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 Posted: Wed Apr 06, 2016 6:58 pm
 
──────────────────── Tʜᴇ ∎ Cʜᴀɪʀᴍᴀɴ ────────────────────
☛xBen glanced at Asphodel. "Stealing it would be easy if we knew where this Unit was hiding," he responded dryly. "Considering the message, we can assume their base of operations is far away. They may not even be in Wales anymore." Which would put it out of our jurisdiction and in the hands of another branch. Humiliating.
This entire situation was bothersome, but there were still ways to spin it in their favor. He just had to find them. "As for making one," he continued, "we could attempt a blood serum. Not knowing the exact list of items that went in to making the bomb, however, makes it rather difficult to create one that wouldn't be dangerous to test." He paused, staring at the table, at the mess of papers that no one had bothered to clean up. (Well, that Slater hadn't bothered to clean up. They tended to leave that to him.) "And we would need a volunteer."
(Of course, THAT wouldn't be hard to procure. Ben always had a willing volunteer a phone call away.)
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Posted: Wed Apr 06, 2016 7:11 pm
 Aѕρнσ∂єℓ Ɓιѕнσρ ━━━━xHєαℓєя ✤ Mєηтαℓ ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━xx☂xCoυɴcιl Tнerαpιѕт xxxx Asphodel took another sip before leaning forward and tapping the words on the paper listing the method that the unit had used to take care of making the bomb. "We have an idea," She pointed out before leaning back in her chair and folding the same hand delicately in her lap.
"As far as danger goes...well, such a thing isn't a problem if we can slip past the legal hoops and take a willing volunteer. My persuasion skills are quite good."
Asphodel waved Hau forward, who poured her another cup of tea. She sighed a little, resisting the urge to slide forward in her seat until she disappeared underneath the table. Asphodel really just wanted a damn nap. "The blood for the serum should be taken, perhaps, from someone who was close to the impact when it happened. It would be the most potent then...ah, in other words, that means somebody from this room, doesn't it?" Well, that would provide a little bit disadvantageous.
Asphodel offered a little sweet smile. "If we go with that idea, then I'll have to be asked to be removed from consideration. I'm already feeling quite weak. I doubt losing a pint or so of blood will make me feel any better."
x
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Posted: Wed Apr 06, 2016 7:55 pm
 
Hᴇxᴍᴀsᴛᴇʀ ───────────────────── Dɪsᴄɪᴘʟɪɴᴇ Eɴғᴏʀᴄᴇʀ
→x"I'm not volunteering either," Slater scowled. He already knew that Eleanor and Asphodel were going to try to pressure him into it, but even he wasn't stupid enough to risk his skin for this s**t. "We don't even know if it would work."
He reached over and picked up the copy of the message, glancing at some of the bomb's construction. It certainly explained the Elfslayer killings, and the thefts at the school earlier in the year. "I think the problem is the magic extracted from the items," he said. "Without knowing all the items, whatever we can mix would be unstable and react badly."
None of the CEE, Slater knew, would volunteer. It wasn't worth the risk, no matter how you looked at it.
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Posted: Wed Apr 06, 2016 8:03 pm
──────────────────── Tʜᴇ ∎ Cʜᴀɪʀᴍᴀɴ ────────────────────
☛xBenjamin certainly wasn't about to volunteer. He was a Councilman, not a guinea pig. Still, if they intended to mix a blood serum, Asphodel was right. Someone who had been on the podium when the explosion occurred would be the best subject.
"We don't have a lot of options to mix a serum," he remarked, "and if it's concocted wrong, it may make this... whatever it is worse." Ben's hands curled into fists; the only outward sign that he was annoyed. They had been the closest ones to the explosion; were they really the only options?
...Wait. Ben looked up, and for a second, he looked past Asphodel at Hau. Then his eyes were back on the other CEE members, cool and collected. "Asphodel, you're dreadfully mistaken," Ben murmured. "We were not the only ones on that podium."
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Posted: Thu Apr 07, 2016 8:24 am
 
xxxxxxSᴛᴜᴅᴇɴᴛ/Mᴇᴅɪᴀ ⚜ Rᴇʟᴀᴛɪᴏɴs Oғғɪᴄᴇʀ
──────────────────────────────────
✒xEleanor eyed the Blood Pact's message on the table, eyes narrowed and teacup raised to her lips yet she had taken barely a sup of any of its contents. Although her magical reserves were still relatively full, she could feel that they were no longer overflowing like they had once been in the presence of the Oak. But Eleanor would persist, she always did.
Her focus turned to Slater and she felt, almost a twinkling of amusement at the idea of the Council supplying the Blood Pact, the hilarious irony. Of course, Eleanor couldn't of cared less about the Council's reputation, she would let it burn to the ground in humiliation as long as she could climb higher and higher, transfer over to France and leave this UK mess behind (of course, only after assuring Asphodel's position was safe). But, alas, Eleanor was still presently a part of this and would inevitably have to deal with the fall out of this incident, busying herself for several days if not weeks trying to smooth over such a scandal with the press (and the police). And so she took a deep draught to mentally fortify herself for the future, draining her cup in one go before motioning to Hau to refill her cup.
"I surely hope for your sake that you don't intend for me to be the volunteer." She tittered upon realizing she was the last out of the four to yet opt out. God forbid they make her a guinea pig for this, she'd punch Benjamin in the face before that'd ever happen, and she was sure, he knew that too. "What about your darling child?" Eleanor asked as a matter-of-factly halfway through another sip. "We all know what a kind and loving father you are, surely he was on the podium too was he not?"
Eleanor resumed drinking her tea as if she hadn't said anything at all, Minding her own business.
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Posted: Thu Apr 07, 2016 3:43 pm
Aѕρнσ∂єℓ Ɓιѕнσρ ━━━━xHєαℓєя ✤ Mєηтαℓ ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━xx☂xCoυɴcιl Tнerαpιѕт xxxx Hau stepped forward to refill Eleanor's cup in one fluid motion as the CEE continued to discuss, eyes flickering to the fine china before he stepped back behind Asphodel.
Asphodel listened in calmly, rolling her eyes at Slater's refusal. She had been hoping to push him into it. It wasn't like the b*****d was good for much else. "If it's the magic extracted from the items that's important," She began after hearing his comment. "Then why don't we simply gather a number of artifacts in the same nature as..." Asphodel made a vague motion towards the paper, trailing off.
Hau, behind her, didn't even notice Benjamin's gaze until his next words came. The implication was heavy, and Asphodel was slow to respond. He didn't expect her to; to defend him would show that she was actually attached to him, a half-elf of all things. (Actually, Hau wasn't even sure just how fond she was of him in the first place.) Like hell she was going to say anything like that. She also couldn't force him to do it for reasons pertaining to their own situation.
He wasn't exactly surprised. Hau had been expecting the outcome as soon as the discussion on needing a volunteer occurred. It was just his luck that he was constantly forced into situations where he had to sacrifice his own well being for the sake of others, wasn't it? Fate really had it in for him.
The pair was silent as Eleanor spoke, and Hau's pokerface finally broke. If Eleanor was trying to be kind -- and he highly doubted she was, for Eleanor never seemed to be interested in that unless it was for her own gain and was a cold stony b***h otherwise -- she had odd ways of showing it.
"No," He protested immediately, finally looking up. Then-- "--forgive me." --because he was speaking out of turn. The child? Hau hadn't even considered him an option. How could they ever consider using a child, never mind the shaking-leaf of a boy that was Lockwood's own damn son? "But a boy shouldn't be the subject of such a high risk operation. I am expendable. I'll volunteer." He said this with clear eyes, placing one hand on his chest unconsciously.
x
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Posted: Thu Apr 07, 2016 4:41 pm
──────────────────── Tʜᴇ ∎ Cʜᴀɪʀᴍᴀɴ ────────────────────
☛xEleanor voiced exactly what Ben was considering. Rowan, he knew, would be a willing volunteer if he spared the boy a bit of empty praise. And it wasn't like he was useful for anything else these days. Ben opened his mouth to approve Eleanor's idea--
And paused.
Benjamin's gaze slid up to Hau. How dare a half-elf speak out of turn? Asphodel hadn't had him trained properly? This was the first time Ben could remember him speaking without being prompted. The rest of the time he apparently served as a walking serving tray for Asphodel and Eleanor, which was perfectly fine with Ben so long as he stayed out of the way. "Asphodel," he began, turning away from Hau (a filthy half-breed servant wasn't worth speaking to), "do tell your servant to hold his tongue."
Ben's eyes landed back on the note. "There were three others on the podium besides us: the Ekaterina representative, Rowan, and Asphodel's servant. Since the third is apparently quite eager to be useful, all that would be needed is the permission of his mistress." He gestured towards Asphodel. "Barring that, I have no qualms about calling my son, and I'm sure Slater's hexed monkey would jump at the chance to volunteer." Ben straightened and looked around the table. "Well, Asphodel?"
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Posted: Thu Apr 07, 2016 5:21 pm
Aѕρнσ∂єℓ Ɓιѕнσρ ━━━━xHєαℓєя ✤ Mєηтαℓ ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━xx☂xCoυɴcιl Tнerαpιѕт xxxx "Hau, do shut up, would you?" Asphodel said dismissively, prompted by Benjamin's order, not even doing as much as sparing a glance behind her. "We're in the middle of a meeting. You're not some untrained monkey, so stop acting like one."
He shut his mouth. They really had been considering the kids, Hau thought, a chill running down his spine. These adults were considering using children as test subjects. I was just one option.
Asphodel just sighed loudly, rubbing at the bridge of her nose in annoyance. Then she switched countenances, patience beginning to slightly run thin. "I can't say I particularly care," She said with a sweet smile. "But ah, I would never want to stop anyone from doing what they so badly wanted to do. Rather than that, can we get back on a better topic, pleeease? Like what I said about making the antidote."
x
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Posted: Mon Apr 11, 2016 4:31 pm
Hᴇxᴍᴀsᴛᴇʀ ───────────────────── Dɪsᴄɪᴘʟɪɴᴇ Eɴғᴏʀᴄᴇʀ
→x"That's the thing," Slater said, frowning at the paper on the table. "We don't know the exact combination of items. Old magic artifacts like the ones listed aren't just something off an enchanter assembly line, Asphodel. Nobody in their right mind makes hands of glory anymore, and those were usually one-of-a-kind."
Slater scrolled through his laptop and with a few deft keystrokes, he accessed the Council database and used his rank to find the warehouse inventories. Scrolling through the items in the more dangerous ones only deepened his frown. "The items the Council's taken possession of are mostly from this decade of artifacts. We don't even have a hand of glory, or a unicorn horn. God knows where they got that terror," he muttered. "It's possible to synthesize something given where we are, yes, but there's no guarantee it'll work. If this blows up in our faces, our reputations will undoubtedly get dragged through the mud."
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Posted: Mon Apr 11, 2016 4:46 pm
──────────────────── Tʜᴇ ∎ Cʜᴀɪʀᴍᴀɴ ────────────────────
☛x"Which is exactly why we must treat this situation with extreme caution," Lockwood added, looking around the table. "It would truly be a pity if our chances at being transferred elsewhere or promoted were dashed to pieces." The message was clear: If I go down, I am taking you all with me.
Honestly, this entire situation was annoying. Sign the bill, get slandered and have rumors started about how all four of them are in league with the Pact. Don't sign the bill, and die. It was a rock and a hard place, and Benjamin was already in one of those. He didn't fancy getting trapped in another by some damn radicals.
"However," he continued, "I do not believe in consorting with terrorists. We are not going to sign the bill. We have one month to find a third solution. Let's use it." He paused, thinking, and then looked up at Eleanor. "Eleanor. See if you can manipulate the media to focus on the gang wars or that ridiculous soap opera instead. That should give us some breathing room."
He glanced at Slater. "Noah. Make use of the professors. Get their opinions of possible combinations and use my ID to get whatever you need from the warehouses."
Finally, he looked at Asphodel, and then looked down, scribbling something on a sheet of parchment. "Asphodel. Find some test subjects. Start with the half-dwarves and dwelves." He slid the parchment across the table. "If your half-elf is so concerned about the well-being of a broken child, then he can go to the nurse with that note. Otherwise," he said casually, slipping his phone out of his pocket, "I have another volunteer on speed dial."
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Posted: Sat Apr 30, 2016 12:49 pm
Aѕρнσ∂єℓ Ɓιѕнσρ ━━━━xHєαℓєя ✤ Mєηтαℓ ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━xx☂xCoυɴcιl Tнerαpιѕт xxxx She took the note without looking, mentally making a list of students to approach. There weren't many stupid enough around anymore that would allow Asphodel to approach them without reacting with hostility. The brats caught on too damn quick.
Behind her, Hau silently fumed. The way Lockwood talked about his own son was almost unthinkable-- were all rich people like this? He wouldn't have even considered the idea that parents could treat their children so horrendously if it wasn't for his past with Asphodel. He moved almost immediately when Asphodel made a motion with her hand, taking the slip of paper Lockwood had written when she allowed him to.
"Understood, sir." Asphodel replied with a cheerful smile, standing up. She smoothed out her dress, glanced at Eleanor once, and then exited the meeting room. Hau followed immediately after her, muttered lowly about going to the nurse's office, and then disappeared as soon as they were out of sight from the other three. Asphodel didn't even watch him go, doing nothing more but rolling her eyes.
"Test subjects, test subjects...where in hell am I to find such a thing in this school? That damn man really loves giving people bothersome tasks." Asphodel grumbled to herself, and she went on her way.
(Exit.)
x
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Posted: Sat Apr 30, 2016 3:52 pm
xxxxxxSᴛᴜᴅᴇɴᴛ/Mᴇᴅɪᴀ ⚜ Rᴇʟᴀᴛɪᴏɴs Oғғɪᴄᴇʀ
──────────────────────────────────
✒xEleanor had, in reality, forgotten Hau was a potential candidate and had merely just been stating the obvious. Oh. right. You were there, forgot about that... She thought with a shrug but then aimed a disapproving stare at him when he spoke out, exchanging identical glances with Asphodel. Eleanor actually quite fond of Hau (not that she'd ever say that out loud of course) and approved of him as the only halfbreed worthy of serving her best friend. She knew also for the record, that Asphodel was quite attached, so any attempt at self-sacrifice on his part would certainly not be in the best interests of Asphodel and by extension, her. (at least, that was Eleanor's reasoning behind her objections.)
At the command of Ben she sighed, It was time to get to work already. Putting down her cup and saucer with a soft clink, she kicked off the ground with her heels, letting her office chair swirl haphazardly across the room back to her desk, switching to work mode in less than half a swivel and probably adding another nasty mark to the already heavily marred floor. Regardless, Eleanor paid no attention and simply picked up the phone, speed dialing all her connections to the media, ready to pull a ******** ton of strings. "Hiiii it's meeeee~" she sang into the receiver in a saccharine voice, eyes momentarily flicking over to Ben and Slater.
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Posted: Sat May 21, 2016 8:53 pm
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Posted: Sat May 21, 2016 9:06 pm
──────────────────── Tʜᴇ ∎ Cʜᴀɪʀᴍᴀɴ ────────────────────
☛xBen watched the whole thing unfold from the safety of the CEE office. The gunshot was muffled by the window, but it was a bit startling just the same. Pity for the teacher, though. One less paycheck for Soulstone to write out, he supposed.
Well, wasn't this a predicament? Students and staff, trapped like rats. Terrorists having the run of the campus, perfectly willing to murder countless students if it meant getting the result they desired. And, of course, the CEE, their hands practically forced to the signature line of the bill already. How annoying. Clearly, there was only one solution left.
"We're leaving," Ben announced, turning to face the rest of the CEE. "Now."
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Posted: Sun May 22, 2016 6:29 pm
Aѕρнσ∂єℓ Ɓιѕнσρ ━━━━xHєαℓєя ✤ Mєηтαℓ ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━ ━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━xx☂xCoυɴcιl Tнerαpιѕт xxxx Asphodel was curled over a cup of tea, Hau behind her having fully recovered. She didn't even lift her head up, not at the sound of the Pact or the sounds of gunshots. Hau behind her looked anxious, his gaze trained on the window outside.
At Benjamin's order, Asphodel lifted up her face and smiled sarcastically. It was dripping with ill will.
"And what do you suppose we do about the antidote, hmm? Do you intend to drag the rest of our reputations in the mud along with yours?"
x
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