strangetrip | [GP/EP] Check-In Day

Why Caroline had needed her to help with Check-In Day she hadn't bothered to say. Just, "you said you'd help," and when Regina protested she wasn't good with people, "aren't you a Queen or a Mayor or something?" complete with shooing gestures. While Regina found Caroline more exasperating the terrifying, she did have a point.

So Regina suited up--literally, gathered her files and folders, coffee mug, pens and pocketed the wooden carving of Henry/Roland Robin had made for her, then headed for the cafe. If, polished and politic and patently Busy, she didn't offer newcomers the brightest or warmest smile when they arrived, it was nevertheless confident and quite possibly reassuring.

Caroline did friendly. Regina...did knowledgeable and polite. Dot and Ignis had been asked to provide finger food on catering trays. The still-grieving Miss Pryde had been tasked with samovars of tea and coffee and ice chest of soda and beer. Caroline's welcome baskets sat on the table beside Regina's for easy access. And though she didn't when she was alone in the office, Regina spent the magic to fix her eyesight so she didn't put glasses between her and new arrivals.

Madame Mayor was in.

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"Funny how we do not wish to," Fenris snapped fiercely. He knew that it wasn't as if Tevinter mages were the only ones to keep slaves, but the practice was so commonplace that it betrayed the evil down to the core of the race.

Before she could react, he took a breath. "Perhaps we should not speak of such things. Take me where I should go."

"Perhaps not." If her tone remained level, there could be no mistaking it for placid. "But before we agree not to talk about it, I would have you know, I will tolerate none being enslaved, no matter who wields the whip."

And with that, she fell silent and continued along the road to the hotel.

Perhaps Fenris had said too much. But then, he had never taken much care with hiding his emotions - at least, the ones on the side of anger.

He walked with her, until they reached the inn, and he looked a bit alarmed when stepping inside. It was not like an inn he'd ever seen. He couldn't quite put his finger on what was so different about how it was appointed, but it was very different.

Not the type to brood or nurse a grudge over true words, powerfully felt, Yasmeen flicked a small, feral smile his way when they entered the inn. He looked just this side of poleaxed.

"You get used to it." For the most part, anyhow. "Enforced stay aside, the accommodations are comfortable. Peculiar, but comfortable."

"Is there wine?" Fenris asked after a moment, because now seemed like a good time to go through a bottle. At least he had not yet seen anything that constituted a threat.

"Plenty of it. And anything else you prefer to drink." Yasmeen inclined her head toward the cafe. "If you'd prefer to start there than with your room key, the details are easier to take over a bellyful."

Fenris considered this for a second and then said, "I suspect it would be advisable for me to bathe before meeting anyone else." And wash the blood off of his armor as well.

"You'd be surprised how many of us turn up bleeding," Yasmeen replied, but steered them toward the front desk.

"Unless I miss my guess, you'll need a few explanations after you talk to the Innkeeper." And because she was bored and he was touchy and wore a sword, she reckoned, "I'll wait."

Ferris looked at her for a moment, and then nodded. He stepped up to the man at the desk.

A few minutes later, he returned to Yasmeen. "Is that man a Tranquil?" he asked.

"A what?" Yasmeen's gaze narrowed as she glanced past him to the Innkeeper. "If you mean is he an idiot, I think not. Although I'm not convinced he and the other staff are alive They behave like highly advanced automata."

"Tranquil mages are stripped of their connection to the Fade," Fenris said, even as he realized that she would likely have no idea what he was talking about. "They cannot dream, nor feel much of anything. They lose the ability to do anything but form a logical opinion."

Yasmeen's stomach turned rather sharply at the inevitable comparison to nanites her mind leapt to. "In that case, I hope not."

"Me too," said Fenris.

He showed her his card. "I have a room, apparently. Can you help me find it?"

Interesting. He disliked mages, but also disliked the practice of making them Tranquil. Perhaps somewhat less biased than he seemed to project.

She took the card from his fingers, read the details, and nodded. "First floor, building three. If your world is anything like mine, you might prepare yourself now. 'Inn' means something entirely different now than it did half a millennium ago."

"At this point I think I will continue to assume that whatever I see next will continue to shock," Fenris said, and turned the card over in his fingers.

"Safe bet." Yasmeen considered the distance involved in getting him from here to there, and held up a hand. "Hold a minute."

She sauntered off to the cafe and asked Kitty, who seemed to be behind the bar in spite of her recent loss, for two bottles of red wine. Kitty didn't bat an eyelash. Just pulled the corks, popped them back in, and handed them over.

When Yasmeen returned, she held out one of the bottles. "It's not far, but no one should have to bleed from their leg and their eyes without wine."

Fenris actually cracked a smile when he saw the bottles. "Thank you," he said, and took one of them. As much as he wanted to remain on his guard, he thought this would help enormously once he could relax for a moment.

Yasmeen acknowledged the gratitude with a nod and the upward tick of the corner of her mouth. "Self-defense," she said wryly and pressed forward to open the glass door at the front of the lobby.

Fenris followed after her. "Did you too come from an entirely different place?" he asked her. He had noticed her teeth and nails, and pegged her for some unfamiliar. But he was already very accustomed to the unfamiliar.

"Two." Although hardly given to chatter and self-disclosure, since she'd undertaken to show this one to his room, she offered the information in a personable tone. "Some years ago, I was summarily transported from my own world, a place of clockwork mechanics and petticoats for women who weren't me, into a world in which this hotel would fit, if slightly the behind technologically."

She did rather miss the convenience of cellular phones, but in all she was just as glad not to have them, since it would only emphasize that there was no need to be able to call.

"Nearly six months ago, I was deposited here in similar fashion."

[GP/EP] Check-In Day

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