(( This is a piece written to cover a trip to London by Annette (Nitoichi), Linda (Liberty Girl), and Dinah Ewers (Alraune) due to Annette's discovery that her family has had a bit of a secret past associated with the 'gentleman's club' Jason Caine helped found. If you want the backstory on this, you'll need to go look in the IC Story thread over in Roleplay, but I thought this stood resaonably well on its own. ))
October 29th 2008, 08:50. Green Line Station, Skyway City.
Annette Barrington waited for the train to Salamanca impatiently. She was wearing jeans, a T-shirt without her usual band logo, and a jacket... and sunglasses, despite the eternal darkness which still covered Paragon City. BODICIA, Over-AI of the Vigil, had supplied her with the strongest analgesics she was allowed and anti-nausea pills, but Annette was paying for drinking too much on charged emotions, and she had to acknowledge that it was her own stupid fault.
Beside her, Dinah Ewers and Linda Lee waited patiently. Well, Dinah waited patiently, Linda looked like a kid about to go on holiday. Annette was half-waiting for her to start saying 'are we there yet?' She's cute, Nitoichi, Annette's alternative personality commented. If we wire her up to some generators, d'you think we could get rid of Terra Volta? Annette mentally whacked Ni around the back of the head, and felt the pain as a deep throb in her own skull. Or maybe that was just the hangover. Linda was wearing her grey mini dress, which Annette always liked... when she didn't have a hangover.
Dinah was obviously expecting something special. She was dressed in her dark blue business suit and her hair was in a ponytail. The look was not quite so effective as when she wore her hair fully tied up, and Annette had thus far managed to avoid calling her 'mistress' once. The small hold-all Dinah was carrying did not look like it could last a lady like Dinah for several days away from home, but this was Dinah, and Annette was not going to question her on travel arrangements.
The train pulled up at the station, the doors and gates opened and they stepped aboard. The trip out to Salamanca took around ten minutes. Ten minutes of silence. Annette was too hungover to make polite conversation. Dinah was musing over her own worries, and was somewhat depressed by the lack of sunlight anyway. Linda would have happily filled the space with words, but the silence of her friends and the presence of other passengers kept her quiet. Instead she sat, hands between her knees, legs jiggling slightly. There was a chime from somewhere above them and a woman's voice announced their arrival at Salamanca station.
Annette had been expecting to meet Jason Caine at the university campus, but a message sent overnight directed them to his apartment not far away. The ghosts and fir bolg seemed to know that tackling the three heroes would be a bad idea, and avoided them as they walked the quiet streets to a three-storey brownstone north of the campus. Annette pressed the buzzer for Jason's flat and the door opened without anyone using the intercom. The three filed up two flights of stairs and Annette was about to knock on the door when it opened.
"Good morning, Miss Barrington, Miss Lee. And Ms Ewers, always a pleasure." He smiled warmly at Dinah.
"Mr Caine," Dinah replied, inclining her head, a smile touching her lips.
"Well, let's get this going," Jason said, stepping back to allow them in. "You have the ring, Annette?" Annette took the signet ring from her jacket pocket. It was gold, with an inset jet inscribed with the letter 'B' in an ornate script. "Good," Jason said, "put it on." She slipped the ring onto her finger. It was a little loose. Jason closed the door and smiled, regarding Annette. "You don't really believe in magic, but you acknowledge that something called magic exists, I assume?" he said.
She needed. "People obviously do magic. Even the Rikti have started using it. It isn't like I can deny it exists. I just figure it's something science hasn't worked out yet."
"You may be right. I'm not much of a scientist, but I'm a reasonable magician." He smiled and then went on as though giving a lecture. "The ring is your connection to the wards of the Barrington Club. Right now it is in a sort of state of flux. It will listen to you, but there is no real connection there. It's a utility thing, your ancestor was a very clever man. Right now, you need to believe that you have a need to go to the Barrington Club. Fix that thought in your mind."
"Okay," Annette said, not sounding too sure.
"Now, open the door."
"The front door? The one we just came through?" Jason nodded, so Annette reached out and pulled the door open.
The corridor outside had changed. Instead of pale yellow, plaster walls there were oak panels. Overhead bulb lights had been replaced by wall sconces. Annette stepped through, followed slowly by Linda and more confidently by Dinah and Jason. He closed the door behind him. They were in a small atrium. An internal door faced the one they had come through and it opened quite suddenly to reveal a young woman no older than Annette, dressed in a Victorian maid's uniform. She smiled and ushered them through. "Good afternoon, Mr Caine, Miss Barrington, ladies. Mr Bellington is expecting you at some point and, as instructed, a room has been made available for Ms Ewers should she wish to take advantage of it."
"Thank you," Dinah said. Her back had gone from the tiniest of slouches in Paragon to ramrod straight, and her features had shifted into something more like the Dinah Annette was used to. "That would be most useful."
"If you would like to give me your bag," the maid said, "I will see that it is taken to room fifty-three."
"Thank you..." Dinah began, pausing to suggest the girl give her name.
"Jenny, ma'am," Jenny replied, bobbing slightly and taking the offered hold-all.
"Thanks, Jenny," Jason said, walking through into the room behind the inner door. "Would you mind telling Bellington that I'll give them a quick tour and then come up to him?"
"Of course, Mr Caine," Jenny replied, bobbing again, and then vanishing off through a concealed door in the wall.
Two attendants looked up from their desks as the group entered. They nodded politely to Jason, and then caught site of Annette. They seemed to know. There was a look of anticipation about them, as though they were waiting impatiently to find out whether she would take the role in the Club that was being offered to her. Annette avoided their eyes and did not see Jason frown at them. The two attendants quickly went back to their notebooks.
"I must say," Dinah put in, breaking the sudden silence, "that this is quite the establishment." She ran a long-fingered hand over one of the wood panels, drawing Annette's attention to them. Those are really old, Ni commented. The wood was light oak, but years and years of polish had turned it dark with a thick patina.
"Shall we proceed," Jason said, and opened a door. "It's a little early for us to be drinking, I think, but this is the bar." He stepped inside, followed by the gaggle of women. The bar had tables, and secluded booths at the back, and a large serving counter behind which stood a tall, lanky man with slicked down black hair and a rather oddly shaped face. Jason walked toward him as Annette surveyed the other patrons. An older looking man was leering happily at Linda as she followed Jason. Annette would not have minded were it not for the fangs this showed. In one of the rear booths a woman with small, red horns was talking quietly to a large column of black smoke. Three men sat around a table were playing cards. They looked up and one of them nodded politely to Annette, who returned the nod just as politely.
She felt Dinah's hand touch her arm gently and turned. "Very good, Annette," Dinah said quietly.
They joined Linda and Jason at the bar. "Annette," Jason said, "I'd like you to meet Barker, the Club's barman." Annette frowned slightly at Linda, who was standing stock still with her eyes a little wider than usual.
"Pleased to meet you, Miss Barrington," Barker said. He had a gravelly voice, and two rows of very sharp, quite long teeth.
"Um..." Annette said blinking. "Pleased to... meet you, Barker. I'm sorry, I shouldn't be stammering like a fool."
"It's quite all right, Miss Barrington," Barker replied. "When you don't grow up with people like me, it can come as a bit of a shock. That, after all is why the Club exists."
"Yes," Annette said, relaxing slightly. "I guess I can see why it would be needed."
"Indeed," Jason broke in. "Sorry, Barker, whirlwind tour. Let's move on, ladies." He lead the way out with Barker's farewells in their ears.
"And that, Mr Caine," Dinah said quietly, "was a masterful way to present Annette with the essential nature of this place."
Jason smiled. "I see I am as transparent to you as always, Ms Ewers." Annette got the impression that the two were playing an elaborate game. From what Jason had said in Rio (she could not believe she was just absently ignoring the fact that he had blandly transported them to Rio de Janeiro for lunch), Annette had come to the conclusion that he and Dinah were more than just friends. And yet they called each other by their surnames and acted so politely to each other. "Barker is hardly the strangest person you'll meet here, but he does typify our staff and members. In the outside world, he would have considerable trouble living a normal life, though he could obviously get by. Here, he's just the barman."
"What's so strange about Jenny?" Linda asked.
"I would say she is considerably older than she looks," Dinah supplied, receiving a nod from Jason. "Her mannerisms, her manners, are from a far previous century."
"She really was a Victorian maid," Jason said, "before we hired her away from the family she was working for. They were beginning to ask questions. Now, this is the dining room, restaurant, whatever you wish to call it." The room was huge and filled with tables seating various numbers from one to sixteen. Staff once again looked up as they entered, each of them looking expectantly at Annette until Jason's frown had them scurrying about their work. "I'm sorry," he said in a low voice, "the staff know that your decision is important and I'm afraid they are rather on tenterhooks about it." His tone changed to a more normal level. "The food here is excellent, and they can probably get you anything you want, whenever you want it. Our members can have rather... eclectic tastes."
"What's 'eclectic?'" Linda whispered in Annette's ear.
"Odd?" Annette whispered back. "I mean, what do you imagine a vampire would have for lunch?"
"This floor also has a couple of lounges for members as well as most of the 'utility' rooms which are obviously staff only. There's a basement with more staff-only rooms. Boiler room and the like. And a sub-basement which houses the Archive. I'd show you around down there, but with the wards having no Keeper it can be a little dangerous." He smiled. Annette had read Terry Pratchett books, she could imagine. "Let's go upstairs."
He led the way out of the dining room and through another door. There was what looked like an old, cage elevator in the room beyond, but Jason took the stairs, going up two flights before opening a door onto the first floor. "The upper floors are all rooms," he was saying. "Two floors of rooms assigned to specific members, five of unassigned rooms, and then two floors for the staff. The Keeper's Suite is room eight."
"K-keeper's Suite?" Annette stammered.
Jason nodded and opened a door, ushering them in. The reception room was larger than Annette's old flat in Galaxy City, and looked larger since there was currently no furniture in it. Beyond it was a lounge, and beyond that a small kitchen and two bedrooms, each with their own bathroom. Annette wandered around the rooms, dumb struck, her hands tracing over the walls as she walked. She looked up at one point to find Dinah watching her. She smiled, and received a smile in return. Dinah was watching her, watching her reactions. The realisation snapped her out of state of shock she had been slowly descending into.
"Time to talk to Bellington, I think," Jason said, as though he had detected the change in her mood. He led them down the corridor outside to a door marker '1' which bore a small, brass nameplate: 'Edmond Bellington, Secretary.' Jason opened the door without knocking, which seemed a little rude to Annette, but since it became rapidly apparent that Bellington was quite well aware that they were there, she guessed it didn't matter too much. "Bellington, I believe you wanted to get the formalities over?" Jason said.
Edmond Bellington waved them to chairs arrayed before his desk, a huge, mahogany thing with claw and ball, scrollwork legs and a slab of leather mounted in the surface which had to have come from a very big cow. He was a tall, thin man with grey hair and hollow cheeks. Annette guessed he was something around seventy, but seemed to be in amazingly good health, despite looking somewhat frail. He had a large, aquiline nose, and eyebrows which badly needed plucking. He looked Annette in the eyes as she sat down and she shivered. There was something ageless about him, combined with a lack of humanity which the immortal Mr Caine managed to keep, despite being older than Annette's country.
"Ladies," Bellington began, "welcome to the Barrington Club. Miss Lee, while obviously our countries differ, I must admire your patriotic defence of yours. Your desire to do the right thing should be admired by all."
Linda actually blushed. "I d-didn't know people over here knew about me?" she said.
"I make it my business to know everything about anything which affects the Club. The..." he coughed delicately, "significant other of our potential new Keeper obviously bears investigation. While my considerable age precludes me from condoning your lifestyle, I can do nothing but dough my hat to you in your steadfast regard for duty."
Linda appeared to take a second to digest this. Finally she said, "are all English guys this charming?"
"I assure you you've been spoiled by Richard," Jason replied from his position leaning against a wall. There was a place he could sit, but he did not seem to want to.
"Miss Ewers," Bellington went on, "I have already received several remarks from my staff regarding you. You have made quite an impression. Style, elegance, demeanour, and yet I understand that you began life at a university, not a Swiss finishing school."
Dinah smiled. "My training took place after my time at university, Mr Bellington, as I'm sure you have determined."
Bellington nodded. "Of course. I'm sorry for your loss." Annette noticed it, maybe Jason, the tiny crack that appeared in Dinah's ever present mask before Bellington moved on and she had time to recover herself. "And Miss Barrington... of course, I know a lot about you, and possibly more about your family than you do."
"That's not hard," Annette replied, "after Mom and Dad divorced, Nate looked after me until the war. I really didn't concern myself with family history. I remember Dad saying that his family had been Irish Protestant land owners who fell on hard times and moved over to the US about... a century ago. Isn't that when Jason said they stopped being Keepers?"
"Indeed," Bellington agreed. "The income from the Keeper's Stipend became a crutch they leaned on, particularly in the latter generations who lived in Ireland. When they choose to reject the role, they lost access to the income, and fled across the Atlantic when they ran out of money. A just reward for ignoring their duty, if you will pardon my judgemental nature." He picked up a file from his desk and opened it, taking out several sheets of paper. "I have been examining your own credit history, Miss Barrington, and I am glad to see that a sense of financial probity has crept back into the family gene pool."
"Dad was always pretty good with money, shame he was lousy with relationships." A thought hit her. "You went through my bank records?!"
Bellington nodded, apparently unconcerned by the annoyance in her tone. "We have high hopes that there will be a new Keeper in the Barrington Club very soon. It would be most remiss of me to not ensure that she will not go wild with the current account when it is handed over."
"Y-yes," Annette stammered. "Jason mentioned something about that. Just..." she swallowed, "just how much are we talking?"
Bellington took another sheet of paper from the file and handed it to Annette. "This is a statement I had printed out this morning showing the last twelve month's payments into the account and the current balance. Sadly, I have not been able ensure a great return on the funds, but I felt it my duty to ensure that the Keeper's financial matters should be kept in order."
The paper was headed with the logo of some Swiss bank Annette had never heard of. She read down the list of columns. Somewhere around $2500 dollars had been deposited every month for the last year, and, for all Annette knew, for all of the last hundred years. She realised she wasn't taking the total figures in and gave up, skipping to the bottom. She stared at the figure. Beside her, Linda had leaned over to look and was now gasping, like a fish suddenly removed from its river. Annette giggled. It sounded slightly insane.
"Annette?" Dinah asked. "Is everything all right?"
"One hundred and five million, four-hundred and fifty thousand, eight-hundred and three dollars... and sixty-nine cents," she said, giggling again. "It's the sixty-nine cents. You'd think they could leave that off, round it up or down or something."
Jason pushed himself off the wall and stepped forward. Dinah looked at him, noting the look of worried annoyance on his face. He glanced at her and let her own worries show for a fraction of a second. He nodded in a 'leave this to me' kind of way and said, "Dinah, Linda, would you mind entertaining yourselves for an hour or so? I'd like to talk to Annette alone, if possible."
"Of course, Jason," Dinah said before Linda could respond. "We'll go and take afternoon tea." She regained her feet in the smooth, sensual manner which typified her movements and put a hand on Linda's shoulder, forestalling any argument. "I assure you, Linda, English high society is an experience not to be missed." She turned and headed for the door. "Come, dear," she said, and Linda Lee was following her as though on a chain.
"Miss Ewers is an exceptional woman," Bellington commented to Jason when they were gone.
"She certainly is," Jason replied. "Come on then, Annette, leave the bank statement on the desk and come with me. You need to see why you'll be earning the money." He led her out of the room, down the corridor, and to the cage left he had ignored earlier. Closing the gates behind them, he took a small key from his pocket and put it into a lock on the control panel. Then he pressed the bottom button on the panel. The lift jerked into life and began to rattle downward.
"Don't worry," he said as she looked around the lift, a little alarmed, "this thing couldn't fail if there was an earthquake."
"Those wards again?"
He nodded. "Look, Annette, the wards are important. You are probably the most likely candidate for a new Keeper that the Club has seen in almost a century. You're smart, talented. You've done things with your mind that most people will never manage. You've overcome amazing odds to get where you are. These are all admiral traits for a Keeper."
"But?" she asked.
"But... nothing, I just want you to realise why your people gave up the role and the danger you're facing if you take it up again." The lift suddenly stopped and Jason reached out to pull the gates open. He paused. "If you'll excuse me, I'll be sticking quite close to you in here. I can shield myself from the books, but it takes considerable effort, and it will be a lot easier to just tag along with you."
"How am I going to protect you?" Annette laughed.
"You aren't, yet, but the wards won't let anything happen to you and if I stay close, I get the same protection. Ready?" Without waiting for an answer, he opened the gates and allowed her to proceed him.
The Archive looked like something out of a Gothic horror movie. Arched corridors, large spaces lined with shelves, all of them packed with books. The light came from wall-mounted lanterns, though when Annette looked closely at one of them, she realised there was no bulb or candle in there, just a glow. Rats, big spiders, and a few things Annette could not identify, and was glad of the fact she could not, skittered around in the shadows.
"This section is fairly calm," Jason said. "It contains mostly fairly mundane historical records. Though one or two of those records would likely give some historians apoplexy. However, we're heading into the back." He placed his hand on Annette's shoulder and pointed down one tunnel which seemed a little darker than the others around them.
Sure enough, the lanterns here seemed slightly dimmer for no reason. The shelves stopped for a few yards, and then were replaced by heavier shelves, all screwed firmly to the brickwork behind them. The books here smelled old, and of methods of manufacture that Annette suspected she did not want to learn about. She got a sensation of pressure from them, as though there was some mass of... something... information, knowledge sitting there pushing inward from the shelves.
"You can feel it, right?" Jason said, watching her.
"I can feel an oppressive sensation probably caused by being in a rather spooky cellar in an old building," Annette replied.
Jason grinned. "Good girl, keep rationalising. Old, old magic books can develop personalities, but mostly they just take on some... psychic imprint of the kind of magic they hold. We keep the nasty stuff in this wing, though we have to break the collection up a bit, otherwise even the wards wouldn't be able to contain it." They came to a cross roads, and Annette could see that the collection was spread across all four arms of a cross. From here, she could see that side passages lead off each sub-wing.
"Like, not letting too much Uranium get clumped together?" she asked.
"Good analogy. This way," he steered her to the right and carried on walking until they hit the very end of the corridor, and found a large, metal door with no lock. "Open it," he said, and she pulled the heavy door open without apparent effort. "You and Bellington are the only ones who can do that," Jason commented.
"Not even you?" Annette asked, curious.
Jason chuckled softly. "I wouldn't normally want to," he said.
The room beyond the door was not large, but the walls had been carved from the solid rock, and then had had their surfaces marked with an array of what Annette assumed were magical runes and sigils. In the centre of the room was a 'table' made by simply not carving out the rock in that area and then planting a large slab of black marble on top of the resulting plinth. On top of the marble was a book. Annette had never seen any physical object which gave off such a feeling of malevolence before. It did not rattle, or try to escape through the open door. It was not a comedy magic book. It just sat there and made you want to... worship it, kill for it.
"I won't bother telling you its name, it's better if you don't know. It's older than I am and in all that time it's been sitting around, soaking up all the malevolent energy it could find. It's evil, and that's why we keep it down here. Part of your job is to guard it. Not that you have to start spending your nights down here sleeping by the door, that's what the wards are for." He smiled bleakly. "About a century ago, someone tried to steal this book."
"Who would want to?" Annette asked, her eyes on the metal bound, locked volume which, now she looked, did not even seem to have that many thick, velum pages. She moved forward a little, Jason keeping pace, and looked at the cover. An embossed image of a dragon's head looked back at her.
"I think he was a cultist belonging to a particular Order. That book can teach you some very interesting things. People have fallen under its sway for... well, a long time. Anyway, this thief made it through that door by carefully unpicking sections of the wards over the course of around ten days. We found him sitting beside the book. He looked like he'd been dead about a decade. The thing just sucked the life out of him; he wasn't 'worthy.' However, the wards needed repairing, and the keeper at the time came over from Ireland to handle it. It was hard work, the Archive was going nuts, but he managed it. We congratulated him and he went back home."
"So far, so good," Annette said, "where does it go wrong?"
"About five days later, the wards went into self-contained mode and Bellington was informed that the Keeper was dead. I went out to investigate myself, and to bring the new Keeper back to London. It seems that the book had planted something in the Keeper's mind while he was putting it back in its box. It took about two days to mature and take over. He had then spent three days or so torturing and killing every living thing he could find on his estate." Jason swallowed. "The things he did to his wife and children..." He shook his head and went on. "His oldest son survived by being away from the house on business. He came home and found his father impaled on an iron fence outside the house, his mother's body in several rooms. He had had three sisters and a young brother, but... well, let's just leave it at 'they were dead.' He told me that if he ever saw the Barrington Club it would be in his nightmares, and he left for America within a month. I can't say I blame him."
"And this book did that?" Annette asked, a little disbelieving.
Jason smiled. "Still the rationalist? I know you can feel it. Very well. You consider magic to be something that science has no explanation for, am I right?" She nodded. "Well then, what if, when science does discover that explanation, it needs a force or substance or particle called 'magic' to work? Still not sure?" He released her shoulder and stepped away from her. There was a smell, like ozone, metallic, perhaps a little sulphurous, and then a loud, whining sound. Light flared around the book, and lashed out at Jason. He was tossed backwards into the wall, falling to the ground, looking dazed. There was a large tear in his shirt, and the skin beneath was burned to a black crisp.
"Jason!" Annette shrieked and jumped between the man and the book. Another burst of light lashed out, but this time Annette caught the impact on her right arm. She felt warmth, a feeling like static was running over her skin, but no pain. When she looked, there was not a mark on her and the book was back to its normal, malevolent self.
Jason opened his eyes and smiled at her. She could see the burn on his chest healing as she watched. Of course, she had seen the same kind of thing on Linda, and even herself when she could be bothered to pay attention during a fight, but watching it happen there and then made her shiver. "Let's get out of here," she said.
"Don't get me wrong, Annette," Jason said as they walked back to the lift. "I do want you to become the new Keeper. I simply want you to do so because you feel it's an important job, which only you can do, and which should be done, not because it makes you rich and gives you a flat in London for life."
Annette nodded in response, but said nothing as they left the Archive and took the elevator upward. She followed Jason absently, not really becoming aware of her surroundings until she found herself sitting on a corner of a bed while he removed his shirt. "Um... did I miss something?" she asked.
Jason smiled at her. "Much though I find you very attractive, Miss Barrington, and I gather from your body language that you are not as fond of women as Miss Lee is, I rather think it unlikely that Dinah would consent to spending time in my company again were I to break up your relationship. However, I don't want either Dinah or Linda asking why my shirt has a huge, burned hole in it."
She giggled. "Sorry, I guess I was a bit lost in my thoughts. This," she held up her hand with the ring on it, "means a lot to all the people here, doesn't it?"
Jason nodded. "Yes, but that really should not affect your judgement..."
"It should, if I'm a hero," she replied. "If I'm a hero, then I do things to help other people, even if it means I hurt myself sometimes. I'm not much of a hero. Richard asked me to fight Rikti for him because their energy weapons hurt him a lot, but it's just an excuse. I went into this for revenge. I'm no hero. Maybe this is my chance to be one?"
Jason looked at her for a long moment, then finished straightening his fresh shirt. When he spoke, his voice was quiet. "The ring knows when you've accepted. Welcome to the Barrington Club, Annette."
I rather like that.
