There is a place on Blake Street, a little gated entrance in front of which sits a man on a stool with his arms crossed over his broad barrel chest. It's a bar, obviously, but it's not like the other bars in the area. The lighted sign above the man's head has a green mushroom cap, and if it looks like the kind of thing seen in most Mario games, that's not a mistake. The sign reads The 1Up. It's a bar, and it's an arcade.
And it's one of Sam's favorite places to go after work. Or after a workout, or after a run. Or after a turn at the shooting range or any of the other dozen things the short kinswoman gets up to in her spare time. She was introduced to this place only a little after she moved to Denver, and she's made a point of hitting it up a few times a month if she can.
At the door they ask for her ID because they always do. It's the curse of being so short for one, and for tending to dress like a punk for the other. Today it's a black shirt that reads in a simple white font "One does not simply Telnet into Mordor" over a pair of boot cut jeans. Her shoes are faded blue high-top Skechers. Her hair is down but tucked behind an ear to reveal the numerous hoops and studs that travel around the outer edge of the cartilage. There are wristbands a plenty on each of her wrists. She doesn't really look like a full grown adult, which is why when she walks up to the man - who is taller than her even sitting - she has her ID at the ready. Her smile when she hands it over is understanding and full of her natural, friendly charm. He looks at the plastic, looks at her, and he can't help a small answering smile that sort of starts to crack that gruff, bouncer exterior, so he looks down again and hands it over.
Down some stairs, through a door, down some more stairs, and finally Sam is into the bar proper. The walls are lined with classic arcade machines. And there's the bar with its walls of liquor, and seating for those who come here to chill, and tables with huge, heavy blocked giant Jenga games, and and and...
Sam smiles, breathes in a deep breath, just like she does every time she comes. It's her favorite place.
Tam[Am I persuasive, this scene? Does the gift work? Will it help me not pay for anything while I'm here?]
Dice: 6 d10 TN7 (2, 3, 3, 5, 8, 8) ( success x 2 )
TamTamsin has never been to the 1-Up before but the name appeals to some homesick part of her. 1-Up is 7-Up is Home and Mom and Bed. The bouncer at the door asks Tamsin for id, too, but she doesn't have it ready, and lofts her porcelain doll fine eyebrows but without a great deal of offense. Her driver's license checks out and says she's from Wisconsin. The picture ain't good - she looks apple-cheeked and too, too shiney, maybe a little bewildered, like she's just a second away from saying 'done?' and the camera flashed just as she was unhinging her jaw to ask the question. The bouncer waves Tamsin in: wolf in sheep's clothing, galliard's moon tucked away and burning behind her ribs, contained by enough will to make it easy enough to kind've sort've fit in, wearing a pair of secondhand leather boots that've seen way, way, way better days, jeans that keep sliding off her hips and a blouse-y peasant-y shirt with red threads winding through it. Wolf in sheep's clothing, right, and she is on the hunt, and what she's on the hunt for is some fun, and also for someone to buy her some food and maybe just maybe for a moment or two of getting completely woozy-brained world-spinning trashed without Hector judging all judge-y judge, and it's with that in mind - with just a little edge, thanks to the spirits, when it comes to convincifying and charming (because wolves are convincifying and charming, see) - that she comes down the stairs and
"Hey, this place is pretty cool," Tamsin says, right-out-loud without even thinking about it. There are some quarters in her pocket--they were for laundry, theoretically, but Calden's place is pretty much set for that kind of stuff, so maybe this is the place to lose her quarters.
Let the adventure begin.
SamIt's early enough that there are people, people like Sam who come here more for the games and a bit of nostalgia than the comeraderie and the Friday night partying, but it's not packed. It'll happen soon enough, but for now there aren't any lines for Street Fighter and the bartenders are still looking a little bored and no one's knocked over one of the Jenga games on accident (yet). It's quiet enough that Sam, on her way to the first stop - booze - can hear the right-out-loud exclamation. She turns a little, looks over her shoulder, smile already blossoming even though she hasn't seen the owner of the voice. It's the smile of a kindred spirit, someone else who thinks that this place is pretty cool, cool enough to lose a lot, and I mean a lot of quarters. Then again, Sam doesn't need quarters to do her laundry.
She sees the woman standing over kind of near the entry place, scoping the place out. Just before she turns away to place her order, Sam tries to scope her out. Not in the way of one looking for their next bedtime partner, but checking as she sometimes does to see if she can recognize the touch of Rage or the hint of wolfishness. She's not as adept at it as some other kin, but then her experience with the shifting ones is relatively limited. There was that time spent in Virginia and DC, but it wasn't a long time, and she didn't get to meet that many people.
Turning away, she turns that smile on the bartender closest. Orders something dark and local.
[percept+PU, diff 7 (assuming she has R4)]
Dice: 4 d10 TN7 (3, 4, 5, 7) ( success x 1 )
TamThere is a hint of (low-simmer, simmer, simmer - ) wolf isn't there. The shepherd usually notices the wolf eventually: just it takes a while sometimes. Doesn't it. There're good wolves and there're bad wolves. Tamsin - well. Tamsin looks innocent enough, right. Dark hair that's not red but's burnished just the same, especially once she strolls over to the arcade games lining the walls and gets illumined by the flashing lights of PAC*MAN BATTLE ROYALE and PUNCH-OUT! and aw yeah Mortal Kombat and she stops in front of Paperboy, forehead crinkling in amused tolerance, like she doesn't quite get the appeal.
But who knows. Innocence isn't always obvious, is it.
Tamsin has her hands in her pockets and there's a guy playing Leap For Your Life who she starts to watch. He is completely oblivious though a friend who'd been yawning and looking over at the bar in a speculative you-want-to-share-fries sort of way notices and you can just see that he's going to say hey that girl was checking you out as soon as she goes away.
The Fianna doesn't go away though until the first guy washes out and then she flirts shamelessly [there's an edge (but who doesn't like an edge)], ending with a sweet and grinny, "Hey bet you two drinks a girl wins the next game of Double Dragon, what d'you say?"
Then once she's locked down her target she bites the inside of her lip, side-smiling all hopeful, and turns to examine the bar.
Sam's alone, so Sam's who she waves to -- hoping to catch the punk's eye. The guy says: "Friend of yours? I warn you, I'm a master at Double Dragon," and Tamsin says, "I'm sure you are."
Sam
Sam seems innocent enough, as well, despite the clothes, the accessories, the thick thick eye make-up that makes her dark blue eyes seem a little darker. Her smile is all winning and friendly. The 'tenders greet her by name, and when she makes her order they make suggestions based on her previous visits. They're learning her tastes and what she likes, which might look like the first clues to a problem but really isn't. People don't forget someone like Sam, someone who's nice and treats them like they matter. She gets a glass of something dark and foamy and she stays a little bit longer while someone tells her about their friend. She's a good listener, is Sam Evans.
Normally once she's gotten her drink she'd turn and eye the machines like she's trying to pick her next dance partner. Instead, tonight she looks for the wolf-girl she saw, innocent with that touch of Rage. The look is helped by the fact the girl is waving to her, trying to catch her attention. With a curious tilt of her head, Sam heads over in that direction. She looks at the girl, brows tight and eyes questioning, trying to see if she can figure out just what she's walking into before she gets all the way over there.
[can we have one of those unspoken conversations of the EYES? oh plz plz: let's say, percept+expression?]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 3, 6, 7, 7) ( success x 3 )
Tam[Oh you lookin worried there. Let's say Char+Exp (or, hm, Empathy? either way same pool -1 diff 'cos gift) for Let Me LOOK You My Plan Before I Just Reveal it.]
Dice: 6 d10 TN5 (1, 1, 1, 2, 9, 10) ( success x 2 )
TamTamsin can't help but notice [because these things are things that she notices the way a nicotine addict notices that whiff of cigarette smoke in an alleyway when the smokers're long gone and the breeze is still] Sam's shirt. Her smile - this wry, promise-y thing right now, a joke-y thing - widens a little. Tarnishes up some luminosity in the ol' eyes, but Tamsin doesn't let a t-shirt logo cause her to accidentally scope out a lady's rack. Sam gives Tamsin an expressive look, and the corners of Tamsin's eyes crinkle reassuringly. There is a little half-roll toward the guys, and a lilt to her now less wry and more open smile that promises (still with the promises, the bribery) nothing but fun.
"Hey," she says, when Sam's near enough: "This is Jess and James, like the famous no-good train-robbing gang-leading outlaw bastard, but split into two nice guys one of which apparently rocks the socks off of Double Dragon."
"You look cool; play me? I'll fund the enterprise." Jingle-jangle, hand in pocket. Tamsin looks just a touch pleading: "Please."
Sam
Sam can tell what Tamsin is, but there's no way for Tam to know that Sam is part of the old extended fam. There is no breeding to catch the senses, and nothing about her appearance that shouts out a tribal affiliation. It doesn't give Sam much in the way of upper hands, knowing that the person she's walking toward could shift in an instant and clear this whole place out. Except, well, knowing that could happen makes her a little bit prepared for the possibility. But Tamsin notices her, anyway, notices that shirt, too, which covers a particularly curvy rack.
She moves her left hand to rest at the edge of her messenger bag, where the strap meets the pouch. When she stops her feet are planted just a little apart, weight more or less distributed evenly between them. It's a casual pose, but a ready one, because her dad taught her to always be ready.
"Really?" she asks, looking between the two boys once Tamsin's introduced them. "Sam," she says by way of her greeting. "And I've been known to rock the socks and shoes off Double Dragon in my day." Translation: Gauntlet Thrown.
However it's Tamsin who asks to play, not the boy. She grins. "Sure, but I get to be Billy."
Argo SmytheThere were some places that just drew a crowd, places of import or whimsy, places of imagination or necessity. To some people, the 1Up bar and arcade were both these things.To the woman named Argo it was neither, not yet anyways, she was to new to this city, its tenuous position between a rock and a hard place something that just drew her in. But she'd heard of this place, heard of it through the digital grape vine and had, on a whim, decided it was as good a place as any for a drink.
The bouncer had been no problem, the gift she used was unnecessary, but she did it anyways. Some folks were just turned off by her appearance, and one could not blame them. Argo was a woman of less then pleasing sensory input, what was once a woman of pleasant appearance was now....something else. She smelled of smoke and oil, metal and heat, her hair wild and unkempt like someone who'd not showered for days...yet her skin was clean. Her face was a mess, scars running up and down the one side of her face, the weary look within her large dull green eyes only made her less approachable.
She moved languidly, first to the bar to get herself a tall pint of beer, and then as she moved about the bar, looking this way and that. She wore simple clothing, a pair of black cargo pants and a black sleeveless shirt that was so close to wife beater it was almost funny, except it didn't seem to be an ironic statement, simply....a fact.
Tam
It was Jess who'd claimed to be a master and he laughs a little sheepishly when [Charming] Sam joins the mix. "Well all right then! All right. Though uh, I've never managed to successfully rob a train, I did once borrow a Trainspotting dvd from a roommate without asking."
He looks the punk-girl over, then eyes James, who's containing himself and not barely. James is one of those guys who is deadpan about everything, whose friends have mostly known him for a long time. He's not maladjusted, he's just a creature of habit with a certain sense of humor best appreciated by those who've become used to it. James has figured out what Jess hasn't: that there's no way he's not going to owe two drinks to the girl with burnished hair and a smile.
Tamsin is a lot less serious when she is surrounded by people. Just people who expect her to be just people too. Every now and then she'll start to get all serious and grave again - but that's when she goes hunting for places like 1Up for to lose herself in mindlessness for a little while. Jess and James, they don't expect anything, and Sam doesn't [as far as Tamsin Hall knows] expect anything either.
"Give me a man in a red any day," Tamsin says, "and I'll turn that red-jumpsuit wearing weirdo into an ultimate badass."
It's when she's dropping quarters in, little gleaming metal Moons, and they've taken their places, that Tamsin says to Sam, "Oh! Um, I'm Tamsin."
Sam"So you've tried," Sam responds regarding attempted train robberies, brows lifting and for a moment it almost seems like she's serious. But then her face is relaxing into that smile again, and Jess knows he's being teased. It's easy, both as far as challenges go and in her demeanor. Sam is nice, she is charming, she is harmless.
And Sam, as they head over to the machine, she hangs a little back, lets Tamsin get ahead of her just a little. She puts herself automatically between the wolf and the boys who have likely noticed the Rage. It gives them a breather for a moment, a little opening to get the feel of it off their skin. And then they're crowding around to the sides of the women. "Hold this," she says to Jess who's come around to her side. If he's going to stand there watching, he's going to make himself useful. As a cup holder.
Tamsin feeds the coins into the machine and for the moment, at least, Sam doesn't notice the scary, dirty looking woman coming down into the bar proper. She looks like she belongs in a regular bar, the kind of place where truckers and Hell's Angels go to drink and sing to old country songs on the juke box. That's just going by her appearance, though. One never knows what habits and hobbies a person might have beneath their exterior. Just look at Sam. She looks like a rebel-type, which she is definitely. She's rallied against the man, she's fought a little, she's cracked codes to bring down empires. But she's neither sullen nor angry as was once the stereotype.
So, Sam doesn't notice the newcomer, but she might notice Tamsin with her little bit of Fianna bloodline coloring the air around them like a soft, gentle fog.
With the boys so close, Sam can't lean in to Tamsin, can't tell her that she knows what she is, and here is what she is, and make with the introductions. So she smiles at Tamsin, sunny and warm. Then it's game time.
Tam[Do I Notice Cool Scarred-Up Chick?!]
Dice: 2 d10 TN6 (6, 6) ( success x 2 )
Tam"We've played Ticket to Ride a lot. There was maybe some robbery involved." Jess accepts his new role as cupholder with decent grace. He tries to telegraph something to James with his eyes and James who can read him really plain just snorts a laugh and folds his arms, bracing himself like he's rooted in his new place. He's watching too, see. "Yeah," James says, blunt and to the point. "You hid some'a my pieces under the board."
"That's a dick move, Jess," Tamsin says, "not very outlaw glamourous, not very worthy of remembrance forever-after and a day."Then: the game starts. All nostalgically hilarious graphics, all dun dun DUN, just when you think you can punch and steal a woman off the street a garage door rolls up and two dudes in jump suits " - are those actually jumpsuits? They maybe look kind of like - well I don't know. Garbage-men suits but colorful - " - rock out and start kicking ass. The game is on in all its glory.
To those who've got the eyes to see there is something faint but mythic [stag's blood, stag's heroes, stag's Greatness: Fianna] about Tamsin Hall. Tamsin Hall who when she first discovered that her tribe was evident because of this subliminal thing, this sixth-sense, this - this whatever it is - this reaction that the garou have to one another had been angry and then wondering, because the stories, see, the stories about fairies, the tales about honor and honor in cunning and brave-words, and it was real. It was really, really real? This is a hint of brightness, see, just a hint like when there's a promise of rain in the air but no clouds in sight.
Maybe Tamsin's just edgy, considering things, maybe it's the edge she's hoping to blunt with some free booze, but the moment Argo's profile is briefly flashed, Tamsin notices her. Notices the scars, because you start to look for them instead of flinching your eyes away like it's rude to see, one you're in the business of remembering why scars exist and reminding others why scars exist and - so right - a moment of distraction after a half-glance toward the bar, guaging what she's gonna order. Then she pulls her eyes back to the game, a prickle between her shoulderblades.
Tam[I'M SORRY SHAY I SKIPPED YOU BECAUSE IN MY HEAD MY OTHER POST WAS BEFORE YOURS.]
Argo SmytheIt might be noted that Argo doesn't smile, not when she went and asked for her drink, and not when she moved through the bar's seating area with her drink in hand, despite the fact that she drew attention enough, even if it wasn't the most positive kind. She truly did look like she belonged in one of those decrept bars filled with outlaws and dissidents, the sort of place where the alone come to be apart of something...but still alone.
She moves out of the bar's seating area smoothly enough, not a glance spared to any of the other patrons and steps towards the rows of games both old and new. It is here, and here alone that a smile, imperfect as it is, spreads across her lips. Her teeth give you that 'british' feeling, some of her teeth pressed against each other, but overall it was simply...imperfect. She smiled as let one hand run along the edge of a pac-man game and she strolled on through the machines like an art lover at a gallery of classics.
It is about now that she starts to draw up on the group standing before the ancient and venerable Double Dragon console, and those who can feel it, though they sense no pure breeding about the woman, can feel the echo of rage...barely present...but there none the less. Those dull green eyes flicker upward and regard Tamsin for several long moments as the woman shifts the weight from one foot to the other....waiting...considering.
Sam[oh hey, totally forgot about this as usual: nightmares]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (3, 5, 6, 6, 7, 7, 8) ( success x 5 )
SamIf the situation were set up a little differently Sam might try to read into that look that's passed between friends. But, one hand on a joystick, the other with fingertips resting on buttons, she's leaned a little forward and her attention's on the screen. And it's really easy to look at people over the top of her head, which barely comes to most people's shoulders. So she misses that look and what it might imply.
"How do you even do that?" she asks completely seriously. "Wouldn't the board bump up?" It should be noted that Sam isn't the best at flirting except sometimes when it flows all easy. If they're flirting she misses it, particularly if this is one of those macho types of flirting where they try to sound tough and talk smack at each other. Sam never really understood that sort of flirting, and never found herself attracted to men who engaged in it.
"It's a, um," she starts to answer Tamsin, but frowns and stops because here come some bad guys who need a good karate chop. "They're those karate uniforms, I think. Except all ripped and shredded because apparently in the post-apocalypse they don't have tailors."
If there's Rage creeping up on them now, it doesn't really register to Sam. She's small but tough, able to withstand the heat of some of the mightest Garou's Rage most of the time.
[do i notice Scar Lady?: alert +2diff for distraction]
Dice: 6 d10 TN8 (1, 5, 7, 9, 9, 10) ( success x 3 )
TamJess is flirting. James, he's a little more mysterious. He's definitely giving Jess shit for his ineptitude, this goading smugness tucked away behind a not-quite-smirk. He says, "Well," just as seriously, "it's mostly a lot of cards, really. You girls ever play an Ameritrash game?" James is going to remember that pick-up line forever, and he is going to mock Jess for that line forever and that day the young woman who brought these people together predicted earlier. James is the first one to sort of display signs of edginess, though you'd think it might be Jess - it's just this fleeting discomfort and more rage closes in.
Sam is shorter than Tamsin. This endears Sam to Tamsin who wishes - who often wishes - that she'd been blessed with taller genes. Among other things. Tamsin who is to the best of her ability keeping a wary, wary eye on someone who's behind her (it's more an Awareness, a hypothetical paranoia, than an actual eye) is one of those people who plays arcade games with a lot of movement. Not twitchy movement, but she leans in hard, presses this button or jerks that joystick hard. But she doesn't plant her feet on the ground for added stability - she goes up on the balls of her feet almost tip-toeing like that'll help sometimes.
She shakes her head at the ameritrash game comment, focus, focus, focus. "Oh," she says to Tam, after another badguy swarm. "Right! Gis!" She bites the inside of her lip--leanin, leantotheleft, stomp!, and then with a laugh: "D'you think those gis were more expensive than, like, the standard? Kinda like distressed jeans? Shit, I could distress some jeans…"
Here, there is the swallow of a melancholy sigh: because she needs money. Her pack needs money. Money is a thing they need so they can get a real live place. Hector's not going to be any good at that. Jack, well, maybe, but Tamsin doesn't want to rely on just Jack. So that means she'll have to think of something. Lola and Calden are great, but -
and maybe it's thinking about her kin that has her looking over her shoulder again, or maybe it's the double-take flinch-grimace that Jess does when he sees Argo's face.
Maybe this is when at least one of the Double Dragons gets k.o.'ed and then DEAD.
Tamooc: Er, it's Jess talking in that first paragraph. Not James, sorry for the unclearness.
Argo SmytheSam doesn't spot Argo immediately, engrossed in the game as she was. Neither does Tamsin, but slowly but surely the others begin to notice, first it was Jess, catching the 5'9 woman out of the corner of his eye, and then perhaps James, and then in the end Tamsin herself. Argo simply stood there, her legs spread ever so slightly, and the cold glass of beer held in one hand as the other hung limply at her side.
She regarded each individual silently before a dry smirk crackled along her lips and she nodded to them, speaking in a soft...but strong voice. "Your dying..." She said with a waggle of one finger. "Better pay attention." Her voice deepened in that moment as she strode closer and looked into the screen, almost inside of the others personal space.
"This game...it loves to chew you up and spit you out." Her tone is reverential, a smile spreading across her dry lips as she looked at Tam and Sam, and then to the others as well. "But you know that don't you?"
Sam[are you a good witch, or a bad witch? empathy!]
Dice: 7 d10 TN8 (2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10) ( success x 3 ) Re-rolls: 1
SamJess asks if they've ever played an Ameritrash game and Sam, her eyes sort of flutter and then they roll, and then she's watching the screen again, headed for the pixelated knife on the ground. She shakes her head, no and also something else all at once. He sort of almost had her at We've played a lot of [boardgame], because Sam hasn't gotten to play a lot of board games in a while. Board games tend to call for more than one player, and Sam's life has been more or less stuck in Single Player mode for most of the last few years.
She notices the woman, too, or rather she notices the effect she has on those around her. As the girls are playing their game, more people are coming down into the bar looking for booze or games or whatever. Sam notices the shift in James, a way over on Tamsin's side. Her eyes shift toward him and she sort of almost kind of angles her head - don't look directly, she was taught, when you notice things aren't right - so that she can see the woman with the scars. Sam doesn't see her that clearly, she doesn't see the scars on her face or much of her body, even, but she knows she's there.
It's Sam's guy who gets KO'd. By Tamsin's. When the Galliard turns away and hits a button and just stabs Sam right in the back. Sam lets out a groan that's lightened by her smile. She's not a sore loser, not by a long shot.
She's just turning to Tamsin, about to nudge her to remind her that she's still going, when suddenly the other woman is there, leaning close to their space. Sam sees the person who has been making her new friends uncomfortable, and she frowns at her. The scars that mar her face, Sam doesn't mind those. She's seen much worse.
Her head tilts as she looks at the woman, considering her and her veneer of bristly sarcasm. The corner of her mouth lifts suddenly, making her smile lopsided. "You wanna play?" she asks, stepping aside just as Billy blue man respawns on the screen behind her. Including the woman.
TamJess's fingers tighten on his - uh, Sam's - drink reflexively. He tries to play it cool, though, play it with swagger, though it's obvious he thinks that Argo's a little strange, or maybe he's just still reacting to her ugly face. He'll get over it. Maybe it's just the but you know that, don't you? "We're, uh, still talking about Double Dragon, right? heh, heh," he says, and James rolls his eyes at Jess and gives Argo a nod. He stares a little, but does a much better job at pretending he's not.
Tamsin bites the side of her lip again, scraping her teeth across the corner and flicking an apologetic look Sam's way: Oops.This is one of those he knows and she knows and she knows that she knows but she doesn't know that she knows moments. Tamsin looks at Argo and she reads rage in her linaments reads rage in her stars and lots of things have rage but Argo doesn't seem like a bad guy, and there're those scars. Tamsin looks at Argo, dark smoulder-gaze slipping down like ash-drifting, then flitting up all spark-twirl, just trying to illuminate the truth, right, to set it down in story-of-now, and she has no idea that the girl beside her knows that she's a wolf inside a girl and a girl inside a wolf. Has no idea that the girl beside her, stepping back away from the console to let the scarred woman step-up, is part of this world too, and more: has cottoned on to the fact that Tamsin is. And Argo. And Argo knows that Tamsin's got that Fianna somethin' somethin', feels that rage, but does Argo know that -- you see. It's one of those scenes. The boys just know that it's going to make a good story, and Jess thinks he might have half-a-shot and if James plays it cool maybe he has half-a-shot too.
But you know that, don't you? Jess gets his ding in. Sam says, Wanna play? Tamsin, firmly - and with meaning: "Yeah." Beat. "Play with me while Jess and James go get me my two drinks."
Here, a flash of a grin - it shouldn't disturb them, but they're on edge; they're not disturbed by it, but they're still a little restless - smile back, but restless, restless, and then Jess is gawking, like, shit! and tries to offer her Sam's, which she does not take.
Argo SmytheThey sat at the Fulcrum of the moment, two roads diverged in a yellow wood as Robert Frost would say, things could have gone bad, the stares never helped, and the woman before them was bristly indeed, her nature, her very personality seemed ready for conflict at any moment, if she felt it was the thing to do at the time. She looks at Jess, looks at him directly and asks. "What...never seen roadkill before?" Her tone filled with caustic sarcasm as she cracked a smirk.
Oh how it could have gone wrong....but then Sam, dear energetic Sam stepped up to the plate and saved the day. She did the simplest of things, she offered Argo a place amongst the group, and the tall dark woman surveyed the smaller punkish kinfolk and then, offered her a small, oh so small smile before nodding.
"Sounds good." She said as she stepped up, her gaze still upon the kinswoman for a few long moments, an intent look held there before she looked at Tamsin and smirked once more. "Watch where you point that pig sticker eh? I like my back unperferated." She said as she took ahold of the joystick and started in. Her beer finding a place on the floor, next to her booted foot.
"Time to kick ass and chew bubble gum kids. Anyone got gum?"
SamIn this instance, Sam probably knows the most of any of them. She knows that these women are wolves, one of them more battle-hardened than most. They know what each other are, but they don't know what Sam is, except for this: Sam is friendly and charming and welcoming. She saw that this wolf had this crusty, bristling armor and she didn't question it. She doesn't poke at it or try to strip it away or assure the woman that this is a safe place. What she does is include her in the group.
And when the woman starts snarking at the boy-toys, Sam sidesteps a little. She is shorter by nearly a foot than anyone in the room, and she makes herself a shield between Garou and human, not to protect him, but to protect her, Argo. From losing her temper and causing a scene. Tamsin tells the boys to go get her the drinks they owe her. When Jess tries to hand her Sam's drink, the kinswoman doesn't miss a beat. She turns a little and takes it from him. "Thanks, man. We'll still be here when you get back." Subtle, but firm, with a charming smile to top it off. The boys are being told to scram.
The look she gets from Argo is met squarely, and she shrugs. What? Then the woman is turning to take up Sam's character's place and asking about gum.
Sam smirks. "Just ran out yesterday."
TamJess's eyes fill up with caught-out trouble when Argo's causticity hits him. His voice goes a little soft and his shoulders go a little straight and he protests. Not very well - just - he protests: "I, ah," like he doesn't know what to say, "uh, it's not," but Sam saves that too, and if Sam hadn't saved it James probably would've - well, maybe. James seems to like to watch his friend flail around in awkward social situations. James gives Sam and Tamsin a jerk of his chin and says "we will be back." Jess tamps down on the urge to keep apologizing, letting himself get angry instead, and he says, "right." Then: the boys are firmly, but charmingly, dismissed to go acquire drinks, and that's what they do.
Now, Tamsin hasn't noticed how deftly Sam is coraling the humans away from garou [sheep-dog instead of shepherd, maybe, and wouldn't a sheep-dog spy the wolf first anyway?], or at least not consciously - but maybe there's something to the fact that she isn't immediately trying to figure out a way to friendlily send the punk-woman off over there so she can have a talk with the scarred up woman and size her up proper.
"You're smooth," she tells the kin, with another quick burnt-ash laugh, and then it's back to the epic journey that is Double Dragon, eyes on the game, eyes on the prize. "And don't worry, the pig-sticker is mostly for vile street scum and servants of destruction. Sorry, Sam, but Billy is a more sinister name than Jimmy. You guys ever know an evil Jimmy?"
Time to kick ass and chew bubble gum, kids: that gets a smile. The kind that makes her ears go up, see.
ErichSo the door opens and in comes two kids that you know, you just know were in some Abercrombie & Fitch ad somewhere. They are tall, and they are blond, and they are tanned, and the boy is broad of shoulder and hard of body, and the girl is just skinny enough, bird-wristed enough, to be chic. Though, she's not dressed for a runway.
And neither is the boy, really. He is wearing blue jeans and he is wearing a t-shirt that advertises something in spanish and he has a pair of aviator sunglasses atop his head, which makes him look douchier than he actually is.
He's midsentence (something about if you keep feeding all those pigeons they will CRAP ALL OVER THE TINYHOUSE) when he breaks off and points right at the Double Dragon machine that Everyone Else (tm) is playing on and yells:
"I'M CALLING NEXT GAME AGAINST THE WINNER."
CharlotteNo, Charlotte's not dressed for a runway. She's wearing an old SPRITE t-shirt that is green and yellow and faded and since returning to the land of the living or at least of the USA where pink hair dye is readily available well, Charlotte's hair is tipped in bright pink again. She has a bracelet made of hempen rope around her right wrist and another of beads around her left and she got long, spare lines and sharply articulated bones and pale, pale blue eyes and she has an aura of distraction about her and Erich's complaining of the pigeons and Charlotte is telling him to put up an upside down umbrella or something and her hair is longer than it was and loose and she sometimes walks with a rolling gait and sometimes wishes the sidewalk moved and she doesn't quite belong here, not really but she walks in after Erich anyway setting her shoulders and gritting her teeth as she surveys the place with a sweeping, wary glance.
An errant shiver ripples up her spine, like there are spiders just crawling through her hair.
So Charlotte frowns and shoves her fists into the pockets of her jeans and keeps watching and follows in Erich's wake like an eccentric little satellite.
She's not challenging anyone to any of these games. She's not touching them, not even with a knee or the back of an elbow.
Nothing unusual (especially) about her to the kinfolk except for her scrawny wariness, but to Tamsin, well. She must look like Arwen, like Galadriel, her breeding a coronal flare all around her, impossible to ignore.
Argo SmythePoor Jess, caught out on his staring doesn't really seem to know what to do, he stammers at first, and then he walks off with James, flustered and unhappy. It doesn't seem to register for the woman as she started into the game the joystick moving quickly and surely, buttons tapped to stab and punch, kick and throw. She gets around behind one of the enemies and holds him in place for Tamsin to beat up on, grinning in that crooked smirking sort of way the whole time.
"Sure did." She says with that self same smirk aimed at Tamsin. "Jimmy the Glitch....what an asshole." She chuckles as the guy she was holding goes down, and she moves on, looking for others. Her eyes flicker from the screen to Sam for a moment before she spoke to the kinswoman.
"You must have a pretty big collection." She says this, but never finishes as some blonde guy yells down the aisle about playing the winner, which draws something of a sneer from the woman before she shook her head.
SamTamsin tells her she's smooth and Sam grins and shrugs in that way that is the modern form of a bow or curtsy. One might almost expect her to tip a wide brimmed hat and say something like Just doin' my job, ma'am. This is what she does, this kinswoman. She clears space so that werewolves don't have weak-willed humans freaking out all around them, possibly starting up fights they couldn't possibly win.
Now, it's about the time that the tall and broad and blond man and the bird-thin blonde girl head through the bar, beelining for the Double Dragon machine, that it might become apparent that Sam is Not Your Average Human. As short as she is, one might expect her to balk and turn and flee right about the time they come upon the group. But though Rage gets piled on top of Rage, Sam just wraps one arm beneath her breasts, leaving the other free to hold her drink, and leans against the side of the machine, watching as the werewolves start mowing through bad guys.
She looks up briefly, greeting the strangers with an upward nod and a smile. "It'll take a while," she says. "Wanna pass the time on Mortal Kombat?" She pushes off from the side of the machine and gestures with a nod of her head toward the machine on her other side. This to Erich, of course, not Charlotte, who is trying not to touch anything.
ErichOf course Charlotte doesn't like this place. It's all machines and flashing lights and weird artificial noises and how could any of this not be infested with Spiders. But Erich moves ahead, oblivious or immune or perhaps -- maybe -- attuned to some primal undercurrent of pure joy, pure enjoyment beneath all the webbing. Crowds part for him like the red sea; he's grown so accustomed to it he doesn't even notice it anymore, and
oh, soon enough he's there at the coveted machine, eyeing Tamsin openly. His mouth opens. Oh god, here comes the Line. Except:
"So, you with the Crescent or the Question?"
-- has got to be the weirdest Line ever. And then, whup! Someone else talks to him. He turns, looks for the voice, finds it. Thinks a moment.
"Is there something multiplayer? So my friend can play too." He jerks a thumb at Charlotte.
TamTamsin is considering whether or not she could get away with a did he do that to your face in regards to Jimmy the Glitch who is an asshole and Argo the scarred-up. The moment passes; Tamsin decides to be discreet and valorous, rather than bold and reckless. Fog's influence, maybe - fog's string-playing, do this, be this way. But Tamsin wants to know. Wants, wants, wants to know, even if - especially if - it's some sad before-Change story. It looks so bad. It's given Argo that permanent - is it permanent? - curl to her lip, spirit and flesh and bone, right? She wants to know. She wants wants wants wants to know. She's trying not to focus too much on how badly she wants to know and to play the game and soon there'll be whatever drinks the boys get and maybe she will actually share one of them with her co-victor, but likely not.
Then here comes a blonde guy in a bar hollering on a Friday night and Tamsin doesn't realize it's directed at the Double Dragon crew at first, not until Sam replies, and then - okay, then Tamsin officially starts sucking at Double Dragon and poor Jimmy of the red apocalyptically chic gi gets bashed by a bad guy. It isn't the guy who's got Fenrir's history on his shoulders [heroic], but his companion who - yes. Does remind Tamsin of an elf: whose presence eases - subtly, so subtly Tamsin doesn't even get that it's happening - something tight in Tamsin's shoulders, some lingering what-if-bad-things-start-happening-right-now-and-these-humans-and-that-nice-girl-get-involved, because even if they do it'll turn out fine with something that full of hope and greatness around. Right?
She wants to know these stories too, see. Wants, wants, wants, with every wistful don't be shy don'tbeshy beat of her heart. Damn it. Tamsin bites on the inside of her lip, and then looks directly at Erich 'cause Erich's the one who's talking. And it's a weird line, but hey, this game's already witnessed the Ameritrash boardgames line not to mention Argo's line, so it's in keeping with the weird wth tradition.
"Neither officially. Not yet. You ever hear of Celduin?" If he says no, she says: "You will," with a grin. In the not THAT likely event he actually says yes, she looks completely gleeful. "I'm Tamsin."
"And yeah, too bad there's not a - " quick-count " - five player game."
CharlotteEasy for humans to imagine they're related - blond hair, pale blue eyes, well proportioned. Even Charlotte, spare as she is, has a physical grace about her, an animal athleticism that her wariness only heightens. In here, with all these noises and all these people and all these electronics that all dovetails bad into this wary little dance that as delicate and fine and precise as the way one of the great raptors backwings and closes its claws around a branch that does not seem large enough to hold its weight.
Though she seems more sparrow than raptor ask her and Charlotte will tell you that sparrows were dinosaurs and even sparrows remember when they rended meat from the bones of their prey.
Or at least, you know, grass seeds.
Since some of them were vegetarians. She went to the Smithsonian. She was in DC. She knows these things.
But see: arms crossed, knock-kneed.
"No." and forceful, when she wants to be. When Erich is threatening her with getting spider webbing all over her hands. "I don't wanna play. I'll - " and her look is sort of flailing but then she gets that this is a bar and bars have drinks and - "I'll get something to drink. You want a cerveza or a Grand Marnier?"
So there's quite a Sophie's Choice, Erich.
Tamsin and her grin and and her you will earn a rather shy little half smile and wiggling wave of Charlotte's fingers. Nails are painted a color called melonberry and we can all guess what that looks like. Maybe.
Doesn't quite introduce herself. Not yet.
Argo SmytheArgo is a shadow next to the brightness of Charlotte and Erich, one might expect to hear the songs of heroes in their words, to feel the drum beat of history in each step, Charlotte far more so then anyone Argo had seen or met in a very..very long time. She shifts uncomfortably, rolling her shoulders before cranking her neck to one side with a pop of vertebrae. That smirk flashes at Tamsin as the woman starts to lose, and with the swarm of bad guys on the screen the Glass Walker can only hold the horde at bay for so long before she too...has lost.
"Game over man..." She says before reaching down to drag up her glass of beer and take a drink, her lean body turning to lounge against the sturdy weight of the Double Dragon console as she licks her lips and watches the newcomers, who really...were only newer then her by fractions.
"They only like you as much as you like them." She says to Charlotte as she turns, the comment speaking of her desire not to play. She then looks around, the rage that filters off her body a minor, infinitesimal thing next to Erichs but present none the less.
"Five player arcades don't exist, unless you count a row of racers." She said with a shrug. "Best your gonna get..is four." She pats Double Dragon then lovingly. "But the best are always with two."
Erich"Well..." Erich slides a glance at Charlotte, decides convincing her otherwise is a lost cause, and switches tack. "Maybe there's an air hockey table? We can play three-on-two." He nudges Charlotte with his elbow. "I bet me 'n Charlotte can take you three."
No answer about cerveza or Grand Marnier, though.
Sam[you alright, Charlotte?: empathy (emotional states)]
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 4, 6, 7, 8, 9, 9, 10, 10, 10) ( success x 8 ) Re-rolls: 3
Sam"You can see the Crescent from my balcony," says Sam, and lo and behold, the kinswoman reveals her nature at last. Or does she? Certainly being part of the Nation, albeit one without a drop of Rage, is a part of her nature. There's much more to her than that, though.
Of the lot of them, Sam is the only one who doesn't respond to Charlotte's overwhelming pure breeding. She doesn't have the sense for it, but that doesn't mean she doesn't notice her. Charlotte says No and offers to get a beer for her friend. Sam tilts her head at her, watching her, brows tensing into the slightest of thoughtful looking frowns. Her eyes flick to the scarred woman, to Tamsin, to Erich, and finally, when they return to Charlotte, her mouth quirks.
"There's a giant Jenga table out on the patio. That's multi-player. Ish." And a little more open, with a little more air. She doesn't know Charlotte's discomfort is with the presence of the Weaver and not the closeness of the crowd, but either way, Outside would take her away from both. And get her away from Argo.
"I'm Sam," she adds, stopping with still some distance between herself and the Theurge and the huge huge huge Ahroun. The smile with which she looks up at the both of them is warm and charming.
CharlotteEr. Charlotte is nervous and alarmed and alert. There's an edge of paranoia to her around all these electronics but she's mostly keeping that under wraps. She not really sane or ... you know, so all of the stimulation is a bit overwhelming but her forceful little no was probably a proud moment for her since she stood up to someone a little bit and when Erich nudges her elbow she's going to smile, especially when he says they can take him on, because she TOTALLY believes in Erich, like hero-worshippy levels of belief.
So: yes, she is mostly okay? even if the whole place makes her feel like she's wrapped in spider webbing.
CharlotteCharlotte holds herself so still when Erich nudges her because she does not want to be jostled into one of the machines. She has an iPhone and she likes her iPhone and she takes pictures with it of Things she sees and inundates her poor brother with them and soon will be inundating Melantha (or perhaps, already is) but she doesn't want to touch these things, which are much larger and do not take pictures.
But see: the way she nudges him back and cuts her eyes back up at the Shadow Lord. Like: yeah, we can take you on. But also, sotto voce, a knot of puzzlement between her brows. " - can you skate on air?" Mostly just for Erich.
But also, a pale eyed glance at Sam, who also gets a little wave. "I'm Charlotte. That's Erich."
Tam
"Strange, isn't it - " she comments, on a lack of five player arcades. "Five's such a good number, y'know? For teams and things. Not as good as [insert whatever number the Fellowship of the Rings has, Jess isn't a fan and doesn't know off the top of her head and is too lazy to mentally count], but still very good."
Jenga? - Tamsin's expression clouds with doubt. Just a little bit of doubt. Is Jenga - even Giant Jenga - as fun as potentially totally obliterating the ass of some Fenrir boy (or, she will perhaps concede, getting her own ass oblite - nah, actually, no concession) at a game? Jenga is more like a riddle-game. Riddle-games are fun, but - but is she patient? Tamsin searches her soul for the answer to this question, and while she's searching her soul her eyes wander back toward those two boys from not-all-that-long-ago and the two drinks a-waiting next to Jess's elbow while nerve is not got up to come back on over.
Tamsin is easily lured into passionate enthusiasm for contests, see. And so: "I will take that bet. I'll take any bet, anywhere, air hockey table or arcade game, outside or inside, but um - first I'm going to go collect my drinks. I'll meet you."
Where-ever.
Tamooc: ahem. let's make tht - "Not as good as nine, but still very good."
ErichErich raises his hand as his name is given. Yup. That's Erich. Strapping upper-midwestern boy, all blue eyes and biceps, blond hair, north-euro descent. Fenrir boy. Yup.
And sidebar back to Charlotte: "No, you just play it on a table. It's not as exciting as it sounds." He's long since stopped being surprised by the narrowness of Charlotte's exposure to pop culture.
"I'm down to Jenga too," he adds. "Actually, let's do Jenga. I bet Charlotte'll kick ass at that."
Argo SmytheThere was talk of air hockey or giant jenga, and while the latter sounds interesting, Argo had come here for a reason. She shook her head at the offer of other games and gestured to the machines that surrounded them. "As much fun as giant 3D puzzles are...I'll stick with these." She said as she looked at member of their would be group in turn and then shook her head.
"My name is Argo....for the record." At that the woman turned and seemed ready to go, to disappear amongst the stacks of the ancient machines. "Don't forget your helmets, gotta watch out for those giant falling blocks." She says with a wave over her shoulder as she started to stroll of down the aisle.
Charlotte"I probably will," Charlotte agrees, when Erich says that he bets she'll kick ass at that and she says it so solemnly and so wide-eyed and so steadily that it has the feeling of owlish prophecy to it. Like she's figuring out that she probably will kick ass or perhaps, more likely, she believes almost anything Erich tells her, or is disposed to believe it, especially when it seems like praise. Or something close to it.
Argo receives a ... survey. Wide-eyed and steady see as she announces her intention to keep playing video games. Charlotte thinks that Argo probably has spiders crawling in spiders crawling on spiders, an endless recursive loop of spiders and that gives her a little shiver as she watches the stranger start to leave.
"Do you at least get sticks?" she inquires of Erich. Then informs him, "Charles played hockey."
Erich
Shake-of-head: "You get these little round things you hold. I'll show you later. C'mon! Jenga first! Do you know how to play?"
SamAir hockey would be good, or skeeball maybe, but those aren't outside on the patio, in the open clear warm air of the evening. And that's the thing Sam wants to get Charlotte to the most, clear open air.
Tamsin is going to go get her drinks from the boys from earlier, boys Sam hadn't really forgotten about, per se, but what interest could she have in humans once they've left the dangerous collection of Rage? She turns a little though when Tamsin looks that way, lifts up onto the balls of her feet to sort of see through a break in the crowd. She offers them a wry grin and the shrug of a shoulder, the shrug probably below their line of vision.
"Are you sure?" she asks of the scarred woman, brows lifted and head tilting, inviting her to join them or at least letting her know the invitiation is there, on the table, ready for her to take should she change her mind. Truthfully, Sam would probably prefer to play more video games herself, but more important than that is the comeraderie. The last time she was able to really be social with werewolves had been that Beltane bonfire at the end of spring, and a little at the Solstice, but not really.
She looks around their little group of four, maybe five. When her eyes land on Erich her eyes land at about the level of his collar bone, taking in the width of his shoulders, considering. Then her dark blue eyes lift and she smiles. "You can do the honors. It's that way," she says, lifting back up onto the balls of her feet to point above and through the crowd. The door leading outside isn't immediately apparent, it just sort of looks like another hallway. A hallway to air and freedom.
Tam"Okay. Jenga first," Tamsin says, the first being a 'we'll see maybe later' sort of thing, and she fixes her eyes on Argo when she casually begins to wander-off, says, "Tempt, tempt? Stay and play a little," and then repetition like a chorus an impression and an emphasis: "I'll meet you."
Then: Tamsin really does vanish off to the bar. For now.
Charlotte"Of course I do!" lies Charlotte, rolling her eyes ever so faintly, with a certain degree of over-convincing enthusiasm. Though really, she thinks probably, if it is a giant puzzle game all being a puzzle she can probably figure it out. Most everything a theurge does is a puzzle, a half-hidden door here, a knot there, a stitched together memory threaded with the blood from a salamander's heart and the memory of the prey-you-caught and the way rain hears.
The way rain hears and the way rain hears things.
No wistful look for the machines they are living behind though maybe a bit of one for the bar but Sam shows them the way and Charlotte looks down the hallway and gives Sam a shy little grin, sliding out of the corners of her eyes, then takes off running down the hall.
Flings a "Race you!" at Erich only after she's already given herself a headstart.
Argo SmytheThe offers of camaraderie are extended to Argo, several people suggesting she stick around with the group, to partake in this little cluster of the nations people, and to feel comforted by it. She seems to consider it briefly, but...out of the corner of her eye she spots Ms. Pac-man, and the decision is made.
"Sorry kiddies...next adventure." She says as she starts down the row towards her intended game.
"Gotta go tend to the Misses."
SamTamsin heads for the bar, Argo heads for Ms. Pacman, which leaves Sam momentarily alone with the Ahroun and the Theurge. The latter gives Sam a shy little grin, and gets a wide warm one in answer.
"Later, Argo," she tosses over her shoulder. Then, if the Ahroun takes off after the Theurge, Sam is hurrying to stay in his wake. The sea of people parts for him in a way it won't for Sam Evans.
Erich"See ya Argo!" Erich tosses over his shoulder as he, too, tears off down the aisles and the rows of arcade machines, pinball machines, soda concession stands, door, outside! Giant Jenga. Where there are other people playing -- but really, not for long. Not as two or more werewolves come bearing down on them. Not when Erich
rather rudely kicks the existing Jenga tower over, raising a chorus of HEYs and WHAT THE FUCK, MANs.
"Help me set it back up," he says: to Sam, to Charlotte, to anyone who intends to play. "The idea is to make a solid tower. And then we each take a piece out one by one until it falls over. Okay?" And he starts to build.
SamSam can't run after the pair because Sam is carrying a beer, and while she's had a bit of it, she's not willing to let it drop and slosh just so she can keep up with a pair of reckless werewolves. Just before she gets outside she hears the rather loud clattering fall of a huge pile of large wooden bricks. She gets outside and she sees Erich crouched and picking up the two-by-fours and a bunch of irritated and angry-ish people parting around the fall to leave. None of them are brave enough or crazy enough to say anything to Erich that he might actually react and respond to, mostly glares cast over shoulders when they're sure he's not looking.
Sam offers them an apologetic smile, then she sets her beer down on one of the wrought iron tables and goes to help set up the game. "It's easier with the regular game," she says, continuing the explanation of it to Charlotte. "The pieces are smoother and it's more about skill and precision. This," she holds up one of the bricks of wood, which is all uneven and not very smooth in one spot, "makes this game pretty evil."
CharlotteCharlotte gives Erich a set-jawed look as he kicks over the existing Jenga tower, but then that set-jawed look shifts into something darker as the poor bastards who were playing it start shouting at her packmate. And then, Charlotte crosses her tanned arms over her Sprite logo and fixes a pale glare at the lot of them, looking absurdly like an enforcer or a lieutenant or something.
"Hmmmph." When the last players are gone, scared off by Erich's rage. Charlotte flashes Erich recalcitrant look that is all hey I know! and I'm not stupid! then watches Sam heft the brick of wood and picks up her own and slides her fingers over the uneven whorls all thoughtful and feels a bit bad for it because it is no longer part of a tree but it makes a kind of tree as it grows and comes down again and again, like a memory of a forest rising vertical.
Doesn't say anything, Charlotte. Not more than hmmph. But she does start to play.
CharlotteDex + Wits! TWINKING OUT YO.
Dice: 8 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 2, 3, 4, 4, 6, 8, 10) ( success x 3 ) Re-rolls: 1
ErichFINE I'M DEX+WITTING TOO.
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (2, 3, 3, 4, 5, 8, 9) ( success x 2 )
Sam[dex+crafts: IT'S ART SHOOSH]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 5, 5, 9, 9) ( success x 2 )
CharlotteDex + Wits!
Dice: 8 d10 TN6 (4, 5, 5, 7, 7, 8, 9, 9, 10, 10, 10, 10) ( success x 9 ) Re-rolls: 4
ErichWTFFFF LOL
Dice: 7 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 2, 3, 8, 10, 10) ( success x 3 )
Sam['GAIN]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (1, 3, 4, 4, 6, 8) ( success x 2 )
Sam[EVANS NEVER SAY DIE]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (4, 5, 5, 7, 9, 9) ( success x 3 )
Charlotte12 and counting!
Dice: 8 d10 TN6 (2, 2, 3, 6, 8, 8, 9, 9, 10, 10, 10) ( success x 8 ) Re-rolls: 3
ErichDice: 7 d10 TN6 (2, 3, 5, 6, 6, 7, 10) ( success x 4 )
TamTamsin finds them again - maybe it was the sound of the tower, toppling like babel, or maybe it's just the instinctual here there be monsters (mine), or maybe it's the end of another game, somebody grumbling about some guy who knocked down their tower and how this place used to be cool - with a napkin between her teeth and two drinks that are whatever it is Sam was having earlier, because that's what the boy asked for because that's what he thought was the safest, and a basket of onion rings that somebody didn't want after all [story later]. Tamsin is not accompanied by the human guys, and as she carefully sets the drinks down and the basket down where-ever it looks vaguely safe, so maybe off to the side on one of the chairs, right, and settles to watch what turns out to be THE END with a head-cocked [wolfish] all wide-eyed interestedinterested and intent. The tower falling this time causes her shoulders to jerk up; or maybe it causes her to choke on an onion ring.
SamAs it turns out, Charlotte is rather fucking awesome at giant Jenga. With her nimble little fingers attached to her spindly little arms, she pulls one long brick out and carefully lays it atop the pile. Sam and Erich are less dexterous. The tower wobbles every time they touch it, sometimes dangerously close to toppling, sometimes just enough to make one or the other of them hold their breath. Unfortunately, Sam's lack of height finally comes to bite her - she can't quite reach the top of the tower anymore. Unless she gets a chair (pass) or asks for a boost from Erich (absolutely not) she has to gently press her brick down on the top and sliiiiiiiide and there it goes, toppling over in a loud loud clatter on the paving stones of the patio area.
Sam lets out a little sort of a cry of distress and hops back, body curling, shoulders hunching, arms coming up to her chest as she twists a little away.
When silence descends - or maybe it does, maybe someone is laughing - she uncurls herself, goofy sort of grin plastered across her face.
"I guess next round's on me."
CharlotteAND THEN THE PLAY GAMES BUT CHARLOTTE DOES NOT PLAY MORTAL KOMBAT THE END.
