|
Fox had been home during the Big Meeting, and she went about texting everyone, quickly rounding up Liezel and Mei and letting Vasha know what the fuck is up. She's fully dressed -- she's even wearing hiking boots! -- calmly sitting on the couch, drinking water. Waiting.
Mei doesn't take too long to get home from the meeting, and when she comes through the door she immediately starts making a search for the others. Soon enough she's entering the living room and finds Fox on the couch there, which makes her immediately pause. "You have boots on," she says. "Are you sure you're not an impostor?"
Liezel isn't long in arriving at all, maintaining the cessation of her visible and audible presence until she's safely inside the apartment. Possibly on Mei's heels. She strides straight into the living room. "What do we know?"
Very direct. Clearly crisis-mode Liezel.
"The Seer I captured after redacting her hit on two Changeling? She escaped. She's a Fate and Time Master, probably a Mind Master as well. Her fate is unbound, and she has no compunction about shunting her fate onto another. She had no Potentia when I handed her over, and was bleeding out from the beating she'd received. Unless she's had help, she's going to be vulnerable. But we should assume she's had help."
Vasha has opened up the weapon closet and is constructing his personal load out. Black metal firearms into city camo fatigues.
"If she hasn't escaped to her Pylon, it's because she still has a mission. We can't let her complete it."(edited)
"I got my stomping boots," Fox answers very calmly, like this is all just another conversation that they're having. "You can check if it's me, I'm still me." She looks at Mei, then. "Jackie said you were there, with Walsingham. Did he have anything else important to say?"
"Understood." Liezel spoke plainly, turning this over in her mind. "Fate and Time will be difficult to challenge. Easier without potentia, but not a perfect solution, especially if she uses such magicks to preclude the actions to deprive her. Perhaps best we enter this planning to undo whatever magicks she might have hanging, promptly followed by a removal of such potentia as she might have recovered. Then the matter of finding and approaching without her being so informed of our intents to do so. Doable, but challenging."
"What do we believe her mission to be? The attack on the Changelings?" All in that plain, no-nonsense tone. The soldier addressing field command.
"Walsingham arranged to pay me a visit," Mei says, moving toward Fox and taking a seat beside her. "I know you're not really an impostor. I can tell such things," she says with some confidence. "I was just joking."
"Anyway, to the point... Walsingham seems to be pretty worried that The Major Arcana let the Seer go on purpose," she says with a grimace. "He didn't say so in as many words, but I'm pretty good at seeing through falsehoods, and reading the meaning underneath. That's what it came around to. They had her captive, and now she's not captive any more. They haven't told anyone, though."
She pauses, remembers something, and takes a coin out of her jacket pocket. "Hey Vasha. Walsingham gave me something to pass on to you." And if he comes back into the room, she flips it to him.
"Did you get a good look at her face? I'm going to ask an uncomfortable question, but are you sure that she wasn't someone from the Major Arcana in disguise?"
"I did. It didn't look like Gardener. Not that it means much. Why? Are you suggesting they're crooked?" Vasha's not sounding like he's leaping to their defense, more wondering what she knows that he doesn't.
"We'll want to dial up our mental faculties. Make it harder for her to mess with our heads. Mental shields and prime shielding as well. I'll do what I can to safeguard your fates, but... just counterspell whatever she throws out. Don't let her get anything off."
Fox stays mostly quiet for the theorizing. "If she's free, then she may not be short of Potentia. We don't know -- like -- the sources she may have access to, whether or not anyone helped her." And then she offers, "Maybe we split up the counterspelling vs the acting. Designated people to counterspell, designated people to act."
"There's a whole list of crimes she committed in attempting to murder two people with magic. And that's not even touching on the diplomatic implications of Changelings dying under our watch. That she is now, somehow, free and clear and Walsingham had to relay that information indirectly says much, I think. Otherwise there's no reason to be so quiet about it. Three dozen eyes be much better than one- there are few reasons to not share this information, and the gentlest would be an accusation of downright toxic arrogance. Were this an accident, I believe all would have heard about it in short order. That we did not..." She narrows her lips. She doesn't say that she suspects a traitor. But it's hard not to read between the lines.
Liezel's lines are very, very big font, after all.
"I don't know enough about them, personally. I'm only suggesting that Walsingham seems to be worried that they're crooked, as well as worried about the consequences he might face if it gets out that he dropped some hints to a bunch of people. Including Changelings."
She sighs. "There are other possibilities, of course. Walsingham could be setting us up himself, somehow. She could have escaped without The Major Arcana realizing it. They could be keeping a lid on things in hopes that they can capture her again and nobody will be the wiser. I don't know. I just know that Walsingham seemed to be genuinely concerned. I might even say afraid, but not to the point of panic."
With a look over at Fox she says, "I got the impression that Jackie knows where she is, somehow, and is off hunting her."
"Then we need to beat her to the target, or she's very likely dead. They knew enough to use cold iron in their costuming, and they're here to gut the Lost. For all we know, Jackie was always the real target, and all we did is help flush her out." Vasha finishes loading extra magazines into his pouches, and begins holstering his many weapons.
"She'll be weak to Forces. Use that if you can."(edited)
"I have, as it happens, been working on some magicks that might help to suppress hostile casters. I'm- not entirely sure the Imago is going to hold, but I intend to try all the same. One, I think, will do us wonders regardless, but it's the other I'm unsure of. I will keep you appraised if the Rote comes together as I hope," Liezel offers helpfully.
"And you've given me an idea. If Jackie is tracking her, we don't need to find the Seer. We need to find where Jackie is going to cross paths with her and be there first."
Vasha now has a plan, clearly. His scowl has become a vague 'I am cleverer than them' smile. "And we can tell everyone I redacted a second hit. No need to source how we got there first. Walsingham is safe, and we don't tip the Major Arcana off that they're made." Vasha seems to really like this plan.
Fox sits quietly, listening to everyone, and ventures again, "What I meant was that -- maybe it would be a good idea for like... Mei and I to trade off counterspelling, for example. So you two can work. But if she's weak to Forces... " her voice trails off thoughtfully. "I mean that can be my thing I guess. Or someone's."
She absently chews her lower lip, watching Vasha work his way through the political implications, which, frankly, she isn't very good at.
"I think it's definitely best to assume that The Major Arcana is compromised until we know otherwise, given the circumstances," Mei says with a regretful tone. "Since there aren't many good explanations for why they'd let the Seer go. I can certainly help with counterspelling, and with dispelling things. I should consider working through rotes for that, in fact."
"So long as she can cast nothing, I think we are better off. Best we over index and prolong the battle safely over risking allowing her to cast, I would think, yes?" Liezel asks, glancing between the others. She was practiced in many things. Attacking Mages was not exactly on that list.(edited)
"Correct. And with the abyss behaving as it is, our counterspells disturb nothing. Her spells just keep getting harder and costing her more. It's how I beat her the first time. So she may try fewer spells. But still. Counter them all."
|