HOPE'S SCARS (4)

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((48 - Rutten))

June 1st, 802 AT. 7:35 AM.

Spider stood in front of the door, looking into the empty room, uncharacteristically still. She'd been unable to sleep, and had gone exploring in the early hours of the morning, floating about the Roost while most people slept. She had come across some thoroughly interesting things in her wanderings, foremost among those being the method by which the Roost kept itself afloat.

The Corkscrew had had massive engines beneath it, powered by several extremely large charged crystal shards. The Roost had no such mechanism. At its core was an unbroken crystal, presumably with demon still intact within it. Kasby had told them earlier that unless broken, crystals never moved. As such, the entire Roost was perched atop this one crystal. It certainly explained the strange architectural design.

People were starting to wake up, though, so she'd returned to her apartment to hide from them. As she arrived at her room, though, she saw the door to the apartment the rest of the crew shared hanging open, and poked her head in. The doors to the bedrooms hung open, and the place seemed quite abandoned. She cocked her head to one side. "Where did everyone go?" She asked the empty walls.

"Who knows?" Seth replied. He'd shown up rather quietly, while Spider was staring into space.

She glanced at him, not reacting significantly. "Do you? Did they just... take off?"

Seth shrugged. "I honestly don't know. I haven't been back here since the last time we spoke."

She scratched her head, a baffled look crossing her face. Did she even care if they left without her? She would've liked the chance to punch Kasby, at least once. "Well, what are you doing here anyway?" She asked Seth, a bit tersely.

"We're running low on time, yo. It's now or never." He leaned against her door, across the hall from where she stood. "You gonna come with us? Or stay with them?"

She sighed heavily. "I wanted a chance to let them know, say goodbye, I guess." She reached into one of her many pockets, and drew out a cigarette. "Got a light?" She asked, her eyes dancing over to his.

"Always." Out of his jacket came a beaten steel zippo. He handed it to her. "Glad to see you're enjoying them." He grinned.

She snatched it from him, and lit up with a fwwshhh, and sucked in deeply. "Yeah, they're alright," she said with a thick exhale of smoke. She tossed the lighter back at Seth.

He plucked it casually out of the air, and slid it inside his coat. "Can't you leave a note for Kasby and the others?"

Spider thought about it for a second. "Yeah, I could, but I can't write. What would I say, anyway?"

Seth looked at her strangely. "You can't write? Really?"

She shrugged, clearly slightly uncomfortable.

"Whatever, I'll write the note for you." He grinned wryly, and pushed past her into the apartment, grabbing a notebook off a shelf on one wall. He tossed it down on the table, flipped it open, and scrawled a quick note with a pen he pulled from a pocket.

Spider leaned over his shoulder, watching him write. "Wossit say?"

"Ahem." Seth stood upright and read in an overly dramatic voice. "See ya later, fuckers. I went to go hang out with cooler people. See you someday. Love, Spider." He pocketed the pen and turned to her. "Sound good?"

She nodded, laughing. "Alright, now bring me up to speed. What do we do? Lasso a demon? Stick a crystal up its ass?" She laughed smugly.

"The latter, more or less." He glanced around the room. "Any more reason to dally here? I can take you to the rest of the Talons, then we'll brief you in full."

Spider shrugged. She didn't look too keen, either way, but maybe that was just the way her face looked.

Seth began to walk out the door. "Follow?"

She nodded, and trailed after him.

"So. This whole demon-wrangling thing," Seth said as they traversed the streets. "We've sorta got a handle on it. Step one: capture demon, insert crystal. That's been done for us." The pair stepped to either side of the walkway to allow a cart loaded with scrap metal to pass by. "Step two: take ourselves, insert crystals. Not quite there yet. And finally, step three: make the link. That should be... interesting, to say the least."

"Mm," Spider hummed. "Can I take a look at the crystals?"

Out of his seemingly endless storage space called a jacket, Seth pulled a small purple crystal. "Careful with it now," he said, handing it to her. "We don't quite have spares.

She took it from him, and examined it for any signs, any... anything. It looked just like all the other crystal shards she had seen, clearly charged with some sort of purple demon mojo."I wonder if my demon juice will affect this... connection," she muttered, twirling the crystal in her fingers.

"Only one way to find out," Seth replied, grinning wickedly.

Spider smirked. "I used to live on one of these, you know," she mumbled, tossing the crystal back to Seth.

He caught the crystal, pausing in his stride to open a metal door to a closer-in section of the Roost. "Don't we all..."

"I guess so." She turned her head to fully look at him. Her eyes flared. "So. You already have these demons captured?"

"Shit yeah. And there's even a spare for you... You'll get to meet it soon enough." He stopped, in front of a door with '2259--Quinn' etched on it. "But for now... you get to meet the crew. Spider, I present to you..." Seth walked to the door, and kicked it in. "The Talons."