undergrounds | stop! ghost time (open post)

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stop! ghost time (open post)

JULY 21; COFFEERS' SHOP (LATE AFTERNOON)

Clara doesn't always snoop around the city and sometimes her work isn't always needed in the school. Sometimes she likes to stay in the shop. Sometimes she enjoys listening to idle conversation of the customers, not really listening in on them, that'll be rude, but nonetheless enjoying the buzz of activity the shop has during their busiest hours.

And sometimes that isn't enough. That's when she goes over and pokes around the lost and found box, seeing what's there and if anything is something that belongs to a current patron she can give back to without them looking. It's there that she finds a pair of marigold gloves during her search and about them draws her to them... Naturally she reaches out to and concentrates a bit to have a goodish grasp of it to see if there's a nametag anywhere when she notices a peculiar thing:

It feels... solid under her touch, real and tangible without the strange numbness to her fingertips she's become accustomed to at this rate. It takes her a second to realise what this means. She can touch them! She can hold them! She can do it with ease, most importantly of all.

Oh, what an exciting day for her as she mutters one little apology under her breath and zips off to the back of the shop with her new item. Already she has a little million ideas for them popping into mind, the excitement of the discovery along with the possibilities just enough to drown out her guilt for taking something out of the lost and found box that isn't hers.

JULY 25; AROUND THE CITY (ALL DAY)

After the last few days of activity, Clara decides it's time to be both proactive and to use her gloves to her advantage.

She'll now be found in areas that she usually doesn't snoop around in her attempts to glean information: The darker parts of the city, the seedier alleyways of the town, and etc. She'll peek through windows and go through walls, doing her best to stay invisible and quiet as a mouse while going through things with a newfound ease thanks to her gloves. (When she can bear the itching for long as she can, of course. Goodness do they chafe her skin.)

From Haringey to Hackney to Waltham Forest and then some, she'll be exploring and peeping into a lot of people today if she can. It's risky but she does her best. If she's to be a good observer of information, she needs to dig deep and hope she finds some things out, see what's going on in the heart of the city.

[ OOC: Or make your own scenario in your comment! Prose and brackets welcomed! A note, though, is that only one person can step in to help Clara get rid of the medium that she'll run into on July 25.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Faolan doesn't really have any particular agenda for the day. In between cases, no clients on the book for the afternoon, he finds himself with free time and well. He's never really much cared for the idea of such a thing. Mostly perhaps because he doesn't really know much what to do with himself when it happens. Not really having that many hobbies, not really much for staying idle, he finds himself wandering. Coffee at this shop, breakfast at another. Finding a seat to sit and enjoy both before wandering more. Idly staring in shop windows. Finding himself lunch. He supposes that this is time that people who had friends might call some of them up and get together to do something, but he's never had that luxury. Not since moving to London, at least. So he'll have to settle for this.

It's around two o'clock, and he's no closer to finding an answer as to what to do with himself than he had been at the start of the day. He seems... Well, lost would be one way to put it. And yet how does one manage to look lost while sitting in one place and knowing exactly where they are? However that happens, Faolan is managing it.

(ooc: let me know if this works/if you need me to change anything? :'Da I AM EXCITED TO FINALLY GET THEM TO RUN INTO EACH OTHER i'm sorry it took me this long!!)

Coffeers' Shop is busy today thanks to the hour, students free from their classes and people taking their breaks mingling with one another as they talked and laughed and gossiped. Generally having a good time having a good time with close friends and loved ones.

Except for Faolan and someone noticed. A young woman, with bright red hair and pretty blue eyes, spots the man all by his lonesome and felt some pity for him. It didn't seem right to leave him all alone. Excusing herself from her gaggle of friends, she takes her untouched coffee and plate of muffins to approach him with a friendly and bright smile.

"Excuse me," she calls out. "Is this seat taken? It's a little hard to find a seat."

At the same time, Clara just happens to phase through one of the walls and spots the Redbright student interacting with someone she doesn't know. Oh! What's Bianca doing here?

She best investigate, she decides as she moves closer to see what's going on but not to be noticed by either party just yest.

Faolan startles slightly. He hadn't expected anyone to approach him, especially not a pretty young woman who is obviously looking for more than a seat. He's not quite certain how much of a conversationalist he's going to end up being, not with how he's been feeling lately, what with all these strange urges to go after flies or squirrels, or the particularly intense way he's been focused on his night hunts lately. But he's not going to turn her down. Turning her away from the seat would look more suspicious than anything. Even if he's pretty sure that she doesn't really need to sit with him, and that she could find another spot, if she really wanted.

"What? Oh, uh. No, go ahead." Well, it's not the greatest, but it's not nothing, he supposes. At least he hasn't been rude. Yet.

The young woman smiles at him and is more than happy to take a seat along with him, unable to stop herself from catching Clara's gaze when she spots the familiar ghost who approaches her to see what this is all about. She smiles at Clara's direction and looks back at him.

"Sorry if this seems sudden and all," she laughs, rubbing the back of her neck. The witch is a social butterfly, always eager to meet people no matter what the occasion or who the person. Sometimes it works out and... sometimes it doesn't. Let's hope this is the case of the former. "It's pretty busy at this time of the afternoon."

"I don't think I've ever seen you here before. And I'm a regular, so!" She takes a sip of her drink, something heavy in sugar and creams that makes Clara nearby comment on with some disapproval. ("That," the ghost mutters dryly, "doesn't really help you stay awake, you know!.) "Trying something new, huh?"

"Something like that," Faolan says, fiddling with his drink slightly before realizing that she's going to talk to him regardless of what sort of a mood he seems to be in, so he should at least try and make an effort, here.

"I like coffee," he says, nodding down to the drink in front of him. A perfectly respectable, traditional flat white, no sugar or added flavoring. He probably could have had something even stronger, but it's not going to be the only coffee of the day, and with his nerves already shot, why tempt fate. "Thought I'd check it out. I get around the city a lot, it's useful to know where all the good coffee spots are."

"So you're a bit of a traveller then." That seems to intrigued Bianca with how her eyes light up, interested. "Fancy yourself as a bit of a coffee connoisseur? I always thought Soho had the best coffee there. A bit expensive but worth the pretty pences on a weekend!"

Clara can't help but think Bianca might be pushing her luck bit and that's saying something with her own personality. She drifts closer to try and advise the witch that maybe her well-meaning attitude is a bit too much when she spots, out of the corner of her eye, a waiter rushing by. She quickly moves forward to avoid hitting him but goes right through Bianca as she's taking a sip of her coffee instead. "Whoops! Bianca, I'm so sorry!"

"Bwurhge aurghah." Bianca winces at the sudden cold taste of coffee on her mouth and she visibly flinches, face a caricature of disgust and shock from both the sudden chill and drop of temperature. The sound she makes is an interesting one: A cross between a dying cat and maybe some untuned harmonics thrown in.

Faolan is halfway between raising his own coffee to his lips when she lets out the sound, and he pauses mid-motion. Coffee half-raised to his lips, eyebrows raised as he watches her. Something had made her make that noise, and that face, and it hadn't been the waiter passing by, and the coffee had been just fine a minute ago. And he's hoping it isn't anything to do with him, for that matter. He's handsome enough, but his personality leaves something to be desired at times -- and yet he's fairly certain he's never disgusted anyone before. Certainly not in casual conversation, while he's not even talking.

"...you okay?" he asks, because at this moment she seems anything but.

Bianca smiles at him apologetically and has not choice but to raise one finger as she tries to keep her coffee. A second, please?

Clara floats by and winces at the sight of the Redbright student trying to down her drink and is glad she manages to succeed despite all odds. "Ooooh! I really need to stop doing that to people. This is why people keep trying to banish me after finding me out."

"--I'm fine," the witch is finally able to say, despite her voice wavering like she's cold. She looks embarrassed at her lapse of manners, feeling silly and having a feeling he must think of her being silly. "Coffee tastes a bit weird all of the sudden and it got really cold out of the blue. Talk about a sugar crash."

"Unless it's the ghost!" A person nearby their table pipes up with this comment, looking at them with interest now. They have a strange device on their table, the screen's number flashing wildly without their notice since they're focusing too much on the two. "She's always causing trouble here! I should know. This place is cursed!"

"Cursed? Don't be silly," Bianca shoots back, looking a bit-- worried? Maybe she doesn't want her tablemate to get a bad impression of the coffee shop here. Maybe the taste lingers on her tongue still.

Faolan glances between the pair of them -- at the man with his device, and at the young girl, who looks distinctly nervous at the mention of ghosts. Whereas Faolan himself can only feel his curiosity rising. "A ghost?" he asks, raising his eyebrows even more, glancing to the other before back at her. She did say that she was a regular, after all, wouldn't she know more about this place than anyone?

It should probably be noted, or at least it is notable to anyone who cares to take such an observation in, that far from being shocked and appalled at such a revelation, Faolan is suddenly sitting forward in his seat. He may not have any supernatural abilities of his own to speak of, but having been a hunter for the last ten years, he is not without his fascinations in the supernatural themselves.

"I'm not that interesting," Clara says in a feeble and unheard attempt to deter people from speaking about it. It's always so strange to hear people speak of her like this, more myth than person.

The man perks up in his seat, pleased that someone is interested in the subject. He holds up the notebook he's doodling one, pointing to one prominent words written there. The Harrowing Spectre "Yeah! There's a ghost. She's been here forever since--"

"--since the shop opened," Bianca finishes for him, looking unimpressed by the person now that she has her wits together. A part of her wants to shut the conversation down for Clara's sake -- since she's starting to look uncomfortable at the direction of the conversation -- but her tablemate here looks interested for once. "It's a bit of an urban legend here in Harrow, really. That there's a ghost haunting the shop."

"And the entire street!" Someone shushes the man, looking annoyed at his volume. "Sorry. Anyways: Did you know that a month or two back that almost five streetlamps exploded in one evening in less than an hour? Just across the shop too."

"Did they really?" Faolan asks, although he's looking more amused at their enthusiasm than he is intrigued by what it is they are saying. Although the mention of a ghost is interesting, he's a hunter, and he's used to this sort of supernatural stuff going on all around him. Besides, there are a million other reasons why streetlamps could explode in one area as well besides there being a ghost in the place, half of them supernatural, half of them perfectly rational.

He glances to the young woman across from him with a wry sort of smile. As if he promises in that look not to join their enthusiastic number, he swears it. Though if anyone's an authority on these happenings, it will probably be her. And from the sounds of it, she's probably the only one to give him anything of a truthful account of things too. Or at least, her version of the truth, anyway.

"They did! Someone filmed it and I have a video of it too." The man begins looking in his bag to pull something out, a laptop maybe, to play the video as Bianca is now more than happy to take a swig of her too cold drink if it gets the taste of dread out of her mouth. "It's not the first time she did this sort of thing, breaking lightbulbs and disrupting technology, but it's fact she blew out multiples is what blows my mind. Usually she only takes out a lightbulb or a streelamp. She took out several for some reason."

"Maybe she was in a bit of a mood," Bianca offers while she tries to take a glance at Clara to quietly ask with her eyes did you really do that?

To which the ghost can only shake her head in reply. "It's a long story, Bianca. Mostly involves another ghost and an interesting chat we had. My friend meant no harm at the time."

"Aw man, I think I forgot my laptop at home." What a stroke of luck! Both Bianca and Clara sigh in relief inwardly, glad that he didn't have that incriminating vi-- "Oh wait! I have my recorder here. Do you guys want to hear her speak?"

What.

Faolan sits forward in his seat, fascinated not only with the man's offer to show his proof, but also at Bianca's reactions to everything he has to say. It's almost as though she has a personal investment in...what? Something about the ghost, if not the ghost itself. Is it this place, maybe? She did say that she was a regular, after all.

"What sort of speech is this, then?" Faolan asks. He glances towards Bianca again and she's looking -- what, alarmed? She's definitely not anticipating whatever it is that this guy has to offer, that's for certain. For all Faolan knows, though, it could be one of those white noise suggestive whispers that any right-minded skeptic would write off right away. He's certainly not seen anything out of the ordinary in this coffee shop. Well, not much anyway.

"Aha! Here it is!"

Bianca looks at the darn recorder with some measured of annoyance but it could be just her annoyed that her conversation with Faolan has been thoroughly hijacked by a third party here. At least he seems quite interested in all of this, detrimental as it maybe for Clara as the man clicks a button and the tape begins to play.

"… swea…" A few false starts here and there but you can hear it, admits the sounds of people chatting in the coffee shop. That's a woman's voice for sure, saying words that can't be mistaken for static or noise. "… sweater… please…

"Please wear… so col…"

"See! It's a ghost!" He looks so happy that he can share this with people now. "See how she mentions being cold? Clearly a spirit still confused being in this realm."

"I resent that remark," Clara can't help but add, wrinkling her noise. Did her accent sound that obvious to other people? She feels a bit self-conscious now. "I'm asking someone to please wear a sweater. The winter was awful! Of course I'll ask someone to please wear a sweater. They could got a cold or something. I hope he doesn't take this too seriously."

"Mmm," Faolan says, making a noise in response to the 'evidence', though he's thinking much the same thing as Clara is saying. Even if it is the recording of a ghost -- which Faolan is not agreeing on one way or the other -- the words are broken, fractured. And by all accounts, it sounds to him like the woman is saying something about how the person she's addressing should wear a sweater since it's cold. Whether or not ghosts would give such advice is hardly for Faolan to decide, he supposes.

"What you have there, my friend," he tells the man, "is the recording of a woman. A woman talking about a sweater, and the fact that it is cold. I cannot tell you that it's a ghost, nor can I tell you that it is one, but you're going to need a lot more evidence than a few words recorded in the middle of a crowded coffee shop. That's hardly an EVP, and certainly not one of merit, I'm sorry to say." And thus does Faolan unintentionally reveal his own dealings with the supernatural. Ah, well. He'd be more careful if they had just let him finish his coffee before starting on this. He wonders, idly, what his companion thinks of all of this, and chances an apologetic glance in her direction.

When one puts it that way, the suddenly strange becomes the mundane with the menacing spirit to a woman fussing over chill. Phew! She's glad someone was able to explain that away before Bianca had to and make herself stand out more. Clara knows it doesn't mean much seeing how he can't seem to hear her, like most people, but all the same she says in relief with utter gratitude, "Thank you so much."

The man visibly wilts at the response, sad but unable to argue with that logic as he grumbles, "Well I thought no one said that when I was recording it."

Bianca doesn't mind at all, judging from the smile she throws at him that's almost grateful.

And though she's happy that the third party's ghost bubble was popped, so to speak, Bianca's eyebrows can't help and raise up in surprise as she looks at Faolan, intrigued to hear him say that type of jargon. Usually she hears it from the mediums and ghost hunters and he doesn't strike her as doing it as a hobby.

"Sounds like you have an idea or two of how this sort of things work," she says, making sure it's with a joking tone so he can brush off if needed. "Not afraid of spooks overhearing this, are you?"

Faolan nods at the man slightly, feeling a little poorly to have shot him down like that, but what he's said is true, and if he's going to go around thrusting his evidence in other people's faces, it had better be good. "Better luck next time, my friend," he tells him, before turning back to the girl sitting with him with a shrug.

"I suppose that I do," he says, honestly, because it's true. He hasn't had all that much experience in ghost hunting, his experience is mostly with vampires and werewolves. Ghosts generally keep themselves to themselves, and if they are terrorizing people, then chances are they're probably not your average ghost in the first place. Much the same as with his dealings with the rest of the supernaturals, Faolan's of the opinion that it's pretty much a case by case sort of a business. Don't do anything wrong, and there's no reason for him to have to come after you.

He glances around them, at the supposed spooks, before back at her. "And no, I'm not too concerned. Even if that were an official EVP, if the ghost is fretting about someone needing a sweater, I hardly think that you and I have anything to worry about, now do we?" There, an innocent enough statement, right? Neither confirming nor denying his involvement with the Hillingdon Clan.

Seeing that their third friend has retreated back to his personal work, muttering about 'more proof' and 'evidence' under his breath as he typed on his laptop frantically, Bianca's smile is much nicer and more relaxed now.

The coolness in the air around Bianca and Faolan's table seems to lighten up as Clara relaxes now that the coast is clear for the time being. She thought she was a goner for sure and someone else would believe in the Harrowing Ghost. (She's never going to get over that name. What a horrid title to get and for that to stick--)

"That's the way to look at it!" Bianca can't help but have her tone be a bit dry despite her perkiness. "She means no harm, I'm sure, but the idea of there being a dangerous ghost, I suppose, is more interesting than a nice ghost. People seem so afraid of things or people that they don't know."

Clara raises her eyebrows at the girl in concern, hoping the student doesn't give herself away too soon in such a public place. "Careful, Bianca. He's a very nice man, yet, but you need to be sure."

She is speaking awfully specifically, for someone who had been uncomfortable with the mention of the ghost earlier. Faolan's a smart man, he's starting to understand something of the picture here. That perhaps there is a ghost here. That perhaps this Bianca might have some sort of a connection with her. Or at least she may believe that she does, as a regular of the place and all. And while she's uncomfortable with the other man's curiosity, it was because he had come to misunderstand the entity, not because he had taken an interest in her in the first place.

"Are you familiar with them, then?" he asks. "Ghosts, I mean? You did say that you were a regular of the place. If the shop is haunted, you must have something of a fancy in them yourself then...?"

Clara and Bianca share a brief blink-and-you-miss exchange of looks as they try to decide if they should be more honest or be more obtuse. There's no turning back on what will happen next after all. Can they trust him? Can they hope for the best that he means well in a way that doesn't involve trouble for Clara or a danger for Bianca down the line?

There's only one way to find out.

"It isn't what I would call a fancy, really," Bianca says as she sneaks a look around to make sure someone isn't eavesdropping on them. She wouldn't be worried of it if not for their friend earlier. "Just happens to be knowledge in it along with all sort of other things. London has all sorts of secrets here thanks to how long its been around. I like to think I know a lot of them is all."

That's quite a brag for someone young-looking as hers. "And you? Do you consider your knowledge of EVP and such just a 'fancy' or more?"

Faolan regards her for a moment, trying to figure her out. Whatever she's just told him, she hasn't outright told him yet. But he's gotten enough from her to understand that she knows. She might not know everything, but she knows enough for him not to have to worry about being careful around her. Or conversely, for him to watch just what exactly he lets out. Depending on who might come to find this out through her later on.

"I'd say it's a bit more than a fancy," he says, taking a sip of his coffee, and then deciding to take the safest route he can. Leaving the Hillingdon part out of it for now -- that can make people nervous, and really, he's not one of the clan that would go hunting something down for no reason. So instead he reaches into his jacket and pulls out a card, sliding it across the table at her. It's got his name (Faolan O'Neill) and his contact information (phone, email), but little else. Written in black ink on a white card. Plain and simple.

"I'm a private investigator," he says. "I guess you could say that this side of things is sort of my specialty."

"I never heard of his name in the school," Clara observes quietly as Bianca takes the card to read whatever information is there. She hovers behind her shoulder to peer though all she gets is a name and contact numbers that she can't use for now. "Must work for some other people. Or he could be a freelancer. I actually hope it's the former; the rates he must have to pay if the latter, poor thing."

Biting back a smile, Bianca decides at long last how to handle this as she sets the card back down and looks at Faolan. "Explains earlier then with him over there."

Bianca looks down and fishes something from under her blouse to discreetly flash him the item to give him a good look.

It's a simple neck, a silver disc with intricate symbols carved on its surface, and to most they would just assume it's a pretty trinket and nothing more. But anyone who is in the know would know what it really is -- A witch's amulet, meant to protect the wearer from the supernatural's attempts to read or control her mind.

"You can never be too careful at times after all," she continued as she tucked the necklace back in. "Especially considering your line of work in this city. Quite a specialisation for you to take."

Faolan shrugs slightly. "I guess you could say it ran in the family," he says, although he leaves it at that. Also to be noted: past tense. Ran in the family, then his family died. There had been a reason they'd encouraged him to pursue his talents, his dreams. There'd been a reason why they had died. There had been a reason why his dreams had died with them, as far as he was concerned.

Unlike Bianca, Faolan doesn't have anything to pull out and denote himself as what he is, except for perhaps his guns and his hunting gear, which he's definitely not whipping out in the middle of a crowded cafe. But he obviously recognizes what she's wearing, and he immediately reassesses her. "Now where'd you come by a trinket like that?" he asks her, letting her hide it away once more, but definitely not letting it out of mind.

"It came from your grandmother, didn't it?" Clara asked Bianca as the witch tucked her necklace from sight. "I believe you told me that before."

The girl nods, to both answer Clara's question and Faolan's question. She's much more relaxed compared to her peppiness before, perhaps realising the gravity of meeting another person not from her well-known circle. Someone familiar and yet not familiar at the same time. "It's a family heirloom. Got it from my gran. I guess you can say what I do runs in the family too. I need a bit of help with it though since I'm new to it so I go to a school to help myself and others."

The Redbright Institute, she means.

"Ah," Faolan says, making a soft noise of recognition. He might not attend the school, but he's been a hunter for a long time not to have heard of the Institute. A lot of cogs start shifting into place. "I know of the place. Never been myself, but I know of it."

And he knows what that makes her then, too. And what that makes her capable of. Eventually, if perhaps not now. He lowers his voice slightly as he continues, raising his coffee to take another sip. "That means you'd know, of course, if that man were lying or not. About a presence in this shop." He raises an eyebrow at her questioningly, although he hasn't outright asked. It's her choice of course whether he wants to tell the truth. But he's become pretty good at reading people, over the years. He's had to, with the line of work he's in.

stop! ghost time (open post)

July 25; Around the City

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