i wear my sins on the outside, close to the skin

[sophicsulphur]

[Set shortly after this thread, with Cwirko.]

Iris Fortner is in the Kashtta, headed for her shared bathroom and looking pretty distracted. And filthy. Specifically, her shirt, her hands, and parts of her face are splashed, smeared, striped or dotted with angel blood. She's not really paying much attention to her surroundings, so it's possible she

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[nomanleftbehind]

Jack’s just on his way out of the Kashtta for no particular reason, all his attention fixed on the yo-yo he recently pinched from the piano room on the first floor. Actually, he didn’t really pinch it; it’s more like it fell from the ceiling onto his head, and seeing as how he doesn’t like to suffer for no reason, he decided to keep it as compensation for injuries received while … not in the line of duty. Still, same difference: reparations, redresses, something along those lines. After all the pain Chicago’s caused him so far, he feels as if it’s the least he deserves.

And well, with all his attention fixed on the yo-yo - he’s trying to remember how to perform an old trick he knew how to do back in high-school - he completely misses Iris hurrying down the corridor in his direction.

It’s his peripheral vision that saves him, in the end. Movement out of the corner of his eyes, and he looks up, sees a distracted someone completely covered in something white and shiny (paint?) heading in his direction. “Whoa!” he says, flinging his

[sophicsulphur]

It's a moment or two before she turns to face him. Most of her attention is focused on her thoughts, and her senses only dimly register another presence in the hall by the time she's already almost hit him

[nomanleftbehind]

Jack’s alarmed, and he doesn’t even bother to conceal it. The yo-yo disappears straight into a pocket. “Healing?” he says. She doesn't look like she's covered in blood, but -

Right. Angels bleed white, demons bleed black, he remembers. (And everyone else - red.) “What the hell just happened out there?”

He wonders if this is an attack of some sort. Something to do with the CLF or the demon-angel shitstorm that’s apparently going to be raining down on Chicago pretty soon, with the Wanderers caught somewhere in the middle.

[sophicsulphur]

She doesn't really want to be having this conversation, but the fact that her comment's put him severely on edge penetrates the fog of her mind enough for her to want to give him all the answer she can. She doesn't exactly like standing around the Kashtta's hallways covered in this stuff, but she likes even less the thought of abandoning Jack to wild guessing.

She wipes her hands off on her shirt a little, self-consciously. "It... there was an angel, and a man, Wanderer, with a weapon, he'd just come through. I saw them fighting and I thought the man was trying to kill the angel, but he said he just used his weapon on him in self-defence. I think the angel grabbed him or something? But they're both fine. The angel ran off after I got a potion into him. I... I brought the man here."

Actually, she didn't exactly see them fighting, but she was a little too shaken by it all to be a reliable witness now.

[kashttaaatman]

Please it the alchemist, a ghost will now detatch itself from the wall before her.

It makes no sound, nor other indication of its presence. It merely crosses the hall through which she's hurrying, a wisp of smoke in the vague shape of a person, and won't much mind if she walks carelessly into or through it.

[sophicsulphur]

At any other time, Iris would think this was the best. Thing. Ever.

She's rather partial to ghosts. In fact, she's been friends with one. Pamela Ibis was just the tiniest bit scatterbrained, but that could be excused on account of her not truly having a brain to be scattered. After several hundred years of formless existence, one tends at the very least to lose track of some of the rudiments of human living.

But right now, she's already unsettled, and she isn't sure what to make of this passing phenomenon. She retains a decent hope that it's friendly-- spirits aren't usually bad-- but there's also a lingering fear within her that she's being judged in some way on her thoughts.

"Not bad", after all, is not synonymous with "non-threatening". One may be tried by many things that are, ultimately, good for one. Iris just really isn't up for a trial right now.

But then, she supposes one never is truly tried by being ready for it

[kashttaaatman]

The energy of this one is like foam on deep body of water: one small disturbance on the depth. It does not respond to her hail.

It continues, unhurried, across the hallway, and when the first impression bounces back from her probe, it dissipates…

[sophicsulphur]

She's reaching a hand out after the shade, but it's already melting away into the surrounding air.

Just a ripple, an echo. It was barely ever there at all. Truly a ghost.

She shakes her head as it fades, chiding herself for being so jumpy over a simple spirit. Well, maybe she'll see it again someday.

She continues on down the corridor, a little more mindful of the world around, this time.