Difference between revisions of "Log:Cliffside Incident"

22 September, 2017

After receiving an omen about something shady going down, CB heads to Crystal Falls to find Nathania chatting with a non-freeholder. It doesn't feel right, and it doesn't go right.

Hedge - Crystal Falls

It's a lovely day to visit Crystal Falls. If any of the Lost currently visiting were, well, simply visiting. What stories are ever that simple?

First, there's one CB Alexander who, despite maybe possibly being warned away from cliffs, has had a brief vision of trouble and strife possibly befalling folks he knows atop a high cliff. Except... when he gets here, when he reaches the top of the falls, it seems there's no one there. But way way way down below?

Nathania Winters serves the area as a Blackbird Bishop, whether those coming to her are members of the local freehold or not. The Silent Arrow always checks, always verifies, and the young woman who's reached out to the local bishop and asked for a meetup at the base of the falls, where she feels soothed and safe, seems on the up and up. On the bank of the lake, someone sits hunched over, arms on their knees, wearing a lavender hoodie, staring at the water.

None of it looks like trouble. That doesn't ease the prickly feeling that something's sort of off.

Nathania shivers. Looks around. And spots a figure at the top of the falls. She waves to CB before she spots the young woman in the lavender hoodie. "Excuse... me, miss? are you... Katia... Denning?" She tilts her head, eyeing the figure before her. She stands warily, ready to bolt at any moment after approaching the unfamiliar figure.

C.B. is here, clad in his usual plaid shirt and jeans, old school messenger bag in tow -- out of which sticks the head of his Hedgebeast Companion, the papery gray and white cat known as Yossarian. There's some kind of shiny megaphone clipped to his bag as well. Spotting Nathania and the woman in the hoodie, he immediately ducks behind a tree or some foliage so he can observe from afar. He's paranoid, and he's mostly here to observe. Intervene? Both? Even he's not really sure. While he watches, he takes a battered flask from his hip pocket, unscrews, and takes a long drink.

There was a CB up there, right? Katia looks and... nope. Maybe Nathania's just really bad at waving? The girl turns her own wary look toward the approaching Bishop as if uncertain of the ragdoll's sanity or intentions, then lifts a hand to wave, to murmur a little, "Hey." Arcadia's influence upon her features is sufficiently modest to suggest that maybe she wasn't there as long as some others or that she hasn't been out very long, though there's this delicate perfection which might imply otherwise. Her eyes are achingly blue, her brown hair framing her face in such a way that she seems innocent, scared. Like prey. "Thanks for meeting me out here. I like the quiet. I mean, ya know." She gestures to the falls, anything but quiet, that roar blotting out all the chitter of the native hedgebeasts. And making it awfully difficult to make out even the barest whisper of what's being said more than few yards away. She gestures toward a spot beside her on the shore in invitation.

Nathania frowns softly and looks around, before staring at the moss for a long, long moment. "I'm... Nathania Winters," she says to Katia eventually. She considers her options, glancing at the closest bend in the path, before settling in next to Katia--a wary crouch, able to be bolted from easily. "You... needed the assistance of ... a Bishop of Blackbirds, yes?"

C.B. tries to get closer. Being at a distance isn't going to help anything, here, though he sticks to cover when he can. He also exchanges his flask for something else -- the pistol resting in the holster by his side. Safety off and ready to go, he and Yossarian inch ever closer. He whispers to the Hedgebeast, "I might need you to distract them. We'll see."

Katia's forehead furrows as she watches Nathania look about. The winter's wariness is not helping the young fairest's unease at all, one woman's fear feeding into the other's. Her shoulders seem to sink a little when the bishop joins her on the bank, at least. "Yeah. Things aren't good." For a moment, that's all she says, though there's surely a sense that she's working out how to say the rest. "Feels like I'm gonna split in two lately, like there isn't any good path, ya know? And I'm doing the best that I can, but how do you know what's the right decision when someone gets hurt either way?" Those bright blue eyes turn to Nathania, pleading, sincere in their hurt and confusion, desperate for some direction.

From where the women sit beside the lake, the pair of figures heading down the path are hard to catch, the taller one tilting in to whisper to the lower one, all the sound of their words and steps obliterated by the constant roar of the falls. They could just be passing by, entirely incidental, not wanting any trouble from anyone. Except a paranoid creature like CB is liable to notice the way they gesture toward the girls, how they keep their eyes pointed thattaway, how their steps ever so slowly edge them in that direction. Is the shorter one readying a weapon? Hard to tell what it is, but he's definitely pulling something from his jacket...

Nathania stares at Katia. "Who... will get hurt... besides you?" She asks, concern overwhelming her need to be wary. She settles more properly next to the younger woman, staring intently into those limitless blue eyes with her slate button-eyes.

C.B. frowns at the pair down below, and touches something inside his messenger bag -- a few mintues later, a crackle of white and blue electricity appears all around his form, protecting him and making him quite a bit more lethal. He uses that electric quickness to move closer to them, aiming his pistol for thte hand of the one who might be readying a weapon -- prepared to shoot if need be. What has he gotten himself into? Who the fuck knows, but here he is...

"My brother," comes first, but it's clear Katia's not done. She turns those pretty eyes of hers off to the water, to watch it spilling endlessly, to watch the way the lake churns. Her shoulders shrug up and hold like that for a moment. "Probably everyone I care about." It's about the time that Nathania notices the shadow starting to stretch up from behind her that the girl murmurs an apologetic, "You," so small that it almost goes unheard.

While the taller of the two figures circles around to the ragdoll's left, the shorter unfolds the rope he's been holding and moves quickly for Nathania, aiming to ensnare her with it and, if he's successful, pull it taut from behind. Neither of the figures seems even remotely aware of the crackle of electricity overhead, each focused on what they came for.

Nathania stares at Katia in shock for a mere split-second before putting magical metal armor around herself. It's a tiny cloud of needles. "Why?" she cries to the pretty Fairest who betrayed her.

BLAM! C.B.'s shot rings out, but misses the dude's hand. He is running like gangbusters go, and Yossarian leaps out of the bag to run along as well. Electricity crackles from him all over, and he'll turn to fisticuffs if it comes to that. Just trying to clear the distance right now. How easy is it to get down there?

"Bitch!" comes from the short guy as one of those needles suddenly circling around Nathania shoots directly through his hand. It's followed by growled profanity as his scruffy features take on a more feral appearance, anger flaring in his yellow eyes. He didn't even hear the gun as pain shot through his body. It looks like he's ready to make another go at it by swinging the rope around the woman despite the blood gushing from the hole in his hand when his partner calls, "Shit! We got a shooter. This was supposed to be easy." Yellow Eyes snaps a snarling look back at CB as the ball of electricity dashes down the mountain and hesitates. "Ain't that--" "Let's go!" Both of the would-be abductors start to bolt, heading decidedly away from the mountain and the sparking man with the gun.

Katia, too, has started to take off, though it looks like she's making for the water as if she means to jump right in.

Nathania tries to grab Katia--if that's even her real name--and misses by a fair few inches. She growls, pretty dolly face contorted into something weird and grotesque, fabric and pearl buttons and stitches pulling in all sorts of strange directions.

C.B. is here, now, thanks to the magic power of being really, really fast. He reaches out with one electric-y hand and takes hold of her arm. "Gotcha!" That's GOTTA sting, Kats. It might even electrocute her, though not fatally -- enough to give her a good shock though, which could be useful in this case. He looks quickly at Nathania, eyes wide. "You alright?"

The attackers are gone. They've booked out of here as fast as can be. Hell, should either Nathania or CB look to see where they've gone, they only see one of them, the taller one, and he's a swiftly disappearing blur putting a whole damned lot of distance between himself and the falls. Whatever they'd meant to do, it did not go to plan.

Katia had meant to jump into the lake, to plunge down with the eels and go for a getaway swim, but instead she's crying out and trying to jerk away--unsuccessfully--from CB's hold on her arm. "Let me go! They're gonna take my brother!"

Nathania nods at CB, grimly. "Yeah. Owe... you one; thanks, man." She looks to Katia then. She shakes her head, holding up a floppy-jointed hand and wrist. "Doesn't mean... you're not a Loyalist." She's angry, two bright red triangles on her cheeks standing out in stark relief against the white of her muslin fabricskin. "Who?" she demands. "Who... called this?"

Katia pulls her arm free from CB, but doesn't run, glaring at the electrified man as if he were the asshole in this scenario. That shit hurt, okay? Which is why she's not trying to run again, not wanting to taste any more of that particular pain. With a dramatic shrug of her shoulders, the fairest clips, "I don't know, alright? They just... they had pictures of my little brother out at his favorite arcade. They said they were gonna take him to the Master--" All exaggeratedly spookified, half-sarcastic and half-terrified. "--if I didn't just come talk to you. I'm sorry, alright? I'm really sorry. I didn't want any of this! I never wanted any of this!"

Nathania stares at Katia. "What... did 'they' look... like? Those two men, or... someone else?"

"Just then. Snarly and Boring." Katia frowns faintly then grumbles, "They never used their names. Just talked about the Master, you, some guy named Glitch?" She glances back at CB, looks like she might say more, but then it's back to Nathania. "Are you gonna save my brother?"

Nathania blinks. "What did you say his name was?" she speaks slowly, deliberately, and without hesitation now. She shakes her head as if to clear it, then shrugs. "What's your brother's... name? How can I... save him?"

She looks between the pair of local lost, frowning with tight annoyance. "The Master. That's all they said." Did she mean Glitch? Katia didn't catch that. She pushes her hands up through her hood, pulling it back, a shimmer of scales briefly evident on her neck, near what might be gills. "Ya know what? You can't. Just..." She shakes her head... and she's gone. A little glamour, a little willpower... and she just vanishes from view despite the fact that people are looking right at her. Should anyone try to swipe at the spot where she'd been standing, it's empty. And it's clear why. There's a splash as she dives into the water, her presence faintly perceptible until she's down too far to see. But yeah. She's gone.

Nathania looks to CB with that grim expression once more. "I," she declares softly, stitched lips a thin line, "need to talk... to my husband."