Topic: Hidden In Plain Sight

Bailey Raptis · Date: 2015-08-24 20:34 EST

Every morning that I wake up in my own bed feels like a miracle now. Not because I had gotten used to drinking too much -- or taking too much ecstasy -- and falling asleep in strangers? beds. That was never my style, contrary to the rumors among my fellow fashion models. Nor is it because I thought I would die young. So few of us seem to reach old age (Fletcher notwithstanding), but I had always held a weird optimism since I fell into the modeling business that I had escaped the cycle. I was not going to die young, nor was I going to be Taken again, now that I was more publicly known -- and publicly seen -- as Robin Pasque, female fashion model who sometimes wore men?s clothing. There was no need to correct them, no need to tell them it was the other way around, no need to tell them who I really was. The confusion kept me hidden even as I led something of a public life, until I left the city to search for my ?brother.?

But I just had to return to the city. I just had to find him, even though I have not actually seen him since the fleeting glimpse I caught during the Marketplace bombings nearly 8 years ago. I just had to take the money Locke D?Vestavio offered me, more money than I had even seen in my best modeling days. I just had to listen to his advice that my ?brother? might actually be back in the city again. I just had to join this growing company, with its extremely visible creative director, instead of staying with my small dress shop in S?o Almador. I just had to reclaim my identity as Bailey Raptis, instead of Robin Pasque. I just had to decide that participating in the very public dueling venues was the best way to sharpen my rusty sword skills. I just had to fill in for Mason when he injured himself practicing for a magic duel, revealing to everyone in the community that I can use magic. I just had to step back into a magic ring again, confirming those abilities.

Every morning that I wake up in my own bed feels like a miracle now. Because each and every day I am not Taken back to Arcadia is a miracle.

Bailey Raptis · Date: 2015-10-12 20:19 EST

October 11/12, 2015

By the time I left Purgatory Sunday night, I was not sure whether it was still Sunday anymore, or if I was now encroaching on the early Monday morning hours. I had stayed in the club far longer than I should have, given the fact that I had to be at work at 8 a.m. sharp. Even though our stores are closed on Mondays, the start of the week ends up being our busiest day, as the store managers present sales figures and the designers their newest creations. It is typically a night where I stay in, or where I make certain to return home from my evening plans before...well, before I have lost track of what day it might be.

Yet here I was tonight, shivering as I walked home in the dark, unsure if the calendar pages had flipped over or not. My clubbing outfit -- a white nepped v-neck tee with navy stripes from chest to stomach, resin washed dark blue jeans, and all-black low-top sneakers -- had been fine while I was rolling in a club packed with bodies. It was less ideal for the fine mist dampening my clothes, threatening to erupt into full-blown rain, or the cold, thick fog rolling in off the water. I picked up the pace, scurrying through the sleeping neighborhoods, my footsteps all too often the only sound echoing on otherwise empty and silent streets.

It had been a disappointing night. I wanted to lose myself in the beat, the E, the warmth of my blood pumping through my heart and the bass throbbing in time with my body. Instead, the DJ they brought in tonight played nothing but glass-shaking, earth-quaking, subwoofer-destroying hip-hop. It pounded me in waves, trying to break me down, but I stubbornly clung to the hope that his set would come to a close, and a DJ spinning house would take over. However, when the first DJ?s set ended, and they brought up another person playing more rap, I decided to cut my losses and head home, a spark that never ignited.

By the time I got back to the WestEnd street my apartment was on, I was more or less running, hoping to beat the downpour that threatened to soak me to my skin at any moment. Perhaps it was the haste in which I had been moving, perhaps it was the faulty security light that flickered off and on far too much to have any efficacy, or perhaps it was the fading effects of the drugs, but I did not see the two people standing in front of my apartment building doorway until I had already jogged up the concrete steps onto the small landing. I nearly stumbled into them as I came up, staggering backwards with an apologetic look on my face.

?Sorry! I am sorry!? I turned my gaze up from the ripped jeans they both wore, at their upper bodies and faces. The man on the left was a full head taller than me, and wore a black leather jacket with safety pins lining the shoulders. His bronzed skin, particularly on his shaved head, seemed to catch the sporadic light from the glimmering lamp and radiate it back towards me. The thick scar that extended from the left corner of his lip to under his nose gave his sneer extra menace. The teen on the right was shorter, but still a half-head taller than me, and the neon blue mohawk he wore spiked up nearly as tall as his companion?s height. He wore an acid-washed denim jacket, the chest of which was covered with a variety of buttons. Some of them were simple anti-authority logos, like a red ?Anarchy? symbol and a black upside-down cross on a white background. Others were the emblems of local music groups: an oak leaf dripping blood from the stalk, a red dragon rearing up over white-capped mountains. But one of them, worn directly over his heart, was an outlier. It featured a long iron spear through a silver crown, imposed over a green background. My eyes lingered on it for a beat, then snapped back up to its owner. He was snarling as well, his forked tongue slithering between his lips and back into his mouth intermittently. I quickly looked to his left, only to see the nail-studded baseball bat he had slung over his shoulder.

?Excuse me, gentlemen?? I asked in a quiet voice. I nodded at the door, then walked toward it, only to find the bronze man sliding over to block my path. He extended an arm outwards, pressing the palm of his hand into my chest.

?We need ta talk, Bailey Raptis,? the mohawked teen said, hissing the last syllable. My eyes went wide for a second, before I composed myself.

?It cannot wait until morning?? I took a step back, away from the outstretched hand, my own hovering near the dagger sheath on my hip. The teen responded by pointing his baseball bat at me, and his friend lifted up the corner of his jacket, revealing a holster.

?No,? the bronze man replied in a gruff tone, pulling his jacket back down. The baseball bat followed suit soon after. ?It can?t.?

?All right. Why not start by telling me how you know my name, since I have never seen you.? I leaned off to the side, against the cool, damp metal of the mailboxes.

?Everyone at the Courts knows the story of the Raptis Family. It?s a, uh...cautionary tale.?

?Yes, well, I am still here, and I am not exactly interested in relieving painful memories. Now, if you will excuse me?? I slid out of my lean and tried to slip past the two again, but a baseball bat quickly jutted into my path. I inched backwards, settling against the top of the rusting railing around the landing.

?You?ll excuse us if we don?t stop with that. See, you?ve been back in RhyDin for almost two years now, and we?ve yet to see you at the Courts.?

?Yeah!? the snake-tongued punk interjected, earning him a stern look from his partner. Ah, the leader, I thought, sneaking a glance at the bald man.

?As I was saying...we?ve not yet seen you in the Courts, and before that, no one knows where you were.?

I scrunched up my nose, and then answered. ?Not that it is any of your business, but I was in S?o Amador, looking for my ?brother.??

?And before that?? He either did not notice, or ignored, the emphasis I placed on the word ?brother.? I smirked. Good. These assholes do not need to know about that.

?Before that? I was hiding in plain sight.?

?Well, we couldn?t find you.?

?Perhaps you were not looking hard enough.? Mohawk lifted the bat up and growled, but the leader held up a hand, and he lowered the weapon with a chuff. After adjusting the cuffs of his leather jacket, he turned his attention back to me.

?Whatever. See, here?s what we think. The Raptis family gets wiped out. Except, of course, for you.? He pointed at me, and his finger held the weight of accusation. ?They bring you back, brainwash you, drop you back in RhyDin or S?o Amador or wherever the fuck, and let you go back to your life. But there?s a spell in your brain, a trigger-? He tapped at his temple, rapid fire, as he continued. ?-where They turn you against us. Turn you against the Courts. See-?

?Let me stop you right there,? I interrupted, ending my lean to stand up as straight and tall as I could. ?I would never turn traitor.?

?So why did you go to the Fae Baroness? Dockside Daggers-?

?Because I stumbled upon it while-?

?And her Fight Like a Squire event??

I paused. I was not even 100% sure why I had attended. ?I do not have to explain myself to you. Or the Courts. Since when did they become so high and mighty, sending babacas to my apartment to harass and threaten me??

?Since the Raptis incident. Since the city grew more and more tolerant of the Fair Folk?s influence. Since Little Elfhame. Since a Fae took a barony and started calling herself Empress. The days of going Courtless are over, Bailey. You?re either with us, or against us.?

I narrowed my eyes, studying the pair of them intently. Then, I leaned back and laughed as loud as I could. ? ?You?re either with us, or against us? ?? I parroted back to him, matching the roughness of his voice. ?That is what you are going with? A cliche? Either try to kill me, or let me go inside, but please, quit wasting my time. I am bored of you, and I would like to get inside before it begins raining.? I folded my arms and slouched.

The bronze man turned fractionally toward the teen, and nodded slowly, almost imperceptibly. Before I could follow his gaze, the punk struck like a viper, cracking the bat against the side of my head. I stumbled back into the railing and bounced forward, falling to my hands and knees. I smelled iron in the air, felt the blood drip down my temple and cheek, saw stars in my eyes. With the ringing in my ears, I couldn?t hear them as they stepped closer to me, bending down to look me over. I blinked, saw the bat cocked back, then a leather-clad sleeve imposed itself between me and the weapon. I shut my eyes, and felt cold, metallic fingers on my chin lifting it.

?We?re not here to kill you, and we?re going to let you go back home. But first-? He pinched my cheeks between his fingers, pulling my head up even further. ?-you?re going to promise to do something for us. To prove your loyalty. Or the next time you see me, it will be with a gun barrel against your head.?

?Wh-what?? I croaked, shaking my head vigorously to try and clear my blurred vision.

?You?re going to kill Jewell Ravenlock.?

Bailey Raptis · Date: 2015-11-08 20:05 EST

November 8, 2015

In the aftermath of the incident outside of my apartment building (and Purgatory?s unfortunate shift to hip-hop Sundays), I decided that for now, it was a good idea to keep my evening outings closer to WestEnd. The less time I spent venturing out of the scrying ?dead zone,? the safer I would be from those who wanted to threaten me. They might know where I lived and where I worked, but I had wards on my apartment for the former and there was a guard at the Highlife Haberdashery building. At the least, he could buy me enough time to make my escape. As counterintuitive as it may sound, I was at my most vulnerable in my spare time outside of those two spaces, when I cannot control who I see -- or who sees me.

Still, I have my needs, and I also had a hole in my Sunday night schedule that Purgatory could no longer fill. During one of my evening runs shortly after I was attacked (training that Eva suggested I get involved with), I discovered a beer garden and hall about four or five blocks away from my flat, just outside of the WestEnd. It was located in a sleepy, mostly residential neighborhood, across the road from a pair of three-story mixed-use brownstone buildings and a fish market. The garden and hall took up the entire block of the side of the street it was on, with most of that space dedicated to the patio itself. A tall stone wall, interrupted only by a taller wooden gate, fenced off the garden from the public. Right next door was a small tavern room, wedged between the garden and a squat two-story white brick building with large front-facing windows, steel and copper railings that lead up gray granite steps, and a pair of white Tuscan columns over a pair of double doors painted brown. On the archway above the doors that connected the columns, someone had placed two words in brass-colored letters that I had never seen before: ČESK? DOMOV. I was curious, so I dropped out of my jog, ducked my head inside, and asked them what it meant.

I found out the whole complex was owned by a group of Czech and Slovak immigrants to RhyDin, who wanted a taste of their old country in their new home. The beer garden and tavern (and, to a lesser extent, rentals of their meeting hall) raised money for them to maintain as much of their culture as they could here. It allowed them to offer language courses at reduced cost, maintain a library of Czech and Slovak materials, host lectures and plays, and provide support for newly arrived migrants who shared their language and ethnicity. I found their cause quite noble, and I enjoyed their pilsner-style beer much more than most beers I had drank in the past. Plus, I was not familiar with either of those languages, and I found them quite interesting. Therefore, I resolved to make this so-called Česk? Domov my home away from home on Sunday evenings.

So it was that I found myself pushing the tavern doors open and approaching the nearly empty bar this past Sunday night. The Samhain celebrations yesterday must be thinning out the crowds today. I nodded to the only other person seated at the bar, a rotund, dark-haired gentleman in a black suit lifting a large mug of some brown ale. As I sat, I smiled at the bartender, a skinny middle-aged man with thinning brown hair, steel-rimmed rectangular glasses, and a moustache. He smiled back, and immediately hustled to the taps to pour me a drink.

?Dobr? den, Jakub.?

?Nazdar, Bailey,? he said, setting a paper coaster down on the bar, followed by a beer. ?It is less formal.? He spoke Common with just a hint of an accent, one I probably would have missed if I had not traveled as much as I have -- or spent as much time learning different languages.

?Pardon, pardon.? I picked up my drink, held it aloft, and tested out a new phrase. ?Na zdrav?!? The man in the suit leaned over and clinked his glass against mine, and Jakub grinned.

?Very good! You learn quickly.?

?Děkuji,? I said, chuckling. ?But it is not that impressive. I only know a handful of phrases.?

?Yes, but you have perfect pronunciation of what I already taught you.? Jakub paused to refill the other patron?s mug, then continued. ?You are so much farther on than I was when I started speaking Common. I still have an accent.?

?Nonsense, Jakub. If I have learned Czech faster than you learned Common, it is only because I have a gift for languages. It is no fault of your own. You have done perfectly well.?

?Thank you. Still, you will humor me and practice Common with me today??

I took a sip of my pilsner and laughed lightly. ?Of course, of course. I do not think you need the practice, but I am happy to help.?

?Oh!? Jakub held up a finger, and darted through a door behind the bar that led back into the kitchen and, presumably, the tavern?s office. After a few moments, he re-emerged, bearing a letter. ?Somebody stopped by yesterday with this. They said to give it to you when I saw you next, ano??

I took the white envelope from him and glanced at it. There was nothing written on either side of it, but the letter was sealed with red wax. When I scrutinized the seal, I instantly recognized it. A spear through a crown. I broke the wax, opened the envelope, and pulled out a small slip of paper. The note was brief, the handwriting crude and messy, but the message was clear as day to me:

Bailey,

Nice job joining the Empress? dueling team. You know what to do next.

C. & V.

I folded it back up and slid it into the envelope. ?Who gave this to you??

?Two men. One bald and with a tan, like he spent too much time in the sun. The other with hair-? Jakub paused to make a stacking gesture over his head. ?-and green.?

I stuffed the note into my pocket, frowning. Another sip of beer could not wash it away. ?You only saw those two men??

?Ano. These men are giving you trouble?? Jakub furrowed his brow, then shot a look over at the other gentleman at the bar.

?No, no trouble-?

?-Because if they are giving you trouble?? He tipped his chin towards the gentleman nursing his drink, who responded with a single, slow nod of his head.

?No, no, no. No need for anything like that. There is something that you can do for me, though.?

?Of course, of course.?

?Let me know when they come in? You can wait until I come back to tell me, or if you feel it cannot wait, send me a notice here.? I reached into my pocket and handed over one of my L.D. 50 business cards. His eyes flicked over it briefly before he put it away. ?And if anyone else comes in asking for me??

?I will tell you about them too.?

?Good.? I drained my glass quickly and hopped off of my stool. I set some silvers down and sent Jakub an apologetic smile. ?I apologize for leaving early, but business calls.?

?Ahoj, Bailey. Be safe out there, yeah?? I held up a hand to acknowledge him, before pushing the door open and slipping outside. As soon as I hit the streets, I grabbed my coat tightly around my shoulders and shivered. I was not shivering because of the weather; cool, yes, but not chilly enough to freeze me. No, something else caused my blood to run cold in my veins.

They were watching me. They were spying on me.

Bailey Raptis · Date: 2015-12-03 17:52 EST

Have I ever mentioned how much I hate preparing for suicide missions? I suppose not. It is not something that comes up in casual conversation, especially if I can help it. I do know that I have been even quieter than usual around my friends and teammates, but I do not think they know what I am planning. The only ones who know are C., V., and whoever it is who is in charge of the Court these days.

But that is neither here nor there. I will repeat: have I ever mentioned how much I hate preparing for suicide missions? Emphasis on the ?s?, there. If he was here, Lyeorn would lecture me on the oxymoronic nature of the usage of ?suicide missions;? if a mission were a true suicide mission, he would say, there would be only one. If you are following it through to the letter of the definition, it would end with your final, irrevocable demise. But Lyeorn is not here anymore and, against all odds, I still am. I am still alive and apparently, still flinging myself headlong towards death.

***

My first suicide mission came after I lost my family. It becomes a lot simpler to brace yourself for dying when the most important things in your world have been ripped away from you. I had no friends, no family, no lover. All I had left were a handful of Stolen One acquaintances who were too terrified to be seen with me, lest what happened to my family might also befall them, and two clues from the scene of the crime. An obsidian handled kukri coated in blood, and Fletcher?s last words to me. ?The Snake,? he had croaked to me with his dying breath, and I took that evidence, along with my limited detective skills, as far as I could.

Us Stolen Ones spoke of the Snake in nearly the same hushed, fearful tones as we did the Fae. None of us knew much about him, save for his nickname and the fact that he controlled a small number of ?collaborators.? Quislings. Traitors. We knew he worked for Them, returning those of us who had managed to escape back into Their clutches. We never had a firm count of how many had turned against all we held dear; our best estimates were somewhere between a dozen and 18. Numbers did not matter, though, when you could turn to the Fair Folk to flex your muscle when needed. No one quite knew what the collaborators got out of their arrangement with the Fae, or why They chose to work with them instead of kill or capture them. All we knew was that there were betrayers in our midst, who thought nothing of sacrificing others to Them. They had thought nothing of sacrificing my family, and they had to pay for that. Even if it meant running the risk of encountering Them.

I will not waste time, nor will I be prurient in describing what I did to seek out those who worked with the Snake, but I will say this: I managed to track down those associates of his who sold my family out, and I made them pay for their transgressions. I made them pay in blood. I had hoped to find a clue on who he was, precisely, but they were...stubborn. I was running out of leads, and the only options that seemed available to me were loud, noisy, desperate, and almost certain to put a target on my back for the Snake and the Fae to aim at.

And then I was tossed a curveball. Or perhaps the correct term is a lifeline? I was on my way to meet with someone I suspected to be a collaborator, glamoured up and dressed in a girl?s school uniform (All I will say on this matter was the man had very...singular taste). Even with a blue blazer on over my white blouse, and even with black tights, I was freezing cold. The city was caught in winter?s teeth, and each gust of wind felt like its jaws trying to shake us to death. I barely even noticed her as I hurried past, pulling that blazer close to my body as I walked past. The belted red trench caught my attention for just a split-second, and then my mind moved on to my quarry, waiting for me at the bar.

?Ma?am?? The word, quick and choppy and soprano, fell on my back, the echo of it receding with each of my footsteps. Then, it was joined by another word, even faster and louder and with a tinge of urgency. ?...Sir?? I stopped, turned around, and saw the woman I had just passed. She was mostly hidden in that coat and a red/black/gray/white checked scarf wrapped around the bottom half of her face and throat, but I could see she was slim and slightly shorter than me, with green eyes and shoulder-length straight red hair.

?Yes?? Even as I replied, I glanced over my shoulder, in the direction of my destination. She must have noticed, because she got right to the point, still speaking fast, her hands cutting rapid gestures into the air.

?I?m Philippa Johnston from RhyDin Model Management. I?m a talent recruiter. I find models for most of the houses on Benson Boulevard.?

?Houses??

?Fashion houses. Haute couture.? She shook her head quickly. ?Never mind that. I know you?re in a hurry. As it turns out, we are too. We?re looking for models for Fashion Week, and you?ve got a unique look that?s caught my eye. However, the Remmington Collection is doing a casting call early tomorrow morning. I need to know, right now, if you?re interested or not. If you are, we?ll get you signed up and send you out there. If not, I?ll let you go meet your john.?

?I am...I am not a prostitute,? I protested in a quiet voice.

?Sure you aren?t. Look, this is your chance to get off the streets, make something of yourself. You can reinvent yourself: new name, new life, new story. You can get away from whatever drove you to-? She finished by gesturing at my clothes. ?Give it a shot. If, after this casting call is done, you want to go back to this life, I won?t stop you. But I think you?ll find the life we?re offering is a lot more comfortable, a lot more lucrative, and a lot safer than walking the streets. So, what do you say??

I leaned around her and looked down the road, where the bar and the possible collaborator were waiting. I leaned back and faced her directly, giving her a quick once over. I then sighed, turned in the opposite direction, and started walking.

?Wait-?

?Buy me a drink at El Lim?n,? I said, slowing down so that she could catch up with me, ?and I will give you my answer once I am finished.? I pointed down the road, at a brightly yellow colored cantina about a block away. She nodded, and followed me without a word.

***

That is how I became a model. That is how my first suicide mission ended, incomplete, with neither my death nor my revenge to show for it.

Bailey Raptis · Date: 2015-12-12 15:00 EST

December 2015

It was almost time for me to die, and I could not help but think my sacrifice would be greater this time than my last ?suicide mission.? During my last brush with death, I had already lost so much going into it. My family, my friends, the safety of my home, the support of most of our community of Stolen Ones. I was a dead man walking, and they feared landing in the crosshairs of the Snake and the Fae. I did not fear death, though, and that gave me the strength to do what I had to do, until another option was afforded me.

Now, though, I could not see another way out. Either I killed the unkillable, which was virtually guaranteed to end in my demise, or I caught a bullet from C. and V. So faced with that fate, I began my preparations.

I sold everything but the bare minimum necessary to pretend to go about my day-to-day business. I went to pawn shops, consignment stores, antique markets, and any place I could find that would buy what I had to offer -- mostly clothing, but also some jewelry, rare books from Lyeorn, and other bric-a-brac. I had the most luck down at Dangerous Duds in Seaside. It was a little strange having a talking raccoon paw over my things -- well, things that used to be mine and now would be theirs -- but she seemed friendly enough and took most of what I had brought in for a fair amount of silvers. I also offloaded a good chunk of my remaining miscellany to Cheeky?s, pretty close to the Old Market district. The buyer there was odd as well, but not as odd as a walking, talking animal. He just never seemed to stop smiling and laughing.

With that task completed, I moved on to the second step in my plan: providing for my friends. I could not completely drain my bank account, lest that draw suspicion on me, but I could at least take out a good chunk of my savings and make sure my friends had a little bit of money to remember me by. I deposited the money I had made by selling off my possessions, and began writing four-figure checks to my closest friends and colleagues: Diane, Micah, Locke, Andressa, Vicki, Eden, Mason. Five thousand silvers a piece -- as much as I could give away without raising suspicions. I did not know how long it would take my friends and colleagues to find out I was dead. Most likely, there would not be a body, and I would be thought of as one of the many the Nexus spirited away from RhyDin. Leaving money behind would make it seem more likely that I might return, and I wanted to keep everyone that was gunning for my back aimed firmly at me. I did not want the Fae coming for them next -- or for C. and V. to target them.

I handed envelopes addressed to my six friends to six different messengers, giving each one the same task: wait two days to deliver the missive (unopened, of course) and answer no questions that may be asked by the recipients about the message?s contents or the person who tasked them with delivering it. I sealed each envelope with plain red wax, and did not sign the exterior in any way. Only their name was on the outside. Inside, on simple white lined paper, I wrote the same note. I should have personalized the messages more, but I was running out of time. I hope they will forgive me my rudeness, my impersonality.

***

If you are reading this, it is too late for me. For your own protection, I cannot give you more details about what has happened to me, but suffice it to say you will never see me again.

I am glad that I could call you my friend while I was here. Your support has gotten me through these past difficult months, but my destiny finally calls me, and not even the strongest bonds of friendship can keep me from fulfilling it.

I do not know what will be said about me when I am gone, or what information will be disseminated when everything has come to pass. All I ask is that you do not do this one thing when you have heard the news: seek out more information. Do not investigate what happened. Do not try to avenge me. Do not meddle. Mourn me or forget me, but leave what happened alone. There are powers at play far beyond us, and they will not hesitate to crush you as well.

Thank you for your friendship, and for doing this for me.

Farewell,

Bailey Raptis

***

With the letters written and distributed, there remained but one step to set in motion. I wrote a different letter, my hand shaking with each letter I pressed onto the page. It left my handwriting sloppier than usual, but I could still read what I had written. I could only hope the addressee could as well.

***

Empress Baroness Jewell Ravenlock,

I feel that we have gotten off on the wrong foot, and I would like to make amends for any misunderstandings or rifts that may be between us. It has been an honor and a privilege to be a part of the Royal Pains/Royal Rabble team, and I would like to give you a token of my esteem. Might you deign to meet with me at the Royal Rabble Club?

Send word on the time and date, and I shall be there.

Respectfully,

Bailey Raptis

***

With my last letter sent, all that was left was to wait, sharpen my knife, and pray that whatever god or gods were up there might see fit to conjure up a miracle on my behalf. At the very least, I hoped they would ensure that my demise was not too painful, and that my friends were protected. That was likely all I could hope for, and all I deserved.

Eden Parker · Date: 2015-12-17 21:41 EST

?What?s got you so gloomy?? Anita stood beside Eden at the kitchen window, popping her bubble gum while watching the line cook finish off her order.

?Oh, nothing.? Eden sighed, sinking into a lean against the tile wall of the diner.

?The regulars are missing your dimples. It?s a bad time of year for bad tips, sparkles.?

?I?m not supposed to talk about it.? With her dark eyes wide, Eden looked over at Anita.

?Can you--? Anita paused as she pushed a plate back through the window, ?Hey, the ticket says coleslaw, Liel, not potato salad!? Then she looked back at Eden. ?Can you say without saying??

Eden screwed up her face this way and that. ?I guess I can try.? She took a plate of pancakes from the window and carried it down the counter to set in front of a customer before returning to Anita. ?Say you have a friend who, like, sends you some money---like a lot of money---and says they?re going away and you?re never to ask about them or talk about them or think about them ever again. What would you do??

?Is this pretend-friend in trouble?? Anita started loading up her arms with plates, watching Eden more than the food.

Eden huffed and then whined, ?I don?t know!? She picked up a plate of meatloaf and a plate of waffles and then followed Anita to deliver the plates to one of Anita's six-tops before the two women retreated behind the counter again. ?He?s not a trouble sort of person.?

?What sort of person is he?? Anita reached for the fresh pot of coffee.

?A good one!? Eden followed after Anita while the older woman moved down the counter filling up coffee cups. ?He?s always been super solid and nice to me. He lends me clothes and stuff, and he?s a good cheerer when I?m dueling. I guess he can be kind of skittish now and again, but--but he?s my friend!?

?How much money are we talking?? Anita cocked a hip, turning to face Eden.

?A lot of money.? Eden quieted down, not wanting to say such a thing too loud. ?And I could really use it but--?

?But??

?But I?d rather have my friend than the money.?

?Wait a second. This pretend-friend you?re talking about. He?s not that kid who works for that clothes store who was on your dueling team thing?? Anita tipped her head back, looking at the diner?s fluorescent lights a moment. ?Goddess what was his name. Boyd? no, Billy? no--?

?Bailey.? Eden could only whisper his name, as if she were afraid of saying it too loud.

?That?s it. Bailey. Right.? She set the coffee pot back on the burner and bent down behind the counter to the little shelf where she had her purse stowed. ?Because I don?t know how far away he can be when he just won a magic tournament.? Anita pulled out a newspaper and folded it open to the headline. ?Doesn?t look like a kid who doesn?t want anyone to talk or think about them ever again.?

Eden gasped, both hands flying to cover her mouth, her eyes wide. ?But--but--?

Anita smiled and patted Eden?s shoulder. ?Looks like you still got your friend, sparkles.?

Mason · Date: 2015-12-18 18:09 EST

Knock? knock, knock.

Ring, ring.

There was a mumble from beneath the down comforter. ?Fu-ghearlygo? The mumble was followed by a push to Mason?s side before Eva turned over, taking the bulk of the comforter with her. Mason mumbled something in return and shifted towards the warmth of the comforter.

Riiiinnnnngggg!

Bare chested, a pair of pajama bottoms, covered with images of Bumble the abominable snowman, hanging low on his hips and the wild halo of hair might have been comical. But the angry scowl and sheer size of Mason filling the doorway froze the messenger in mid-reach for the doorbell again.

?What?!?? Mason barked out the word at the messenger.

?Mmm-mmm-message for Mmm- mmm?.? The messenger just held up the envelope, showing Mason his name on the envelope.

A small growl, like those of a wild animal whose cause for alarm has disappeared, rumbled out the word, ?Oh.? Mason reached to take the letter from the messenger. One hand dropped to his hip in search of a pocket that wasn?t there. He looked down. Oh. ?Hang on a sec.?

Mason stepped back from the door. A few coppers were on the entryway table. He grabbed those and looked around for something to give the messenger and spotted the mess in the kitchen.

The night before he and Eva decided to sample the bottle of bourbon a client had given to Mason. Why not, they were both off the next day. They could sleep late or thought they could. Half way through the bottle someone (Eva) decided baking would be fun. The morning found their kitchen counter covered by an army of gingerbread men and women. Cookies that were decorated to resemble various members of IFL for some reason.

The messenger peered through the door, unsure if he should wait or flee. He straightened as Mason shuffled back to the door and shoved the three coppers and a stack of gingerbread duelers at him. The young man wasn?t sure if the mumble from Mason was a thank you or a curse as the door closed. He backed away and looked down at the ?tip? in his hands. The messenger pocketed the coppers and took the top cookie from the stack. The red boots bitten off the gingerbread woman with the DCK logo as he walked away from the Harrigan home.

Inside the house Mason went back to the kitchen. He picked up another cookie. Mostly painted black, the yellow and orange flames about the head meant this one was supposed to be Bile. Bile?s leg was gnawed off as Mason trudged back up the stairs.

?Read it again.? Eva frowned, propped up in bed as she listened to Mason read Bailey?s note for the second time. Then she sighed softly. ?He really thought he was never coming back.?

Mason nodded slowly. ?I think he really did.?

?We?re obviously going to give him that check back.? Eva frowned disapprovingly.

?Here.? Mason handed the cookie to Eva before climbing back into bed. ?Take it out on Bile.?

(Co written with Eva's player. Thanks!)

Bailey Raptis · Date: 2015-12-28 21:56 EST

December 29-30, 2015

It was time to spring the trap.

To be perfectly honest with you, there probably was not much of a trap to be sprung, given recent events. After winning the Tower of Water, I decided it was safer for me to make it my permanent residence as opposed to my apartment in WestEnd. If anyone from the Courts was casing my apartment, they probably only saw me go back once or twice, to retrieve my memory box and the bare essentials of my work wardrobe. Otherwise, I could only be found at one of two places: working at L.D. 50 in New Haven, or on Twilight Isle, mostly in the tower. The former had plenty of people around at all times, and the latter was a place of high magic, making it less than appealing to most Stolen Ones. I also bribed the goblins with Hanukkah gelt to keep an eye on the portal in case C. and V. decided to make a visit. Fortunately for me, though, they did not.

Still, I was at a disadvantage, seeing as they had an unknown number of spies that could potentially be keeping track of me, and my own allies were far less numerous and, most likely, far less blindly loyal than the Courts? lapdogs. I also did not want to get my friends involved in Stolen One business, as it would put them one step closer to Fae business. And the last thing that I want for any of my friends is for the Fair Folk to start paying attention to them. Also working against me was the time that had elapsed since C. and V. had...encouraged me to kill Jewell. I had received a letter of support when they thought I had infiltrated her dueling team to get closer to her, but with both of our Iron Fists League teams out of the playoffs and out of action, any continued affiliation with the Royal Pains and Royal Rabble would be a strike, and I have not exactly publicly repudiated them or announced that I would be leaving. My continued dabbling with magic dueling, and my recent successes in that field, were also a strike. We Stolen Ones tend to view magic with suspicion, as little more than a tool of the Fae to be used only when absolutely necessary, and to be otherwise hidden from view. So that was already two strikes against me potentially, and although I do not understand much about the Terran sport of baseball, I am told that three of them take you out of the game. With my back to the wall, and my options limited, I had no choice. I reached out to Jewell again.

If my plan was to have any chance of succeeding, I needed her to stay completely out of the public eye for at least a day, preferably two or more, so that the lie that I was about to tell C. and V. would stand up to initial scrutiny. I sent a note to The Line, where she was currently staying with Kalamere.

***

Jewell,

In order to take care of our mutual problem, I need you to disappear from public for at least two days. If this is not a possibility, then the solution to our problem is going to be a lot noisier, a lot messier, and a lot more likely to end with one or both of us morto. Let me know what you can do.

Bailey

***

I received a response back soon after, while I was trying to look busy at L.D. 50. It was brief, to the point, and included no outward indications of who had written it. Still, given the content of the message, it was immediately clear who had sent it.

Done. Going to Faerie. Promise I won't let them kill me before you do.

I shook my head and frowned as I sneaked out of my office and onto the loading dock, ostensibly to smoke a cigarette. While I did, I burned her letter and began penning another one to C. and V. in my head. By the time I got back to my desk, it was mostly formulated, and I spent the remainder of the day writing it, sealing it in an envelope, and dropping it off at Česk? Domov. I gave Jakub the envelope, with instructions to give it to either of the two men he had mentioned seeing there previously, or anyone who had displayed inordinate interest in me before.

***

C., V.,

The deed is done. I am assuming you want proof, so give me a time and place to meet, and I will bring it to you.

Bailey Raptis

***

When I stopped by the bar the next day, after work, I found my answer waiting in Jakub?s hands. He shook the letter at me before he handed it over.

?I do not like these people, Bailey. They stink of zlo. Promise me you will be careful??

?I will be careful, Jakub. You be careful as well.? I passed him a few silvers for troubling him with my messages, and stepped outside to smoke and read.

***

Bailey,

Tonight, after sunset, Last Chance Saloon, Cadentia. Come alone.

C. & V.

***

I finished my cigarette, lit the note on fire, and took the rest of the day off. I had preparations to make before I flung myself back into the jaws of death again.

((many thanks to Jewell?s player for the text of her note!))

Bailey Raptis · Date: 2016-01-01 23:22 EST

December 30, 2015
Last Chance Saloon, Cadentia

I had to pay the carriage driver twice his usual fee before he would agree to take me this far out of the city this late in the day.

?Do you want me to wait here? Should I come back later, tomorrow morning maybe??

I shook my head as I handed over my payment, along with a generous tip. ?There will be no need. I will make...other arrangements.? Most likely in a casket, I said to myself, though I did not give voice to that thought. He did not seem to be terribly interesting in waiting around anyways, and almost as soon as I told him I did not need him to stay, he hastily jumped back onto the carriage?s bench. I watched him trundle off into the distance, and lamented that he might be the last friendly face I would ever see. And really, he was not all that friendly.

The fading embers of the day stained the western sky in several different hues of orange, red, and purple, while black fought with blue for the lion?s share of its color. It was a fight that blue was slowly and inevitably losing. Overhead, the twin moons of RhyDin had come out. The larger one, Arabrab, hung fat and lazy in the sky, while Trebor tracked a skittish circuit through space. There was not much to see below the horizon this far out in the southern wastes. A mesa or two stood guard to the northwest and northeast, but not even cactus seemed to grow in the brown sands that surrounded the Last Chance Saloon. I heard nothing but the wind kicking through the dunes, and I could not smell anything at all. No sweetness, nothing floral or pungent or musky, not even decay. Only the cigarette I smoked stained the sterile air.

As sand seeped into my sneakers and a cold breeze cut through my leather jacket, I began to regret my wardrobe choices as I approached the tavern. Only now did I remember Lyeorn?s passing comment about deserts: a desert is not a desert because it is hot. It is a desert because it is dry. I pulled the canteen out of the sling on my belt, took a slug of water, and kept going through the cool twilight. I wanted to zip my coat up but I knew I could not -- my cold iron knife resided in one of the inner pockets, and the key to the Tower of Water hung in a chain just over my breastbone, below the black long-sleeved shirt I wore. I needed quick access to both if I wanted a prayer of making it out of here alive. That, and the handled paper bag in my hand, and the contents within.

The Last Chance Saloon only reminded me somewhat of the bars I had seen in the Western movies Boris used to watch. Made out of wood, it had batwing doors and a porch and two floors, and the establishment?s name -- or part of it -- had been painted on the front. The Last Chance Saloon, however, would have given the most rundown taverns I had glimpsed in those Westerns a run for their money for most decrepit. Much of the wood on the porch had vanished -- some of the remaining beams had scorch marks, some had bent nails from failed attempts to pry them free, and some had termites visibly crawling around on them. Chunks of the exterior wall were missing too, with holes that looked to have been punched through by bullets, musket balls, and grapeshot. The batwing doors were half-functional: the one of the left side hung perfectly by its hinges, but the one on the right had been pulled loose on top, rattled with every breath of wind that struck it, and threatened to fly off entirely when a strong gust hit it. I slipped carefully past the working door, and stepped inside.

There was no light -- be it electric or candle or mage -- brightening the interior of the saloon. Only the gaps in the ceiling let the moon?s light in, illuminating the dust now dancing in the air, dust that choked my nostrils and almost made me cough. The floor inside had fared better than the porch, but there were still missing planks and soft spots in the wood, where the effects of time and decomposition could no longer be held off. A piano sat by the entrance, its bench now split in two, the ivory keys long stolen by scavengers. Some of the tables and chairs inside had survived whatever apocalypse had blighted this region, but not all of them. Three-legged chairs lay crooked on the floor, while further damaged ones had formed piles of legs and backs and spindles. One table rested on its rounded edge, while its supporting feet kicked uselessly at thin air. Another one had been separated entirely from its support, tossed haphazardly in a pile of glass and sand. At least one of the tables, two of the bar stools, and the bar itself seemed to have made it through though. For it was in those locations that I found my...guests for the evening.

The two men I had seen previously at my apartment were back at the bar, dressed the same as they had been before. The green-haired teen was tapping out a message on his cellular phone, while the bald man watched me enter carefully. He looked aside as his younger companion, slapped him on the head, and stared at him until he put it away. Closer to the entrance, standing by a tall circular table, was a man I had never seen. He stood at least a foot taller than me, and his skin carried a sickly yellow-green tint. He wore a black eyepatch over his left eye, and fit the general stereotype of a motorcycle gang member: long stringy brown hair, a leather jacket filled with patches (including that familiar image of a spear through a crown), chaps over blue jeans, and scuffed-up boots.

?Hello, Bailey,? the bronze-skinned man said as he shifted in his seat.

?Hello - what should I call you? You were not so kind as to give me your name when last we...spoke.? I gave the bag a little shake, testing the weight of it.

?I?m C. This is V.? He gestured toward the young man beside him at the bar, then pointed at the person at the table. ?And that is Cy.?

?As in, Cyclops??

?Yeah, he figured he?d own it. Right, Cy??

?Yeah,? Cy rumbled. For a moment, I wondered if his deep bass would shake some of the rafters loose, but everything stayed intact for the moment.

?What is he doing here?? My eyes darted around the first floor, as I tried to quickly draw a mental map of the building. I had not factored a third person into my plans.

?You?ve brought proof of the Empress? demise, right?? He looked at the bag in my hand.

?Why, yes.?

?Cy has the Third Eye.?

?Well, I only see one.? I let out a dry laugh, which I quickly bit back at their dirty looks.

?You know what I mean, Bailey. He can see through glamour and those sorts of tricks.?

?That sounds...useful.?

?The proof?s in the bag, isn?t it? Give it to Cy.?

I sighed, then walked up to his table and set my burden down in front of him. ?You don?t want to see for yourself, C.? V.??

?There?ll be time for that once he has verified...whatever it is that you have brought us.?

?Her head,? I replied, just as Cy took the large hat box out of the bag. It was emblazoned with the Highlife Haberdashery logo, but the clean whiteness of it had been marred by splotches of red on the bottom.

?Hey, boss, there?s some kind of rune sealing it.?

?It is protection from, h?, scrying, seeing through the box, those sorts of things. You can understand why I would want to take such precautions while carrying around the head of a Fae? If They knew I had this, if They knew what I had done?? I closed my eyes and shook my head, tsking. As I did so, I slid a couple of steps back from the table.

?Break it,? C. said, his voice rising in volume.

?All he needs to do to break the rune is open the box. Go ahead, open it.? I took a few more steps backwards, watching the reactions of the three men present. They looked angry and annoyed more than anything else. Good.

I watched and listened carefully as Cy slipped the top off of the box. My right hand rested on the vest of my jacket, close to my heart, close to the key. He pushed the lid back so that he could get a closer look at what was inside, then frowned as he removed the lid entirely.

?Boss, it?s a pig?s-?

At that last word, I slapped the key on my chest and felt my body slide away into liquid. A wave of energy tossed me back against the front wall, splashing harmlessly against the wood. The bright flash of the rune bomb rippled and blurred in my vision, and I could barely hear the roar of the blast through the sound of waves crashing in my ears. When the light finally winked away, the only thing left where the table, box, bag, and Cy had been were his legs. They wobbled unsteadily for a moment, before crashing to the ground.

I tapped the key on my chest once more, shifting from water to flesh, and began sprinting towards the bar.

Bailey Raptis · Date: 2016-01-04 22:38 EST

As I bolted towards the bar, I watched as the stunned expressions on C. and V.?s face soon gave way to rage. V. leaned over the bar to grab his nail-studded baseball bat, while C. drew the pistol from the holster on his hip. As he drew a bead on me, I slapped the key again, just as a dull report rang out through the saloon. A bullet sliced through my aqueous form, an impossibly fast current cutting through my body?s still waters. As he lined up a second shot, I trickled through the floorboards.

I could hear their muffled voices and feel the tremors of their footsteps on the wood above me as I flowed across the hard-packed sand below. I could see little in the dark, cramped space, and my body was not precisely designed for human vision at that moment, so all I had to go on were the muted sounds above me and my previous scan of the tavern?s floor. I had to find an open spot to spring out from, hope they drew close to that spot, and pray they did not see the puddle of me lying in wait for them.

I got lucky. When I sprung back into my skin, they were facing towards the entrance, their backs turned to me. I chopped at C.?s wrist, forcing the gun from his grip, then spun back towards the charging V. and jabbed the tips of my fingers into his throat before he could swing his bat. He staggered back, coughing and choking, and I twisted back in C.?s direction. He had finished shaking out his wrist and was now reaching for the pistol on the ground. I let his fingertips just brush against the metal before I stomped on his hand, then kicked the weapon away from his grasp and towards one of the holes in the floor. It skidded across the wood and slipped out of sight. C. held up his injured hand, the broken digits bent into unnatural angles, and cursed at me.

?You fucking goddamn traitor!? he snarled, glancing over his shoulder at V., who gasped and still had his hands near his throat. I reached into my coat, pulled out my cold iron knife, and slashed at C. He blocked the blow with his wrist, splattering blood on both of our leather jackets. I clapped my free hand to my shoulder and felt my body shift once again, this time from flesh into marble. I side kicked at C., sending him stumbling away as he clutched his forearm, and then wheeled around to face V. He was charging straight at me, hissing, both hands holding his bat aloft. He swung the bat down in an overhead smash that I blocked with one of my marbled arms. I lashed out with a push kick to drive him further back and off-balance, then leaped forward. Before he could bring the bat up in defense, I stabbed him in the side of the neck, and then ripped the blade across his throat. Gurgling, he dropped the bat and clawed at the wound, but it was too late for him. Seconds later, he collapsed to the floor. I spared a moment to glance at his body and his blood on my coat.

?Vince!? C. screamed, as I wiped the blade clean on my now-ruined coat. One of his hands formed a fist, while the other struggled against the broken fingers. Finally, he slammed his knuckles together with a loud cry. I chose that moment to rush him, but he decked me with his uninjured hand, sending me teetering backwards. I spit off to the side, and tasted blood. The moonlight seemed to glint off of his bronze skin. I stepped forward and slashed at his face, but the blade just whanged off of his cheek. He countered by slamming the heel of his hand into my chin. My mouth filled with that familiar iron taste, and I felt a couple of loose teeth barely hanging on in my gums. I twirled the blade a couple of times, then stuck it back into the sheath inside my jacket. I was going to have to find another way to take C. down.

First, though, I had to prevent C. from separating my head from my shoulders. It seemed similar to what I imagined a bullfight might be like, with myself playing the matador?s role. C. charged, and I would step away at the last moment. The first time, I tried kicking him square in the stomach, but it did not even faze him. Neither did a sharp kick to the shins, or a chop to the back of his knee. I had the speed and agility advantage, but he was taller and stronger and I could feel the mana that powered my marble armor ebbing away with each moment. Without that protection, I would be in serious trouble.

?I should have...shot you in the head when I had the chance!? C. said, interrupting his own sentence to try and deck me once more with a jab. I dodged but did not counter, instead sliding closer to one of the piles of ruined tables and chairs.

?You are not the first person to suggest that.? I somersaulted toward the pile, picking up the loose leg of one of the chairs, and wielding it. Halfway through another bull rush, C. realized what I had done, and tried to twist himself around and back towards Vince?s studded baseball bat, but his body was too heavy, his momentum too strong. I reared back and smashed him in the face with the leg. Stunned, he stumbled headlong into the rest of the debris, and I did not give him a chance to stand back up again. I ripped up one of the loose floorboards and cracked him in the back of the skull with it, over and over again. Somehow, the ragged chunk of wood in my hands did not give way before his consciousness did.

I stepped over his back, leaned down next to his prone form, and checked his pulse. Still beating. This will not do. I looked at the makeshift weapon in my hand, shaking my head as I tossed it aside. I peered in the general direction of where the gun had gone, but shook my head again at that. No. No no no that will not work. Then, I pulled up my mental map of the front of the saloon. With a loud sigh, I grabbed C. by the scruff of his jacket and dragged him across the floor, through the batwing doors, and down the porch.

A few feet in front of the porch were a pair of hitching rails and watering troughs for horses. I pulled C. towards one of the troughs, slamming his skull against the edge twice to ensure he was still unconscious, and pointed an outstretched palm at the bottom. The key turned cool to the touch against my chest, and a jet of water began streaming out of my hand into the container. C. moaned once or twice as I filled it up, but I soon reintroduced him to oblivion courtesy of the nearby post. Finally, when it was full, I lifted him up so that his head rested on the lip of the trough. I placed both hands there, sucked in a deep breath, and plunged his face into the water.

It took much longer than I thought it would to drown him -- most likely because I did not know how long I needed to keep him submerged without breath before he would die. The fact that I kept lifting his head out of the water to check his breathing, and then brought him back into the bath by bashing his temple against the wood, most likely did not speed up matters either. When I lifted him out of the water the final time, and felt no pulse in his neck or breath from his mouth, I left him perched over the rim, arms resting against the sides, like he was just about to vomit. I leaned back against the hitching post, and felt the marble dissipate from my skin.

I looked down at my body, soaked, bloodied, and covered with two men?s blood. Vince?s baseball bat had ripped up my coat, and once my armor had vanished, what had been chipped marble became wounds that oozed blood. I could feel my face beginning to bruise, and my tongue kept poking and prodding at the loose teeth in my mouth. I pulled the canteen lose from its sling on my hip, and drank the rest of its contents, before scrambling to my feet.

Vince had been texting somebody when I came in, and I wanted to know who. I walked back into the tavern, approached his body, and knelt down. I pulled his cellular phone out of his pocket, broke the laughably simple passcode on the device (1-2-3-4? Seriously?), and opened up the messaging application. I found the message thread at the top of the list, clicked on it, and stared.

I could not read it. I blinked, focused hard, and tried to pull the Common words out of my own memory, and not the malfunctioning dictionary embedded in my mind.

***

Vince: Hes here. Well take care of hm & txt u bak in 15 mins
Kheems: K
Kheems: U there?

***

I dropped the phone like a hot coal, cracking the screen. I stomped on it a couple of times for good measure, cursing in Fae as I did. They are coming. They are coming, and they will bring more people, and they will kill me, and I cannot get out of here. I cannot - Wait, I actually brought my phone for once. I reached inside my jacket, retrieving the mobile device that Diane had bought for me months ago. The mobile device I had barely used, barely even carried around, out of fear of being tracked through it. Well, there was not time to worry about that now. I needed to find someone who could get here fast. I began scrolling through the list of contacts, mentally crossing each one off as either unable to arrive quickly, or as someone I did not want to put in harm?s way. Andressa. No. Bailey. That is me. Eden. No. Eva. No. Jewell. Not here. Kate. Kate! She has an airship, does she not? I could only vaguely remember when we might have exchanged numbers, but I was not really worried about the details. I needed another miracle. I needed her to have access to that ship. I punched the ?call? button beside her name, and when the person at the other end picked up, I began to speak in halting, uncertain Common. I could hear the ghost of my voice echo back to me through the poor connection in the line, and I prayed that she could understand me.

?Kate...help...At...Cadentia...Last Chance Saloon...Very fast, por favor!?

Bailey Raptis · Date: 2016-01-26 18:28 EST

Kate was comfortably sprawled in the cockpit of the Wind, feet up on the wheel that was locked in autopilot. They were on one of their monotonous circular routes above the city - an air tour for those that could afford it and Kate made sure they paid well. It was easy money and so she'd bored with it but Hal liked these types of things for the very same reason. Quiet, legal, no need to rouse Viska from her quarters. She was busy watching vids on her phone screen when it paused itself and a little icon popped up. With a smile haunting the corners of her mouth, she touched the circle and put the thing to her ear. "Yo yo, wh --" The urgency of the voice on the other end saying her name caught her attention immediately, feet sliding to the floor with a heavy thunk. "Bailey? Saloon? What the hell is going on? What happened?" The phone was cradled between cheek and shoulder while nimble fingers flipped switched and pushed buttons on the console next to the wheel.

The connection already wasn't the greatest, given the almost complete lack of cellular towers in the no man's land that was Cadentia. Not helping matters was the fact that each and every word he spoke seemed labored over, with longer than usual pauses sprinkled in. Plus, his Common seemed to lack a basic grasp of normal sentence structure. "Last Chance Saloon... At Cadentia... It... dead place? People... try kill me here." He moved his mouth away from the ear piece, but not quite enough so that his next words weren't fully audible. They were, however, not in Common; the language sounded a little like elvish, but there were subtle differences that would have made it nearly impossible for an elf to understand.

The connection was crappy, his words sounded choppy and far away. Pale eyes squinted at the windshield while trying to pick out the words that she could, the ones that mattered. "Cadentia, dead place. Got it. You stay the hell alive until I get there or we'll have a problem." She was not an elf and so didn't understand any mumbles that came on the tail end of their almost-conversation but that didn't matter. The little red circle on the phone was pressed as she hung up. She didn't know where the hell Cadentia was but that's what technology was for! More pokes at her phone screen while she swung the Wind around, just needing a direction to point it in. If Hal came up to ask about their change in path, she'd tell him but not before. Time was of the essence.

Bailey glanced down at the little-used cell phone in his hand, flipping it shut and sticking it back in one of his jacket pockets. He then spent the next hour or so scavenging through the belongings of the men he had killed. Cy was a bust; there was nothing left of him but his legs, and the magic blast had ruined everything that had been in his pockets. And those chaps! Those awful, awful boots! No, better to let what remained of him keep that. He scooped up Vince's damaged cell phone next. It remained powered up, the light still flashing, but it was unreadable thanks to the cracks spiderwebbing the screen. Bailey found a wallet and keys in Vince's pockets, but there was nothing of value to be found in either item, and so he left them alone. He spent a good 15 minutes trying to find C.'s pistol, and trying to retrieve it without setting the damn thing off unintentionally -- he was quickly beginning to regret not taking up previous offers of shooting range lessons. He finally went back outside and examined C.'s body, but there was even less there than with Vince. He had no phone, and a wallet that was similarly devoid of valuable items, save for three 20 silver paper notes. He pulled them out, muttering something in Fae to the corpse, and then walked back to the porch in front of the saloon, the pistol in his hand pointed down and away from him. It was where he would be found, shivering from the cold desert night, whenever Kate managed to arrive.

It was about an hour, slightly less, when the Wind was visible in the skies above the Saloon. Since that was the bearing he'd given her, that was where she was headed. In the meantime, she fast talked a surly Captain (snapping at him that her friend was in trouble) and then worked her charms on their ?guests? that were watching the landscape slide by underneath. Not that there had been much to see but she promised that the destination would be worth it. They could be titillated by going somewhere off the beaten path, somewhere "dangerous" and have a fun tale to tell at their next circle jerk. Of course, Kate skimmed some extra money off their cards in the process, unbeknownst to them or Hal. Fair was fair. Knees had been bouncing for the past half hour and if she hadn't been manually following the nav, the petite woman would have paced a rut in the cockpit by now. How was she going to find Bailey in all this? With a small frown, she tapped out his number again, praying he would answer.

Luckily for him, he had fully charged the battery on his phone and left the ringer on even after hanging up on his previous call. Or, more likely, he had never figured out how to turn the ringer off. The generic ring tone (two eighth notes, two quarters, repeated each time in descending pitch) managed to distract him from staring off far into the distance and waiting for someone else to try and kill him. He set the gun down gingerly in front of him, pulled the phone out of his pocket, and answered.

"Al?? H?...hello?"

Bailey Raptis · Date: 2016-01-26 18:54 EST

"Oh, thank the Traveler, you're still there. Now where the hell is there and how do I get to you?" She was up above with a bird's eye view of the building and any others though the surrounding landscape was dark and desolate. Squinting down through the windows of the cockpit, she wondered if she could get a bead on him. "Are you in the Saloon or somewhere else?"

Now that they were in closer vicinity, it became clearer that the earlier pauses in conversation were not the result of a bad connection. They were because he kept stumbling and pondering almost every word as he spoke. "Think...It only building near. It...empty here. I...porch on. On porch. Can...walk out from under?"

Kate would still blame a bad connection but she did understand his words, nodding along. "Got it, on the porch. Okay, I'm going to set 'er down next to the building. Anyone with you? Anyone we need to take out?" She was already moving while speaking, maneuvering the graceful air beast just to the east of the building and so very glad the Saloon seemed to be an antisocial type of joint - no neighbors.

"All dead..." He paused, picking up the unfamiliar gun and walking out into the open. He immediately turned on a dime and headed east, past the watering trough he had filled earlier and C.'s body. He glanced to the side at it briefly. "Just me. Leave...bodies for vultures." He shivered again, sneaking a peak at his left arm. The jacket was probably -- okay, almost certainly -- a loss, but he had at least stopped bleeding from where the nail-studded bat had struck him earlier.

?Good." With that, she hung up -- no need to parse words when she was halfway to the ground. Since he was able to stand on the porch and use his phone, she assumed he was going to be okay but would wait to batter him with questions when he was sitting on board. Grine and Nym were chatting up the richies, Nym making up colorful stories from whole cloth about this place to delight the paying morons and make them feel special while she headed to the cargo bay. The vibration of the landing gear was whirring beneath her feet and then there was the subtle earthquake of touching down. The door was already opening, and she had a blaster in hand in case anyone tried to follow Bailey onto her ship (Hal's ship but that was up for debate.) "Bailey!" she called out as the door was half down. "It's Kate! Come on!" Peering anxiously past the lowering cargo door, her hand hovered over the button that would bring it back up.

He snapped the phone shut and stashed it away, then began running towards the sound of the airship. Evidence of the fight he'd been in became clearer as he drew closer to the vehicle: besides the damage to his arm, half of his face was bruised and blood had splattered all over his coat and jeans. He kept the handgun pointed at the ground as he sprinted and hopped on board. His tongue poked at the loose teeth in the front of his mouth and he winced, before he gestured toward the gun. Carefully, he held it toward Kate, grip first. "Take...I...do not use."

A figure came into view and her grip on the blaster tightened before recognizing...well, he looked kinda like Bailey, except half his face was jacked up. "Sweet baby Traveler, thank god. Get your skinny ass on board," she said, motioning him to hurry. The control for the cargo door was hit once his feet touched and he might have to hustle to avoid getting dumped on said skinny ass. The gun was taken with a nod, holding it down toward the floor as she turned. "Let's get you cleaned up and you can tell me what happened." There was a com box on the wall next to the doorway and Kate paused there, tapping in two keys and then pressing a green button. "He's on, take 'er up." Pause while a smile flickered. "Gently. Don't you think about scratching up my baby." Grin as she hit the red button to end communication, not allowing Hal the last word. Kate led him down a hallway and into a room that was a makeshift clinic, though they didn't have a medic on board, so the cupboards were kinda bare. They at least had bandages, though, and a sink so he could get the blood off his face. "Now. Spill."

He scurried inside and just barely managed to keep his balance once the door shut again. He followed Kate through the corridors of the airship, rubbing at the non-bruised side of his face as he walked. "Smoke?" he asked, already reaching for the pack of cigarettes and lighter tucked away in his front jacket pocket. He removed one from the pack and stuck it in the far corner of his mouth, giving a brief glimpse of reddened teeth, a couple of which (the bottom front row) were definitely loose. He didn't light up until given permission.

He took a seat on a chair in the clinic, rubbing his arms as if trying to drive away the remnants of the cold outside. "What...want...know?" He frowned, his eyes darting up towards the ceiling, and he sighed. "Sorry...magic...brain..." He tapped on the side of his head, allowing himself to smile faintly. "Common not first...language? There...dictionary in brain, help, but probably rely on too much. Stop work when I use magic. Should try learn actually."

Sure, sure," she said absently while rummaging through the cabinets, waving a hand dismissively in his direction. Hal smoked sometimes and so did Kate (dirty secret, sshh!) so he wasn't going to set off any smoke alarms. "I'm not much for playing nurse...not without being paid lots of money first," shooting him a quick grin over her shoulder, "but I should be able to at least get the blood off you." A tea towel was pulled down, crisp white and never been used, but that was about to change. A bowl was scrounged for water and that was set on the nearest flat surface so she could start dabbing at his face. "You take your time, we've got at least an hour before getting back to the city," offering a softer smile but the concern was clear. "Who did you kill and why?"

Bailey Raptis · Date: 2016-01-26 19:03 EST

He ashed on the floor as she began cleaning him off. He took his jacket off finally, revealing a plain black long-sleeved shirt (with a rip near the forearm to match the one on his coat) and the indentation of a key hanging around his neck. He began rifling through the interior pockets, pulling out his phone, a smartphone with a cracked screen, and a cold iron dagger in a leather sheath. He dropped the items on a nearby table, leaving the ruined article of clothing on the floor. "Real doctor...tomorrow." He pointed at his mouth. "And...dentist?"

Of course, Bailey knew there would be a cost for this favor, and information seemed to be the most likely currency, besides actual currency. He squinted, concentrating hard and giving himself a few taps on the head for good measure. "...Trying to kill me. Beat them to it."

Normally, Kate kept a running mental tally of checks and balances between herself and others, always marking off to see who owed who a favor and what it might be. This, however, was off the record. A friend needed help and she was able to give it, simple as that. If he didn't feel like talking, that was his business but she was curious by nature, nosy and adventurous, so naturally questions fell from her mouth once all the hooplah was finished and they had a moment. Time to kill. Hal might have balked at the ash on the floor but Kate barely noticed, more concerned with his mouth and the mention of a dentist. "Oh yeah, I've had some teeth knocked loose before. Luckily, I was on a world that had dentists so I didn't have to swallow it," making a face over that memory. With a gentle touch, she was able to get most of the gore off his face but left some evidence around his mouth, too afraid of messing anything up beyond repair. "Hey, hey, you been hit enough tonight," smiling wryly as she touched the hand he tapped himself with. "You don't gotta talk right now. Just know you're safe and we'll get you home, okay? Also, bonus for beating them to it. I would really hate to read about you on the news screen."

He slipped into another language, one that had been harder coded into his head than Common, but the sentiment was clear. "Obrigado." His eyes wandered over toward the damaged phone, and he swore loudly at it, first in that semi-elvish of his. "Shit! Phone tracked!" He jerked his head toward his own mobile device. "Why I do not carry mine around much. Do not want to be tracked."

Yeah, the sentiment was clear and she gave him a soft smile, shrugging her shoulders. "Ain't no thing," she murmured, attention shifting to his forearm. She was about to reach for it, see if it was more than she could handle when he swore and she looked to him askance, perfectly manicured brows raised high. "Oh, I got this," grinning widely as the cracked phone was scooped up. Didn't take her long to hack any passwords but she did pause a moment to look to him. "You need this? Or want me to just ditch it?" Dropping it over the side of the ship wouldn't do the trackers much good except give a general direction of the city. But if they knew Bailey, they already knew he lived in the city so no harm done.

"I broke it." The look on his face was pure guilty schoolboy: head down, eyes shifted to the side, frown on his face. "There is probably not much to get off of it. I know his name, and I know who he is with." He suddenly looked up, a light bulb seeming to flash over his head. "He can be tracked?! I can find out where the Courts are now!" The enthusiasm soon dissipated, gone once he remembered the state of the device. "Ah, well. I will not be so hasty next time."

Kate cracked out a laugh, shaking her head. "Nah, just the screen. I can work around that. If he's had tracking on this whole time, I can shut it off now but see where he's been, yeah? But if not...no luck. Either way, I can get all his contacts, upload them to your phone or another. Clone it so we can see who calls him. You interested or just want to trash it?" All this time, her thumbs were moving over the cracked screen, tapping and typing away.

"A contacts list would be nice, although I know who at least one of the people he was talking to was." He scratched his head as he quickly added, "I, h?, looked at the phone before I...stepped on it. Repeatedly." He sighed as he pondered the rest of the options available to him. "I do not know that knowing where he has been would be useful to me, unless I knew for certain those places were not places filled with more of his allies. Still...that would save me a lot of detective work, which I am not terribly good at. Yes, cloning the phone would be useful. Go ahead."

She nodded, thumbs still tapping away, careful not to swipe over any jagged edges and cut herself. Maybe Nym might even have a use for some of the parts after and could strip it down, make sure they weren't followed. Kate could do the cyber-tech part, Nym was more hands on hardware. "Got it. I'll need a new one, will pick it back up when we get to the city. I should have it ready for you by tomorrow," giving a perky smile, glad that she could help. "Stepping on phones can be useful in the short term but they already knew where he was going, I'm betting, so it didn't do much for you. I...get the feeling you're not the most tech-savvy person?" her smile becoming a touch wry. "Where are you from?"

Bailey Raptis · Date: 2016-01-26 19:19 EST

?They are probably on their way to where he is now..." He shuddered a bit, thinking about what might have happened if he had not been bailed out by Kate. "Fletcher and Lyeorn never let us have cellular phones because they knew there were ways to track people through the phones, even those early models that practically nobody carries anymore." Nobody except Bailey, of course, though his was a streamlined version of the old flip-phone technology. He tapped the side of his head once, allowing himself a small grin. "My brain appears to be functioning once more." And as quickly as he tossed that fact out there, he let it drop, crushing the almost finished cigarette in his hand against the sole of his boot and flicking it towards a trash can. The last question got answered off-hand. "I am from the WestEnd."

"Probably," she chirped cheerily, also glad that Bailey hadn't been left there to face them on his own. The blood was cleaned from his face and arm but she was no good for anything more than that. The answer of ?West End? as his place of origin was met with a mental scoff but she didn't pry for the moment, thinking they'd come back around to that later. "So what kind of trouble are you in, exactly? Friends of this guy gonna come looking for you? Why? And why did you kill those guys back there?" Not that she cared about the fate of strangers one way or the other but she was trying to understand the situation in which Bailey found himself in need of emergency backup.

?They probably will, but when I am not working, I spend my time on Twilight Isle." Bailey pulled the neck of his shirt down just a little, reaching down to pull the key on the chain out so that it was visible. It was made of coral, and had an aquamarine gem set inside of it. "I am now the Keeper of the Tower of Water. Which means I have access to a stronghold they cannot get into, not unless they possess some serious magical firepower, which I highly doubt that they do. As for work...I do not think they are the sort of people who will come after me in broad daylight, draw attention to themselves, or hurt the innocent." He pressed his lips together, then retrieved another cigarette and lit it.

She noted easily what was answered and (more importantly) what wasn't. The cracked phone was slid into the back pocket of her pants, arms crossing over her torso. "So you are not considering yourself one of the innocents here, huh?" Pale eyes searched his features while waiting for a response. "If they were willing to hurt you, I'm willing to bet they'll hurt anyone else they want to. I'm glad you've got a safe house to go when you're not working. I can keep an ear to the ground for you if I know what I'm looking for. I've got contacts all over the city," though the nature of those contacts and her business with them would not be divulged.

"Innocent, but in a different way." He sucked the smoke in and exhaled it in fat, lazy rings that circled over their heads. "My coworkers, my friends, they are innocents through and through. I am...sorry that I involved you in this." He looked to the side, away from her, trying to hide the guilt on his face. "I only have the names that will be on that phone. I just killed every other person I currently knew in that community."

"I put on my Big Girl panties every day, one leg at a time. I can take care of myself," grinning and tapping his cheek gingerly to get his attention back on her. No need to feel guilty or hide away. "Plus, I got this big, narsty half-Orc on board that wouldn't let anything bad happen to this ship, which is my home, so I'm pretty good. Not my first taste of trouble," flicking a glance to his gun and her blaster on the counter across the room. "Besides, you killed anyone that could I.D. the ship so no worries there. What brought on the killing spree? You don't seem the cold blooded type."

He sat and smoked in silence for a spelling, formulating the best answer for her question that still allowed him to keep his secrets. "They think that I am a traitor to their cause, and so they set out a loyalty test for me. However, I did not complete their...test in a very timely fashion, and I realized that they probably were going to kill me regardless of whether or not I had brought them proof of its completion. So...I lied and told them I had, so that I could get them in one place. I was not counting on them having a third person. Or Vince being in contact with someone else from the cause. Believe it or not, that was not the first time I have killed. Though it was probably...the messiest."

She let the silence draw out, even though it grated like sandpaper along her nerve endings. Kate did not have the patience of a saint or any other sort of benign entity but she did respect private space and the need for secrets. "Ah," nodding slowly when he finally responded. "Yeah, anything called a cause usually produces more than a few fanatics," a harsh tone biting through the words. Not that she judged him for being part of one but Kate had been on the wrong side of a "cause" before and it ended in nothing but bloodshed. She hadn't seen anything across the far flung galaxies to ever prove that experience wrong. Sucking on her lower lip a moment, it was released and she clucked her tongue. "Baby, I know better than most not to judge people on what they look like. Appearances are always deceiving," offering a Cheshire smile. "I've got clothes you can wiggle into if you want to change, or you can try to get a nap in, food in your stomach. Whatever. We've got time to kill before we get back, I can show you around the ship." Let him know what was off limits so Hal didn't get his panties in a bunch.

"If you have a shirt, that would be greatly appreciated. This one is a loss." He held up his left arm, rotated it, and showed off the rip where Vince's nail-studded baseball bat had struck him. "I should be able to clean up everything else, save for that jacket." He pointed to where he had tossed it on the floor, also damaged beyond repair. "Actually, all of those things sound good." He laughed, giving his head a little bit of a shake. "I am not being very helpful, am I?"

"My wardrobe is locked and loaded at all times," breaking into a grin before she gestured for him to follow. "You want this back?" hefting the gun that was scooped off the counter, making sure the safety was on before pointing it toward the floor. The blaster was in her other hand as she stepped into the hallway, making for the private quarters. Bailey didn't know it but none of the crew except Hal had ever been allowed in her room, her privacy enforced with a number of locks on the door. He was getting special treatment.

Bailey Raptis · Date: 2016-01-26 19:53 EST

Bailey shook his head as he looked over the handgun. "I would not know what to do with it. I had an acquaintance offer to show me the ropes, take a little, what is the word...target practice? But I am more comfortable with the weapons that I have been trained in already. The sword and the dagger and...magic." The last word came out much quieter than the first two weapons he had mentioned. He lifted his heel up and put out his cigarette on his shoe again, as he waited for her to unlock the door. Smoking in public areas was one thing, but smoking in someone's personal quarters was another. He wouldn't do it unless expressly given permission.

There was only one lock on the outside, the rest on the inside - a cascade of chains and deadbolts that made it clear she valued her privacy. There wasn't much call for it on this ship she called home but old habits were hard to break and she hadn't known the crew as well when they were installed. The interior of her room was decorated in neutral tones - white walls, floor and ceiling, black furniture and black kitsch and a black fuzzy hide of...something on the floor. Grey dotted the room in the form of throw pillows, a throw blanket, knick knacks and other debris she'd picked up here and there. The only bits of color apparent were clothes that spilled from her closet and of those, there were many. Not the tidiest creature on the ship but she normally never let anyone else see it. Inside her large closet, Bailey would find clothes in a multitude of styles and sizes for men and women - as if it was pooled between five or ten different people though all of them belonged to her. "Pick out whatever you like," she said, gesturing for him to go crazy.

He gave the interior design of Kate's room a cursory glance, though the locks managed to pull his attention toward them for a beat or two more. What really caught his eye -- perhaps not surprisingly, given his career -- were the clothes she had. There appeared to be more than a few pieces that differed from what he had seen her wear during IFL. He took it all in, his eyes drifting from piece to piece, putting together an outfit in his mind. Finally, he took a step towards the closet, but he stopped short of grabbing anything. Instead, he took a look at his jeans, grimacing. Rather than take the blood-stained pants off, though, he kept them on as he crouched to look at labels -- the sizes, more specifically. He started with a white, crew-necked t-shirt. Slowly, and with his teeth gritted as the fabric scraped over his wounds, he pulled off the long-sleeved shirt he had been wearing. His teeth remained gritted as he pulled the t-shirt over his head and neck and down over his torso. Now, he had to find a proper shirt to wear over it.

It would have been easy to spend hours sifting through her wardrobe, like a modern rag-and-bone man, but he was trying to make an effort at being more polite. She had helped save him, after all. So he only spent one or two minutes picking through the piles, before deciding on a rather basic navy blue zip-up hooded sweatshirt. He shrugged into the sleeves, leaving the zipper undone and hood down for now.

Kate seated herself on the end of a black velvet chaise lounge, one booted foot curled underneath while she watched with a hovering smile. She could nearly taste his desire to pick through each piece individually (which might take days) but knew time was also of the essence. The smile disappeared, a frown marring her brow, when his shirt was removed and she saw the extent of the damage there. "Hey..." she said softly, rising to her feet to go into the bathroom. She brought out a damp rag and an unmarked bottle of pills. "I've got some pain killers if you want, nothing that will make you trip too hard but give you a nice fuzzy feeling once the pain is gone. I could give you half or something." Kate didn't touch the stuff unless necessary but it made her good money on the street. "Imma take you to a doc or something when we get back, don't give me any sass about it, either," softening the command with a small smile though concern still darkened her pale eyes. "Why don't you lie down and rest," gesturing to the chaise she had previously occupied.

"I am...not looking to roll." Bailey allowed himself a quirk of a smile at the rare usage of slang, and looked right at Kate to see if she reacted at all to it. "But my teeth hurt and my face hurts and my arm hurts, so anything that will stop that until we can get back to the city would be fine."

He nodded at Kate as she vacated the chaise, reaching down to unlace his boots and slip them off. He caught the faint whispers of sand settling throughout the insole and lining. There was nothing to be done about that now. He frowned as he looked at his socks, the white marred by brown dirt and dust that had snuck up and over and into his boots. The socks stayed on, though, as he padded softly across the room, sat on the cushion, and then twisted his body so he was fully laid out on the chair. "I...will not argue with you on the doctor. I promise."

He got a glance and an impish smile for his slang but the humor faded when he rattled off his litany of ailments. Hearing that he just wanted to take the edge off, she nodded and turned to the nearest flat surface, setting the bottle of pills down as well as the rag. Glad that he was complying enough to rest a bit and then see a doc, she busied herself with fishing out one of the pills and then cutting off a third of it. A spoon was found under a sweater next to a book on the floor and after deeming it clean enough for the work at hand, the small bit of hardened pill was crushed under the spoon so she could scoop it into a glass of water fetched from the bathroom. Stirred it with the spoon handle and then brought it to him. The rag was folded and put over his forehead - therein lay the extent of her nursing skills. Street drugs were different, she could play with those all day but healing junk...far beyond her purview. "Drink this, it won't make you see anything but help beat the pain for a bit. I'll tell the doc I gave it to you." Sitting on the edge of the chaise, she helped him prop himself up enough to down the liquid without spillage. "Let me go check on Hal. I'm gonna lock the door so no one else bothers you, okay?"

"That sounds...good." He took his medicine with no complaints or difficulties, only a brief moment where his mouth puckered on the bitterness of the smashed up pill and water. He touched the rag on his head, smiled just a bit. Kate had nearly made it to the door when he spoke up again. "Thank you."

By the time she had made it back from her visit to Hal, Bailey had fallen asleep. The sweatshirt had been zipped up and the hood thrown haphazardly over his head. He slept on his side, hands tucked underneath and pressed against his chin as a makeshift pillow.

((Edited and adapted from live play))

ShiftingSands · Date: 2016-02-02 00:27 EST

Text to Bailey: Hey Cookie, it's Kate

Text to Bailey: That clone been working for you? Hear anything good?

Text to Bailey: That symbol you gave me last time we saw each other, been seeing it around. Tagged on buildings, I hear, edge of Stars End. Ish.

Text to Bailey: You feel like checking it out, you tag me. No more going solo, Cookie. Consider me your loyal Wookie. But with a much better ass and frizz control.

Bailey Raptis · Date: 2016-02-04 17:09 EST

Text to Kate: No one is calling the cloned phone, but I have had some time to read the messages Vince sent to other people.

Text to Kate: I have one of those corkboards like you see on those detective shows, with all the string trying to connect people together in the organization. Most of them were smarter than Vince and did not give out even a name, but I have an general idea of how many people handle ?wetwork?, as they call it.

Text to Kate: They had a dozen operatives until I stepped in. Kheems seems to be a middle manager. No idea who might be above him or if there are others like him, except for whoever is in charge of the Courts. Someone with the very unique name of ?Sandman?

Text to Kate: I keep seeing mention of meetings at a ?YGG.? Guessing it is an anagram but I do not know of any words in Common that might include those initials. Anything like that in Stars End ring a bell? I have been too busy with work/training to look into it.

Text to Kate: What is a Wookie? Also, my fingers hurt. Do people really find this an easier way to communicate with each other?

ShiftingSands · Date: 2016-02-04 22:26 EST

Text to Bailey: Well if you had all that to say, Cookie, you could have called

Text to Bailey: Coffee soon? Or whatever you drink, pick your poison. But we can drink and talk. Give your thumbs a rest.

Text to Bailey: Save them for funner things.

Text to Bailey: I wanna see your corkboard but I'm afraid you won't respect me in the morning.

Bailey Raptis · Date: 2016-02-05 14:20 EST

Text to Kate: You do not want to know how long it took me to write all that.

Text to Kate: Radical Ray?s or Java Hell, or do you know some place else? If you wanted a beer instead, we could meet at Cesky Domov.

Text to Kate: Not sure if you would respect me now that my apartment is cleared out and no longer a pigsty or be...creeped out it is so empty.

ShiftingSands · Date: 2016-02-06 22:08 EST

Text to Bailey: Best way to get faster is to practice, Cookie

Text to Bailey: If it's daytime, coffee. Night time = liquor. All of those places sound great, know where to find 'em. When is best for you?

Text to Bailey: Also, we should go shopping.

Text to Bailey: I bet you make creepy look cute. I'd love to come see it, thanks for the invite.

Topic: Hidden In Plain Sight

Bailey Raptis

Bailey Raptis

Bailey Raptis

Bailey Raptis

Bailey Raptis

Eden Parker

Mason

Bailey Raptis

Bailey Raptis

Bailey Raptis

Bailey Raptis

Bailey Raptis

Bailey Raptis

Bailey Raptis

Bailey Raptis

ShiftingSands

Bailey Raptis

ShiftingSands

Bailey Raptis

ShiftingSands