faderift | open

[other closed stuff might go here too, hmu for something or wildcard]

[Matthias' desk is typically tidier than might be expected of him. Papers are piled neatly, ink stains are wiped away, and his files are suspiciously in order. This comes at great personal effort. He is not, by nature, a tidy person. Anyone who shares the dormitory with him could tell you as much. He has taken the opportunity of such things like free and available personal space and personal possessions to cultivate an equally personal untidiness, but once he crosses the threshold of the Forces office, he shrugs on a cloak of Professionalism and cleans up after himself with meticulous attention.

This afternoon, however, his desk is strewn with crumpled pieces of paper, and more crumpled parchment litters the floor around him. It is approaching after hours, and no one is around, so Matthias is muttering to himself as he works. He can be observed to pause occasionally, hold up the piece of paper he has been scribbling on, scan the lines with his lips moving occasionally, repeating back phrases to himself--and then, he frowning. Sometimes he swears. And every time he crumples that paper up, tosses it away, grabs a fresh page, and begins to write again.]

'Con... trol. I want to learn how to have better control because I think that it will'-- fuck, no, 'because I know that it... will... help me...'

[He doesn't narrate the whole thing aloud. Just pieces. Anyone with business in the Forces office will have to side-step the balls of paper. Crunch one underfoot and Matthias looks up, startled and wild-eyed, and immediately moves to shift aside the page that he's working on, and stumble to his feet to start gathering up the crumpled ones.]

Edited 2020-08-15 21:10 (UTC)

[There is a little patch of hardy roses. It is late enough in the summer that their blooms have started to go crispy at the edges of the petals. Matthias is sitting cross-legged on the ground beside them. He's made a neat stack of rose petals next to one knee. He is holding the empty stem, and shifts his hand so that he can push his left thumb against one of the thorns.

The cut beads with blood. Clinically, Matthias drops the stem back onto his knee and lifts his hand, studying the place the thorn had pierced. He blows on it, experimentally, and then he holds his right hand over his thumb, concentrating. There's a glow, a cool feeling in his thumb, and when he lifts his right hand away--the cut is gone.

Satisfied, he turns his thumb back and forth, examining it from each angle. Then he wipes the leftover blood on his shirtsleeve, picks up the stem, and pricks his finger again, methodical.]

[other closed stuff might go here too, hmu for something or wildcard]

[The Silver Fish isn't as gleaming as its name makes it sound. Nikos likes it for that. He has spent a lot of time in taverns like this, shadowed and generally inhabited by people who don't come for the conversation. When he was younger, he used to come to places like this, desperate to prove himself among the People. Slumming. He was a fucking idiot. He knows better now.

Brusque, and without comment, Nikos stuffs the last of his pamphlets under the lantern sitting in the center of the last trestle table. The paper is not very thick, but it's enough to tilt the lantern a little, shifting the light across the scarred surface of the table.

The pamphlets are Caspar's idea. Everything is Caspar's idea. But Caspar's ideas work, usually, so Nikos does as he's told.

The language in the pamphlet is simple and digestible, written to be read. A short summary of the history of the title of viscount, the history of the Orlesian occupation of Kirkwall, the sanctioned process of nobility electing a new line of viscounts from their own ranks when the viscount dies without an heir. A king who is not called a king remains a king, inevitable tyranny. It draws no conclusions but poses simple and pointed questions, questions that the reader of the pamphlet will, hopefully, answer for himself, or at least begin toward consideration.

Or wipe his arse with it, Nikos had said to Caspar, when Caspar read it aloud to him. Which made Caspar laugh, which made Nikos, against all odds, smile, because--Maker's balls--he's over thirty years of age and he is still besotted.

Not right now. Not on his face, at least. It helps that Caspar isn't in the room. Right now, Nikos is ready to get down to the business of drinking the last of his wine, and going back to the bar for more.]

[There is a very large and well cared-for raven that puts in regular appearances to the Gallows' rookery. His smooth black plumage and sleek head make him look like a cut-out of midnight whenever he appears. He is well-trained, does not jostle the other birds overmuch as he sits on a perch, eats his fill and then some, but does not peck at anyone's hands if they reach for him.

The letter today, tied tightly to his leg, bears an elaborate purple wax seal, an ornate letter A twisty with vines and blooming flowers. This mark is always upon what he is delivering, in regular correspondence.

Nikos tries to be at the rookery early to intercept, before anyone sees the raven or the letter or the seal. This is difficult for him, after a late night, and he stumbles up the last few steps this morning, looking disheveled and irritated. Breathing heavily, he leans against the wall--after he's checked the patch for caked-on birdshit.]

[other closed stuff might go here too, hmu for something or wildcard]

[The Base Operations office is awash in paperwork.

This isn't remarkable. The filing system is a continual work in process, regularly revamped and typically dissatisfying. Between Salvio and Poppell, there is always a better way that things could be done, some new system that will save time and fix all of the issues, and so files are perpetually out of the cabinets, stacked in slumping towers on every available surface, and generally giving the whole place the impression of a very small and very ramshackle city.

Salvio is up to his elbows in a drawer, taking out a sheaf of papers, skimming its cover page, then setting it aside into a particular stack. The area around him is quickly becoming a ramshackle suburb of that ramshackle city. Occasionally he stops and flips a few pages in to the sheaf that has gotten his attention, reading quickly.

To anyone who enters, he will offer a distracted greeting, and go right back to what he is doing. He is on a mission.]

[It isn't every day that the Seneschal leaves the Gallows. And he is not really leaving today, either, but has come down to the ferry dock to argue with a man who has disembarked with a freakishly large goat.

Words don't do it justice. This goat is nearly the size of a pony.]

No, this is not-- There has been some mistake, please. I did not-- Serrah, a moment--

[The man continues to talk over Salvio, jabbing his finger at a piece of paper he is holding. It says right here, mate, got it here--one goat, and that's your name, innit--

The goat, meanwhile, stares blankly forward, her yellow eyes fixed on some distant point in space. Or perhaps fixed on nothing at all. It is difficult to say, when it comes to the peculiar and unnerving eyes of a goat.

The argument goes on for some time, but eventually, Salvio can be seen dejectedly leading the goat into the Gallows, while the ferry sets off back to Kirkwall, with one slightly richer goat man on it.]

[Already at the bar and acquiring his first drink is one Obeisance Barrow, who, noticing the familiar face (though he isn't sure which one it belongs to), raises his mug in smiling greeting.]

Easier to think down here, isn't it?

[All the while, a little white dog with one floppy ear has been sitting patiently in the boat and giving the distinct impression that it is enjoying the scene.

Before the ferry can pull away, it hops off onto the dock and trots after Salvio and the goat, tail wagging cheerfully.]

[ Nell's not one for stealth, but with Matthias so engrossed and the garden's patch of lawn not yet dried to a crisp, it's easy for her casual wander to take her close enough to spot the blood, and the deliberate press of thorn to thumb. She frowns. Are there any good explanations for this? ]

What are you doing?

[ Normally, Batty Batkins lives in the aerie with the griffons, but sometimes he finds his way to the rookery, and since she didn't find the giant fluffy creature cuddling up under Chawcey's wing, this seemed like the next best place to look.

So she's here, with an oblong basket of nearly-too-far-gone fruits from the kitchen when Nikos stumbles into view. Athessa turns to look, sees who it is, and hesitates. They haven't spoken since Sonia's party, when she took her frustration out on both him and Kostos. There's a gnawing little voice telling her she should probably apologize...but she doesn't. Not yet, anyway. ]

...Mornin'.

[ Athessa doesn't usually have business in the Forces office, but lately she's been playing courier (ever since she mistakenly did REAL WORK while pretending to be the Lord Ambassador for a joke), so she's here with just a boring stack of missives to pass off to whoever is there with hands to take them.

But she doesn't expect to stumble over crumpled up bits of paper, stepping on one with a crunch and toeing a few others out of her way. Looks like a graveyard of letters, here. ]

Uh...Matty? What's with all the—? [ A broad gesture. All of this. ]

[ She doesn't mean to find Matthias in the courtyard, but she does. It's a matter of happenstance, coming back from an afternoon of watching people at the market and occasionally intervening in alleyways. Sometimes, she does this: without the City Guard, without Riftwatch, waiting for cutpurses to try their luck and keeping them from success.

Because he seems intent on his roses, she doesn't join him, just watches his back from a distance and admires the slight movements he makes. Silently, she moves a little closer, angling herself so she can see something of what he's doing. He touches a thorn, lets it go, admires the blood that results. And then he does it again. That magic happens in between feels immaterial to her.

She keeps watching from the shadows, wondering what it feels like for him, to break open his skin over and over in the same place. Eventually, when she realizes she'll have to ask to know for sure, she comes a little closer. ]

People dislike it when you make yourself bleed.

What? Oh--shit--

[Athessa. Guiltily, Matthias shoves his chair back from his desk, drops to his knees, and begins to scoop the discarded crumpled pages closer to him.]

Just some-- some writing. Sorry. Don't look.

[Having Nell Voss walk up to him and ask him anything is enough to take Matthias' breath away. When he looks around at her, he is appropriately star-struck for a moment. Never mind that she has been nothing but helpful and generally kind (or ambivalent, but that's nearly the same thing, isn't it) to him. It is still Nell Voss. Possibly he will never be over that.

Once the awe clears a little, though, Matthias looks around again, and remembers that he is holding a rose stem, and a little bead of blood is dotted on his thumb, and--]

Oh. Er. Just-- practicing. Practicing healing, I mean.

I won't— [ She'll just...corral the detritus into a pile. ]

What seems to be the problem?

[Laura is quiet when she approaches, besides quiet, naturally--and Matthias is focused--so when she speaks, he jumps, startled. The thorn sticks hard in his thumb and he hisses, shakes it out, even as he looks wildly around at Laura.]

What? No, I'm not-- I mean, I am, yeah, but it's only 'cause I'm practicing. Healing.

[And it's normal. He shoves the rose stem away from him, wipes his bleeding thumb on his shirt.]

S' all right.

[Nikos grunts, which is as close as he will get to assenting, and shoves his cup across the bar. It is refilled; he lays down coin.

He doesn't walk away, but tolerates the company for a moment of quiet. Easier to think that way. He takes a mouthful of wine, swallows it, then says,]

Nikos. Not Kostos. To forestall hilarious confusion.

[Or not so hilarious. He's been held accountable for Kostos' debts a few times.]

[Nikos rolls his eyes around to look at her. Then he closes his eyes and breathes out. It isn't exasperation, exactly.]

Mm.

[Dull and dry-mouthed, he swallows hard. Too early. Still with his eyes closed, he lifts one hand and taps his chest.]

Nikos. [And, in case she needs more prompting,] The friendly one.

There's no problem!

[Scrabbling blindly, he grabs her foot once, lets go with an uh, and keeps sweeping the paper into his arms.]

It's just work. A project. I'm, erm, writing... a thing. Like a paper, sort of. But not that scholarly. Er, I mean, it's not a paper, proper, it's a list, a bit. To begin with.

[ She rolls her eyes. ]

Yeah, I know, [ Dumbass. ] dumbass.

[ ...Whoops. She taps herself the same way, even if his eyes stay closed for the bit. ]

Athessa. The dumb one.

Right, so all these— [ She keeps nudging the wads of paper around. ] —are what? Paper replicas of cannon-balls?

[Salvio, plodding along, doesn't notice the dog straightaway. His eyes are set on home, and the goat isn't giving him any trouble.

The goat doesn't seem to notice the dog either. Its weird eyes keep staring forward, dead set. It's when Salvio is looking around at it nervously that he sees the white flash of the dog's wagging tail. He cranes his neck to see around the goat.

Oh. A dog. He gives it a quick smile, uncertain, and then... looks forward again. Perhaps if he ignores it.]

open

matthias

OPEN -- forces office

OPEN -- courtyard, tw: mild self-harm

Nikos Averesch

OPEN -- lowtown tavern

OPEN -- the rookery (like the real one not the comm)

Salvio Pizzicagnolo

OPEN -- base operations office

OPEN -- gallows ferry dock

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gives nell the other one bc that's funnier

cw: self-harm all the way down

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