open | full circle pt 1

[exequy]

WHO: Concerned mages/rifters/others
WHAT: An emergency meeting!
WHEN: Solace 20
WHERE: The Gallows
NOTES: Explanation in the OOC post. Please tag this like a network post. There are top-level comments to provide a little chronology/structure, but threadjack to your heart's content.

Before and during dinner on an otherwise unremarkable Wednesday, there's a chain of whispers (or notes, or perfectly audible comments from the particularly unsubtle) about an emergency meeting, at an evening hour, in a basement room, regarding a matter of concern to rifters and mages.

The basement part is probably unnecessary. It's certainly ineffective; the organization is too small, the Gallows too contained, and the halls too echoey for something arranged with this much finesse-wrecking haste to truly remain a secret. They could have done it in an empty office or the recreational dining hall, probably, and sat on chairs instead of storage crates. But Kostos picked the location, and he's dramatic. If nothing else it signals a clear intention to do this as unofficially as necessary.

Anyone who accepts the invitation (or just decides to come see what the fuss is about) will first encounter Marcus Rowntree, posted up outside the door like a bouncer, letting mages and rifters move through undisturbed but stepping in to question and likely bar the arrival of anyone else. Inside, Kostos is nothing but a dark scowl in the room's far corner, picking at a splinter of wood on a crate and not mustering a word of greeting for anyone who comes in. Derrica has parked herself within arm's reach of Kostos, a long gold-edged shawl spilling over one shoulder. Her diplomacy pin gleams from the front of her tunic. The worried pinch to her brow is the only outward sign of anxiety; otherwise, she is tightly contained, watching people enter. Julius–notably not in robes–is serious but calm as people come in, standing next to the ever-composed Madame de Cedoux.

Once as many people have arrived as seem likely to, Marcus closes the door, remaining beside it, and they explain what the problem is.

Comments

[altusimperius]

We need them too. ['or at least, some of us do', goes unspoken]

[inkindled]

[Equally unspoken, but definitely implied, is Matthias' Really?]

Not if they won't back us when things get tough. We don't need anyone that won't give us support--proper support--when it matters.

[altusimperius]

But we don't know for certain that they won't. Do we?

[He gives his head a little shake.]

Otherwise, why be here at all? Why stay?

[inkindled]

'Cos of Corypheus, of course. I'm not stupid. I know that's important. But that doesn't mean we ought to stop thinking of what's next for us. Obviously the Chantry and the Loyalists aren't stopping thinking of it.

We ought to know who we can trust, before it gets to the point where we've got to be asking.

[altusimperius]

Maybe I already do.

[But what can he really know? He's a foreigner, just eking out his best life in the South.]

I think you're being fatalistic. There's time to wait and see without running off all half-cocked.