Things Might Have Been Different

[Morgan Lake] [Awareness comes with lots of practice (lots of practice?) lots of practice]
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 1, 3, 9, 10, 10 (Success x 2 at target 6)

[Declan] [Nightmares]
Dice Rolled:[ 4 d10 ] 2, 6, 6, 8 (Success x 3 at target 6)

[Declan] [Per+Aware - because Ashley told him to practice]
Dice Rolled:[ 5 d10 ] 1, 1, 1, 6, 9 (Failure at target 6)

[Morgan Lake] [You can't see nothin' at all (Mind 1), -1 slow, added die per White Rabbit SL, weeoo]
Dice Rolled:[ 2 d10 ] 6, 7 (Success x 2 at target 4)

[Declan] [Clearly this is practice he needs]

[Morgan Lake] [Testify! (Mind 1, -1 slow, added die, blah de blah)]
Dice Rolled:[ 2 d10 ] 7, 8 (Success x 2 at target 6)

[Declan] One of the many less-than-pleasant realities of being a vagabond was that your primary source of income came from the generous (or, more realistically, not-so-generous) donations of people who passed by on the street. Declan had never really mastered the fine art of begging for change, mostly because it required social interaction, and he was loathe to approach people he didn't know. His particular spin on the practice was to curl up somewhere relatively safe, but in plain view, and take a nap while he left out a weighted paper cup. Today the location was Grant Park, and he was stretched out on one of the benches with his eyes closed, breathing in a rhythm that suggested light sleep. There was an old denim jacket folded up for a pillow under his head, and a cup on the ground next to him which probably contained about five dollars worth of change. The one advantage that he had over a fair number of the rest of Chicago's homeless population was that he was both young enough and normal-seeming enough to pull off the lost puppy look. People tended to feel sorry for him, rather than afraid of him.

Sooner or later, though, he woke up, because he never stayed asleep for very long. Sitting up slowly, the scruffy blond drifter rubbed the grogginess from his eyes, then reached down to lift the paper cup off the ground and inspect his most recent take. Not much, but it would buy a cheap dinner. Better than having to endure the lines at the food pantry.

[Morgan Lake] Morgan is watching, studying. She's also practicing - making herself less noticeable, with her plain, boring clothes and the cap hiding the majority of her vivid red hair. Sitting on a bench equidistant between a fountain that gets used as a wading pond, a tennis court, a basketball half-court and a mini playground (comprised of a swing set, a slide, a merry-go-round and a teeter totter, all in sand) she sips some sweet, frozen coffee treat as she watches people rushing by - long since late for dinner, for picking kids up from day care, for whatever.

It's that time of night, when things slow and stretch, when it's not quite dusk yet but can't really be called day, either - it's to this that Declan wakes up, and to the feeling of eyes on him. Morgan's bench is just a bit away, you see, and this is a good location for would-be panhandlers to collect change - from kids with leftovers after they buy ice cream, from long suffering parents, from whoever happens to be passing by. It's also, unfortunately, a good place to get jacked for said change as it gets darker, when the bigger kids come out to play, so it's probably a good thing Declan wakes up when he does.

But, back to the important thing, which is those eyes.

There's someone sitting there, that's clear, but she (or he, it's difficult to tell) is boring and non-descript - the sort of nobody that tends to go slipping out of mind seconds after the eyes drift away. That's not so unusual. What is unusual is the way his eyes want to skate away - as if he and the person are repellent magnet poles. And never mind that her eyes are on him, so

[fractured (but what does that mean?)]

intent, intense. That gaze is, in fact, the only notable thing about whoever it is sitting there.

[Declan] On a better day, he might have felt the girl sitting near him even before he saw her (or rather, the general impression of a nondescript living thing taking up space.) This ability was something he was only beginning to understand, though, and his mastery of it was poor at best. Most of the time, when it happened, it wasn't because he was directing it but because he just happened to be in a particularly receptive state.

That wasn't the case right now, so the drifter barely noticed the girl on the bench, in any sense. Rationally speaking, she probably shouldn't have noticed him much, either. He didn't stand out. Declan was neither particularly handsome nor bracingly ugly, and while he looked convincingly disheveled, he wasn't dirty enough to attract attention. He smelled like old clothes that had been sitting in a box for too long, but wherever he was staying, it had showers. There was no reason to pay him any mind, so long as he kept to himself, which he'd been doing.

Except that... he resonated. And most homeless guys didn't broadcast supernatural ability into the air like pheromones, the way that he did. The way that Enid did. The way that all of the awakened world did. The precise nature of Declan's resonance was unusually difficult to pin down. In the past, others had described it as quicksilver. It was mutable, mercurial... shifting and changing. Protean. Like water. Like emotions.

It was instinct that made the drifter uncomfortable now, as the hairs on the back of his neck prickled. He looked tense as he looked around the park, searching for whatever it was that might be staring at him (because something was most definitely watching.) Like many vagabonds, Declan's gut feelings were rather hyper-attuned. They had to be. It was an issue of survival, more often than not.

Nervously, he scratched the tips of his fingers through the stubble on his jaw (it was light today, maybe only 24 hours old), and gave a slight wince as he prodded the tender spot where he'd been punched yesterday. It was only mildly bruised, but sore nonetheless. The change from his collection cup got dumped into an inside jacket pocket, then the vessel itself was tossed into a nearby trash can as he stood up, still looking around. Suspicious.

[Morgan Lake] On a better day, a lot of things might have been different.
On a worse day, they might have too.

So on this day, largely indifferent, Declan gets up nervously, and Morgan (the magus formerly known as Enid) rises from her seat with the smooth, easy confidence of an athlete, of one of the pretty, popular few. It doesn't matter that she isn't one of them any more in this particular case - she still has the look, the act, of a girl who has friends not because they're afraid of her, but because they generally like her. Even her attempt at obscuring herself doesn't hide this. So it's an approach, clearly non-antagonistic, and a smile that will slip out of his mind as quickly as the rest of her does - like wind, like fog.

"Hi," she says. "We met once, I think?"

But it's difficult to place her with anyone he's met (though she-of-then may or may not have stuck in his mind), given her effect.

"I don't remember your name, though. I'm Morgan." And if he remembers that name, he may remember the vivid red hair and the intensely quiet young woman with whom it belongs.

[Declan] [And there was much pausing, for headaches are evil things]