OPEN

[nonvenomous]

WHO: Dick
WHAT: Dick.
WHEN: Guardian
WHERE: The Gallows/Kirkwall
NOTES: Brackets or prose ok, wildcard ok. Other starters maybe later who knows what could happen.

The Gallows

A sharp intake of breath, pupils blown out in freefall panic that quickly pins into blearier confusion, Richard Dickerson jolts awake where he’s sat. Sometimes he reaches for his hip, sometimes he flinches blind to jostle an empty glass, or knocks the book at his knee to the floor.

In the library, in the chantry, in the baths, in any seldom-used nook or cranny between the towers after hours, he might be found dozing and nudged or shaken or spooked by instinct at the proximity of another living creature’s presence.


Lowtown

In a Lowtown tavern, he’s being hefted off a table by the shoulder, levered to his feet to have his satchel shoved into his arms.

A gossamer thread of drool keeps him tied to the surface for a moment after he’s upright. There might be blood spindling through it if his nap was unscheduled at the end of a sucker punch at some smart remark. Or maybe it’s clear -- maybe it’s just past closing time and he doesn’t have to go home, but he can’t stay here.

Regardless, he cuts a distinct figure at a distance -- long legs and beak and beard and the shaggy ruff of his cloak, which will serve him well in the snow outside.


Kirkwall/The Gallows

On business in the streets of Kirkwall, or in the hallways between spaces within the Gallows, his reluctance to engage in anything but the most cursory of conversation is clear: he keeps odd hours and waits behind blind corners for approaching footsteps to carry on past.

This is especially true of ferry trips and mealtimes, when he must watch from afar to see that the boat is likely to stay empty, or snake in and skim off the scraps left over -- cold eggs, lukewarm dregs of stew. He’s not picky, so long as he doesn’t have to make small talk.

He’s always been this way, but now more than ever, there’s a clockwork regularity to his comings and goings that makes him easier to find than he’d like for anyone who’s looking.


Wildcard

Choose your own adventure -- check in w/me about meetings arranged or requested IC, as he is likely to be rude or otherwise strange about them for the foreseeable future.

Comments

The Gallows

[okayimin]

The cot in the rectory office is too large for Sawbones, the way most things on the surface are. That isn't why she's stopped sleeping in it, rather she's just stopped sleeping entierly. When sleep does finally catch up to her, it's similar to Richard's.

Though her preferred alcoves are a bit different from his and that's why Richard will have to deal with his foot being knocked as Sawbones crawls out from under one of the back pews. She squints up at him, "What're you doin'?"

[nonvenomous]

His next breath hisses through his sinuses at a milder slant -- he diverts the hand he’d raised in defense to feel over the bones of his face instead. His eyes ache in their sockets. Sore vertebrae twinge in protest when he leans to check that his satchel is still beside him, and he stiffens upright to nudge it with his near foot instead.

“Praying,” he says. Obviously. He looks at the rest of the bench laid out empty next to him. Measuring, speculative.

“What are you doing?”

[okayimin]

She does not call him a liar, but the look she gives him is a speaking one. She hauls herself up onto the pew next to him, stretching herself as she does.

"Sleeping," Sawbones says, "Got a few hours before the evening round of faithful show up to say their prayers." In so much as what faithful in Riftwatch bothered with regular prayer, or used the chapel for that matter.

[nonvenomous]

Whatever inclination he might have had to stretch out along the wood and continue sleeping is foiled by her levering up to sit next to him. Dim, tired, and sore, he’s forced to survey the rest of the chamber instead, scanning for evidence of other comings and going and finding none.

“There have been more of them around, lately.”

Not sure how he feels about that. He kicks a brow up when he looks aside to her for a clue.

[okayimin]

Sawbones grimaces. "Templars mostly, I think." She sighs and rubs her forehead. "Don't know if somebody sent 'em or if they just drifted here on their own. Got a new healer in the Infirmary who's a Chantry Brother."

Which frankly she doesn't know how to feel about, except for maybe faint annoyance. "So long as they're not causing trouble with any of the mages."

[nonvenomous]

“I don’t believe in coincidence.”

And that’s what he has to say about that.

Sleeping for another hour or three would be nice, but this isn’t terrible -- sitting in the quiet of an empty chantry with someone who knows what he’s about and doesn’t mind.

“About the dream,” he says, unprompted after a moment, “I should thank you.”

[okayimin]

She hums, a soft noise of agreement. The problem with the Chantry choosing to act up is you can't really know how to respond until they get around to it. So for now all there is to do is sit and wait. It is more pleasant to do it here.

Sawbones does tip her head back to give him a dry look, "What, for not letting you bleed out?"

[nonvenomous]

He is dry right back, brow hooded flat into an unspoken yes but no.

“You’re reliable company in a crisis.” High praise, from a snake. Reliable, and capable of exercising discretion.

Not everyone is.

“Even when the crisis is -- largely imagined."

[okayimin]

"Well, someone has to be." But-

"And if we're saying unnecessary things, I do like you. And folks can be stupid about shit, so." She shrugs. Her help is a given.

[nonvenomous]

“Mm.”

Richard folds his arms back across his chest, set as they were when he was sleeping. Or praying.

“I did try to kill several of them,” he says, reasonably. “In some cases I was successful.”

[okayimin]

"Well, I suppose as long as you managed some of it," she says, "Understand I'm not pleased about it, but if you're going to try and kill someone, you should at least do a better job of it."

It's like most of this company has never been in a gang before or something.