It's not like every devastating end brings a new beginning...

[torchwoodsheart]

A cab pulls up in front of the Main Gauche, rather slowly and reluctantly as it gets close enough to see the twisted wreckage of the gates, a few scorch marks on the buildings and grounds... Gwen hands the driver a few bills and slides out of the back seat, eying the gates uncertainly for a second before she starts inside. She can deal with this.

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[homoraptor]

And there is Malek, waiting at what's left of the gates, watching the parking lot. his shoulder is bandaged and his trenchcoat off - odd, for him - but he's refusing to wear a sling. He looks unhappy with everything - he hasn't seen Anya, and while there were no bodied they could identify as her, there were a lot of bodies that couldn't be identified. Elashte is up in his office moving as little as he can, and who knows where Tay's got off to.

He sees the taxi and pushes himself off the gates, walking out to meet the visitor. "You Cooper?"

[torchwoodsheart]

Gwen nods a little, glancing up to meet his eyes. She recognizes him from the Kashtta, the velociraptor... One of the two people she was supposed to contact if she could't reach Jack. A lot of good that will do now.

"That's me. You're Malek?"

[homoraptor]

Malek nods. "Well, our mems' fine. El's up in 'is office. Rest of you kids're 'round here somewhere. Dunno where, exact."

He motions her to follow him, heading back into the courtyard. In the light of day the destruction is given a strange, arbitrary air, blood drying on the grass and torn patches of unearthed soil and burn marks all disconnected from the violence of the night before. A few birds, undaunted by the lingering smell of smoke and blood and magic, are in the trees and bushes, twittering as though it's any other day.

"Heard it was your kid Romana went off 'n' Fell on," he mentions, voice flat. "Was there. Saw the thing. Stood right in front of Romana, told her down. ...didn't turn out so well, not either o'tem."

[torchwoodsheart]

Gwen clenches her jaw a little, closing her eyes just for a second as she trails after him. "She wasn't supposed to be here," Gwen says quietly, trying to keep the guilt and grief out of her voice and mostly failing. Gwen's never been good at holding back her emotions. "Shouldn't have been." As if that makes any difference.

[tryandmakemedie]

Noah, too, is in the halls, still gleeful after the events of the previous evening- what an introduction to the Gauche! And then he sees Logan, the only demon he really knows, although that Rakshasa... Jeremy... but Noah hadn't really gotten the chance to talk to him, because then had come the bloodshed.

And it had been thrilling.

"Miss Logan!" he calls out as respectfully as he can, which isn't very. Noah's not really one to respect people. He does sort of respect her, in an odd, twisted way.

He's strange like that.

[sauntereddown]

"Noah!" she says brightly - the two of them are probably some of the few still pleased about what happened last night... but then, Logan was far enough away, still on the roof, from Eric that she didn't get hit with any of that Glaysa manipulation. "And how are you, darling?"

[tryandmakemedie]

Noah somehow managed to miss out on the Glaysa manipulation as well, which honestly does not surprise the narration.

"I'm absolutely spiffy," he replies, the smirk/grin on his face widening. "Particularly after the events of last evening. Yourself?"

He can't help feeling giddy (in a very repressed way, of course,). He got to kill last night, and kill he did. He's still sort of riding on that high.

[sauntereddown]

"I got to blow things up," she says with a grin. "I had a good night. And I assume you did too, huh?" She didn't really notice him down on the battlefield - mostly, she was paying attention to the angels, and sometimes Missy, who is always entertaining to watch. But he's still alive and uninjured, so she supposes he must have done well.

[nothingsodivine]

Des was at his building (which is starting to look more like a building and less like something vaguely building-shaped) when he got the message from Grace and... Well, sometimes Des just forgets to respond to things in his haste to get to a place.

He actually still has his cardkey to get into the basement and intended to use it when he sees Grace almost as soon as he walks in. He's expecting to be stopped by management considering he's walking into a fancy hotel in dusty teans and a dirty T-shirt (he's been working- fear his raw masculinity!), but he doesn't much care.

"Grace, what the hell happened?" Not that he didn't get the skinny from the backdated entries in his journal on the cab ride over, but he might as well hear it from her too.

[2ndchanceacharm]

Grace untangles herself from the little ball she'd been curled into almost as soon as she sees him and tumbles out of the chair to throw her arms around him, ignoring or at least not seeming to notice the dirt and dust for the time being.

"Sorry. I worried, and I know it's stupid because if you were hurt I'd know." Grace worries anyway. Often. It's Des and she has cause to. "The archangels attacked the demons and Romana fell and died and I've been taking care of the archangels that came back... I should probably still be down there, it's just... I don't know."

[nothingsodivine]

Des staggers a little- more in shock than anything, because Grace is tiny and she didn't quite lunge at him anyway. He wastes no time wrapping his arms back around her, however, and holding her and shooting some dark looks at a group of fancy-dressed people who apparently seem to take offense that he looks like a workman.

"Jesus Christ," he swears. "Well, the apocalypse is over anyway." Not that that means a damn thing as far as Grace is concerned- Romana brought her in. "I'm sorry about Romana."

For her sake. He didn't have much of an opinion of her until she started targeting the Doctor and planning assassination attempts on his friend and making the basement a not-fun place to be.

"If you need to go back down there, I can stick around. Moral support and all that. It's been awhile since I've been in the basement."

[2ndchanceacharm]

"Thank you," she murmurs into his chest, arms still wrapped around him. Des is warm and solid and safe, never mind that he's somewhat dirty. "I know you probably didn't like her much - I mean, not a lot of wanderers do - but she was... She found me." Grace still wouldn't even know what she was if it weren't for Romana. Wouldn't have found Des, wouldn't be here, and God knows where she'd be instead.

"I think..." She considers going back into the basement again. They don't have many other doctors down there, but no one's seriously injures, and just thinking about it makes her a little queasy. It's not the injuries that bother her, it's the emptiness, and the feeling of having lost a war. "I think I'd rather just be with you. Wherever you need to be. If that's alright."

[hymnsofgenocide]

Jeremy's conscious again. Oh, joy.

Conscious and not too pleased with the turn of events since that bitch of an angel knocked him out, but what's he gonna do?

When he sees Logan, though, he smiles for a minute. It may not reach his eyes, but it's something.

"You did some fuckin' amazing work last night," he says, in lieu of a greeting. "Nice to see you're still standing."

[sauntereddown]

Logan grins back at him brightly. Greetings are for other people, clearly. "My pleasure, darling. I was a little worried about you last night when things started to wrap up. Good to see you're up and about again."

[hymnsofgenocide]

Jeremy shrugs. "Headache like you wouldn't believe, but serves me right for getting cocky." He's pretty philosophical about things like this. He lived through it, learned from it, moving on now.

"Did what I set out to do, anyway, so I can't really complain."

...Except he can, but the vague dissatisfaction with Romana's death (once the bloodlust wore off, anyway) isn't something he's going to casually bring up in conversation.

[sauntereddown]

"Hey, you killed a First. Even if she did Fall first. Someone should be throwing you a party, my friend." Though that would probably be undiplomatic wouldn't it? Logan is none too impressed by the politics going on here. She gets them, they just bore her.

[aint_a_shepherd]

Shepherd Book is on his way out of the Conrad, actually. It's long past time he settled in with Torchwood, but he caught some sickness or another -- maybe something he ate, maybe something in the air -- and has spent the past several days being far too ill for his liking.

But when he sees Grace, he stops, luggage and all, to peer down at her. He's aware of what's happened as far as the journal entries go, and this girl... Well, she may have been part of it, and even if she wasn't, he can't see someone so unhappy without wanting to help if he can.

"Something wrong, child?" he asks her, concern plain in his voice.

[2ndchanceacharm]

Grace looks up, chin still resting on her knee, and forces a little smile. It doesn't quite work, because Grace is the worst liar in the history of time. Well, close, at least.

"I'm fine. Just a little stressed." Because the woman who brought me here killed an innocent and died, and almost everyone I know with the exception of my ward is dead or injured or in a coma or just plain traumatized, but aside from that, yeah, I'm fine.

It's a miracle she actually managed to keep that an internal ramble.

[aint_a_shepherd]

"I've seen 'a little stressed'," Book says, slowly. "I don't think that's it." He gives her another concerned look, wanting to be of some help. But then, he's not sure his help's welcome here.

"But it's not my intent to pry," he continues. "Been a bad few days for a lot of folk around here, as far as I've seen."

It's a hint, a subtle one, that he knows some of what's happened . He's there if she wants to talk. Listening's one of the the things he does best.

[2ndchanceacharm]

Grace takes a breath, studying his face for a second, and then the smile slips a little. "I'm a doctor. Down in the basement." For the archangels. "And I just... it's a little much. These past couple days."

There's a reason you're not supposed to treat friends and family. And trying to keep Vincent from dying from a gunshot wound to the head the other night while they waited for the ambulance would have been quite enough without the aftermath of a war to clean up.