|
NEW SCENE @sevensided (Anthony) The Frankford Chocolate Factory is a bit outside of the heart of Philly, and is the site of a 150 year old factory that has been out of use for some time now. From the outside it looks like a dump. It turns out to be a reasonably well secured dump, with gated fences, security systems,and most of what could have once been windows now bricked over. Inside it a well maintained facility, but only where things are tucked away from possible prying eyes. Even someone flying a drone around the building to look inside will only see what really appears to be a run down factory, but once you get past the disused layers there are well light hallways, small apartments including safe rooms, and a large chamber that serves as the Elysium's lounge. There's plent of comfortable seating, including table & chair combinations as well as sofas, piles of cushions, and reading nooks, but there's also a stage that has all of the equipment someone might need to put on a performance, whether that's music, or comedy or unholy rituals to summon dark powers. Floretta is there, sitting down at one of the table with a dog sitting on her lap, peeking at whatever she's doing, a little brown pup with curled brown fur. The Kindred herself is dressed in a pair of fashionably torn jeans, heeled bootes and a purple t-shirt that hangs off of her shoulder. (Blush Active)
The footsteps that heralded Anthony's arrival sounded almost deliberate. Like footsteps meant to herald his arrival. The man making them was shy of six feet tall, dressed in a horrid burgundy velour tracksuit and out of place combat boots. The Mekhet, being oddly obvious, walked into the open area, and dropped the large green duffle he had slung over his shoulders. It impacted the floor tellingly, like paradoxically heavy object, and Anthony stretched. "Not much has changed I see," he said to no one in particular, then looked over his shoulder at Floretta. Or rather her dog. "Why hello there little puppy!"
"Rogers?" Her head tilt to the side and her dog who seems to be enthused at the addresses toward him. "Anthony Rogers?" she turns around and cross her legs, containing her dog so he doesn't run toward the kindred. "Man it's been kind of a while." she looks down at her dog "This is Herbert, by the way."
"Well how do you do, Herbert?" he asked, trying a smile that mostly failed. It was a lot like watching a tree try to smile. It just didn't work. The kindred squatted to fish through the duffel. "Floretta. Floretta. It is Floretta, yes?" He didn't look up from his search. "I remember a Floretta. She was a lot like you. So like you. Like..as if you were twins. or the same person. Ah!" He pulled out a bone- not a toy bone or the sort of bone one got for a dog from a pets store. No, this was a leg bone of something big. It also looked old. Anthony waved it out in front of him. "Would Herbert care for a treat?"
Floretta nods once blinking at the macabre offer and then looks down at her dog and then the bone. "The bone is bigger than him." she murmur with a little bit of amusement. "Also, who or what did it belong to?" she pets the dog at little bit, as he seems interested in the aforementioned treat. "And it seems like he'd be interested, I think."
"Well of course he would be interested! He's ferocious like a ferocious wolf!" Anthony exclaimed, and slid the bone across the ground towards Floretta. "Its a bear femur," he answered, straightening, with an extra flex at his lowerback, like an old man with lower back problems. "So what's the news, Miss Floretta? A whole decade, something had to happen."(edited)
"Two unauthorized embrace happened, one of them is still on the run." Floretta lets Herbert land onto the ground and it's a good few second of her being entirely too amused by the small pup struggling with the bear bone. "We got a bunch of Nereids in town chasing after a black glass artifact, an ancient vampire that can only feed from other vampires that want to cause trouble and possibly related to nereids, but I'm not sure about it." She pauses for a moment. "One of the Inwictoos got ashed because she tried to mess with changelings with Dominate and shit." she finally looks up to Anthony.
He was still fixated on watching the puppy try its teeth on the bone. "Faeries. Bad mojo. Well, serves them right," Anthony absolutely failed to lament, with a shrug. He walked over an dropped into a chair by Floretta like a person bored with standing. "Ancient kindred. Anyone we know, or intruder? Or did the Phanatic turn out to be some elder monstrosity like I always warned everyone."
"I don't know what the Phanatic is but the name he claims to have is like, from biblical time." a shrug. "Rihat of Nineveh, a few people in town have shared what they know about the dude. He made his intro by dominating some poor woman into crashing into an elysium and making his introduction to people."
"Rihat, eh? Never met 'em. Sounds positively apocalyptical, though," Anthony says with slow nods of his head. "How's Sakimama handling it? Drumming up the troops? Parley? Appeasement? Oh, I know. She revealed she's a badder mama jamer than he is." He paused, then shrugged again, leaning back in his chair. "You...don't know the Philly Phanatic? Baseball mascot? Green? Mouth round and open like something with a wide open mouth?" Anthony stretches open his mouth to demonstrate.
How to tell the player of the character is not actually from Philly. "Wow I'm an idiot, no, no so far he's on the up and up." she chuckles "I don't really speak with the Sakima all that often, so I don't know what kind of stuff she got planned for that guy or what she wants to do."
"Well fiiiine. We need to up your social circles," he noted. "Wait, were we friends?" He rubbed at his chin as he thought about that. "Ahh, nevermind. So what's new in your world, aside from the pup. Man, look at the little devil go. The bear bone might not be enough."
Floretta watches as Herbert struggles with it and gnaws and growls at it. "I mean, I can definitely see the fun I'm going to have watching him play around all day." Floretta grins at the effort deployed by her little puppy. "Right now I'm working on too much stuff to work on social circles in addition, but I agree when my occulty stuff is all done, I agree."
Anthony narrowed his eyes at her. "Is your occulty stuff ever finished? I thought that was the point of you all," he asked, waving a thin fingered hand in her direction. "Study study study. Lab work lab work lab work. Only the occasional -" he makes a gesture with his two hands as if he were miming cutting into someone with a chainsaw- "to lighten up the spirits?"
"Nah that was just one of the guys who got caught up embracing illegally. Ruined our rep." She shake her head and she says it pretty straight-faced too, then the bear bone hits her legs and she jerks away from it. "We're mostly occult nerds who bicker about what methods of divination is better." yeah that one sounds like bullshit. "And yeah it's rarely finished, but, I do have a point in my head that I want to get to before I start playing the social game."
"Well you tell old Uncle Anthony when that is, if that is, and I will be certain to point you towards someone who can actually play that game," the Mekhet assured her. "I mean, someone of them should still be around, right? Its Philadelphia- who wouldn't want to live here?" Anthony rubbed the back of his neck. "So who is Keeper of this dump? Still Chevrolet? "
"Esme is the keeper of this particular Elysium, Clayton got infected by the Nereid and he's one of them now, don't fight them or you could be one of them too." It's clear that detail hits her in the middle of her idea and she just smushed the two together as she went. "Takes a week to settle in, after that you're done."
"A week? Nah, I'll be settled in two days- oh OH! You're talking about these Nereid. Steal your body, do they?" Anthony gives a sage nod . "Or...disease? Kind of shocked how much happens in a decade. You go off on an excavation for a bit, and suddenly its all Invasion of the Body Snatchers around here..or..or like..some other old horror movie."
"Speaking of. Where were you ?" She asks curiously, playing tug of war with Herbert and the bone, letting the dog win for the moment
Anthony spread his hands as he spoke, like a magician revealing a poorly done trick. "Alaska..." It was almost a hiss. He patted down his track suit until he pulled out a boarding pass for United...and Anchorage was indeed the point of departure. "See. Cold. Like...Russia cold up there. Was almost Russia, you know. Alaska. Imagine if that had happened."(edited)
"The cold war would have been much different I feel like." Floretta mentions, then pulls on the bone until the poor puppy is on his hindlegs, trying to not let it go. "Were you there for a specific reason?"
"Yes, but that would be telling, Miss Floretta, and that sort of information has a cost involved," Anthony informed her, a single finger raised. Then he looked around. "Wonder if the basement is still a ruin. Might have to sleep here today. What a boooooore."
"Oh, the Bellevue Hotel Elysium provides for rooming for kindred in need of it, I can give you in adress if you need to re acquire it." Floretta seem unbothered by the refusal to answer her question.
"The hotel, eh?" The Mekhet made a show of considering it. "I guess I should have gone there first, but damn glad I didn't! Cause then i wouldn't have met Herbert!" Anthony slid off his chair, squatting before the dog, hands raised. His odd smile stretched across his face like a rubber band being pulled from both ends. "But it is nice to see my Family hasn't burned down half the city and left in a huff."(edited)
"Which family are you with?" She ask curiously, the dog comes close and barks once, sniffing at Anthony', curious and wary just a little bit.
"The Rodriguez family. They made an offer I absolutely could not refuse. And they were so...smooth with it too," Anthony replied, letting Herbert smell him. He did shower regularly, so nothing to untowards should have been on him. "So whats the newest object of study on your dockett? Wait...let me guess..you are..." He squinted up at her and placed a hand to his temple. "You are....studying the neirid whatsitmacallit?"
"I did study a little about them, but whatever I found is part of the greater information available about it. Plan of action are happening and I'll be trying to help" A shrug. "RIght this moment, most of my studies are going toward more into applying my knowledge of the occult than like, anything specific."
When Floretta revealed he was not quite right with his guess, Anthony glowered at his hand he had held to his head, as if it had been the one to come up with the wrong guess. "Guess I'm a bit rusty. So like...whats that entail? I mean...whatever you can lay on me without getting in trouble with the Axes. They're still axes right? that hasn't changed, has it?"
"Yeah even if one of them uses fist." she chuckles "Basically right now I'm trying to find a way to use my knowledge in occult in some useful fashion, that's not just ... oh I know things." she offers a shrug. "It's a little harder than it looks"
Still sitting on the floor, Anthony leaned an elbow on his seat, and rested a head in his hand. "Yeah...sounds like it," he agreed, like someone agreeing for the heck of it. "But there is a power in 'knowing things' all its own. information allows people to create and enact countermeasures to so many problems that plague us in the night. Plus, you know, self awareness is like...enlightenment, you know?"
"I know!" She chuckles a little bit and roll her shoulders a little bit. "But I know other people can do some stuff with their knowledge I'm just trying to find my own."
"Well you can't sell it, cause then you'd get ...The Axe," Anthony notes overly dramatic. "I thought the whole...schtick, of you all, was to take this mountain of knowledge, and then try to find make change things with it. Like...maybe you could find a cure for my incessant laughing at bad TV shows? Its a curse, I am certain, because there is no way Mister Ed is still funny." He shook his head. "It sounds like you might be having issues trying to decide what precisely you want to actually do with your knowledge. Less a need of experimentation and more about being decisive. " He checked a non existent watch. "Well hell's bells. I should probably scoot on over to the Hotel. Getting a Lyft is chaos at this time of morning."
"Alright, Anthony, happy to see you back." Floretta smiles "And thanks for the little bit of advice." she rubs her hand together, trying to get the dog's attention. "Have a nice rest."
He rises again, and collects the overly heavy duffle back. "Wow. Thanks, that means a lot," he said, hand to his chest. "Keep the bone. It makes a great door stop and bludgeoning device to ward off muggers." He grinned. It was like a three year old drew a smiley face on a plate. "And hey, stay safe in the night, you know? Ciao." He threw up a peace sign and walked out, his heavy steps trailing after him.(edited)
|