open to hillingdon.

[specifiercity]

Sometime in early June, some posters start appearing in the halls of Hillingdon house. They read CLAN MEETING at the top in big bold letters, with the date, time, and location of the meeting below. Arthur's not looking to give a lot away here, but he tells a few people about it and how important it is to attend, hoping that the word will spread through the faction.

Arthur doesn't know what to anticipate. So far it's been a lot of stand-offish hunters and shifters, and they might not be eager to participate in an initiative that unites them and begets communication. Arthur was like that too, but now there's a need to be prepared and a need to act; getting the information out there is important.

JUNE 7

People are late, of course. Arthur waits until it seems like people have stopped filtering in to start, waiting patiently at the front of one of Hillingdon House's grand ballrooms. He doesn't like being the center of attention, but he's been the lead on more than a few military briefings and debriefings in his day, so he's not totally out of his element in front of everyone there.

He starts with a small introduction, explaining that he's been with the clan for about a year and a half and before that he was in the US military. He leaves out the bit about his special-ops vampire-killing team, of course, but the fact is that he was trained to kill by the biggest military complex in the world.

He then goes on to explain why he called the meeting, telling everyone that Millicent has been murdered - just to get them all on the same page - and that she's been replaced by a far worse leader. Raymond Harris' new rules that Islington's vampires are allowed to feed on locals and that shapeshifter kills are reason enough for Hillingdon to start getting a little more pro-active, not to mention the fact that he'll allow children to be turned now. It's critical for Hillingdon to be prepared, not only for the inevitable rise in bounties, but for a more aggressive vampire population in general.

Not only that, it's critical for the faction to start sharing information between members a little more freely now. Information and skills.

He invites anyone who has more information to speak, and says that he'll offer anyone who wants them some extra training on marksmanship, shooting, hand-to-hand combat, any of the skills he has. He makes it clear that he's not looking for Hillingdon to go on a hunt - they don't need to be tracking down innocent vampires and killing them for sport - but it's time that they become a little more unified so they can use their skills to help deal with this if it gets worse.

[Please use the appropriate headers below if you character wanted to speak up during Arthur's presentation or for mingling! You can also start threads if you want to consolidate any threads that come up as a result of this, so skill sharing etc. If you have any questions feel free to PM me or to plurk me at dreamalittlebigger!]

Comments

SHARE WITH THE GROUP

[specifiercity]

Arthur asks if there are any questions, or if anyone has anything to share with the group while everyone's paying attention. He's patient, so he'll wait in silence a little while before someone to contribute before he moves on.

[constantprisoner]

[Why does he feel the need to make himself noticed?]

So, are you offering classes, or is this a one on one deal?

[specifiercity]

[Arthur shrugs a shoulder casually, like he hasn't made up his mind about that yet.]

I was thinking one-on-one, just to be less conspicuous. It's not like carrying this stuff around is exactly legal in the regular government's eyes.

[constantprisoner]

Fair enough. It's not exactly a time to be drawing attention to ourselves.

[As if any time is for him.]

What would you say is the least conspicuous thing to carry?

[specifiercity]

[Arthur takes a deep breath and tilts his head while he thinks the question over.]

Basic handgun is probably the easiest to conceal. Depending on how much you trust it not to go off, it might be easier to carry a small stake.

POST-PRESENTATION

[specifiercity]

After they break, Arthur hangs around, gathering up any documents he has sitting with him and waiting for people to approach him if they want to.

ota

[constantprisoner]

[As a shapeshifter, Sirius is less than thrilled by this news. While he's certainly rather tolerant of other supernatural races, one of the main reasons he ran away from home so long ago, he's never really been able to reconcile his feelings about vampires. With good reason, he's always justified, considering what could happen to him should things go south for him.

He agrees that they need to be prepared, and is all for unity, and finds himself curious about the extra training. Granted he probably just needs training in general. Any skills he might have had would be extremely rusty, and he's typically been getting by with trying to talk his way out of the situation and then running. Or just running.

He hangs around after the meeting, trying to find the best way to start that conversation.]

[anniesgonemad]

Hi. [Annie's sidled up to Sirius after the meeting, moving nearly silently.] I, ah, wanted to see how you're doing...? With... everything.

[Annie wasn't really good at being subtle.]

[constantprisoner]

[If Sirius is surprised (which he is, a little), he doesn't show, and instead offers a smile.]

Hey. I'm doing alright, all things considered. Not that this recent news is thrilling.

[anniesgonemad]

[Annie nods, slowly.]

All things considered.

[No, it's not thrilling. It's awful. There's another literal price on Sirius' head.]

If... If you need another place to go... you can let me know? My grandmother- she's got a nice place. It's where I usually live. [When she wasn't with Finnick.] There's a lot of extra room.

Faolan | OTA

[reticence]

Faolan is still a bit uncertain as to the general feeling of the Clan towards him, and thus has hung back away from the demonstrations for the most part. It should be noted however that he is in attendance and he does speak up here and there, though he lets Arthur run the event. It had been the other man's idea after all, and one that he approved of, at that.

It's after the meeting is over that Faolan hangs around himself, available to answer any questions if anyone wants to ask them of him, or offer any demonstrations one-on-one that a person should care to take. He has a set of weapons set out beside him, for the purposes of demonstration itself, knowing that not everyone will be familiar with such combat as some of the more senior members of the clan like himself are.

He is trying to make himself as available as possible to the lot of them, especially after what he knows was a serious offense in surprising them with the whole Guardian thing. Vampires, he thinks warily to himself. It just had to be the vampires.

[roddy_reinigen]

Eventually, Roddy approached the table, not really sure how to approach the subject. His eyes skimmed over the various weapons on the table as he considered what he was going to say.

"So I don't really have a lot of fighting experience..."

Aside from some fighting with classmates which, honestly, was so far from the level of fighting a vampire it wasn't even worth mentioning it.

"But if they're going after shifters now, I figured I should probably learn some stuff."

[reticence]

Faolan nods in greeting. He's spoken to him once or twice before, when he'd been trying to get the general sentiment of the Clan. Back before he'd taken part in the defense against the vampires. Back before the Guardianship had been revealed. At least, he thinks to himself, Roddy hadn't been one of the ones to be outspoken in his displeasure in that. Which didn't mean, of course, that he couldn't still be displeased.

"Alright," he responds. "It's Roddy, isn't it? What sort of experience do you have then?" Because it's better to start from the ground up, in Faolan's view.

[roddy_reinigen]

"Um...I got in a fight at school once. Other than that? None."

He was a shifter, not a hunter, and he was a scavenger at that. While a rat might hunt the occasional insect or bird, their instincts mostly revolved around fleeing and finding easy food, not around fighting. At least, not until they had to. That didn't mean Roddy couldn't learn to fight, of course, it just meant that Faolan would be starting from scratch.

ota

[roddy_reinigen]

Roddy had spent the meeting at the back of the room, listening intently. Honestly, what he heard was terrifying, but he'd heard rumors lately that made him think something was up. People going missing, vampires targeting shifters…and this brought it all together. Gave him the information on why now and how bad the situation was really getting. It was good to know, and enough to make Roddy decide he really needed to learn some basic self-defense.

After the meeting he hung out a bit, debating if he wanted to approach someone. He wasn't used to getting involved, or looking into weapons, or really considering too deeply if he'd have to get in a fight at all, but it looked as if he'd have to start worrying about those things now. At least, he would if he wanted a fighting chance if he should happen to run into the ever increasing amounts of trouble that came seeking people out anymore.

So he'd probably have to approach someone. He'd lurk around a bit, watching and listening to the people around him before he'd commit to doing so, though.

[dirtyredneck]

Daryl hadn't exactly made his thoughts known during the presentation. He'd been pretty quiet, watching the other members of the house and exchanging murmured talk to a few of the human hunters he had regular interaction with. But after things broke, he figured now was as good a time as any to mend a couple bridges. Or try to. Much as he was still pissed with Faolan, Arthur was right that they needed to be more cohesive and protective of each other. More 'pro-active'.

This led to him quietly making his way over to stand behind Roddy when the kid was distracted. Attempted to catch his attention with a soft grunt and a 'hey'.

[roddy_reinigen]

Roddy turned...and cursed under his breath. Sure, he'd known Daryl would be here, but after the last time he saw him...well, he'd been hoping to avoid talking to him. Or looking at him. Or acknowledging his existence. Clearly, that wasn't an option.

"What do you want?" Roddy asked irritably.

[dirtyredneck]

Yeah, Daryl probably deserved that. But he still bristled at the tone and it was a visible effort on his part not to let his lips curl into a snarl.

"Wanted to talk," he said after a moment of getting his reaction under control while maintaining eye contact. "'Bout what happened."

Annie, ota

[anniesgonemad]

[The small Irishwoman has kept to herself through the whole meeting. She alternates between sitting on her hands and messing with the ends of her hair, sea-green eyes watching the room around them. Vampires... Vampires she hates more than anything. They'd killed too many, and the Blood Fest had only brought up uncomfortable memories.

She wanted them gone, she wanted humans safe, and she was going to work hard to get it. She knew that. She just had to convince herself to push forward. She had to get better.

She knows, too, that she's lucky. While human, she doesn't have a price on her head the way the Shifters amongst them do. Her mind immediately goes to Sirius and Daryl. They were her friends, and she was going to protect them, too, on top of everything else. And she couldn't do that if she didn't push herself harder.]

and for arthur...

[Annie approaches Arthur after the meeting, and, quietly, lets him know in no uncertain terms:] I want to learn to shoot a gun.

[specifiercity]

[Arthur raises his eyebrows at her gently as he glances at her up and down, trying to determine the answers to his questions before he asks them. He asks them anyway.]

Have you ever tried before?

[anniesgonemad]

They didn't teach us.

[She doesn't go into the details.

She's sure he underestimates her immediately. The tiny Irish girl with wide, scattered eyes. Most people did. Even she underestimated herself.]

[specifiercity]

[Arthur's not terribly interested in who "they" is right now. If it's pertinent he'll find out later.]

You a hunter?

for arthur

[akillersmile]

It never occurred to Kyle that he might run into another ex-military American, let alone one who had a freakishly similar background in vampire special-ops. What Arthur described, briefly, sounded perhaps a little more specialized than his own military squad had been, but it was still enough of a connection that he couldn't help but want to reach out.

"Where were you deployed?" He asks as an introductory question when there's finally a break between people. Kyle has the posture and presence that almost immediately denotes him as former military by anyone who knows what to look for. And he's just as American, though there's a hint of small town charm to him rather than city slickness.

[specifiercity]

Arthur raises an eyebrow at Kyle curiously in between glances down at his phone for time, giving him a once-over before he responds.

"Domestic," he says, conversational, "mostly in the northeast, but we did a tour of the bible belt."

He looks Kyle up and down a little more obviously before he makes the assumption and asks, "you?"

[akillersmile]

"South Africa. I knew there were other special ops units, but I didn't expect to run into an unfamiliar face here." Kyle smiles lightly, partially to off set Arthur's taciturn nature. The idea of someone being deployed back home to do the same hunting he did there surprises him. Hell, he's from Ohio. That means there are probably vampires there too.

"So what's the plan? We hope the werewolves kill the new guy too?" Alex is still in hiding for Millicent. Killing the new leader might make for a nice distraction, if Hillingdon can man up enough to handle it.