caved in black, pinpointed in the center of her vision for a second, and cleared almost as fast. She shook her head, scrubbed her hand up the side of her face and back across her neck, then tucked the wallet into her back pocket, the keys into her front, and kept the shotgun shells in her hand as she ducked on out of the kitchen and back toward the room once dedicated to weekly sermons.

She excuses herself with a simple explanation of: "Gonna be ready."

[Roman Turner] "No Ma'am Miss Kora, weren't no sign of anyone out there yet, but I'll go watch the door just the same."

He responded to his Alpha, then greeted Imogen on the way by to go watch through the slit on the door.

"Hey Miss Doctor Slaughter, Ma'am. Miss Drew there ain't up to par yet."

He motioned towards Drew then headed towards the front doors of the Church. He didn't much like looking through the slit in the door because he was always sure it would be like the Three Stooges and someone would poke his eyes out one of these times.

[Imogen Slaughter] Perception+Alertness
Dice Rolled:[ 8 d10 ] 1, 2, 2, 2, 3, 3, 7, 7 (Success x 1 at target 6)

[Rain] [Perception + Alertness]
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 1, 4, 9, 9, 10 (Success x 2 at target 6)

[Roman Turner] Percept+alert
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 2, 3, 4, 6, 8, 9 (Success x 3 at target 6)

[Rain] Kora asks Rain if she can shoot. The kinswoman nods and reaches behind her to pull her firearm from its snug fit in the small of her back. She holds it comfortably, fluently even, with no fingers on the trigger just now and the safety still on. It's confirmation that not only can she shoot, she's also joined their Stone Soup family with every intent to defend herself -- and them -- if needs be.

She's not alarmed at the prospect of trouble, not with this many True and the sturdy walls of the Church between her and the out of doors. Perhaps that's hubris. Perhaps it's something a bit more like resignation.

"Where do you want me?" she asks Kora, straight and to the point. "I can shoot, but I can help patch folk up after also." This appraisal of her skillset is calm and without boast. Wherever the alpha tells her to go, Rain's headed that way next without hesitation.

[Drew Roscoe] [Perception + Alertness]
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 1, 5, 7, 8, 8, 9 (Success x 3 at target 6)

[Kora] Imogen can hear the echo of voices outside. She doesn't hear anything specific, but knows well enough that this is unusual. Humans - even loud-mouthed gang banging types - have avoided the area around the church since the pack moved in.
to Imogen Slaughter

[Kora] Kora: Per + Alertness!
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 1, 1, 5, 7, 7, 9, 10 (Success x 2 at target 6)

[Imogen Slaughter] Doc, Kora addresses Imogen as the redhead's dark eyes sweep over the bloodied kitchen, impassive, an eyebrow stirring.

Her attention returns to the Fenrir Jarl, her gaze steady, a tendon moving in her jaw as the other speaks.

"Brilliant," she says, flatly, stepping further into the room to set her brief case down out of the way, careless of the blood. The kinswoman, straightens, removing her jacket and dropping it on the brief case. Anyone behind her will see the two guns at the small of her back.

Drew is leaving and Roman directs the doctor's attention toward her. "Drew," she says, "If all this blood is yours try and find something sugary to drink. Yeh need to replace what you've lost."

She turns her head suddenly, tilting it as if it might help her hear better. "Listen."

[Kora] Kora and Rain both hear raised voice outside the church; there's a certain urgency to them, the familiar edge of anger, the heightened tension of rage. "I GOT IT. I GOT IT - " echoes in through the ruins of the rafters.
to Rain

[Simon Zahradnik] Nothing draws out the primal side of the garou more than the promise of blood, but Simon was not Fenrir he was a Shadow Lord and thus capable of acknowledging the fact that he was outnumbered... He looked from the boys to the truck and back again before catching notice of the Packhouse."Shit..."He says to himself.

Fortunately he was in constant communion with his totem, and in that Simon hoped they were around and understood spirits. Simon was polite enough in asking his Totem to march ahead and convey a message to the Pack that others were approaching their pack house. He found himself hopeful that the message would get there in a timely fashion while he, himself, continued to trail them keeping a cautious distance from the group.

[Kora] Roman and Drew hear the back and forth; identify at least two distinct voices - curse words. It sounds like the back and forth of gang members except gang members don't hang around here, not with Garou residing in the church. Focusing, they hear, "I GOT IT. I GOT IT. I'M GOING TO FUCKING - " and can tell that the group is coming closer.

Quickly.
to Drew Roscoe, Roman Turner

[Simon Zahradnik] [Don't get seen Simon! Trailing!]
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 2, 3, 4, 4, 4 (Success x 1 at target 6) [WP]

[Roman Turner] He sent the warning back through Drew, even if she heard what he did as he peeked out the slot in the door.

"Incoming, there's at least four of 'em, maybe more, can't tell but three on foot, at least one in a junk truck. I'm gonna go greet them, bar the door behind me."

With that he stepped out the door, closing it.

[Kora] "C'mon - " says Kora, with a sudden liminal tension in her frame. She does not like this. Does not want to leave the kin behind in the bowels of the social hall, amidst the old sunday school classrooms, the initiate's dormitory. Does not want them caught alone from behind and doesn't trust the echo of sounds. They're headed back to the massive space of the sanctuary. " - I think I'll have you two get up in the belltower," she maintains an urgent sort of calm, but when Imogen says Listen, Kora tips her head, frowning. "Well, we might not have time for that."

The frown tightens, a brief grimace over her brow. "I want you to stay back, get to the choir loft if you can. Don't shoot if you can't tell us apart unless you're in direct danger. But generally, we'll be the ones without weeping sores."

"I'm gonna go greet them - "

"No you're not, Ragabash." - Kora interjects immediately; as they emerge from the hallway into the vastness of the sanctuary. There's a flash of rage there, immediate and sharp.

[Drew Roscoe] Drew's out in the sanctuary along with Roman. He's at the door, peering through a crack in it, and Drew's got her shotgun kicked open and is reloading it. She's listening because it's quiet, Roman's not speaking, he's busy keeping a look out. She's not interrupting his concentration.

Silence between the both of them, they hear the same thing.

She looks to him, he sends her a warning and says he's going to go greet them, and she's closing her shotgun with a snap! and holding it against her side with one hand. Her eyes widen when he turns toward the door, a flash of 'Is he serious?' runs through her mind, and she damn near sprints the distance between them and jams her arm between his torso and the doors. She's smaller, lighter by roughly twenty pounds, and not True Born. But by god, the look on her face was the perfect blend of bewildered and 'don't you fucking dare' to instill a sense similar to Mom putting her foot down on whether you're going out partying tonight.

Her voice is hushed, it doesn't need to be loud for the impact of her words to meet his ears. "Are you fucking insane? Your pack is literally forty feet from you and you're going to charge three or four Spirals alone? Do you know how little time it takes to die in th--"

Kora's interjecting, cutting Drew off, and she's looking back to the Skald, then up to Roman's face again. Damn right he's not.

[Roman Turner] "Who's charging?"

For a brief moment confusion clouded his eyes, then Kora's command stiffened his spine and instead of going out the door, he braced his back against it.

"I don't want them in my home."

[Linus] The air balloons outward slowly, a building thing and quite suddenly the frigid clap of the Church's chill interior releases another form, pushing the pressure out of ear drums with Linus' arrival. The Godi steps across the aisle between the pews, eyes unfocused, a finger rising to wiggle inside his ear canal with a wince on his features.

"Scabs are out. Bring back...word...in..." He stares at the huddled mass of Rage and tension buddying up to the doorway, both Kin and Garou alike. A brow perks and he switches his attention from one to the other rather rapidly. The long shaft of the spear dangles absently at one side, a finger lifting on his free hand.

"Uhhh...What the Fuck people?"

[Imogen Slaughter] Roman speaks, Kora snaps back, and Imogen turns her attention to Rain. "Come on." She says, simply, tilting her head.

The kinswoman moves with purpose, heading from the kitchen toward the stairwell which leads toward the choir loft.

[Kora] This is all quick, nearly hissed. Kora's in motion, walking swiftly toward the door, speaking in a low, sharp whisper after her barked interjection that doesn't change as she moves, but carries nonetheless. "They don't know we're in here. They're expecting a badly wounded Garou and a kin who is bleeding to death. They're making no attempt to hide themselves. They're going to storm the doors, and we're going to flank them, take advantage of that surprise. You're going to use the shadows and jump down behind those fuckers if they storm in. Linus and I are flanking the doors and taking them down from the sides while the ladies with the guns open up from above. Got it - ?"

Linus stumbles in from the umbra, Kora gives him a gleaming-eyed, snapping look. "Incoming," she says, already moving again to flank the massive wooden doors. Hell, she's going to unbar them, so one tap sends them spilling open.

[Rain] There's some disagreement about who is, or is not, headed out to greet, or not greet, the incoming assault. Rain's eyes narrow slightly in disbelief, but she's not party to the particulars -- more precisely, she's been told where to go by Sorrow, and isn't going to linger around to get told twice.

Come on, says Imogen. Rain glances toward her, nods, and falls in behind the rowan haired Kinswoman. She is not as calm and purposeful as Imogen, but she comes in a reasonable second. Rain's jaw is tight, and her gait a little more carefully policed as they ascend to the choir loft and pick out their places.

"It's good to see you again," she says, managing a surprising amount of warmth for the situation. Then again, when you're kin to the Nation, this isn't all that unusual. Certainly no church tea and potluck dinner, but not a rare and surprising mishap either. She finds a place to wedge herself where she can see the door, and use the banister to help steady her aim, but will be as covered by the loft's railings as possible. Rain's no fool, and doesn't have any desire of battle scars or stories. It shows.

[Linus] ...Linus response is a quick blink and an almost exasperated hiss.

"For fuck's sake..."

[Drew Roscoe] There's the choir loft where the other Kin are going, but, well... Shotguns didn't have that great of a range on them. She doubted the effectiveness of her weapon from anywhere up above. Down on the ground 'in the shit' so to speak wasn't ideal either. She cleared her throat some, pulled her arm out from behind Roman, and wordlessly walked to find her own position and hold it.

A few rows of pews in, to make being reached a little more difficult and escape more of an option, far enough away that she wasn't likely to be caught in the crossfire but close enough that she trusted her weapon. Angled back so she was more in front of the door than to either side of it-- this way she didn't run the risk of hitting Kora or Linus right off the bat.

She put one knee on the pew, the other foot on the floor, leaned down (with a very faint hiss of discomfort from crunching up her abdominal muscles), and set herself up to aim.

[Roman Turner] "Yessum."

He was already shifting to Crinos to climb to an advantage point, using claws to aid his climbing. Though he wasn't so sure about the shadows. Sometimes the shadows liked him, other times they kicked his ass out.

Man+stealth diff 8
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 1, 2, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7 (Botch x 1 at target 8)

[Kora] " - shit." - says Kora below, not yet shifted. "I can see you seven ways from Sunday, Roman. You're - glowing. Just, uh. Drop on the first one's head, okay?"

[Kora] "I AM GOING TO KILL YOU BITCHES AND FUCK YOUR FUCKING - "

Eddie has a limited vocabulary in English, but a complete command of every foul, debauched, grotesque way to degrade a human corpse. These is what happens when you are born to darkness, not even human, all this wrongness twisted inside you, the hero born to the wyrm to kill the fucking world. He holds that dousing rod his mother's mother made with her own hands and blood from a dead night, that she witched into being and bound into darkness, that still has her blood drying on it - and he stumbles forward in his staggered run, crowing his goddamned victory, already tasting the blood and ash in his mouth, already savoring the many ways he has to make them feel the yawning hurt he has inside him right now.

The dowsing rod is still stiff in his arms, and he rumbles forward, his brother Johnny at his flank, Karl just behind them, fists in the pockets of her greasy trench coat, her head down, her mismatched boots heavy on the pavement.

The church is ahead, a ruin behind the old sagging chainlink fence, and she can feel her eagerness starting to overtake the rage, she's salivating at the prospect of a kill all her own she's going have flesh to pick from between her teeth tonight -

When the pack reaches the steps they are sharp with hunger and rage, already heady with the victory that is going to be theirs, and they open their human mouths bellowing like wolves baying at the moon, in that oddly in time, ever-dissonnant way of wolves, except their voices are just raw, cracking, Johnny's still sounds like a fucking 9 year old boy, cracking like a broken egg along the top notes - all to inspire terror in their prey, these raw idiotic - human - screams as they charge up the front steps of the church and

- on the street, Cletus swallows his plug of tobacco deliberately, mutters a "fuckin' kids - " to his compani, and puts the truck in gear, inching forward after them, eyeing those big wooden doors and wondering if he could drive the truck up the steps and in through them.

"Heh. That would make an entrance." Cletus tells his friend.

[Kora] (Inits!)

[Drew Roscoe] [+6]
Dice Rolled:[ 1 d10 ] 10

[Imogen Slaughter] The kinswoman exhales her breath sharply - it's impossible to tell if she is laughing or scoffing, it is so soundless. "Oh I'm sure," she answers Rain, sinking to a crouch at the front of the choir loft, levelling her gun at the door.

+9
Dice Rolled:[ 1 d10 ] 3

[Drew Roscoe] RAIN
[+5]
Dice Rolled:[ 1 d10 ] 7

[Roman Turner] Int +8
Dice Rolled:[ 1 d10 ] 9

[Kora] Eddie +6
Dice Rolled:[ 1 d10 ] 2

[Linus] (7 +...)
Dice Rolled:[ 1 d10 ] 5

[Kora] Johnny +5
Dice Rolled:[ 1 d10 ] 6

[Kora] Karla +71
Dice Rolled:[ 1 d10 ] 6

[Kora] (er, she is +7. hah.)

[Kora] Cletus. +4
Dice Rolled:[ 1 d10 ] 10

[Kora] Kora: in hispo! +9
Dice Rolled:[ 1 d10 ] 3

[Simon Zahradnik] [+8]
Dice Rolled:[ 1 d10 ] 3

[Kora] Cletus' passenger +8
Dice Rolled:[ 1 d10 ] 7

[Kora] Roman - 17
Passenger - 15
Drew - 16
Cletus - 14
Karla - 13
Imogen - 12
Kora - 12
Linus - 12
Rain - 12
Simon - 11
Johnny - 11
Eddie - 8

[Kora] Eddie: OH SHIT. NO ONE SAID THIS WOULD BE HARD. Rageshift to crinos.

1. Bodyslam Linus into the church.
Rage 1: CHOMP.

Johnny: Uh, ditto bro. WTF. Are you sure that's mom's dousing rod? Rageshift to crinos.

1. Bodyslam Kora into the church.
Rage 1: CLAW.
Rage 2: CHOMP.

[Rain] Declare: Shoot Johnny.

[Simon Zahradnik] [Approaching the truck from behind... Stealthily! Dex+Stealth! And 1 more WP to be on the safe side!]
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 1, 1, 3, 4, 4, 4, 5 (Failure at target 6) [WP]

[Simon Zahradnik] [*LOL*Oops!]

[Linus] '...My name is Inigo Montoya...'

Reflex: Resist Pain.
Initial Action: Pike jab at Eddie.
Rage 1: Same.

[Kora] Kora: reflexive - resist pain.

1a. BITE Eddie. 1b. BITE Eddie. Rage 1 and 2: uh, ditto!

[Imogen Slaughter] Split actions:
1. Three Round Burst
2. Fire.

[Imogen Slaughter] (at Johnny)

[Simon Zahradnik] [Still approaching the truck from behind!

-1 Rage Shift to Crinos

1a: Leap into the back of the truck
1b: Attempt to grab and toss the driver outta the truck
R1: Claw his ass
R2: Claw his ass again!]

[Kora] Karla: Rageshift to Crinos!

1. Falling touch Roman.
Rage 1: Claw Roman.
Rage 2: Bite Roman!

[Drew Roscoe] 1. Headshot Karla, spending WP

[Kora] Cletus: 1a. Drive truck up steps, shaking Simon off. 1b. Shoot Simon!

[Kora] Passenger: 1a. Get out of truck. [Rageshift to Crinos] 1b. Draw oogly sword. Rage 1: Slash at Simon. Rage 2: AGAIN.

[Roman Turner] Reflex Resist Pain
1.a Claw Karla
1b. Bite Karla
1r. Claw Karla

[Roman Turner] 1a Claw Karla
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 2, 2, 2, 4, 5, 7, 8 (Success x 2 at target 6)

[Roman Turner] Damn
Dice Rolled:[ 9 d10 ] 1, 1, 3, 5, 5, 6, 7, 8, 10 (Success x 2 at target 6)

[Roman Turner]
Dice Rolled:[ 2 d10 ] 7, 10 (Success x 2 at target 6)

[Kora] Karla: soak!
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 1, 5, 5, 9, 9, 10

[Kora] (she soaks 2!)

[Roman Turner] 1 b Bite Karla
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 3, 4, 6, 6, 7, 8, 10 (Success x 5 at target 5) Re-rolls: 1

[Roman Turner] Damn
Dice Rolled:[ 12 d10 ] 1, 1, 5, 5, 7, 7, 7, 8, 8, 10, 10, 10 (Success x 6 at target 6)

[Kora] Soak!
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 1, 6, 6, 8, 8, 9 (Success x 4 at target 6)

[Kora] Passenger: 1a. Gets out successfully! Rageshift and draws sword to face Simon successfully!

[Drew Roscoe] [Headshot: Dex + Firearms, +2 diff for called shot]
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 4, 5, 6, 6, 9, 10 (Success x 3 at target 8) [WP]

[Drew Roscoe] [Damage: Base 8 + 2 suxx (L)]
Dice Rolled:[ 10 d10 ] 1, 3, 5, 9, 9, 10, 10, 10, 10, 10 (Success x 6 at target 6)

[Kora] Karla: soak!
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 5, 6, 7, 7, 8, 10 (Success x 2 at target 8)

[Kora] Karla: rage back!
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 2, 5, 7, 7, 7 (Success x 1 at target 8) [WP]

[Kora] Karla: raged back, incapped.

[Kora] Cletus: dex + drive up steps, to stop before crashing into the wall!
Dice Rolled:[ 4 d10 ] 1, 2, 5, 8 (Failure at target 6)

[Kora] Cletus drives up the church steps, erratically and not especially quickly, and has a fender bender with the solid wall of the church, but fails to: 1. block the entrance/exit; 2. shake simon out of the truckbed.

[Kora] Karla: twitch. Incapped.

[Imogen Slaughter] Three round burst. HAIL KAHSEENO!
Dice Rolled:[ 10 d10 ] 1, 3, 4, 4, 4, 6, 6, 8, 8, 9 (Success x 4 at target 6)

[Imogen Slaughter] Damage
HAIL KAHSEENO!
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 2, 3, 3, 3, 6, 7, 7 (Success x 3 at target 6)

[Kora] Johnny! Why is that mean lady shooting you!
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 1, 3, 5, 6, 8 (Success x 1 at target 6)

[Imogen Slaughter] One last tap.
HAIL KAHSEENO!
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 2, 4, 8, 9, 9, 9 (Success x 4 at target 6)

[Imogen Slaughter] Damage.
HAIL KAHSEENO!
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 2, 4, 5, 7, 7, 7, 8 (Success x 4 at target 6)

[Kora] Meanie. :(
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 1, 2, 3, 4, 7 (Failure at target 6)

[Kora] Kora: 1a. CHOMP Eddie.
Dice Rolled:[ 8 d10 ] 1, 2, 3, 5, 5, 5, 6, 8, 10, 10, 10, 10 (Success x 8 at target 5) Re-rolls: 4

[Kora] Damage!
Dice Rolled:[ 15 d10 ] 1, 1, 2, 2, 2, 2, 4, 5, 5, 6, 6, 8, 9, 9, 9 (Success x 4 at target 6)

[Kora] Eddie: SOAK.
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 1, 4, 4, 6, 7, 8, 10 (Success x 3 at target 6)

[Kora] Kora: 1b. CHOMP.
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 5, 6, 6, 8, 9, 9, 10 (Success x 7 at target 5)

[Kora] Damage!
Dice Rolled:[ 14 d10 ] 2, 3, 4, 4, 5, 5, 6, 6, 6, 8, 9, 9, 10, 10 (Success x 8 at target 6)

[Kora] Eddie: SOAK
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 1, 5, 6, 7, 9, 10, 10 (Success x 4 at target 6)

[Linus] (Pike thrust: Dex 4 + Melee 2. Diff. 6)

[Linus]
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 1, 2, 4, 5, 7, 10 (Success x 1 at target 6)

[Linus] (Strength 6 + 1 Spear.)
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 3, 5, 6, 9, 9, 9, 10 (Success x 5 at target 6)

[Kora] Eddie: SOAK!
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 4, 4, 6, 6, 8, 9, 9 (Success x 5 at target 6)

[Rain] [Shoot Johnny. Dex + Firearms. For the love of Gaia, Rain, do not embarrass yourself in front of the Fenrir.]
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 2, 2, 2, 5, 8 (Success x 1 at target 6)

[Rain] [Damage: Base 4 + 0]
Dice Rolled:[ 4 d10 ] 2, 3, 3, 10 (Success x 1 at target 6)

[Rain] [Liz told me to!]
Dice Rolled:[ 1 d10 ] 1 (Botch x 1 at target 6)

[Kora] Johnny: I have never had a girlfriend. :(
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 2, 3, 6, 10, 10 (Success x 3 at target 6)

[Kora] Johnny: Bodyslam Kora. -5 dice for wounds.
Dice Rolled:[ 3 d10 ] 2, 6, 6 (Success x 1 at target 7) [WP]

[Kora] Kora: Dex + Ath to Remain standing
Dice Rolled:[ 8 d10 ] 1, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 9, 9 (Success x 3 at target 7)

[Kora] Johnny: Dex + Ath to remain standing -5 WOUNDS.
Dice Rolled:[ 3 d10 ] 3, 6, 7 (Success x 2 at target 6)

[Kora] Johnny: Damage
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 4, 4, 6, 7, 8, 8, 9 (Success x 5 at target 6)

[Kora] Kora: Soak!
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 1, 4, 5, 7, 8, 9, 10 (Success x 3 at target 6)

[Kora] Eddie: Bodyslam Linus! -2 dice for wounds!
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 1, 4, 8, 8, 9 (Success x 2 at target 6)

[Kora] Dex + Ath to remain standing -2 dice!
Dice Rolled:[ 4 d10 ] 1, 1, 6, 8 (Failure at target 6)

[Linus] (Dex 4 +Ath 1. stand up mofo!)
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 2, 3, 6, 6, 7 (Success x 1 at target 7)

[Kora] Eddie: damage!
Dice Rolled:[ 9 d10 ] 1, 2, 3, 7, 8, 8, 9, 10, 10 (Success x 5 at target 6)

[Linus] (Soak!)
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 1, 1, 5, 6, 7, 10 (Success x 1 at target 6)

[Simon Zahradnik] [1a: Graba Tireiron!... 1b: I'ma just kill you *Stab with Sharpend* Dex+Totem+Crinos+Melee = 10 -3 for second split Action... Imrpovized weapon spec!]
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 1, 3, 3, 4, 5, 7, 9 (Success x 1 at target 6)

[Simon Zahradnik] [Str+Totem+Crinos+1+2=11 Take that Cletus!]
Dice Rolled:[ 11 d10 ] 2, 3, 5, 5, 6, 6, 7, 9, 9, 9, 10 (Success x 7 at target 6)

[Kora] Cletus: soak!
Dice Rolled:[ 3 d10 ] 2, 3, 9 (Success x 1 at target 6)

[Kora] Cletus: is now also stunned.

[Roman Turner] He dove over the prone figure of Karla, heading for Linus.

[Kora] Passenger: Rage 1: stab!
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 2, 2, 2, 3, 3, 5, 7 (Success x 1 at target 7)

[Kora] Damage!
Dice Rolled:[ 8 d10 ] 1, 1, 2, 3, 3, 4, 6, 7 (Failure at target 6)

[Simon Zahradnik] [Soak!]
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 4, 5, 8, 8, 8, 8 (Success x 4 at target 6)

[Kora] Kora: Bite Eddie!
Dice Rolled:[ 10 d10 ] 1, 1, 1, 1, 2, 4, 5, 7, 7, 9, 10, 10, 10, 10 (Success x 4 at target 5) Re-rolls: 4

[Simon Zahradnik] [Per+Primal Urge]
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 8 (Success x 2 at target 8)

[Kora] Kora: Damage Eddie!
Dice Rolled:[ 11 d10 ] 1, 1, 1, 2, 4, 4, 5, 7, 8, 9, 10 (Success x 1 at target 6)

[Kora] Eddie: I SOAK.
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 4, 5, 6, 6, 7, 8, 10 (Success x 5 at target 6)

[Linus] (Dex 4 + Melee 2. Diff 6 - 2 for partial immobile.)
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 1, 6, 6, 8, 9, 10 (Success x 5 at target 4) [WP]

[Linus] (Strength 6 + 1 Spear + 4 Sux. Fuck you Kahseeno.)
Dice Rolled:[ 11 d10 ] 1, 4, 4, 6, 6, 6, 7, 8, 8, 9, 10 (Success x 7 at target 6)

[Kora] Eddie: soakie?
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 5, 5, 5, 7, 7, 7, 10 (Success x 4 at target 6)

[Kora] Rage back!
Dice Rolled:[ 3 d10 ] 4, 5, 8 (Success x 1 at target 8)

[Kora] Eddie: incap!

[Simon Zahradnik] "I'ma teach you bitches how to use a weapon..."Simon snarls as he rips the Tire Iron's sharpened end from Cletus, dripping in the man's blood as he turns with tire-iron in hand and brings all his strength to bare against the Sword wielding maniac attacking him.

[Dex+Totem+Crinos+Melee = 10 Dice!]
Dice Rolled:[ 10 d10 ] 1, 2, 2, 5, 7, 8, 8, 8, 9, 9 (Success x 5 at target 6)

[Simon Zahradnik] [Str+Totem+Crinos+1+4 = 13]
Dice Rolled:[ 13 d10 ] 1, 2, 2, 3, 4, 7, 7, 8, 9, 9, 10, 10, 10 (Success x 7 at target 6)

[Kora] Mr. Bad Dude SOAK
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 1, 2, 5, 7, 7, 9, 10 (Success x 3 at target 6)

[Kora] Johnny: Claw Kora! -5 dice
Dice Rolled:[ 3 d10 ] 5, 7, 9 (Success x 2 at target 6)

[Kora] Damage!
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 1, 3, 3, 3, 5, 7, 8 (Success x 1 at target 6)

[Kora] Kora: soak!
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 1, 1, 2, 2, 3, 5, 8 (Failure at target 6)

[Kora] Passenger: Rage 2: STABSTAB.
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 3, 5, 6, 6, 9, 10, 10 (Success x 3 at target 7)

[Kora] Damage!
Dice Rolled:[ 10 d10 ] 3, 4, 4, 6, 7, 7, 8, 8, 10, 10 (Success x 7 at target 6)

[Simon Zahradnik] [Soak!]
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 1, 1, 3, 4, 5, 10 (Failure at target 6)

[Kora] Kora: BITE Johnny!
Dice Rolled:[ 10 d10 ] 3, 3, 3, 5, 5, 7, 7, 8, 9, 10 (Success x 7 at target 5)

[Kora] Damage!
Dice Rolled:[ 14 d10 ] 2, 3, 4, 5, 5, 6, 6, 7, 7, 7, 7, 8, 8, 9 (Success x 9 at target 6)

[Kora] Johnny: soak! [I ded.]
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 3, 3, 6, 9, 10 (Success x 3 at target 6)

[Kora] Johnny Ra-aaaaaaaaaaaaaage?
Dice Rolled:[ 3 d10 ] 3, 9, 9 (Success x 2 at target 8)

[Kora] The fight – as always – is brief and bloody; in the space of three heartbeats – someone has slammed a truck into the side of the church, crumpling the front end. The building is solid enough that Imogen and Rain, up in the choir loft, do not even feel the impact. They do hear it, though – the crunch of metal outside, and the raw roar of pain, anger and triumph as the rather ordinary looking man who was Cletus’ passenger – balding just a bit, with a bad haircut and a checkered shirt, old jeans and worn cowboy boots, complete with spurs - climbs out of the passenger’s side of the truck and erupts into a massive monster. They have a glimpse of that fracas, perhaps, through the panes of glass broken out of the stained glass windows. A massive black-furred Crinos flattens the truck’s driver with a tireiron, than charges the other crinos – who is equally large, with a faint, green sheen to his mottled black fur – but wields a sword whose blade is covered with a slick of slime the color of antifreeze.

He puts takes a blow, then puts the tire-iron wielding Crinos down with one elegant swing of the sword.

The Shadow Lord crumbles at his feet, unconscious, and the Passenger’s maw peels back from his fangs as he turns to snarl a warning, rage and taunt and challenge combined – to the Garou in the church.

This one mine. Then you. Then you. Then you women. Then you boys. I eat you liver. I lick you spleen.

[Linus] (8 +...)
Dice Rolled:[ 1 d10 ] 3

[Imogen Slaughter] (+9)
HAIL KAHSEENO!
Dice Rolled:[ 1 d10 ] 1

[Roman Turner] Init +8
Dice Rolled:[ 1 d10 ] 5

[Rain] (+5)
Dice Rolled:[ 1 d10 ] 1

[Drew Roscoe] [+6]

[Imogen Slaughter] +9
SERIOUSLY STOP EMBARRASSING ME.
Dice Rolled:[ 1 d10 ] 6

[Linus] (Re-rolling apparrently...8+)
Dice Rolled:[ 1 d10 ] 8

[Drew Roscoe] [+6]
Dice Rolled:[ 1 d10 ] 5

[Simon Zahradnik] [Zzzzzzz]

[Kora] Passenger! +8
Dice Rolled:[ 1 d10 ] 10

[Kora] Kora: +9
Dice Rolled:[ 1 d10 ] 10

[Kora] Kora: 19
Passenger: 18
Linus: 16
Imogen: 15
Roman: 13
Drew: 11
Rain: 6

What happens is: this. Johnny dies and something snaps in the snarling, taunting Spiral. The swords seems nearly a foreign thing in his hands - turns, enraged, and charges toward the church, Bone Grinder forgotten, still unconscious on the street.

[Rain] [Declare: If it gets to me, we are seriously hosed, so Shoot Him + WP]

[Drew Roscoe] [Headshot on Last Man Standing]

[Roman Turner] Running out the door, right through taunting Spiral if need be to reach Simon.

[Imogen Slaughter] (three round burst + extra tap)

[Linus] (Spear toss at the flapping Goober)

[Kora] Passenger: 1. Charge the church! Rage 1: Slash Kora! Rage 2: Slash Linus!

[Kora] Kora: 1a. BITE BAD DUDE. 1b. BITE BAD DUDE. Rage 1: Dodge! I'm PREGNANT YOU BASTARD. Rage 2: BITE.

[Kora] Kora: 1a. BITE.
Dice Rolled:[ 8 d10 ] 3, 3, 3, 4, 4, 6, 7, 7 (Success x 3 at target 5)

[Kora] Damage!
Dice Rolled:[ 10 d10 ] 1, 1, 2, 2, 3, 5, 6, 6, 6, 8 (Success x 2 at target 6)

[Kora] Soak!
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 1, 2, 6, 6, 8, 8, 10 (Success x 4 at target 6)

[Kora] 1b. BITE!
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 2, 2, 5, 5, 6, 8, 8, 10 (Success x 6 at target 5) Re-rolls: 1

[Kora] Damage!
Dice Rolled:[ 13 d10 ] 1, 1, 1, 2, 3, 4, 4, 5, 6, 6, 6, 8, 10 (Success x 2 at target 6)

[Kora] Soak!
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 2, 3, 6, 6, 7, 7, 8 (Success x 5 at target 6)

[Kora] Dex + Ath (Run up steps?)
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 2, 2, 2, 5, 7, 10 (Success x 2 at target 6)

[Linus] (Dex 4 + Ath 1. Spear toss)
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 3, 4, 4, 7, 9 (Success x 3 at target 6) [WP]

[Linus] (Strength 6 + 1 Spear + 2 Sux. Fuck off Kahseeno)
Dice Rolled:[ 9 d10 ] 1, 2, 3, 5, 5, 6, 8, 9, 9 (Success x 3 at target 6)

[Kora] Soak!
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 1, 2, 5, 6, 6, 9, 10 (Success x 3 at target 6)

[Imogen Slaughter] Three round burst
HAIL KAHSEENO!
Dice Rolled:[ 10 d10 ] 1, 3, 3, 4, 4, 4, 5, 6, 7, 7, 10, 10 (Success x 4 at target 6) Re-rolls: 2

[Imogen Slaughter] Damage
HAIL KAHSEENO MOTHERFUCKER!
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 4, 4, 5, 8, 8, 9, 10 (Success x 4 at target 6)

[Kora] Soak!
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 1, 3, 3, 4, 4, 6, 7 (Success x 1 at target 6)

[Imogen Slaughter] Single tap
HAIL KAHSEENO!
Dice Rolled:[ 6 d10 ] 3, 4, 5, 5, 9, 9, 10, 10, 10 (Success x 5 at target 6) Re-rolls: 3

[Imogen Slaughter] Damage
HAIL KAHSEENO!
Dice Rolled:[ 8 d10 ] 1, 2, 3, 6, 8, 8, 9, 10 (Success x 4 at target 6)

[Kora] Soak!
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 3, 3, 3, 5, 8, 8, 10 (Success x 3 at target 6)

[Roman Turner] Bite
Dice Rolled:[ 9 d10 ] 1, 3, 4, 6, 6, 7, 8, 9, 9 (Success x 5 at target 5)

[Roman Turner] damn
Dice Rolled:[ 12 d10 ] 3, 4, 4, 4, 5, 5, 6, 8, 8, 9, 10, 10 (Success x 6 at target 6)

[Kora] SOAK
Dice Rolled:[ 7 d10 ] 1, 2, 4, 5, 9, 9, 10 (Success x 2 at target 6)

[Kora] Rage back!
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 1, 3, 3, 4, 7 (Botch x 1 at target 8)

[Kora] Roman can feel the spatter of acid from the blade against his fur as he charges into the remaining crinos - the largest of them, the oldest, and the only one who collapses into human skin when he falls dead, at last.

In the aftermath, there's this ringing sort of silence, interrupted only by the coughing of the pick-up truck's motor, by Bone-Grinder's labored breathing, by the call of birds across the sky.

[Roman Turner] He was shaking off the spatter of acid as he headed for Simon to use his mightly gift on the poor guy.

[Imogen Slaughter] Imogen is crouched at the front of the choir loft, her gun balanced on the lip of the opening, her ears ringing. She remains still, crouched, for several seconds, eyeing the carnage in front of them before she gets to her feet, clearing the chamber of her weapon with a single, deft movement.

"Come help clean up." There is something flat to the kinwoman's voice, her gaze on the blood below. She does not glance at the Gaian kin before she starts toward the stairwell once more.

Night's Reprieve

[Sorrow] Someone walked her to the Brotherhood, that cold dark morning. Oh, it crept above freezing the day before, enough to bring everyone in the city out of their warm nooks and crannies onto the streets, out to the lakeshore, into the parks made a morass of mud and ice by the constant trickle of snowmelt. Worm pale faces greeted a wan sky, the sun like a translucent slice of lemon floating in a bottle of distilled windex before night brought winter back to the streets, freezing and refreezing the filthy slush, the north wind bright and damp against her skin, the constant, insistent whistle of between the city's industrial corridors, its canyons of office buildings and condos, the one piece of the paved prairie they cannot kill.

The Brotherhood had closed for the night; was not yet open for the morning, but some of the kitchen staff were there, and the scent of baking bread comingles with the lemon-scented cleaner from the late-night scrubdown in the downstairs bar.

There's always coffee.
There's always food.

There's whiskey behind the bar if she needs it, and someone to serve it to her if she's too shy to let herself behind the bar, to grab the bottle, to pour. The word has already spread among the kin here. They're quiet with it, sober. They don't bother her for the details unless she looks like she needs to vent.

Someone pours whiskey, though. And not long after, someone brings her fresh bread, so hot from the oven steam curls visibly from the slices, with which to soak it up.

Roman precedes Kora by a good half-hour or more. Finds Quinn whereever she has chosen to sit - in the dark, warm wood of the downstairs bar, closed and quiet, the wood gleaming with polish, the brass burnished to a spit-shine - or upstairs, on the sectional in the common area. In her room, or his.

The Skald arrives later, when the first wan light of preday has grayed the seam of the horizon, the scent of the icy lake sharp on her skin. Her eyes are bright with the cold, her cheeks and the tip of her nose pink.

They are strangers, these two - but there is fundamentally no denying what Kora is when she comes in from the cold in search of the kinswoman and her own packmate. Tall and leggy - 5'10" or 5'11" - with long, lean limbs and a long, sure gait, hair the color of the winter sun and dark blue eyes set in pale northern features, sharp and regular in a way that would denote prettiness were it not for the wolf underneath, the way it animates in her - behind the eyes, in the twist of a generous mouth, in the animal directness of her level gaze.

[Roman Turner] He was close to 5 inches shorter than his Alpha, Kora. And he was almost a polar opposite when it came to open friendliness. He'd come back to the brotherhood to watch over the Kin and see to any wounds she bore. Mostly he came to be company and see that the girl was warm and as comforted as he could make her till Kora appeared.

[Quinn] She should have slept. It's been a long long night for Quinn, one that started out so fine. She worked the overnight, served the party-goers traveling from bar to bar in Cabrini. In the earlier hours, her patrons had been happier, more free, more buoyant. As the night wore on, those trickled out, and the regulars remained, just a few. The lost and lonely, those with no hope for what a new year would bring. The owner of The Winchester did what she could to lift their spirits, or at the very least keep them from bringing down her own and those of her staff. It was a battle of will, but not a tough one.

Not like the one that took place out on the sidewalk just after closing. That was a different kind of fight altogether. And then there was work to be done, blood to be scrubbed from the sidewalk, claw marks to be erased or covered or disguised in the concrete. A friend to be brought home. The kinswoman should have known the Godi was sin-born, all the signs were there. For a moment she'd had hope, seeing his Crinos-formed body collapsed and shredded outside her bar. He was alive but unconscious. He could be saved. But he couldn't, not by the time she got back to him, and what could a kinfolk have done to save him, anyway.

So the night has been long, and the day has been longer. The dark-haired Fiann is sitting at the bar, one of the tall stools, a bottle of whiskey at hand. Her pale face is almost grey with weariness, and her jeans still carry the blood of a fallen hero. She sits there with whomever, with Rueben for quiet company maybe, or Roman nearby. That's the beauty of The Brotherhood: there's no space for true solitude, and Quinn wouldn't want it, anyway.

There are dark smudges beneath her brilliant blue eyes, but no signs of tears. She turns her head when Kora enters, and knows her immediately for what she is. One doesn't live their entire life surrounded by Rage and not learn to recognize it in others, or to see the predatory grace, the powerful fluidity of motion. Quinn sits up as Kora nears, straightens her shoulders. Her muscle creak with the movement, vertebrae wishes to pop. she should have slept.

But she didn't. She knew someone would come. She knew someone would want more details, more information. Someone would want the story.

Lifting her head, she doesn't smile or offer warm greetings as she might have under better circumstances. Angling her body toward the wolf in woman's skin, Quinn says, "Hi." Then, as direct yet respectfully as she can muster given the circumstances and the number of hours since she woke yesterday, "What do you want to know?"

[Roman Turner] This was his business in only the fact that he was Kora's Pack Mate and one of the Nation. It wasn't his Tribe however and unlike Kora, he did not bear the weight of so much responsibility for so many. Still he murmured to Quinn.

"That's Kora and she won't eat ya, she's too busy bearing the weight of a Tribe on her shoulders."

[Sorrow] Kora is dressed for the weather - a down coat over a hoodie over a t-shirt over a thermal - and the warmth of the bar's interior mades a good three quarters of those layers unnecessary to someone born to the north wind, fostered on the spare, flat islands in the North Sea.

There's no legacy of that fosterage in her voice; when she speaks, her voice is low and rich, the accent rather blandly American, suburban, ordinary to most American ears.

"That you're well, first - " the Skald says, stripping off her coat as she walks from the front door to the bar, the nylon layers whistling against each other from the friction. She seems to mean it; there is a subtle shifting glance from the kinswoman to Roman before her attention returns to Quinn, and remains there - whole, intent as few people are. Not animal this, but something else - some cultivated watchfulness, some inborn attentiveness to both the surface of things and the shadows beneath.

Her dark eyes flicker over the kinswoman's posture, the gray undertone to her skin, the blood soaked into her jeans, the whiskey glass on the wooden bar, the marred reflection of her movement in the polished wooden bar.

The winter coat is left carelessly over a barstool a few feet away. Kora's wearing a worn hoodie, half unzipped, three letters of her PIXIES t-shirt underneath visible. When Roman introduces him the serious mask of her features is undercut by the brief twist of a half-smile. The expression - seems hollow, undercut by the sobriety evident in her posture, in the steadiness of her gaze, by the blood on her hands. Still, she lifts her chin toward the Gaian in subtle acknowledgment of the introduction as she pulls out the nearest barstool to Quinn and slides onto it.

"Quinn," her brows rise to frame the subtle question, " - right? As he said, I'm Kora, a Skald - Galliard - and Alpha of the Fenrir. I've heard the story secondhand, but I'd like to know what happened, beginning to end, in your own words."

[Quinn] Quinn looks at Roman, and she attempts her best tired smile. It's weary all around the edges, but she tries - for his sake, he seems so young, a boy with old eyes - makes the effort to put him at ease. The smile, the look of her eyes, they say what she can't quite form the words into: that she's weary, not wary. That she doesn't expect the Garou present to snap her head clear off her shoulders. "Thanks," is all she says, and if he's close enough she actually reaches out to him, rests a slender hand over his forearm or his hand, some part of his arm that she can reach. The touch is light and brief, and probably reassures the kinswoman more than the Ragabash.

Then her attention is on the newcomer. The alpha of her tribe in Chicago. Quinn angles her body more, turns in the stool so that she faces the talesinger. Her hands swipe along the thighs of her jeans, down to knees and back up again once. And she nods her head to her name, doesn't offer more to it than that yes, she is Quinn.

What she asks for is a difficult request, if only because now Quinn has to do what she doesn't like to do these days. Cast her memory back to things unpleasant, events that led to the loss of someone she cared about. The unsteadiness of her spirit is not nearly so terribly great as it was months ago, but it's there' all the same. She takes a breath to steady herself, to find the words.

And she tells the story of Night's Reprieve's death, or as much of it as she can tell.

"I own a bar in Cabrini. The Winchester. Been in the family ages. Reprieve stopped in sometimes after working around the Caern, I guess that's what he did last night. He stayed and helped me close up for the night, and when I was locking up, these three people came up to us. One of them, the guy," here her brow furrows, and she looks confused, "he did something to me. I've heard about Garou who can use their Rage to draw someone in, but I've never seen it before. He used it on me, but Reprieve tried to protect me. He tried to get me away from them, but the two girls attacked. Both shifted to Crinos in the middle of the sidewalk. One of them had a sword, both of them had black fur." She shakes her head and sighs, frustrated with herself. For having nearly given in to a strange and unnatural lust she ahd no control over. There's no point thinking about what might have been or what could have happened. What's done is done. "I don't know what happened to him after that, the grabbed me and tried to drag me into the alley. He's the one I brought back." She stops, looks down at the hands resting in her lap, and she sighs. "I tried to get away from the guy. When I came back around in my truck, the other two disappeared, and Night's Reprieve was dead."

Her voice catches on the name, her brow furrows, and her eyes glisten, but that's as far as Quinn comes to tears. Wiping at her eyes with the back of one hand, she says, her voice wavering oh so slightly yet noticeably, "After that I knew there wasn't much time before people would be out. I called in my staff and we cleaned up."

[Roman Turner] Under normal circumstances he would of lit up like a torch if I woman touched him. This wasn't one of those times. In fact when Quinn told her story he gently rubbed her back in an attempt to comfort her.

"He died doing what was right, he'd have it no other way. It was an honorable death."

[Roman Turner] He eventually slipped out to give the pair some privacy, though Kora could reach him with but a thought.

((Ok guys, I need sleep for work and to fight this cold. Thanks for the play. Sorry I must go.))

[Sorrow] Quinn has been awake for a night and day. Outside, the sun has finally broken through the clouds at the edge of the horizon, sending long fingers of light over the dark, reflective waters of Lake Michigan. Cold fog is beginning to rise, and the city's awakening. It is a new year by the reckoning of most humans, but Garou are so divorced from human rhythms that the holiday is nearly meaningless. They live by the moon and the sun, the turning of seasons, these half-remembered ancient poles around which the world turns.

Roman offers Quinn what comfort he can; that it was an honorable death; that he died as he should have; he offers her the simple grace of human touch. His packmate is a different creature. She sits upright on the bar stool, her hands in the front pockets of her hoodie, the hood still half-covering her pale hair. The bright points of color - the flush of capillaries beneath her pale skin - gradually fade as the warmth of the bar chases away the last of the chill.

One of the kin, kitchen staff, approach quietly, some lull in the story - and offers Kora something to drink, to eat. She asks, of all things, for a glass of milk.

They bring it, of course, and there it sits incongruous on the bartop, the opaque and white, its wavering reflection obvious in the dark surface of the wooden bar.

There's no give in Kora on a night like this; her attention has a certain pitilessness. She watches Quinn, the movement of her mouth, the subtle furrow of confusion, the gleam of moisture across the surface of her brilliant eyes. No tears, not yet. The way her voice burrs over the name.

Silence, after. Kora is quiet, shooting a brief glance at her packmate in consideration of something, her mouth twisting in thought. "Thank you, Quinn." Her voice moves over the name like the curvature of the earth; she pronounces it with precision - just so, a certain illiquid music embedded in the tone.

Another glance at Roman follows, this one moving, brighter, thoughtful. "We could go to Battleground - watch the fight. That could give us enough to track them, but I'm not sure - " that they could find the battle, a small one, in the vast fields of them. That it would be wise for her to travel there, just now.

Something sharpens, then - and she focuses on Quinn again, asking two quiet questions in succession, "Your staff are kin, I take it? And you - do you have a place to stay?"

[Quinn] There are some kinfolk who, when driven to the brink of exhaustion, become more wary of their shifting, monstrous cousins. They haven't he will to withstand their Rage, and they become fearful. Quinn doesn't have the look of a rabbit, she's made of stronger stuff than that. Roman rubs her back and it's comforting, or at least is a start. The road towards comfort will end later today, in the stiff, awkward embrace of an unbearably depressed Galliard of all people.

Kora doesn't offer the same, and Quinn doesn't expect her to. She hadn't expected the touch on her back, much as Roman hadn't expected the one on his arm. The kinswoman doesn't ask for much from Garou. That Night's Reprieve died trying to save her. Quinn is very much aware of that honor. She'll never know the reason for it beyond the assumption that they were friends, drinking buddies, comrades, nothing more and nothing less. Roman tells her the Godi died an honorable death, and Quinn just turns her head, offering a smile over her shoulder.

She's fine, of course, if tired and shaken and worn. The blood staining her clothes belongs to a Black Spiral Dancer, and to Night's Reprieve, her own flesh is as whole and healthy as it ever is. All she needs is a good sleep and she'll be right as rain.

Kora speaks to her packmate, and Quinn drops her gaze, lowers her chin, disappointed. She's offered all she can about the Spirals that killed Night's Reprieve, but she can't help but wish there was more she could give to help.

Your staff are kin, I take it?

Quinn's head snaps up, her eyes wide as she drawn out of a momentary reverie. "Yes, yeah. Fianna, all of them. And I live upstairs in four. Um." She swallows, lifts a hand to rub her knuckles over her lower lip, considering for the length of a breath. "I haven't been in Chicago long," she explains, and it may seem there's no point to the sharing of this information. "Night's Reprieve was the first real friend I made here. I know Kinfolk aren't allowed on the bawn," there's a note there, confusion or annoyance, surprise, maybe a mix of all three, "but, would it be possible for me to go to his Gathering?"

[Sorrow] Upstairs in four - Quinn says, and Kora glances up, at the ceiling, as if she had X-ray vision. The movement is small, but enough that the hood half-covering her pale hair falls back, catches on the tumble of it twisted at the nape of her neck. Kora is older than most Garou in Chicago - by every human measure - an adult before she ever change. In such moments, the memory of she-who-was touches her face, like a shadow against a screen - makes her seem ordinary, a face in a half-remembered photograph, tacked on a stranger's wall.

"Good," she tells Quinn, dark gaze dropping back to the kinswoman. This space then, where she's deciding again if she agrees with the conventional wisdom, and at last surrenders to it. "You should be safe enough here. Your bar, though - "

Now the lingering, neutral curve of her mobile mouth flattens, and she shakes her pale head briefly, wordlessly. "These cursed Garou attacked you just outside it. They know where you work; they may have identified you and tracked you before. Had Night's Reprieve not been present to defend you - "

She does not speculate further; instead, she allows the possibility to hang in the air - the worst sort of unfinished sentence. "If any of your staff are pure blooded, give them an indefinite leave of absence. Whoever remains should conceal any trace of their tribal affiliation. No glyphs on necklaces, cover any runed tattoos with clothing or make-up.

"I'll want the address, too. If we can't track the survivors, we may be able to ambush them if they return to the scene.

Quinn's last request brings the full weight of the Skald's attention back to her features. Kora regards her quietly for a moment, the background noises of bread baking a distant counterpoint to the tick-tick-tick of the heaters running in the background.

There's a quiet moment when the Fenrir turns over the thought like a stone against her tongue, until at last she gives a definitive sort of nod, her pale hair gleaming in the soft light of the closed bar. It's like a lock, tumbling home. "I would not bar you from the ceremony, but you should have permission from your tribe, first. If your warder or elder - Rory? - allows it, I will speak to the Grand Elder. The final decision will be his." Another pause. " - and if your tribe will not allow it, I will find you before the gathering if you wish to contribute something to the grave goods we will burn with his body."

[Quinn] Quinn's brow furrows with concern. Cut the staff? Of course she understands the necessity of it, the need to protect her employees, her family. But she's worked so hard to try to resurrect the tavern from the ashes of its own gradual demise. It hasn't even begun to get back onto its feet again. It's taken every ounce of elbow grease from everyone in her employ -- and even a few who aren't -- to get The Winchester to where it is now. Cutting the purebred staff means the rest of them will have to work harder to take up the slack.

The look lasts only a moment, however. So they'll have to work harder, at least they'll still be alive, or relatively safe. It would hurt financially to watch her investment sink back into the mire, but it's not worth it if lives are at risk.

"I understand," she says. And she knows. If Night's Reprieve hadn't been there, Quinn would have been at the mercy of a trio of Dancers. They would have hurt her in ways unimaginable, or tried to at any rate. Probably would've succeeded, too, if Quinn couldn't get her gun to her temple in time.

She casts about for one of the kin staff. Someone finds her pen and paper on which to write the address of the old tavern, which she hands to the Skald.

"I'll talk to Howard or Patrick, then. They might know where to find her, I just...he's not my tribe, I didn't want to intrude." A nod to the rest. If she could get something to be carried off with him to the Homelands, that would be enough. "Thank you."

[Sorrow] "I think it would be honorable for you to attend, so that the spirits of the Caern may see whom he died defending," says the Skald, quietly. " - but I must know that your own tribe has no objections. My pack claims territory to the north, in Cabrini. The abandoned Cathedral a few blocks from the river is our packhouse. Your alpha can find me there or leave word at the Caern, but I'll come back to speak with you before the gathering."

Kora slides easily from her bar stool, her hands slipping from the pockets of her hoodie. It adds just enough bulk to her frame - or perhaps she wears it loosely enough - to conceal the curve of her pregnancy - at least around strangers, though not for much longer. "No, Quinn of Stag," says Sorrow then, quiet and formal, her booted feet soft on the worn wooden floorboards, her twisting as she reaches to pick up her winter coat, crumbling the shoulder in one capable hand without a sidelong glance, " - thank you, for bringing him back to us."

[Quinn] The weary smile returns, and it carries more than a little relief. There are so many more steps to this for Quinn than there were in Baltimore, but it will be good. Her thoughts are mostly on herself, on her need to say goodbye to a quiet steady presence in her life, but that her presence would be in some way honorable obviously pleases her. It lifts away some of the weariness not caused by sheer exhaustion.

Kora slides from her stool, and Quinn rises to her feet, as well. She's tall, as well, but more slender, her figure not as strong as that of the Fenrir. Her spine is straight, but her shoulders round.

"That's not far from The Winchester," she says. "If you ever need anything..." the offer is left hanging in the air, to be done with as the Jarl will. They're not tribe, Quinn is not under Kora's or Roman's protection, but she certainly isn't one to turn away anyone because they're not from her particular branch of the Family.

This is the part where they part ways. Quinn nods her farewell, her strength sapped and her body craving the blissful numbness of sleep. When the Garou has left, the Kinfolk looks at the whiskey bottle, barely touched by her own hands. Finding her wallet, she lays down a few bills, and she trudges up to her room. The first day of the new year is a long one, but the sun will set tonight.

Tomorrow it will rise again. The earth keeps turning. Life continues.
[Izzy Montoya] The message, when it was delivered via voice mail, was simple and to the point. "I have some info for you. Karls?"

If one thing could be said about Detective Izzy Montoya, it's that she does her job. She does it, and she does it well - both of them. Which is why she's here, at the smallish run of the mill sports bar called Karls, where most of the patrons are busy watching the night's game on the big screen, and Izzy can find a quiet table in the back.

When Kora arrives, she's already there. She's obviously just come from work, her jacket draped on the seat of the booth next to her, a file folder that she's working through taking up most of the area directly in front of her.

She looks as she always does - with one addition: the remains what must have been a spectacular black eye. There's a cut high on her right cheek well on the way to healing, and the bruising has faded from brilliant blacks blues and purples to a not near as pretty green and yellow.

Otherwise, she is just the same - from the casual business dress code, to the whiskey -neat - within easy reach. She hasn't ordered for Kora, as she's unsure what she'd drink now that she's pregnant, and Izzy is not one to make assumptions. Ever. Instead, there is a glass of water, with lemon, drops of condensation dripping down the side.

[Kora] Today was warmer enough - with slices of sun incised neatly through the canyons of the city's high-rise developments - that some of last month's - last year's - accumulation of snow has started to melt. The massive piles pushed up around berms, caged trees, streetslights are criss-crossed with slowly growing rivulets of meltwater that gleam pale gray against the darker grime of the filthy snow.

Still, when the sun sets - no later than 4:30, 4:45 - winter closes in again, and a cold, wet wind dances through the city. Kora enters Karl's with another gust of that cold wind at her back. The creature is dressed for winter - in layers - a dark wool coat, black or gray - over a hoodied defined by varying shades of horizontal stripes in tones of deep blue-green, the hood pulled up over her pale blonde hair, her hands kept snug and warm in the forward pockets of the coat.

Her black boots glisten with runoff, snowmelt; the multicolored laces are dark from the wet, and bedraggled where they wrap around her calves. The well-worn leather is stained from salt and cinders spread by the city and well-meaning shopkeepers to keep the streets and sidewalks free of ice, and her jeans are damp nearly to the knee, rising above the boots, from a long day out in the city.

They are opposite as night and day. One of Izzy's colleagues might assume that the pale-skinned blonde with the sharp, dark-eyed stare is an informant of some sort. Her skin is pink from the cold, in the cheeks, in the tip of her streaming nose - and her eyes shine with the pleasant shock of the heat blasting against her sinuses after the cold night outside - but there's nothing else innocent about her. The winter gear is enough to conceal her pregnancy, still, and the way she walks - thoughtless and sure - says animal all over.

"Detective," Kora greets her, stopping at the side of the table to unbutton the outer layer of her wool coat, sliding the buttons through the buttonholes one by one, before she tugs it off and slings it into her side of the booth. She half-unzips the hoodie, showing a dark t-shirt over an undershirt in a thermal waffle-weave, and folds herself into the seat with an ease her future self will envy in the months to come. "What's up?"

That question is quickly followed by - " - what the hell happened to you?" when Izzy looks up, revealing the old, sickly pattern of her healing shiner.

[Izzy Montoya] There's a moment, when Kora enters the room, where everything goes still. It doesn't last long, less than a second in truth, where the patrons inhale, and wait as she animal walks into their midst. If asked, they wouldn't actually remember the moment at all - it's that basic, it's that instinctive, it's that buried. It passes, the noise resumes it's level, and Izzy's 'informant' makes her way to the table.

Detective, Kora greets her. "Kora." Is the reply.

Then she asks the question of the hour, and Izzy actually chuckles, and lifts a shoulder into a shrug. "Zigged when I should have zagged during a questioning. It's nothing. You should see the other guy." Sometimes? There isn't a doubt at all that Izzy is Fenrir.

"As for what's up - heard anything about knockoff shoes and or makeup being sold on the streets?"

[Kora] Izzy brushes off the question - zigged when I should have zagged with a joke. There is a moment, nearly liminal, where Kora's attention sharpens like so: her eyes narrow and her mouth goes still, and that sense of attention, of watchfulness, of consideration shifts to something more full of intent. Stillness lingers in her mouth, and the kinswoman may have the strange impression of her reflection in the Garou's eyes, pale against the dark irises, the smear of lights from the bar, the back and forth on SportsCenter about the playoffs and bowl bids, discussion of the Bear's chances, and all the like a sort of illiquid background to their conversation, made staccato by the rhythm of the games being broadcast.

Then the moment passes. Pale lids cover dark eyes, the grace of her blond lashes across her still wind-lashed cheeks as Kora blinks looks up over Izzy's shoulder, then drops her gaze back to the Detective's face. Unflinching, right? Even, steady, and assured.

"No - " here the line of her mouth breaks, crests into a brief, wry smile. " - fashion isn't really my thing. Why?"

[Izzy Montoya] Kora's attention sharpens, her eyes narrowing and her body falling still, full of intent. She arches a brow, slightly, and quietly adds... "It's my job, Kora. He got scared, he swung, I didn't duck fast enough. It happens. It's nothing."

Nothing to do with the Nation, she means. Then, she moves on, and nods, a slight smirk curving her lips. "Mine either. Got a call on a dead hooker in an alley on the 26th. In the course of investigating, I discovered she was kin. I don't have a lot to go on, but enough to suggest you and yours might want to look into it. Here's what I have."

She sifts through the folder, and finds the paper she's looking for and slides it across the table. On it are typed notes that she recites from memory. "Her name was Claire Daniels - street name was Chloe. The security guard that waited for my arrival was Officer Wallach. He was her friend - in the way that cops can be with hookers without fucking them, anyway, but didn't know much about her. Said she wasn't from Lake View where we found her - worked the corner Southside by J and C liquor."

She pauses and takes a swallow of her whiskey, swallowing it with a grimace. "While I looked into it - heard some things." There's a pointed look, so that Kora knows exactly how she heard such things... "She was Gnawer kin. Killed by a blow to the head after... well." She waves a hand. She heard it. She's not going to repeat it. "Before that though, she was talking with a guy she called Jonsey. Officer Wallach confirmed that someone named Jones was a friend of hers, that and a guy called Royo or something similar that he considered bad news. Anyway, they were talking about the knock offs of makeup and boots being bad news, and 'hard core shit'" A beat, and a shake of her head. "He wanted her to quit hookin. She said she would when it stopped getting her information."

Another drink, another inhale. "Only other thing of interest was just before they killed her, she asked where they were getting the product. They said North."

[Kora] Someone else might need to write the details down, but Kora is a Skald, with a Skald's careful attention to the fundamentals of a thing, and a Skald's ear for words, and a Skald's care for a story. Her mouth cuts itself into a brief, narrow little frown as she considers the information, her nostrils flaring when Izzy mentions that she was kin to the Bone Gnawers.

The creature is quiet, after.

"Claire Daniels," she confirms, breaking the pall of silence, a minute's worth, or two or three between them, while TCU scores in the background again and again, and a thick-necked commentator bloviates about the bowl system. The need for playoffs. Future prospects and present dangers.

"I'll tell her tribe directly." This is the first duty - not vengeance but memory, scrawling the name that might otherwise be forgotten back into the realm of smoke and ash to which it belongs. "I'd appreciate it if - if there is information as to next of kin - you could find out for me. I'll pass it on. Let me know if someone has claimed the body. If not, her tribe will want to do something - " Pose as a sister, a mother, a grieving brother. Ensure that the dead woman does not become a science experiment, a desiccated, excavated corpse for the education of men - a thing on a slab, cold in the light of morning. " - to give her an appropriate send off."

Kora straightens her shoulders, flashes Izzy a quiet direct look, unsurprised in the end at the rest. The source of the knockoffs, the connection of the goods to violence. "More than a moon ago - " this is low-voiced, all in earnest, her voice pitched quiet to share between them. " - I tracked a cursed human to a boutique on the Mile. He took refuge there, tripped a silent alarm before I could take him out. While I was waiting for the cops to leave, a no-moon snuck into the building, found it crawling with darkness, tainted goods, with several cursed humans inside. We ended them, later, and the store closed."

A flat, wry look.

" - briefly.

"The murderspirits seemed to gather around the shoes and perfume."

Kora reaches for a napkin, then, and gestures for Izzy's pen, scrawls an address in the Mile from memory and pushes it back to the detective. "That was the original store. See what you can find out about it, yeah? Public information, nothing that might expose you to them, nothing that might show your hand." Kora pauses, her mouth curving downwards in thought. "Let me know if your investigation turns up anything else, too."

[Izzy Montoya] She nods. "I happened to have a run in..." literally, in fact "...with one of her Tribe. Said he is packed with one of yours - Joey Oliver? I let him know of her death, and that I would be speaking to you as soon as possible. He seemed to think that unnecessary. I informed him otherwise." A slight smirk there - the expression familiar.

"I'll find out about the body, and next of kin if they exist and let you know." And then, she mentions the boutique, and Izzy nods. "Someone mentioned a boutique - one of her Johns, but I couldn't get a name out of them, or an exact location." It's likely connected. Such things usually are.

She takes the napkin and the address written on it, and nods, slightly. "I'll see what I can find."

[Kora] "Joey?" echoes Kora, with a certain arching sense of surprise, the lilt of her pale brows, brief, narrow line that is shadowed between them, this fleeting ghost of startlement replaced by something - different, solid underneath, wry again but with a darker edge - judgment rather than humor implicit in the expression, something closed to the line of her gaze. " - she's Fenrir, but I've not seen her in a good three moons. Maybe more."

The flat expression resolves itself, not softening, but curling in response to Izzy's smirk. This subtle acknowledgment of the sentiment, with a brief, renewed glance at Izzy's black eye. Though Kora is now speculating freely about the provenance of Izzy's injury, she conceals much of it, and does not impugn the kinswoman's honor by questioning her about it beyond the information she offered.

"Then again," Kora's generous mouth curves again; not a smirk, but this distinctive expression, twisted at the corners. " - she seems to come and go." Inconstant, the creature nearly said. "Thanks, Detective."

Kora reaches for her coat, then, pulls it to her side, the way she sits forward in the booth is clear indication that she's ready to leave. But she stops at the last moment - stills, and casts Izzy a brief, speculative look. "Drew's back in town. Did you know her?"

[Izzy Montoya] She nods, slightly. "He said they just returned." Other than that, she hasn't a clue. Other than Joey was around while she was dealing with Daniel, and that is a time she'd rather not revisit. She is exhausted, she is alone, she is stubborn and determined and still terrified of enclosed places and still mouthy at all the wrong times.

She says thanks, and Izzy nods. This is followed by the information that Drew has returned. There's a huff of wry amusement. "I knew her. We didn't get alone."

Shocking. Not.

[Izzy Montoya] (er, along. They did not get ALONG. not alone. *L*)

[Kora] "She left with Joe," Kora returns, her voice distinctly neutral - inflectionless - like a mirror rather than a well. Kora is careful about the details; or rather, is careful to leave the details in that dead space outside of recriminations or approbations. We did not leave on good terms. - she said to Drew, leaving her to imagination, swallowing the rich spark of anger the mention of her former Alpha could still strike in the fibers of her soul, the chord of it - consuming her lungs, filling the possibility of her breath with it.

So now, careful, all that history - held in check. "They were mated." Kora's voice is flat, even - glassine. "He's dead." Her nostrils flare, but this is the only sign of her tension beyond the curious narrowness of Kora's inflections. A twist of a half-smile follows, but only after a reasonable period of silence. Of quiet - which is to say, space between the news and the half-smile, not pleasant the expression, not even with the way her mobile mouth moves - but tightly woven, like a well-made knot.

"Izzy, I am sure you did not have the best opinion of War-Handed. And," here that taut half-smile appears again, "I trust your honor enough not to speak ill of the dead that I'm sure you will agree that Drew need never hear that opinion from you." Softly, still holding the kinswoman's dark brown eyes with her own, a deep, reflective blue. "I hope we understand each other."

[Izzy Montoya] She left with Joe. Joe is dead.

It's isn't that that gets a reaction, though, it's what comes next. There's a tightening of her jaw, a swallow, a flash in her gaze. Then, there's a huff of laughter, brief - and without humor. She does not flinch away from that even gaze, either, but simply meets it.

"If that were true, Kora, that you trust my honor enough, you would not feel the need to bring it up at all. I have no intention of speaking with the child, let alone about the dead. I should think I've more than proved myself to you and yours. I see I am mistaken."

One step forward, two steps back.

[Kora] "The child is an adult by every measure of their society - " a brief glance beyond Izzy's shoulder indicates the humans, seated at the bar, lingering over their beers, rehashing yesterday's winter classic, debating tomorrow's playoff game. Her tone is mild, as she slides smoothly from the booth, the wool coat trailing behind, held easily by two fingers. " - and ours."

The buttons have a vague, persistent iridescence that gleams mutely from the dangling coat as she folds it briefly over her arm. "And a name, I think, Detective Montoya. Thanks for the information, we'll talk again soon."

[Izzy Montoya] "As am I." She does not look away when Kora does, and when blue eyes return they are met with her own dark gaze just as it was - a simmering anger, a disappointment, exhaustion, underlying undefined emotion written in the depths of dark brown.

"Goodnight, Kora."

Harano

[Kora] The fight is brief and vicious. Humans watching would see - nothing more than a flurry of monstrous forms, something out of a horror movie, less than a handspan of heartbeats and then -

just blood, just the ozone of rage oozing in the air. The rat-faced man falls, not dead - not that, not yet - but nearly so, incapable of rising, unconscious - metis, he reverts to his breedform, the monstrous, misshapen crinos has dun-black fur covered in spiraling tattoos. Sorrow stands over him, flanks heaving, mouth peeled back from her teeth in a silent snarl.

But look: Simon tracked him here, and Sorrow gives him the grace of the last, killing blow.

[Simon Zahradnik] Simon was breathing heavily over the corpse a little grin on his face as he shifted down. Looking down, and smiling just a bit at the mess they've left behind. He reaches to his pocket and he draws out a knife before looking down at the carpet."We need to get this guy... And the carpet the hell outta here somewhere."He says with a slight chuckle. This would be a challenge but Simon was up to that challenge.

"If you want to take a trophy take whatever you want before we dispose of it. However I have an idea for the head."He says with a little grin before looking from the corpse on the ground and smiling up at her."As always fighting alongside you has been an honor. I've also been looking for a chance to get to speak to you. I suppose now is as good a time as any."

[Kora] In the aftermath of a battle, time seems to sparkle and slow. Sorrow had the good sense to take off her winter coat before shifting; it's against the wall leading toward the stairs, a few blood spatters on the nylon, but otherwise wearable. She's lost her hoodie to the shift, though, and a few other essentials - socks and the like. Without the coat to conceal it, the subtle signs of her pregnancy are easy for any to read - but they are busying themselves with the corpse, and she herself says nothing.

Instead, she sinks to her haunches close to the head, her hands blood spattered, her hair loose now, wild around her face. She's still breathing hard, and there's a brightness to her presence after battle. "I'll take the eyeballs for the Hrafn, and the claws for Fenris." - she tells him, leaving the rest as she too begins to assess how to break down and remove the body, the carpet, the furnishings, what remain of them.

Then, a subtle glance up, brief and winging. Her mouth half-curves. " - as good a time as any," she echoes, dark eyes fixed on him now, the look easy and goodnatured. "What did you want to talk to me about?"

[Simon Zahradnik] He looks down at the things face, kneeling before it and drawing his knife forward to poke it, though not enough to draw blood. He decided not to mention the swelling her body was doing but he had noticed. He was more attuned to his beast than most homids his age so these kinds of things tended to stand out. It wasn't his job to point out the obvious to others even if it occasionally put a little smile on his face. After all she was carrying around the next generation right? The future would go on even if he died tomorrow at least someone would send a little one on to fight another day.

"You would think Hrafn would want the liver too..."He says with a little laugh before peeking up at her."I was thinking about a few things actually... First of all what do you know about Harano?"He asks her softly before handing the knife up to her with a bit of a grin.

[Kora] "They like the eyeballs - " says Sorrow, easily settled onto her haunches, this animal pose, feral, her body well-balanced despite the subtle change in her center of gravity. " - and shiny, shiny things. Some say that the last minutes of someone's death are contained in the eyeballs, and the Hrafn eat them to remember, to carry the story back to Odin."

She cuts a lilting look upward at Simon, then, as he asks what she knows about Harano. The creature's sure, dark eyes fix on his young face and linger there, as if she were looking for answers to a question she never asked. Something hardens in her jaw before she tells him, quietly, "I've seen it in Garou. A weakness, assuredly. Why do you ask?"

[Simon Zahradnik] "Maybe I am looking too far into it... But Lets say you knew someone who you thought was slipping."He shrugs his shoulders as he pauses in thought."What I am saying is that we all occasionally get struck by the fear that everything we do is pointless. It just happens... Fear, doubt and all that shit right? But we realize it for what it is and move on right? But let's say someone honestly seems to have lost hope. Lost their faith in the whole damn war... As Wyrmfoe I think it's partly my job to remind the Garou of what they are right?"He shrugs."I am just being curious. I mean the Wyrm weasles it's way into peoples hearts right? Hopefully we catch it and we stop it and if not we do what we gotta to prevent them becoming an abomination unto themselves or whatever. But how the fuck do you fight something like Harano? I mean... I fight shit by killing it. I can't just go inside someone's brain and stab their doubt till it's dead. But I'm also not gonna sit back and let a Garou lose all hope right? I mean yeah I could be all "Fuck it" and ignore it or be all "Fuck you" and kill them. But it seems like either option I chose there the Wyrm wins right? And I fuckin' hate the Wyrm and as long as I am Wyrmfoe I am not going to lose any kind of battle to the wyrm so long as I can help it. So what I wanna know is... How do you remind someone that what we do is worth doing?"He asks her with a little smirk. It was likely the most confusing and indepth conversation he has... Ever had with anyone.

[Kora] "No," agrees Kora, her hands gloved in blood, her (mostly) lean frame poised over a bloodied corpse. "You cannot go inside someone's head and stab away all their doubt. You can't kill Harano, although I suppose some Garou have killed their way out of it.

Her eyes flicker over his face as he goes on - and on - trying to puzzle out whether the whole elaboration was a subtle sort of roman a clef, a story Simon is telling about himself. "Strictly speaking, I would say it's a Galliard's job to remind people of why we fight, to ensure that they remember both the past and the promise of the future, but every Garou carries his or her own stories with them, right? And this isn't a place where I would stand on ceremony.

"Is this someone you know well?"

[Simon Zahradnik] He shakes his head."That's the problem... I don't know him well at all. I don't even fuckin' like him... But I mean."He shrugs his shoulders."I couldn't do anything about Thirty Second Silence or about your Kin. I didn't know them but they died in battle and that is where I could have actually helped them. If I could have I would have been there in a heartbeat but I couldn't. This guy it seems like I dunno... Ignoring would be just as bad as letting another garou die when I could have actually done something to prevent it."He laughs a little and shakes his head."I'm not gonna let the Wyrm have a single fucking one of us period. No matter how much I dislike someone that is not a fate I would wish on my worst enemy. The only other option I can see is killing him and that doesn't help us but I don't think he's gone yet."He rolls his eyes.

"His name is Patrick. He is one of the two new Fianna. I was kinda thinking you might be able to talk to him... Not about what we talked to here but maybe find out about his past? Something meaningful or whatever and maybe surprise him at the next moot with something? He's a galliard to so you might be able to relate. Just don't let him know. I don't want him hiding away in shame. I just wanna see he and his pack mate up and ready to fight when the time comes. It's fuckin' triage, save the ones you can."He laughs softly.

"I wanna get this sept ready for war, and I'm not talking about piecemeal battles here and there. Sooner or later we're gonna have to take this fight to the hive..."He points at the corpse on the floor."I want assholes like this shaking in their boots and they're not gonna do that if we can't get our own boys and girls up and off their asses and ready to fight."