(no subject)

[whattingawhat]

who: Buffy Summers
what: Coffee shop ,patrol, blood donation, exploration of the area
when: March 21-27
where: Perimeter, clinic, general area
warnings: TBD



Morning is spent working her shift at the coffee shop. Being a barista is something that worked out for her at home and something that she chose to do here. As far as jobs go, she likes being a barista. Once her shift is done there, she'll head out for an early afternoon patrol.

The brownouts had made Buffy a little nervous, but when the blackouts started she got even more nervous. The assurances that the perimeter fence will hold don't do much to assure Buffy. She prefers patrol as a means of assurance. Besides, it's something she knows how to do. She can be found patrolling along the fence with a stake in hand. She looks casual and relaxed. In fact, she might not look like she's paying any attention at all, but especially where Buffy is concerned, looks can be deceiving.

She'd read the announcement about needing blood donations both for injuries and for food sources. It hits close enough to home that she stops by the clinic and donates blood (but not any tissue because she's a little weirded out by that). She gives some warnings about her blood possibly being like crack to vampires and maybe stick to using it for an injury since it could also help with some speedy healing.

Between afternoon patrol and evening patrol, Buffy does some exploring around town, checking things out and not only trying to get the layout of the town, but get an idea of how people are reacting to the power issues as well.

Comments

[dust_of_life]

There was no greater crime than harming a tree. Okay, there was, but Fatima was attuned with mother nature and therefore not going to press her luck. So she decided to break a chair in order to whittle some stakes for herself. She bought it cheap at one of the markets and took it to the edge of town, near a deserted part of the fence. And then proceeded to crack it against the ground until it shattered.

Practical. Efficient. And, if she was honest, kind of therapeutic.

Her frustration had been growing steadily for days now, as she struggled to wrap her mind around the idea of the multiverse. Of dealing with more than one version of a person at a time. And of the growing realization that she was...well. Alone.

There wasn't anyone else from her world here, as far as she knew. And certainly, she didn't have friends.

She scowled down at the chair leg her hand, half worn into a stake with her hunting knife. Maybe it was better that way. No friends. No attachments. At the very least, it meant no distractions from her work. But she would be lying if she said it didn't make her feel severely less human.

[whattingawhat]

Buffy doesn't go out of her way to harm trees. Her stake actually comes from a chair at the coffee shop that was wobbly. She was doing a public service by putting it out of it's misery and repurposing it's corpse. Or something like that.

The multiverse is something that Buffy is comfortable with. She got even more comfortable with it while she was in the Complex. Being pulled here has only really cemented the idea of a multiverse. While she doesn't have anyone from home, Buffy knows that she's incredibly lucky to have Derek and Alcide, the little family she built in the Complex, here. She's not alone.

Hopefully, Fatima can make friends here the way Buffy had made friends in the last place she been living. She knows how important it is to have friends.

See, that was the purpose of friends, that was why friends were so necessary for people like them: friends reminded one of their own humanity. They also gave a person something to fight for.

When Buffy came upon some carving stakes, something that was unusual enough to make Buffy do a double take, she paused then moved in closer. "What'd that stake ever do to you?" she asked by way of greeting.

[dust_of_life]

Fatima looked up. There had been a few people passing by. No one had paid much attention to her activity and her Cainite radar hadn't gone off. She was surprised. Both by the immediate jump to 'stake.' And by the fact that the girl talking to her looked like any number of the blond cheerleaders from her high school who had tortured Fatima, calling her a terrorist and her mother a 'witch.'

The combination was...eerie.

She tilted her head to one side, lowering the tip of the hunting knife so it pointed down. No point in threatening someone just because they were blond, after all. "I don't trust it," she replied blithely. "I think it wants to give me a splinter. It just has that shifty look to it."

A decent recovery, she supposed. But the word 'stake' was still...stuck. In her mind.

[whattingawhat]

Well, she was a cheerleader, but she accidentally threw a girl across the gym and that ended her cheerleading career. She never tortured anyone though, even before the slayer thing when she was a vapid, shallow teenage girl. As for 'stake' what else should she call it? Fence picket?

Buffy appreciates the lack of threatening and that Fatima does make the decision to tilt the knife down tells Buffy that she thinks about things like that, not everyone does. Fatima has been threatened before or has done some threatening and she knows how to use the knife. Her works make Buffy smile broadly, something bordering on a laugh. "You do have a point. It is pretty shifty looking. You have to watch the oak ones especially." She has no idea what sort of wood the stake Fatima is carving is made of. Oak is a kind of wood though, she knows that much.

"I'm Buffy," she says with a little wave, not moving any closer to Fatima. After all: knife, stake. It makes sense to give her some room threatening or otherwise. Fatima might also notice that Buffy has a stake that was pretty clearly a coffee shop chair at one point. It's tucked into the waistband of her pants.

[dust_of_life]

"Well, the stake has the real point," she said.

Her eyes swept up and down Buffy, catching only briefly on the stake in her waistband. That was oddly comforting. For the first time since arriving, Fatima started to feel a glimmer of hope. Maybe she wasn't entirely a lone. She didn't recognize the girl. But it wasn't like she knew every single hunter or dhampir back home.

A lot of them, yes.

But not all.

So she decided to stand up, tucking the knife into the back of her boot. "Fatima," she said, reaching out to offer her hand.

coffee shop;

[rouxgaroux]

He still can't really believe that he got here with both Derek and Buffy. He keeps looking for Zee for that reason, hoping she'll show up and he'll have all of his little makeshift pack he'd formed in that other place they were in before finding the portal into the Quarantine. He gets sad about it, about the lack of Zee. But then he also counts his blessings: Derek and Buffy. Eventually, he won't be so paranoid about losing them here. But until then, he's probably a little too present in their lives.

Wearing jeans and a tee, the cheapest thing he could find at the shop, he's the asshole that walks into the coffee shop a minute before closing. He goes over to the counter and rests his elbows on it, leaning in as he watches Buffy cleaning up with closing preparations. The less asshole-ish part of this is that he doesn't intend to stay.

Her back is to him when he speaks up. "Ain't really here for the coffee. But can I walk you out when you're done?"

[whattingawhat]

In all honesty, it really depends on what the asshole walking in at the last minute wants whether Buffy is irritated or not. If he just wants an espresso, well the espresso machine isn't that hard to clean. If he wants something with steamed milk or really anything else at all...yeah, asshole. Of course, she doesn't say that, just tells the person in question she'll be with them in a moment.

When he speaks, Buffy recognizes his voice so she turns around with a smile on her face. She sees Alcide a lot, especially since they've already moved into the loft with Derek together, but somehow that never makes seeing him again any less happy-making. Funny how that works. But she's not falling in love with him, nope. Definitely not (really, she's kidding no one; she was falling in love with him before they even arrived here).

"Well, if you're here to walk me out I don't see how I can be angry face at you showing up. Want an espresso before we go?"

[rouxgaroux]

Really, Derek saved the both of them some heartache by getting his loft here. He not only let them come live with them, getting Alcide out of a situation where all of his roommates know each other already and he and two other guys were watching the shenanigans unfold, but also giving Alcide something to do with himself on the nights he can't sleep. Fixing up the loft is going to be good for him if Derek lets him keep it up.

Plus, there's the fact that he has two of his 'pack' right with him. Like it or not, both Derek and Buffy are his pack. But then even back home his pack was almost always made up of a small group of hodge-podge kinds of people... not your typical wolf pack in spite of the Alpha blood that runs in his veins.

"Nah, I'll never get to sleep drinkin' it this late." He has coffee every morning if it's available. Only after noon if his intent is to stay awake all night. Although Buffy and coffee brings about other memories. "Mostly I'm just here to see the blond barista runnin' the joint."

[whattingawhat]

Buffy had been coping a little better with her communal living quarters; she'd met a couple of her room mates and they all seemed fairly unfamiliar with each other, but she's still incredibly grateful to narrow those room mates down to the two people who have become more like family to her with their shared history. Buffy probably isn't nearly as much help when it comes to fixing up the loft, but she does try to help when they're all up late at night. With all her powers intact, Buffy doesn't need more than about four hours of sleep a night.

With Buffy living in the same house, there is coffee available. The first thing she did without a doubt is buy a coffee machine. It's not as nice as the one at work, or the one she had back home, but it gets the job done. Alcide's words make Buffy smile even wider, a light flush coming to her cheeks. "I'll tell her you're looking for her. She'll be done in just a minute. You know, if she stops flirting with the cute guy that came looking for her."

Because she can't even deny that she's flirting anymore. Sometimes she still feels a pang of guilt over Spike, over knowing that she does love him and back home they're in a good relationship, but Spike isn't here and he hasn't been around in awhile, not since she was first pulled out of San Francisco. She's feeling less guilty all the time. She has to wonder if that makes her like Alcide's ex; she pushes those thoughts away because they're not going to do anyone any good.

Patrol

[greatcleavage]

Midway through her patrol shift came a deployment of additional staff. The wall might hold, but no one wanted to take any chances.

Roy didn't mind working extra time, especially when the Good of the City was at stake. Sure, he walked up to the fence with a frown, but that had more to do with getting stuck in a sub shop for an hour than any particular irritation with the job, and he managed to bring up a smile for his new shift partner.

"They're adding guards," he said by way of greeting. "Just in case, I suppose -- I haven't heard of any credible threats. But it looks like we'll be patrolling together for a bit."

Re: Patrol

[whattingawhat]

Additional staff is good. Buffy is all about precautions, particularly because this seems like a good place and thus far, she likes the people. A good majority of them seem capable of protecting themselves, but it never hurts to add a little protection to the mix.

For Buffy, patrol is as natural as breathing so she doesn't really count it as overtime. She's wouldn't be reading a book, and she really only watches TV when it's a movie. She could be helping Derek or Alcide renovate the apartment building, but with everything a little crazy, she'd rather be on patrol.

Buffy nods a little at his greeting. "Just in case is good. They keep saying the fence will hold, but I'm glad they're being precaution-y. I'm Buffy."

[greatcleavage]

"Roy Greenhilt," he said with a polite nod in return. Normally he'd offer a handshake, but while on duty they ought to keep their hands free for a combat response, if necessary. He hadn't drawn the weapon that gave him his family name yet -- it was too large to walk around with absent a need -- but he could draw it quickly enough to meet a threat.

"I think it's more for PR than anything," he said, as he matched his steps to hers on the patrol route. "The perimeter seems pretty safe, but keeping a populace from getting panicky and nervous is good policy too."

[whattingawhat]

He's very...rigid about these things. That's probably not going to work well with them being patrol partners. Buffy is very not rigid and if she figures out he is, she'll start doing things purposely to annoy him. Her stake is tucked in her waistband and she walks with the casualness of someone on a walkabout rather than patrol.

She tilts her head to one side and gives a sort of facial shrug. "Maybe, but I'd rather put in extra time on patrol and the fence be totally safe than wake up to the town being rampaged by monsters. I'm all for mayhem and destruction, but I'd rather it be more controlled and less all over town."

[advanced]

Bucky also enjoys patrolling, though not for the same reasons and not for the same enemies. The power outages are making him nervous, they could easily be a tactic to throw the city into confusion before an attack comes, and he's assuaging those nerves by making sure the defences are holding up as well as they can.

He has beaten back a couple of monsters that found a weak spot, only small ones, and now his leg is aching viciously. He should find a place to sit down, but he keeps going all the same, rounding a corner only to nearly run into a young woman.

She reminds him immediately of Black Widow, small and slight but with a stance that says she knows exactly how to fight people more than twice her size. But her weapon of choice... what the hell is that?

"There's a small breach back there, arm yourself properly before you go on."

[whattingawhat]

The power outages alone are a pretty valid reason to be nervous and Buffy is pleased to see that lots of people are taking the danger serious. Her concerns are more straightforward: monsters taking advantage of the city when it's vulnerable, but patrolling for any reason is a good one.

Even if he hadn't nearly run into her, the guy with the metal arm would have gotten her attention. She takes a quick step back to avoid the running into thing.

Hey now. Her weapon of choice is totally valid. She can cause a lot of damage with a wooden stake, as she's often proven in the past. Besides, her scythe isn't here so she can't impress him with her weaponry. He's just going to have to trust that she knows what she's doing with the stake.

He says arm yourself properly and she gives him a confused look. "Uhm...stake plus heart usually equals dead."

[advanced]

At least his arm is concealed at the moment beneath a long sleeve and a leather glove, he doesn't want to draw more attention to himself than necessary and the stupid silver arm is a pretty big giveaway. He probably looks, and smells, more like a hobo than a fellow fighter right about now, as he's spent the last few nights down an alleyway without working plumbing.

"It's made of wood, not exactly durable."

He could snap that thing into kindling if she came at him with it. He's pretty sure that the monsters could do the same thing.

"A knife would work better."

[whattingawhat]

She can definitely understand that, wanting to avoid drawing attention to himself. Okay, now she can and will (once she gets to know him better) blame him for not taking a shower. Come on, he's got access to them. There's no excuse for being smelly, Bucky.

"A knife wouldn't kill everything and I don't have a knife. I have a stake and I know how to use it and wood...totally plentiful."

Coffeeshop

[toolatetochangethename]

It's probably a bad sign that Scott's waiting by the coffee shop before it even opens, but, yo, man, he's been up all night trying to fix the power grid. So, make that a scruffy-looking Scott, loitering and mumbling to himself, pacing back and forth in front of the coffee shop door. Probably mentioning how much easier this could be if he had ants.

Re: Coffeeshop

[whattingawhat]

Maybe it's a bad sign, but it's an action that Buffy can sympathize with. She's very attached to her morning cup of coffee. The fact that she's already had one at home while she was getting ready makes her a little more chipper and awake when she approaches the coffee shop door, keys in hand. "Morning," she says in a voice that's not too chipper. After all, it is still morning and coffee does not make her a morning person instantly, at least not without multiple cups of coffee.

Once she gets the door unlocked, she holds it open for the man that looks like he's in dire need of coffee. "I'll get a pot brewing," she promises as she she ducks behind the counter. Because he's waiting, she'll get the coffee brewing first then proceed to open the rest of the shop.

Coffeeshop

[toolatetochangethename]

'Chipper' has never been a word applied to Scott Lang, and especially not after he's been up all night staring at wiring that looked like it was assembled by angry monkeys.

"NNGGFFFFF." That's about as coherent as he can get right now.

Nah, he can do better. And he should. "Thanks. Rough night." Well, at least he's still got a grip on the obvious?

Re: Coffeeshop

[whattingawhat]

The noise he makes gets a surprised laugh out of Buffy. "Sounds like someone is even less of a morning person than I am," she tells him, but to be fair, she's already had one cup of coffee at home. Once the coffee is started, she starts setting everything else up: pastries in the glass case, chairs come down off the tables. As soon as there's enough coffee in the pot for a cup, she pours him one, leaving room at the top for cream if he's that sort of person.

"Want a pastry with that?" she asks as she hands over the cup.

Patrol

[ragnarsson]

Ivar is out on patrol himself, wheeling himself around in the wheelchair he's recently painted camo. All the better for blending in if he ever decides to take it out into the woods. He's already beaten back two critters that had tried to get through the fence, so he's looking a little tousled and beaten-up.

He notices the stake with a raised eyebrow. "Is that all you have for a weapon?" The teen has a throwing ax and a few knives hidden on his body. It always pays to be over-prepared instead of under. But wooden stakes don't seem practical.

Re: Patrol

[whattingawhat]

The guy in the wheel chair with the throwing ax is a bit of a surprise. To be honest, anyone in a wheelchair on patrol is a bit of a surprise to Buffy. No, she's not that person that believes a handicapped person can't do things, but she's never seen one that fought, particularly against monsters. It's obvious by the weapon and his appearance though that he's been battling something.

At least they're sharing surprised looks? Of course, at his question her look becomes indignant. She's caught a lot of flack about her stake. "Apparently, you'd be surprised by what I can do with a stake."

She's got quite a few super powers that make the stake incredibly deadly even if she's not trying to slay a vampire.

[ragnarsson]

He sees that look and knows exactly what it means. No one ever expects someone who can't walk to be capable of much. But Ivar's spent a lifetime proving his Viking brethren wrong. It's continued even into Riverview. So long as Buffy doesn't say something stupidly obvious, there won't be a reason for that anger of his, always kept so close to the surface to come bubbling up.

"I'll believe that when I see it," he says, a curious Scandinavian accent coloring his words. She looks like a pretty little slip of a thing, but Ivar's seen shieldmaidens just as blonde, pretty, and ready to shove a spear through a man's throat.

[whattingawhat]

Nah, she's not that sort of person and hey, as far as she knows, he's from a world that's trained to fight from a wheelchair. Maybe it's a sport, like basketball...okay, maybe not, but she's heard stranger things.

She likes the accent even if she can't place it. It makes her smile a bit as does the hint of a challenge in his words. Like Ivar, she's spent much of her life being underestimated. She's too small, too blonde, too much of a girl to be any good when it comes to a fight. Funny how a group of people hundreds of years ago thought women more capable than they often do in the twenty-first century. "Come on then," she gestures for him to follow her. "I'm Buffy, by the way."