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Madeleine Cadrasteia     The Belle Fourche warpgate is- wait a minute, this isn't Belle Fourche! This is the edge of a wheat field, with tire tracks leading from the gate to a black van with Concord license plates. Madeleine's standing next to the vehicle, her hands on her head in dismay. "I have NO IDEA where we are," she explains. "This is NOT where this warpgate's supposed to be!" Behind you all, the gate hisses like an off-kilter CRT television.

    "Okay, not *no* idea, we're still in the American west, probably near to Canada if it's this temperature at this time of year. But the GPS is all over the place and I can't ID any landmarks closer than the Rockies," she says, pointing over your shoulders at the distant mountains. "If it's gotten this bad already, we're on borrowed time." How bad is 'this bad'? The horizon wicks upward at the edges of your vision, like the surface tension in a glass of water. The clouds are all moving in different directions, changing their paces as they pass overhead. The ground looks normal, but *feels* underfoot like it's sloping in two opposing directions at once.

    But why? Madeleine recaps for those who only skimmed the memo. "Some bastards stole the geographic center of the United States. Apparently the monument in South Dakota is gone, but that's not all - the actual center itself is moving along with the marker, warping the fabric of space. I don't know how they managed it, but here we are. Wherever 'here' is."

    She leans against the side of the van. "I think we've got a couple options. One, we can find our way to Belle Fourche and look for clues there, maybe somebody saw something. Two," she counts off on her fingers, "A couple'a you can do magic. If we can find out where the center is relative to us right now, we can try to catch up with the thieves straight away. Three, we could-" the warpgate behind you shrieks and flickers out, torn to sparkling ribbons by spatial distortion. "-well, damnit! Never mind about three." She kicks at the dirt in frustration.

    For a moment, the only sound is the subtle buzz-click of insects in the long grass. "Well, no sense wasting time. Either way we've gotta find a highway, long as you can do your divinations on the move." She opens the driver's door and clicks a button to open the automatic sliding door into the back two rows. "Saddle up!"
Regulus Regulus is, admittedly, just really fucking curious about what it means to steal the geographic center of the United States. In a way, it's more curious than stealing the geographic center of the Earth. No, the geographic center of the Earth is fine. This is the geographic center of, specifically, the United States so when Madeleine gave her a call for assistance, Regulus put on her sunglasses and said "I'm in."

Regulus has brought a guitar (in a case), some headphones, herself, a phone, and big bright smile. She has no idea how they're going to put the geographic center of the United States back into its proper place. Maybe once they free it, it will naturally sort of silde back into position?

''A couple'a you can do magic.''

Regulus thinks this over and says, "Do you have a golden compass?" She asks as the warpgate suddenly flickers out.

"Aw man, that's not good is it?" Regulus says before reminding herself of her secondary objective for this mission. She shouts "Shotgun!" almost entirely because she wants to control the van's radio and, unless STOPPED, will aim to throw herself into that seat. Otherwise she'll grumpily force herself into the backseat, leaving the guitar in the back of the van.
Ozhira     The Beast is already present in the shape of a young black-haired woman. While Madeleine tries to sort out what the actual fuck just happened and where the gate dumped her van, Ozhira skulks around the vehicle itself. One could be forgiven for assuming they're checking for damage from a rough landing in the dirt where a road was expected, with how they're crouched down near the front wheel well.

    Somewhere around 'wherever 'here' is', they stand up. There's a deep vibration, like infrasound rattling through the air around Ozhira and right into the ground at their feet, enough to shake loose earth for a second or two. They remain still, head tilted back slightly. Eventually, the creature shakes their head.

    "We are, unable to hear-- anything," they admit, head rolling forward and aside towards Maddie, "No echoes. No echoes. No echoes. We smell road. But it is-- only this road." They pause, glancing down and pressing their hands together. After a moment, their hands draw apart, producing a lattice of silvery threads. This webbing wraps around a globule of deep crimson... stuff, too thick to be blood.

    The web separates from Ozhira's right hand and they hold the wrapped glob up, pinching the strands near the bottom. Like this, they aim as straight up as they can, stretch the whole thing back, and release it-- hurling the blob of fleshy red matter into the sky.

    "Maybe-- we can see from up high."
Petra Soroka PHONE: Lilian Rook says, "So I take it you're inviting me on a date."

    To be entirely clear, when Petra brought up Madeleine's little road trip, she wasn't *expecting* to be doing that. But the moment Lilian said so, Petra decided to retroactively and from then on align all of her motivations towards that goal, because it's not like she was going to say *no*. And so, here Petra is, having abruptly shifted her mission for this road trip from 'do something where it doesn't matter what the result is for once' to 'the result of this road trip is the most important thing in human history, but only so far as it concerns Lilian'.

    Frankly she could not care less about the condition of the United States of America. She's spent too much time getting thrown into fairy portals and time loops to really get phased by the abstract center of the U.S. being moved around, because that stuff just sort of happens now. After Madeleine's explanation, Petra's brain cobbles together a series of thoughts that are only approximately applicable to the situation without directly saying that she 'couldn't care less' about the stated goal of their mission.

    "I think, when we get it back," Petra begins, looking around the distorted wheat fields. "We should put it wherever in Canada it should be if Hawaii wasn't a state. It's crazy fucked up what happened there. You ever hear about that?"

    Petra has unlocked a new thought for her thought cabinet: Decolonialization! She won't work on that right now.

    Petra is overprepared as she often is, but this time, she's overprepared for two. The guitar case slung across her back would be much more questionable as a necessity if it wasn't extradimensional, but still, it's *mostly* packed with recreational objects. She's also got her mirror, where Qetra is drowning in a deluge of supplies for Lilian, and then just a little duffel bag for things that are actually relevant to her own travel.

    She's dressed... casually, you could say, with a sleeveless graphic t-shirt that has the words I'M WITH STUPID and an arrow pointing downwards at, presumably, herself. Below that, baggy jeans are held up with a belt strap that has words on it if you really squint. While Madeleine runs through the plan, Petra ambles around the great outdoors and stretches like a cat, teetering forwards to put her hands in the grass. Accompanying her, enshrined like a pet, is a little cartoonish succulent in a pot that's weightlessly floating in the air, with a tamagotchi blob of a pixellated rat sleeping on the screen.

"If we can find out where the center is relative to us right now, we can try to catch up with the thieves straight away."

    "I've got nothing for that magic-wise, but I could toss a ratbot up in the air and look down. Maybe there's a big smudge in some direction, or maybe I'll just throw up. I--"

"-well, damnit! Never mind about three."

    The warpgate disappears! Petra looks over at Lilian and nervously, excitedly, smiles, for reasons that have absolutely nothing at all to do with the curtailing of their mission options. "We might as well stop by the... city? Town?"

    Saddling up involves putting Petra's luggage (guitar case, duffel bag) in the trunk, and taking Lilian's luggage (mirror) to the seat with her. Obviously she ends up in the seat besides Lilian, in the back of the car.
Ivy Carrow     "This is NOT where this warpgate's supposed to be!"

    "Exciting!" However dire the circumstances, Ivy grins wide, clapping her hands together. She's wearing a pair of camo shorts, boots, a black shirt with an abstract outline of a castle with a swirling gate in the--is she wearing her own merch?--and a familiar cloak, one that Regulus will recognize as enchanted with powerful spatial magics.

    "Warpgates are infamously difficult to damage and set off--not to mention move. Did it change the whole rest of the world AROUND the gate?" She bounces up and down where she stands. "Oh, I don't think I've seen this before! And whatever it is, it warps space, but it doesn't seem to consume it..."

    She is having the time of her life. When the warpgate fizzles out behind them, she's initially dismissive. "Oh, who needs THAT, when you have me?" She puts a hand on her hip, another--metal and clawed--in the air, smirking. Beat. "...But, I guess we shouldn't rely on portals too much." She concedes, her hand falling to her side. "Who can say what's being down to the spatial landscape, the dimensional density...We could be jumping blind, if we try to go too far."

    "I try not to spoil the fun of a roadtrip." Ivy said, "But if we're willing to try, my portals can be big enough for a car, easily!" She saunters off toward the car, not disputing Regulus' claim for shotgun, and slipping into the back, not particularly interested in which seat she claimed.

    "The last time I ran into something with this kind of influence over space, it was fall less benign! And a big part of the reason that I'm now a Captain." A wink.
Foundation Scions     Despite the matter at hand being metaphysically chaotic (if not disastrous) for the world on the other side of the warpgate, it's a hard sell for either of the FDMO representatives assigned to face it with gravity- Matilda Bouanich, Monitor Assistant, is *chomping* at the bit to be not only useful, but a consulted expert, on matters of divination, and thus hardly restrains the skip in her step and humming smile on her face, while Mesmer Jr., Laplace's sourest piece of medical equipment, simply frowns- her presence, today, is purely a matter of the number of involved wayfarers, and the fact that it's been handled on the Foundation's side as an official field deployment, which holds strict requirements in precautionary training- in other words, she's here so the St. Pavlov Foundation needed someone certified in First Aid along, for the ease of some bureaucrat's paperwork.

    The ever-prepared Matilda Bouanich has demonstrated to the multiverse on more than one occasion, that when there is cause for a field mission, the get-up she relies upon is a terribly endearing overall shorts ensemble, outdoorsy and lightly adventuresome, with a downright comical flat-topped straw hat, and string after string of little crystal jewelry pieces, each with an explanation for the manner of luck it safeguards.

    But between the two representatives of the FDMO, as usual, it's Mesmer Jr. who continues to have the less-hinged fashion sense. Instead of her Laplace Rehabilitation Center uniform, she's donned something still surprisingly close to it in make and model- still a dull grey vinyl mini dress, but instead of the ridiculous window and chrome shrug, it's cut with a tall halter neck, capped off with a (if not uniform, very Laplace-styled) metal collarline, like it could theoretically affix one of the silly fishbowl helmets. Further distinguished, however, the dress hem has large triangular notches in the material, filling gaps in with white backing material, overall some strange pattern-matching to Foundation motifs. The same belt she wears cinches the waist, as do unremarkable boots, and matching elbow gloves- if that wasn't tacky and retrofuturist enough, capping the outfit off more than her EM-clarifying headband is a transparent vinyl duster, for no apparent reason whatsoever.

    Both come bearing packed-up bags of equipment, supplies, and travelling necessities, up to and including the satchel Matilda's ever-present (and ever-heavy) orbiculum resides within.

'We should put it wherever in Canada it should be if Hawaii wasn't a state.'

    Fully not in response to Petra's words, but as Mesmer Jr. is one prone to squint, and as a tactically disarming point in time to interrupt her, dry and wary, she asks, "'Service dog'?"

'Shotgun!'

    Mesmer Jr. flinches, a hand reaching to her K-tope Callibrator- ohhhhh, she super hasn't ridden in cars with normal people much, either that, or her self-defense courses are only making her jumpier. "Excuse me? What cause could you have to blurt something like that out-" Only when Regulus actually reaches for the door does she put two and two together, wrinkle her nose up at the arcanist, and let it go.

'We are, unable to hear-- anything,'

    Dismissive, and not even looking towards the other figure, Mesmer corrects, fully for the slight kick of superiority, even if she sounds annoyed- "'I'. The word is 'I'. 'I am unable to hear'."
Foundation Scions 'A couple'a you can do magic. If we can find out where the center is relative to us right now, we can try to catch up with the thieves straight away. Three, we could-'

    "You will not need a third option, for I am here!" Matilda states, hands-on-hips proud, in the moment before the warpgate flickers out. "-Zut! That is, er, not, a problem, of course! Of course we would not need to backtrack. Ah-hem, I, the prodigy diviner Matilda Bouanich, will certainly ascertain for us its current location!"

    Matilda pauses for a moment, and awkwardly unzips the crystal ball from its carry-case. Surprisingly, when she does this, Mesmer wordlessly takes the other luggage the Monitor Assistant carried, and starts to load it into the van. "Right here, with, erm, not exceptionally suitable circumstances? Ms. Cadrasteia-" pronounced with the full Parisian-accent spice, "It would not be most strictly necessary, but would be helpful nonetheless, to possess, in fact, an indication as to what the 'center' is? An image of the monument, or a piece of it, or something most indicative of the correct positions of things? Certainly, without, (and without a proper ritual), I could provide *an* answer, but-!" Matilda looks down into her crystal ball.

    "Montre-moi le 'centre des États-Unis', s'il te plaît..." She whispers, the incantation taking hold- and visibly draining her of energy, to provide even the basest of answers, in small, abstract visions even she scowls at to make sense of.
Lilian Rook PHONE: Petra Soroka says, "Actually, you know, I was talking with Xion recently, after the Reception, about how everything lately's been so life or death for a while.'"
PHONE: Petra Soroka says, "And I figured that I probably need to blow off steam by fucking around a little more where it doesn't matter, you know?"
PHONE: Petra Soroka says, "And Cadrasteia's planning something soon...."
PHONE: Phoning Petra Soroka, Lilian Rook says, "Really? That's your idea of blowing off steam?"
PHONE: Phoning Petra Soroka, Lilian Rook says, "Not that camping out in the woods wasn't nice, but still."
PHONE: Petra Soroka says, "Oh, no, I mean I'm gonna fuck with her."
PHONE: Phoning Petra Soroka, Lilian Rook says, "So I take it you're inviting me on a date."
PHONE: Petra Soroka says, "Er-!? Can--?! Huh?? Oh-- oh, oh, with the-- y-yes. I think, that it'll be nice, and probably relaxing, and I-- I would be happy if you were there."
PHONE: Petra Soroka says, "And I won't be able to solve all of W Corp's issues before then, but I'll at least take care of Cane Office, and I'll try and make sure you don't have to hear about it again."
PHONE: Phoning Petra Soroka, Lilian Rook says, "How long is it going to be?"
PHONE: Petra Soroka says, "I dunno. I'm guessing like last time? I'll ask."
PHONE: Phoning Petra Soroka, Lilian Rook says, "I'll consider it."

    After due consideration . . .

    . . . . . . . .

    'We might as well stop by the... city? Town?'

    "Petra you asshole! How are you going to fix this?!"

    Lilian Rook, who unwisely did not consult the portents, prepared for a silly little day long exercise with a goofy little state fair, or perhaps a day and a half with a bout of stargazing veiled as cryptid hunting. Despite recent events, she was really down for that! She actually was! Not two minutes out of the warpgate and realizing just how unpleasant the bizarre slope of the Earth is, the warpgate has decided to explode (or relocate, or something), and the dread realization spreading across Lilian's face, starting with her widening eyes, is: "This is one of your adventures is't it?!"

    Whatever was going to happen after she grabbed Petra's collar hard enough to lift her up to her toes must simply be left to the imagination. Putting all of Petra's weight, plus her gear, on top of her core muscles like that causes Lilian to wince and clutch her lower abdomen with one hand and a strangled hiss, dropping Petra again in the process. "Fuck." seems to be the final summation of her thoughts on the subject.

    'Shotgun!'

    "Goblin." And that's her thoughts on seat positioning too!

    Despite her physical state, Lilian really is prepped for nothing more than a casual ride through scenic nowhere with at least one person she kind of likes(?). She has one cross-body bag to carry and one that's sized to sit in a conservative footwell if need be, and neither looks terribly heavy. She's split the difference on hair laziness versus endurance by just tying a partial celtic knot at the back of her head, to keep the back in back and the front from frizzing, and done the same for weather with a green sleeveless turtleneck and loose autumn cardigan (currently over her arm) to take on or off depending on cold.
Lilian Rook     If it's too hot instead, then tough shit! Her top has to be thick enough for the gauze pads to not stand out! This is such a 'roughing it' occasion that one could squint and call what else she's wearing almost a cargo skirt, and then privately think she's a little bit stupid for choosing white, using their best mental inside voice. She doesn't even have a thigh holster on! Instead, it's just flagrantly on her waist (attached to the fashionable sword belt she wore at LSCC), because this is America and people Do That There. She doesn't want to stand out too much.

    'Excuse me? What cause could you have to blurt something like that out-'

    "God you're stupid." Lilian moans and shakes her head. This causes her to actually process that Mesmer here, then properly look at her, which cascades into a critical failure state of looking her up and down, then pressing her hand over her mouth, looking away, glancing around the group, then looking back, and finally adding a very fake cough. Her hand slides away from the lower half of her face as if she'd been massaging the bridge of her nose, not covering her lips.

    "Um. Oh. Leave it to Matilda, Cadrasteia." Lilian says, with an airy wave only vaguely in Matilda's direction. "I'm not lifting a finger to help if it's magic. Not until tomorrow at the minimum. I'm fucking knackered already." Naturally accepting that she will be taking a seat within arm's reach of Petra, she delays getting into the Mystery Mobile only just a little. "Be grateful she's here. I haven't seen her fuck up yet." Lilian says, finally securing enough energy to toss her hair and fold her arms. She's wearing that little plastic bangle again. "Petra." She snaps her fingers and points inside.
Petra Soroka     There are TWO guitars in the back of the van. Three, technically, if you consider that both of Petra's guitars are stored inside of her guitar case. As a road trip, this is starting to make the packing situation look more like they're on tour, except instead of being anywhere with civilization, they're in fuckoff nowhere in the middle of the U.S. Petra decides that this is a Chekov's gun that will come up sometime later but not right now.

"Shotgun!"

    "If you put on shitty music then not only am I gonna change it, but I'll make fun of you too." How Petra intends to change the radio from the back of the car isn't entirely clear, but she's got her ways. Despite her tone, this is a friendly interaction with Regulus, otherwise she'd assume by default that her music taste would suck.

"Who can say what's being down to the spatial landscape, the dimensional density...We could be jumping blind, if we try to go too far."

    "I never rely on portals," Petra explains, gnawing through a candy cigarette quickly enough that she has to retrieve a second by the end of her sentence. "People try to trick you into going onto trains with them way too often. Well, I rely on them to get to work. And school. I mean, you can't not rely on them, but you know what I mean."

"'Service dog'?"

    "Huh? *You*?" Not even a 'you're here?' or a 'it's you again'. Petra's indignance at Mesmer's presence starts from just disliking her a bit, but then grows considerably when thinking about *why* she dislikes her, and the specific relevance that has to this car trip! Hastily, she tugs down the hem of her shirt and glares at Mesmer, but her shirt's really too short to actually cover up her belt.

    "And what's your problem? *I'm* not the one wearing a *collar*." After that retort, Petra turns her head away and covers up a two syllable mumbled addition with a cough.

"'I am unable to hear'."

    She waves her hand dismissively, as if this is the most obvious thing in the world. "They're, like, one thousand bugs in a skinsuit. Grow up."

"Petra you asshole! How are you going to fix this?!"

    "Wahhh--!!" Petra strains to keep balance on the ends of her toes, hands shooting to grab Lilian's as she's pulled up by the collar. Nervously protesting, "No, it'll be nice! I think it'll be nice! I'll make sure-- wait, are you okay?"

    Immediately from getting yanked and tossed around, Petra's demeanor fully flips back into being fussily concerned, dipping back into the trunk to look for her duffel bag. "I've got pain meds if you need it. Er-- lots of them, actually."

"I haven't seen her fuck up yet."

    "Well, if she helped find Ash, then... I mean, I probably could've just asked them, but still." Petra jumps into motion at Lilian's snap, hurrying into the backseat. Norton the succulent bobs in after her to float placidly inside the car between her and Lilian, and obviously she positions Lilian's bag to take up her own legspace so that Lilian's is unimpeded.

    When both of them are situated back there, she continues gossiping about Matilda as if she can't here, "She seems like the kind who's *so* worried about fucking up that it wraps all the way back around into making her less likely to do it instead of more."
Madeleine Cadrasteia     "Maybe-- we can see from up high."

    Ozhira softball-pitches an eye straight up, which makes even Madeleine wince in reflexive disgust. "Don't get any of that stuff on the upholstery," she says. As the orb of flesh nears the apex of its arc, it slows enough for Ozhira to get a good view of the more distant countryside.

    From up high, the distortions are even more evident - the visible curvature of the Earth at the horizon is uneven, like the edge of a warped vinyl record. Rivers flow directions that at least appear to be uphill. What's more, the land is striated, great marks of strange terrain running east-west as if the land itself has been dragged in the perpendicular (north-south) directions.

    There's a town not far to the north, with what appears to be a highway. Ozhira can barely make out a '95' on one of the big signs. "That's... something," Madeleine says when informed. "Puts us in Idaho, most likely. Belle Fourche is gonna be a long drive to the east, all the way over in South Dakota - who knows how much longer for all this craziness with the missing center."

    "It's crazy fucked up what happened there. You ever hear about that?"

    "Remind me? I don't get out there often, so what I know's a little spotty."

    Maddie jumps a little at Ivy's clapping. This whole situation already going off-plan has her feeling tense. "Y-yeah, portals might be a little dangerous, considering what happened to the warpgate. I'd rather not teleport this van to the bottom of a river."

    "Um. Oh. Leave it to Matilda, Cadrasteia."

    Madeleine nods. She's barely holding herself back from asking what's got Lilian so fatigued, but not so well that onlookers can't tell she's wondering.

    "It would not be most strictly necessary, but would be helpful nonetheless, to possess, in fact, an indication as to what the 'center' is? An image of the monument, or a piece of it, or something most indicative of the correct positions of things?"

    "Oh, yeah, I've got- here," she says, handing over a brief dossier on Concord stationery. Inside is the message that was sent to Madeleine detailing the emergency - with hardly more information than Matilda already has - paperclipped to a glossy 8"-by-10" photograph of the missing monument, a large, flat stone circle with eight star-points in the cardinal directions and their intermediate points. Into its surface is carved in relief a polished map of the United States, with a small metal marker right over the center point in South Dakota. "Will that be enough to work with?"

    As Matilda gets to work on her divination, everyone piles into the car and Madeleine finally gets on the road. She doesn't *stop* in the town - apparently Culdesac, Idaho based on the local church's name - but rather gets onto US Route 95 heading southeast. "Closer to Belle Fourche means closer to some answers, I reckon," Madeleine says, "And worst case we just turn around if Matilda says they're out in California or something."
Ozhira > "Don't get any of that stuff on the upholstery."

    "That is us," Ozhira admits, "We will not-- make a mess."

> "'I'. The word is 'I'. 'I am unable to hear.'"

    Ozhira pauses. Could this be the first time someone has taken umbrage with the way the creature speaks? The eyes shift upward in an imitation of a thoughtful expression, their jaw slightly slack.

    "'I' is... singular," they hesitantly point out, as if it should be obvious how wrong that is.

> "You will not need a third option, for I am here!"

    The great and talented Matilda Bouaniche draws the creature's attention away from Mesmer Jr., as loud and flashy things tend to do; and there is nobody else here as loud and flashy as Matilda. Ozhira doesn't seem to understand just what she's talking about though-- it's not until she pulls her crystal ball out that the beast creeps closer to get a better look at the sphere in the diviner's hands.

> "They're, like, one thousand bugs in a skinsuit. Grow up.

    "Ahh?" Ozhira straightens, glancing Petra's direction, "We do not-- have skin, though."

    The glob of fleshy whatsit splats to a stop in the middle of the road. It immediately gathers itself back together, reforming into some unidentifiable multi-legged bug thing, and scuttles right into the side of Ozhira's foot.

    "...Strange," they mutter as they process what the other part of them had seen. They relay the sign and the town and the warped nature of the landscape for Madeleine to make sense of while they pile into the van in whatever seat is open-- the beast is not particularly picky and also, notably, doesn't particularly care if it's crowded.
Regulus Regulus gives Mesmer a strange look. "What? C'mon Mesmer, even you know the tradition." She says as if she's the weird one.

''Goblin.''

"Eheh!" Regulus rubs the bridge of her nose with an index finger like she's trying out for shonen protagonist today but this doesn't stop her from stealing the seat. At the very least she did decide to leave the guitar in the back rather than playing it all the way over, but seeing Lilian's injuries or, rather, seeing the implication of injury makes Regulus's shoulder hurt. She almost rubs at it but grips the side of her seat instead and gives Madeleine another look, trying not to seem too wary. At the very least, she reasons, she wasn't there during the fight. Maybe she backed out after experiencing some goo or something but at the very least she's confident the GHOST SHOOTER won't be showing up here.

''I haven't seen her fuck up yet.''

"Wow nice job, Matilda." Regulus says. "Keep that hot streak going!"

''If you put on shitty music then not only am I gonna change it, but I'll make fun of you too.''

"Heh!! An empty threat...because my taste in music...is immaculate!" Regulus grins at Petra which is also taking it in stride before looking over the CONTROLS and adjusting her scarf with her good arm. "Researched some classic rock stations and don't you worry, mate, we'll keep trying till we get the groovy vibe right on. Lilian will have a bashin' time when all is said and done."

She gives Ivy a look over but doesn't speak about her cloak just yet, instead she's more interest ed in her being a Captain. "Lots of Captain energy here today." She decides happily.

''We do not--have skin, though.''

Regulus is startled by this and gives Ozhira a long loo, definitely seeing skin as far as she can tell. She takes off her sunglasses. Nope. Still looks like skin. Regulus pretends so hard that she didn't see a glob of flesh walk into her that she successfully convinces her brain that it didn't happen but she does reach back with her sunglasses and pokes Ozhira in the arm with it. "You sure you don't have skin, mate?"

It makes total sense to Regulus that stealing a monument that is representative of the center of the united states would fuck up the actual geographical situation of the country. Once the car is on, she immediately turns the radio on and starts twisting the knob until she catches a few familiar lines of Along the Watchtower. "This one's after my time, but I sure hear it on the radio a lot. But that's Hendrix! That's my guy!! On the radio! Wow!"

She air guitars while humming along to the tune.
Lilian Rook     'If you put on shitty music then not only am I gonna change it, but I'll make fun of you too.'

    Honestly, Lilian was expecting 'kill you' and 'make it hurt'. Perhaps Petra likes Regulus, actually? Or perhaps she's just projecting. Yeah the second one is more likely.

    'No, it'll be nice! I think it'll be nice! I'll make sure--'

    "It'd better be. Or else not only am I going to--" Lilian cuts that one short; both because she's realized that her inside and outside thoughts are getting mixed up, but also because the residual throbbing in her waist is making her diaphragm spasm. "Eugh. Just find some that actually work, would you?" Lilian mumbles.

    While Petra is rummaging around, she breaks the pause by asking "Why aren't you, by the way?" Then one entire second elapses between Lilian saying that, imagining her and Petra going up to a cash register at a gas station like that, and shaking her head. "Never mind." Without thinking further, Lilian climbs in after, inexorably placing herself next to the floating stonecrop, dropping her bag (it is mostly filled with personal care items; Petra isn't allowed to brush her hair), and leaning in close to examine its condition for herself.

    TIP: You can entrance a woman with a cute little plant actually.

    'She seems like the kind who's *so* worried about fucking up that it wraps all the way back around into making her less likely to do it instead of more.'

    "Isn't that backwards? Being a little afraid of fucking up motivates you to try harder, but worrying too much just distracts you enough to make it more likely?" Lilian says, still fixated on Norton for the time being.

    'Lilian will have a bashin' time when all is said and done.'

    Hm. Maybe Petra and Regulus do get along, actually?
Ivy Carrow     ''I haven't seen her fuck up yet.''

    "You've caught the eye of the great Dame Commander Lilian Rook!" Ivy exclaimed, a celebratory half-laugh. "Lead on, Matilda!" She throws her cloak back. "Chart our path through a reality fractured, to the center where it all began!"

    "We'll do whatever we can to keep you from needing to step in, Dame Commander!" Ivy offered her idol a deep bow, before turning with a flourish toward the car.

    "Lots of Captain energy here today."

    "Oh?!" Ivy leaned forward in the car to try to get a look at Regulus, until her belt snapped tight at the sudden motion, intent on protecting Ivy from the crash that was definitely happening (and Regulus from unvarnished Ivy) "Oof."

    She doesn't let it slow her d own long. "Does that make you a Captain, too?" Her eyes glittered. "There's got to be a story there. Were you appointed, or did you take it yourself? Do you have a crew, or do you fly solo?"
Petra Soroka "Why aren't you, by the way?"

    Petra pauses in her rummaging and unconsciously touches her throat. "Er... I could. If you'd-- I do have it."

    She takes the liberty of shaking out two pills into her hand and offering Lilian a bottle of water with the other, because obviously she's brought enough bottled water so that Lilian wouldn't have to drink *tap water*. Like asking her to drink from the sewer! Unforgivable!

"Remind me? I don't get out there often, so what I know's a little spotty."

    Petra continues to babble about this completely unrelated thing as long as she's given attention for it. Since her one idea was already done by Ozhira, she's got nothing to do besides chill in the backseat with Lilian and chat about what she's learned in college, which is fine by her. "So, like, up until right before the 20th century, Hawaii was its own thing. Then a whole bunch of Americans that were allowed to farm there by the native Hawaiians got pissy about some laws or something and started murdering the police, and then did a coup to overthrow the Queen. This was theoretically supposed to be about, like, export laws and farmers' rights or something, but turns out it was just a plant by the U.S. to scam out manufactured consent for the coup and then sweep in and turn it into a new colony."

    "And then they put a billion military bases there and enslaved the native Hawaiians and beat them until they lost their language and became American. It's fucked up! It's fucked up." Petra ends her thought with a contented little hum, dissonant with the subject matter, but her mood is too good for anything else.

"Researched some classic rock stations and don't you worry, mate, we'll keep trying till we get the groovy vibe right on."

    "Huh? Did they even have car--" Quick! Petra, you don't want to ask if they had cars in 1966! "--carrrrrr.... rrradios? Where you're from?"

    She snickers, after. "'Classic rock'. Old. Old old old." Obviously Petra listens to classic rock too. She's got an electric guitar!

"Lilian will have a bashin' time when all is said and done."

    This promise increases Petra reputation score significantly if it's true, but it also escalates the threat rating of the car ride! Petra narrows her eyes at the back of Regulus's head. "If she doesn't then I'll kill you and make it hurt." Idly, she adds, "I think it's fun to listen to music and be like, 'wow! I know how to play that!', because it really helps you understand what's going on in, like, the production of the thing you're consuming."

"We do not-- have skin, though."

    "That's awesome, man."
Petra Soroka "And worst case we just turn around if Matilda says they're out in California or something."

    "California..." Petra murmurs distractedly, extremely slowly leaning closer to Lilian. "That'd be really pretty. There's lots of good forests in northern California."

"Being a little afraid of fucking up motivates you to try harder, but worrying too much just distracts you enough to make it more likely?"

    "No, you're right." Petra nods, wiggling a little in her seat. "Just, I think there's a third thing past that. Where you become *so* fixated on people having a good opinion of you that you actually make it a serious priority to do well instead of just a shallow priority, because you don't have much else going on to fuck you up." She is saying this about Matilda while sitting next to Matilda.

    More importantly, Norton! Conniving the maximum possible way of fascinating Lilian by combining her love for cute furry animals with gardening, Petra has given Norton's tamagotchi-face several features. As a sort of combined two-halves of the entity of Norton, interacting with the plant in some ways shows up on the blobby rat on screen; particularly, when lightly touching a leaf of the succulent with a finger, a little hand shows up on the screen to pat the rat's head.

    Petra 'huhu's proudly at Lilian observing her handiwork. "I've brought extra water, a sun lamp if it's needed for some reason, and a backup pot if something terrible happens somehow."

"Does that make you a Captain, too?"

    Petra scoffs at the conversation happening between the two rows in front of her, surreptiously using the Norton-distraction to leaaaan just a little more into Lilian. "I was a Captain too, even. I guess technically I've been promoted from that, but it's more that the entire job's gone."
Foundation Scions     Mesmer spares a very short moment to Glare at Lilian bodily hoisting Petra nearly off her feet. That the action stops in pain serves as a queue for her to stop glaring.

'Huh? *You*?'

    "You're correct. Me." She sounds, actually, equally upset at that simple fact! "I don't appreciate the wandering eyes. It's a mundane piece of modern fashion. I truly can't see the problem- it's functional, sturdy, and contemporary." Just modern fashion for WHOM? The *Jetsons*?

'They're, like, one thousand bugs in a skinsuit. Grow up.'

    "What? Ew, disgusting- keep away from me, far away from me. That's unsanitary. Who approved this? Who fallowed this?" Mesmer will now stand and sit as far from Ozhira as physically possible for the entire rest of this journey!

>Reforming into some unidentifiable multi-legged bug thing

    She's going to have nightmares, too. Mesmer doesn't shriek, but only because she's the type to get quieter the more scared she is.

'God you're stupid.'

    Mesmer prickles at that- actually tightening her shoulders up, before turning to reply- and holding off, when she realizes she's being examined. Mesmer crosses her arms in front of herself, and quickly turns her torso back away. "A criminal arcanist with a dangerous past of kidnapping shouts that she has a gun, and I'm the foolish one for reacting? Hm. Is your understanding of threat and consequence that underdeveloped? I can recommend a self-defense course, if so."
Foundation Scions     Matilda coughs, an intentional little noise, and gives Mesmer a Look- "Ms. Mesmer Jr.? Are you, erm, quite sure you mean such hostile-sounding things, of Ms. Regulus and Ms. Rook? The former certainly could do better by registrating- regist*er*ing, with the St. Pavlov Foundation, but Ms. Rook is talented and most helpful? Surely you do not mean it!"

    Mesmer huffs, and gives Matilda a curt little nod, expression souring once the diviner can't see. Matilda looks genuinely worried and embarrassed on her compatriot's behalf- it looks bad for her, too, as a member of the FDMO, but it's also odd and hard seeing an old acquaintance act like *that*.

'Um. Oh. Leave it to Matilda, Cadrasteia.'

    That banishes all the worry from Matilda! A bit of praise! She beams. "I assure you most strongly, I have no intention of ever 'fu-'." Matilda stops there for a solid moment! She's normal, she can say curse words, but she is representing the FDMO, and saying them in English is less appropriate than in a more graceful language like French, and as suchm returns with, "Disappointing any of those to whom I promise my highly-regarded services! Er- but if your arcane capacities are worn through," Matilda rummages, tongue out of the corner of her mouth in focus, for a few small pricasma candies. Is this because of the sharpodonty bite, some unconscious assumption, or just an instinctive response to that kind of trouble? More importantly, do they possibly even taste good? Matilda's offering them out to her!

'Oh, yeah, I've got- here,'
'Will that be enough to work with?'

    "Hm! We will have to see, of course! But I shall do, as always, my utmost excellent best!" The picture isn't the best thing for Matilda to go off of, but it's something! A moment of swirling mists within the orb follow, and quiet muttering results in a steadfast declaration of- "It is very, very far away! Sud-est, er, south-east, a length of many miles and leagues, but high, high up, somewhere glowing and sprawling!" Denver. There's not another high-up metropolis south-east but Denver, and Mexico City, and if the Center of the United States was there, that's got to be a bigger issue of international relations!

    With Mesmer having tossed both of their bags into the trunk space, Matilda clambers on in, divination complete, the big crystal kept with her (surely to be hugged in her lap the Entire Trip), riiiiight into the third-of-three back bench seat, with Lilian and Petra, in the midst of being talked about.

    Mesmer, quietly, as if she simply doesn't notice Lilian's seat position (she does), sits in the middle-row, on the same side as her, in order to be directly in front of her. That this undoubtably means she's closer to Ozhira is a price she's somehow affording paying (she hates them so so much, ew, gross), in order to get......... something?

'Heh!! An empty threat...because my taste in music...is immaculate'

    "Oh, ooh! Do you take requests, Ms. Regulus? I have two requests! Premier, that you play any of the excellent selectable recordings of American jazz Vocalist Mrs. Ella Fitzgerald?" Matilda wants to listen to jazz on a roadtrip. "Secondly, please *do* register with the Foundation! Assisting as you are on this field deployment may reflect well on the remedial courses you would surely be assigned!"
Foundation Scions 'Lead on, Matilda!'

    "I, of course, certainly will, with great navigational acuity! Er, but... I do not believe we have been introduced?" Matilda leans out from the back seat to awkwardly try and offer a hand-shake to Ivy, regardless of where in the van she's sitting- this undoubtably leaves her leaning over others un-gracefully. "Monitor Assistant of the St. Pavlov Foundation's School for the Primary Defense of Mankind, Matilda Bouanich, and trustworthy representative, as well, of the Department of Multiversal Outreach! I am now, in fact, reaching out!"

    This job? Or with the handshake? She's not laughing, was it a joke? Huh?
Ivy Carrow     "I am now, in fact, reaching out!"

    Whether or not she's joking, Ivy laughs. The girl takes Matilda's hand to shake it, a firm clasp. "A joy to meet you, Matila Bouanich!" She smiled. "I am Ivy Carrow! Gate-Captain of the Warprunners. We scout the unseen gates of the multiverse for all their hazards and dangers, to see for ourselves! To secure and reinforce warpgates and incorporate them into our Hub! To explore the infinite expanse of the multiverse."

    She made a broad gesture toward the uneven horizon, the empty sky, her tone becoming conspiratorial. "Touch them with our own hands! See them with our own eyes!"

    
Lilian Rook     'A criminal arcanist with a dangerous past of kidnapping shouts that she has a gun, and I'm the foolish one for reacting?'

    Lilian nods. Not because she's even trying to be mean, but because she's still bug-eye fascinated by that choice of clothing, and more importantly, Mesmer's reaction to being seen wearing it. By her specifically. For some reason. Weird.

    'Hm. Is your understanding of threat and consequence that underdeveloped? I can recommend a self-defense course, if so.'

    "You know, that's actually a fantastic idea." Lilian says, then looking over to Matilda, "If Mesmer Junior would recommend that course so highly, would it be possible for me to enroll in it alongside her? I've been meaning to assess the Foundation's combat readiness standards for a while now." There's a normal way to say this, a greasonous way to say this, and a secret unlockable third way that Lilian has just discovered right now.

    'What? Ew, disgusting- keep away from me, far away from me. That's unsanitary. Who approved this? Who allowed this?'

    Honestly, Lilian doesn't totally disagree with Mesmer. Or like, at all. Throwing eyeballs around is gross! Slushy red meat horror stuff is just genuinely kind of offputting! This is only reflected in the slightly longer pause than usual before she says, "If you're afraid, you can always--" Lilian looks back at where the Warpgate was, then frowns. "--Well I suppose you could sit by me then. That is, if you're serious about hygeine and safety." Lilian does not actually want this. Lilian wants Mesmer to actively choose to sit next to Ozhira instead of her. Because it will make her look soooooooooo lame and stupid.

    'The former certainly could do better by registrating- regist*er*ing, with the St. Pavlov Foundation, but Ms. Rook is talented and most helpful? Surely you do not mean it!'

    Good ol'e Matilda! Lilian smiles a little! What a wonderful Fixer protégé! "Indeed. Not only have I freely provided LSCC the scientific curiosity of the decade, but I've even been wounded in the line of duty protecting the Foundation's interests. You'd think she could control her wording a little more precisely, don't you? I might begin to feel unwanted otherwise."

    Annoyingly, Mesmer is technically sitting 'next' to her in the car. But still closer to Ozhira! So it's basically a win, but not really, and Lilian can't say it out loud. Sasuga, Junior-san. She decides to cope with this by acknowledging that Petra exists. First by taking the pills straight out of her hands, popping them into her mouth without looking, and downing half of the water bottle in one go. Then by actually talking to her.
Regulus Regulus is reasonably confident she can make sure Lilian has a good time! She is nothing if not confident in her ability to party and be helpful. She's done things that helped Vertin! So she can be helpful, she knows that for sure, so she doesn't have to sweat being helpful so much because she can be helpful at any point. But--

''If she doesn't then I'll kill you and make it hurt.''

Upon hearing that she's feeling a little less confident because she does know Mesmer's in the car and Mesmer seems like the sort willing to make sure Lilian has a bad day so Petra has to kill her. She really didn't entirely think this through when she made her promise! "She'll have a splendid time." Regulus makes a promise to Future Regulus. "She adores Matilda and we get along and you're here and clearly devoted! We just need to work together so she has a grand old time."

''Carrrrr.... rrradios?''

As a Reverse 1999 character, Regulus has a thematic feature of being able to exposit about history. Normally this duty is given to APPLe who has a voice made for the history channel (back when it was about history) but Regulus can step up in a pinch.

"Since the 1930s. The first car radio was the Motorola, but they were so expensive that it was a wonder anybody's buy one but for the novelty! And since then they've found ways to make the vehicular radio cheaper so that more and more people can tune in to the tunies and the talkies." She pauses before adding, "They added FM Radio in the 1950s. In fact, last I heard--they were even adding a cassette player, a whole 8-tracks, into vehicles! Fancy that!"

She is so endeared by the progress of technology that is so outdated they don't make cars with them anymore already.

''Does that make you a Captain, too?''

"Mhm! Though I've lost my poor ship--but I hope to be back on the seas soon! Until then, the Suitcase is my vessel! ... Vertin's vessel, but I'm in it."

''I think it's fun to listen to music and be like wow I know how to play that!''

"That's why I started learning. I wanted to know more about what I was listening to. I had to know how they were making those sounds, my mind was reeling!"

Regulus bobs her head in agreement that some kind of bug skinsuit creature is gross and that is why they definitely aren't sharing a van with a thousand bugs wearing a person. It's so silly of Mesmer to bring that up when there's clearly not some kind of bug flesh blob stuff going on here. Nope, haha, silly Mesmer.

''A criminal arcanist with a dangerous past--''

"Damn you make me sound cool." Regulus says. "I don't have a firearm, though. It doesn't really fit my love and peace brand, you know?" She frowns as she considers whether or not she actually did a kidnapping. That requires transport right? Well she was on a boat but they came to the boat--well she doesn't really care so she lets it go in her mind.

''Matilda gets Mesmer to quiet down.''

Regulus didn't really have a low opinion of Matilda or anything, she likes her vibes, but she is actually kind of impressed she got Mesmer to react like that. Maybe it's because she's so sincere and nice about it?
Regulus ''Do you take requests, Ms. Regulus?''

"I can move to a jazz station but I can't make 'em play Ella Fitzgerald." Regulus prefers rock, of course, but she has some respect for jazz. "That okay with you?" She pauses at the mention of registering and Regulus attempts to deflect by saying, "Actually, i was on an official mission from the Foundation with Team Timekeeper just yesterday." She winces. "Those maneuvers Sonetto has all memorized, do you know them too?"

Once Along The Watchtower is over, Regulus moves to a jazz station. It's not playing Ella Fitzgerald, unfortunately. It's playing cool jazz right now actually.

BGM: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gCGNYJOrebA

"Don't think that's Fitzgerald, but does that work for you?"
Lilian Rook     'It's fucked up! It's fucked up.'

    "It occurs to me that I should perhaps be reading some American history if I would like to better anticipate how the Letter Agency functions." Lilian says, cracking open her currently half-read tome straight out of her crossbody: 'A Collection of Abridged Variations on Ars Magna'.

    'Huh? Did they even have car--'

    "I don't know. Probably." says Lilian, who was there for 1966 and saw cars. She's already found her page again.

    'That'd be really pretty. There's lots of good forests in northern California.'

    "I thought that California was mostly beach?" says Lilian, who was also at California, but it was mostly desert then. Her grasp of the sheer scale of the USA is still very weak. "And I didn't pack a swimsuit. I'd certainly hate to offend anyone, after all." she adds, burning a hole in the back of Mesmer's seat with her eyes.

    This prevents her from actually reading the page she opened to, and getting distracted by Norton again. She touches a little leaf to test for hydration, then makes a soft gasp at the animated rat on the screen. "Goodness . . . ! How did you make him do that? You didn't attach anything to the leaves did you?"

    'I've brought extra water, a sun lamp if it's needed for some reason, and a backup pot if something terrible happens somehow.'

    "Mhm, mhm, good thinking." Lilian nods along. "And if something happens to those, I can handle sun and water with magic, of course. Once I've got it back." She says it as if nineteen layers of redundancies are part and parcel of raising a trusting little plant baby. "You're surprisingly good at this, you know."
Ozhira > "That's awesome, man."

    Ozhira's eyes close. They look quite pleased, letting out an anomalous chirping sound.

> "That's unsanitary. Who approved this? Who fallowed this?

    By pure virtue of seating arrangements and prime Glowering real estate, Ozhira winds up seated in the middle of the middle seat *right* next to Mesmer Jr. and right after she had that entirely understandable reaction both to Petra's shorthand description of them and their own Horror Creature antics.

    "We are Ozhira," the beast offers to the spooked Laplace agent, "Our song welcomes you." While a proper greeting would involve offering a handshake or something like that, Ozhira keeps their hands in their lap. Whether they realized it would just make Mesmer more uncomfortable or just didn't think to do so remains unclear.
Madeleine Cadrasteia     "It's fucked up! It's fucked up."

    "Oh, geez. Tell me about it. Why are people always doing that, anyway? Coming in where other folks live and stampin' everything out into the shape of wherever they came from."

    "That'd be really pretty. There's lots of good forests in northern California."

    "There *are*," Madeleine agrees, suddenly animated. "I was out there a few months back, 'cuz somebody was moving the sequoias. You know, those reeeeeeally big ones? Turns out they were walking off on their own! Slithering around on their roots. Somethin' folks'd done to the water supply wasn't agreeing with 'em, so we shut down a couple farms and they've started moving back in." What?

    "That's unsanitary. Who approved this?"

    Madeleine shrugs. "Eh, don't worry too much about Ozhira. They're uh... sticky enough to not get all over. You know, like surface tension." As for who *allowed* this, "They're some kind of military experiment."

    "It is very, very far away! Sud-est, er, south-east, a length of many miles and leagues, but high, high up, somewhere glowing and sprawling!"

    Madeleine nods. "Sounds like, what, Colorado probably? Past that there's not mountains for a good while, and they can't have got *too* far with the center. Regulus, there's a map in the glove compartment, might need you to help with navigation if we're heading thataway..."

    After about half an hour of driving south, Madeleine takes a left onto a country road, turning east toward the looming Rocky Mountains. The fields shift from golden to green as the route continues onto a state highway, which jogs north for a little ways to link up with US Route 12. The junction is in the small town of Kamiah, nestled in a little valley among bands of steep hills. When the highway resumes its eastward path it does so directly into the mountains, fields giving way to slopes of crowded pines. "'Least the highways aren't all torn up," Madeleine comments. "For now."
Foundation Scions 'I don't have a firearm, though. It doesn't really fit my love and peace brand, you know?'

    "That makes you out to be even more the unstable, dangerous kidnapper, to commit crimes unarmed. That isn't better." That's her last little barb for now, thanks Matilda!

'Those maneuvers Sonetto has all memorized, do you know them too?'

    "Hein-? W-w-what manner of maneuvers do you mean? Do you, perhaps, mean those of a more... ro- Oh! *Combat* maneuverings? Why, of course I do, most likely!" Matilda kicks her legs, seated in the back of the van, woe to the passenger in front of her. "The mission yesterday? I, er, have not yet heard many details- was it successful in its goals? Surely, yes?"

'Sounds like, what, Colorado probably?'

    "Mm-hm!" Matilda doesn't know the less-important states, except for Illinois, as it is quite focal right now, and she'd still be liable to call the whole state there 'Chicago'. "Most likely! But, er, if there *is* a later chance, to assemble the properly-associated components, I would very much like to complete a further-clarifying ritual! For now, er," Matilda yawns a little, and rummages for another picrasma candy than the offered-ones earlier, "It would be quite taxing, even though I could in theory still try?"

'Not only have I freely provided LSCC the scientific curiosity of the decade,'

    Mesmer adds, unprompted, "They'll pay you when they remember life outside a lab exists. They'll pay you." She refuses to explain more, like how the budget afforded to this is symmetrically taken from other efforts of LSCC, including the Artificial Somnambulism ward, and thus annoys her in particular because she's obliged to argue about it and eventually concede to some compromise.

'And I didn't pack a swimsuit. I'd certainly hate to offend anyone, after all.'

    Mesmer may or may not feel the burnt-through stare-hole, but she does respond! "It's a common trend of American hotels to have pools." Said so dismissively, what could she possibly mean by this!

    Mesmer is going to spend the entire ride looking out the window, or glaring behind her, and never once forwards or over to Ozhira. The fact that they're sitting right next to her makes her skin crawl, and her hand twitch- what's going on in her brain is an even more frantic feedback loop of disgust, discomfort, and catalyzing over-awareness.

'They're uh... sticky enough to not get all over.'

    "Ew, ew- that doesn't help in the slightest. Please be quiet, please leave me alone."

    In a little pause after Mesmer speaks, Matilda pipes up- "Surely, Ms. Regulus, you could in fact ensure the radio would be playing the correct track? An accomplished 'radio disc-jockey pirate', one would assume, could perform such a handy trick! This music, it is of course, enjoyable, but-!"

'We scout the unseen gates of the multiverse for all their hazards and dangers,'

    Matilda gasps- "Super- Ms. Carrow," SO much spice to that one, all the r's and soft-ending, "You *must* tell a story of those adventures! I, er, I have my own of course, but, tell, tell!" Starry-eyed French girl has latched on!

'Just, I think there's a third thing past that. Where you become *so* fixated on people having a good opinion of you that you actually make it a serious priority to do well instead of just a shallow priority, because you don't have much else going on to fuck you up.'

    Matilda, orb hugged in her lap, beams at that statement- it doesn't register as anything but positive! Yay! Matilda's making SUCH good impressions on people, maybe, possibly! Do your best, Matilda!
Ivy Carrow     "I was a Captain too, even. I guess technically I've been promoted from that, but it's more that the entire job's gone."

    "Oh, you huff," Ivy says behind her. "...But I'll bet yours came with some stories too~" Ultimately though, her attention comes back to Regulus. "So, you're a proper ship's captain, huh? What made you want to set sail in the first place?" She leaned as far forward as she could without her seatbelt snapping her back again. "Where did you want to GO?"

    "Colorado," Ivy mused, after Matilda and Madeleine had done their assessment. "At least the direction sounds correct, which could help us. If we assume that locations are being scattered semi-randomly, in an area around the displaced center, then it probably won't end up pushing us too far further out of the way." She thinks. "Do you think it stabilizes, once it's far enough away? Or is space still distorting around us, even now..."

    Ivy is distracted from badgering Regulus, when they get into view of the town. "How long do you think they've been stuck like this?" A rare frown. "This warping will have affected their supply chains. Maybe their communications, too." Being in charge of a Hub where people lived, she had to pick up something about this.

    "Let's hope they've got a supply of food, or a way to get more. This isn't the kind of disaster that people are good at preparing for."
Ivy Carrow     "You *must* tell a story of those adventures!"

    Matilda had said the magic words. "Oh, but of course...!" She grinned. "I wasn't always a Captain, you know," turning in her seat to look back at Matilda, tragically limited by the seat and closed quarters from making the kind of grand gestures she so loved to make. It left her feeling a bit put-upon..."Once, before I learned the blade, before I was even allowed to carry my own sidearm...I was an assistent to an expedition into an old kingdom."

    "There were great vaulted cathedrals! Buildings of dark-red stone, piercing a sky with three moons, and a distant sun...But the inhabitants were gone...Who were they? What had become of them? And could it happen again...?"
Petra Soroka "A criminal arcanist with a dangerous past of kidnapping shouts that she has a gun, and I'm the foolish one for reacting?"

    "Huh? What? I didn't--" Petra hears 'criminal', 'kidnapping', and 'has a gun', and glosses over the word 'arcanist' entirely. When she realizes it's not about her, she leans forwards, speaking directly past Mesmer's head to talk to Regulus up front.

    "Wait, wait, Regulus! Who'd you kidnap! Tell!"

"Er, but... I do not believe we have been introduced?"

    Petra has now successfully brought herself through the arduously slow process of leaning towards, then occasionally brushing against while the car turned, to putting her head on Lilian's shoulder, like a predator creeping slowly through the underbrush to avoid notice. From this position, she interjects after Matilda's own long-winded introduction, "Her name's Matildork. You can tell why already."

"--Well I suppose you could sit by me then."

    "No she can't there's no room." Petra has to cut that off quickly!!!!! And *right* after saying she'd beat her up in a self-defense course that Lilian got her put into as a punishment?? Lilian wants to fuck Mesmer so bad it makes her look insane and no one but Petra can see it for what it really is.

"I might begin to feel unwanted otherwise."

    "Well, like, it doesn't really matter if *she*........" Petra can't finish that sentence, because if she actually completed saying the words 'it doesn't matter if Mesmer doesn't want you', her intuitive precognition warns her that this would result in the exact opposite of what she wants happening.

"It occurs to me that I should perhaps be reading some American history if I would like to better anticipate how the Letter Agency functions."

    "Mmm," Petra non-committally agrees. "I don't actually have to take any history courses for my degree, which is great, because like, I kind of don't know anything about American history. Like, it wasn't taught on Io, obviously. I just heard about it from a classmate of mine who's from Hawaii."

"I thought that California was mostly beach?"

    "No, that's just... the coast...." Petra struggles with saying that sentence to Lilian, because it's so obvious that it seems demeaning, and yet.... "And actually up north the beaches have tons of really cool forest on them too. But it's got huge, super old trees, and tons of camping sites in the woods, and national parks, and surfing...."

    She's about to shoot upright to emphatically stare and demonstrate her enthusiasm, but doing so would force her to take her head off of Lilian's shoulder, so she just sort of twitches like a sleeping dog instead. "And! I mean, hypothetically, I could just skip over to L.A. in the Beauty of Ash and be back in a few hours with a swimsuit."
Petra Soroka "How did you make him do that? You didn't attach anything to the leaves did you?"

    "Nope!!!" Petra proudly kicks her feet, using the little wiggling motion that creates to squish her cheek against Lilian. "Around the rim of the pot, there's a bunch of heat and motion sensors, that notice if something finger-like gets occluded by a leaf at a certain distance. If it's super cold out, it won't work, but like, he wouldn't be out if it was super cold."

    At the praise, Petra hums happily, then tapers off into a more contemplative buzz. "I've had practice with pets and all, like Curupira, and... you know. If something's depending on me, I want it to do well." There's more to it, but that's the socially acceptable answer, at least.

"Since the 1930s. The first car radio was the Motorola, but they were . . ."

    "That's awesome, man." The exact same tone that she replied to Ozhira's confession of having skin, except, in this case she's actually listening. Giving Regulus some more thought, "... Actually, that is pretty cool. You know, if you could listen to any song ever made in all of history, at any time, with no limit, wherever you were, would you think that's better?"}

"Don't think that's Fitzgerald, but does that work for you?"

    "I've heard of Fitzgerald, I think..." Petra's meters gradually decline while the jazz plays over the radio, bringing Regulus slowly towards the danger zone. She's just not that interested in jazz! The fact that this is being sung by a woman with a lot of focus on her beautiful voice is doing a lot to slow down the decline, though.

"Sounds like, what, Colorado probably?"

    "Colorado... okay...." Petra murmurs while taking out a remote with a big red button on it and tapping something into it. That probably doesn't mean anything.

"It's a common trend of American hotels to have pools."

    "Oh, awesome. And me with all my newfound experience drowning people in them." Petra's aggression at Mesmer has absolutely nothing to do with their previous meeting anymore.
Foundation Scions 'If Mesmer Junior would recommend that course so highly, would it be possible for me to enroll in it alongside her?'

    Matilda doesn't exactly know what to make of Lilian's tone with any of this- surely, it's a normal request, and Matilda loves to volunteer success at normal requests! But when she tries to press the mental 'confirm' button there, a metaphorical warning of that action having consequences pops up, unexplained. No matter! She'll just be confused, and diligent at the same time!

    "Ah-hem, as to the same one, that may be a matter of scheduling and class sizes, but-! Of course I can put requests in (with attached good-words, no doubt, from my esteemed office) to hopefully facilitate such! It... seems a most sensible thing to do, yes!"

    Mesmer is glaring at each and every movement of Matilda's mouth, as if she's trying to explode her with her mind. Has anyone confirmed that the resident Mesmer can't do that?
Regulus ''They're some kind of military experiment.''

A military experiment to make a normal non-bug-related entity, Regulus decides. Good job you made a normal weirdo instead of a weird weirdo. She's going to believe this up until Ozhira eats a guy in front of her.

Regulus isn't plant afflatus but she appreciates nature too. She is a lady of two worlds, the City and the middle of nowheres. The fact that the latter is usually in water-related areas is unrelated.

''Combat maneuverings?''

"Uh yeah. Combat maneuverings. Or maybe tactical? I'm not a fighter or anything but since she's with the Timekeeper all the time I figure I should figure out how to support her...? You know, sometimes." She quickly evades the idea that she's planning on this being a full time obligation. "She went over them but didn't exactly...explain what they actually were?" Did Sonetto forget she's not Foundation? She better not have! If Sonetto starts seeing her as a normal colleague rather than a philisophical rival...!!! She'd die!!! And be buried a square!!

But that fight with Schneider has convinced her that figuring some of this out might mean she'll get shot less often so--there's that.
r''Was it successful in its goals?''

Regulus is tempted to lie to Matilda. "Oh--well...Sssort of? Sonetto and Vertin are fine." She doesn't bring up the bullet in her arm, not because she's not totally willing to whine about it, but because her head isn't there right now. The wound is still throbbing but she's more worried about Matilda fretting. "I managed to get a look at--" She remembers Madeleine is Concord. "--A map. Of the mission site."

''Even more the unstable, dangerous kidnapper to commit crimes unarmed.''

Holy shit, Regulus thinks, Mesmer is like the ultimate hype woman??? Like yeah she knows she's talking shit but her way of talking shit just makes her sound cooler??? How can she get her to say this stuff about her MORE? DAMN.

As she's thinking about ways to be cool and dangerous, Matilda says that as a radio pirate dj she should be able to make radio play what she wants right then and there.

"Well... Maybe if I could do some modifications to the radio, improve its signal range I could increase the odds of getting a station that plays her tracks all the time." Regulus says. "Tell you what, when we have some time with the car parked, I'll take the radio apart and see what I can do."

Matilda believes in her! She cannot fail!!

''What made you want to set sail in the first place?''

"Mm...Freedom. Adventure. I'm not someone who just needs to be out on the sea the whole time, I like my cities too, love racing on motorbikes. But I feel more in tune with the world at sea. Fewer distractions. Even alone out there, you feel less alone, because you're, like, ''there''."

It seems like there's a town coming up. Regulus might get a crack at this radio system sooner than she expected. "I didn't need a set destination, there's plenty of places I've still haven't gone to."

And in a way, she might never get to. Not the places of her own homeworld. But this thought is mitigated by the idea of the vast infinite world that has opened up.
Regulus ''Wait, wait, Regulus! Who'd you kidnap! Tell!''

"Well a couple of Foundation agents boarded my vessel but I got the drop on 'em and I tied 'em up and made them listen to my radio broadcast. And then, gosh, it felt like the army was after me after that but it was actually a whole slew of organizations, I guess." She frowns. And then she looks over to Lilian. And then remembers a second time Madeleine is Concord and keeps her feelings about Flamel quiet but she--

--She thought everyone was at least genuine about wanting her to register with the Foundation. Now she wonders if they didn't care at all and was just trying to get her to do what was easier for them personally.

She wants to ask about Norton she's naturally fascinated but she has so little space to get into it.

"That's a good question." She admits to Petra. "I mean, venue is important right? At least it is to me. Nothing like a live concert, vinyl second best--'specially if it's a live track--but with that internet you can pretty much get whatever song you want whenever you want it at a whopping 2 kilobytes a second. It's incredible! But I worry people will value music less. I think on the whole it's better? People already devalue music all the time--yeah, yeah I think it's better that way. Yeah. It'd happen anyway so it's better that it's all around."
Lilian Rook     'No she can't there's no room.'

    "Hm? You looked into it?"

    Lilian does ask, but doesn't actually care that much. She was mostly just intending to be threatening, because she knows there'll be some stupid excuse preventing her anyways. Not that she wouldn't, if things just so happened to work out that way, but--

    "I've already taught you how to fight. Why bother?" She wants to look at Petra directly, but with Girl on her shoulder, all she can really do is glance out of the corner of her eye, holding her still unread book. She shifts a little bit on the second try, when Petra cuts off her sentence. At no point does she realize that Petra meant 'no room to sit' and not 'no room in the self-defense course', because her thoughts are maybe still unsaintlike.

    'It... seems a most sensible thing to do, yes!'

    "Don't put yourself too far our on my account." Lilian makes a dismissive gesture.

    'And actually up north the beaches have tons of really cool forest on them too. But it's got huge, super old trees, and tons of camping sites in the woods, and national parks, and surfing....'

    "Oh. That actually sounds . . . ?" Nice? "Rather nice. How far out of the way is it? Is it more than two hours?" Oh you poor, sweet, naive, evil British girl.

    'I've had practice with pets and all, like Curupira, and... you know. If something's depending on me, I want it to do well.'

    "You did a surpassing job with Curupira." Lilian says, moving on to a shade just shy of 'approving'. "Even if he was something irresponsibly foisted on you by Tachibana. I didn't fail to notice the pains you took to ensuring his comfort, much less his survival, throughout everything that happened in that city. If I never told you I was impressed, then I'm saying it now." she says, without directly saying it. She is too fascinated by repeated leaf petting now. Petra lazing on her while she fidgets with Norton has the odd energy of gently bouncing a nine month old baby on her knee somehow. "Putting a name and face on something so you remember to treat it more kindly . . . If people did that more often . . ."

    'I don't have a firearm, though. It doesn't really fit my love and peace brand, you know?'

    Lilian glances down at Winter Crow, holstered unusually high on her for once, but comfy enough in a car. This is a handgun that is visibly an artifact of posh dark magic and fucked up billionaire alchemy. She looks up. "Maybe you should. While we're in America, I mean. That's just sort of how they do things here."

    'They'll pay you when they remember life outside a lab exists. They'll pay you.'

    "See? No gratitude whatsoever." Lilian says, finally fed, theatrically shrugging as far as she can with Petra still on her and shaking her head for Matilda and Regulus in particular. "No wonder you people are always having a manpower shortage.

    'It's a common trend of American hotels to have pools.'

    Her smug little show of underappreciation pageantry terminates with a double blink and a toneless "What?" aloud to the cabin. She stares at Mesmer's seat, then leans over to try and get a look at her face via a rearview mirror angle, and finally Petra, when she throws that barb right back out. After staring back and forth at them, eyes-narrowed, lips slightly parted, Lilian eventually-- well, she contemplates reading her mind first-- gives up.

    'Why, of course I do, most likely!'

    "Most likely?" Lilian turns her attention on Matilda, arch-questioning. Now she's in a mood. It looks a little weird with Petra leaning on her side.
Madeleine Cadrasteia     Matilda gets out some Picrasma candy

    "Oh, you brought suckers? Nice, what flavors ya got? I might want some, lemme know before you hand the last ones out."

    Regulus's command of the radio turns the channel to jazz. Madeleine nods in approval. "Classy." The fields and hills pass by, giving way to mountains, and the signal gets a little fuzzy - this must be a West Coast station.

    <J-IC-Scene> Radio DJ says, "-and that's the end of today's Cool Jazz Morning. Coming up next we've got Kings of Swing with one of the *queens* of swing, that's right, it'll be Ella Fitzgerald with 'Someone to Watch Over Me' right after a few messages from our sponsors."

    <J-IC-Scene> Commercial announcer says, "Are you hungry? Like, *really* hungry? Is your stomach growling like a lion? Denny's has got you covered with our new Lion's Share breakfassssssssssshhhhhhhhhhhh--

    The radio fades to static, spatial distortion making the shift from signal to noise remarkably sudden. "Guess we gotta find a new station," Maddie says with a shrug. "Any ideas, Regulus? Dial's all yours."

    Madeleine glances over and spots Regulus examining her bandage. "Ooh, ouch," she says, wincing a little in sympathy. "Did you get *shot*? What have you been doing?"

    Then she notices Ozhira vibrating in the rear-view mirror. "Easy, tiger," she implores. "It's almost lunchtime, and by lunch I *don't* mean Regulus. She needs that arm."
Lilian Rook     'And! I mean, hypothetically, I could just skip over to L.A. in the Beauty of Ash and be back in a few hours with a swimsuit.'

    Thirty seconds late, Lilian bolts up and shouts "Okay no hang on, what the fuck are you two talking about?" Finally, Petra is ousted from her roost, though ostensibly by accident. "Are we all speaking English in this car?" is something that demands Lilian be sitting up to huffily demand.

    . . . . . . . .

    But half an hour of driving is half an hour of driving. Surely Petra and Mesmer can't be weird for that entire time. After a while, Lilian starts actually reading her book, and by the end of thirty minutes, has gone about four times further than is realistic, though at no point does anyone see her either skip pages or egregiously speed read. By thirty minutes, also, she has decided that she is bored and hungry enough to jab Petra for something to eat along the way, and simply trusted that the American Girl (false) knows how close they are to a meal stop by familiarity with the entirety of the USA.

    Thirty minutes is also enough to more than get through the thoughtful little lollipop that Matilda offered her. She'd had the patience to just keep it in her mouth while reading for a while, but eventually given up and split it in half, then into quarters (judging by sound) in her mouth, out of idle habit. Her complete disinterest in asking what it was or how it helps (it's candy) leads to her crunching through the last of it, and when finally finished, popping the stick out of her mouth, tossing it to Petra, and saying "Thank you, Bouanich. I must've had low blood sugar, I think. You're very thoughtful."

    However, Matilda's divination is simply taken as a given. So very taken as a given that she doesn't have any input on it at all! She's totally radio silent, on the verge of apathy, about the important thing! She has less to say about it than candy! Instead, she folds up her book again near the mark, replaces her bookmark, stretches her arms above her head, and winces a second time at the stab of pain in her abdomen.

    "I thought you said you had painkillers that work, Petra." says Lilian, already moody it. "God. And right before I have to sit in a car for--" The rest trails off unto unintelligible muttering as she twists her upper body and partially rolls up her top, reaching audibility again at "--better not open back up I swear."

    Staggered out above her belt, three separate patches of vaguely sci-fi gauze-analogue are stuck down amidst purple mottling bruise edges. Lilian clicks her tongue at the sight, narrowing her eyes from the bottom, and double checking for fresh blood with tender little prods with her fingertip. "I could have sworn . . . Well, not that I'm complaining." she murmurs. Fortunately, it looks like all three wounds are far from her kidneys. Actually it kind of looks like those abs of hers must have affected the trajectory of--

    "Does anyone have anything stronger?"
Ozhira     When Mesmer Jr. responds to their presence with even more hostility, Ozhira's head tilts with an anomalous clicking sound. They don't press the issue, either way. They aren't here to hunt humans (yet). In previous excursions with Maddie, the Devourer has largely acted as a combination of muscle and front-line scout, given how stealthy they can be.

    For the remainder of the hour, the creature is silent and stock-still, eyes closed, only wobbling slightly with the jostling of the road.

    And then *someone* exposes a freshly closed wound. Even if Lilian isn't actively bleeding from her injuries--

    The vague, whispering voices that make up their mind all start chattering more excitedly and, for those who might be paying psychic attention, the song of Ozhira's thoughts gains the undertone of a great beast stirring in its slumber.

SCENT?
    There.    Blood.
MEAT?
    There!    Blood!
HUNGRY.

    They are visibly restraining themselves, hands clutched into fists on their lap. Their entire form shakes almost-normally, there's just a bit more gelatinous wobble than a human body should have. Eyes open, they stare down at their human-shape knees, jaw slightly slack, pupils shrunk to tiny points.

We can't. We can't. We can't.
HUNGRY.
No no no no no

    "Can we-- stop, soon?" Ozhira finally asks, "We-- must hunt. Quickly. Quickly."
Foundation Scions 'What?'

    "Excuse me? I simply stated a well-known fact. The beach is hardly the only location Americans tend to find cause to swim. That's it, that's all." There's basically no plausible deniability left in Mesmer about literally anything.

'Oh, awesome. And me with all my newfound experience drowning people in them.'

    "If you've decided firmly that you'll be drowning people, notify me beforehand. I'm attached to this mission in the case of medical emergencies, nothing more- drowning is a medical emergency." Mesmer can't not sound horribly dismissive of everything- it's intentional, but it's SO constant it might as well not be.

    "Excuse me? Please do not be drowning *anyone*, whether on Ms. Mesmer Jr.'s overwatch or not, that is strictly against acceptable reason and regulation! Safe and responsible pool use for exercise, only!"

'Does anyone have anything stronger?'

    Damn. Mesmer might have to do something. "Are you experiencing a medical emergency?" Mesmer Looks, out of the corner of her eye- and seeing any hint of the gauze and injuries turns that Look into wary exasperation. "Excuse me? Did you show up with an untreated abdominal injury? If you herniate or eviscerate in an automobile, I'll-"

    There isn't a threat or precaution to back that up, except that it looks like Mesmer is about to retch. Pulling out a first aid kit she'd tucked under the seat, she starts to inventory bits and bobs in the same motion as selecting out two different glass vials- one of pills, another a sludgy tincture. "Opiate pain relief cocktail, two by mouth with water, more if you're suicidal," Read: half modern opiates, the rest packed with 1920s straight-up opium powder where it would usually include tylenol, "And Dumbitter potion, a paralytic, if we're lucky. Side effects include increasing mental stability, but also blindness. Take it if you're at risk of having your organs spill out, not after, not during."

    Mesmer HATES being the assigned medic.
Regulus ''Maybe you should. While we're in America, I mean. That's just sort of how they do things here.''

"Fair enough, but would you really want someone untrained waving something like that around?"

Silly Regulus, that's also how America does things.

"Oh but dang that's really something you've got there huh." Regulus marvels. "That's an alchemical device isn't it?" She twists around to get a looksee out of academic interest. She quirks her head around from side to side. "Can I check it out sometime? I won't break it, just to see how it's all set up." She's already assumed Lilian will say no but that doesn't exactly stop Regulus from asking anyway.

She moves between stations periodically during the thirty minutes, swapping between rock and jazz. At one point she actually gets Fitzgerald without even aiming for it!

She tentatively rolls up her sleeve to examine her bandaged wound. It doesn't look like it got worse but she quickly rolls her sleeve back up like she doens't want to look at it.

"Sorry, love, doubt I'm packing anything better than what she's got." Regulus admits sadly. The not-having-a-job giveth, the not-having-a-job taketh away...

''The radio fades to static...''

"Oh that's too fast--probably because of monument. I really don't want to operate it while the car is in operation because the radio is usually connected to the car battery. I'll eat lunch while working on it, add a ritual to boost the signal and bam--! It should resist the effects of all the geographical stuff--least for a while."
Petra Soroka "Tell you what, when we have some time with the car parked, I'll take the radio apart and see what I can do."

    "Oh shit." Petra perks up at that. "You too? I've got spare parts that should do it."

"Well a couple of Foundation agents boarded my vessel but I got the drop on 'em and I tied 'em up and made them listen to my radio broadcast."

    Petra snickers, in a positive way this time. "You kidnapped government agents and made them listen to your *mixtape*? Sick. Damn, maybe that's what's next for the Letter Agency goons."

"I mean, venue is important right? At least it is to me. Nothing like a live concert, vinyl second best--"

    "Yeah, some guy named Walter Benjamin I think wrote about that. Er, definitely after your time? Not that you seem like you read anyways. He called it 'aura', the kind of cultural prestige that comes from art not being easily replicable, making its position in space as relevant to the consumption of the art as the actual thing itself. Like the collective social, uh, whatever, while at a live concert."

    Petra tilts her head, fiddling with the pendant around her neck. "... But I don't know, whether it's better or worse. When I have infinite music, I listen to it less. But, like, most of the time I just sleep out in the woods, so I have to pre-download whatever I want, and I feel like rationing it makes me like it more. If I just have a few songs to listen to on any given day, then I have to, like, draw from myself in order to keep engaging with it, rather than just sitting there while it autoplays. And that means I end up meditating to it, or practicing playing guitar, or something like that."

"Hm? You looked into it?"

    Petra's confusion only lasts for a few seconds, before a stab of nausea-inducing unpleasantness at understanding Lilian's own misunderstanding hits her. She stiffens up, voice soft and dispirited. "Nevermind."

"Putting a name and face on something so you remember to treat it more kindly . . . If people did that more often . . ."

    She can't be unhappy for long, though! She's getting praised! Or, almost praised, at least. "Yeah, right? People can usually barely manage that for themselves." Smug mean-girl humu-ing later, "Curupira's back at the castle. I've been thinking of moving him into the apartments so that all the agents-- former agents-- can be around him, basically just like before. Well, except, you know, Cinder was the one besides me who'd take care of him. Now Heyalexa does... maybe I could teach Love."

"Most likely?"

    When Lilian turns to look past Petra towards Matilda on her other side, Petra squiggles her way downwards a bit, simultaneously clearing up Lilian's field of vision towards Matilda, and further enacting her Manifest Destiny of snuggling Lilian in the back of a van.

"Are we all speaking English in this car?"

    But not for long! The absence of Lilian-touch makes Petra's left side feel desolately cold, and pouty even though she wasn't really *thrown* off. "Wonhasindamyeon, yeong-eoleul sayonghaji anh-ado doebnida."

    Hands on her knees, Petra is forced to engage a short, and yet unbearably long, cooldown before she can return to her perch. "Los Angeles ga yuilhage gwaenchanh-eun suyeongbog-eul guhal su issneun gos-il geolago saeng-gaghaess-eo."
Petra Soroka . . .

    When asked how far out the next food stop is, Petra is forced to lean forwards and talk to Mesmer as if she doesn't want to throttle her to death and toss her body out onto the road for the vultures. "The window next to you. Can you open it? For a sec?" Petra needs to get a ratbot out the door so she can scout the surroundings for a food stop. (She will also attempt to check the GPS on her phone using the Silver.)

    Of course, unfailingly prepared, Petra has plenty of snacks for Lilian before even considering relying on the wretched American infrastructure. She pulls a cooler out of her mirror and pops it open, handing over chilled fruit, some sweet Japanese crackers, and a sandwich made by Cecilia if she's really hungry.

"I thought you said you had painkillers that work, Petra."

    "Aoaughugh," Petra makes a noise of distress that somehow has every syllable and none at the same time, and starts getting antsy in her middle-back seat. "I'm sorry. I didn't know how bad it was, sorry. I probably have something better? I'll look when I can-- can we stop the car?"

"Opiate pain relief cocktail, two by mouth with water, more if you're suicidal,"

    "What? Don't give her *opiates*." Petra's insistence is fully and completely because it's Mesmer. Her best thought for what she might have as backup is morphine, but, if Lilian gets addicted, and it's Mesmer that gives it to her, then that's basically like Lilian getting addicted to Mesmer! And maybe actually if Petra thinks about it, Mesmer won't know about how Lilian's metabolism works faster because of stopping time, so Lilian can't possibly go back to ask her for more, so if she *does* get addicted to opiates, then it's actually only *Petra* who could keep facilitating that, so,

    "Well," Petra's objections abruptly die off, and it's unclear why.
Lilian Rook     'Are you experiencing a medical emergency?'

    "What? No. It's just a few gunshots. Don't make it weird."

    Lilian can say that, and it can certainly sound totally automatic, because it is, and she can even mean it, because her scale of serious injury has become totally divorced from how it was the very first time she got shot (with a bulleproof vest on too!) six years ago, but it's still not Mesmer making it weird. Lilian hastily shoving her shirt back down to cover up her abs is making it weird.

    'Excuse me? Did you show up with an untreated abdominal injury? If you herniate or eviscerate in an automobile, I'll-'

    "It's already been treated you anal retentive mouth-breather." Lilian hisses. "And I got it out there, fighting Manus Vindictae. So you could try showing a little respect, ward jockey." If anything, she may be more offended by Mesmer's nauseated expression than her tone. When she starts rummaging through a medical kit, the first words out of Lilian's mouth are spoken in confused and visceral haste: "Don't fucking touch me."

    Even if she's scowling about it though, Lilian is still going to take the offered meds, even if she insists on removing them from Mesmer's hand in a way that is obviously trying not to even touch her gloves. Rather, she'll hand the potion off to Petra and swallow the pills herself. People giving her things is just normal. Anything someone hands her is a gift she rightfully earned by being divinity made flesh.

    'You kidnapped government agents and made them listen to your *mixtape*? Sick. Damn, maybe that's what's next for the Letter Agency goons.'

    "At least you two get along just fine." Lilian sighs, holding out her hand for the water bottle again, so she can consume opoum. She is fully treating Petra like a surgeon's assistant here.

    'Curupira's back at the castle. I've been thinking of moving him into the apartments so that all the agents-- former agents-- can be around him, basically just like before. Well, except, you know, Cinder was the one besides me who'd take care of him. Now Heyalexa does... maybe I could teach Love.'

    "You know, I saw that butterfly again." Lilian begins, non-sequitur at first. "On board Sapient Heuristics, I mean. The one that Kirenai was so upset about, because it broke out of its cocoon because of one warm day, just in time to die in the cold snap forecasted for tomorrow." She sounds as if she can't decide how to feel about that, even though her tone is conversationally positive. "That bothered me so much at the time that I went all the way to Kagoshima to track that specific butterfly down and take it somewhere it'd be appreciated. Now it's immortal, because of Persephone. And all the children love it. It lives in the arboretum now."

    "It's funny to think about. That butterfly was destined to die for no reason, through no fault of its own, but for no other reason than I happened to take note of it, it's beloved by all these different people who take care of it now." Lilian stares out the window, then shakes her head lightly. "Curupira makes me think of that sometimes. And I suppose now Norton is in a sort of similar situation. In a way, I think those three things represent what an Elite is supposed to be; far more than any of the things they usually fight for."

    'Los Angeles ga yuilhage gwaenchanh-eun suyeongbog-eul guhal su issneun gos-il geolago saeng-gaghaess-eo.'

    "May I slap you for being a smart-ass?" Lilian says, abruptly slapping Petra anyways. Not as hard as she could, because that'd break her jaw, but hard enough to leave a red mark. Nothing about this prevents Petra from returning to her shoulder.
Lilian Rook     'Oh but dang that's really something you've got there huh.'

    Lilian glances down, then to the other side of her hip. "Winter Crow?" she says, as if Regulus would automatically know. "Of course it is. I commissioned it from Nell Goldstein. You wouldn't know her, but she's rather famous in her field." Lilian says, pivoting to obnoxious namedropping. "Of course, the design is half-mine. She doesn't know much about alchemy, but she's a genius gunsmith, and not just in the narrow field of the mundane sciences." By the sounds of it though, she does actually rather like Nell as a person. Even though they met three times in total.

    'Can I check it out sometime? I won't break it, just to see how it's all set up.'

    "You don't have the muscles to break it, Beatles girl." Lilian sighs, creating a whole different affect by doing it while unholstering her fucking gun. The way she flicks the action is frankly terrifying, but seeing as it's just to stylishly eject the striated rod of metal amalgam ammunition and catch it mid-air, it's technically safer that she did!

    With the weird middle-axis split still open, and the partial hinge action broken open, she hands what amounts to an artisinal piece of black and metallic-shades gun gore over to Regulus. The insides look like nested revolver cylinders of partial arrays, surrounding a rough-hewn crystalline core. "Don't get crumbs inside it or I'll kill you, and I'll make it hurt." Lilian says, twirling the world's most technically lethal rod of inert metals between her fingers like she's doing stage magic with a coin. At rest, her fidgety dexterity tricks are as common as they are slightly insane.

    'Sorry, love, doubt I'm packing anything better than what she's got.'

    Lilian blinks, then hastily tosses Petra the ammo as well.

    After just downing a double dose of opium from Mesmer; the third medicinal item she's had handed to her and consumed on faith today.
Regulus ''You too? I've got spare parts that should do it.''

Regulus is a little particular about who works on her stuff but this is Madeleine's stuff so she has no objection at all to this. Plus, Petra's a bit rough but RRegulus likes having someone to talk about radio and music and machines with. It's nice, even if maybe she's also a supervillain who just got slapped by Lilian Rook?? Is that normal? Petra just returned to her shoulder afterwards so it's normal?

She eases back after that surprising shock. "Heh, yeah, it was pretty sick--" She agrees before remembering both Matilda, Mesmer AND Lilian are in the car but she can't really roll it back so she just sort of gets her cheeks pinkening a little as a result.

But she is curious about Petra's own rationale. "You know that's a real good point." She says of rationing music to make it more likeable. Regulus is leery of limiting music in any way but she's gotten the feeling that she's now in a multiverse where music is far less restrained than even in her time. It's one thing to appreciate venue and distribution method of course but is there such a thing as having too much cake?

"I'll have to ponder on that for a while." She eventually admits. "Maybe experiment, feel what works best for me. Even in one world, you could never listen to everything, but in a multiverse any selection... Woof."

But she's invariably drawn to the question of the butterfly. She listens to the story. She doesn't know any of the names, really, but something speaks to her about the tale all the same.

"Love." She marvels. "Making that butterfly live longer. That's an incredible thing. REally makes the world go 'round and keeps you going too."

''Obnoxious namesdropping.''

"Wow...! Nell Goldstein1" Regulus doesn't know who it is but the name sounds like a cool alchemist name. It even has ''gold'' in it.

''You don't have the muscles to break it, Beatles girl.''

"Oh that's good, then I wouldn't have to worry about doing so accidentally." Regulus takes this in stride, of course. Regulus, knowing very little about guns, but her shoulders tense anyway.

''GUN GORE''

Regulus carefully takes the gun gore and opens her mouth--

''Don't get crumbs inside of it or I'll kill you, and I'll make it hurt.''

"That's twice, a third makes a song." Regulus murmurs. "Oh but don't worry, I'll be very careful!" She is pretty sure Lilian can both kill her and make it hurt and she is already determined to make Lilian have a fun adventure that she's happy about because she ended up promising that to Petra who will also kill her and make it hurt if she fails in the promise so she's got a lot riding on this! Getting crumbs in Winter Crow would be going against her objective of the adventure.

"Why do you call it Winter Crow?" She wonders. "They're usually off looking for food around then right?"

She takes a long look at it, murmuring soundlessly as she examines it--she's going to be busy with that until they stop before carefully handing it back to Lilian. You know. In case she needs that gun to save geography.
Petra Soroka "At least you two get along just fine."

    Petra is being requested to give Lilian water so that she can take unmarked opioids from Mesmer. Time slows down as she's given an interaction prompt with two options, one that is blue and sparkly and one that's red and surrounded by fire. Then time literally slows down, as in her panic, she reaches for the psychic mimicry of Angela's TimeTrack, and frantically flips through webpages at 100x speed using the Silver to scroll through her phone. Two entire seconds of indecisiveness later, while her phone's search history piles up with searches for whether side effects of combinations of drugs are lethal, Petra reaches for a water bottle as directed, and instead comes up with a bottle of fruity sake.

    With Lilian not looking at her, and evidently being *so* willing to just accept drugs that *Mesmer* gives her, Petra sweatily holds it out to her in place of the water. Lilian will probably just drink it and not notice until after, and then she can explain that it'll help with the pain too.

"May I slap you for being a smart-ass?"

    "Ow-! Sorry. Yes ma'am. I shouldn't have been a smart-ass." Petra yelps and winces, holding her hand to the red mark. Then she caaaasually just leans down against Lilian anyways and returns to cuddling position.

    When she does, after indulging in the warmth and scent of being around Lilian for a little bit to reset her mood, she returns back to the topic of pets. "... Yeah. I don't think I've ever thought about it in those words, but, that's sort of how I view Elite things too. If I take care of the things and people close to me, then I can guarantee that they're taken care of well, and that people I like and know deserve it are better off. We can't be, like, perfect utilitarian weapons or whatever."

    She gently pats a finger on Norton's leaves, as the pot slowly sinks down to settle on the shared lap-space between Petra and Lilian. "I guess Hydrochoeria's kind of symbolic of that for me, and Trideag is like that for you, right?"