Riverside 20: Another day, another disaster

[Beans]

[Church of the Indigo Mantle]

"Hmm. Bears and cats are like, kinda in there, yeah. And... well, if we get to the point of expansion, we may want to set up a bat roost." Outside, the sun's light fades from the sky, giving over the heavens to the domain of the kindly goddess.

[Deathkeeper]

Church of the Indigo Mantle

"Well, I'd need training to handle animals like that, but we can get to it. Is there anything I can do my first night on the job for you? Telling people about you can happen in the morning when folks aren't sleeping." He pauses, rubbing his lips with the back of his hand.
"Say, you wouldn't happen to have any tea here, would you? I feel like a nighttime goddess would, is all. I've been craving something. I dunno, kinda fruity? Do they make blackberry tea? I know they have a hundred flavors with honey in them." And speaking of the point of expansion, wasn't he shorter five seconds ago?

[Beans]

[Church of the Indigo Mantle]

"Yeah, we don't really handle those so much as... just provide a roost. Like having a birdhouse in your yard!" And as he brings up tea, she waves him along around the corner to the kitchenette with its several kettles, its well-cleaned sink, and its racks of tea. Mostly decaf.
"I got you, my guy. There's like a billion Sleepytime varieties, but then... let's see, blackberries, honey..." She fills a kettle enough for a few mugs and clicks it on. "Ooh, 'Blackberry Harvest' seems pretty on point. Blackberries, honey, chamomile, the good stuff."

[Deathkeeper]

[Church of the Indigo Mantle]

Euphrone only turns her back for fifteen seconds, and yet when she turns back to Teddy she finds instead a noticeably taller, larger, curly-haired black bear-looking fellow in a set of flannel jammies and nightcap. The book and emblem seem to be stuck in his pocket.
"Mmmm. Smells good." sniffs the oblivious bear.
Looks like old, worn-out curses mesh well with wholesome goddess-magic.

[Beans]

[Church of the Indigo Mantle]

She pauses and puts a teabag into a mug, picking a different one for herself. "... Uh, Teddy, you---okay, just look." Her wing reaches out to trace an oval on the wall with its tip, pulling forth a silver mirror. She then scoots it down to Teddy's height so he can actually see.

[Deathkeeper]

[Church of the Indigo Mantle]

Teddy squints into the middle. Examining his muzzle and his stout frame.
"Do you think your spark turned on my old family mojo? I'm not smashing anything so it's probably not the same thing. It's only for night time every once and a while, right?" That's probably why he's not panicking. Everyone knows werecritters usually only change once per month. And he doesn't feel like he's currently a threat to anything in the area by existing.

[Beans]

[Church of the Indigo Mantle]
"Hmm... I mean, it seems to have... specifically brought out the more serene aspect of the bear in you. I don't know if my magic could make somebody aggro, so I'm pretty sure you're safe. As for how often and how long, I wouldn't know exactly, but I'd hazard a guess it's a night thing." She peers into the mirror with him. "The way it turned your clothes into PJ's is pretty on point." She waves a hand and her own clothes warp and shift into her own set of PJs and a robe. The kettle pings and she pours steaming, boiling water into the two mugs. It already smells good, especially to a certain newly-acute nose.

[Deathkeeper]

[Church of the Indigo Mantle]

Teddy gently slides a mug closer to him so he can help cool it with his breath. Though it's kind of hard to do that with his current face.
"Well, I guess it's not anything major, then. It's not going to make me do anything bad, and it's not like I won't fit into the dorms." he looks down at his cozy flannel outfit.
"I mean, it might be annoying if I'm ever invited to a dinner party but it beats ripping all my pants like in the movies." He certainly feels serene. It doesn't really seem like it's something worth worrying about. And he'll probably be safer walking home at night like this than as himself.

[Beans]

[Church of the Indigo Mantle]

"If it does get to be an issue, I can see what I can do to fix it, but if you're content with it... I think it kinda works for you. And honestly, with everything in the Nexus, "I turn into a bear person in PJ's at night" isn't that crazy. People out here are like, dying eight times while also being across town having lunch." She blows on her own tea, adjusting the loose plait of dark hair thrown forward over her shoulder.

[Deathkeeper]

[Church of the Indigo Mantle]

"Yeah, I've definitely heard of more troubling superpowers." he says, sipping his tea.
"Besides, we don't know if it's every night."
It's every night.
"But uh yeah, that aside can I help with anything?" Though as much as he doesn't want to worry about it, some part of him does want to say I've been turned into a bear can I go home?

[Beans]

[Church of the Indigo Mantle]
"I think we're all good here. For now, I think you should just head home and get a good night's rest, which is both good for you and worshipful unto me." She winks behind her veil. It's, uh, hard to tell? She sips her own tea. "If you need anything... well, I mean, you can pray, which is handy. Good way to check in."

[Deathkeeper]

[Church of the Indigo Mantle]

Teddy nods. "Okay. I'll talk to you when I convince some people or I need to print more pamphlets."
He downs the tea in surprising speed. Not in one gulp, though. He's a bear, not a crazy person.
And then he shuffles off home to his dorm! He'll have to actually read that booklet before bed.

[5a Violista]

Eastside. An older building, patched and repaired numerous times. As long as anyone can remember, this shop has been run by Old Man Carter. He's a bit of an eccentric recluse, but he sells all manner of antiques and curios, often at a low price. The battered, hand painted sign above the door proclaims the shop's name in faded green letters. Inside, labyrinthine shelves hold all manner of oddities with no discernable organization, and, right by the front door, Old Man Carter himself snoozes contentedly behind the counter, leaning back in an ancient rocking chair with a red and white afghan blanket draped over him. The lights are dim, not enough to be forboding, but enough to provide an air of mystery to the place. It might be somewhere someone could find unusual treasures.

Hmm. He already has a headdress, no need for another one. Right?
Or he could start a collection of them, for different occasions.
Yes, this is the better plan. He lifts the flamingo-and-bone adornment from the shelf (as well as the hand candle, that could be useful in a couple of ways) and heads over to the proprietor.
Plus, he does not like the sound of chanting from down that way.
"What can you tell me about these pieces?"

[Carter's Curious Collection]


A second customer enters. He's got red hair, and is pretty androgynous-looking. But, he's wearing masculine clothes - a long-sleeved brown shirt with a couple buttons, long shiny gray athleticwear bottoms, tennis shoes. It's June! Maybe.

To be honest, the building looked interesting. So he decided to check it out.

The first thing he notices, of course, is that it's a shop. With some pretty interesting things. No obligation to buy things, right? He can just window shop? Plus, who knows, he might find something interesting.
He glances over and sees another customer holding a couple things. Yeah...those definitely look interesting.

He goes down a shelf, looking at all the things (but obviously making sure not to touch them! He might have to buy them if he touches them).

[bc56]

Tao:
Unlike some mysterious shops, it's not hard to find one's way back to the counter, where the old man is still peacefully snoozing. When addressed, he wakes with a start, the newspaper falling off his face and onto the floor. "Huh? What?" It takes a moment for him to get his bearings. "Oh, those items? That," he points with a shaky, arthritic hand to the headdress, "Is an authentic Flaschorikian battle headdress. Their greatest warriors would wear them in battle against terrifying monsters." Then he indicates the severed hand and its candle stump. "That is a hand of glory. Legend has it that if you hold it, it will only give light for your eyes. Or that it will paralyze everyone caught in its glare. But who believes those legends anyway? I've run this shop for more than fifty years, and not one of the supposedly magical items I've sold has had any supernatural property that I've seen." He chuckles amiably.

June:
As June looks along the shelves, he'll find several items might seem to call out more than the others around them. There's a scrimshawed drinking horn stained brown with age and grime. A heavy tome that proclaims itself the guide to all things mechanical, with a picture of a steam engine on the leather cover in chipped gold leaf. A glass eye, or is it a real eye encased in glass, designed to look like it belongs to a lizard or a serpent. A square, blunt, iron nail coated in flaking rust. A wax sculpture of a mushroom, with a white stalk and a blue cap that seems to have partly melted onto the shelf during a heat wave. Or, if none of those interest him, June could keep looking. Maybe he might find the faint sound of chanting, coming from further along, interesting?

[5a Violista]

While the faint sound of chanting is both interesting and nostalgic, there's just too many other interesting things to look at first.

June pauses to look at the glass skull. Pretty neat artisanship. The painting is pretty nice-looking, too. He pauses to look at that, looking at the details.

The mechanical book also looks interesting, to be honest. Maybe he should look through it? It looks pretty old, though. Would it really have anything that interesting that he doesn't already know? Meanwhile, this eye...oh. It's probably just a glass eye. If it were real, it would be interesting, but it just looks glass. (Obviously, a nail is just a nail.)

He looks at the half-melted mushroom, and tries to (carefully) lift it up off the shelf. It might have something interesting on the bottom of it, he thinks.

June gives the book another thought. Actually, maybe...it would be interesting to read? Even if it's just steam engines and steam power, it might have gone in a different direction from what he knows. So, maybe it's worth just looking through it. He grabs the book too and starts to flip through it.

[bc56]

The painting looks a lot more sinister when examined closely. The man is staring hungrily at the woman, who looks less than thrilled to be there. But June soon passes on to examining the mushroom. With a little force, it pops free of the shelf... And breaks apart. A small silver capsule, about the size of a film canister, falls out. It's got a lid that could be unscrewed. The book, if after that fiasco June is still interested in reading it, seems pretty normal. There are small brown stains on the edges of its pages, which otherwise seem in very good shape for such an old book. The edges are pretty intact. Intact enough to give someone a serious paper cut.

[Recaiden]

Tao chuckles to himself at the shopkeeper's antics.
"Were their greatest warriors any good?" He inquires. I's a nice headdress either way, but it doesn't strike him as terribly battle-ready.

Now, Tao does have some skill at identifying magical auras. Or at least he used to. He turns the hand over, trying to get a sense of its authenticity.
"So how come you collect all this stuff if it's so ordinary?"

[bc56]

"For their time, yes. That was a few thousand years ago, of course. They're all dead now." That headdress probably belongs in a museum then. As for the hand, despite the shopkeep's statement, there's definitely something magical going on there. Hard to say exactly what though. "I don't so much collect them as hold on to them until someone who does comes along. I wouldn't sell them if they were of any use to me. But some people like those kinds of things. Me, I collect old stories."

[Earl of Purple]

Carter's Curious Collection

Another customer arrives. This one is a young adult, in their twenties or so, with short black hair and grey eyes. They're slender, with an androgynous appearance. They wear a purple hoody with two holes in the back, from which a pair of black wings sprout. In the central bend of the wings is another grey eye, one per wing. They see lots of different things, including through illusions, but the things they see aren't native to what this individual is used to and they don't know what it all actually means. A pair of jeans and heavy hiking boots complete their clothes, whilst slung over their shoulder is a brown leather satchel with a stylised crow- or other corvid- branded into the flap. Her left hand is missing the little finger, and they look around curiously to see what may be found within.

[bc56]

The newcomer should see a couple other customers milling about, one in particular talking to the man at the counter. But if she searches through the shelves, perhaps her supernatural senses will pick out certain items as significant. An old-fashioned brass key without a lock to match. A small glass skull with obsidian shards for eyes. An old painting of a middle-aged man, dark haired and pale skinned, arm in arm with a beautiful woman. A scrimshawed drinking horn stained brown with age and grime. A glass eye, or is it a real eye encased in glass, designed to look like it belongs to a lizard or a serpent. A square, blunt, iron nail coated in flaking rust. And the faint sound of chanting coming from further in the store.

[Recaiden]

Alas for the poor Flaschorikians. Their beauty-appreciating ways too good for this sinful Nexus.
Museums, though, those are a luxury. It belongs on a warrior's head, going into battle!

Tao sets the hand back down with an affected disappointment.
"Stories, huh? Are those on sale too?"
Are there price tags here, or is it all bargaining?

He glances at the new customer upon hearing the door.
Oh, there's something strange about that bird-person. Gotta keep an eye on her.

[Earl of Purple]

Carter's Curious Collection

The stranger doesn't have a permanent abode, so really they're after small things they can carry around as they move from place to place. The painting... Her eyes can't tear themselves away, but she can't take it with her. She has nowhere to put it. The key is interesting, but it doesn't have a lock so it's probably decorative. The horn is really interesting; bonework is always fascinating, it's just a pity it's so dirty. The stranger would not like to use it without a good clean first. The nail... Appears to be just a nail, so why's it here? That's very curious. And chanting... That's always bad news. Always. Even in antique shops. Perhaps especially in antique shops.

They pick up the key. The nail is tempting, but where they stay there's lots of nails. When they moved, it could just be left behind and that's just not good enough.

[bc56]

Tao:
This is definitely the sort of place where there are no price tags, and everything must be bargained for. "Sure, stories are on sale. But the price is a bit different. Get me a drink from my fridge in the back, then we can talk. You can get yourself one too, if you like." The old man points his thumb to a doorway in the back of the shop, barely visible over the tops of the labyrinthine shelves.

Jack:
The key tingles in the newcomer's hand, almost electrically. For some reason, a thought worms her way into her mind. The key isn't missing its lock. They've just been separated. Somewhere in this place is a brass globe. On that globe is a keyhole. This key goes into that lock. She should find it. Why? Her mind will fill in the blanks with whatever it is she would expect to find in such a manner. That's what must be there.

[Arkhosia]

[Moth Park]

"Huh, that's pretty cool." Eliseo remarks. He shuffles his feet. He can't help but proceed carefully. "Why lockpicking? Planning on breaking me out next time I'm in trouble?" He grins.

"Well uh, mostly I thought all the rogues in my dad's stories sounded like they were the coolest." Anastasia sets the sword down to lean against the bench. It was a little cumbersome to hold, and it felt a little odd just chatting like this.

"I guess it was something about how, like, clever they were? Always solving problems with a quick wit or some clever deception, snatching keys off belts, getting around things that seemed impossible... and it wasn't like my parents would let me learn how to do sick knife tricks or anything, so I settled with lockpicking."

"Point is, um, it's been a little while since I've actually like, done any of it? But hey, who knows - " Anastasia takes a few steps closer to Eliseo, leaning a little into his personal space with a cheeky little smile on her lips. " - maybe I'll see about setting you free sometime," she teases.

[5a Violista]

[Carter's Curious Collection]

Oh.
Oh no.
He broke it.
...
He can't just put it back. Guess he needs to buy it now, right?

June glances over at the guy. He'll have to wait until they're done to go buy it. After buying it, he can unscrew it and see what's inside, probably. He picks up the capsule, and then goes back to the book.

The brown stains. Judging by their position - being on the edges - they're probably not chocolate or dirt. Which leaves...blood? Gross. He doesn't want to really touch this old blood, even if it is really old. So, June makes sure he uses his fingernails to handle the page-turning as he looks through it.

[bc56]

June manages to avoid the threat of paper cuts to find... That the book is a perfectly mundane book about machines, mostly focused on steam power. The first chapter is a very in-depth discussion of the mechanisms of a sewing machine. One driven by steam or running water, so a pretty old-fashioned one. But he might be able to learn a bit about how to operate such a machine from these diagrams. Other sections discuss locomotives, steam engines, revolvers, and forms of steelmaking, among other things.

[Recaiden]

"Sure thing." Carter guy is putting on a convincing appearance of being harmless. Perhaps because he really is.
And hey, a free drink?
Tao heads through the labyrinth of shelves towards the door, leaving his prospective purchases at the counter.

[bc56]

Old man Carter smiles softly as Tao leaves.

Now that he's trying to find his way to the door, Tao should get a feeling of just how badly laid out this store is. It will take quite a while to navigate to the back, and the sound of chanting gets louder and louder the whole time. Finally, he reaches the doorway. Beyond is a small room, with aging appliances stained yellow with time. The chanting is very loud indeed, coming from a closed door on the far wall. But another loud sound comes from the straining refrigerator, humming away to keep its contents cool.

[Hattish Thing]

[Watching Suncrest Manor]

Larza ignores the demon's protestations.

Now was not the time to argue, now was the time to whisper strange things into a microphone!

The goblin will follow Hekta, careful to tread only in her tracks so as to avoid leaving an extra set of footprints or risk alerting the cameras. "Ye gonnae gang foremaist? Whit urr ye aff tae say?" Oh, this was so exciting!

[5a Violista]

[Carter's Curious Collection]

Oh.
So, already stuff that he pretty much already knows.
The book would be interesting, but you can find out much more from a library. Would be much more useful, too.

June closes the book and puts it back.


He sees the person talking to the guy at the desk leave. Well, now's just as good as any time to go up there, right? Talk about this capsule.
And, since he's going up there, might as well grab something else. Probably something cheap, so...the glass eye looks like it might be a bit more expensive, so he grabs the nail and goes up to the counter.

"Hi," he says. He places both the capsule and the nail on the counter. "Um...there was this wax mushroom thing that I was trying to look at, and it broke apart, and it had this thing in it," he explains. "So, well..."

He trails off, to see what the guy will say.