iterumrp | Arrival Mingle

Entry tags:

Arrival Mingle

Who: Everyone.
What: The Chosen return or arrival in the City.
When: July 1st.
Where: The Districts of the City.
Anything Else? Feel free to make your own arrivals, or throw an arrival starter here! The party is open to all. As a reminder, language barriers are not an issue in the Tower.

The City hadn't changed at all in its time without the chosen. If anything, The City seemed a little dusty. The Chosen would find themselves waking in their assigned homes. Even if they were returning and had other homes. They would wake in their chosen home. For the most part, anyway, a few chosen had special ways of arriving.

The assigned housing varied depending on the district they were assigned according to their sin. However, everyone had a box, a welcome package awaiting them upon waking. Inside the box was an extra invitation inviting them to the tower if they so decided to come visit upon arrival.

The city was once again bustling with life. Cars, demons, and the people of the City moving as if time had never stopped. Business as usual for the returning Chosen.

The Tower

While it was not Aiden's district, he had talked the Duchess into opening up the ballroom, and Skiffell to provide food, that just didn't seem to end. The grand ballroom was filled with many delectable dishes, and a small band of demons playing big band music in the corner.

The doors were propped open with the music drifting out to help lull the chosen who decided to attend. A handwritten poster board outside the open doors displaying 'Welcome Chosen!' with about 10 smiley faces drawn on it. While normally parties at the tower demanded fancy dress, Aiden throwing a party meant that rule would not be abided. He didn't dig out the fancy threads for anyone. This was a different kind of party, put together by the lord of Leisurebrook.

While Aiden didn't plan to reveal himself as a magistrate, he did love to mingle with people and hear their stories. So he was there. He was napping at a round table off in a corner, his messy brown hair spilled over his crossed arms as he napped as if he didn't have a care in the world.

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"Yeah, what I'm making in a lab definitely isn't edible. It's usually distilling solutions and the occasional bodily fluid. Same basic principals as cooking. You have instructions that you need to follow, step by step. The result is different thing. Purpose too."

She grabbed a few more olives for her plate. They smelled great. She used to love olives...

Tilting her head to one side, she looked up at him again. "Why weren't you allowed to cook?"

"... You make potions?" Solutions, bodily fluids, what else could she be making?

"It was the House elves' job to cook and clean. And my mother wouldn't hear of me doing their work."

She shrugged one shoulder at the idea of potions. Before her untimely death, she would have scoffed at the term. Now, though? It wasn't exactly precise, but it wasn't exactly wrong either. A lot of what the dragons did was somewhere between science and alchemy. Maybe they did brew potions. All about your point of view.

Again, though, her eyebrows were lost in the fringe of her wig. "What's a house elf?" she asked.

Suddenly, she had the mental image of Orlando Bloom, in his full LOTR glory, wearing her father's 'kiss the cook' apron, holding a turkey baster.

Now Regulus assumed Sam could do magic and make magical potions.

"They are magical creatures that cook and clean for humans. My family owns a bunch of them." A look crossed Regulus' face as he explained it, a conflicted look. He didn't like the way House elves were treated.

"Owns," she repeated, a cautious look on her face. That was a tricky word. A complicated word. And, if she was being perfectly honest, kind of a dirty word. She didn't want to jump to conclusions, though. House Elves might not be...people. Maybe they were like Roombas or something?

Except Roombas didn't cook.

Regulus gave her a sad nod.

"It's a, um... it's not great. But they are magically bound to the estate and I don't- I didn't have access to the charms on the contracts. And if I tried to free them a different way, it would probably kill half of them outright. Or... my mother would."

House elves, his one soft spot.

Okay. Not Roombas. This guy's family owned actual people.

At least he had the decency to look really embarrassed about it. That didn't forgive the whole thing but...well, it was starting to explain some stuff about him.

Like the not being able to cook.

"That's disgusting," she said bluntly. "You get that, right?"

Regulus looked offended. "I didn't create the system! Wizards are terrible to House elves. But like I said, if I tried to free them it will go really bad for them. I can't change my family."

About a thousand arguments were ready to bubble up. Sam understood the lessons of history. Perhaps a little better than some, given she knew how involved the Kindred and Predators were involved.

What stopped her was that comment about families.

Yeah, she knew a thing or two about shitty families. Her own biological family had more or less destroyed...everything. And nothing she could do or say or be would change them. She knew better than to even try.

She swallowed. Hard. "I'm not saying you created the system," she said, trying to sound even keeled. "I'm just saying that system sounds pretty fucked up."

Regulus visibly backed down. He nodded.

"It is a terrible system," he agreed.

And he found he didn't want to talk about it more because he was here and poor Kreacher, his family's house elf, was stuck back home and who knew what his mother was doing to him.

"So... what potions do you make?" He was definitely changing the subject.

Potions. That was a word that would take some getting-used-to. "Uh, well, my primary area of interest has always been genetics. So I mostly mix solutions that can help to isolate and identify YDNA and mtDNA in samples. I can analyze autosomal DNA too."

It would be easy conversation with another Dragon. Or a scientist. But this was a dude that whipped out a hand and had elf slaves.

Sam rocked on the balls of her feet, for a moment. "Basically, I can tell you a lot about your body and who your parents are, by looking at genetic samples. Blood, fingernails, hair. It can tell me where your family comes from or what diseases you might be prone to getting. Although mostly, it's used to identify people's fathers, back home. Usually on a talk show, in front of a life, studio audience."

She paused, debating the next part. There was no fucking Masquerade. That was what all the evidence seemed to suggest. But she still wasn't quite ready to reveal what she was. Maybe just test the waters, a little. "Uh, my brother and I were also developing a kind of...protective antidote. That...neutralizes the abilities of others. Specifically...um...well...mind control..."

Regulus took all of that in, understood only half, and synthesized it down to: "Blood magic."

And he nodded in appreciation. "A potion that protects against mental intrusions is good for those who cannot master Occlumency or lack the mental will to break the Imperious curse," and then he added, because Sam clearly wasn't from his world, "mental scrying and mind control."

Blood magic was probably more of a Circle of the Crone sort of thing. But it was pretty accurate, for the purposes of this conversation. And the lines between the Circle and the Ordo Dracul had kind of been blurred, in light of the whole apocalypse thing and all.

All that to say, she gave him a slight nod at the descriptor.

"I guess that kind of sums it up," she said.

Wow, she was actually having a casual conversation about deep Kindred secrets with a total stranger. What the fuck was this day?

And what a day for Regulus. Here he was successfully having a conversation with someone who would probably throw his family into a right fit.

He wished he could explain how difficult this was for him, but words failed him.

So instead, he said, "Erm, thank you- for helping me with food." He gestured at the plates. They were almost full enough for the preservation charm and sending back to his room.

"How... how did you, erm... procure employment?" It was one thing to mooch a few week's worth of food off this party, it was another to think of the long term.

She supposed it made sense that a guy whose family owned slaves probably didn't know much about working. Admittedly, Sam herself had been a spoiled rich kid for a while there. Not slave-level, or anything. But at least she hadn't had to worry about paying for college.

So, no judgment. This time, anyway.

"Work in progress," she admitted. "I'm visiting the hospital in a few days to see if they could use a lab assistant." She didn't need much money. Rent seemed to be covered, and it wasn't like she was a fashion plate. Mostly, she just needed to hold body and soul together. Which meant art supplies and figuring out a way to pay for blood.

The latter was...tricky. She was thinking...butcher shop? Maybe? Felt kind of nasty, but it was nastier to just chew on random locals who could have who-knew-what in their systems.

That was an accurate assessment of Regulus' familial expectations in life: rich enough that 'employment' was what other people did, and positions such as serving on boards and committees was just handed to his family members and they did such when they felt like it.

"So... you just go there and they just give you a job?" Interviewing, resumes, applying to positions, looking for jobs he was qualified for - all foreign concepts to him.

Oh, this poor dude. "No," she said, the corners of her eyes crinkling just slightly. "There's a process. First, there has to be a job available. Then, you kind of need to prove that you're the right person to fill that job. There are usually a few candidates, so you need to stand out as the best one." Wait. No. "The most qualified one." The word 'best' was a snake pit.

Sam saw the subtext happening here. Regulus was going to need a job.

It was his way of asking for help without actually asking for help.

"Start by thinking about what you're good at doing," she said. "Come up with a list of things. There may be a job that matches that list."

Regulus was quiet as he took in this information. Make a list of things he was good at but he wasn't sure anyone needed a Seeker on a Quidditch team - the only other person here who knew who that was was his brother and that was not enough for even one team, even if they could get over this not talking to each other thing. He was good at making and breaking wards and curses... did that count? His charm work wasn't bad, maybe that was useful?

"What... if there isn't a job that matches the list?"

"You either make the job up yourself, or you take one that only uses some of the things on the list, I guess," she said. "There are basic jobs out there that pretty much anyone can do." But something told her that he wasn't going to want any of them.

No judgment.

She wouldn't want some of them either.

Regulus nodded.

"Okay, I'll... make a list and then..." he trailed off because he didn't know the next step. "Where do I find the jobs to match with my list?"

"The inter--"

She cut herself off. After all she'd been through back home, with the Rain of Fire and all of that shit, a part of her was genuinely amazed that she'd immediately defaulted back to assuming things like the internet still functioned and shaped society.

The City was no post-apocalyptic aftermath. But it still didn't have what she'd once considered a basic tool of survival, a necessity.

Fuck. They were going to have to kick this old school. Like her parents used to talk about. Like in 1980s sitcoms. "I guess a newspaper?" she said, wrinkling her nose. "They usually have those, uh, classified ads."

This was surprisingly an answer that wasn't frightening to Regulus. He absolutely knew what newspapers were. His had moving images, so that would be a shock to him, but the basic concept of a newspaper was already there in his head.

Okay, he'll make a list and check that list against ads in the newspaper. Maybe this wasn't as daunting as he originally thought.

"You have been... very helpful." Spoken with a great deal of surprise, he'd learned early in life not to expect that from people.

"I can send-" He gestured to the plate she was holding with his wand to signify he wanted to send it to his room.

Helpful. Not an adjective often applied to Sam. Although it wasn't like she wanted to be a little shit all the time. It just seemed to come to her naturally. Mostly because she was always surrounded by fucking awful people, it seemed. Even the ones she loved could be...well...

Grace Yi had burned down that orphanage.

Shaking her head a little, she handed Regulus the plate. "It's cool," she said. "The magic. I mean, it's really fucking cool."

Before taking Sam's plate, Regulus sent the one in his hand off to his room.

He paused before sending off the plate.

"I... um... I'm on the fourteenth floor. I guess, if you-" Well, he didn't know if she'd want to know that. But this was probably the most positive interaction he'd had in this place so far and he thought, maybe, he wouldn't mind running into her again.

"Eighth," she replied.

While Sam knew she wasn't always the best with people, she also knew she needed them. It was the paradox of the Kindred. They were all crazy loners who needed each other. Or something more tactful and poetic.

Honestly, didn't seem all that different from humans. Give or take a tendency to chew on people, sometimes.

Besides, Regulus was...he was all right. At least, he wasn't some jackass who thought he knew the answer for everything. Obviously, he didn't. Sam could appreciate someone with the balls to admit it when he had no idea what the fuck he was doing.

...even if she had a hard time of it herself.

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