[DRP] Taking Up a Collection (Temperance/Others)

[The Semblance of Unity]

look behind both eyes

"Did the Burning Man threaten you physically or otherwise force you to give him your fingerprint for his charter?" She'd flipped open her notebook, determined to keep it businessy.

daekie

 

[The Semblance of Unity]

wool

"Un..." she sighed. "Unfortunately not. Thank you for your time, Detective." Temperance almost said 'hey don't try to knife the Burning Man again', but what was the point of saying that? He would still do it if he wanted to.

blade kuroda

 

[The Semblance of Unity]

We'll pay the toll charge

"So," she breathed out. "Basically, there's gonna be a trial for the Burning Man and the thing's he's done and I'm the... the prosecution." Temperance swallowed and flipped open her notebook.

"Can you tell me about your meeting with him? What was said, done, et cetera?" She paused and really looked at him. "You look so much better than you did - I'm glad."

shibrogane

 

[The Semblance of Unity]

hes a cheapskate

"Did he... threaten you or anything to give your fingerprint?" Temperance blinked. This is the sort of thing that happened when magic users weren't kept knowledgeable enough. "Or just sort of try to bribe you?"

iloveyoudie

 

[The Semblance of Unity]

lie to me

Temperance's office was incredibly bare, if only because she'd had zero time to decorate it. There was one desk and two chairs and that was it. Plus one tacky lamp. She looked up at Rabbit as he entered.

"Sonny hates me, so I think that makes this even harder," she confessed. "I'm.. I'm a nurse, not a lawyer, but." Temperance took a deep breath and flipped open her notebook, past the scribbled pages of witness accounts.

"You met with the Burning Man, right - for your fingerprint? How did that go?"

smerdle

 

[The Semblance of Unity]

veiled

"Did you agree of your own free will due to past experiences or were there other, extenuating circumstances?" Temperance had her notebook again, jotting down things in a neat hand. She had a sinking feeling that Alg's experience wouldn't be prosecutable either. While she didn't like him, she needed his testimony and that, as always, came first.

iloveyoudie

 

[iloveyouDIE]

he's a cheapskate

"No threats. Though I mean, afterwards," He scratched his head with a paint stained finger, "I guess I felt a little misled."

He turned to his canvas and gave another dab here and there, "He said this was just part of the charter stuff everyone was working on together. That obviously we had to break it first-" Wil frowned, his discomfort that he'd done it without argument obvious, "-and he had all these prints already so.."

So he'd taken his word for it.

"He almost set my hair on fire when I asked for a light?" Maybe that counted as harassment or something.

The Semblance of Unity

 

[iloveyouDIE]

veiled

"Is extenuating circumstance that he is a possibly immortal magical being who clearly had geased everyone into leaving their print without discussion? And that common sense told me I'd end up forced and possibly debilitated if I didn't?" The professor sighed.

"Certainly past experience had demonstrated that even in his giving moods people ended up burned, crippled or hospitalized.." Alg's frown was firmly set, more to do with the topic of conversation than Temperance herself. He was still not quite clear on why she disliked him so much as they'd barely interacted in the past aside from very public demonstrations. Though it was likely that he'd find whatever reasons she had to be, well, unreasonable.

"So, yes, I would say I agreed of my own free will. If only out of preservation.. of myself and others," Though that underlying threat had been laid out clearly at the time - that everyone would die.

"I'm sorry if it's not what you want to hear. He is a threatening figure. He said foreboding, terrible things, but I can't say he forced me."

Alg's frown wasn't so severe, but sympathetic, "I'd like him punished. Probably more than some others.." His shoulders rose and fell as he sat back. He wasn't sure his input could help.

The Semblance of Unity

 

[Daekie]

look behind both eyes

Alexis sighed. Their eyes went a little distant for a second, but - "No. I asked him what I could do to get my magic back, n' he said to give my thumbprint first. N' I knew he could kill me if I said no, so." Their gaze averted down to the ground, a little ashamed, a little disappointed. "He would've gotten it either way. Figured the way where I didn't get burnt was better."

The Semblance of Unity

 

[lizbot]

a talk

America, in general, was easy to find. Even moreso when Temp came home to find the other sitting on her doorstep, one of the local stray cats in her lap. "Hey, Temp." There was the familiar satchel nearby, bulging with the shapes of books and notebooks and the odd bottles of ink and magic dust.

"Have you apologized to Sonny, yet?"

the semblance of unity

 

[Smerdle]

lie to me

"He said he had something to tell me about the sirens, so I went voluntarily. I gave him my print voluntarily too, so I'm not sure how much help I'll be in all this." Truthfully, he was grateful about that. As much harm as Ezra had done to other people, Rabbit couldn't find it in himself to condemn his father.

"It seemed fishy, but he said it wouldn't hurt anyone, so..." Rabbit shrugged. That hadn't been exactly what the Burning Man had said, but at the time it had meant the same thing.

The Semblance of Unity

 

[shibrogane]

We'll pay the toll charge

"He came to the library and demanded my thumbprint on the new Charter he was making. I'm not stupid, so I said no, because it'd mess up whatever s**t yall were up to, and he said, I'll take it if I have to, and the--you know my magic was unstable? It's why I was staying away from everyone--magic kind of lashed out at him, so he was all, I've always wanted to do this, and ******** gutted me."

Pride ran a self-conscious hand over his hair. "They say I'm healing up pretty well."

The Semblance of Unity

 

[azuredreams]

afterword

Nasir caught Temperance after she was done talking with Alexis, taking her cup of tea and offering another one if she wanted it.

"Um, there's ... Well, there's something I'm supposed to tell you. Sonny told me to tell it to you." A small half-smile is given; he is so obvious nervous. "It's something I saw while scrying."

The Semblance of Unity

 

[saedusk]

You Know We're Trying

The look on Jamie's face spelled it out—he didn't want to talk about the information. He didn't want to talk about the schema. Did she really need to know?

"He said something like... it would be mostly painless if I did it myself, but if I didn't do it he'd make me and I wouldn't enjoy it." Then he paused, unwilling. It took a moment before he spoke again.

"He knew I had the schema somehow." Except he didn't explain what the schema was. "Told me to put it on the charter sigil. I could email him when I wanted to do it, but I never did..."

The Semblance of Unity

 

[The Semblance of Unity]

a talk

"Hi, America," she said tiredly. "I was going to try to drop by and talk to you, but you've beat me to it." Temperance looked at the cat. They usually avoided her; maybe America was half Disney princess.

"Apologize for what? Also, have you got that note from Ezra, still?"

lizbot