View source for Log:CB's Enormous Mouth Pt I

{{ Log
| cast =[[CB_Alexander|C.B. Alexander]] & [[Franklyn_Garreau|Franklyn Garreau]]
| summary = All that happened was Franky won some stupid car and a free trip to Arcadia - why does everyone gotta get so bent out of shape about her amazing luck? C.B. interrupts Franklyn's me-me-me time to drop a big ol' truth bomb on the poor Mortal: it's... Dramatic. Followed by [[Log:CB's_Enormous_Mouth_Pt_II|CB's Enormous Mouth Pt II]]
| gamedate = 2017.07.10
| gamedatename = 
| subtitle = "What the fuck is -WRONG- with people, why can't they be /happy for me/?!"
| location =Moontide Vineyard, Ft. Brunsett
| categories = Changeling, Mortal
| log =Any inquiring minds searching for a one Francine E. Garreau would be directed, if they asked at her Green Door Theatre, towards the Moontide Vineyards -- that arid patch of land in Fort Brunsett, that they've been desperately trying to turn a profit on since it was established in 189Whatever. Who cares about the /details/, or the fact that the Garreau and Alexander Family rift started, way back when, on this very land...

It's not the most glorious vineyard in the world - hell, it's probably not even the third nicest bit of land in the whole /city/ - but it's /theirs/. Not hard to find Franklyn, if a person was looking: down on the side of a hill where the summer sun has all those fruit slowly ripening on the vine, there she lounges on a blanket in the shade: hair drawn up in a messy topknot, sunglasses on her face, wearing a faded red t-shirt with a bright yellow sun and '1969' emblazoned on the front. Frayed denim cutoffs keep her decent, and platform flip-flops covered in oversized plastic daisies smack on the ground as she taps her foot to the beat of the music.

She's got a radio out here, see: loud enough to scare away crows and lure in anyone who's so inclined. Loud upbeat music, something about talking all night... A wine glass in her hand, and a backpack as a makeshift pillow, she sings along breathily, trying to keep up: "...the road, it runs a bit to the right: a couple more miles, a couple more miles and I know we'll arrive -- the rolling hills and valleys, girl they'll eat you alive..."

Even when she's alone, Franky is on stage. Doesn't mean she's amazing - just /invested/.


Usually...C.B. is on the dressed up side when he seeks out Miz Garreau. Granted, it's been awhile. Quite awhile! And things are different now, on many levels. Which is why C.B. Alexander is clad in his more usual uniform of weathered Red Sox cap, jeans, work boots, and red and black plaid work shirt open over a very interesting t-shirt. Messenger bag as always, one of Kip's "#6" buttons pinned to the strap along with the other ones.

He runs breathlessly down the hill, certainly not because he also has a cigarette between his lips...no, there is something different about C.B. today. His inkstained fingers are twitching and his blue eyes, the color faded like old denim, stare wildly out at the world, like he's actively running away from ghosts. Once he skids to a stop near Franky, he is clearly out of breath. Actually, he sounds like he's about to cough up a lung. Smoking and running at the same time -- kids, don't do it. It might be several moments before he can speak.


"We got it in the dark; we took the long way down - just to find our in somewhere inside this ancient town: we talked, we talked about it all night! We thought, we thought we'd make it alive!" Franklyn chants the chorus, totally wrapped up - in the song, in her feelings, in the moment: so human, so /tremendously/ human, a font of pure unyielding emotion. 

Raw and rough, like her voice as she hollers on with unembarrassed, unbridled enthusiasm - leaning into the bittersweet enthusiastic desperation of the song, arm waiving through the air rhythmically: "Just to throw the plan out at the first light: we thought we'd make it out alive! Or at least we'd give it an honest try..."

And then she takes a sip of her wine, opens her eyes, and spots an unexpected man who is very suddenly -there-, panting and out of breath and coughing.

Franklyn screams. A magpie in the distance decides it's time to fly off. A hand clutches at her chest as she reels back, nearly tearing at the little 'E' pinned to the collar of her shirt. Eyes widen as she realises who it is - and the scream turns into /words/, hot and flush as her angry embarrassment and shock: "What the FUCK?!"
 

C.B. leans over, elbows resting on skinny thighs. He is desperately trying to get his voice, and his breath, back again. Moving his head to one side, he hocks a monster lugey; it does the trick enough that he's able to stand again, and breathe, and...smoke.

"Sorry," he says quickly, putting both hands out as if to say: don't shoot. "Sorry, Frank. Sorry. Sorry. I -- fuck. I didn't mean to..." His brow suddenly gets all tight and furrowed as he squints at her shirt. "...what the hell are you wearing? FUCK!" He suddenly yells it almost as loud as she did, slapping his thighs with both palms, rubbing his forehead with inkstained fingers. "Okay. Start again." C.B. stands back up to his full height, but his eyes are still wide, still wild. "Sorry I scared you. I've been looking for you. Need to -- need to talk to you." He takes a drag with trembling fingers. Not at all the sardonic, casually-nihilistic-yet-passionately-angry intellectual image he tends to have going on...maybe this is why Green once told him he looked like a serial killer?


Franklyn's mouth drops open with disgust - DISGUST - as Mr. Alexander spits his choleric humours all over her family's precious legacy. Good thing C.B. holds up his hand - she's posed to throw that wine glass right at his face, his /face/, but then he's talking about her /clothes/ and Franklyn pauses.

And she leans away, looking down at her legs outstretched on the picnic blanket - back arched and chest puffed out a bit, so she can check out her shirt; fussily making sure there's no unnoticed stains or bugs or whatever C.B. must be complaining about. Because really? She looks pretty good - girl eats well and does a lot of yoga. A /lot/. It shows. But? This, she knows. 

Errant hair is swooped back out of her eyes, as she draws a leg up towards her chest and gestures for the smoking man to come sit -- reaching into her bag. Out comes a bottle of Evian, which is hurled in C.B.'s direction - and a pack of Lucky Strikes, which she keeps to herself. "Apparently so... JesusfuckingChrist, Ceebabes, what's got you all worked up?" 

Meanwhile, eyes dart as she looks him over -- surely not checking for, say, knives or a garrotte or a kerchief dabbed in chloroform or anything. She must be, er, concerned for him instead. Sure. That.


C.B.'s blue eyes /do/ wander over Franklyn's trim form, probably much to his chagrin...for a myriad of reasons. Although they eventually land on her 'E' button, and his brows go up. "Figures," he mutters, and he does, indeed, come sit next to her. He cracks open the Evian and mock-toasts her with it before taking a healthy glug, though he immediately follows it up with a drag. Like the cigarette is the only thing keeping him tied onto this earth right now.

Probably a good thing she /can't/ see the concealed Colt 1911 pistol that he wears beneath his t-shirt, eh? Were he not wearing that plaid shirt over it, the outline might show through. He wets his lips, eyes searching her face. Those eyes just seem so haunted. Whatever he's seen, maybe he's having trouble getting it out of his mind.

"Okay, Franklyn. I know this is gonna sound strange, but...well. I know other people have talked to you about this. But...that trip you won. To Arcadia. What are you doing about it?"


Franklyn is used to getting looked at - not because she's particularly striking, but simply because the girl takes up a lot of mental space. Presence. It. She's got quite a lot; but in a unbridled, earthen kinda way. So human. So tremendously human: no colourful plumage, no intoxicating flowers or grisly spines or ever-moving will-o-whisps about her: she is unmarred by the Wyrd, or anything else for that matter. Well. Besides a little fork of a scar, peeking around her thigh and at that slice of midriff -- but only briefly, as she fidgets about.

Cigarette lit, she turns and exhales a plume of smoke in C.B.s direction while she listens - expression growing guarded, defaulting back to quietly bitchy. He is downright scrutinised: green eyes prying and peering and /looking/ at him with so much focus. They linger around his middrif for a moment and... Why would she even presume he had a gun? Probably got his underroo's in a bunch. HAH. But before she can tear into him about that, she's become distracted by that face - those haunted eyes.

It causes Franklyn to pause.

Really, she pauses and stares: expression softening, just around the edges. Franky is, let's face it, an asshole - but she is still perfectly capable of compassion, sympathy and concern. They well up, expressed through a slight frown...

Which lasts about three moments, then she's scrunching her face up with petulant disapproval - angrily puffing away at the Lucky Strike. "I swear on the /earth beneath us/, if one more person asks me that question, then /fuck/ the free ride, I am just going fucking -walk- to Arcadia myself."

... She just said those words. But she has no clue. She huffs, she puffs, she groans and leans back flat on the ground.

"What the fuck is -WRONG- with people, why can't they be /happy for me/?!"


The haunted look hasn't quite gone away. Even when C.B. rubs his eyes, like he's trying to /make/ it go away, it just stays and stays. As does the slight tremor in his hand as he lifts and drops the cigarette. "Who keeps asking you? What have you been told?"

The air is somehow charged around him -- like that feeling the air gets before a storm breaks. Like the ozone right before lightning zaps you in half. One could almost /swear/ they feel that electricity in the air. Pulsating, vibrating, desperate to get out. "Look...I know it...I know it sounds weird. But you gotta trust me. I...I don't want to see you get hurt. You or anyone else." He wets his lips, reaching into his messenger bag and pulling out a flask. He takes a very, very long draught from it before holding it out to her, out of sheer camaraderie if nothing else.


GAME: You spend 1 Willpower with reason: Being A Sweetheart
====-> >> Franklyn to Here << <-==============================================
    Rolled 5 Successes for an exceptional success.
    < 1 1 1 1 1 3 3 4 6 8 9 9 9 10 >
=========-> >> Manipulation + Persuasion.Pretty_Please + 3 [9-Again] << <-====


Franklyn's ire is put on hold, as she tilts her head to the side so she can stare up at C.B. in silence - something about that persistently haunted look, the way his hands tremble... She shifts her weight, so she's lounging on her side; all stretched out, cigarette hanging from her mouth as she reaches towards the wine bottle. A healthy sized glass is poured, and offered over to C.B. without comment - trying to exchange it for the flask. Don't worry, it's from a winery in California. She doesn't drink the house swill -- but she will drink from the offered flask now, eyes still watching C.B., watching /carefully/.

Ozone in the air has her tense, or something - a hand pawing at her side, where the possible-scar is. She lays there in contemplative silence, watching the very very angry, very very sincere seemingly-young man with... Consideration.

"...I have been told it is a crumby trailer park in rural Florida or something - I assume there will be mosquitos, orchids, and people who take a lot of meth." Franks voice is very even - she's making /an effort/ for it to be so, damnit. "Regardless of this, I will still be going to Florida - because it is hilarious, and strange, and I am curious. But..."

Her eyes squint. This could go two ways for her: bitchy or sweet. She's at a crossroad. Franky chooses the right hand path: sweetness and light it is.

Breathy little sigh, and Franklyn stretches out a bit before pushing herself up to sit cross legged: all bright eyed and eagerly sincere as she whips off her sunglasses, gnaws on her lip and leans in towards C.B. -- her tone dropping, conspiratorially murmuring to her strange companion. "...Ceebabe..." A hand reaches out, but does not quite touch the man. "People keep saying things. I'm not stupid. I went to The New School -- but... I don't know why people are getting so, mmm, worked up." She raises a hand and pushes a strand hair behind her ear, sucking on her lip as she peers doeishly at him - smiling, but it's sad. Sad and just a little pleading. "Can you help me? I know... I know you know something, and I feel like... I should know? Please?"


Wine glass is exchanged for flask. Flask is full of cheap bourbon. Period. This is not artisinal whatever. It is not special. It is not organic. For all of C.B.'s many causes, he himself is a man who drinks cheap swill and eats meat and generally pays very little mind to his personal habits. The People are what matter, is what he'd say someone who might challenge him on this. (Someone like Green.) It's what he does for them, not for himself. His personal choices matter little in the end.

Anyway. Ceebabe's eyes widen even more when she says that she is /going/ to this place. To Florida. His lips part, like he is just about to spew forth a breathless amount of paranoid gibberish on the subject, and then they press together again in a thin line. He watches her, watches her pleading, sad eyes. God, she went to the New School? That actually makes it harder to resist her, not easier! In spite of himself, he reaches out for her free hand with one of her trembling ones and takes hold, should she let him. It isn't romantic. It isn't sexual. It's desperate, like a man reaching across an abyss to hold onto something real.

"Yes. Yes, I can help you, Frank. I'm probably the only one who can. But listen, if I help you -- it's going to lay a /real/ heavy trip on you." He takes a large swallow of wine, staring, barely blinking. "You're not going to believe anything I say. You're going to think I'm crazy. But you have to believe me: whatever I tell you is /true/. One hundred and fifty fucking percent. Okay?"


The irony is... Franklyn may act all fancy - the posh clothes, the sweet rides, the complicatedly artistic programming at the theatre she calls her own - but when faced with the offer of cheap bourbon? She doesn't balk. It's drunk down like it's sweet as any divinely offered Ambrosia, and even though it stings her throat, she goes back for more. It's not until C.B. get's all /earnest/, reaches for her hand, that she pauses and lowers the flask.

Shit's getting real.

And while Frank is a wicked bitch, she is not without sympathy: that desperation is picked up on and acknowledged, and in a tiny show of humane compassion she places the flask to the side, so she can attempt to steady C.B.'s trembling hand in both of hers. She listens to what he has to say, and while there may be a glimmer of worry in her expression, when she speaks? Determination, steeling up that lil' hint of desperation. 

"C.B., look -- if /you/ think that you can help me? Then I believe in you. No, I cannot promise I will believe whatever comes out of your mouth: but listen, if /you/ believe what you believe? /That's/ what's important, okay? Nobody else can tell you any different -- and who am I, to judge you?" His hand is squeezed gently. This is possibly the most sincere she's been with him, like... Ever. But what -focus- she has, what a sense of faith she projects as she speaks. It's downright reassuring. "Now whatever you have to say, I promise I will /listen/, one hundred and eighty fucking percent. What's eating you up, man?"

And this is the kicker - the real rare expression of something Franklyn hardly ever shares: genuine kindness. "How can I help?"


This Angry Young Man is incredibly earnest -- usually, but especially right now. Every atom of him is focused into this moment. One hand holds the wine glass, still holds his cigarette, too, as it burns down to ash, but the one that she is holding...that one is still trembling, but a little less so. Something warm comes into his eyes. It's the realness of how she's being. It means he can get right down to it and /rap/ with her, you know, and she might grok what he's saying. He leaps at the opportunity.

C.B. wets lips as dry as summer grass. His blue eyes -- and they are so very blue, so very wide, and so very unblinking -- are totally focused on hers. "What if I told you that you are at the center of a conspiracy, a conspiracy that in and of itself leads to a still deeper conspiracy? And what if I told you that I knew all of this from personal experience? That my concern for you is not merely based on hunches, but on actual knowledge I've gleaned from what I've been through? Could you begin to believe me?" It's vague, because it's only the beginning. You've got to dip into these things slowly.


Franklyn hesitates, but she does not interrupt -- that self centred impulse to tapdance over any given social interaction is put on a back burner, and she merely nods - keeping ahold of C.B.'s hand, while the cigarette smoulders and hangs from her lips. She's not too opposed to a little smoke getting in her eyes, if she can get to the real bare bones of this issue. 

Still. Her eyes narrow ever-so-slightly -- it's not scepticism, it's... Curiosity. 

"Continue." Not a request, a demand: hey, she's still Franklyn. How many year's has she been bossing people around in the role of director? Enough, that she's kind-yet-firm as she prompts C.B. to go on. "I am here to like, hear you out man -- so lay it on me, I won't like, freak out."

So nonchalant. That is a promise she actually can't keep, but hey - promises mean something else to Mortals like Frank. One hand lets go of C.B.'s, so she can take the cigarette from her mouth and ash it off to the side -- but never does she stop looking at the man.


C.B. seems to remember his own cigarette when she does that, and he practically copies her movement (not on purpose) before he takes a quick drag down on the smouldering butt, which he then snuffs out on the sole of his work boot. The possibly sarcastic, possibly pseudo-sixties-speak? It actually goes over his head, right now, because to C.B. this kind of talk is still normal, not hopelessly out of date. He was too unstuck in time to catch up. Maybe ever? Then again, maybe Frank isn't being sarcastic at all...everything that's old is often new again.

Continue he does. "What if I told you that the party you went to was a setup, that all of that is a setup, and that you and the people there were being mined for information? That most of the people there had some sort of psychic gift, and the people who threw that party were hoping to turn them into bloodhounds? And that," and he swallows, hard, "and that 'Arcadia' is almost certainly not a reference to a place in Florida, but an alien world, of this earth but apart from it, where most human beings are tortured, abused, and used as slaves? And what if I told you," he just can't stop talking now, "that I know this because I have /been/ to Arcadia, and barely escaped with my fucking life?"
 

Franklyn's sincere - damnit! Her shirt says '1969' and she's /invested/: the great thing about moving towards the singularity, with all this immediate access to decades worth of pop culture the click of a button, is that Franklyn can use those absurd words and really mean them. Really. Only... Only when C.B. starts to speak, the little Mortal lass starts to look a touch confused. It's a complicated expression: confusion and scepticism mixing with suspicion -- oh, no suspicion with him, by the looks of things, but the whole damn -world-.

This calls for a drink. The abandoned flask of bourbon is picked up, and a substantial sip is taken.

"...I... I, I..." Another sip, then Franklyn clears her throat and gestures sharply towards the Angry Young yet Not Lying Man wit the flask. Her voice waivers, but her resolve stays firm. Just. "Would ask for proof. Like, evidence - empirical evidence. Not that I don't... Believe that -you- believe this."

Suddenly, she is blushing; trying to explain herself while avoiding a potential offence. Her voice grows softer, "It's what they say to do - when faced with, like, a sensation or experience that defies the standard constraints of what-is-known: what proof can we fall back on? What is tangible?" /They/? Sounds like Franky's had some training from Outside Influences, of some sort... Her expression softens still, as she clears her throat a bit. "But... You can also tell me a story?"


There is a heavy, pregant pause. "I would want the same thing," he admits, and he takes a big swallow of wine. She is not the only one who drinks to calm nerves. Speaking of calming nerves, C.B. is also fishing out another cigarette, lighting up hastily with one of those cute little Slaughterhouse-Five matches of his. She doesn't really have to explain /why/ she wants empircal evidence. He gets it; he gets it all.

Then he glances at her with those faded-denim eyes, eyes that have seen more than she could ever know. Or maybe not. Maybe she's about to know. "One. I can prove it...after a fashion. It depends what you want proved." Some of the nervousness is flowing away, almost like the truth is a panacea for the anxiety. Can anxiety stand up in the face of really-real reality? Maybe not. Two, clarify the kind of story you want told, and I will tell it to you." He wets his lips again. "Three, I'm going to have to ask you to not tell /anyone/ about what we discuss here. There are...ways to make that easier, or I can just trust you. We'll see how it goes." I /want/ to just trust you, comes the unspoken words. Not all Lost are Pledge-obsessed. Some Lost don't like any kind of absolute...


Only when C.B. starts agreeing with Franklyn does she start looking a little skeptical - it's not his fault, exactly; she's just sensitive to being told what she wants to hear. Sometimes. Like this time. In an oddly mirroring gesture, she fetches another Lucky Strike from her bag - the last one stubbed out unceremoniously on the ground, before she lights up and sends smoke towards the heavens. Listening, always listening; watching still, with keen interest.

She's not entirely convinced. That's obvious -- but neither is she laughing, screaming, or telling C.B. to fuck right off.

"Firstly; if you feel that you can prove it, what do you have to lose by doing so with me now?" A shoulder shrugs, and she leans back with forced nonchalance. "Secondly; what did you take from this... From this alien world, besides your life?" Good question - but Franky hasn't finished. She doesn't know what a Pledge is - so the weight of C.B.'s words means little to her, so she just shrugs and gets, well, pedantic, "/Anyone/? Well aren't you anyone? What if I gotta say something, for the safety of you and me?" She nearly smiles, but then gets all serious again.

Her hair is swooped out of her face, then Franklyn points at C.B. with her cigarette. "Look, this is your business, and it's like, /obviously/ a big deal to you or whatever. I am not going to just like..." She fades off with a shrug, then adds, "I'm concerned here, bud - not gonna lie. But I've had," side-glance to the flask, then back to C.B., "A few, and yet you don't seem... Insane. But, dude, honestly? I just won a prize. It's stupid, but hey, I'm lucky. What's the big deal?"


C.B. puffs on his cigarette like it's about to disappear. It's desperate smoking. Everything about him is desperate, even if the anxiety is mildly quelled. Mildly. "Okay. Firstly," and maybe it's oddly calming because now it's like any other debate he's ever had, INCLUDING his one with Enid -- not that he's debating with Enid, of course! "I have a lot to lose. It's related to your second question. By going to this alien world for the duration that I did, and for escaping -- it changed me into something else." He gives her such a serious look. Maybe even an intimidating look. "Something not entirely human. Because of that, discretion needs to be used when it comes to sharing information about...that place, and what it does to people." Truly, he has a gift for using the exact same tone of voice about Changeling shit as he might about arguing the merits of Marxism or Norman Mailer.

C.B. completely ignores her pedantic snark, this time around, and keeps talking. "You /should/ be concerned," he says, almost whispering this through clenched teeth as he suddenly leans forward. "That's my whole point. It's not a stupid prize. You are /bait/, Franklyn. For me, and for others -- but it also puts your own life at risk. Even if you can't think of other people, at least think about /that/." So he has to get in a /slight/ dig on her perceived millennial selfishness.


It should feel comforting; what's happening now isn't just a debate, it's a /negotiation/. Isn't that how fae survive? Through bargaining? Not that Franklyn is picking up on this aspect: to her, this is all just banter, baby. She listens aptly, puffing on her cigarette as C.B. goes through his super serious desperate young man routine: something about it must strike Franklyn as sincere, though, because she's not being snide nor is she being flippant.

She's being kind, and understanding - listening him out, even though she doesn't fully believe and can't even begin to comprehend the significance. Perhaps it's his -intensity-, that intimidating note to his voice that keeps her from doing something brash, like rolling her eyes and laughing.

No. Franklyn looks very serious - spooked, even.

"Ceebee... You're... Scaring me." A confession that only comes about when she's called bait. What does -that- mean?! Her brow knits with discontent as the words 'can't think of others' are said, and she leans back defensively - puffing on that cigarette, and taking the flask of bourbon with her. Her pride is a delicate thing. "...I don't know what you're trying to say here. How... How do you know the Institute is in cahoots with... Whatever..." Oh shit. He's losing her -- that earnest sympathy is waning, and she seems concerned. "Unless you have evidence, who's to say this just isn't coincidence? Sometimes it snows in April; doesn't mean Winter is Coming - know what I mean?"
 
 

No, he doesn't know what she means by that at all, because the bulk of his pop culture knowledge does not extend past 1972. "I'm scaring you? Good!" C.B. suddenly shouts this, bringing his fist down on the grass. In a nearby tree, a flock of songbirds gets spooked, too, and go flying off across the vineyard. "You should be fucking scared, Frank! I went to Arcadia -- not a fucking shit town in Florida, mind you -- and got fucking /tortured/! Brainwashed! Experimented on! IS THAT WHAT YOU WANT?!"

He's on his feet now, having accidentally kicked over the wine glass as he set it down. C.B.'s gone all sweaty and frantic, gesturing wildly with his long, ink-stained fingers. "A reliable source provided all the information I'm telling you about the Institute. I trust this person and his research. I can't give you concrete evidence about that, not /yet/ but what I /can/ give you concrete evidence about is what Arcadia did to me. Would that help you believe me?" He stares down at her with an eerie stare. Bright-eyed, intense, a little batshit, for sure, but the sincerity is still pouring off him in buckets.


Franklyn's entire posture changes, as soon as C.B. raises his voice and brings his fist down. She's leaning back, but sitting up straight - flask abandoned on the ground, so she can slowly move and pick up her bag: dragging it over so it fits in her lap. Franklyn? Is scared. It doesn't take an empath to see that: her body language is tense, the hairs on her arm standing up despite the hot summer air. Hell, she even looks a little green around the gills; swallowing hard as C.B. starts to scream.

Scream at her. Alone. In a vineyard. Nobody else around. Ranting about brainwashing and experimentation.

Franklyn stays stock still as C.B. gets up, watching him like a hawk - or a deer in headlights. A hand sinks into her bag, but doesn't move any further. She swallows hard, then slowly shakes her head. In the past, Frank has been left speechless with amusement or meanness or faux-shock, but never because of /fear/. Of what he talks about, sure, but about C.B. himself, as well.

"...I..." Her voice is more than a little tight, hesitant. "...Think you, should..." Franklyn seems stumped, yet she perseveres. "Show me what you think will make you feel better. Does... Does that sound reasonable?" Franky attempts a smile. It's wan, at best.
 
 

Does C.B. like feeling like this? A person as empathic as Franky should be able to tell that the answer is not quite 'yes.' In fact. C.B. almost seems scared himself -- scared /of/ himself, perhaps, and scared of the very things he is ranting about. Terrified, even. Fear is contagious.

He breathes in deep. Breathes out. Puts both hands over his eyes and rubs, hard. "Yes. Yes. I'm sorry. I'm not trying to scare you. I promise." His head is briefly pounded with both fists. Like he's trying to get something to stop. And it kind of works, because when he is done, he looks at her seriously, but in a less frightening manner. There's a nearly pathetic quality to him now, even if the intensity is still lurking underneath. "It involves you making me a promise. Just for one day." He shakes his head, looking away from her now. "I won't make you promise me anything for longer than that. It's a protective measure, mainly for me. Hard to explain."


Franklyn hesitates as she watches, listens; but for all her caution, she is green and naive. What's a promise to her, but something to be made and considered and occasionally broken? Mortal's live a carefree life of blissful ignorance - they've not had to negotiate with the Wyrd. Not most of them, anyway. Not Franky.

The flask is lifted with one hand, but Franklyn doesn't take her other hand from the bag; it stays there as she drinks - watches C.B.. "C'mon, like... Sit back down." Haphazard negotiation tactics - not for bartering, but for talking people off ledges. Franklyn may very well think C.B. is a touch Off, but at least she's being discreet about it - kind, even. Maybe -too- kind. "What do you need? I promise that I will listen to you today, and that I wont... Make any decisions about the Feldmann institute's offer, until you've talked to me about what your reliable source told you. How does that sound?"

It sounds -naive-. That's what -- but Franklyn is trying to be all /gentle/ with the man. It is not her forte.

"But you... You've got to stop yelling. You're... Upsetting me." A beat, and she compresses her lips with a frown. "I'm not your enemy here, okay?"


C.B. swallows, hard. The red inflaming his cheeks has started to die down again, and now he's starting to look a little overly pale. Sick, even. Wobbling on his feet a touch, he slowly collapses back down into a sitting position. He wipes the beads of sweat on his forehead with the back of one hand. Are there /tears/ in his eyes? Surely not. Whatever's going on with them, they do look red-snapped and still the teensiest bit crazed. All signs sure do point to a touch Off. Mysterious alien world abductions or no mysterious alien world abductions.

"Okay," he echoes, and takes a drag with a shaky hand, having nearly forgotten about his cigarette again. Then he turns to face her, sitting cross-legged on the ground. There is a long pause. "Are you ready?" It's merely asked out of politeness, and perhaps to give him another moment or two to collect his bearings.
 

Franklyn looks, in a word? Concerned. C.B.'s behaviour has her worried, there's no doubt - but there's a hesitant and strangely gentle aspect to her at the moment. Fact is; she thinks he's quite possibly sick - and even /she/ can't help but feel sympathy. She's not some kind of a -monster-, after all. She's just a human girl, living in a human world, doing human things: like being petty and documenting her diet on instagram and getting drunk by herself in her family's vineyard. /Normal/ things.

"Sure..." Placating words - she hasn't removed her hand from her bag, but she jets her chin in the direction of the earlier water bottle. "Here, have something to keep you, like, hydrated. Have you been in the sun all day?" Even when she's being caring, a tiny bit of judgement passes through -- but nothing super intense. She's still a little, er, spooked. Wary. Concerned. 
 

"No," he murmurs, a touch sullenly, though he does take the water and makes himself drink a big gulp. Then C.B. turns to look at her again, wiping his nose with the back of his hand. It isn't dripping or anything -- seems like another nervous gesture. Blue eyes are all on hers again. When he speaks, it's almost without inflection, this time around. That's nearly spooky, too.

"I enfold you in the world of the Wyrd: for one day, you will be infused with Glamour, able to see Changelings as they really are." Who in the what now? "And I won't yell at you, so you won't get freaked out. In return, you will listen to what I have to say, and not act on any decision about the Feldmann Institute; in addition, you won't talk to anyone else about whatever you see or hear. May the Wyrd provide us with appropriate blessings and punishments, should we fuck up." A tiny bit of humor, a little bit of normalcy, steals back into his demeanor. "Because not yelling might be hard for me. Deal?" The strangest deal ever, but he's staring right at her. No one else around to take this deal...


Who and the =WHAT= now? Indeed. Franklyn blinks dimly at C.B. as he get's all... Specific. Changeling. Glamour. Wyrd. What the fuck is -that- about? Those big round green eyes of hers narrow a bit - confused, sympathetic, and just a touch o' pandering around the edges.

Poor C.B. - Franklyn presumed he was a bit nutso, but now she has proof. Cold, hard evidence in the words he shares so freely with her. She bobs her head in agreement, her posture still a bit rigid -- comfortable, she most definitely is /not/. In accordance with the terms C.B. has so blatantly set?...

"Whatever you say, Ceebabes -- I'll give you a day. Why not?" 

Deal. Done. Huh. Isn't it -easy-, getting a mortal to just... Agree. They're so /stupid/, really. No sense of -proportion-. What's a promise to her, really? Franklyn's never had to interact with the Wyrd - it's as plain as the smile on her face, as she gives C.B. a look that is gently sympathetic and only a touch sad on the surface. "...You okay?"
 

It's not like she can see it, or feel it, one presumes, but there's that pressure in the air -- that feeling that comes from the Wyrd being applied, like pressure to a wound. Sealing it off with a nearly audible 'pop.'

And that's when everything changes.

The young man Franklyn is looking at, crazy or otherwise, is not himself, quite literally. Oh, sure, he sort of looks like C.B. He's humanish, same boyish facial features, and hunched shoulders and inkstained fingers. But his bones seem slightly more protruded through his skin. Smoky silver lines the brown hair of his temples, nearly making him seem aged beyond his years, though his features are smooth and young as ever. And his eyes...the faded denim-blue, too, is snapped through with the same smoky silver, swirling around his iris like a vortex.

Most of all, though, is the electricity. Literal lightning winds around C.B.'s limps -- white-blue, crackling voltage, like the nervous energy that infused his yelling, like the intensity that feeds his words. /Words/, yes, that's something else. Nothing is there visually, yet somehow, Franklyn can maybe sense that words are /very/ important to C.B., and more beyond the importance of your average writer. Almost like he needs them to stay alive, and they need him.

Finally, it's hard not to notice a sense of doom -- it mixes with the ozone smell of the lightning. It's the hair-trigger edge C.B. naturally carries around, somehow made manifest.

Somehow, all of these things together are who C.B. really is. There may be no horns or wings or hooves, but the sense of /otherness/ is still strong enough that Franky will know that something is true. Either that or he drugged his bourbon.


Oh. Oh hell no. One second everything is... Fine. Then the next? Things are fine, but they're also /different/. Drastically different. Radically, even - like her whole world is turned upside down, but she's left standing where she was. Or... Something. It's confusing, it's new, it's Wyrd...

...It's taking Franklyn a very long time to react. She just stares at C.B. - to any outside observer, they'd just see a girl zoning the fuck out. But she isn't doing that, not exactly: the shortness of breath and ultra-stillness suggest she's just keeping herself together. /Just/. Fingers of one hand reach out and press the wrist of her hand which is still half-hidden in her purse. She attempts to steady her breathing.

Lets face it, she's facing off a panic attack. On the plus side? She seems to be winning. Again: /just/.

"...Did you come back for me?" A hand slides up and presses into the side of her stomach, and Franklyn's expression swings from fearful to something akin to defeated. Also? Possibly dissociative -- her voice dreamy, a bit distant. For a second. Then her eyes narrow and she lifts her chin - defiant, even now. But... But it doesn't last. She's blinking and she's leaning back. Trying to snap out of it. "What? The... fuck?"


This? This wasn't the response C.B. was expecting. I mean, yeah, he wasn't expecting anything good, but Frank's response seems so...specific. "Come...come back for you, how? Look." C.B. spreads his hands, taking a step closer. He seems to be trying to diffuse the lightning, to ground it down into the earth. Though fortunately, his everyday sparks don't seem to hurt people. Not unless he wants them to.

"It's me. This is what Arcadia did to me. Do you want to know how long I was there? Thirty seven fucking years. Let me be your cautionary tale, Frank." His tone is pleading. So are his eyes, that handsome blue infused with the endlessly swirling silver. "Don't end up like me. Don't go to Arcadia."


Franklyn blinks twice, scootching back on the picnic blanket as C.B. starts moving a little closer -- she is not ready for her Personal Space to be invaded, that's for sure. A hand is held up defensively, fear mixing with angry defiance. "Back UP." He may not have been ready for her idiosyncratic response, but Franklyn wasn't even ready for -any- of this. The lightning, defused as it may be, is not reassuring her - as it moves towards his feet, she scoots back a little further: her fight or flight response in a hazy area. To say she's confused is an understatement.

But also... She's a little curious -- and a whole lotta not quite getting it. C.B's words about Arcadia and the length of time, she hears them but she doesn't quite -get- it, judging from that doe-eyed expression of wary disbelief. Eyes rapidly scan the Wyrd form of the electrified Author -- she doesn't seem to be sure as to where to look. Or possibly? What the /problem/ is. She stares up at him, those intense blue-and-silver swirls of his eyes.

"...Where is it? Why'd you come back?" Uh oh. Shit. The initial shock is peeling back, and relieving something close to fascination in Franklyn's expression - eyes wide with open wonderment. It's not too far from being enthralled, in honesty. Mesmerised by lightning and, well, magic: it's likely she has never seen anything like C.B., outside of, well, dreams really.
 

"Don't worry about the lightning." C.B. holds up his palms, much like he did earlier in the afternoon when he arrived. "It won't hurt you, I promise. Here." And he does his best to suppress it, taking a deep breath. It crackles a little around his hands, but then mostly blips out. It's mostly in his eyes, now. Kind of a cool sight. Like little storms crackling around in there.

"Why did I come back...from Arcadia? Is that what you mean? And where is it? Well, that's hard to pinpoint. There is something called the Hedge. Think of it as a world-behind-the-world. Real Alice in Wonderland stuff. It's a gateway between here and Arcadia. That's how most of us get out of there; we crawl back through the Hedge until we return to this." He eyes the trees and the sky around them. "So-called reality, though I'm probably the wrong one to confirm exactly what is and isn't fucking real."


Franklyn blinks slowly as C.B. dampens the electricity - it's like some switch has been flipped inside her, and all that hyper-animated expressiveness has been dulled under a thick cottony blanket of confusion; movements slow, reaction times lengthened. A hand reaches out towards C.B. as if to touch him, but it's pulled back last moment.

Then she does something odd. She turns and starts taking off her shirt.

Jeez. Is this how those Pantheon weirdos get all those Devotees? One glimpse of the Mien below, and they're stripping off?

Overly lacy black bra aside, Franklyn's purpose seems to be beyond flaunting sheer nakedness. Turning her shoulder to him, lifting her arm, it becomes apparent: she has a Lichtenberg figure scarred across her skin. A long, swooping series of fractal patterns that bend from the top of her back, down across her torso and towards her thighs. Pale, faded, so probably old -- but there, none the less. A pattern of a lightning strike or electrical mishap, permanently with her.

Why show him this? Well, maybe Franklyn feels like it's something -solid-, in a conversation that's just gotten topsy turvy. "Alice and-- a... Beyond? Hedge?" She's struggling, shaking her head in disbelief. "I don't... I don't see how this has to do with Florida -- or... I'm, I'm... I'm having trouble-- you're saying you /left/ another /dimension/, to return -here-, but now you're not /sure/ if this is where you originally started?"

Blink. "Are you an alien?"
 
 
C.B. takes a step forward. He, too, raises a hand out, as though to touch the remarkable scar. His eyes, wide at first, quickly begin to narrow in something like sadness. Or even shame? Like this is his fault, even though that's impossible. He squats down near her in the grass, his hand falling impotently by his side.

He wets his lips. "No. Not at alien. /They/ kind of are, though. Some call them the Gentry. I hate that term; gives them too much power if you ask me. Although I guess it's fitting. For most of us, once they Take you, you're basically worse than their peasant. You're their slave. Look, I was just a guy -- I was a young man, in fact," and he has to smirk, giving her a sideways glance, almost as curious to see what she'll say to the truth bomb he's about to drop as he's been to see her reaction to changeling stuff. "a long time ago. I was Taken by these creatures in 1972, and they fucked with me over that whole period of time I mentioned, until I escaped in 2009."

Don't even get him started on what the government had to do with this. A rant for an entirely different day...or is it? It all depends on her line of questioning. Whatever the case, he watches her closely. Strangely, he seems a little fragile. Almost like he's the one with his shirt off, not her.


====-> >> Franklyn to Here << <-==============================================
    Rolled 1 Success 
    < 3 3 4 5 10 >
===========-> >> Composure + Subterfuge.Impersonations - 2 [9-Again] << <-====

Franklyn watches C.B. very carefully -- very carefully /indeed/ -- as he gets close, but doesn't touch. Something in her erratic-to-the-point-of-irrationality brain kicks into action, and her mood shifts: that tenderness is icing up, being edged out be haughty defiance. Maybe it's that complicated emotion: sadness/shame/defeat vibes she picks up, be they right or wrong, from the electrified Wizened. Shoulders held back, it's like she's /more/ comfortable being half nakedish in a bra and shorts, listening to a morose alien fellow spin a tale.

Humans. At least they adapt quickly.

"...You are a young..." Hesitation, and Franklyn squints. Does some mental math. -Listens- to what C.B. has to say, instead of interrupting. As the truth bombs start to drop, her expression stays fixed: for all accounts, she superficially seems cool and calm and composed. An impersonation of somebody who has their shit together. Fake it 'til ya make it. "...How did you escape? I don't under-- you were... You were imprisoned by, entities from another dimension..."

Franklyn blinks - the facade of cool and calm shaking. She's staring C.B. right in the face, but the more she tries to /say/ what she's being told has happened, the more insane it seems to her. At least -looking- at him feels solid, even if he looks, well... Fucking /weird/. The fragility, if it's noted then something calloused in Franky doesn't make any effort to /stop/ staring. 

Still. She's more -interested- than grossed out, even if it is a breath away from outright gawking. "...How did you get out?"


Ah, but C.B. does have a nose for phonies...so it's possible that he doubts this act from the get-go. Right away, his blue-silver eyes narrow and he watches her face very closely, as though looking for cracks. This is more the way he usually is, when all the chinks in his armor aren't showing. "No, I /was/ a young man. Was. I was born on November 29th, 1947. Come on, Franky." He has to smirk, and shake his head. "Somewhere, you know I'm telling the truth. You probably sense how hopelessly out-of-time I am, don't you? How un-with it I am?" How Baby Boomer self-righteous he is? He doesn't say that part. "I'd turned 24 only a few months before I was taken. When I got out again? Still a young man." He indicates himself. Even the silver at his temples doesn't do much to distract from those smooth features. "Hell, if anything, I seem to stay sort of young. I don't know how it works."

Squatting as he is, he rocks back and forth on his heels, his gaze moving from her down to the grass. "How did I escape? I can't remember everything. I think I won the game." It's a weird thing to say, but what hasn't been weird today. "I won the game, and I got to go. But sometimes I'm afraid I didn't win." He squints back up at her. "I'm afraid I didn't win, and he's still looking for me. So we can play another round."


Oh man. Franklyn tilts her head to the side as she listens, mouth just a little agape: her little Mortal mind awash with waves of what-she-see's evidence battling tides of this-can'-be disbelief. Makes for a rather tempestuous inner dialoug, no doubt. But she's promised she'd listen, and really besides the unknown intensity of their little agreement, Franklyn is -curious-. Hanging on to every word C.B. says, even if her expression flips back-and-forth from dazed to sharp, dazed to sharp, dazed to...

Sharp. Eyes narrow. She is becoming Suspicious. "If you are self-aware enough to know you're hopelessly out of touch, why have you not endeavoured to adapt yourself? Do you have a... Specific limitation? Unless..." Further squinting, as she looks C.B. over: not exactly paranoid, but close -- and critical. Oh so critical, even now.

That thought of hers is not finished though - maybe sympathy keeps her from really digging her claws in and subjecting C.B. to an impromptu Turing Test. Dazed look returns as she shakes her head, lifting a hand to gnaw at her thumb nail briefly. When she speaks again, her voice is soft and gentle; compassion in her eyes, but possibly pity too. "...Are you familiar with Pascal's Wager?"


He's not making it easy on her, either. Not holding her hand or dumbing things down. C.B. trips through these facts and ideas at a dizzying rate. It's like being a freshman in a senior honors class. Maybe he thinks Frank is smart enough to follow along, or maybe he doesn't care.

He leans forward on his heels again, staring back at her just as critically. "/You/ try being out-of-time for 37 years and tell me how easy it is to adapt to the world when you return. Go ahead -- go take that trip to Arcadia and you'll find out /real/ quick." The young-old man frowns. Some Lost adapt better to changing times than he does, and he's well aware of that. It might even be a sore spot.

"Pascal's Wager? Yes, of course." He opens his mouth again, about to ask why...and then he stops. He thinks about it. Marinates in it. Something in there looks melancholy, again, and a little scared. Like he just stumbled onto a landmine. His eyes stare into hers, searching. But for what?


No. He is not making it easy on poor Franklyn: she's been lured, without much warning, and talked into an agreement that leaves her now being faced with something she has very limited abilities to comprehend, let alone make -sense- of. No wonder her moods would be out of whack; dipping from puzzled to shocked to dazed to sharp and back again, and again, and again. 

As C.B. leans forward, Franklyn frowns and shrinks back a bit: chided by his tone, and worried by his appearance. So... WEIRD. Humanoid but not human. Young yet old. Pinched and elfin and -intense-. There's meanness in his words, even if they're supposed to be a warning: the hurt she feels is obvious on her face as she hunches away, fearful of his closeness. Just a touch.

Then the tables turn - Franky's question leaves C.B. at a little loss and... Well... Franklyn is Franklyn. She sits up a little straighter, and smooths her hair back as she stares back at the Solstice Wizened. Only a little hesitation, and her head dips to the side. "Of course." She agrees, but pushes on; "And...? What is it, CeeBabe? It's okay - I mean... Tell me. It's... I mean you wanted to tell me, right?"


Tables turning. Constantly, with these two. Push and pull and back again. "Just wondering why you brought it up, that's all," he mutters, and sighs. Is he still smoking? He should be, if he doesn't have a current cigarette. He'll light another one.

It might not be easy on Ceebabe, either. He's made himself utterly vulnerable to her. She could get him locked up for this...do you s'pose C.B. really loves being locked up? Hmm, maybe another sore spot.

The electric Wizened rubs the bridge of his nose. "Look. I know this is a lot, and I'm sorry for that. There's no easy way to explain it. I don't even know where to begin -- I mean, if you want to know /why/ this happened, I blame the government. I have very good reason to believe that this is all a vast conspiracy fabricated by the government, in fact. Your Feldmann Institute may very well be run by the FBI, or the CIA, or INTERPOL, or some other shadowy organization we don't know about..."


"Why were you wondering why?" Franklyn gives a hesitant little smile, head still tilted. "I mean, surely you /know/ why I'm asking, right?" Oh that's just rich. Pull the tiger's tail, while yer at it Frank. As he goes for a cigarette, Franky follows suite: taking a Lucky from her bag, then leaning forward. Yes. She expect him to light it for her.

She's just temporally Ensorcelled. She's not /enthralled/ or anything. C.B.'d have to work a helluva lot harder to get Franklyn treating him like some kind of otherworldly demigod who demands persistent and unwavering respect and devotion.

"You, blame the government? For being... How did you get through the Ledge and into this so called Arcadia, again? Do you remember?" Franky is not convinced, not in this moment: who knows what the next one holds, though. She does frown a little bit, eyes narrowing at the mention of the Feldmann Institute. "I forget - tell me again what organisation your contact who gave you the lead on them was from? Because the research I've been doing..."

OH yeah. Frank's /been researching/. She just buried that lead.

"...Gives no indication of that. There are... More things in the world than... You." She gives C.B. another weird look, voice lowering. "Is it difficult, being all alone?"


Would C.B. even want persistent and unwavering respect and devotion? Okay...maybe he would, despite his Communist ethos. And he does light her cigarette, though he gives her a pissy look. He lets the tiger's tail question just dangle, too. There's too much other shit being flung around right now, and he gets up again and starts pacing in a circle, running his long fingers through his hair (the Red Sox cap having long ago fallen off and is just lying on the ground near his messenger bag).

"The Hedge. They call it being 'Taken.' And I was. One day, I was in a prison cell. Someone knocked me out, and I ended up /over there/."

But, what's this about research? He steps up to her, suddenly, eyes wide and wild again. "You've been researching? What have you learned? There's no way you would ever be able to learn about what I know, Frank. It just wouldn't reach your ears." He sounds very sure of that. And he wets his lips. He was trying to avoid talking about any others. "I'm not, technically, but don't worry about that right now. Let's concentrate on the task at hand. Tell me what you know." He grits his teeth. "/Please/."


Who doesn't want to be adored?

Unfortunately for C.B., the look that Franklyn is giving him is not exactly that of adoration: it is a complicated mixture of fear and fascination, with just a hint of dissociation thrown in. The girl is -obviously- overwhelmed -- even if in the moment, she is leaning in to allow the electrified Wizened light her cigarette. When she leans back away from him, smoke is exhaled towards the sky, and she -stares- at him and his explanation of being Taken.

This is brand new information.

Leaves her a little stunned, possibly - slowly nodding, and hunching back with downplayed alarm as he steps towards her. Franky is Uncomfortable. Possibly it's the wild eyes. Slowly, her cigarette-less hand slinks back towards her big black carry-all protectively, hiding inside as it's held close. She blinks slowly, then her eyes narrow as she scans him from head to...

Well, C.B doesn't have a tail, but he get's a -skeptical- look from Franklyn regardless.

"...Why do you care?" Slightly sharper than intended, she attempts a wan smile and puffs away. Still unsettled. "You're... They're just, hmm, people. I'm sure you're, ah, contacts have better info -- if... What you say about, my ears... You know." Not her most confident of performances, that's for sure. She's clamming up.


Granted? C.B.'s experience was maybe even less typical than your typical experience. Being bashed over the head in a federal prison and waking up in Arcadia is probably not the standard way people go to Faerieland. Then again, how is Franky to know that?

His eyes -- so strange in the way the blue is all shot through with silver like that, and the lightning that periodically crackles inside his irises -- move down to the hand in the bag. "What do you got in there, a gun?" Dubious doesn't even begin to describe his tone. Trying to imagine a bougie girl like Franky firing a gun at him is the kind of stuff he might invent for one of his funnier short stories. There's just no way that can be reality

Then he sighs again, snorting smoke out his nostrils after a drag. "Why do I care? Because if the info you've found out fucking contradicts what I know, that's concerning. I want to collect everything I can so I can better evaluate what's actually happening. I mean, sure, maybe I'm wrong and you really are going to Florida, but I highly fucking doubt it." His stare is almost accusatory now. "What about the car? What did you do with it?"


"No." Franklyn replies -fast-. She isn't /exactly/ lying. She's just being shifty. Cigarette is dragged upon, then ashed quickly with a flourished wave of her hand -- it looks like she's about to start chattering, possibly as a distraction technique; but C.B.'s gone one up on her: as he sighs, she watches him Carefully.

Gawking, just a little bit. He's so =weird= looking. The occasional crackle of electricity is doing nothing to calm her nerves, which are probably at a 8.7 out of ten: she's /close/ to freaking out, but some unseen force is keeping her held together.

"...Why do you doubt I've been invited to Florida? The evidence points towards that being the case." She takes another drag, and shrugs a shoulder - never not looking at the Wizened. "I'm... I'm not quite sure... Why you're so invested in like, me? Nobody is trying to force me to do anything." 

Franklyn's defiant tone, it's replaced with suspicion as she watches, smokes. "It's parked at the Estate." Ah yes. Merriweather Manor. Not too far from here. "Do you fucking -know- how much it costs to insure a car like that, in a town like this? Hah!"


No doubt that he's weird looking, although C.B. is attractive in his way, and that hasn't changed. His weirdness merely enhances certain key features about him, and makes him seem inhuman for sure, and yet...he's still human. That in and of itself is an odd juxtaposition.

"Franklyn. Have you been listening to a goddamn word I say?" He's not shouting, as per the Pledge, but he is gesticulating wildly, getting cigarette ash all over his jeans. "/My/ evidence points to the contrary, that you are going to the /Arcadia I am talking about/, not some place in Bumfuck, Florida. Wake up!" He makes an expansive motion with his hands. "I care because it not only affects you, it affects other people too. And you're not being very cooperative. Even after all this!" He suddenly rubs his temples, then appeals to her with a look that's nearly pleading.

"Can I see the car? Would you at least do me that solid?"


====-> >> Franklyn to Here << <-==============================================
    Rolled 0 Success 
    < 4 5 6 7 >
============================-> >> Resolve + Composure - 1 [No Flags] << <-====


The melding of the familiar and the fantastic - human and inhuman - does result in the grotesque. From the way Franklyn is watching C.B., it wouldn't be too difficult to assume she does, on some level, find him as such: his presence worries her, and while he may not be /shouting/, something in his speech and mannerisms - not to mention Wyrd appearance - seems to finally overpower her cool, calm, collected sensibilities.

Franky raises a hand to her head, tugging on the back of her hair with obvious annoyance as she finishes her cigarette then hurls it at the ground, all while moving to stand. "I don't =UNDERSTAND= that you're /SAYING/." Hey, she never promised she wouldn't yell - or even /get it/. She's just gotta listen. "You're telling me about, about, about fuckin' Alice in Wonderland and prison and MIND CONTROL," She draws in a raggedy breath, shoulders heaving as she leans forward, clutching at her head.

Oh shit. She was at a 8.7. Now she's at bout a 9.9, and rising.

"And like, like-- FUCK YOU!" The wine bottle they'd be drinking from is lifted, and waved in C.B's direction as she carries on, "Asking me /QUESTIONS/ and getting in my =personal business=, like, how come /you/ want to know so much, huh? Do you know what =YOU= sound like? Some fucking /creep/ who's trying to win me over, so I just happy-skip arm in fucking arm. I'm not DOROTHY." Her tone is suddenly mocking, high pitched and whining, "'You're not being very co-op-pra-tiiiive'!"

The wine bottle is shook in her hand, threateningly. "You're not just going to /win my trust/ but trying to /trick me/ into submission!" Soo... So visiting the car's a no, for the time being.
 
 
Man. C.B.'s getting red in the face. Struggling sooooo hard not to yell back at Franky. It's taking everything he has. So much so, in fact, that he gets up, goes over to the nearest tree, and punches and kicks it for a good several seconds before he returns to her, no less red-faced but a little less wild-eyed.

"Franklyn. Calm down. Okay? Calm down." He puts out both hands again: stop. "What do you need me to do, will you tell me that? What do you need from me? I'm not trying to trick you into anything. I'm just trying to get you to understand. I can't /make/ you do anything. And I -- I care about you." This is totally true. "I don't wanna see you get hurt. Can't you understand that?" Oh, how their roles are reversed now. Just a little bit ago, she was trying to placate /him/ as he yelled and carried on.


"Don't FUCK with our =VINEYARD!=" Franky screams at C.B. -- all 5'6" of her puffed up and projecting with many hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of stage school voice training. Shirtless, standing there in a fancy bra and denim cutoffs - all fury and fear - she makes quite the impression. It's just not a good one. 

Pacing backwards, she doesn't flee - she does a caged animal loop-de-loop, eyes always on C.B., "How the /fuck/ do I know you're even who you fucking =say= you are? Just come strolling up here onto our land, looking for me -- talk all this /crazy fucking shit/, and then FUCK, you're just, you're just... =Whatever= the fuck you are!" Wine bottle is jabbed in his direction -- jab jab jab -- but it's not thrown.

Then he says something about caring. Franklyn looks, in a word, horrified.

"Ohmygod, you're not even like /a real person/. It's fucking happened again. I =KNOW= it." Franky has reached a ten. Talking her down? Will require work. This? This is not everyday irrationality. Some switch has been flipped; awakening something deeper. On the plus side? Girl is oozing emotion; heady and complicated - fear and sadness and desperation, thick like radiation from a meltdown.


C.B. Alexander? Not great at talking women down. Oh, you bet your sweet bippy he's been in a lot of 'conversations' that are similar in tone to this one...but, chances are, not about this particular subject. "Jesus Christ, I'm fucking sorry! I'm trying not to yell at you," and he says this with such gritted teeth it's amazing they don't just break into pieces and fill his mouth with enamel dust. "I am real. I AM REAL!" He doesn't shout this, but he does put a lot of emphasis on it. A /lot/. For her benefit? Oh, no. This is purely for his own selfish reasons. Because if someone insists enough times that he isn't real...he may begin to believe them. And then he might start questioning all of reality. And that would probably make things more complicated, wouldn't it?

"Just tell me what to do. Tell me what to do before I do something stupid, please." C.B. tears at his hair in frustration, quite literally. He even tears out a handful, the brown and silver strands scattering to the winds.


Franklyn is in to deep, man, she's in =too deep=. She stops pacing as C.B. apologies - but her chest heaves as she tries to catch her breath, eyes wild and hair all on end. It's like she's auditioning for Cathy Earnshaw in a modern production of Wuthering Heights or something: girl is /unhinged/. 

Case and point: when C.B. mentions being real, those green eyes widen and she pulls back her arm to toss the bottle -- then HURLS it at the ground where it shatters, not /too/ far off from where he stands. Did she miss her mark? Was it a warning shot? She's already yelling, as wine drips around broken glass. "=BULLSHIT=. You look like Samuel Beckett fucked a light-switch!"

So. This is why Mortal's are so often checked with Contracts of Moon before their eyes are opened to the wonderful world of Wyrd, eh?

Winds of change come through, and with it there's a dramatic, erratic shift in feeling: Franklyn starts to look sad. Despondent. Hysterically upset. She holds her head in her hands and fights back tears, voice dropping volume but never losing intensity. "How can I trust a single word out of his mouth? Jesus Christ. It's happening =again=. I don't even know /why/. All I did was win a stupid fucking game -- is this what it means to be lucky?"


C.B. leaps back from the bottle and curses under his breath, but maybe it says something for Mr. Alexander that he doesn't go running for the hills when she freaks out like this. Familiar territory? Maybe so. And about that contract of Moon? Might come in handy about now. The Wyrd seems to agree, as he squints over at her.

But C.B. has a few screws loose himself, doncha know, and he actually laughs when she makes that comparison. He's definitely been called worse. It's kind of a compliment! But for once, he holds his tongue. What he really wants to do is hold her in his arms. Oh, sure, he has a girlfriend, so this is probably a bad idea, but he can't think of anything he wants to do more right now. Just hold Franky in his arms, stroke her head, and tell her it's all alright.

He doesn't do that. Not yet. He concentrates on her, learning about her, and ponders, tapping his lip. What else can he do...


Now he's =laughing=?! Franklyn claws at the side of her head, tugging some hair loose from her topknot as she makes an exaggerated cry of despair, and promptly bursts into tears. This is terrible, no good, awful and the worst: the girl has been lambasted with arcane information, shown a whole new world, and now she's just shirtless and weeping in a decrepit vineyard. It's positively Romantic -- in the same way drinking oneself to death in a crumbling Greek fortress in the 17th century would be.

It's not hard for C.B. to pick up on /why/, though: Franklyn Garreau is, quite notably, deranged. The evidence is all there; the girl has some deep seeded issues that lend her to have dangerous Irrationality. She was barely holding it together when things got all Wyrd, but it was only when the Wizened started talking about 'waking up' and 'not being cooperative' that her lid got flipped. His confession of caring. Her anxiety that caring is somehow a very real threat to her.

Why... The Wyrd works in mysterious ways: C.B. would get the sense that Franklyn's madness hasn't been with her forever. There was a time, in the not too distant past, where what she /saw/ did not match up with what she /felt/. Some kind of betrayal, like a bird who returns to its nest and discovers its fledgeling has been replaced with a cuckoo. Other birds are bound to get angry, when it's pushed out of a nest. Franklyn did something bad, possibly violent, because of a betrayal like that: it's left a mark.

And now she's just weeping furiously, despondent and desperately upset.


====-> >> CB to Franklyn << <-================================================
    Rolled 3 Successes 
    < 1 1 3 5 6 7 7 7 8 9 10 >
=================================-> >> Wits + Empathy + 3 [No Flags] << <-====

====-> >> CB to Franklyn << <-================================================
    Rolled 6 Successes for an exceptional success.
    < 2 2 3 3 6 7 8 8 8 9 10 10 >
======================-> >> Manipulation + Persuasion + 5 [No Flags] << <-====


It's a good thing C.B. has seen shit like this before, not that it usually means he has any better idea what to do about it, half the time. Stand back and think about it, C.B. What would Yossarian say? If only he were here. He would know exactly what to do: and yet, though he isn't here, C.B. can almost hear his advice. Of course, he goes about doing it in his own way, which means one long stream of consciousness. Just like his damn writing. "Okay. Hey, Franky? Here." He squats down, holding out his already lit cigarette to her. "Have a drag. Relax. No one and nothing is going to hurt you. Listen, you gotta pull yourself together or we'll never be able to put on King of Insomnia. The play, remember?" He forces himself to smile. "You hired me to write it 'cause I'm a writer. I write books. One of them, Young Man's Disease, even won some fucking awards. You're going to be okay. It's not your fault this is happening to you. And I'm a shit for being so pushy. We should probably just get you home, maybe have another drink." C.B. is not against using alcohol as a crutch. Lord knows it's one of his favorites. He squints, staring over at her to see if any of this is getting through.


WWYD? TBH he'd probably run off to Rome and get drunk -- but in the absence of any cargo planes to get off in, comforting Franklyn is a good start. She sniffs a bit, tilting her head as she listens to the Wizened: wiping at the big wet tears that roll down her cheeks. Cigarette. Cigarette's are good. The screaming and hair-tearing have stopped, and she reaches out: taking the cigarette carefully, like she as afraid of getting shocked.

Afraid, but not -too- afraid. She's stubborn, damnit. Even when she's obviously weak, she puts on a tough girl front, however wan.

"...You're talkin' about you're fuckin' /awards/ now?" Hey, at least she isn't screaming. Cigarette is puffed at, and her lip wobbles a bit: nodding slowly in agreement. C.B. is right: he is a shit. By proxy that makes her right -- and being right makes her feel, if not the best? Then better than before. Way better.

Another more enthusiastic nod. Booze. Home. Both seem to ground her: familiar comforts, and all that. She looks around at all the litter: blanket, toppled wine glasses, broken bottle -- but all she moves to get is her t-shirt and her purse. Look at that! She's calmed the -fuck- down. "...We have a lot to talk about..." Eyes scan the Wyrd form of the Wizened man. "...But I can't-- I mean... Give me some time? I feel, raw. This doesn't feel re-... Well no, it does. Maybe too real. I just got to..."

She stops, turns, and looks up at C.B. with a slight pout. "/Why/ did you think I needed to =know= this?" A pause, then she eyes him carefully. "...Did you really need to be seen?"


"You needed to." So earnest. The award-winning Author is back to that. He's managed to suppress most of his lightning, so while he definitely still looks weird -- grotesque, even -- at least he's not sparking like a generator in a storm. "I wanted you to understand why it matters to me, trying to get you to not go to Arcadia. And I can't make that decision for you." Though he has to purse his lips /really/ hard because yeah, he's C.B., he's a know-it-all and he's always right, isn't he? But still... "But at least you now have a slight inkling as to why it matters. We can talk about it more...whenever you want."

He's just standing there, now, one hand on his hip, and as weird as he looks, there's some identifiably human feelings on his face for sure. Mild despair, exhaustion, and the crackle of ever-present paranoia somewhere in his eyes. "Anyway. Walking distance from here, or do you want a ride? My jeep is parked over there." He jerks his thumb over his shoulder.


Franklyn furrows her brow as she listens, looking up at C.B. with an incredulous expression. Ah. There we go: back at it again with the petulant, bratty haughtiness. She must be feeling better! When she eventually replies, though, voice is serious: low and heavy with concern. "...Ceebabes, I think when you get home, you better take a good, long, -hard- look in the mirror, and ask yourself who this was for: me, or /you/? Because... Because I feel like what you perceive to be a slight inkling, is like... In actuality? A whole big can of fucking worms."

Flounce. Bounce. Huff and puff. She holds her shoulders back, chin high, and begins marching through the vineyard: not up the hill towards where C.B. parked, but off in the direction of Merriweather Manor. She going to put her shirt on? NO. Franklyn does -what she wants-. However foolhardy or ill advised.

"Ppppft, like I'm getting in a car with your drunk ass." Hey. Where'd his flask get to anyway? Spoiler alert: the back pocket of Franklyn's denim cut offs. She swooshes her hair out of her eyes and continues to glide towards the house, like she wasn't just freaking-the-fuck-out ten minutes ago; voice half haughty, half sad, all complicated, "...I'm not going to see things like this forever, am I?"


Let's face it: they're both complicated. Ceebabe just has the dudely version. It involves fewer crying jags and more shouting and violence, usually. Her question -- who was this for? -- seems to hit him, hard. He wears it on his face visibly for a moment, like she's just punched him in the stomach. He clears his throat, frowns, but follows after her anyway, grabbing his messenger bag first. He needs to be sure she gets to where she's going.

"I'll have you know I drive quite well when I'm drunk," he quips, not really back to his usual self at all, but there's always room for sarcasm. He eyes the flask, but doesn't reach for it. "No, you're not going to see things like this forever. Just for a day." A beat. "Maybe don't leave the house. I don't know." Why don't people want to know the truth? He doesn't understand why they wouldn't want to know. What would he do, if the situation was reversed? Who can say.


Pow: sucka punch right in the feels. Franklyn's violent; it's just mostly symbolic and metaphorical. Mostly. She looks over her shoulder, catching that expression, eyes narrowing as his throat is cleared -- hello, gentle expression of satisfaction. Being right is so delicious. Did she just look at his butt when he picked up his bag? Only the little birds in the vineyard will know.

But they may not tell. The quip has her snorting and rolling her eyes, "You're fuckin' kidding yourself, babes. Be careful or Johnny Law will come down on ya, and I don't know if I like you enough to pay your bail." But she does wait for him, then falls in line: giving him a concerned look when he tells her not to leave the house.

Damnit, C.B. - reverse psychology is a thing for a reason.

"...Have you ever been in love?" Straight outta left field, that question. She turns, and looks off towards yonder hill, presumably in the direction of the manor. Before he can answer, another. "Will I be able to sleep? Will my dreams be okay? What happens next? Do I remember what happened today? I mean I ought to, otherwise why the fuck would you tell me this shit you think I need to know -- Jesus fucking Christ, I need a drink."


Hey, it's been established by other parties that C.B. doesn't have a bad butt. You know how some skinny guys have /no/ butt, straight as a board? Not Ceebabe. His is pretty decent. Has a nice shape. The More You Know...!

"If I was worried about Johnny Law, I wouldn't have made those bombs," he mutters under his breath. He stares at her, somewhat alarmed, when she asks the love question. At least she rolled along so he doesn't have to answer it. "I think you'll be alright...but you'll remember everything." His eyes are a little wide again. Bloodshot, too. He also needs that drink. So he can drive better. "That's why I really, really need you not to blab about this. It's important, Frank. Don't tell /anyone/, please." He's begging. Just a little.


Aside from a colossal pain in the ass, what is Franklyn? A good -listener-. It's all part of stage craft: being able to /hear/ people's stories. As C.B. mutters, Franklyn's expression darkens with though, then she shoots him a quick side-glance. "Is that why you were in prison? Were you planning on blowing something up?" There's less judgement in her tone then one would presume, really. Just -curious-. Prying, even. 

Means she catches the love question response: her eyes widening a bit. Juicy detail for later. More pressing issues at hand, though... Franky nods along to the mention of remembering, looking complicatedly bittersweet about that, but pleased. Mostly. She turns, taking in a deep breath as she listens and looks off towards the house.

Begging. Even a lit bit of it...

Franklyn just smiles, and shrugs - sooooo carefree. Well. A pretty decent impersonation of someone who is, at least. Just a little sigh - is she contemplating it? Taking things seriously? Even /getting/ what he's saying? An arm raises and she stretches, arching her back a bit. "Are you hungry? I'm -thirsty-. D'ja wanna come inside? We'll use the servants door, don't worry - hardly anyone's around..."


C.B. lets out a deep sigh, through his nostrils. "Planning on blowing something up, yes." He's not ashamed of it. "And succeeding, a few times, on a lesser scale." He drops that bomb, so to speak, but he leaves it at that.

This isn't the first time that Franklyn has made him sunk to begging, pleading, conjoling, and doing what she wants. As proud and defiant as he is, he seems to bow to her more often than not. Green, too. And Mina. It's funny how that works. Could have an armchair psychologist field day with that one!

There's a pregnant pause, during with C.B., with his shoulders hunched and the silver shot through his hair and all those other weird things, shrugs a shoulder. "Okay. Sure." Why the hell not. Better to keep an eye on her, to make sure she's not off doing anything weird in Ensorcelled land.


"Succeeding?" Franklyn raises her eyebrows, but drops the subject. Seemingly. She merely walks along: bringing C.B. up through the vineyard, down a dirt path, towards the manor that looms in the near distance. It's old, oversized, and only a bit ostentatious. She seems comfortable - nearly perfectly comfortable - just strolling around in her bra like she owns the place. Probably because, in a way, she does.

So chilled out. So calm now. So not like she just was a short while ago. Ticking time bomb of emotions, this one - just as volatile as the real thing. This? C.B. will /know/, thanks to a little hint from the Moon.

"That's great. I need something to cool down." Frank says eventually, as they come up on the side of the house. The funny think about a lot of Garreau's? Even if they're not all technically doctors, there's enough armchairs to go around. "...Bombing is a funny thing..." Uh oh. Subject was not dropped. "...Typically, like, they possess an above-average intelligence, yanno? Paired with unknown, untapped destructive capabilities. The kinda person who like, /chooses/ to use explosive destructiveness? Must take a lot of pride in their intellect..." 

She smiles and shrugs, soo carefree, so human. "Pro'lly because they're usually chronic underachievers who're hopelessly socially inept. Do you want bourbon neat, or should I hop down in the cellar and get something older?" She stops, standing in the shadow of the house's east wing or whatever, close by to one of the (many) back doors.


Fucking Garreaus. C.B. stares with disdain at the manor looming before them. It's part Alexandrian, part socialist, this disdain of his. At least he's not saying anything about it. Yet. Give it time.

He eyes her when she goes into her psychoanalysis of bombing. Actually? Something funny happens to his face. A little electricity flares up in his eyes -- briefly, very briefly, before he forces it down again. And he smirks, half his mouth moving up as if in cynical agreement. "Pride in their intellect? Sounds about right. Devastatingly handsome and talented, most of them, too, right?" It's a joke. Isn't it? Probably. Arrogant as he can be, C.B.'s really not self-centered in that way.

"Bourbon's fine. Whatever you got." He stares around at the house, getting a better look at the bougie surroundings. Probably searching for fodder he can use against her and her family later, or something.


That little flair - of what, irritation? Glee? Franklyn picks up on the motion and not the motivation - but the girl's just... Weird. It only makes her smile and shrug, and turn towards him; sizing him up or something, from the looks of things. She's listening, sure, but she's also watching him watch the house. His joke gets a weak chime of laughter, eyebrow arched as she steps towards him. All curious.

It's the electricity, probably. But who can tell, really? 

"Undoubtedly, you've got /something/ going for you in the intellect department - although, genius? Is contextual. You always do the smart thing, Ceebabes?" Franklyn tilts her head to the side, gentle smile on her face. Slow movements - she's reaching out to adjusts the collar of his shirt, smooth out the shoulder. "...You're obviously charged up about something. What's the source?"

She tilts her head to the other side, looking at his face with gentle focus. Silver swirling, Wyrd weirdness. "What would you say drives you, hmm?"


What is she playing at? The question is written all over his face. "Turn off the...smart thing? It's not like it's something I can just turn off, unless I start huffing paint." But when she touches him, adjusting his collar, smoothing his shoulder? Much to his chagrin, a flare of red comes up in his pale-sallow cheeks. He's blushing! "Yeah, of course I'm charged up. It's been a helluva afternoon, wouldn't you fucking say?" But he's smiling. Just a little. And squinting. He does that a lot.

The silver. In his eyes, in his hair, even though it might make him look a little like an old man, maybe Frank gets the sense, thanks to her newly found understanding of the Wyrd, that it /means/ something. The silver is there for a reason. "What drives me? Don't I even get a drink first?" Another joke. He shrugs. "I don't know. What drives me now? Still trying to figure that out, I guess. Maybe it's always been the same, though. I like to wake people up, and protect the underdog. Do I always succeed? I'm sure I don't." More squinting as he looks at her. "Et vous, Mademoiselle Garreau?"


"Context isn't a /lightswitch/, Sparky - it's, like, a series of relationships, causality, /circumstance/." What -is- Franklyn playing at? As the Wizened's gets some blush in his cheeks, a broad smile crosses Franky's face - lip bit, eyebrow arched. All a game. She steps a bit closer to C.B., hips nearly-but-not-quite touching, because why not -- a hand dropping to grab the flask from her back pocket, twist the top open with one hand; but her eyes stay on his face, watching his expression and peering curiously at his hair. "For instance... Bombers."

She's not going to let that drop. The flask is raised between them, but Franky keeps it to herself as she chatters on softly, "Are they driven by ideology, belief, or ego? Maybe that part is moot, because... Well, it's about attention, isn't it? I mean, we /all/ like getting attention - but look at you. Look at your work! Glorious? Yes. But... Telling. And like, a bomber... That's an attention seeking profile right there, right? But a person who like, can get -so- caught up in getting attention for /themselves/, that they may make the mistake of doing mmm, something destructive enough that they end up in prison and, well..." 

Franklyn pauses her rapid chatterbox mouth to take a sip of bourbon from the flask, and push closer: hip to hip, empty hand going to his waist to steady herself. "At what point did you sit down and ask yourself; was it worth it?"

She smiles, offering over the flask -- but a shadow of something concerned crosses Franky's expression, as her hand moves at C.Bs waist. Hey. Wait. Is that-- no it couldn't-- wait, is that a /gun/?


"You don't get it," and C.B. is a hair away from adding 'kid,' but he stops himself. Even though she knows more of the Truth, now. He brushes a lock of hair from his face, this one brown. The squinty-eyed look doesn't go away. He gets like this in a certain mood, when he's trying to understand something, or /someone/, better. She never answered his question, after all. She has him pinned.

"It was never for me, it was for the /movement/. Everything I did was for the movement. That's what I truly believed at the time. We had a sense of solidarity, and we felt like it was falling apart, and I was trying to keep the pieces together by fucking /them/ up." Who them? The Man, of course! "I mean...it's complicated." He makes a tangled gesture with his hand. "It's a long story. A really long story. Was it worth it? I don't know." A sigh as he runs a hand through his hair. "I still don't fucking now." He tries to reach for the bourbon so he can avoid looking at her hand on his waist. A gun? It might very well be a gun, strapped to a holster on his hip, beneath his t-shirt. Hard to see...but maybe not so hard to feel.


"Ideology, then -- and so like, you haven't sat down and thought about it long enough to unpick your story, eh? How would it be, if you realised that whatever you did - regardless of how /right/ you thought you were - was for nothing? You made zero difference? And you've just gone and, well, fucked up your entire fucking life from the-- wha... What /is/ this?"

Franklyn's hand stops blindly pawing at C.B.s waist, so she can stop dodging his question about her character motivations, and attempt to yank at his clothes. She's -curious-, damnit: civility be damned, she's trying to get under his shirt and figure out The Mystery.

Because that's all that matters: solving the mystery. However unsettling or unexpected. Or weird looking. Jeez, Franky's relentless.


His frown was getting deeper and deeper the more Franky keeps implied that what he did was for nothing. Clearly he's spent many sleepless nights wondering the same thing, if that deeply furrowed brow has anything to say about it. Maybe he's grateful for the distraction of her pawing at his shirt.

"Hey, hey, what the fuck are you doing? Jesus." C.B. sighs, lifting his shirt just enough to show it to her, should she stop clawing at him. Indeed, there's a leather holster strapped there the size of a pistol. A shiny brown handle emerges from the leather. There is no question that this is a gun. "It's a pistol. God bless America -- no." He smirks. "God bless Vermont and its wonderful gun laws. I hope you're not as freaked out by guns as your pal Green is." Guess he's about to find out?


That deepening frown. Yaaas. It only seems to make her bolder, brighter eyed. Franklyn is no Changeling - she does not /need/ to garner an emotional response to survive. She just =wants= one. The good, the bad, the ugly - who cares? If a person is /feeling/ something, due to whatever performance she's putting on? That's enough for the little starlet and her global stage.

But then there's the gun issue. Franklyn? Is just as much as a red bloodied Yankee as C.B. is: gun ownership is not a totally foreign concept -- it's juts a little absurd. Franklyn laughs, scrunching up her nose and -- bless her irrational heart -- reaching for it in the holster with grabby, entitled hands.

"Ohmygoooood. Tell me you've got like, 'don't tread on me' embossed on the grip -- lemme see!" So close, so pushy, so all up in C.B.s business. Easily distracted though; she moves to lift more of his shirt as well. What does a faerie look like under their clothes? How far can he be pushed? Are there sparkles? Inquiring Mortals so casually Ensorcelled want to know.
 

"Frank, it's fucking loaded! Stop it!" C.B. tries to bat her hand away, blue-silver eyes wide. "I'm not being held responsible if you shoot one or both of us with that thing. /I/ know how to use one, do you? It's just a gun, okay? It's a Colt M1911 pistol. Your classic Army model. Nothing special or fancy about it. It's just like the one my daddy used to have," and that's said with a touch of disdain, or maybe snark, in his voice.

The Changeling bod underneath? It looks like the rest of him. His skin is pale-sallow with some of those bones protruding out just a /smidgen/ more than they should. But there's no glitter and there's no weird markings and there's no scales, at least, not on this Lost. There are some scars, but that's a different story. Meanwhile, he's still trying to bat her away. "Christ, you're annoying. Are you like this with everyone you meet?" But he says it almost...fondly?



"Holy SHIT - /why/? Why is it loaded?!" Franklyn laughs, putting a hand to the side of her head as she nudges C.B with her shoulder. "Alright, Chekhov - sheesh, didn't yer daddy tell you there mere fact you carry one of those around means like, you're already courting conflict?" Her eyes narrow with glee - the distain, oh, it was picked up on, tucked away, and saved for later.

But then she's giving him a neutral look of cool appraisal - reaching out to poke at his side where some bones protrude like so. Little pinch, as is if to feel the texture of his skin. Is it papery? She assumes it will be papery, for /some/ unknowable reason. Wyrd. Then she turns and scoffs, rolling her eyes and shrugging to C.B. "/I'm annoying/? This is how I am - take it, leave it, whatever. Besides, -you- should feel /honoured/. I don't give a shit about ninety nine point nine percent of those dweebs out there. Humanity is great, but most people? Are boring as fuck."

A finger pokes C.B. in the side, as she stares up at his face: so earnest. "You? Are many tedious things. Boring is not one of them." Then she jerks a thumb towards the door. "Come get trashed with me and recite bad prose or -whatever- you do. It's getting dark and I don't wanna get bit by mozzies." Or put a shirt on, apparently.

 
C.B. snorts laughter in spite of himself at the Chekhov reference. "No. My daddy most certainly did /not/ tell me that, because my daddy wasn't exactly someone who avoided courting conflict, thankyouverymuch." Has she stopped trying to grab his gun? He hopes so, because he keeps trying to put his shirt down again. Vote for No. 6! The shirt implores you!

His skin? It is a little papery, though maybe not as much as one should hope. Mostly, it feels like skin. His Hedgebeast, now. /That/ one is papery. "Fine. I'll take that as a compliment," he snarks, and maybe he does. Maybe he feels the same way about her. Why would he still be here? It's not /just/ because he Ensorcelled her, is it? It can't be. He was hanging around her even before that! "Alright. But I don't write bad prose." Half a smirk at that. "You read my book, right? You know that." He's not confident about a lot of things, but the Author /is/ confident about his literally supernatural gift of writing. It was pretty good before he got Taken, and even better after.


"Oh yeah, a bad man then - did your daddy--..." Franklyn does something strange: she stops herself, mid-way through what suspiciously sounds like a snark attack. The look she gives C.B. turns from playful meanness into something hesitant and, that's right, /compassionate/.

There are some lines that even Franky doesn't cross. Bringing up complicated family shit for no good reason is one of them: she can come to her own conclusions about what Mr. Alexander Sr., the conflict courtier, was like -- /without/ drawing in C.B's insight. For now.

Instead, Franklyn claps C.B. on the shoulder, and pushes/pulls him towards the house. "It is a compliment, you freak. And oh my goooood." Bark of laughter and she's rolling her eyes. "'Did'ja read my book, did'ja read my book, did'ja read my booook?'" Huffy sigh and she's laughing again, flouncing up to unlock the servant's door, ushering in C.B. first. "I've met a lot of needy writers in my life, and you are for sure competing for 2017's top contender. C'mon. Get me drunk and make me cry at your astonishing brilliance, then. Let's go."

And into the house Franky pushes. 
}}