It is currently 19:47 Pacific Time on Thu Jun 6 2002.

Currently the moon is in the waning Crescent Moon phase (25% full).

Currently in Saint Claire, it is partly sunny. The temperature is 63 degrees
Fahrenheit (17 degrees Celsius). The wind is currently coming in from the
west at 9 mph. The barometric pressure reading is 30.22 and falling, and the
relative humidity is 44 percent. The dewpoint is 41 degrees Fahrenheit (5
degrees Celsius.)


[Motel room]


There is a light rapping upon the door from outside, one, two, three, then a
familiar voice. "Ey'Yo, I hear yeh'ordered dis' ere pizza."

There's silence for several long minutes. Then the sound of chain and
deadbolt and lock being pulled back, unhitched, undone. The door opens; the
room is black.

Alicia slips her way inside, chatting on the phone. "Hey Franky, just got
some heavy crap going down I guess. Its hard to explain over the phone. What
other languages you know besides spanish?"

A hulking, slouching, nine-foot form shuts the door behind the Gaian,
shutting out the light from the buzzing lamps outside. Salem -- if that _is_
Salem -- utters a querying rumble as he shoves the deadbolt back into place.

Alicia squints her eyes and continues forward, talking, trusting her senses
and her memorization of the room from earlier. She steps over the broken
chair, continuing on. "Lots of shit is wrong." Turning about face, she lets
out a breath. "Your brother is in trouble and we need to help him out."

There's an audible huff from the Crinos-shape by the door, and snuffling
sounds. Then he goes quiet, hunkering down.

Alicia pauses for a moment, then starts to shake the phone. "Hmm.. it
died.." Trailing off, she glances towards the door, then kneels down a bit.
"How are you hanging, big guy?" She whispers.

Salem's reply is the kind of deep, growling baritone that only a Crinos
chest can produce. ~Are you Guards-the-Flame?~ There's a cold intensity
there, the voice of a judge demanding answers -- _truthful_ ones.

"I sure as hell hope I am. Or else if you aren't my big bro, I'm toast."
Alicia says, slowly reaching inside her jacket, fingers grasping the handle
of her gun.

Second question, ignoring the scent of gunmetal, the sounds of moving cloth.
~Are you allied to the Wyrm?~

"Fuck No." Alicia says, her voice wavering a tad. "I'd rather slit both of
my wrists open and die slowly if it came down to that, or the alternative."

Salem is silent for a few breaths. Then he utters a rumbling chuff of
acknowledgement. ~I cannot sense Wyrm. No other way to be certain.~

"I can do it the other way around." Alicia says as she shifts a bit on her
knees, blurring herself into the glabro form. "Just you and I tonight
buddy.. phone lost its signal, but I did tell Yi what was up, in case we
need a shout out. I'm packing silver.. and I got an extra clip for you in
case you need to fire off a few rounds."

Salem shifts his weight, then moves, slowly. The deeper shadow of black
Crinos in the dark motel room shrinks. Salem -- now in homid -- flicks the
television on to a dead channel, muted and full of static. He's showered and
shaved, but otherwise looks no better than he did earlier. "Do you have a
weapon to go with that ammunition?"

Alicia opens up her jacket, showing the bulkiness of three heavy looking
hand guns. She reaches out and pulls off a standard cop firearm, handing it
over. "Has only one clip in there, so.. I hope it helps."

"Will have to do." Salem checks the handgun with a practiced eye, ejects the
clip, checks that, then shoves it back home. His hands bear a slight tremor
in them, and a muscle occasionally goes twitch in his jaw.

Salem flicks off the safety, and then sits down on the floor, back to the
wall.

Alicia pulls out two cans of RedBull from her pockets also and rolls one
across the floor to him. "No sleep for us ta'night eh'?" She says, trying to
give him a cheeky grin across the way of the dark room. "You know how hard
it will be to keep me quiet most of the night? You may have to empty that
clip out on me instead."

Salem doesn't smile back. A hand comes out to intercept the rolling can of
beer; he plucks it off the floor and sets it upright near by, but otherwise
shows no interest in it. "Just stay away from the window," he says, checking
the clip of ammunition again.

There's an abrupt knock on the door.

Alicia stiffens up quickly at the sound of knocking, instantly whipping out
her firearm, pointing at the door. Her thumb flirts over the safety, cutting
her eyes to him.

Alicia pages: Mind Speak: (I only remember telling Yi, but I didn't give her
an address, did you let anyone else know where you are at?)

Salem's attention snaps up at the knock; he's on his feet in an instant, gun
pointed toward the door. Lips peel back from his teeth; he shoots a sharp,
cold gaze to Alicia. "Don't do that. Stay down." And then he steps toward
the door, warily, quietly, and peeks out the peephole.

Alicia shifts herself behind the bed and keeps herself aimed at the door,
hunkering down a bit in case bullets or nasty bane arrows fly through.

It's just Kaz. With Questing Fry in hand. She's standing slightly back from
the door, all the better to see her from the peephole.

Salem opens the door an inch or three, wide enough to show the Bone Gnawer
the unscarred half of his face and the muzzle of his gun.
"Ears-to-the-Ground?" His greeting is suspicious, and the hand holding the
gun isn't _completely_ steady.

"That'd be me. You havin' a good time aimin' things at me?" She's standing
fairly casually, really. "Given you're aimin' things at me, can I assume you
got one've them harassin' phone calls from the nether regions?"

Salem squints. If anything, that seems to make him more suspicious. "What do
you know about that?" he demands.

Kaz sighs. "I /got/ one, dipshit. All giggles and 'you'll like working with
us'"-- it's a fairly credible imitation of the voice-- "and general morons
barkin'. Lemme in and I can fuckin' explain why both've /us/ got 'em, even."

Salem considers this for a moment, upper lip curled up. Then he opens the
door further, staying behind it of course and keeping the weapon up, and
lets Kaz in.

The motel room would be just like any other motel room, except for the
overturned table, the broken chair, the fist-sized dent in the wall, and the
various and sundry small objects scattered about, most on the floor. Salem
seems to have reverted to his Shadow Lord roots, too; once he closes the
door behind the Gnawer, the only light in the place comes from the muted
television, which is currently displaying static.

Alicia shifts herself up a bit as she stares ahead to Kaz, gun pointed at
her. She sniffs the air about the room now, sensing for the dark father's
wicked touch, in case it has felled the Gnawer as well.

Kaz doesn't even sound very sarcastic when she says, "/Thank/ you," and
wanders in. There's a pause. "Like your remodeling. Mind if I sit?"

"She's clean, Salem.. I don't smell it on her." Alicia shifts up a bit,
standing, but still keeping her gun drawn and held, waiting for the Half
Moon's confirmation.

Salem shuts the door quite firmly behind Kaz, and clicks the locks home --
deadbolt, latch, chain. The gun stays up and more or less remains pointed at
the Gnawer, though it's by no means steady. "Sit, then. Are you still a Bone
Gnawer, Kaz?"

/That/ question seems to surprise her. "No, I'm a fuckin' Silver Fang. Of
/course/ I'm a fuckin' Bone Gnawer. Why the--" She stops abruptly. "Oh. No.
Ain't gone to no Wyrm. Ain't gettin' no Wyrm lovin' from me. I'm too busy
tryin' to keep my own /skin/, thanks."

Alicia slowly slides the gun back into her jacket, then lets out a soft
breath, watching the scene unfold.

Salem hesitates, staring at Kaz intently -- a little too intently, really --
and then lowers the gun. "Good." He takes a step back, watching her.

Kaz shakes her head faintly, and slides down the wall into a seat on the
floor. "So dude, /have/ you gotten harassin' phone calls from the nether
regions, or am I jumpin' to conclusions?"

Alicia grows silent as she lets the two converse, sliding back down to her
spot next to the bed.

Salem's eyes are bloodshot and dark-shadowed, and they never leave Kaz's
face. "Yes," he says, after a beat, warily. "Calling me by name. They
said--" His gaze flicks, for the briefest second, toward the blind-covered
window, then to the door, and then back to the Bone Gnawer. "They said that
they were coming tonight."

Kaz blinks, and looks at the door. Then back to Salem. "Well, ain't I got
nice timing. They din' say that f'me. All they said was that I'd like
workin' with 'em, and they'd see me real soon."

Alicia murmurs to them. "Both are creepy, that is for sure, and it seems
like its working. Trying to scare us into looking over our shoulders
constantly."

Salem flicks a look to Alicia, and then his twitchy stare is back on Kaz.
"You said you could explain why-- how they knew."

Kaz nods tightly at Alicia, though she seems to have no response, right now.
But she sighs at Salem. "Glissa. That kin lady with the cute kids? The one I
almost gave every single fuckin' phone number I knew, to? The one I told who
the Alpha is? The one who I gave Patrick's an' my numbers to? She may've
been kin once, but y'know what she was when she was talkin' to /us/? She was
a fuckin' goddamed fomori, that's what she fuckin' was."

Alicia lets out a breath. "God.. I heard that story from Yi already." She
shivers, rubbing her arms now to rid the goosebumps.

Salem forgets to breathe for a moment. He goes utterly and completely still.
Then an expression of nausea creeps into his face, and the handgun simply
thuds into the rough, cheap motel carpet. "...Glissa? Glissa...
_Nicholson_?"

Kaz says, grimly, "/Yes/."

Alicia glances down and away as she rubs at her shoulder some more, then
paces around the room slowly. "Fuck.."

Salem sits down. Or, rather, he backs up a step and his body hits the wall,
and then he simply slides down to the floor. "Glissa Nicholson." Kaz might
as well have used the back of his head in her own game of Walker t-ball.

Kaz just nods, this time. She watches him carefully.

After several moments, Salem inhales sharply, his breath catching, and he's
not really looking at Kaz anymore, but past her. "Glissa Nicholson," he
says, a third time, in that same too-calm, half-dazed tone of voice. Then, a
beat later and more quietly -- almost a whisper, really -- he adds, "I gave
her the address of the safehouse."

Alicia sighs heavily and bonks her head against the wall as she leans it
back, eyes closing. "Fucking A... she knew 'bout the junkyard and rialto
also?"

Kaz says, "Oh. I was wonderin' who told her 'bout that one. It wasn't me,
but I told her enough /other/ shit..." She thumps her head gently into the
wall. "Rialto, I dunno if I ever tol' her about that, but I tol' enough
folks, over th' years, that I wouldn't be s'prised. An' I think Lyra an'
them tol' her about th' 'yard, yeah."

"What about her children?" asks Salem, in that same quiet, dazed tone.

Alicia clears her throat and glances over to Kaz, swallowing. She bites her
lip a bit and murmurs. "Julie is at Vicki's place..."

The metis sighs. "Julie's ok. Mike's dead." She doesn't expand on just what
kind of dead Mike /is/. "Vicki's? Ok, cool. Lyra'll wanna go bug her."

Salem says, "Dead. How?"

Kaz says, vaguely, "He got killed." And the look in her eye seems to
indicate she's not expanding on that explanation.

Salem bares his teeth, upper lip and nose wrinkling like a dog's. "_How_?"

Alicia lets out a quick breath. "Salem.. please...."

Kaz gives the Walker a /look/. "Dude. Ask me again in a week. I'll /tell/
you, then. In the meantime, get a grip and stop fuckin' gnawin' on th' open
wounds."

Surprisingly, Salem wilts at the Gnawer's gaze. He drops his eyes, the snarl
vanishing, simply draining away. He leans forward, elbows on knees and head
bent as he rakes his fingers back through his hair. His hands come together
at the back of his head, fingers laced.

Kaz's expression doesn't precisely soften, but it's a lot less hard, once he
looks down. She remains silent, watching him.

Alicia glances up at the two, softly saying. "You think they'll come tho'?
Or was it some fucking sick joke?"

Salem remains quiet, unmoving.

Kaz says, "I don' think you're gettin' any speculation outta /him/. Me, I'm
takin' normal precautions an' I ain't lettin' anyone find me if I can help
it, but y'know, yeah, I think they're mostly just tryin' to fuck with our
heads."

"Excuse me," Salem says abruptly, and he gets up, heading for the bathroom.
On the way, he stumbles over the chair -- twin to the broken one -- that's
sitting there, right by the door, right in plain view. The Walker grunts,
catching himself on the door frame, and then vanishes inside. The door
closes.

Alicia glances over her shoulder to him, then back at Kaz. Sighing, she
twirls a finger in the air. "This has been a rough night, thats for sure. I
hope they don't come for him."

Kaz regards the door fixedly. "Yeah," she tells Alicia, then stands,
abruptly. "Salem. You gonna do somethin' stupid in there?"

In answer, Kaz gets a pair of thuds, as from a fist pounding on the door
from the other side. One, two. Well, he's still alive in there, at least.

Alicia bites her lip from making a rather cruel comment.

"Rrrrrright," mutters Kaz. "I think this might be my cue to book it."

Alicia lets out a breath. "I'd rather you stay.." She says softly. "You
know.. just in case."

Kaz blinks. "Point. I'll make sure some've my folks come hang out after
patrol, too."

Alicia nods her head slowly, then offers a smile. "Thank you Kaz."