So, true fact: the Tamarack Falls Jewish Bookstore is a two-level affair, and the back room where all the Lost gather? That's a one-floor portion of the building. So what's a golem to do with this but open the window from her aparment over her store and turn the roof of the back room into an impromptu deck. So tonight's dinner -- lamb biryani, made at home -- is dished out into bowls, and in the warm summer air, Gisa sits on the roof overlooking her back alley, alongside Alonso, watching the sun descend and the stars come out.
That's probably quite a sight if one could see it from a distance, actually: one Darkling with lightning eyes, and an Elemental with fiery eyes and a flaming sigil on her head, sitting out in the dark? Sure, that's not at all creepy if you don't know them. Probably good they're slightly elevated.
"Sidney promised to come for dinner tomorrow," Gisa informs Alonso easily, in between bites of spicy rice, lamb, raisins, and cashews. "He and Lucky seem to be getting on -- well enough. Somewhat stable." As if that's all she could hope for.
"He should bring him 'round for Shabbos dinner. I know that would make you happy, in any case." Alonso tends to lounge when possible. A sort of loose limbed sprawl in his chair, one arm draped over the back of it, the other resting on his lap with a glass of wine in hand. At present his big floppy hat is unworn. It's late enough that the sun isn't a nuissance. It leaves instead his long red scarf which he wears wrapped about his head, draped back over one shoulder. Even so, the man's outfit and bearing screams 'I should probably be on the set of a golden age of Spain drama'. The accent, too, is a dead giveaway in that respect. "That reminds me. I completely missed celebrating Shavuot with you. My apologies for that."
It's a lovely night for a dinner outdoors. The two Lost on the rooftop would be forgiven for not noticing what's going on in the alley just behind the store. That might be what the vagrant figure, a shuffling form covered and concealed in ratty clothing and a big green jacket, is thinking as he creeps up to the large dumpster back there and pushes it open despite their presence. It's done with at least some discretion, the hinge pushed up fluidly and smoothly, but there's no hiding the rattling of the metal container or the creak of the lifting lid, nor the sounds of junk jostling around as one hand plunges right into the garbage to search through it. Head down, the figure's totally obscured, but quite visible to the two rooftop diners from their vantage. Bent over like that, the huge and suspiciously full pack on his back is easily seen, as is something long strapped to his back, concealed there with a handle jutting out.
"That is forgiven, of course. You have been busy." Still, that apology probably mollified Gisa somewhat, or at least it might seem so to Alonso. She's very difficult to read if you don't know the minutae of her expressions, given that she speaks in a near-monotone, albeit one with a thick Israeli accent. These are definitely two people who are Not From 'Round Here. "He does come by, but it would be nice for him to eat by us on Shabb-- " And then she pauses at the noise. Carefully sets her bowl down. Gestures toward the roof's edge, and slowly edges toward it. Edging up so she can peer over the edge and down, she calls: "If you are hungry, there is food," into the alley. Of course, from below, there's a four-armed W floating in the night air with two glowing eyes underneath it. Hardly reassuring. Perhaps she means the food will be Glitch.
Alonso, too, ticks his head at the sounds from below. He rolls up to his feet and edges that way, himself, peering over the edge with his wine glass still in hand. He lifts it in toast to the creature down below. "Greetings, friend. What she says is so. This is essentially how she and I met, so." He gestures to the wine glass in his hand, "Avail yourself of the hospitality, Tovarisch!" He does straighten back up, not quite waiting for the answer. Falling off the roof makes for a lousy first impression. There's a glance over to Gisa and a shrug of the shoulders. "Maybe we should put a sign down there, eh?"
The figure rummaging through the trash stops dead when Gisa calls out. After Alonso adds his voice, there's a loud burst of noise and clattering as his gloved right hand flies back out of the dumpster to catch on that handle of whatever's tucked between his jacket and backpack. He straightens up immediately and looks straight up. In the dim light, the hood covering his face flops back, and reveals a young man with a smooth face, haunted looking eyes, and a muss of dark hair. What Gisa and Alonso will notice over this is how his face is muddled. It's hard to tell what's going on with it in the dark, but his features are scrambled and blurry in a very unnatural way, a flickering and twitching aspect to them. While the exact nature is difficult to discern, it's clear he's more than just a normal mortal. Staring back up at the flaming eyes and the spanish soldier, he stands his ground silently, unsure of what to do. Hand still at his back.
"Yes, that is how we met. Though you invited yourself in and took up sleeping on my fold-out couch. At first." Gisa reacts to the whole series of events with what could come off like callous diffidence, though perhaps she might later be forgiven this if her essential Elementalness is better understood. She peers down over the edge of the roof, the eyepits in which those flames dance narrowing and then opening again. "Shalom, friend," she calls down into the alleyway, raising a hand. "There is no harm for you here. There is only Hope." And accompanying that word? A wash of scents and sounds: petrichor, the leading edge of a match striking, the scent of ozone on the air as if lightning's soon to follow. The crackling of tree branches snapping against one another when a storm blows in, right before the rain starts. The pop and hiss of dried grass catching flame.
Either supremely confident of his own abilities or sublimely foolish, Alonso's hands do not stray to his weapons. They raise, open palmed and empty in a gesture of peace. Or at the very least, an implication of no threat. "Easy. Easy, comrade. No need for violence. If we wished you ill, ill would have befallen you. Consider also the fact that we are eating dinner on the roof of the only Jewish bookstore within an hour's drive. We are not precisely in a position to be habitually unneighborly. Eh? Let us start with the simple things. I am Alonso." He moves a hand to his chest, "And this is Gisa." A gesture to the ceramic lady at his side. "Now you share what you are called."
The young man in the alleyway stares up. His eyes narrow at their words, his teeth set...with a look of clear frustration, even anger. When his hand leaves his back, it's in almost a huff. "Of course. It's not Them, it's...fucking Dawns," he speaks out in a halting voice. It sounds electronic, distorted as if through a cheap, static-laden speaker. Resettling his expression, but not exactly looking friendly, he shoves both hands in his pockets and steps away from the dumpster to stare back up at the two on the roof. "...I'm Glitch," he says, without a hint of irony, face flickering slightly.
Well, that isn't the response she expected, and that much is very clear. Gisa's head pulls back at the 'fucking Dawns' comment, and she looks -- briefly, and clearly, despite the darkness -- quite puzzled. Who doesn't like Dawns? What is this even. "Not yet, friend, it is in the middle of the night yet. There are, as Alonso points out, unfriendly ears around, however, so maybe we invite you in for dinner? I have biryani, or if you do not eat lamb, I will make you other food, and gladly so. There is challah and cheese and wine and many other things I can make." She adds, "I am going to jump down now so I can let you in to the room for visitors, which you are now, Glitch. And inside, we talk more. Okay?"
Alonso seems slightly less puzzled than Gisa at the stranger's distaste for Dawns. They are an annoying bunch, truly. But his shoulders shrug in answer to Gisa, another gesture of 'your guess is as good as mine'. He seems less enthused about the idea of her jumping down, his lips pursing tightly shut. But he says nothing to contradict her intentions. Instead he answers Glitch's introduction, "Good to meet you, Glitch. I am sure. No doubt your mood will improve with some hot food and a warm bath. Perhaps some rest. You can be on your way in the morning, if you decide that is for the best."
Glitch relents as they speak, looking over his shoulders repeatedly, as if expecting to be ambushed at any moment. He takes a few steps back, glancing between the two, face contorting in concern a moment. "I'm being followed," he beeps out, looking like he still is ready to dart. "Maybe not right now. But. They're after me." He doesn't warn them off, but he shares the info, hands still in pockets, letting them decide whether to still be hospitable.
She doesn't quite stick the landing, but she lands easily enough and without turning her ankle or anything of the like. Gisa leaps from the roof and lands about five feet away from Glitch. Looking up and down the alleyway, she grunts in response to the information that Glitch shares, and then tips her head up toward the roof again. "Maybe set your friend to watch, motek?" she asks of the Darkling, and the shin carved through her foreheard and into the flames within her flares brightly, briefly. "Anyone who chases you will find friends at your defense here. We will take you tomorrow to a safe place with more friends, if you desire. But tonight, food, a bath if you want it, clean clothes, a safe place to rest. Come, come." She fishes her keys from the pocket of her jeans, and trundles up the back steps of the bookshop, leading directly into the back room.
Alosno looks aside to Gisa and nods his agreemnt to her suggestion. It's hard for Glitch to see from his vantage point, of course, but the results of whatever Alonso does on the rooftop is fairly clear when a large dark raptor of some sort-- an eagle, maybe --wings up into the night sky to begin circling slowly overhead in the darkness. As good a lookout as you could want, all things considered. He then disappears from view entirely, likely heading into the store through the window to meet them downstairs.
Glitch seems mollified by Alonso's display on the roof. He pushes in alongside Gisa, standing near the doorway once he's through it, casing the joint with his gaze. His hood still down, they both can see just how young he looks, a face that can't be much older than 20. His features aren't just blurred, they're pixellated, broken up into a myriad of fine little squares in a regular grid. All evenly spaced, all solidly colored, but enough of them altogether to not break up his features too much.
The back door leads directly into the back room, without having to pass through the (closed) bookstore. She flips on the lights in the back room, and gestures around with one hand. "Do you have any particular food restrictions or preferences?" Gisa asks, trundling over toward the kitchenette and starting to pull out pans from the lower cabinets. Apparently she's totally serious about cooking for him straightaway. She pauses, squints a little bit at Glitch, and then goes back to the task at hand. "I prefer a good neighbors pledge, and perhaps it will make you feel more safe sleeping here to know I am as oathed not to harm you as you are oathed not to harm me. Do you agree? It can be for one day. Tomorrow we can take you to meet others, if you like. It is late now."
Glitch looks back at her and nods. "If you have words and they're safe I'll speak them," he beeps out. He's clearly a suspicious one, continually looking around at everything, but he slips his backpack off to put it down, sighing with relief slightly as he does so. There's another pause as if he's processing what she said earlier, and he replies haltingly, "I'll take whatever you've got," apparently in response to the question about food. "I've been...out for too long."
"I will make you something good. I have some rice already made, and I think there is leftover lamb." The pan that Gisa takes out is a colorful non-stick pan with an orange exterior, taken from the lower cabinet market FLEISHIG. She puts it on one of the two burners in the kitchenette and turns the heat on, takes down an apron from a hook on the wall and puts it on, then goes back to rummaging around in the fridge. "Hmm." A pause, and then she stands up, turning her face toward Glitch. Her eyeflames flicker gently, but the shin on her forehead glows so brightly it turns from its usual orange to yellow and then almost white. "Shalom, new friend. Peace between us. On our true names, we unclench our fists and clasp empty, peaceful hands, for one week's time. Let us find strength from our peace, or let that strength be poisoned if we break the peace we have sworn to. So be it." She adds, "It is not elegant, but it will do. What do you say?"
Glitch watches her, and then reaches down. He shrugs off the jacket, wearing a hoodie under it coated in more bloodstains than not, and pulls off both gloves, revealing the pixellation apparently extends across all his bare skin. Looking her up and...well, mostly down, even though he's not all that tall himself, he balls up his right hand into a fist. "That's a bad pledge," he says rudely, voice low and monotone. "You oneshot me in my sleep and all you get is a stat penalty for a little bit." Eyes meeting hers, he somewhat confusingly puts his hand forward...a hand that's shaking and trembling maybe a bit more than he expected it to. Desperate despite his surly attitude towards the pledge, ready to make peace.
"Murder is the unforgivable sin," answers Gisa, setting down the pan on the stove, spraying it with cooking spray as if she wasn't talking about whether or not she's likely to kill the person in the room with her in his sleep. "One cannot ask forgiveness of the dead. One can never be forgiven." She takes it in stride, apparently, or, if she's insulted? It doesn't show on her face, not easily. The ceramic woman's skin is literally a mask, after all. "I would not ask a pledge of longer duration of you. Perhaps when we are better friends, we may swear another pledge, or to be better friends, we might swear another soon. I would not take advantage of someone who is so afraid. We were once slaves in Egypt." With the pan heating on the stove, she leaves off with her monotone attempts at reassurance, and crosses the room toward Glitch, offering her open hands to his. Her skin is smooth, and actually warm; her handshake is almost exactly like wrapping his hand around a mug full of hot coffee. "You have no reason to trust me now, nor I you. I understand. I hope you will find reason to trust me, Glitch."
Glitch stares at her wearily. Far too wearily for someone so young. The feel of his bare fingers as they wrap around hers is like faint static; while his skin is smooth and warm, normal, the pixels not felt or having shape, there's a tingle to the contact like tracing a hand along the glass of a running television. As they shake, the faint tinkle of Gisa's mantle fills the air in the silence with the hiss and pop of potential...and then falls quiet, the sounds winking out in proximity to Glitch one by one until only a few still whisper hope into the air. "It's stupid to trust you," he beeps, hand trembling a bit in her grip. "But I need...to recharge. I need to pause. I want to trust you."
As her Mantle starts to fizz out into silence, a look dawns on her face -- pun entire intended -- and her eyes light up slowly. "Oh, oh," the golem says, as if agreeing with Glitch. "You are of a kind with my grandson." Grandson? She looks like she's not even thirty. "I will leave him a message so he can come to meet you, if you would like." Her other hand closes around his, and it's warm without being unpleasantly so. "I can make you not tired, if it would help. I am told I should ask people before I do that now. Also I will feed you food."
Glitch looks relieved for the first time. "Yes. Heal me. Thank you." He has no qualms about that one. "Should have learned that one before I had to leave. Would have made the street easier. Didn't have time to..." His legs wobble a bit, and he looks around for something to sit on. Somehow, through fae means or otherwise, he's avoided the thick scent of a vagrant, but his clothes are an absolute and genuine shambles, no fine hedgespun lurking under them or anything. "I might have to talk to the...Freehold here. Just got in town a while ago."
Her Mantle -- albeit suppressed by his -- swells for a brief moment. Petrichor, and the threatening of a Spring storm, accompanies the warmth washing through his body. It won't heal any big lacerations or deep wounds, but all the bumps and bruises and scuffs, the exhaustion, the hunger, that all goes away as the warmth of the Firehearted golem scrubs all the tiredness from nerves and bones. "You will have time to learn it here, I am sure," Gisa assures, as she gently releases his hand once the Contract's invoked. There's a couch, and several overstuffed chairs, for him to sit down in. "There are clean sweatpants, sweatshirts and t-shirts in the closet there," she offers with a gesture of one hand, "and there's a small shower in the bathroom in the corner, if you want to wash up. No pressure, of course. Do what is comfortable for you." And she seems to mean it. A nod of her head. "I will take you to the Wayhouse tomorrow. You can meet everyone you need to there."
Glitch looks around...and as eager as he might be to sit down and have a meal, the talk of a shower is hard to miss. The closet door is flung open and hastily looted as if money might be in there, a sweatshirt and t-shirt grabbed blindly. Then it's off over towards the bathroom to step just inside the door and start tugging clothes off, starting with that hoodie, the door left wide open in his eagerness. "Fuck it," he mutters nearly to himself, looking a lot more determined to get cleaned up now that the fatigue of the street has been healed.
The golem rumbles deep in her throat; the sound is possibly a chuckle and sounds like pebbles rolling down a tin roof. She nods her head once, heads to the closet and closes it back up neatly, and doesn't pay any mind to Glitch's eagerness to get a shower. The old saying 'he's got nothing she hasn't seen' and all that. There are towels stacked up on the shelf in the bathroom, shampoo and conditioner, et cetera. She is most definitely prepared for taking in people who need taking in.
While he showers, she cooks, doctoring some pre-cooked rice with lamb, curry, a handful of golden raisins. It's not proper biryani but it certainly smells good. While the meat's cooking, she rummages in the cupboards and fridge, coming out with hazelnut rugelach and leftover spinach salad, both of which are put out on the table. There's even a little slightly-off-meter humming to herself, some old folk song or other. The pitch is good but the meter is a little strange.
Glitch comes trundling on out looking nearly normal, save for the scrambling of his mien. The pile of raggedy clothes has already been traded for a pair of gray heathered sweatpants and a sky-blue shirt with "I LOVE YOU A LATKE" on it, along with a few bleach stains. He slowly creeps over towards the kitchen, silently, hands in his pockets, as if trying to sneak up on the food.
There's an orange plate on the table, and the salad's in a bowl next to it, the rugelach in an aluminum foil disposable container. Gisa's back is mostly turned, and she's busy stirring the rice and veggies and lamb in the wide pan. She turns on her heel, balancing the pan in one hand, and pauses when she sees Glitch sneaking up on the plate, before leaning forward and piling the fragrant rice -- yellow with saffron, orange a bit at the ends from curry -- and all its delicious add-ins onto his plate. "There is beer, there is wine, there is water and there is apple juice. I do not have pop, I am sorry."
Glitch stares back at her a bit awkwardly as she pauses, but upon seeing that steaming pile of rice and meat go on the plate, he becomes glued to a seat and begins shoveling food from all three sources into his mouth. Both hands are used, and they are used incredibly efficiently. Despite the forces of Spring removing fatigue and hunger alike, Glitch sets about stuffing himself as if the food might disappear soon. "Water is fine," he beeps out eventually after there's been a long stretch of him just eating. This is followed by an utterly cavalier little murmur of "So you're a Golem."
And so, she gets him a glass of cool water, setting it down by his plate. Never let it be said she doesn't fuss over people. Once the food has been delivered, Gisa starts cleaning up after making it. There's a divided sink, of course, so the pan goes in one side of that to soak, and then she goes about cleaning up the detritus of cooking while he eats. Finally, once all the trash is in the trash and the cooking implements are in the sink, she hangs up her apron on the hook again, washes her hands and dries them on the towel by the sink. "I am a Golem," she agrees, reaching for a wine glass, and then a bottle on the small winerack on the counter; after pouring herself a half-glass of a dark red, she leans her hip on the counter, turning to face him once more. "What are you? Are you literally a glitch, or is that your name?"
Glitch has to think about that one for a bit, but just eventually settles on "Yes" as a reply to the question. There's another little pause before his head tilts, the feasting put on pause for a bit. "You know what a glitch is?" he asks quietly, eyes moving from the hip against the counter back up to her burning eyes.
She takes a small sip of her wine; her ceramic lips click against the glass rim. "A glitch is a sudden, usually temporary malfunction or irregularity of equipment, usually to apply to technical equipment, programs, video games, or other high-tech things." Beat. "I am made of words, in some senses, as much as I am made of earth and fire and stone," Gisa explains, taking another sip of wine. "Your skin glitches the way that my skin is baked clay and yet it is still flexible."
Glitch takes a moment to look down at his pixellated hand, watching as a faint little corner of it scrambles and flickers before returning to normal pixellation. "It does," he says, looking up at her. Swallowing more food after studying her features a bit. "Video games," he repeats, from her earlier words, but doesn't actually form it all the way into a question. He's selective with his words, and despite the fragments of conversation, still shaken.
"You only need tell me what you are comfortable telling me," the golem reassures, and she trundles from her spot leaning against the counter to a chair that -- when one looks at it -- is clearly Her Chair. It's surrounded by small piles of books on the tables, many of which have post-it notes sticking out of them, as if she was in the middle of some huge research project. She props her right foot up on her left knee; the bottoms of her shoes appear to be, well, non-existent. Her single piece of Hedgespun, apparently: shoes that look like they've got soles but don't. "You were in a video game. You were or are a glitch. So that is your name." She frowns slightly, but doesn't say 'bro I don't call myself golem, that isn't a name.' "Is the food good?"
Glitch nods eagerly to everything she's said so far. He's absorbed in the food, looking at it more than her, still absorbing the reality of his good fortune and the continued lack of betrayal. There's a look up at her near the end, though. "I was a Player," he murmurs, roaming his eyes over her arms for a bit. There's a little bit of quiet after Gisa seems to have him figured out. Whether motivated by that or apropos of nothing, he takes a sip of water and intones in that electronic voice: "One evening, before evening prayers, the rabbi forgot to take the charm out of the Golem's mouth, and it fell into a frenzy. It raged through the dark streets, smashing everything in its path, until the rabbi caught up with it, removed the charm, and destroyed it. Then the Golem collapsed, lifeless. All that was left of it was a small clay image, which you can still see in the Old Synagogue."
"Ah. Player One, Player Two, fight?" Gisa's question is not really a question. She sits in the warm light of her reading lamp, the easy yellowish light making her fine copper-wire hair glitter subtly where the wiry curls have been ruthlessly smoothed back into the braid that lays at the back of her neck and between her shoulder blades. Wine glass in one hand, she watches him thoughtfully, and then her expression grows a little rueful. "I made myself a Golem. I am no goat made of clay because two rabbis were hungry, or an instrument of defense that might grow mindlessly violent. A golem is made to defend Jews, by Jews. When I was Taken, I could either allow myself to be what I had been made, or I could own myself again. So I decided I would be not a woman of stone and earth made by my Keeper, but a golem. I made myself."
Glitch listens slowly, nodding the entire time, from her comment about players one and two to the talk about her being Taken. His little quoted litany apparently not meant to judge. His expression grows firm, respectful even, at the talk of rejecting the Keeper and building oneself. "I made myself a Glitch," he says, glancing down at his hand again. "I did the damage. Broke the rules in order to get out."
She raises her glass to him when he says he broke his Keeper's rules to get out, and Gisa tips her chin up at him, even. There's a brief moment of what looks like pride at his statements, and Gisa seems to be treating them as if he was speaking of accomplishments. "You chose for yourself, and you made your own rules, then," the golem agrees. "Mazel tov, Glitch." A swallow of wine to finish the toast. "Is there any other way I can honor the spirit of our agreement and help you feel safer sleeping tonight?"
Glitch meets her gaze and raises his glass in turn, the cheer mutual. He's proud of it, despite his steely little standoffish expression, the way his shoulders roll back and his chin lifts up show it, along with a little fire in those pixellated eyes. He's glad he did it and he'd do it again, even as the digital scars flicker across his face. He thinks for a bit, before asking quietly: "Do you know...Nathania?"
A glitter of those eyeflames as she watches him puff up with well-deserved pride. Her eyes widen, and Gisa smiles a little bit, even. "Yes, I do know Bishop Nathania. I am going to go see her in the next few days, actually. Do you want me to inform her that you are here?" Another swallow of wine, savored, and she cants her head slightly to the side while waiting for his response.
Glitch stares back silently at that question, and tenses up again. He looks down at his hands and plate for a long time after that. "I...don't know," he says. "I..." He looks up, expression youthful and uncertain now. "Just tell me if she's safe," he says softly.
Realizing, perhaps, that she might have misstepped, Gisa's eyeflames go out, then come back on again. "The last time I spoke with her a few days ago she was quite safe indeed. As safe as any of us are." After a pause, she adds, "Probably safer than you were before you came here. But we will see to that." Finishing her wine, Gisa rolls up to her feet, trundling to set her wine glass in the sink. It isn't that she moves slowly, more that she moves with an incredible purpose, as if everything she does, she has considered the potential implications of, and found the risk worth it. "I am going to go get Alonso off the roof and leave his raptor to watch over us tonight. There are sheets in the closet, and the couch folds out to a bed. In the morning, I will make breakfast, and then one of us can take you to the Wayhouse so you can meet people. You are welcome to stay here as long as you need to stay here. You are my guest. Okay?"
Glitch looks up at her and nods, slowly and then more quickly. "Okay," he says, finishing his water before standing up. Looking almost innocent cleaned up in his jammies as such. He wanders over to his backpack and pulls out a scabbarded sword, the poorly concealed weapon seen earlier, and keeps it with him as he heads over to the couch to deposit it.
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