undergrounds | you don't have to let it go away

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you don't have to let it go away

{ A - Closed to Faust }

She's not sure she's ever felt so defeated before. Yes, she's physically hurt more than she has been in a while, but her emotional state is even worse. All she can think of is how her weakness directly led to someone's death, how her lack of experience had cost an innocent boy's life. And as for Akane... well, Maera can't think of her without immediately becoming enraged, so she's trying not to let the Seelie fae cross her mind. Her rage doesn't allow her to think clearly - it makes everything into a haze, makes her more likely to make mistakes and lash out at those who don't deserve it.

Simply put, she's not feeling good. Broken, tired, and more than a little humiliated, she makes her way to Faust's clinic first, not wanting to go home just yet. After all, that would require explaining to her mother the nature of her injuries, and she's definitely not ready to relive the experience. She doesn't think she ever will be. Entering the clinic, she sighs as she sees the several people gathered in the waiting room, but sits down in a chair anyway. To pass the time until she's called for, she takes a clinical stock of her injuries, checking the time every few minutes in anticipation of being treated.

{ B - Closed to Kenzi }

Thank goodness she doesn't get seasick.

After a couple hours of bobbing up and down in the Thames, Maera's anger has worn out. The glass around her shows no sign of the barrage she'd doled out in her rage, and she's come to a sort of acceptance that she's stuck here for the time being. Stuck in a knee-high pool of alcohol that smells terrible enough to make her want to retch. She's been trying to make a list of all the good things about her situation, and despite the list being only one item long, she's already starting to feel calmer.

That is, until the bottle knocks against the riverbank. She groans as she's thrown against the side of the bottle, her already-injured body protesting and the beer sloshing around up to her waist. But after she picks herself up, she realizes that she can see feet traipsing by the river, which must mean that she's close to people. There's hope for her.

"Help me!" she cries out, rocking up onto her tiptoes to see outside the glass as much as she can. After a moment, she slaps her hand over her mouth, realizing the dilemma she's in. She definitely needs help, but she'll get into loads much trouble with the Night Council if a random mortal picks her up.

After one more bump of the bottle agains the side of the river, she's made her decision. After getting to her feet again and (unsuccessfully) trying to squeeze the beer out of her hair, she yells out, "can anyone hear me? I'm in the bottle down here!"

{ C - Open to All }

It's been a terrible month, to say the least. To make up for the time she spent in that accursed bottle, she's taking on a lot more work than usual, and she's hard-pressed to find time in her day for a break. On top of that, her injuries still haven't healed properly, and her pride is even more severely damaged. Put it all together, and Maera is moodier than ever as the month comes to its close.

Oddly enough, when she does get some spare time, she doesn't frequent her usual cafes and bookstores. Instead, she pays visits to Redbright Institute, watching the kids in summer camp run around outdoors during their time for sports. She wanders through clothing stores to look for new fashion for the winter season. She can even be found in Bromley and Bexley, finding secluded places to work on her magic. She's moodier than usual, but will try to put on a nice enough face when running into someone. "--oh. Hi. How are you?"

{ D - Wildcard }

ooc; leave me a prompt and i'll respond!

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Thankfully, Maera's turn came fairly quickly -- probably helped along by the fact that the staff were familiar with her. "Maera Perkins," called one of the assistants, a girl with dark hair. Her name was Penny, and because she worked at a rather unusual clinic, she was a witch herself.

"Please come with me." She'd lead Maera to a room past the ordinary exam room, where Faust was waiting with Maera's file.

"Ms. Perkins," he said, looking even more tired than usual. Still, he managed a smile. "Gotten yourself into a spot of trouble?"

"Just a bit," she admits with a wan smile, sitting on the examination table in the room with a slight wince. "You know how the job is."

That's right. She's going to blame all of this on the job.

"I'm sorry to hear it. Please, sit down and we'll get started right away," he said, motioning over to the examining table.

"I hope you won't mind me mentioning, but things have finally started off on the right track around here. I was starting to feel as though I'd be spinning my wheels forever."

"Oh, no, it's fine." She gives him a little smile, shrugging her shoulder. "How are things getting better for you?" Because that's the polite thing to ask, no matter how tired she is.

"I told you about my wife, didn't I?" he asked, clearly more cheerful than usual. "I'd given up trying to contact her, assuming that she'd moved over. But I realized my assumptions were incorrect.

"I summoned her, Miss Perkins -- in this very clinic! Now I know that I'm on the right track! I'll be able to bring her back. Not just summon her spirit, but really, truly bring her back to life!"

Hmm. Hmm. That sounded like a potentially dangerous and maybe not advisable idea?

Her mouth goes dry almost immediately at his statement. After a moment, she swallows, shakes her head, then speaks again. "I'm-- what did you-- you're bringing your wife back to life?"

"Yes," he said emphatically. What a wonderful plan. What a wonderful day. Sure, Eliza didn't strictly want to be brought back to life but DETAILS.

"You've no idea how much this means to me. After all these years..."

"But- if she's dead, she should stay dead. You shouldn't mess around with things like that," Maera warns, her eyebrows knotted together.

"Stay dead," repeated Faust. "My wife should stay dead."

The words were an echo of what his relatives had told him. His colleagues. Those traitorous Daybreak witches -- those serene incompetents with their condescending smiles and platitudes about how much better he'd feel once he'd accepted that when you took a bullet to the brain, the only real thing to do was dump you in a box and toss some dirt on top of you and let the worms have you even if you were beautiful and sweet and kind and hurt no one on God's green Earth.

"And what would you know about it? My beautiful Eliza should stay dead? Why should she lie in the cold, while all the world's refuse can stroll about in the sunlight? But you can afford to mouth those platitudes, you

ignorant swine.

What do you know of loss? What do you know of dying?"

Somehow he'd gone from 0 to 60 in approximately no time flat, and was now out-and-out raving. Eerie, pale green light suffused the room, summoned up from the pentagram etched onto the floor.

"But I'll teach you to keep that foul mouth of yours shut. I'll fix your little red wagon."

Maera's already jumped off the examination table at this point, hands raising as if she even has the slightest glimmer of strength left in her to protect herself from anything he might try to do. "Look, I'm- I'm sorry you're angry!" she says first, looking around herself in surprise at the change of lighting in the room. "Please don't get mad. I just- don't agree with you."

The words seemed to calm Faust; he relaxed slightly, voice lowering a notch or two in volume. "Is that so? You're sorry?"

Was the storm averted? Was everything... okay?

Suddenly, brilliant light filled the room,; when it cleared, Faust was holding one (1) bottle of Château Latour, filled not with wine but with a half-fairy. He burst from the door of the examination room, leaving his assistant to stare at his wake as he left from the back door of the clinic.

It takes her a moment to realize exactly what's happened. She stares down at the floor - which is now glass, and filled up to her knees in foul-smelling alcohol - before everything clicks together.

The scream she lets out isn't polite. It's long, and loud, and if he looks down at the bottle, he'll see that she isn't keeping up her usual human appearance, that she's starting to look more feral and wild. This is Maera angry. This is her trying to break through the bottle with what little strength she has left.

TOO LATE (and way too far gone, in Faust's case). He may have noted the change in her appearance, but let it never be said that he didn't have follow-through.

The clinic was close to the Thames, and what better place for a nasty, screaming bottle of fae than the river? It was almost poetic in a way, like casting a message out to sea in hopes of an answer. Maybe it would flow west -- all the way west, to the North Sea! Maybe he'd get an answer in the form of another screaming bottle!

With a cry of his own, half-scream, half-roar, he heaved the bottle into the river (not without getting some stares).

"Hmmm?" Cooper looks up from updating his Instagram on his phone at who he thought was speaking to him. He racks his brain for a long moment but he can't place the girl's face. "Sorry, darling. I think you've got me confused with someone else."

He sincerely hopes she's not one of those young hanger-on human types that skulk around the nest. They're good for a bite now and again, but aside from their willingness to be fed upon, they're downright annoying little creatures.

She blinks in surprise, actually looking up at the person she's talking to before giving out an embarrassed chuckle. "I'm so sorry. I think I'm just on- some sort of polite autopilot right now." She shakes her head, but continues earnestly, "it is nice to meet you, though."

"I think I've had a few weeks like that." Or maybe a year or two back around the turn of the last century. Who was really counting? Living forever, life could start to get frightfully dull after a certain point. All the days started to look the same and it was easy just to have them blur together. "Likewise. Name's Cooper." He moves his cell phone from right hand to his left one so he can shake her's properly.

"Good to know I'm not the only one," she says with a little smile as she shakes his hand. "Cooper. I'm Maera Perkins. Now that I know your name, can I ask how you are?"

"Better'n most an' not as good as some," he replies in a flippant answer that says absolutely nothing at all. At least it's better than just answering "Good" like anyone else would do. He's friendly enough with those he's just met, but he'll leave any real talk for when he gets to know her better.

One of the waitresses, Cindy, approaches the table that Maera occupies by herself with Clara 'sitting' on the chair next to the fae. She slides a drink, probably a favourite of Maera's or a popular drink of theirs in the shop, on the table despite the fact this one wasn't ordered.

"My treat," Cindy said with a friendly smile before drifting off to attend to the other customers.

Clara looks at the drink with surprise on her face and is quick to raise her hands just in case. "To let you know now: I didn't influence her to do that or anything like that. She can't hear me but I'm sure she noticed how under the weather you've been."

For a good reason. Clara is worried for Maera. Of course she's worried for her ever since the murder -- What else could they call the poor death but that? -- of poor Ellis some weeks ago. The Redbright school is reeling from it, the staff horrified the boy died such a death and the students wondering, quietly and aloud, if Daybreak could really protect them after that.

The ghost is worried over a lot of things but Maera takes priority at the moment. So she does her best to cheer her up or, at the very least make her comfortable here. "Do you want me to sneak you a muffin? Karl made them."

Maera gives her a small smile, reaching for the drink with a quiet shrug. "I don't mind if you did or didn't. It's a nice gesture of hers either way." It's hard for her to keep up being polite when she's so angry - with the world and with herself - but she feels like she owes it to herself and Clara to at least try.

So when Clara offers her a muffin, she smiles again, this time putting more effort into it. "I'd like that, please."

And Clara is off in a pinch to get her something from the tray that's just coming out of the kitchen, freshly baked and carried by a very busy Karl. It isn't too hard to make one look like it 'fell' but bringing it back is a little bit trickier.

She handles it to the best of her abilities, sinking into the floor to keep the cupcake from view and dodging feet and furniture to keep it clean. It is exhausting due to balancing her powers of being tangible just enough to hold the confectionary but intangible enough to sink to the ground? Of course. It is rewarding since it could mean being one step closer to making a friend of hers happyish? Naturally.

So while one of the employees takes pause and takes stock of the tray he had just brought out, one muffin suddenly finds itself on Maera's table. Clara looks tired but her smile is still there, hopeful this helps out somehow. "Sorry it took so long! I keep forgetting how busy the shop is around these hours. It's certainly rather noisy."

"It's- it's okay." Seeing how much trouble Clara went to for one muffin is already making Maera feel bad enough. She picks at the top of it, letting the sugary bit sit on her tongue and melt away. "Thank you for this. I'm sorry for causing trouble. I'm just..." She thinks for a moment, then lets out a long breath. "I'm just a mess right now."

"Please don't say sorry," Clara insisted in the most gentle way she could, "I'll always be willing to do these sort of things for you."

They're friends after all. If Maera could be there for Clara when she was too sick to leave the bed for a month, then Clara can be there for Maera when she's recovering from an even worse month. "You-- You tried, Maera. You and Ekko."

"Yeah. We tried. And then we failed." She lifts a shoulder, staring into her drink instead of at Clara. "And then Ellis died directly because of that. Because I was no match for Akane."

"You know she won't get away with this," Clara said, doing her best to find a silver lining under the dark clouds they found themselves in.

She already alerted the school to the incident the moment she found out about it and she's planning to inform some of those higher up in the chain. This will not go quietly into the night if she can help it. "Akane won't get away with this scottfree. You and Ekko tried so hard-- That'll be recognised by the others. They won't be angry with you."

"But I'll be angry with me," she says softly, frowning up at her friend. "Like - I am angry with myself. Really, properly angry. And I'm- I'm keeping control of it like Dad said I should, but it's hard, Clara. I don't know what I should even be doing at this point."

Clara looks away in shame when she recalls the events of Ellis' death, wondering if maybe she could have done something-- No. What they need to do is focus on the now and what could be done later for everyone else, she decides. That's a good step, isn't it?

"What you need to do is rest and recover." She tries to reach out to touch her friend's hand, needing to focus a bit so her hand would feel solid and not that cold. "You've had such a rough month."

She lets Clara take her hand, appreciating the gesture, but it's not enough to soothe her in any major way. "I swear, I'm resting. I just- I need something to do. To feel like... I'm making things better somehow. You know what I mean? I can't- I can't stand myself just lying around doing nothing."

Oh, Clara has a feeling she's going to be in trouble over this but-- Seeing her friend hurt, thanks to her mostly, is enough to make her think that the punishment will be worst it.

Giving a phantom gesture that's supposed to be a squeeze of her hand, she leans forward to whisper, "You-- You don't have to not do anything. If you're resting from work then maybe you can help out a bit with the school? They're... They're planning to expand the territories. To make another safe zone."

More safe zones meant more chances for others to find safety in an area if in trouble. More chances that something like earlier wouldn't happen again. "It's still up in the air, we're still looking at places, but if we go ahead with it then maybe you could... help?"

Kenzi is sitting at a bench on the edge of the Thames nursing a hangover behind a pair of truly oversize sunglasses with a huge coffee. She's somewhere between passing out and complaining about behind alive when she spots the bottle floating down the river and thinks to herself: fucking litterbugs, when she sees a little someone inside the bottle pounding against the glass.

...That is what she's seeing. Right?

"I'm so not drunk enough for this," she complains, as if chastizing whatever hallucination she is seeing. Because tiny people in bottles floating down the Thames is not a thing.

Kenzi stands, coffee still in hand and walks closer to the edge while keeping up with the flow of the river itself.

Yep. That's definitely a tiny person in a bottle.

"Uh...," how exactly is she supposed to rescue her? Kenzi doesn't want to go swimming!

They see her. They've got to be seeing her. There's no other reason for one pair of feet to be following her slow movement down the river. "Hello? Can you hear me?"

After a moment of consideration, she jams her shoulder hard into the side of the bottle. Despite the pain, her bottle does change direction slightly, heading towards some steps that lead straight into the river. For now, the current isn't pulling her too quickly, so whoever it is can easily lean over and pick her up. Hopefully.

"Oh ewewewewieew."

Kenzi chants it as she traipses down the steps and plucks the bottle from the water. She pinches the lip of it between two fingers and holds it at arms length.

And then really gets a good look at the little person inside and her eyes immediately dart to the kids sitting on the stares looking at her like she has a second head.

"Save the planet, don't litter!" She shouts it before tucking the bottle in her jacket and running away.

"Ugh I'm totally burning this outfit." Everyone in the world knew how nasty this river was. And she just rubbed it all over her clothes. Once she was tucked into a little alley meant for a dumpster, Kenzi took out the bottle.

"Dude how did you even?"

Obviously she means 'how did you get into the bottle' but leave it to Kenzi to not extrapolate.

Running is an altogether unpleasant experience, Maera decides. Luckily, it doesn't last long before she's taken out of the pocket and held up to a woman's face, someone she vaguely remembers from Lammas. Good - hopefully she's not any random mortal, then.

"I got cursed," she says, trying to sound more informative than angry. If she blows her fuse now, she won't be any use, and she needs to focus on helping herself get out of here. "I need someone to un-curse me. If- if you could help me, that'd be really nice." After a pause, she adds on, "I'm sorry about the grossness." Because she's seen a little too close-up how disgusting the river is.

"Worry about it later. I... I can't do anything for you here. It's too public."

Kenzi frowns, sympathy written all over her face as she says it because this is a really shitty curse. But a badass one too; she's going to try to ask who did it so she can get some tips.

"Would you hate me if I hid you in my jacket on the Tube? I need to go to Enfield."

It's where her coven's workshop is and Kenzi thinks she might need some help on this one.

She rolls her eyes, even though that's rude, and slumps against the side of the bottle. "No, it's fine. I mean- you can do whatever you'd like as long as you think it'll help."

Not that she can do much to stop her. Maera's never really been this vulnerable before, and she decides then and there that she doesn't like it at all. "What's in Enfield? Or- who?"

"My uh....office?"

Kenzi sounds as if that's the first time she's actually said that and she's testing it out. She doesn't want to take Maera to her personal workshop, but she can't work this curse unless she has some supplies.

Even if she doesn't like the hesitance with which Kenzi says the world, she doesn't have a lot of choice in the matter. "Sounds good enough to me," she decides with a nod. "Let's go. Please."

Kenzi holds Maera inside her jacket and smuggles her onto the tube and towards Enfield. She'll be taking Maera to the Seven Sisters where she and the other Midnight witches are fronting as people working in a psychic shop. It's a little on the nose, as far as Kenzi is concerned, but it's almost so stupid it's brilliant. Almost.

Kenzi takes her into her own little corner of the workshop in the back on the groundfloor and gently places her on a table. Hopefully the ride wasn't too awful.

"Okay! Let's see what we're working with."

Kenzi studies the bottle Maera is trapped in with her chin against the table and her nose mere inches from the bottle. It's not a flattering angle, but then she isn't interested in looking pretty right now. Kenzi enjoys puzzles and this is one that she's eager to crack.

"Do you think you could fit out of the neck? Or maybe I should break it?"

To say that it's been a terrible month for Faolan as well is a bit of an understatement. With the lack of any steady sort of casework -- he tells himself that it's just a slow month, that people must be vacationing, enjoying their last few weeks of official summer before kids go back to school and universities start up again, although he isn't certain how much that's fooling anyone. At least he's got the Guardian gig to fall back on but that's not exactly steady employment either. And considering his only other talent besides his work as a Private Investigator is -- no. He's not going to even think about it.

So there he finds himself, parked on a bench Danson Park since he might as well (he's in the area), an ever-present coffee in his hands, intent on keeping himself to himself -- much the same reason that she's there really. To find some sort of an escape. Unfortunately for the pair of them, they seem to have sought out the same spot. And Faolan for one has no intentions of vacating elsewhere.

"...I'm not in your seat, am I?" he asks, looking up at the newcomer. It's becoming a decidedly familiar greeting, to strangers.

Maera purses her lips, just a little pissed off. Not that she really has any right to be. It takes her a moment to set her jaw and bite back a genuinely irritated response. "No, it's fine. I don't think anyone can really claim a public seat. And anyway, you got here first."

It's a polite, clipped smile she gives him as she stuffs her hands in the pockets of her jacket. And then she leans against the arm of the bench lightly, almost perching on it. "You don't mind, do you? I just... need to be here."

Faolan's gotten pretty good at reading facial expression and body language throughout the years. You have to be, if you want to stay alive, with the job(s) he has. He can tell that he's obviously annoyed her simply by being there. But he's never been a pushover, or a gentleman for that matter -- why start now?

"No, go ahead," he says, sipping his coffee for a moment, swirling the words she's said around in his head, getting a flavor of them as much as he's getting a flavor of the coffee in his mouth. He turns slightly in his seat, knowing that he's hardly been invited to do so -- hell, he'd hate it if someone were to come up and start bothering him if he were wanting a quiet moment alone. Though he can't help asking, "'Need' to be here?"

"Yeah," she replies immediately, because it's easy to answer his question blandly rather than give him a reason. After a few moments, she feels bad, though. It's not fair for her to be snippy with others just because she's in a bad mood. So she tries to put her compulsion into words. "You know when... when you need to reconnect with something so you're trying from a different angle? That's what I mean by needing to be here. If that makes any sense."

Faolan raises his eyebrows slightly, shifting his coffee into one hand so that he can reach another up to scratch through the stubble on his face. "Not...exactly," he says, although he does look apologetic as he does at least. He even goes on to apologize, in his own way. "Sorry. I've had a bit of a shit time of things lately. Makes it hard to make sense of things. I came out here for..." He doesn't even know really. It's certainly out of the way.

He shrugs slightly. "To get away, I suppose," he says at last. He glances up at her. "Is it anything like that, that you could mean? Or am I way off of the mark?" He quirks a corner of his mouth up into a half smile. "You're allowed to tell me if I am."

"Tell me about it," she says, a touch more sympathy in her voice. At least she wasn't the only one down in the dumps. "August was terrible. September had better not be half as bad."

Maera looks back at him when he asks his question, her own lips quirking up slightly. "Kind of... completely the opposite of what you're saying, actually." But he gets credit for actually making her smile a little. "I'm trying to make this feel like home. It's a little difficult, to say the least."

"Trying to make this feel like home," he says, looking around them at the park and raising his eyebrows slightly. "How literal are you meaning, here?" he asks, turning back to her with the same, eyebrows-raised expression. "London? Bexley? Or...?" He raises a hand and gestures to the greenery just beyond them.

It's obvious that he's not from around there himself. His accent is Irish through and through, nothing like the local flavor, despite having spent near a decade in the area now. He knows what it's like to uproot yourself somewhere new, to have to try and make it feel like your home even when it isn't. He's not sure whether that's what she's getting at, though. He'll just have to find out, he supposes.

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you don't have to let it go away

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ignorant swine.

"But I'll teach you to keep that foul mouth of yours shut. I'll fix your little red wagon."

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C

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[ D - THE COFFEE SHOP ]

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C/D! -- let me know if this is alright? :')a

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