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Post by Evangeline on Oct 6, 2009 14:56:59 GMT -5
Rihanna had seen many such slums and "barrios" in her travels. The faces of vagrants and indigent families peering at her from ramshackle doorways, windows and alleyways was always a potent reminder of how humanity in general had suffered from the last few decades. But it didn't seem particularly threatening. The locals, she had noted, were highly intolerant of real criminality, and the gallows near the public park was ample demonstration. Ian and Liriel, like other cultists, managed to skate the fine line without getting into "criminal" territory.
Beauchamps thrust her nose over to a container waiting on a hand-trolley by the gate. "That's them right there."
"I'll help you out with that." Dmitri went over and pushed it with his nose.
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Post by elizar on Oct 6, 2009 16:42:57 GMT -5
After some time of walking, Ash slowed down. "Here's what I've been talking about." He said in a restraint excited tone. He had begun to act, and was convincing at it. "I don't know how they do it, but here's a proof! She even has a tail she can control by herself."
Sandra was content with letting Dmitri play the gentleman and push the container. She would have wanted to have at least one human in the party, but this wasn't really a game of choosers and beggars. "You lead Capt" She said to Beauchamps.
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Post by Evangeline on Oct 6, 2009 17:23:15 GMT -5
Beauchamps did just that, striking out ahead. "Those of us in colors will have to stay out of sight, though." She picked out a slightly different route, that would take them to the rear portion of the old mall.
Rihanna and Annalise played along with the appropriate show of amazement. "Whoah, that's awesome."
Liriel was giving her spiel, with head now fully exposed and tail flicking. "Why put up with living in filth and poverty, when a new, revitalized land and community await you? Why accept the body that some random meeting of genes assigned to you, when you can remake yourself in the most literal sense?"
Danae kept silent, nose whuffing as she took in the scents. She was behind most of the humans and others who listened to the pitch, but her stripey coat still stood out.
Bree was positioned further back.
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Post by elizar on Oct 6, 2009 17:34:01 GMT -5
Ian was with Liriel, and pitched in when she did require him to go on with a spiel about how the Oka was a representation of the unification of the two worlds of mechanians and humans. But he saw and smelled the other young oka in the crowd.
Subtly, he flicked his blades in a 'come here' motion.
Ash kept back slightly to let Rihanna and Annalise take it in. He knew the schedule, the morning speech would end soon enough, giving the stragglers some time to stick around and ask questions. And now they were going to be the group to stick around and be taken in by the message.
Ash seemed to be more of a guide for two out-of-towners to "protect them from the evil of the 'hood" For a fee of course, always rip the tourists off was the mantra for any free-agent guides.
Sandra followed Beuchamps but kept an eye on Dmitri to see if he was doing okay with the load.
"I think all of us would have to stay hidden in order to spring the trap." She said. We can't have Ian back out in distrust because of the presence of an adult helicopter. "We need both of them. And separate later if Ian is indeed Liriel's anchor to the illusion.
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Post by Evangeline on Oct 6, 2009 20:48:50 GMT -5
<<< Sorry if I'm a bit lazy, working on comics. That's an interesting dream you had, maybe you might want to write it out. >>>
Danae dared not glance at anyone else and give the game away. She approached with the care that any young woman would exhibit to a stranger, nostrils dilating as she took in his scent. Bree was looking on, her face a careful mask veiling the concern beneath.
Rihanna and Annalise lingered at Ash's side, mixing with the stragglers as the throng started to thin out.
Liriel greeted those remaining with a hundred-watt smile. "So, you want to know a little more about us?"
"Well, we do have a few questions." Annalise nodded in a show of diffident curiosity. "How could this all be real, what you speak of?"
"No surgeon could have done THIS." Liriel, in what could be seen as a slightly provocative move, hooked down her low-rise jeans to show where the tail joined her body. "Look it over if you want. It extends right from the spine, as if it were there from birth."
"Back of the mall would be good." Dmitri concurred, words slightly furry through his clamped jaws as he bore the descenting-bomb canister bundle carefully between them.
"We can't use too much of those in any one space." Beachamps cautioned. "If it accumulates, it'll take on a smell of its own."
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Post by elizar on Oct 7, 2009 3:06:29 GMT -5
((Like I said, you were just posting a writing contest with those outlines . And I had this one between sznooze sessions. I have a lot of waking-up dreams there I can tell you.))
"Welcome." Ian greeted Bree and Danae, but the latter more in general. "I didn't want to impose on you at the base." He said almost apologetically. "But it is nice to see you coming to join us." He did not recognize Bree or what her being here meant exactly, though he did know about her previous history of change after some other visitors telling the same tale to him and Liriel. At most of the hearings, he was treated like a prize puppy on a show.
"I know." Sandra said. "We just have to dump enough so that our scents will not be able to overcrowd the place for at least half an hour or so." She grabbed a canister. "How would you want this captain?" She was going by rank in this one, even though she was far from being in the same unit as Beauchamps.
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Post by Evangeline on Oct 8, 2009 21:56:37 GMT -5
Danae smiled to Ian. "I'm certainly willing to give it some thought, but the whole waterfront thing makes me a little... uneasy." she spared a nervous glance for the rather slummy, run-down surroundings. "Could we go somewhere to discuss this?"
"By the door is fine." Beauchamps nodded. "The entrances can't have any trace of us about them."
Dmitri also took a canister in his teeth and took it towards another route. They were designed so that a 'craft could deploy them easily without assistance.
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Post by elizar on Oct 9, 2009 6:44:14 GMT -5
Ian looked towards the humans of the group. He could smell that she was with them for a moment, but had just met them today or yesterday. And she certainly wasn't proposing anything to him, as she smelled like a virgin still. He looked to Liriel for a moment and then looked back.
"Are you with the group?" He asked and motioned to the humans talking with Liriel, only to get a clarification.
Sandra went to work at the entrance and did her work diligently. Soon enough, the main entrance along with the rear entrance were scent free. At the moment everyone was trapped in the mall in order not to scare off Liriel or Ian once they would come here.
Breakfast was over. It was time to work now. Jonathan packed together the gas stove and put it aside where it was shielded by whatever weather that would come today. At the moment it was sunny and bright, but his own emotions didn't reflect how the weather figured the day would be.
He held onto the mage-crafted stone ring and looked through it. In the distance he could see something dome shaped. Perhaps the area of influence. He saw how high it was up and wondered if any low-flying aircraft had been enticed by the message of change.
"Time to dance." He said to Elena.
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Post by Evangeline on Oct 11, 2009 1:25:26 GMT -5
"We can come along, if you don't mind." Rihanna said.
"Yeah." Annalise chimed in.
Dmitri came back to join Sandra and the Captain. "Done." he said. "Now just the waiting."
Bree texted to them: "Danae has him talking. Looks hopeful."
Elena smiled and nodded. It was the closed-lip smile of a hunter watching his prey approach the trap, or of a state trooper hiding behind the billboard while a speeder blew by. "Cue the music."
The others were getting ready.
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Post by elizar on Oct 11, 2009 15:21:02 GMT -5
"I would not mind." Ian said. He looked over to Liriel. "How about you?" He asked her. He was not the one in charge of the small band of recruiters, but that was always obvious.
Sandra went into a small store with wide opening, perhaps due to shopping windows already smashed to dust.
Minnie packed up her tent for the time being. She wasn't quite sure on how much was going to be accomplished now. And she had the feeling none did.
Jonathan paced a bit. He was finally going to get inside the dome and inside the area of influence. He wanted to know just how much was going to happen to him. Would he even change at all? Would some alarm sound when he entered, would it be then silent or apparent to him?
But he wasn't afraid. He was excited.
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Post by Evangeline on Oct 11, 2009 18:26:13 GMT -5
"No problem." Liriel nodded. "I agree, it's kind of skanky here anyway." She seemed eminently sweet and reasonable here, perhaps that was the danger.
"There's an old mall here," Danae pointed with a blade, "They have the farmers' market and haymarket there on Saturdays, but nobody's using it now."
Dmitri and the Captain sought out other hiding places, after spraying each other with onboard systems.
Elena and her boys were already packing up their necessary things to follow in. One could almost smell the tension, like the ozone in the air before a lighting strike.
Kelora shifted nervously as her eyes went over to Gideon.
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Post by elizar on Oct 11, 2009 20:30:44 GMT -5
"There aren't any others waiting on us." Ian said after he had sniffed the air a bit. "I guess you'll lead." He said to Danae. While Ash clearly showed himself as a local, he was still a human who wouldn't know the proper way to the mall that helicopters could get through.
Gideon didn't say anything, it would just add to the tension in the air. He simply nodded. Minnie went over to him to secure a backpack inside him. Emergency provisions for today's trip. They had to be ready for anything now, in case things went to hell in a span of seconds.
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Post by Evangeline on Oct 12, 2009 14:35:41 GMT -5
Danae moved out ahead of them and beckoned. "It's just this way." The other humans followed along behind Liriel.
Kelora was also taking on emergency provisions, and Teru mounted up into the "observer cockpit" just behind the Oka female's head.
"All aboard?" Elena called out.
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Post by elizar on Oct 12, 2009 14:46:47 GMT -5
Ian took the six while Ash fell in between. He was getting a bit nervous, trying not to be close enough to Liriel to warrant her attention. And it felt to him like Ian was preventing anyone to run away. One of the reasons for why he survived relic hunting solo was paranoia. And now, on the phase where things can go wrong, the plan was on a knife's edge.
"We are." Minnie said as she saw everyone within Kelora.
"I'll follow you in the rear." Gideon said through the small-range radio.
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Post by Evangeline on Oct 13, 2009 19:06:56 GMT -5
Annalise and Rihanna did their best to come across as carefree strangers just getting acquainted. But they were still maintaining situational awareness as the yawning mall entrance drew nearer. Bree was following discreetly in the distance, only to take a route to the back when she was sure that neither Ian nor Liriel were looking that way.
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