[DVFP] Brewin and Chillin (C 2.4, J 2.5)

Rich

June,
After your visit with cinch and the crue, you head back to work on brewing. Rothschild is smoking some weird blunt and offers you a puff of of it before you get into High Rent. The cool air of High Rent is a welcome relief and something Rothschild mentions she could used to. You head into your room and Beckett's out. Left a note that she's heading out to Truk Stop for some Megahol, will be back. Rothschild heads into the kitchen to catalog everything in there.

What are you brewing today?

halcy

Jacket off, sleeves rolled up and buttoned back, I wave off Rothschild's blunt. "I shouldn't have anythin' more mind alterin' than liquor. What is it?"

Since Rothschild is in the kitchen, and since she's cataloging everything, I put her to work handing off ingredients. I label all my things and run it like a lab, really. Very clean, nice and separate.

Today I'm making a new batch of vinegar, and a ginger beer. It's time to crack into the molasses I got ahold of the other day - everything's gonna be dark and heavy and sweet. Whoever got ginger to grow in here is a saint. Or maybe it's from the outside, smuggled or care packaged.

I take a deep whiff off a freshly peeled knuckle of the root, then offer it to Roth to smell. "How you like that?"

Rich

Rothschild hops up from the neat stacks of kitchen implements she's made on the linoleum floor ("pots go here", "forks go here", "things with power go here") and comes over to gently hold your wrist as she takes a whiff.
She nods, "Smells very fresh. I like it." She glances back to the kitchen stuff, "We have three blenders. Why would one place have three blenders? Who used to live here?"

halcy

With Rothschild's endorsement of the ginger smell, I get to grating it carefully into a bowl. "Three people, each with their own blender? Are they all whole and intact?" I sure as spit don't need three blenders. I glance over at the piles on the floor.

"Reminds me a little of home. I used to have an astoundin' amount of crap." I start layin' things out nice an' mise en place, weigh ingredients out on a digital scale, including the water, before setting it aside.

Rich

"One is farbotz, the prettiest one, of course. But the other two are good. One still has plastic over its parts." She moves the broken one over by the door, looks at the other two. "We've got to keep hustling, June. I like this place here. I feel safe." Rothschild walks over to stand behind you, pressing herself against your back, then turning her face so her left cheek's against you, too. "Tell me about home, June. What do you remember about it?"

halcy

Rothschild can make the decisions about the blenders, I think. I keep working while I respond, "I can keep the lights on here, don't fret. There's always some pick-up work, and Beckett's gonna hold down her end, too."

She presses into me, and I stop my work, put it down carefully and breathe. Support myself on the counter so I can provide a firmness. "Just about everything. I could show you, if you like. Are your eyes closed?"

It's a strange offer, but home was pretty. Worth the strangeness and the effort.

Rich

"Yes, please. I am closing them now."

halcy

With a nod, I take a settlin' breath and close my own eyes. I focus on our closeness and her mind, which is gettin' very familiar to me, and our resonance, which is new. And of course, I focus on home.

"I inherited the place from my grandpa, which sounds like a sweet gig, but it was underwater. Didn't matter a bit, I was happy."

Here we are at the foot of my old driveway, lookin' at the front of my old house, white siding, grey shingled roof, a screened-in porch..green grass, trees with Spanish moss hangin' off of them. It's neither small nor big, really. There's a neglected grill near the carport, and my old car, dark and clean. It's warm and humid. My property has a high wooden fence to either side and backs onto a small wood.

Here we are in my old kitchen, planter hanging on the outside of the window full of herbs. There are shadows of the people who would gather in here during parties, never sittin' where I'd cleaned up for them to sit, every one of them wanting to hover where the action was. The floors are wood, the cabinets are glass-doored.

Beneath us there's an old bootlegger's cellar where I keep wine and brew projects. Upstairs, my bedroom, my office with my personal servers and gear.. neat, but some bad memories rest there, too. I keep us on the first floor.

Out to the backyard, into my old garden. I've got railings sunk in everywhere, unhandsome old pipes..but they don't have to be handsome. The roses do all of that and more. I must have had 16 different bushes, and the climbers over the trellis that bridged the way to my fenced-in practical garden. My reward for steady, daily labor is to be crowded in by blossoms on the main path.

Rich

June,

There's a small gasp as you open yourself to her, as you broadcast these memories to Rothschild. She squeezes your side with her left hand and presses her cheek against you. "Wow... I see it. I feel it. June, it's like I'm there. All the green, all the people, so clean! I can't even remember that much. How did you keep, you know, who you were?"

There's a knock at the door. She slips away from you reluctantly to go answer it, picking up a knife by her boots and hiding it behind her back.

Cinch, After checking in at the door with the High Rent Guards and getting patted down, you head to 220 and knock. Rothschild answers the door. She's barefoot. She offers you a quick nod.

What do you do?

scott

I get patted down a lot in my line of work. If they're confiscatin' then the nice guard is hanging onto my magnum for me. Holstered. High rent fuggers ain't gonna rip me off. Generally.

"Hey Rothschild, when'd you move in?" I smile and let myself past her.

"June! Place looks dang near civilized!" i tease a bit, though her gear all over makes it look more like a mad scientist might be moving in, "what'cha got in the fire today?"

halcy

It's pleasing to share with Rothschild, and show her something good. "I'm a hard-headed woman."

I keep an eye on her as she answers the door for me.

When it turns out to be Cinch I start cleanin' off my hands and take her bait with a smile. "Cinch, I am always civilized, and so are all my homes. Although I have not had as much time as I'd like to finish putting this place together. Pardon the mess."

I gesture to the works in progress. "Today I'm startin' a ginger beer and a dark vinegar."

scott

She makes me smile, and the coolish air full of strong scents makes me breathe deep.

"Sounds deelish," I crane my neck a bit to see what she's up to from my place near the door. Hesitate to walk in too far for fear of displacing something.

"So," I glance at Rothschild as if to ask silently if she should be in on the business, "you tell me how urgently I oughta be hitting the road, but I gotta admit being outta the heat for a spell is... real nice.."

Rich

"I just moved in." Rothschild answers a few beats later than asked. She walks over to grab her boots and drops to the floor to pull them on.

halcy

I beckon Cinch to come further in casually with wave of my ice-white fingers. She isn't a clumsy person.

"Well.." I move through the apartment with a few clicks towards the package for Cinch. "Here's the goods, and frankly, Winkle won't be expecting them. So all the urgency comes from you, Stazie."

It..hurts a little bit that Rothschild so obviously wants to leave. She doesn't have to. I look over, the question on my face.

Rich

June,
Rothschild catches the look. She still pulls on the boots, but remains seated, doesn't get up to leave.

Cinch, seems like Rothschild's allowed on your secret talk.

scott

I take the package (how big a thing we talking about. Doesn't sound big, and can ya tell what it is by looking?) if offered and treat it with utmost care.

"Business being business it's not usually my place to ask. But so happens I know the addressee... now am I puttin' this in Winkle's hand or his momma's?"

I must look slightly confused. Can't help but ask.

"If you don't mind me askin' June, how does a kid like Winkle have someone like June Weaver doing him favors he ain't even asked for? "

Genuinely curious like... Not trying to be nosy.. Sort of impressed in a way.

Rich

June,
How big is the package you're handing off? It's "Depot Dollars", but you could hide it in some vinegar, whatever you like.

halcy

Oh, I'm not sending a pack of 5 jingle worth of Depot Dollars into the Irons for Winkle and his momma - that just sounds like trouble to me, how about you? No, luckily I had enough to make the exchange myself for 5 barter's worth of portable, good stuff - spinners, bullets, a box of sani-wipes, a small passel of little bottles of Red Hot, and a couple tubes of epoxy. It's all bundled together in a few flannel shirts, 'bout the size of a breadbox. It ain't too hard to guess it out.

"Winkle's probably a little small to hoist this, yeah? You can give it to his momma." I don't hand it off directly, but I indicate right where it is and that she can go ahead.

"I'm doin' this favor for Juju, who taught me somethin' I couldn't have learned any other way. In return I got his cut of a job. The whole truth is kinda heavy stuff, Stazie. The kind I charge for." I pull a cig out of my jacket and get a match out by the time I realize I'm inside my home and grumble. I put it away.

"And I'm not certain of all of it yet, you know?"

scott

I rub the back of my neck with a hand, listening, then a low whistle, "you got a complicated way of living, don'cha? Truth worth it's weight in gold 'round here, June, though from my experience, most folks..." I click my tongue, "don't wanna know it."

It is a sizable package, and we haven't yet discussed my fee. I'm inclined to see this as a favor to Winkle and his momma, though.

"Is there... somethin' in particular you're trying to noodle-out?"

Something Juju taught you? I'm curious to say the least.

halcy

"Truth, in my experience, is yet costlier than that." And it's because people love lies. And people forget truths.

Like the truth that this is still DVFP, its society organic and artificial at once. Me, I'm borin', unpleasant, no action. Cinch, she's excitin', cute and cool under fire. Attention-worthiness is visitin' my home.

I pull out a small pocketbook from my jacket, and a pen, and write out a small note in my high, sharp and frankly, difficult professorial script. Sorry, Cinch.

Juju moved data, gobs of it. Ridiculous. UF has a cybo-doc. Where from and where to? Why? To whom is this allowed?

I rip out the page, fold it up tight and quick and flick it towards her with two fingers. "Open that somewhere in the stretch. Or read it in the dark with a red light. If you find anything at all about that, know I'm deeply interested."

scott

I watch with a bit of puzzlement as the writes me a note, then do my best to catch it and hold it tucked hidden in my hand without looking. I give June a grave little nod. She seems pretty serious.

"Will do," red light? She's trying to prevent surveillance... funny how that works from this end. I won't mention it the note again until I've read it.

I couple of seconds of letting the implications of a secret that needs keeping secret from outside surveillance... and which she knows needs keeping secret. Then a little breath and try to get back to normal.

Business concluded for the moment, I finally walk further in, find a seat somewhere near Rothschild and settle into it. "Ginger beer, huh? The hell do you get ginger 'round here?" Not really expecting an answer though, just being impressed by her ingenuity.

Rothschild seems... intimidated? Uncomfortable? I try and smile at her as nicely as possible.

Rich

End Scene