summer has come and passed, the innocent can never last | open, with starters

[wrathfulkhan]

Characters: Eyebrow Squad Gene, Jackie, Deon, and you!
Date: Throughout September 15 days late with Starbucks
Location: Keeliai and the rest of the shell
Situation: September interactions for Eyebrow Squad.
Warnings/Rating: None initially, but subject to change.

A. [Gene] House Iron Dragon | September 15 | closed to Pepper
So this has been a long time coming, and things have come to the point where Pepper and Gene need to - gasp! - talk their problems out. Gene's sensed this coming for a while. He's made tea, and is sitting at the table, waiting for Pepper.

B. [Jackie] Dove's Place | early September | closed to Dove
Jackie is in an unusually good mood today. Yunxu seems to be ignoring him for now, so he's not sure what to do with himself...aside from hang with his Snake brothers. He's still itching for something more than gang life, and talking to Dove usually seems to make him chill out; while he is in a good mood, there's some anxiety lingering about him for sure.

C. [Deon] China's Place | early September | closed to China
Deon's been avoiding China ever since Erskine had accused him of being a spy. Confrontation is not his style. But learning sigils from her had been fascinating, and he'd been wavering between continuing his studies while keeping his head low, and telling her exactly where she could go shove her information requests. Perhaps if Deon had been taken a week or two before, he might have gone with the former; now, he's more inclined to opt for the latter. But he'll hear her out. She deserves a fair shake.

He takes a deep breath, and knocks.

D. [Gene] Fire Sector | throughout September | open
Gene is keeping a weather eye on the Chihuelans as they make their way through the city. And not a particularly kindly one, either. In fact, it could be read as a downright stink-eye, if they ever took notice of him.

E. [Jackie] Sky Sector | throughout September | open
Jackie can be found in the Sky Sector this month, slumming it with his Snake buddies, gambling in alleyways and generally being a hooligan and a layabout.

F. [Deon] Metal Sector | throughout September | open
Of course, Deon isn't Deon if he's not working on some ridiculous project or other. He's going around the Metal Sector in his off-time, picking up bits and pieces to tinker with. He might even find something worthwhile.

G. [Deon] Deon's Room | early September | closed to Tom
Deon's been sitting in his room all day, working on cracking the security of the laptop that he'd come upon in the market. It's been a side project more than anything - current events had kept him busy - but he's still interested in breaking in. It's not his laptop, but it's Tetravaal, so that makes it a little something of home.

H. [Gene] House Iron Dragon | early September | closed to Tony
Mail wasn't something the occupants of House Iron Dragon were accustomed to getting, so the pair of letters shoved under the door while Gene and Tony were out were a surprise.

"What, is Pepper leaving us notes now?" Gene asks, stooping to pick them up - and stops when he sees the name scrawled on one envelope, in what's unmistakably his handwriting.

铁木真.

I. [Deon] the Morrigan | early September | closed to Shay
Deon has gotten to know the former Assassin's ship (not a boat) passably well, and he knows it's here he can go to find Shay when he needs him. He knocks gently on the cabin door. "Shay?"

Comments

[highprofilerichkid]

"...Yeah. Mine too." Cue Twilight Zone theme. This is getting really weird. Tony turns the letter over in his hands a few times, looking for any more clues. But it's just a plain envelope: no other writing or notable features.

"You don't remember us sending letters to ourselves, do you?" Tony's starting to feel like he's going crazy, and he's not sure whether a 'yes' or 'no' would be more comforting.

[wrathfulkhan]

Gene shakes his head, feeling the weight of the paper in his hand. "No. Not at all."

Then he looks at Tony. "I suppose we should probably open them in a contained environment. Who knows what's in these?"

[highprofilerichkid]

"Okay. Then this is definitely really weird." As Pepper might say, mega super ultra weird.

Still, Gene's suggestion seems a tad bit paranoid. "What do you think's going to be in them? Anthrax?"

[wrathfulkhan]

It's not paranoia if they're out to get you, Tony. For all he knows this could be a trap set by those who stole the soul gems.

"I'd rather not find out the hard way, if it's all the same to you."

[highprofilerichkid]

Tony shrugs. He still thinks it's a little over the top, but he's too unsettled - and curious - to argue. "It can't hurt. Are you going to put a force field bubble around them or something?"

[wrathfulkhan]

"That's the idea," Gene says. What he's going to do is bubble them, then analyze them with the crimson ring, and then if there's anything dangerous about them, stick his gauntleted hands in to open them.

Better safe than sorry.

"Come on." He turns and goes inside.

[highprofilerichkid]

Tony follows Gene inside, not taking his eyes off the letters. He's still not convinced the letters aren't some temporary shared delusion, and he half-expects them to vanish or transmute into something banal like kedanese junk mail.

Though, speaking of delusions... "Do you think this has something to do with the Dreaming?"

[wrathfulkhan]

Gene shrugs. "I'm not sure. Since the planes merged, any weird events are usually a toss-up."

He encases the letters in a forcefield bubble, examining them, and then turns the crimson ring on them. He's not sure if he's relieved or annoyed the scans don't turn up anything.

"I think they're clean," he says, releasing the forcefield.

[highprofilerichkid]

If the Dreaming's involved, Tony just hopes this goes better than his last Dreaming-facilitated encounter with himself. But the Dreaming had been tainted by Malicant's influence, then. No reason to think it would spit out something so malicious again.

Gene gives the all-clear, and Tony gingerly takes his letter back. "So... can we open them now?"

[wrathfulkhan]

Gene shrugs. "Sure." He picks up his own letter and examines it, but doesn't yet open it. It's like he's trying to read it without opening it, which is crazy talk. While his scan hadn't revealed anything untoward, he was still wary.

[highprofilerichkid]

"Okay." Tony sits down on the couch, and without further ado, tears his open. Why delay any longer? He is a man of action, Gene!

He pulls the letter out of the envelope, and flattens it on the coffee table.

It's a couple lines of... what looks like incomprehensible gibberish. "Uh." And, again, "...Okay." That's a bit underwhelming.

"It's some kind of code, I guess?" He frowns, and starts running his finger along the lines, silently mouthing the jumble of numbers to and letters to himself as his brain kicks into code-breaking mode.

[wrathfulkhan]

He is a man of honor.

"Figures you'd send yourself code," Gene says, laughing a little to himself, and opens his own letter.

He reads it, quickly at first, then going through another pass more slowly, lingering on the postscript.

"Tony."

[highprofilerichkid]

Tony's engrossed in his letter. When Gene says his name, he doesn't look up, but excitedly replies, "It's a code I wrote when I was a kid, when I was messing around with cryptography." That's why the letter's written in it: it's something only he would know.

"I haven't thought about it in years. I need—" he fishes around in the Junk Bowl until he comes up with a pencil, and starts furiously scribbling underneath the encoded lines. Letter by letter, the message starts to take shape.

[wrathfulkhan]

"Oh." Gene leans against the table, waiting impatiently for Tony to finish. He's learned by now that there's no talking to Tony when he's like this...and besides, he's interested in Tony's letter, too, if he chooses to share.

In the meantime, he reads his own letter again, stopping at one phrase every time.

[highprofilerichkid]

Tony's scribbling slows as he decodes more of the letter, and his concentration on the code shifts into a kind of hopeful uncertainty.

When he's done, he picks the letter up. As Gene had done with his, he reads it over several times, lingering longer with each pass.

"I..." He looks up at Gene. "What— what does yours say?"

[wrathfulkhan]

Wordlessly, Gene turns his letter to show Tony. It's all in Chinese, written with a practiced hand, but the postscript is in English.

It worked.

[highprofilerichkid]

"That's what mine says too," Tony says, almost in a whisper, like speaking it too loudly will jinx it.

He puts his letter back down on the table, turning it so Gene can see.

"How could we... Do you think they're real?"

[wrathfulkhan]

Gene sits down hard next to Tony on the couch, the letter in his hands shaking.

"What if they are?" he asks, and it's less a challenge than a tremulous hope. "What do we do if they are?"

[highprofilerichkid]

"Well... Then, that's... good, right?" He starts to smile - it's hesitant at first, but slowly becomes a wide grin. "That's great."

[wrathfulkhan]

"Yeah," Gene says, trying a smile. "I guess so." His smile falters. "But if it came from the Dreaming...how do we know this isn't just something we conjured up by hoping about it?"

[highprofilerichkid]

Tony's smile falters a little. "We don't, I guess. But at least we know they're not from someone or something else trying to trick us - they're in our handwriting, and I'm the only one who knows this cipher."

He pauses. "And... if the Dreaming was just reacting to us hoping about it, it would be weird for it to give us both the exact same thing."

[wrathfulkhan]

Gene exhales a bit. "Yeah. You're probably right."

He pauses. "We should probably talk to Pepper about this. If the letters aren't lying to us. If it really worked."

[highprofilerichkid]

"Yeah, we should. If what you did with the rings does work, we could do it for her, too."

His grin returns full-force, and suddenly he laughs and flings his arms around Gene. "It might really have worked. We can go home, and it'll be okay. It'll be amazing."

[wrathfulkhan]

Gene laughs and hugs Tony back, some of the worry in his heart easing.

"Do you think she'd trust me with the last ring?"

[highprofilerichkid]

"Yeah, sure. I think so," Tony replies, too giddy to be pessimistic.

Pepper's forgiven Gene enough to live with him, and to not rocket-punch him in the face for dating Tony. Even back home, she'd been the most willing to give Gene another chance. Tony doesn't think she'll have as hard a time with the tenth ring as Tony had.

"Especially for this. I don't think Pepper wants to get mind-wiped, either."