(no subject)

[manofbusiness]

Childermass is at a table, his ragged and mismatched set of cards in his hand, laying out a tarot spread.

Whatever it's telling him doesn't seem entirely to his liking, as his eyes flick from card to card and his frown deepens.

Comments

[electro_kinetic]

"Didn't pull the inside straight, hm?" Noriko asks, pulling her hair up to twist it into a sort of topknot at the back of her head with a kanzashi clip--it conforms to her calendar, being a chrysanthemum for October.

[manofbusiness]

He mutters something under his breath, then gathers the cards together and looks up at her.

"Evening."

[electro_kinetic]

"Nah, man, it's like five-thirty where I came from," she says. "In the morning."

And she's pretty nicely put together for that hour, too. "Nice try, though."

[manofbusiness]

"You must be an early riser", he says, glancing her over casually. "Many would not choose to ever see that hour."

[electro_kinetic]

She shrugs. "Comes with the territory," Noriko says. "Can't sleep more than like three hours, four if I'm absolutely exhausted."

[manofbusiness]

He nods in acceptance of that. "All are different, I suppose. Maybe that is enough for you."

[electro_kinetic]

"It's not by choice," she laughs. "It's a side-effect of my mutation."

[manofbusiness]

That gets a raised eyebrow, and a glance at her hair - because he does at least know what the word means.

"Mutation?"

[electro_kinetic]

"What, you thought I did the lightbulb impression for the hell of it?" she asks. And she is, faintly, glowing around the eyes.

[manofbusiness]

"In this place", he says dryly, "I should not like to draw any conclusions about anybody."

[electro_kinetic]

"It's a genetic mutation. In essence I function as a lightning rod."

[manofbusiness]

He leans back to look at her more carefully at that, eyebrows rising.

"At no risk to yourself?"

[electro_kinetic]

"Nope, no detriment to me," she says. "It barely tickles at a hundred thousand amperes. Voltage is inconsequential mostly."

[capture_eternity]

There is a tall young man of very refined clothing, and he is watching Childermass and his cards with a smile that contains both amusement and fascination.

"If I may be so bold," he finally says, "but what do the cards tell you?"

[manofbusiness]

He gets a glance that seems to take him in completely in a moment, and judge him a little unfavourably for being a dandy gentleman.

"Something I am not sure I fully understand."

[capture_eternity]

"Don't they always?" the dandy gentleman says. "I was once told that the cards are always vague, and we are the ones who have to make sense of them; if we do that, they are able to tell us all the stories there are in the world."

[manofbusiness]

"To me, they usually make more sense than this." He shuffles them in his hand. "But I may not yet have all the information."

[capture_eternity]

"What do they tell you?" the dandy gentleman asks, curious.

[manofbusiness]

"Change is coming. That is certain." He shakes his head. "But I do not understand what they tell me as to why."

[capture_eternity]

"Because the world exists, time passes, and things always change?" the dandy gentleman suggests.

[manofbusiness]

That gets him a sharply irritated look.

"The cards would not bother to warn me about the normal small changes of life."

[capture_eternity]

"But the large changes and cataclysms are part of nature as well," the dandy says."And those small changes may seem quite large to the people caught in their midst."

[manofbusiness]

"Then they are not small changes to those experiencing them, are they." He shakes his head. "What matters is what the querent asks."

[capture_eternity]

"But you know what you asked," the dandy gentleman says. "Or did you ask too vaguely?"

[manofbusiness]

"I may not yet know the proper question. Or be equipped to understand the answer." He tries to phrase. "If I ask who will cause this change, and I have not yet met him..."