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[baedalites]

Who: EVERYONE.
What: Swap meet.
Where: The Apache and surrounding environs.
When: Sukkardi the 14th of Haneden
Notes:

• Swap Meet Spreadsheet: Pre-chosen swaps are green. Assigned are blue. There were a few characters that were selected more than once, so objects were assigned on a first-come first-serve basis. If you have any issues or concerns, please do not hesitate to contact the mod team.
• For objects that might not be immediately apparent as belonging to their owners, there may be a picture or name attached, or players are welcome to have their characters ~just know~ it's for them. Drr drr drr, bb.
• Party post nights are a great time to come join the chatroom.
• The topic threads are just suggestions; if you've got somewhere else that your characters simply must be, make your own thread.

Warnings: None yet. Please put warnings up on individual threads.

The Apache is much the same as it always is: dimly lit, with the jukebox playing in the background, and the bartender serving whatever's on tap.

Comments

[cerebral]

There were few things more unlikely than handing Charles Xavier a bundle of scientific papers and expecting him not to look --and he was glad he did. Baedal had already opened his mind to the idea of magic --thaumaturgy-- as science, and in his first few weeks he'd read various books and articles from TMU on the subject. This research was of a different calibre. By the time he had finished, his lips were thoroughly bitten and he was overwhelmingly reminded of the horrors that the city had faced in the previous weeks.

Suffice to say, these papers are not going on the table. Gods wrath or not, he would never forgive himself if they fell into the wrong hands. Instead, he takes a seat at a table and places the documents in front of him, waiting for the rightful owner to claim them.

Up until that occurs (and afterwards), he's more than happy to push away such worries and greet friends and acquaintances as they pass.

[norea]

Speaking of acquaintances, one leggy porn-scene starlet he happens to know from the Vault (and the Network) is making her way over to say hello. Her heels' click on the floorboards does precede her, but it's not easy to hear, given the din in the Apache tonight. She flashes Charles a broad, friendly smile.

"It's been a while, hasn't it? It's good to see you--" And her gaze lands on the sheaf of papers in his hands. She recognizes them instantly; she couldn't not, given their contents, how many times she's poured over them, all the work she's done to try to keep them out of the wrong hands.

Her expression has faded to something like a vulnerable alarm, a sort of aching nostalgia.

"--and I see," she says, voice steady, despite the look in her eyes, "you've got quite a haul from the gods."

[cerebral]

He's about to give a greeting of his own until he notices the change in expression, then watches as it slips and slides back into place as best as possible. You, then he has to catch himself from saying. Hasibe Ozcelik is certainly full of surprises.

With a quick deduction, he replies, "Or I believe you have." He tries for smooth but there's a hesitance there, the 'I am right, aren't I?' unsaid but practically audible. He pushes the papers forward by his fingertips slightly, then proceeds to drum the table around the corners of the papers, nervous and fluttering.

[norea]

The resignation evens out further into a sort of quieted-down sadness. What Hyde took from her cannot be replaced. Sometimes she thinks that even though he's dead, he's still inside her, all the time, pushing her into this fitful cycle she can't escape, this need to climb higher and higher on the ladder of monstrous men in her life. Hasibe gives Charles a little smile, soft, closed.

"My deceased husband's work," she says. "Ordinarily kept under lock and key. I assume you can gather why."

She's guessing he had himself a peek.

[cerebral]

"I hope you'll forgive me for prying. At first it was to find out to whom it might belong, but the more I read..." The more he'd become increasingly alarmed. He doesn't feel the need to explain that, and instead returns Hasi's small smile with one of his own.

"You can rest assured that reading is all I'll do." As a mutual acquaintance of theirs often said, some people can be too sharp for their own good. Finding the balance was Charles' ongoing tightrope walk; he hadn't fallen yet.

[norea]

"I understand," she says, with a slight tightness to her voice that suggests an intimate knowledge of what's in those papers. She does believe, watching his expression, that he has no interest in repeating Henry's mistakes, but that doesn't mean she won't hammer in the point. Hasi knows how seductive the work can be--though she'd been the real siren in that situation, so maybe it's different.

All the same. She reaches out one manicured hand for the papers.

"If you don't mind?"

[cerebral]

"No, of course not." They are, after all, hers. He sets his hands back further from the papers in an attempt towards more open, diplomatic body language now that the issue of ownership has been resolved.

[norea]

"Thank you." Genuinely: "There are people in this city who wouldn't have returned these."

She holds them close at her hip, fingertips gripping just a little bit too tightly. Once she's had some time to process, she'll put them somewhere safe, warded a hundred times over, unbreakably so, and hopefully that will be that. It'd be better to just destroy it, but she knows there might be something useful in there eventually, too.

"Which is why I'm glad you've assured me, but...even so...try to forget you ever saw it. Please."

[cerebral]

"Oh, there are a great many things I want to forget from these past few weeks," he says, with a friendlier smile, and sounding somewhat more cynical than he usually does. But then Baedal and a shower of monsters will do that to even the most innocent souls, and Charles hasn't been the latter for a while (despite what some people may believe, contrary fellow that he is).

"I'll add this along with the others and make sure to thoroughly enjoy my evening."

[norea]

She exhales a little, hoping that is, indeed, what he does, and manages a nod; tinged, still, with that ache she's buried for years and which particularly came to the surface when she saw those papers.

"You do that. And next time you come to the Vault, come say hello to me." Hasi gives a slight head-tilt to indicate she's going to take her leave--she needs a minute to just...stare at this for a while--and smiles mildly, again, in his direction. "I'll see you."