morally dubious dirt man 💔 weir dredger (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
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finalflight2023-06-26 11:54 am
fossick) wrote in finalflight2023-06-26 11:54 amEntry tags:
fossick) wrote in finalflight2023-06-26 11:54 am
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My words are never meant to warm. Only speak the truth. There is value in that, too, that more need to appreciate.
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[Both bread and vegetables are grilled nicely and she just starts to idly peel the hardboiled eggs.]
I appreciate you. Mercenary mindset and all.
[The manner in which she expresses gratefulness obscures the sincerity. Lucinda isn't under any illusions that he's an honorable man who's housing her out of the kindness of his heart. It's convenient and he's suspicious of her and rightly so. The woman has an eerie tendency to be able to read into another person's character, with or without the helpful whispers of shadows.]
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You'd be fool not to. I'm giving you a place to stay, never mind what you think of me otherwise.
[Neither is fooling the other: Weir will not pretend to be a gracious host, but he will be a host for someone who doesn't belong here, who appeared in the forest through a means that can only be described as a tear in the veil between worlds itself. One more oddity to add to the list of strange things happening about, the dangers that have lurked in the deepest parts of the forest, where there should be no danger at all.
Best to keep her close, if only to keep an eye on her for now.]
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[Lucinda is not above insincere flirtatious jests.
The meal is coming along nicely. She's basically making an open-faced sandwich. First the base of toasted bread with artful char marks. It's covered in a thin layer of butter and a generous spread of soft white cheese. Next is the placement of the meat and then the vegetables she cooked are diced into small pieces and mixed with sweet vinegar, salt, and pepper. And last of all is the hardboiled eggs, sliced and placed on top.
There are two servings, one for her, and one for Weir and additionally, she prepares a tray with the extra leftover bread and toppings. Lucy explains cheerfully.]
Since one won't be enough, especially since you were out all day. You can add what you like after you're done.
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[He says, noncommittally. Once more: he's rude, not dead. She is very pretty to look at, quite easy on the eyes, and it's hard not to let his gaze linger maybe a little too long on her tattooed skin, but Weir is not fool enough to fall into the trap she's set with that flirtatious retort. He'll keep that to himself else he's teased to oblivion and back — she seems the type.
Best to focus on the food, instead.]
Tomorrow— [He takes the plate with his serving without so much as a thanks. It’s simple, but still a lot more artful than what he bothers with.] —you’ll be out all day, too. Save enough for breakfast, because I don’t want to hear any whinging about an empty stomach come late morning.
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In her late teens, she had thought it was all Flora's doing. The spirit's sweet scent can draw people towards her, soften them to suggestion, and in most cases (because this is the most coveted for the Collective's operations), forget.
Her mother (the new one), dressed her up and worked around her ghost tattoos and the real ones to enhance her appearance. Working with other Collective members taught her how to use everything about herself to her advantage, not just her abilities to see and speak to shadows or have her three friends do her bidding.
She's a formidable agent for reasons other than her strange ghosts.
Lucinda seats herself against the wall with her serving using a fork to delicately cut into her meal. She's a slow eater.]
No whinging. [Her lips quirk a little at the word.] That's a promise.
[Not that she's done much of it if any at all. It could be mistaken as passivity, but it's more of a calculated move.
Or maybe she's just enjoying her time in this new world.]
Feather can wake me up. [She beams at Weir.]
So if you hear a thump on your floors, that's just her taking possession and making me roll off the bed.
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It’s fine. They both have their share of things unsaid for now.]
And you just let her do that? Possess you?
[Gods, it’s hard enough to sleep with a stranger in his lodgings. The idea of one who might be puppeted around by a ghost is (ironic) twice as bad.
Anyway. He’ll sit at the table and eat? Because he’s not a heathen???]
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Mm. [Lucy finishes a slice of egg before replying to Weir.]
Sorry. I forget that casual possession shouldn't be taken lightly. [yeah lucy you should know... she pats her shoulder where one of Flora's blooms is apparent.]
But these three have been with me for a long while so our communication is finely tuned. They would never take over my body unless I let them and even then it's limited.
[No, that still doesn't sound all that great... But better than the alternative of some stray demon taking hold of her sensitivity.]
Keep in mind, they are not ghosts of humans. To be honest, their nature and make is quite a mystery to even those on my side.
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If not human, then could they not be something more… insidious? Communication does not necessarily equate to trust.
[He can sense her spirits, in the way he can sense faint essences entwined with her own. Still, they baffle him — he’s not encountered anything quite like it since the acquisition of his own abilities.]
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[Her tattoos, both ghostly and normal draw attention away from the damage that's been done by "worse."]
Just so you know, I'm not dismissing your suspicions. Even among my own kind, they're unsettled by my current state. A medium usually begins and ends with seeing, speaking, and channeling the dead. More than one spirit that manifests beneath the skin? And I'm not dead myself? Rather unheard of. Not impossible but there isn't anyone else like me.
[She twirls her fork at him playfully.]
I'm what's derisively called, "a special snowflake."
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[Excuse him as he works on his sandwich for a bit.]
Your “snowflake” status [???] is not unsettling to me. That’s the wrong word for it. I’ve seen worse things than a woman who harbors something strange beneath her skin and talks to dead things.
[Its voice thrums in his head.]
What concerns me is why you are here at all. Does your “specialness” have anything to do with being thrown wide of your own world? This simply does not happen here, in this town.
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Have you now?
[She masks her interest to make it sound mild and proceeds to answer his question.]
Well. I think the conditions were just about right for it. Prior to waking up here, I was having... A disagreement with a warlock from my world. Fang had taken care of him but his workshop was in disarray. Many substances. I don't really remember what happened after I blacked out.
[It's true. Being thrown into another world was not on Lucinda's to-do list for the weekend.
She rolls her eyes as if expecting Weir to agree.]
Magic.
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Substances.
[His brow wrikles. That isn't particularly specific, nor is it helpful. He does, however, very much agree.]
Magic of that degree, I imagine, is only asking for needless complications. Of course this one had to find itself in my lap.
[weir you're not even the on who was flung out of your world]
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[Her opinion on witches and warlocks is lesser than most.]
Having dinner in another world with the most jubilant man I've ever met wasn't exactly my plan on my weekend off you realize?
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Even though Weir still uses magic to a (very) small degree, it's not like what used to exist; sorcerers and their ilk, weaving spells and unweaving them over and over again, testing, trying to achieve new heights that seemed far too fantastical to ever be anything than an opportunity to boost one's own reputation, one's own pride. Beyond that, he knows very little, beyond his passing experiences in the city and that one woman; those were never circles he cared to walk in.
And now, those circles very much do not exist. Magic is an untapped well, and those who try to draw it back up are cursed with bumbling fingers.]
You sound as though you speak from experience, from before you were sent here.
[He is not remarking about his jubilance, thank you very much.]
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[Lucinda idly places the side of her fork in the middle of her bread. Most of the toppings have been eaten save for a few diced vegetables and some egg slices.]
There are other individuals who fall in between the categories. [Like her to an extent.] But by and large that's what it mostly comes down to.
Espers outnumber the latter but those with magic are... Troublesome. I can kindly say that most witches keep to themselves and contribute when it matters.
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But those that do not… Like your warlock fellow. Is that the sort of trouble they cause? The sort that unwinds the fabric of time and reality?
...Why were you there, exactly?
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And I was there to apprehend him.
[That's the vague explanation. She cuts her bread in half and takes one piece to take a small bite.
And then she follows up with something more concise.]
Since he resisted, Fang took care of him as I've mentioned before.
[How? She actually hasn't been forthright about his power, how out of her three spirit companions, he was the most dangerous and posed the most threat to espers and magickind alike. Fang has a non-corporeal form and yet a physical and mental threat of significant proportions.
Lucinda is a perfectly well-rounded agent.]
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So... you are something of an authority figure in your community.
[aRE YOU THE POLICE, LUCINDA!!]
"Took care of him" as in, you killed him. How?
[Might as well see what he can get out of her about this Fang of hers.]
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yeah i guess]Mm. Enforcement is part of what I do but I'm not a go-to authority. I'm given assignments. More often than not, I perform damage control.
[Thanks Flora.]
Unfortunately, yes. It's really just my last resort.
[Lucy takes another bite of her food before answering Weir.]
Fang got the jump on him. [And she stops there, looking pointedly at Weir.]
What? Are you going to write a book about me?
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He gives her a pointed look in return.]
Am I not allowed curiosity? You come from another world, operating on a standard of rules utterly alien to a man such as myself.
[Deflect right back!]
We may eat in silence if you prefer.
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[She only has half a sandwich left!
Lucinda tilts her head at him just so and smiles sweetly.]
If you wanted to see Fang so badly, you didn't have to ask me in such a roundabout way, Weir.
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He may usually sidestep her little potshots of innuendo or flirtatiousness, but this time, he'll step up to that challenge.]
Show me, then.
[He'll either call her bluff, or she'll provide him a few more answers.]
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Alright.
[Lucinda stands up and sets her plate aside.
And starts unbuttoning her front blouse.]
Turn around please. I have some modesty you know.
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Some.
[Anyway,,
He stands, turns his chair around, and sits again with his back to her. Don't worry, he won't peek.]
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