[Open] Pearl Steps Through the Rift (Grant Park)

[pearlapothecary]

Thirty seconds ago, Pearl had been walking through an antique shop, trying to find a pair of rings that looked old enough that she might have owned them before the United States had its little unpleasantness. Suits made of fine fabrics paired with classic jewelry spoke of old money. Everything depended on giving the right impression. Then she

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[idontgethurt]

Damon is not expecting to run into anyone that he knows from Mystic Falls tonight. Granted, he isn't the only one here from that universe, but they all know not to show up in the park at this hour. He has a meeting to get to. Thanks to being friends (the closest thing Damon ever gets to friendship) with Josef Soltini, Damon has a lot of money and some semblance of power in Chicago.

This means attending meetings at any hour of the night, because not all the business that he's involved with is entirely... legal.

Damon sees her ahead on the cement path, and he recognizes her immediately. Pearl. It could be her or it could be someone that looks exactly like her, but she has the same style, the same expressions on her face that he would expect from Pearl.

He has a list of people that he would hate to fall through the Rift, and she is not on it. It doesn't mean he's happy to see her either, but he wasn't happy to hear she'd died soDamon stops a small distance from her. The surprise is evident on his face. "Of all the people I

[pearlapothecary]

Pearl wouldn't say that Damon Salvatore is one of her favorite people, but she knows he can be useful. Even if his youth does cause him to make mistakes. Those can be managed. She isn't sure Damon can be managed, but even that she can work with. Most importantly, she needs information, and Damon has it.

"I can't say I was expecting it either," says Pearl. She acts like it's nothing to take one step in an exclusive shop in New York and then end up with her shoes covered in mud in Chicago. "I suppose I'll have to find the nearest airport. Or perhaps I'll learn to drive."

She has no idea that the park is dangerous this time of night. It's Chicago. It's hardly, so she thinks, any more a hotbed of supernatural activity than any other place.

[idontgethurt]

It is very difficult to control Damon. It is difficult for Damon to control himself. There's all that emotion, and he doesn't deal with it constructively ever. However, he has gotten better at it.

Damon smirks at her at her reply, maintaining his distance for the moment. He is not surprised at how unflappable she seems. She always did appear to be put together in nearly any situation. Sometimes that annoyed him, because he's the complete opposite.

"It's... really not that simple. You walked through an invisible door from wherever you were to Chicago. Do you really think a plane ticket's going to clear that all up for you?" He pauses, folding his arms across his chest. "...you're not in the same universe anymore, Pearl. Everything's changed."

That's putting it lightly.

[pearlapothecary]

She'd forgotten how smug Damon can be. It hasn't been that long since Pearl last saw him, but she's been working very hard to leave Mystic Falls and all its residents behind her.

"A different universe?" She gives him a skeptical look. Nothing is outside the realm of possibility; she's all too aware of that from things Emily Bennett has said. "How did that come to be?"

There's a certain tightness in Pearl's expression, a set to her mouth that says exactly how much it's costing her not to turn and search for Anna, to find her right now and make sure she's okay. Her daughter is a grown woman, hundreds of years old. She'll be all right until she and Pearl can find each other again.

The first thing Pearl needs is information. She just hates having to get it from Damon. She's going to owe him a favor, and, knowing him, he'll call it in at exactly the wrong time.

[and_dontgetcute]

It's late. Flack knows he shouldn't be in the middle of Grant Park this late at night -- this is usually when the very interesting monsters come out to play, and Flack isn't in the mood for his night to be interesting. He just wants to make it back to the Kashtta and home.

But when he sees the woman standing in Grant Park, he can't help but stop in his tracks for a moment and stare. It can't be. "Maka?"

[pearlapothecary]

"I beg your pardon?" asks Pearl. She sounds confused, not offended. Her voice is a little strained, though, given everything she's been through tonight.

It seems pleasant outside tonight, and, if the air is a little chilled, it's not something she takes notice of. The weather is about the only thing she's come across that's ordinary.

[and_dontgetcute]

It's then that Flack actually looks at her. Not to say that his friend wasn't ever well dressed, but this woman is a great deal more formal than Maka ever was. She's just another wanderer who happens to have her face -- nothing more.

It's a little depressing, for a man who hasn't seen anyone from his own world in over a year, but he pulls it together as best he can. "Sorry. I thought you were someone else." There is a beat, because he's fairly certain that the look on her face is a 'Recently Rifted' look. "Is everything okay?"

[pearlapothecary]

If there's one thing Pearl's certain of - though she's going to be very surprised someday - it's that she doesn't have a doppelganger.

"Just fine," she says, with a pleasant, if distant smile. If vampires could be said to go into shock, that description would certainly fit her tonight. "It's been a very long night. I'm Pearl, by the way."

It would be rude not to introduce herself, and this man seems nice enough. He's tall, well-dressed, and has a care for those around him. She could do far worse than chatting with someone like him in a nearly vacant park in the middle of the night.