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voicemail

Voicemail

"You've reached Erasmus Boone. I'm not answering the phone right now. Leave a message and I'll get back to you."

BEEP

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Rattay, Thursday Fandom Time, Bohemia

By noon that next day, Henry had recovered enough from his hangover to move about town and do his business. He slunk to the lower castle as the sun reached its highest peak, with most of a mind to finally Lord Hans Capon again. It had been a bit, and he hadn’t gotten much measure of how the man was doing since then.

He made conversation with guard Janoslav as he wandered up the stairs towards the higher floors. Sir Capon, Janoslav told him, was still in his chambers, as he had been for most of the past week. And he’d been a beast, by the sounds of it.

Henry pushed the doors open gently. He hadn’t put much thought to the whole nobles and fancy castles thing when he’d first arrived at Pirkstein. Too much else on his mind. But now he did spare a thought to how odd it was, being able to just slip into a nobleman’s chambers this way.

( In which an unhinged peasant and an unhinged nobleman get utterly, blindingly wasted. )

[[ taken and adapted from the quest Next to Godliness in Kingdom Come: Deliverance (2018), aka Why It Is Absolutely Hilarious That The Fanboys Argue They Were Straight Before The Sequel ]]

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ooc: infopost

Infopost: most precedential to the bandwagon

Hello my most excellent digital neighbors and friends! It is I, Bel A. Temple, BA, with my newest character, Wilhelmina! “Billie”! S.! Logan!

( Strange things are afoot at the Circle K )

ANYWHO. Questions? Comments? Air guitar?

Around the Mainland; So Late Thursday Night It's Actually Friday

As established, Harley now had a great big bland-looking van.

But that was not all: Harley also had an accomplice! No, not the kid this time, because Cass had begged off on the basis of having gotten her little life's worth of dusty antique shops in just scouting all of them over the past couple of weeks, and also because Harley had need of someone who actually knew how to drive and who had a smidge more experience breaking into places.

So... She'd ~~handwavily~~ roped in Remy.

And now the van, Remy, Harley, and the whispersilk cloak currently still shoved into a bag were all nearing their first target, an antique shop in a part of town that was probably relatively quiet even when it wasn't the dead of night - and when it was, well... It really was dead out there. No movement along the street outside of the van itself.

Perfect conditions for the start of a heist!

"Okay, we should be... two blocks out," Harley said from the passenger side, surveying her map - yes, a physical one with squiggles and notes all over it. "Ca-- my associate says there's an alley on the left side of the place? With a side door into the building. That's how we get the goods."

(NFB because off the island again, and for the fellow criminal modded in the post)

Paris, France - Wednesday Evening

They'd spent time in Dublin and it'd been great, but Tony had an idea and that idea involved a bakery that they clearly needed to own in Paris. Which made sense only to him. But, unfortunately for everyone else, Steve was indulging him on this whim.

Which mostly ended up meaning visiting a baker's dozen (ha) of them to try out the wares. Well, Steve was trying out the wares because Tony was but a mortal man. Who had a cup of coffee at each place and whichever treat that Steve deemed the best of the bunch.

"Okay, next up..." Tony muttered, looking at the street signs to get his bearings again as they exited the last stop.

[for the husband!]

On the Mainland; Late Wednesday Evening

Heist time was approaching! And for that, Harley had need of a mode of transportation that could hold a lot more stuff than the Chevelle she kept wishy-washying about whether to keep or not. A mode of transportation like, say, a huge van. Which was exactly what she'd gone out shopping for that fantastic Wednesday night!

Well, "shopping". Look, she couldn't be blamed if someone just happened to leave a convenient van just laying around just right out on the street, all alone and ripe for the taking for someone with the right skill set. If anything, Harley was doing the poor thing a favor! She was going to take it on an adventure!

So, long story short: now, Harley had a van.

( just one small problem )

(NFB because it's off the island, establishy!)

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The Church at Uzhitz to Rattay, Wednesday Fandom Time

Henry woke up with the worst bloody headache and not the faintest idea where he was. Memories from last night only filtered through in uneven bursts.

There had been the talk with Father Godwin at the tavern, of course. He remembered that much--

( Cut for excessive Catholicism. )

[[ taken from Kingdom Come Deliverance (2018), following yesterday's post. ]]

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The Flat In London, Wednesday Late Afternoon Until Evening

Marc's stuff had been pretty easy to take care of. They could've put it off if Illyana needed them to stick close by. But she swore she didn't and Marc figured may as well get it over with since he'd booked the appointments already.

Nothing urgent. Just some things he had to look at personally, including some property he was debating investing in. Yeah, place was a dump. But it was in the neighborhood and would be somewhere he could stash things other than in Steven's apartment. Maybe even put a car or something in the garage space it had too.

On the way back he ~~handwavily~~ texted Watts to see if he needed anything. Then checked in with Illyana.

Watts reminded him they needed vegetables for their dinner, so Marc stopped for groceries on the way back. He debated getting a steak for himself but figured if he came out again while they were still in London he could always order something.

After that he headed back, taking the ancient elevator up to their floor and letting himself into the apartment.

"It's us," he said, as he came in.

Mind the cat! Steven said from the mirror by the doorway.

Right, they had the cat with them. Marc kept an eye out to make sure it didn't get out while he closed the door behind him.

[for the guy who is in the apartment]

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From Rattay to Neuhof to Uzhitz, Sometime, Henry's Bohemia

It took a day or two for Henry to settle fully back into this life. Lord Radzig had returned him to Bernard's service almost immediately; those two days were full of long patrols and precious little impressions, the full weight of Skalitz settling back on him like a shroud now that he'd returned to these familiar places.

After that brief glimpse at the start of it, he'd seen hide nor hair of Hans Capon. The man was an arrogant twat, that was true, and Henry shouldn't care. Yet that glimpse had brought back the memories of their hunt-- days ago for Capon, months for Henry. He found himself wondering if his Lordship was recovering properly. He'd still had the limp a few days ago, after all.

By the third day, though, his time languishing in the stuffier corners of his mind was up. He'd been ordered up to the upper castle early in the morning -- something about nearby Neuhof, and a horrific crime committed there. Down below by the stairs stood Captain Bernard, gruff and uninterested, along with a small group of soldiers, all dressed in the bright yellow of the House of Leipa.

Captain Bernard was curt. "Follow me, keep quiet and do exactly as you're told," he said. "I don't know what Sir Radzig sees in you, and I don't care. If you're to ride with my men, I expect you to listen."

( Yes, sir! )

[[ in which I stitch together a whole bunch of questlines from Kingdom Come: Deliverance (2018). it remains very funny to me that they hired the world's most random Canadian to voice Godwin. anyway, part 1 of this catchup! tomorrow's will be funner! CW animal death ]]

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Harley Quinn's Apartment, Gotham City, Early Tuesday Morning

Harley hadn't been there last night. But Pam was hurting, more fragile than she'd like. (Or maybe she needed the comfort.) So she'd come home anyway. Slipped under the covers. Buried her nose in Harley's pillow.

She jerked awake to the sound of a voice - "Ivy?" - in the middle of the night. It was still dark, shadows playing over the many pieces of random furniture that sat around Harley's bedroom. The door creaked open beside a mounted tentacle and revealed a little clown girl dressed in checkered print and desperation.

"Harley?" Pam said, half-sitting up. Relief slid over her like pleasant spring rains. "I'm so glad you came back. I... know you need your space sometimes. I was worried. But I promise, I trust you'll be okay."

The bed dipped as Harley crawled onto the covers on her hands and knees. "I'm sorry I said you were better off without me."

"Thank you," Pam said, reaching for her cheek to draw her in. "Because I know I really wouldn't be."

What would she do without sunlight in her life? Moulder and wallow in the dark.

Harley wrapped her arms around her and wriggled her way under the covers. "Ugh. I don't want anyone but you to look at me for a few days."

"Not gonna ask," Pam promised. "But happy to oblige. Now get your street clothes off the bed and c'mere."

She had a lot of stories to tell, but they could wait.

[[ taken from Harley Quinn #34 by Tini Howard and Sweeney Boo. And now y'all get a little bit of a break from all the Ivy on the timeline. ]]

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Midnight Manor, Room 1D. Fandom Island. Late Tuesday Night [8/26]

It was mid-to-late evening, Fandom time, when Illyana finally returned to Midnight, intending to hit the shower since she was rather covered in, well, goo and looked like she'd been through a war zone.

The perils of being an active Sorcerer Supreme. On the bright side, no more cultists, AND she'd gotten out a lot of her frustration over the interaction with Peter earlier!

( Stephen was not a fan of how much fun she and Clea had while solving this particular problem, but he'd get over it. If there was ever a place where Violence was the question and the answer, it was the Dark Dimension. )

[OOC: NFB. TW: Marvel (emotional trauma, NPC deaths). Midnight modded with permission. OCD UP FOR THE RESIDENTS OF MIDNIGHT MANOR, although I will be crashing out shortly.]

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Edinburgh, Scotland. Earth-18133, Tuesday Morning Fandom-Time [NFB, NFI]

Across all the fragments of the multiverse, events shift and change as a million stories breathe and flex and push their way forward into the light. A different choice, a different chance, and the shards of possibility break further apart into new timelines, new worlds, new paths.

And yet, some universal constants remain: death, gravity, taxes... certain events that are fixed points, perhaps not in time, but in the lifeblood of a universe. Sometimes, they were simply...delayed. Out of sync from one universe to the next, perhaps, but inevitable all the same as sand sliding through the hourglass of events. Waiting. Waiting.

Here.

( Illyana Nikolievena Rasputina was used to being a girl out-of-time. )

[OOC: NFB, NFI, adapted from The Uncanny X-Men #225 : False Dawn. That's right, it's time for THE FALL OF THE MUTANTS for Earth-18133!

You didn't think I was going to let Illyana escape this particular trauma unscathed, did you?]

Needful Things Building to Ink, Holes & Smoke; Monday Morning into Afternoon

After yet another restless night, Harley woke with a start.

And then immediately sank back down with a groan, because Christ, her nightmares really did love to just run reruns on her, didn't they? Mr J and an operating table this, Belle Reve straitjacket bullshit that, it was all just the same shit on a loop for ever and ever, regardless of the specific intricate psychological context of the waking hours that was pulling them back out into rotation in the first place. The lack of imagination was honestly insulting, at this point.

She stretched her arms above her head and blinked the sleepy blur out of her eyes, and looked at the room.

... The living room slash kitchen situation, yes, where she was lying on the couch under a pile of blankets. Despite Pam's best intentions, Harley had still not made any moves towards restoring the bedroom back into a habitable environment. Or the rest of the apartment, either. Takeaway trash kept piling up, and almost every bit of furniture was placed awkwardly in ill-fitting spots, like the way the couch itself continued to halfway block the bathroom door. Cans and candy wrappers and empty bags of nachos kept getting underfoot every time Harley moved around the apartment.

In essence:

( time to clean a real shithole of a dump )

(establishy!)

Current Music: 'Versions of Violence', Alanis Morissette

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Slaughter Swamp, Monday

Pam was trying, really hard, to give Harley her space. To not take it personally. To not give into the urge to call Harley-not-Harley and beg her, pathetically, for advice. (Admittedly, considering her habit of keeping her own counsel, that one was less difficult than the other two. Still, it was a thought that kept nudging at her.)

Her side also wouldn't stop hurting. But she ignored that.

She ignored all of it. In fact, to make sure her focus was on this, and nothing else, she'd moved some of her lab equipment into the shed at Slaughter Swamp. Fandom had provided too many distractions, and she was running against a clock she couldn't even see. She needed more of the antidote, and fast, and she wasn't sure that her blood could provide enough of it to protect Gotham City when her fungus came to roost.

Unfortunately, as it turned out, even Slaughter Swamp was full of constant interruptions...

( Are you havin' a barbecue in here or somethin'? Smells weird. )

[[ taken and adapted from Poison Ivy #18 and #19 by G. Willow Wilson, Luana Vecchio and Marcio Takara, and a little bit from Harley Quinn #34 by Tini Howard and Sweeney Boo because if you got overlapping integrated canon then you use it ]]

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where: rataje nad sázavou (rattay)

Out Somewhere in the Park to... Somewhere Else, Monday Morning

Henry was starting to acclimate, a tad. He thought. Yes, it was likely that what he was acclimating to was-- Hell? Heaven?

Crimbo? Like that priest had talked about that one time.

But still. He finally could make it through a day without spending half of it staring at the walls, though Skalitz still burned behind his eyes at times. He could even leave the castle, as he was doing now, heading back out into the park with his notebook to see how all the flowers and things were doing.

Perhaps, he mused, as he stepped between some shrubs, he should take some home and see what happened if he a--

So lost in his thoughts Henry was that he completely missed the root sticking out of the ground. The fall felt as if he was moving slowly and quickly both at once, and his eyes widened before his face landed straight in the mud...

He sunk into it, helplessly. How was there so much of it? It hadn't rained much or anything...

"Henry!" called a familiar voice. And then followed a familiar burst of laughter. "What are you doing in the mud, you bloody oaf of a peasant? Was it calling to you?"

Henry frowned, pushing himself up. He squinted, eyes adjusting to the light. He caught blond hair, slightly off teeth, an obnoxious grin-- "Just lookin' for turnips as a peasant does, Lord Capon," he managed, finding his wit somewhere amidst all of the madness. "Sorry your Lordship had to see all that."

And before he knew it, he was being hoisted up onto his feet by a firm grip, to a standing-steady beneath the bridge to Pirkstein Castle in the heart of Rattay.

Had it all been a dream?

[[ commence the week of canon catchup! that henry tripped and fell and disappeared is FB, the rest is not. ]]

Dublin, Ireland, Sunday Evening

Well, the homes in Austria and Greece were both still under construction with a more defensive mindset after AIM attacked one of them. And Tony had (needlessly) promised Steve a vacation for the little break between classes.

Which was why he'd surprised him with a trip to Dublin!

Look, Tony had this need to be Tony sometimes and it was best to just let him get it all out there. Otherwise you ended up with giant teddy bears and rooms filled with roses. Sorry not sorry, Steve.

"How do you like the room?" Tony asked, setting his bag down.

[for the guy on SP]

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Harley Quinn's Apartment, Gotham City, Saturday Night to Sunday Morning

It had been a long couple of weeks. But Harley - her Harley - was back; that, if anything, could put Harley-not-Harley out of Pam's mind and put a smile on her face. She dashed through the door as soon as she saw those telltale blonde-blue-red ponytails draped over the sofa. "Hey, squeaky," she said, grinning, and put her knees on the couch. "Since I'm here this weekend, and don't feel like cooking, shall we dress up and get dinner at that Quraci place down the street?"

Harley had talked about it before. And she loved dressing up. So--

...

( But there was no reaction from the lump on the couch. )

[[ nfb, nfi. taken and adapted from Harley Quinn #33 by Tini Howard and Sweeney Boo.

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The Flat In London, Saturday Afternoon

Marc had been kipping in the flat enough in the past few weeks that Steven wanted to poke his head in as well. Make sure Marc hadn't moved anything about. ("Cleaning, Steven. It's called cleaning.")

So after their usual Saturday morning activities, Steven and Llewellyn got lunch from a few street vendors (Steven had gravitated towards the bao buns in particular) and brought it back with them to the flat to eat.

"Things look to be the same," Steven said once he unlocked the door and came inside.

You're hilarious, Marc said, from the mirror near the doorway.

"Marc thinks I'm very funny," Steven told Llewellyn.

[for the hubby]

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All Over Los Angeles, then Lucifer's Penthouse, Saturday

It had started with an idea: perhaps Lucifer's disappearance from his now confusingly-parented future child's life was because he'd been murdered. Chloe had pitched the idea, and it had grown and grown, especially after he'd found that Azrael's Blade had vanished from his locker. Azrael's Blade! The only sword that could kill a divine being.

And so Lucifer had swept away with the Detective on an old-fashioned case. A case that led them to his disorienting spawn -- "He wasn't murdered. All you told me was you two were together in Van Nuys, near Tenth and Swanson. Lucifer turned the corner, and you never saw him again." "Ah, well, the scene of the crime, but unfortunately not the date--" "Oh, I know the date." -- and then to a dentist's office where the dentist's husband, the receptionist, had apparently gotten himself involved in quite the love polyhedron, and the accidental revelation thereof had left him with some rather murderous feelings towards Lucifer himself -- and then finally to the couch in Dr. Linda's renewed office.

On the couch with Chloe and their apparent? daughter, who looked exactly like the future daughter he thought he'd have with Octavia and Duke, and who somehow still had the blade wings that seemed rather more suitable for one of Octavia's chi--

"She's the only one with motive, means and opportunity!" Lucifer declared.

"That's why you brought me here?" Rory snapped, her eyes wide as she hopped up off the couch. "This isn't family therapy. It's an interrogation?!"

Her eyes went big. "I can't believe you did this. I am not a murder suspect. I'm your daughter!"

She stormed out of the room, slamming the door behind her.

"She takes after you in exits," Linda muttered.

... So none of that had gone well.

And then it had gotten worse.

Sufficient to say, by afternoon, Lucifer was on the floor, his two hands barely keeping their grip on the edges of Azrael's blade as Chloe brought the sword down to bear on him. "Chloe! Chloe!"

"I know what I'm doing, and you're not taking it away!" the Detective growled.

Sufficient to say, much like the rest of the summer, today had been rather a thing.

[[ for them who can hopefully save him. very very compressed from Lucifer 6x05, 'The Murder of Lucifer Morningstar', because we're now hitting the parts of this season i loathe ]]

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what: supper club

KPOT, Catonsville, Maryland, Thursday Evening

Lydia had seen a video on Korean barbecue, and it looked fun! Maybe with less alcohol than in the video. She didn't trust some of you not to catch yourselves aflame. But fun! So she had made inquiries of the tiny internet in her phone, and instructed the Supper Club to meet her this time in the suburbs of Baltimore for a Korean barbecue and hot pot dinner.

She didn't know what a hot pot was, actually. But she was looking forward to finding out.

Welcome to Supper Club, everyone!