(no subject)

[vampthropologist]

Who: Cuthbert Beckett and Beatrice Brewer
What: a case of horribly unmistaken identity
Where: corridors outside intake
When: during the nightwatch times
Warnings/Notes: probable discussion of horrible vampire ways


"Embrace not love, for love in My Embrace will grow cold, wither, and die."  

 - The Book of Nod, Chronicle of Shadows, words of Caine to his childer, on the subject of progeny

Beckett is standing in the hall just outside Intake, though not with any particular intent.  It just happened to be where he came to rest; he's been pacing the corridors for days, hoping to find some sign of the killer stalking the Rig, and it's not like he needs to sleep.  It isn't that he's particularly alarmed by the circumstances, no, not at all - but it keeps his mind occupied, and gives him an excuse to start making maps.  Beckett appreciates maps.  A good map can save your life, under the right circumstances

This is why he's propped his lanky body up against one side of the corridor, notebook open and braced on one arm, and why he's chewing lightly on the inside of his cheek with concentration as he traces out the area he's just walked through.  It's not much, but he's already noticing how clumsy the Rig's construction is, how many gaps and loose spaces and sealed-off, forgotten rooms there seem to be.  Which is both useful and interesting; the contradiction of the Rig's incredible technology and its amateur hour administration means something, something more than mere incompetence or disregard for the New Hires' safety.  He's quite sure of it.  There's something broken behind the eyes of every Jorgmund employee he's encountered, something he feels like he should recognize, but doesn't.

He's totally engrossed in what he's doing, and unlikely to notice anyone coming up on him

Comments

[smallmediumwelldone]

Beatrice has just been set loose from her intake. She's sore and disheveled and has one arm wrapped tightly around her chest, doing her best to not think about the insurance policy wrapped around her spine. It rather reminds her of when she was first Embraced and dragged shivering, half-alive, to take eternal oaths she didn't yet understand.

Thinking about home isn't very good right now. That is why when Beatrice first catches a glimpse of a familiar silhouette from behind, she thinks her mind is playing wishful tricks. He's dressed all wrong, anyway - although so is she. But no matter how hard she blinks, no matter how many times she checks with her senses-

"Beckett?"

Beatrice hates how small her voice is as she calls out, hates how she has half reached out with her other hand. At least, Beatrice tells herself firmly, if this is someone else she can brush off the error easily.

[vampthropologist]

Beckett looks up at the strange voice calling his name, his focus briefly divided and then settling totally on the stranger - because she is a stranger, quite obviously a Kindred, and she's addressing him familiarly. He draws himself up, an expression of aloof curiosity locked firm on his face, and address her.

"Have we met, madam?"

His glasses are off, folded and tucked in his breast pocket.

[smallmediumwelldone]

What.
"What?"

Beatrice is staring at him quite openly. No, not just at him but up at him, square in the face and up in the eyes, someone unafraid of what eye contact with an elder may mean. All Beatrice can think is that she knows those eyes, has spent plenty of time staring at them. She knows less well the distant expression on his face. She blames this for why it takes her - far too long to realize she has just been standing there in silence for a minute.

It's reverse-Pygmalion. A living woman turned from life back to stone. The tentative hope and openness on Beatrice's face closes up, is shielded by a bleak nothing.

"...No. I am terribly sorry for the misunderstanding, sir."

[vampthropologist]

"Nonsense." Beckett takes her retreat as a cue to seize initiative, and the upper hand. "You recognizes me, you called my name, you're clearly a fellow kindred - I don't recall you, however, so we must have met in passing, or you simply know of me - " or perhaps she's lying altogether, but that seems unnecessarily baroque for the circumstances, even for another kindred, " - or some third explanation I've not thought of, something to do with the nature of this - place."

He examines her, top to bottom, a thorough assessment of everything Jorgmund's left her with: nothing jumps out straightaway, except for the aura of supernatural cold, but he's met kindred with that before from several clans - by itself, it means nothing. She bears no obvious disfigurements, but he can't rule out his own or a nosferatu under masque, or an unusually discreet tzimisce. And her attitude is remarkably neutral - no ventrue arrogance or toreador self-absorption.

"May I ask your name and lineage? I am, as I suspect you know, of clan Gangrel."

[smallmediumwelldone]

"I don't-" Beatrice realizes she has drifted towards him without quite realizing it, and takes one firm step back again. The arm around herself tightens, stopping any spillover.

Beatrice examines him in turn, a careful scrutiny [ feel free to describe his aura if you wish.]. Her voice isn't quite even when she speaks again.

"You must forgive me, they have only just released me from their - warm welcome. You became victim of me being - out of sorts and I- I mistook you for-" Beatrice gives up on that line of thought and skips past it, not quite answering how they know each other. Besides, surely what she says next will put him off, Tremere do tend to have that effect.

Beatrice lifts her chin up. "Beatrice Brewer. Magus of the Chantry of the Five Boroughs."

[vampthropologist]

Beckett's aura is much as she would remember it from their first meeting - if this is her Beckett, which - it's not, it can't be. His aura was gray, yes, and lifeless, yes, but there were flickers of rose and gold beneath it, pools of fierce faith and passionate meaning that have only grown richer as she's come to know him.

This Beckett's aura is not dead, exactly, but cold. Tired. No sudden, startling flashes of warmth and passion. Just - stoic gray and pale sad blue, a light dusting like withering veins under dead skin. If she keeps looking, past the point of rudeness, she might see scatters of the gold, the rose. But hidden. Buried so deep that he might not even know they're there.

His aura flares in some kind of annoyance or irritation when she introduces herself, but all he gives her physically is a polite nod.

"Well, I don't suppose the pyramid's ever heard of anything like this?" he asks, gesturing to the - everything around them.

[smallmediumwelldone]

The set of her jaw and uplifted chin do not get any less defensive. The flare of irritation, the aura being all wrong yet horrible familiar. Beatrice's tone is weary when she speaks, however, an undertone of wry knowing.

"If they had, don't you think the Pyramid would have used it? They surely can't be that different across worlds."

Beatrice doesn't quite wince as she lets that slip, and soldiers on. She also brushes a stray strand out of her face, doing her best to shove it back into her bun. She did just get released from the shocks-for-fun welcoming, after all. "Or - so I have been told. About multiple hypothetical worlds in this place. By that horrible bureaucrat just now. No, I daresay you know more than me on this, sir."

[vampthropologist]

"How did you make it as far as the Fifth circle being such a terrible liar?" Beckett asks cheerfully, and closes his notebook with a satisfied snap. "But I don't doubt I do know more, at the moment - the people in charge aren't terrible clear or, frankly, bright. How about a tour? We can trade questions along the way."

He's got a scent now - Beatrice has secrets, secrets that involve him, or are related to him and his goals in some way. And that is frankly the most normal thing in two weeks.

He's a little bit delighted, and can't quite hide it.

[smallmediumwelldone]

She frowns at him, but there's no real way to say excuse me I have several subterfuge dots but your mere presence has thrown me wildly off my game.

"By being very good at what I do," Beatrice tells him instead stiffly. Oh, his face is doing a bit of the - oh dear. Beatrice can feel the guarded edges of her expression trying to soften in response to his excitement - Beckett's always at his best like this. It's almost familiar, which makes the reminder more horrible that it isn't familiar at all.

She lets her chin drop, looks away first. "Do not feel obligated on my account, Mr. Beckett. It was me who - who disturbed you from your night on error. As a matter of fact, I really should go settle in-" Beatrice's efforts to look anywhere else have landed her eyes on the map he was developing and she can't hide her instant sense of curiosity.

[vampthropologist]

He sees her flush, he sees her look away, and then he sees her eyes light on his notebook right before he closes, focusing in like a cat who's spotted a mouse. She's too busy to notice, but his smile deepens.

"Then allow me to be of assistance. Besides, there's a murderer about - we're not to go off alone. You'll save me a scolding. And this place can be rather counter-intuitive."

Putting it mildly.

[smallmediumwelldone]

"Oh, a murderer about. Naturally there is, why wouldn't there be? Next there'll be a monologue."

Beatrice shifts, running a hand down her face in a rare human gesture. She forces herself to unwrap her arm from around her chest - it barely even hurts anymore, and besides, she's dead.

She peers at Beckett from under her hand - Beatrice is aiming for suspicious but lands solidly on tired. "A gamble to trust that the suddenly appearing Tremere is safe to gallivant off with." Where is your survival instinct, Beckett?? "What do you want in exchange for this? Only questions, quid pro quo?"

[vampthropologist]

"Of course. Knowledge is more precious than gold, and especially around here. They treat us like mushrooms, kept in the dark and fed on bullshit."

He folds the notebook under his arm, extending his arm for her to take, the very soul of courtesy.

"I think even a Tremere can guess that co-operating with Jorgmund isn't in their best interests. You and I are in the same boat - if the lupines trapped in it can refrain from murdering us in a fit of pique, surely we can put aside any rivalries in the interests of handling the current difficulty?"

[smallmediumwelldone]

His mushroom quip gets an appreciative quirk of the lips, but it doesn't last long. The offering of the arm just rings with too much familiarity for her, of nights walking along the waterfront that she can't have back, of panic and grief threatening to well up that Beatrice has been forcing down.

She flinches like expecting - or having just received - a blow. A minute enough reaction that a mortal would likely miss it, but she doesn't look back up at him again after, not even at the mention of lupines.

"I- no thank you. I haven't any gloves. You will find it unpleasant." Her mouth twists. "Although you will find me ill company regardless tonight, but very well, Mr. Beckett. You will have your cooperation - and your questions." She knows that's what he wants, anyway. Beatrice clasps her hands in front of her, waits for him to make his move.

dumb vampires...part 2!

[smallmediumwelldone]

[A continuation of this very smooth conversation exit.]

Beatrice has shoved herself in one of the unused rooms off-shooting the dormitory area for the New Hires. Not quite large enough to be a lounge despite the solitary moldering couch shoved in there, not quite small enough to be a closet despite the cleaning implements. The wallpaper that was behind her on the vid is distinguishably hideous – a puce color patterning of dots and flowers.

However, it is quiet and isolated. Both qualities that Beatrice highly values. Particularly now, as she hangs up on Beckett and buries her face in her hands. This is permissible, because there’s no one to say otherwise.

God, she was so foolish. Stupid to have trusted Bell, stupid to have let herself get caught, stupid for having let herself be used as a tool to kick off the entire apocalypse in the first place. Of course Beckett, with his unerring sense for ridiculousness, caught her out right away.

“This is not productive,” Beatrice reminds herself firmly, trying to wrench down the self-pity on the various ways she has been lured into self-betrayal. The way she just was, because she can’t resist engaging with the horribly familiar stranger. Still, her face remains planted firmly in her hands.

Re: dumb vampires...part 2!

[vampthropologist]

It's a long, long time before Beatrice hears Beckett's by-now familiar tread coming down the hall. Beckett had needed to run down some supplies, and then to remember where that particular hideous wallpaper was.

But he finds her closet, eventually. There's a rustling sound as he kneels down, and pushes a sheaf of papers under the door. Another rustle as he stands again, and walks off.

The papers are a copy of his maps and notes on the Rig, so far.

[smallmediumwelldone]

There's a tense minute when Beatrice watches the door with the same look one would give to a hissing snake, rearing up to strike. But the blow never comes, there's only.. paper?

She kneels next to the gap, takes the loose-leaf carefully. Oh. Beatrice can't quite quantify what is welling up, so she simply chooses not to, just stays kneeling there as she skims through familiar writing. A minute, then two, before she realizes time is slipping away.

"Mr. Beckett?" Beatrice calls – not loudly. Not even as loudly as she intended, and she fiercely hopes that her voice doesn't sound as small as it does to her own ears. Beatrice isn't sure that he's still near, even, but if he is – she knows he'll hear her.

And it's so much easier than trying to figure out how to send a message on those little communicators.

"...Thank you."

[vampthropologist]

Beckett hadn't gone very far, perfectly aware that he was being rude by lingering, and perfectly unconcerned. He'd need to know how the overture was received before planning another sally, after all. The woman was wildly cagey, and clearly hiding - god, he couldn't even imagine what, and that made him all the more curious.

Besides, it could be important. She wouldn't be the first Tremere to have developed an inexplicable fixation. The thought isn't a pleasant or likely one but he'd just as soon not end up a blood sacrifice, all the same.

He doesn't respond when she calls his name. It's her soft, near-whispered thanks that undoes him.

"You're welcome, Ms. Brewer."

[smallmediumwelldone]

Oh good, he was there. That saves her the supreme awkwardness of the communicator. Figuring out the steps, having to compose the message, leaving an avenue open for indefinite conversation – no, it's better like this.

Beatrice stays next to the door, crouched. One fingertip traces the familiar writing as she reads, following along with the lines.

This is – not what she expected. That Beckett would sensibly get far away from the strange, unpleasant Tremere with the whole rig between them, perhaps, or to hunt her down and interrogate her. Not this quietly offered – what? Whatever she is, Beatrice doesn't know what to do with it.

"You have done fine work mapping this place out. Much finer than whatever addled workman first laid it out." There's a pause. Tense on her end, merely quiet on the other side of the door. Perhaps he seeks to establish a trade of minor boons. Benign, as prestation goes, but the thought of being in debt to Beckett leaves a sour taste all the same. "This is quite gracious of you, but I haven't yet – I feel as though I have not paid my end."

[vampthropologist]

"Quite the contrary," he replies, using his voice to cover the sound of his footsteps coming closer. "This is me holding up my end of the earlier bargain. You answered my questions with perfect candor. It's hardly your fault the answers were so boggling."

Now he's in front of her closet door; she can probably see his shoes if she looks at the crack. She can certainly see his shadow blocking the light that trickles through.

"I apologize for whatever offense I gave."

[smallmediumwelldone]

What? It's a good thing he is not there to see how her brows draw together in confusion. At least it's easier, now, to separate the Becketts in her head when conversation with this one is so odd. Well that and the door ensuring it's only his voice, and not his likeness.

"..You have given me no offense, sir. I assure you, if you do, you will hear about it. That is a promise." He's standing right there. The thing to do here would be to open the door, thank him properly and politely, assure him of no ill feelings. Beatrice lays a hand on the door, but she doesn't manage to quite move beyond that. It's so much steadier like this. "Still, I owed you – owe –" A pause. Beatrice isn't quite sure what. "–an attempt to clear up the bafflement, rather than be saddled with my poor handling of the situation."

She doesn't bother to specify. There's only one Situation here, really, or at least one larger one that is a horrible mess of all the others bleeding together. Beatrice thinks back and notes, a thread of amusement in it, "Were you truly working off of the assumption of time-travel?"

[vampthropologist]

"Generally, when a woman runs off rather then continuing conversation, a gentleman assumes he gave offense," he says, more gently than dryly - to his own surprise. "I'm pleased to know that isn't the case."

He isn't going to press the issue of clearing things up. There's not exactly anywhere to run to, and sooner or later he always gets his answers. But he does feel the need to defend himself.

"Well, parallel universes is one thing, someone whom I've never met knowing me tends to imply time travel, at least to my thinking. It could still be time travel, in way - if I exist in your world, surely you exist in mine."

[smallmediumwelldone]

"Far be it from me to question your gentleman credentials." In reverse, it comes out more dryly than Beatrice intended. Why is it that Beckett only ever seems to cite chivalry when he was being confusing?

She blinks away memories of starry nights and car rides and instead lets her amusement grow a hair wider. "An interesting proposal. I daresay I owe Mr. Cesare an apology for slandering him when assuming ownership of some..rather colorful books. However, your logic to press the initial train of thought is – somewhat strained." She can respect the attempt to make it sound extra academic, though. Even if it still amuses her.

"My experience has indicated the passage of time can differ between realms. Considering we were pulled from only a years difference in time, my own assumption would be that our worlds are more akin to running simultaneous parallel tracks, rather than a discrete jump. I don't know how much similarity I would bear to any counterpart, though–"

Oh. The amusement drains from her with such force that she feels almost dizzy for its loss. That is most assuredly why Beatrice's voice takes a turn for the leaden, why the pressure of the hand supporting herself against the threshold grows. "Although should she exist, no doubt she would be easy to find. I'm sure that I – she – remains in New York's Chantry still."

[vampthropologist]

"And you do not?" Beckett spies the crack in her story and goes for it with all the unthinking instinct of a predator. He's going to disregard her making fun of his pleasure reading for now - and how would she even know that about him, any him, without being some kind of close confidant.

"Don't tell me I've developed a habit of kidnapping Tremere, now."

[smallmediumwelldone]

See, this is why Beckett deserves to have his pleasure reading made fun of.

"Two would not make a habit," Beatrice says sourly. "Particularly since you did nothing of the sort, you were merely willing to provide transit to me." She has no way to know that the Blake woman is a constant across worlds, but it's difficult to think who else – in any case, Beatrice was never a victim. And she was never part of a habit. Beatrice can practically hear Lucita now.

There's another one of those extended pauses, where she is deeply grateful that the door provides several inches of wooden cover. At last she exhales. "No, I am no longer a Chantry member in good standing. I have not been there – or part of the Pyramid in some months. My bonds are broken, and who is here to care?" No vampire cops in corporation space. It's not like she's concerned about Beckett knowing that.

[vampthropologist]

Beckett has to sit down a bit after that. He ends up leaning - not quite against the door, more off to the side. But close enough to hear her clearly.

"Are you - if you are sabbat, you're certainly one of the more sensible ones. If you oppose Vykos, I suppose you'd have to be..."

It doesn't make sense, though. She's far too young to be a sensible Sabbat - perhaps she met Lucita first? He's lost the plot entirely.

"You did mention Lucita, I think? I suppose she was involved in the whole affair - ?"