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 Posted: Thu Aug 20, 2015 11:07 am
Who: Nell and Zeke
When: August 20th, 2015; around 6pm
Where: Cream of the Cup, a cafe in Gambino
Weather: Sunny and hot, hot, hot!
He had not been surprised to hear from Nell or to hear she had questions. As the first of two new Guardians selected to call, email, text, or otherwise seek Zeke out with questions about Guardianship and everything it entailed, Zeke was all too happy to oblige.
"Meet me there around six and I'll answer anything and everything you wanna know!"
So here he was now, sitting in a booth with a strawberry lemonade before him, eyeballing every person that passed through the door into the cafe. He had made it here in record time after work, even pausing at the Lab to change out of his vet get up into something more summer appropriate. Purple cargo shorts under a hot pink tank top splattered in green stars was more his speed for these things, especially when the only other option was a long sleeve button up, tie, and slacks.
With a tap of his finger on the face of his phone, he checked the time and then took a sip off his drink. Close to six now, but Nell could show up five minutes past and it wouldn't bother him one bit.
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Posted: Thu Aug 20, 2015 4:52 pm
It had taken her a few days to muster up the courage to actually call about it instead of just dialing the number and turning her phone off without calling. She was afraid that if she voiced her worries and concerns it would reflect poorly on her ability to take care of the future Raevan, and soon after the meeting she would find herself sans essence and soul bottle.
But her nerves by this point were frayed to the breaking point and she thought she would fall asleep while she was driving if she wasn't able to get a decent night's sleep again soon, and who better to answer her questions than the Lab who gave her the essence. The call was eventually made, a time set for a meeting, and both essence and soul bottle packed carefully into a backpack that she could take to work with her.
Thankfully the cafe was only a few blocks from her work, so even though she got off a few minutes before six, a quick jog got her there only a few minutes late. Dressed in similarly eye-blinding colors (though she was still mostly wearing workout gear), she was rather hard to miss as she walked in, and the fact that she was scanning the cafe seemed to indicate that she was looking for someone as well.
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Posted: Mon Aug 24, 2015 10:15 am
It seemed third time really was the charm in this case. The door opened twice - one coming in, one going out - but when the third chime thereafter alerted the whole cafe once again, Nell herself had walked in. A smile lit up his face to see that she was dressed as brightly as he was and if there was any uncertainty left in him even after a quick round of 'I'll be wearing...' on the phone, the fact alone that she seemed to be searching the cafe was enough to disperse it.
When her head turned back toward his section of the room, the vet first reached his arm up to wave and did so with all the exuberance he was known for. Then he opted to do one better, clamoring out of his seat to stand at his table's side as if his arm and the fact his hair was as bright as his appearance could be missed, smiling widely with his arm still waving overhead like an overeager schoolboy.
Third, naturally, he called out but blessedly the distance between himself and Nell was not over anymore than a table and a half. Only a couple pairs of eyes turned to look at him rather than the entirety of the cafe.
"Hey Nell! I'm over here!"
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Posted: Mon Aug 24, 2015 12:40 pm
The sudden movement made her jump slightly, though a rather sheepish smile spread over her face once she realized who it was. She really needed to relax, though that was the whole point of this meeting really. Her smile turned into a much more relaxed one as she returned the wave, hitching her bag up on her shoulder a bit higher before making her way over to his table.
"Hey, Zeke, right?" She held her hand out as she approached, attempting to take a good look at the man without rudely staring at him. Well, she couldn't fault him for his style, at least. They looked like the might have shopped at the same place for the most part. "Thanks for taking the time to talk to me."
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Posted: Wed Sep 02, 2015 11:10 pm
"The one and only!" He stuck out his right hand to Nell for a shake then gestured to the table he had picked out for the two of them to share. "No problem! I'm always happy to help a Guardian out and the newbies are no exception!"
He waited for her to take her seat before returning to his. The vet took a moment to set his glass aside - placing a napkin under it so the condensation that was starting to fog up the glass wouldn't make a ring on the table - then cheerfully took his 'I'm ready for your questions' pose. Nothing too dramatic, perhaps blessedly, just a simple twining of his hands on the table top along with a gentle c**k of his pink and blue-colored head. He was ready for this.
"So let's cut right to the chase: what would you like to talk about? I'm sure you must have a million questions at least!"
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Posted: Sat Sep 05, 2015 9:38 pm
A good portion of her tension seemed to leave her when it was clear that she was, indeed, speaking with the right person, and that he was quite a bit more approachable than the stuffy scientist-y type she had originally invisioned. Good! At least he wouldn't think she was crazy! Probably. She hoped so at least. She slid into the seat across from Zeke, carefully placing the backpack on the table in front of her, fidgeting with the zipper as if deciding whether to open it or not.
"Well. Um. Mostly I have questions about the essence? I mean, um, I'll probably have a million questions about everything but that's the most..." she paused for a moment with a slight frown, fingers continuing to anxiously fidget with the zipper pull. "Pressing." To be honest, she hadn't really wanted to bring either the essence or soul bottle with her, but she figured it would be best to have them on hand to help back up her worries.
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Posted: Thu Sep 10, 2015 8:49 pm
The vet was relaxed in his posture and expression but that didn't mean his focus was equally so. He did not miss Nell's frown and the way she fidgeted with her bag.
"Okay, Essence questions. I can do that." He smiled to reassure her and whatever it was she was clearly concerned about. He recalled her Essence clearly; one small, not quite perfectly round stone with a smaller, equally unsymmetrical hole through it. Each Essence that he was tasked with giving out always came with a small written description from Dr. Kyou (if not verbal, if the two happened to meet up for the handoff). Zeke wasn't familiar with actual hag stones, but he had learned enough to know they were considered to be protective amulets and were tied, apparently, to the world of the fae. The one Nell had been given, however...
Essences did the opposite of what they are supposed to do or are intended to do. An Essence made from a protective charm wouldn't be so protective, would it?
"Let me first ask you a question, if you don't mind. Has the Essence been..."acting up" at all? In a manner of speaking? By which I mean has it given you any grief? Random, unexplained happenstances or misfortunes? Anything like that?"
There wasn't cause for losing one's head with alarm JUST yet, but a quiver of concern in one's breast was unavoidable all the same. This was especially so when Nell was coming into this looking clearly uncomfortable and added to only by the fact that Zeke was who he was - one of the handful of folks who had experienced just what a malignant Essence had to offer first hand.
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Posted: Fri Sep 11, 2015 10:40 am
She nodded, glancing down at the bag in front of her as she tried to think of a way to phrase her question that didn't make her sound entirely crazy, but would also get her the answer she was looking for. 'Is this supposed to make me see things?' didn't seem quite right, 'can you hear someone whispering something?' was definitely not good, and...
Her train of thought was cut off when Zeke spoke again, and looked up with a rather surprised look on her face. "It's supposed to do that?" she blurted, letting out a rather relived sigh. "Oh thank god, I thought I was going crazy." She visibly relaxed at that, one hand reaching up to rub at her eyes.
"Yeah, kind of. I've been, um. Seeing things? At first it was only when I looked through the stone, but now it's..." she trailed off her eyes unfocusing slightly as if she was looking at something just behind Zeke. With a small shake of her head she brought her attention back to the conversation. "And now I think I'm starting to hear things too? I mean, nothing bad has really happened, but it's Um." she trailed off again, though this time it was just to sigh again in frustration.
"Weird."
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Posted: Fri Sep 18, 2015 12:19 am
Nell's sudden display of surprise made him laugh, although he was quick to try and stifle himself with a press of his hand over his mouth.
"Well...yeah, actually!" His words came out slightly muffled and when he dropped the hand he was beaming at her. That look didn't last very long however, not when she explained just what her Essence had her experiencing. His pierced brows knit together and there was a few moments were Zeke was silent and sucking on his lip ring as he thought hard on just what she said.
"Okay so...Let's start from the beginning. From what I understand your Essence is naturally believed to be a protective charm. Kind of like those God's Eye amulets; it's something to protect the bearer from harm and supernatural elements. Essences commonly display effects that counteract or are completely opposite to their normal or intended purposes." As he spoke his hands were a blur of movement. Left, right, up, down, and back again. "That's why I asked if it was being weird or if you noticed anything. Since you have I'm sure you can piece everything together as far as that goes."
He smiled a little, although it was more sheepish than sunny on his part.
"You say you see things when you looked through it, right? Is that still true or are you seeing things when you're nowhere near the Essence? And hearing things...same deal? Do you have to be around the Essence or are you hearing things when you're, say, across the house or on an entirely different level from it?"
Assuming she lives in a multi-level house, anyway.
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Posted: Fri Sep 18, 2015 10:08 pm
The quiet clink clink of the zipper pull being fidgeted with punctuated Zeke's words as he spoke, though she seemed to be put more at ease with the relatively unworried way that he reacted to it. That was good, right? Surely he would act a bit more concerned if there was anything seriously wrong.
Well, considering the number of ways that a protective amulet could go wrong if it went against its nature, she supposed she should be grateful that she wasn't being plagued by a string of bad luck, but still. Why couldn't she end up with something that made her float or made everything smell like roses? She let out a long breath, looking up at the ceiling as she tried to remember what happened when.
"It um. It was only when I was holding the stone for the first couple of days, but after that it's gotten worse. It's mostly been while I'm still at home with it, but it's gotten a lot more, um." She paused, trying to think of the right way to refer to an inanimate object actually doing something. "Active? It's not as bad when I'm not at home, but it's still a bit...unsettling. I'm guessing it's gonna keep going on until I send it back to the lab?" Hopefully it didn't keep up with this trend of getting more severe until then, though. Who knows how long it'd take for her to actually capture a soul.
"It's a pity it's not closer to Halloween, this would be perfect," she muttered, glancing down at the lump in the bag caused by the bottle.
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Posted: Mon Sep 21, 2015 9:07 pm
He listened, sucking his lip ring again as she spoke and he thought on her words.
"You have a very active Essence, if that's the case." Quite a few Essences were rather docile in temperament. They didn't activate their special powers around their Guardians or whomever unless prodded to do so. Once in awhile there was one that came along that liked to 'show off' even at the Lab. Made for some interesting work days whenever those ones were brought out, but he could clearly recall that this one didn't do a thing when he was packing it away for shipment. "It just may keep on doing its thing, yeah, but it could also stop at any time. They're kind of unpredictable like that."
Zeke took up his drink and took a sip. Better to speak with a wet tongue than a dry one. Setting it down thereafter, the vet cleared his throat but chuckled at the comment Nell made about Halloween.
"Maybe that'll be your Raevan's favorite holiday given what their Essence is doing." Now there was a silly thought. "On a more serious note it is worrisome that the Stone is increasing its activity like you say. But let me ask you this - when you have it at home, do you keep it out or do you store it in the case it and the Soul Glass came in?" His attention flicked briefly to the bag she had with her. By the way she was fussing with it, Zeke figured a guess that the Essence was inside would be right on the money. If that was the case, the oddly active Essence was displaying quite the set of manners in lieu of the conversation being had about it.
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Posted: Thu Sep 24, 2015 7:41 pm
"Well," she said with a sigh. "At least things won't get boring at home, I guess." Not exactly the most hopeful of answers she could have gotten, but at least she knew now that this was something that was supposed to be happening. She guessed it made sense, after all. The essences seemed to be entirely one-of-a-kind so it would be kind of hard to figure out how each one worked individually.
"I used to keep it out, but I've been trying to keep it in the case mostly for the past few days." Oh, if she looked up much she would certainly see something, but she was very much keeping her attention firmly on what was in front of her and doing her best to completely ignore everything else. It was working for the most part. Though the thought of a polite spooky stone was an amusing one.
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Posted: Thu Sep 24, 2015 8:34 pm
"Hm..." A crease formed between the vet's brows while his mouth skewed into a small frown. "And I assume that even in the case it's still causing problems?"
So much for his present idea. His gaze once more flicked to the bag Nell had brought with her and the woman sitting across from him, alternating a couple of times between the two before finally coming to rest once more on his equally flashy counterpart. He wasn't entirely back to square one with that idea blown out of the water, but he wasn't sure what she would think about his newest one, even as beneficial to her as it would end up being.
"I might actually have a solution to your situation, although it's a bit unorthodox and you're the first person I've ever had to ask this. Congratulations on that!" His final words were punctuated with a sunny display of jazz hands despite the severity of the situation. "What I'm thinking is this: since the Essence is giving you so much trouble and hasn't shown any signs of stopping, I can take it from you and return it to the Lab. We can store it there until you catch and return a soul, which is when the two will be combined into a Raevan."
His gaze was steady but again his hands were a flurry of movement as he spoke. The Lab had the means to store the Essence and to his knowledge had a clean track record of keeping Essences contained...save for one small blemish now named Anastacia and under his care. It felt like a good solution but in light of her situation, 'what if' scenarios were going to happen and there was a sure-fire, aptly named 'Big One' staring him in the face from the corner where the elephant in the room was hanging out.
"Of course...there's alternative to that as well. If you'd prefer I can arrange for you to get a different Essence instead of using the Hag Stone. Maybe - and this is a pretty big one but maybe - I could even see about having you stop by to pick another out yourself." For all the trouble she had been going through, even trying to see if that was a possibility was the least he could do for her.
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Posted: Thu Sep 24, 2015 11:11 pm
His questions stunned her into (more) silence, her mind stunned into near-uselessness as she tried to the over the choice she had been given. It was one hell of a tempting offer, if she was being honest. She had generally never been fond of overly scary things, and this had certainly been testing her limits as far as that had been concerned. Being able to think of a soul that she could possibly collect in relative peace was something that was worth some consideration.
And the offer of a new essence was an even more serious thing to consider. She drew in a sharp breath, opening her mouth as if to say something before closing it again with a frown. She sat in silence for a few moments, staring pensively down at the bottle-shaped lump in the bag, making herself think it out thoroughly before saying something.
"I...rea`lly want to say yes, that sounds like it'd be wonderful, but..." her face scrunched up as if she wasn't entirely too pleased with the conclusion she came up to. "It'd feel a bit too much like giving up, y'know? What I signed up for was a big responsibility, and I shouldn't let something like this get to me." Even if it would mean getting a good night's sleep again. She would have to take care of the person that was born from this rock, after all, and it wouldn't speak well to her future if she wasn't able to deal with it when it was an inanimate object in a jar.
"Guess that means I'll just have to work on getting the soul a bit faster, huh? Speaking of!" She finally unzipped the bag, rooting around in it for a moment before pulling out the soul glass, setting it down on the table between them. "Kinda drawing a blank on it, really. Don't have a lot of brown things around, unfortunately."
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Posted: Thu Sep 24, 2015 11:45 pm
He let her mull over the choices he gave her as the stunned look on her face was enough to tell him that perhaps the ideas he had uttered had not crossed her mind up until that point. When she finally gave her answer it was his turn to be the stunned looking one as his brows shot into the relative cover of his choppy bangs and his mouth opened just enough to make him look suitably 'surprised'.
"Are you sure? It'd be no trouble to just hold onto it at the Lab if you want to keep it." It didn't hurt to make certain but in the end he could relate to her answer. He had faced similar topics before, during, and after he had been given ownership of the Self-Replicating Virus. What had been had been a scary thing, but who had come from it was wonderful, beautiful, and someone he would not trade for the world.
His smile returned, small but fond, and he shook his head to the words he had uttered.
"Actually, scratch that. I can see you're certain about this. " He was about to tell her about his own experiences, whip out his phone and show her his many photos of the Black Widow Frei who was probably comfortably lounging about at home, but before could start down that particular road there was an empty Soul Glass in front of him and an unasked question hanging in the air. He laughed.
"Well now! It's not every day I get to see a Soul Glass handed over to me empty!" Zeke took the heavy glass and metal contraption up and turned it slowly in hand. The Glass had been a surprising sight next to the Hag Stone. Zeke had figured Kyou for a man who would have chosen something brighter to counter the Stone Essence's earthy grey color but he had gone completely opposite what was expected. The cloth in question was grey-brown, but not a horrible shade by any means. It darkened toward the metal edging of the cone that held it in place and its design was definitely unique. Zeke had seen swirls, leaves, spots, and waves galore, but nothing yet like this particular cloth. Again he unwittingly did the lip ring thing, thinking for possibilities he could shoot Nell's way.
"August is good for greens and less for browns, that's for sure. You've got a cloth with an interesting color, at any rate. Kind of grey-brown? So you could get something brown, sure, but you might be able to capture something grey I think." Maybe. Possibly. Brown would be the safer bet. "As for brown things...Well you've got plenty of rocks that are brown. Gemstones like topaz or tiger's eye would work although they'd have to be raw and unpolished or cut. Can't catch a soul from anything that's been tampered with by humans."
He set the bottle down cloth up between them so they could both look and think. One hand went to his beard to rest his chin upon it.
"Plenty of brown animals, and I'm not talking dogs or cats, although those are valid. Horses, birds, fish...lizards and frogs have a lot of brown-colored species in their ranks. Insects are also doable if you're not creeped out by them much and plants..." He paused there, a little stuck. When had he ever seen a brown flower that wasn't caused by wilting? "Plants you might have to look a bit I think, but I'm sure there's some sort of brown plant somewhere in the world! Metal too, though again, raw ore, nothing melted or smelted or messed with by people."
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