The Art of Searching [Finished]

[Bee]

Ezra had spent twenty minutes staring at the menu. It all looked equally adequate and uninspiring in his eyes. Mocha, espresso, grande, venti, blueberry syrup or caramel. It made little difference. It was all caffeine. Giving up on actually making a decision, he closed his eyes and dropped a sugar packet on the menu. It landed. Macchiato it was, then. With...he dropped the sugar packet again. Raspberry flavoring. And a shot of chocolate. And...sprinkles. He was told that this was not how macchiato was typically prepared, but he shrugged off the helpful admonition.

The combination did not actually taste fantastic, and he was pleased to find that he disliked it quite intensely.

To Freakshow, he said, "Have you ever done thing sort of thing before?" Probably best not to utter the words "commit a robbery" in a relatively crowded cafe. He was just curious to see if the kid had any experience in the field, and how he felt about it.

[Dark]

Hadyn shook his head, staring at the foam residue in the bottom of his cup and trying to figure out the best way to get that last bit of sweet deliciousness out without looking completely undignified.

"Nothing like this, no. I have a rather... extensive... background in demolition, but that particular talent doesn't really apply to our current endeavor."

A waitress wandered too close, hands fluttering nervously, probably preparing to confront him about the chilly mist that was slowing starting to build up. Hadyn sent her a level stare that sends her scurrying in the opposite direction. He really would rather he had complete control over the ability, but at the same time, the cloying mist tended to lend him a certain animosity that saved him from being bothered in most instances.

He turned his attention to his companion, "You know, I actually don't know your name. Allow me to introduce myself: Hadyn Adelbrecht D'Allesio."

[Bee]

An interesting name, but Ezra dismissed it almost out of hand. It was too long, for one, and for two he had a vague notion that Adelbrecht was a form of Albert, and for three that he had been right in his earlier assessment: Freakshow Sunset would work just as well. He was proving himself to be even more of a freakshow by the moment, in fact: Ezra had not noticed it before, but there was a chilly mist around the boy's feet, getting thicker by the minute. He had never seen an ability quite like that one. He might need to ask about it, later. And see if the kid could turn it off. That kind of thing tended to catch the eye. And give gooseflesh.

He supposed it was good social protocol to respond to the reveal of someone's name with the reveal of one's own. He said, "Charmed, of course, to meet you. I'm Ezra Huldah."

[Dark]

Hadyn quirked a brow, not being able to help but get the feeling that the weasel wasn't as dourly impressed by his name as was normally anticipated. Long names had a habit of making people think one was rather important, and Hadyn liked to play off the usually radical change in behavior at his introduction. But Ezra Huldah dismissed it. A little bit of the devil rose up in him, and he found himself setting down his coffee cup with a decisive click and giving the man a daring smile.

"Esmeralda, did you say?"

Before the man would have a chance to respond, Hadyn waved over the skittish waitress and ordered another cup of coffee; he also asked for a strudel--they still had awhile to wait until sundown, and he might as well eat a little something while he was waiting.

"You want anything?" The waitress shifted nervously as she waited for the response, goose flesh prickling her skin. Hadyn wondered idly how cold the mist really was--he could barely feel it, himself.

[Bee]

Esmeralda? He supposed he could see where the kid would get that. And he supposed that if he was going to address the boy as Freakshow, then perhaps he should be allowed to have his own nickname. Fair was fair, after all, and Ezra did not think Esmeralda was all that odd. He had been called far stranger, at least. Besides, he was frequently told that the best friendships were ones that held no inequalities. He had never really had any friends with which to test this theory, but he thought it might hold true.

"Yes," he said, idly. "Esmeralda." To the waitress, he said, "Do you enjoy your work?"

The waitress stared at him blankly, eyes widening a bit. She was mentally lumping him in the same "crazy" group as Freakshow. But Ezra didn't mind.

"M-mostly."

"Is it your calling? To serve the coffee, and dole out silverware, and put up with people like Freakshow and me?"

"I--"

Clearly the answer was no. Ezra said, "I will take a slice of...whatever you want to serve me. Thank you."

[Dark]

It took a moment to register what, or more precisely who, Esmeralda was talking about, absorbed as he was with watching the waitress's tiny brain stutter out an alarming amount of smoke. Hadyn hadn't pegged her as someone overly bright, but it was still amusing to see the slightly baffled, otherwise blank stare of a lifetime of monotony staring back at him. It probably made him a bad person.

"Wait, wait--Freakshow?" He couldn't help it: he laughed, the sound rusty and awkward rolling off his tongue. It was ridiculous, but he supposed he could see where Esmeralda had derived such a nickname from. His coat was rather bright, but that was being part Morganberry for you. The region tended to stand out in a crowd.

The waitress bolted for her relative safety of the counter and her little-waitress friends, immediately swallowed by the twittering mass. Another girl brought them their order.

[Bee]

The cafe eventually closed, as cafes do. Ezra suspected that they might have closed a little early in order to be rid of him and Freakshow. He wasn't sure why: they were paying customers. Though the kid's mist might have been a bit off-putting. Nearing the end of their little sit-down, Ezra had begun to find it a bit uncomfortably cold as well, and the chill might have driven some of the other patrons out.

Sunset was in the early stages when they stepped out of the cafe and back into the street. The people who were out were moving swiftly, probably on their ways home, or to a poker game, or to their mistresses.

They stil had some time to kill. They may as well wander for a bit, and then go to West Side and begin to scope out some of the houses. He told Freakshow such.

[Kiki]

Bee and Dark receive 1 tokens each, to be redeemed in Ashwin's Shoppe. This will automatically be added to your recorded totals in the shoppe. Congratulations, and keep up the good RP!

[Dark]

They walked the cobbled road until near nine, strolling casually under the streetlights and nodding in greeting to the lamplighters. The glow of flickering flame was soft and warm and old, nestled in iron wrought nests.

The block was a stretch of foreboding gargoyles and sweeping arches and wrought iron fencing and stone, whispering of age and wealth and privilege. It was eerie, waking under the stony faces of those houses, and Hadyn felt a delightful shiver of fear travel up his spine.

They'd actually chosen the target fairly early in their rounds, drawn in by the towering Gothic architecture. It was practically a mausoleum, and Hadyn couldn't help but marvel at the shear amount of glass used in its construction. As it grew darker, but before the bobbies started to make their rounds, they slipped in the alley way that ran alongside the back of all the houses.

[Bee]

For lack of any kind of alarm system, most houses that held a good deal of wealth had some kind of patrol--a few muscular, armed men who made rounds and kept people from trying to enter, often by jamming a knife through an intruder's heart as easily as one shoves a stick through a marsmallow to prepare for the roast. Perhaps the guards subsisted on human hearts. It wouldn't surprise him. He had seen a few of them before--brutish-looking fellows, with sharp teeth.

They were going to sneak in through the back, and Ezra knew just the way to get past the gate. When the time was right, and darkness had completely fallen, he crept toward the large padlock that held the gate secure. He let the chain drop from his mouth, and tried to repress the upwelling of shame that had been instilled in him since childhood concerning his bindings--the chain was worn for the good of his people, and he was failing them.

He brought up his forepaws and swung them down repeatedly. The padlock busted.

Ezra quickly put the chain back in his mouth.

"Okay," he said. "Next stage."