The full seasonal event can be read here! Below are the main seasonal items for quick reference:
1. A thread reacting to the season's weather in some ways.
2. A thread in the part of the city your character doesn't live in!
3. A thread relating to your vocation.
Of The Season
Quote
"Tell Dr. Nate that Gale sent you, and he still owes me for the mushrooms. Except that it takes you a while to reach the clinic, and by the time you do your fever is spiking, and so instead of the requisite message you instead tell the poor soul who greets you that 'A gale'a m'shrooms sent me cus'a my hands.'" - Zephyr in Oh help me, please doctor, I'm damaged
Tavi folded his arms, resting his back and boot on the wall. Though it was night, the air was still thick with heat. Beads of sweat bubbled on his brow and he wiped it with a sleeve, turning his head toward the Alley beyond. With eyes drawn to slits, he filtered out the glare emitted from each establishment and sifted through passerbys who moved about with purpose. He turned to look in the opposite direction and faced almost a mirror image of the former. Nothing.
He looked down at his watch and shook his head to himself. The smile on his face seemed to say, 'I told you so, Tav.' She confirmed it all with Tavi earlier: she'd bring the money and he'd bring the goods. Only she flaked. Now he had another buyer to add to the multitude on his black list.
The reality of post-Lockdown business.
He kicked himself off the wall and paused. Slipping his hand into his leather jacket pocket, he produced a packet of cigarettes and thumbed the lid open. Just three left. He brought the packet up and plucked one out with his lips. While shielding it, his other hand worked the lighter, producing only sparks. He gave it a shake with irritation and tried again. He glanced around.
You don't need sympathy
They got a pill for everything
Adam was on his way home after a spontaneous pub crawl, the kind that had left him spiralling on a bar stool for a while. Once he'd sobered up enough to walk he'd dropped the last of his lasti on a table and hopped out of the window, climbing up and onto the rooftop and along the Neon Alley. This late, he didn't have to worry about Enforcers coming around to enforce curfew - all the little bastards were asleep in their beds; he hummed a tune and danced his way over the tops of buildings.
It wasn't unusual to see shady men stood on their own down below; after all, it was the Drench, made on the backs of many such shady men - as such, Adam didn't pay much attention to the guy he saw at first.
As he was directly above though, something caught his eye - the failed spark of a lighter and the sound of a sigh. Oh yeah, cigarettes. That sounded nice, and since he was in a good mood...
In a fluid hop, Adam jumped off the roof, dangled with one hand for a moment then dropped to the street next to Tavi. "Hey." From his pocket he produced a beat up sliver lighter, which somehow caught a flame despite it's condition. "Trade you a light for one of your smokes."
Just take that dark cloud
Ring it out to wash it down
Tavi turned his head, eyes widened in surprise at the Drencher who appeared, like some kind of saviour, from above. The finger of flame was enticing, certainly. But the manner of this Drencher's movement, the air about him and the display of opportunism, was more so.
Tavi cocked his head, eyes searching for a moment. It was curiosity that raised his hand and handed his second cigarette over. 'You got it,' he replied.
Tavi leaned his head forward, letting the end catch alight. It glowed as he drew in its cocktail of chemicals and his eyes closed to savour it. He watched the smoke drift out slowly from his nostrils, rising and coalescing about the neon sign above.
The frustration seemed to disappear from his face like the smoke in the night.
Tavi nodded to his acquaintance in thanks. He gestured toward the roof and spoke again, his Drencher accent coming in thick and strong. 'What brings you down this way? Tall guy like you moves pretty well off-Alley.'
You don't need sympathy
They got a pill for everything
There was a chuckle on Adam's lips as he took in Tavi's surprised expression; admittedly, a large part of the reason he liked to wander around on the rooftops was because of how people didn't expect it. There were few better entrances than falling in from the sky.
"Nice. Ta." He took the cigarette, turning it over in his fingers as he inspected it - neater than his rolled smokes, which tended to look like crumped receipts wrapped around dirt. Popping it in his lips with the same ease as Tavi took in his, he lit the end and found a windowsill to sit on, bony ass not taking up much room. There was a quiet moment as they both watched the smoke rise, enjoying the sharp acrid taste of something that was yes, bad for you, but felt so much better than most of life in the Drench.
He hummed at the question, tilted his head from side to side. "Just kinda wandering, really. Didn't feel like going to bed just yet, y'know. I've been takin' the high road for years now. Best way to avoid the Enforcers - you seen any around here?"
Just take that dark cloud
Ring it out to wash it down
Tavi leaned back on the window alongside Adam. He rested his elbows on the plate of steel, feeling its surface caked with a mixture of dirt and rust. For a moment, all that could be heard were their exhalations of smoke, overlaid by the dull thumping of music that came deep within the bellows of the Alley.
As Adam began to speak, Tavi’s ears pricked up and he paged through a catalogue of people he knew but none seemed to fit the bill. All it left Tavi was a feeling that this guy, familiar to him in some way, was on the right side of this fight.
Tavi earmarked this as he considered what Adam said about the nights of the Drench. He could understand it. The night was a time of escape from authority and the high road - well, that was an ultimate form of it. But it was Adam’s mention of the word ‘Enforcers’ that made Tavi’s jaw clench shut. With a sense of guilt, he recalled all the business he had done with some of the Enforcers, Plate-side with his pseudo-Plater identity, and how he had relished in every sale. Now he was in the Drench. Business was different here. Here he could sense his and everyone else’s feeling of the Enforcers down here. Hatred.
Tavi shook his head, flicking ashes to the side. ‘Nah man, none tonight, thank fuck. I get some word where they are, but it don't work always. And they're all over the joint too, especially now.' He turned his head to Adam. 'You had any trouble with them lately?”
You don't need sympathy
They got a pill for everything
Adam was not scared of Enforcers, having come up against them too many times for the authority to have any effect, but he still rested a little easier when Tavi said there hadn't been any around. These last seasons with the Lockdown and general unrest were becoming exhausting, every moment having to be spent on watch in case the Plates got jumpy yet again and sent armies down into the streets.
Of course, they only ever found people trying to live, so they were making that into a crime.
He drew on the cigarette - better quality than his usual fare - and shrugged. "Who hasn't? But uh, I was at that masquerade party thing last season up there." Now that he said it out loud, it sounded embarrassing, something that a Drench revolutionary shouldn't admit to attending; he added: "...I went for...reasons. But it ended ugly." True, he'd been too drunk to remember most of it, but he knew from the bruises and tales of friends that there had been violence. That the Enforcers, once again, had turned a situation from tense into erupting in seconds.
"What about you?"
Just take that dark cloud
Ring it out to wash it down
Tavi turned his head to Adam, his face, inquisitive. Masquerade? He could not answer Adam’s question without understanding more about the one who asked it. It intrigued Tavi. This one wasn’t as he seemed.
Tavi gestured to Adam with two fingers laden with the cigarette, the smoke making zigzags in the air. ‘I know this party you say and that is no easy one to get in…I did business up plate side,’ He explained. ‘And that’s no surprise that the enforcers ruined the night. Plate or Drench, that’s what they do.’
‘To answer the question - yeah I have trouble with ‘em because like all Platers I do business with, enforcers, much as I hate ‘em, sometimes buy my shit and for more. Not something I’m exactly advertising down here, now it’s all locked down, so I’m trying to keep my head down. But coin here, its so fickle, in fact I was just stood up by a seller tonight…’
I’m Tavi by the way.’ He extended a hand. He hoped by offering his story he might receive one back.
(This post was last modified: 03-23-2023, 11:45 AM by Tavi.)
You don't need sympathy
They got a pill for everything
"Well, this was the one where they were like 'hey, let's let the poors mingle with us' - then they totally fuckin' regretted it, of course." Adam snorted, shaking his head as he took a draw of his cigarette - he recalled the judgemental looks and cautious movements of the Plate nobles around him at that party, how they'd seemed shocked that anyone from the Drench dared to speak and not just meekly nod in the presence of those 'better' than them. "I was kinda too drunk to really see how it all went to shit, but I'm pretty sure it was an Enforcer being upset a Drencher was like. Breathing."
The business Tavi referred to, one that had him dealing with Enforcers, certainly intrigued. Adam suspiciously looked him up and down, asked: "And uh, what business is it you do?"
At least for the moment though, he didn't have too much reason to distrust Tavi, so he took the hand and gave it a loose but firm shake. "Adam."
Just take that dark cloud
Ring it out to wash it down
Tavi grinned at the thought of a Drencher, blind drunk, running amok among the well-to-do who would have looked with a mix of loathing and guilty pleasure. Classic. Though this display would have only attracted the eyes of the Enforcers, it was these eyes that saw not someone having a good night, but a Drencher that needed to be put in his place.
Tavi soon realized his acquaintance seemed to like his drink as much as his smoke. Tavi wasn’t surprised though, though he didn’t drink much himself. Here in the Drench it was a reprieve. A medicine. It was the buttressing that kept the whole structure from collapsing. It kept them sane.
Tavi felt the sweep of eyes of this stranger, the probing of his question and one name. Adam. He repeated it a few times in his mind, wondering if he had heard it before. For the question, part of Tavi wished he hadn’t mentioned dealing with the Enforcers, but with the cat out of the bag, Tavi had a thought with optimism that this Adam seemed a genuine Drencher, if there were such thing. He shrugged it off and opened his hand palm up as if it wasn’t a big deal.
‘They call me a Material Recovery Specialist,’ he answered, repeating the oft used industry term. ‘I prefer Scavenger. I look into finding unusual, lucrative items and sell it off. Every man’s treasure, so they say. Difficult to get things past the lockdown, good buyers, like Platers, are scarce. Maybe you are in some line of work where you need something? I do parts, old relics, you name it - I’m your guy.’ He tapped his chest with a thumb, not able to resist a little self-promotion in these dire times.
You don't need sympathy
They got a pill for everything
Adam didn't even think about the fact he'd advertised he drank heavily while smoking: it was just how it was in the Drench. He didn't know anyone who didn't numb themselves with a little something every once in a while (or quite a lot in a while) and had done so himself since an age most would find shocking.
"A...Material Recovery Specialist." He repeated, in a tone that implied he didn't think such a role existed, though he did listen as Tavi continued to speak and hearing 'scavenger' as well as an actual explanation of the work made his cynicism fade away. "Ooh, right. A junk-man." The old, somewhat derogatory term was just what Adam had grown up with, though as it left his lips he gave an apologetic cringe, realising just a moment too late that Tavi might not like the title.
Did he need anything, though? It seemed like a long shot, but... "I do need radio parts. Real bad. But I don't know if you'll find any that'll work. It's kind of specific." Without an experts knowledge, it would be hard to know what parts were what anyway, unless Tavi found a whole working radio out there, which seemed unlikely. "You ever find something really exciting?"
Just take that dark cloud
Ring it out to wash it down
