Weird Women

Shoshannah
It had taken a lot for Shoshannah to call . . . well, anyone really but calling Sid was somehow both easier and more difficult than calling Pan, with whom Shoshannah's retreated to her more usual behaviors.  Which is to say, she's quiet and distant and moody and as closed down as it's possible for someone with a face as expressive as hers to be.
The girl practically wears a 'DO NOT TOUCH' sign around her neck.
But when it came down to it, this time it was Sid she called when she needed something.  "Hey.  I'm out of some things and I don't know where anything but the house is out here.  I can kick in some gas money?"  She doesn't expect anything for free.  To be honest, Shoshannah doesn't expect anything, full stop.  It doesn't matter that there's an uneasy (for her) sort of understanding between herself and the Orphan or that they've gone through as literal of a hell as they're likely to find together; the Dreamspeaker just doesn't relax.  It's quite possible [probable] that she doesn't know how.  Regardless, Sid agreed to come get her and so - after a brief stop at a bank for Shoshannah to take some cash out of her account - they find themselves back in Federal, shopping not far from Padre's church.
It may be interesting to note that Shoshannah doesn't even look in that direction.
".....thanks," she offers, though she hasn't had much to say this whole time (which isn't anything new - she watches and absorbs, for the most part, though it's not out of shyness or anything like that).  Given what Sid's seen, it's probably no surprise that asking for things is terribly difficult for Shoshannah, and giving thanks for them is worse.  That's not something on which she lingers for long, though.  "You're doing alright?"

Sid
Shoshannah needed a ride.  Sid was a little surprised - but a lot pleased - to get the call for a rescue, but she was at work at the time.  She told the Dreamspeaker she'd see if she could get away and she'd get back to her.  To her surprise her bosses, the leaders of the different divisions of the Science department, were perfectly okay with letting their office assistant take off early.  It's the day before the holiday and things were slow one of them said, and her friend needed her said another.  So go said all of them in their own ways.
It took most of the drive out to the chantry house for Sid to get over the shock of it.  It was nice, though, working at a place that would let her help out her friends, even encouraged it.  There's still a niggling feeling in the back of her mind that she'll pay for this later that has nothing to do with the general discomfort with which she interacts with the world.  It's that years of working in retail will do that to a person.  The offer of gas money is politely turned down, accepted only if Shoshannah is insistent.  Truthfully, Sid could use the coverage, but only because she's still waiting on that first check from her new job.  She still has money left over from the loan her roommate gave her, but she's been trying to avoid dipping any further into it.
Now they're back in the city, at some shopping place close to Shoshannah's previous residence.  If Sid suspects there was something more to this location choice than "I know where things are there" (and she does, though she doesn't know of anything that's happened with the padre so it's not that), she keeps her suspicions to herself.
Shoshannah's gratitude is met with a faint shake of Sid's head, as close to No need or Don't worry about it as she's likely to express.  She's a woman of few words, usually, so the teen's quiet is accepted easily.  It keeps the Orphan relaxed knowing she won't be dragged into conversations, particularly ones that might circle back in toward personal things.
You're doing alright?
As usual, Sid doesn't answer this question right away.  She stops and ponders as if that question were infinitely deeper than it probably should be.  Most people answer it automatically.  Sid considers it carefully.  After a few seconds she shrugs a shoulder.  "I'm okay."  She's dressed as usual in her faded and torn jeans, her old falling apart sneakers, and a faded purple t-shirt.

Shoshannah
"Good.  I'm glad."  It's decisive, that, and rare for the girl who spends so much time and effort Not Caring to admit.  Her shopping list has been a bit strange, though not anything too weird for a girl who lived off her bike and out of a tent, then in the rectory of a ghetto church before landing in a stunningly gorgeous house on even more beautiful property (at which she seems more at home, natural, and at least a little more angry about it because of that) outside of the city.  And she did, in fact, insist on giving some gas money.  "I've been studying some stuff, and practicing some stuff, but it's hard to know what's going on here when I'm way out there, you know?"
She shrugs, and of course she looks and sounds indifferent.
Shoshannah, it must be said, doesn't have a 'usual' mode of dress; the closest she comes to that is that all her clothes are in remarkably good repair for being kept in a backpack and tent until fairly recently, and are of a quality that clashes with her previous lifestyle, at least the one of which Sid knows. Even with the revelations that came in a Fallen dreamscape, most people no very little about Shoshannah; to her credit, Sid probably knows the most of anyone other than Pan.

Sid
In that they are quite a bit alike.  Very few know much about Sid beyond what they've seen of her.  Even Shoshannah, who traveled that hellscape with her, didn't glean much about the redhead.  She's afraid of small enclosed spaces.  She's very, very quiet.  As far as Shoshannah would know she's still very much against physical contact.  Except that she held her hand all through Leah's mind.
She is a little bit different around the younger woman these days, though the difference is very slight.  It's in the way she walks with her through the aisles, close to her elbow though not so close they risk knocking into each other.  She's wary and watchful, but that wariness is focused outward, keeping an eye on the people who pass them, staying aware of their surroundings.  It's defensive.  She's being protective of Shoshannah without exactly hovering over her.
Even as they're stopped now, talking about whatever, Sid's dark eyes move over the area behind Shoshannah.  Her ears are alert to the sounds of approach.  Even her senses are open.
That gaze shifts abruptly back to the younger girl when she says it's hard to know what's going on here, then drops, and a little of the tension of preparedness eases out of her.
"There've been some things," she says quietly.  Her lips tighten to a line.  "There's a, a very tall man, very big.  He almost seems alright, but he's...he scares me," she admits, which might not mean much.  All this time Sid has seemed afraid of everything and everyone.  So there's one more, big deal.  But her head tilts to the side as she says it, her eyes shifting away as the uncomfortable memories resurface.

Shoshannah
Sid's preparedness isn't entirely unwarranted; Shoshannah seems a magnet to all sorts of attention.  Some of it's good but most of it's bad, and as they spend more time together in this populated area, it's not difficult to see why her tension level - which she's not as good at hiding as she thinks she is - is always through the roof.  It ranges from the occasional pick up line, to an old woman who thinks she has the Sight (she does, of course) and wants to know about her husband, to signs against the evil eye.  At least no one throws anything at her or touches her . . . this time.  For an eighteen year old girl who swirls with anger and defensiveness, Shoshannah does a good job ignoring it all, except for the old woman - who she tells that this isn't the time or place, but if she really wants to know to go ask Padre Echeverria for a message left for her in two days.  There's a surprising sympathy there, an empathy that most might not know Shoshannah has.
Well, most who didn't see how she was with Leah, anyway.
"There are always things.  Is there anything I can do to help, do you think?"  Anything more active than sitting on her butt at the chantry, that is; sure, she can read languages that not many outside of the Order of Hermes can and doesn't mind doing it, but that doesn't mean that's all she wants to do.  Not when the two people she might tentatively think of calling friends could be in trouble.

Sid
Sid.  Actually.  Glares at people.  The ones who get too close, the one who threw out a catcall.  Only the old woman doesn't get a menacing look.  Not that Sid is terribly menacing in appearance, her glare is her usual frown but a little more intense.  There's a little bit of a spark in her dark eyes.  It's not as fierce as it was in Leah's mindscape, she doesn't reach out and grip Shoshannah's hand tightly and stand against a tide of ghostly figures.  But she blocks them.  One person laughs at the mouse protecting the beautiful but eerie young woman.  It didn't phase Sid in the slightest.
The only person she didn't try to block of shoo off was the old woman, but only because Shoshannah herself accepted her approach.
"No," she says sharply, frowning, her head rocking back a little with the force of the refusal.  It eases almost immediately, so that when she says, "No," again it's quieter, more normal.  "Not with him.  If you see him," stay away from him she wants to say, but doesn't.  Shoshannah is her own woman, she'll do what she wants and Sid doesn't presume to tell her what to do.  Into that brief but awkward pause, she says, "Be careful.  He...likes to bring out bad things in people."  There is so much more to it than that, but she doesn't have the words to describe it, nor does she want to.  Shoshannah can probably tell, though, can almost see the thoughts that swirl and fill Sid's dark eyes.
She blinks and suddenly it's gone, replaced by concern.  Leaning a bit closer, she asks quietly,  "Do you do drugs?"

Sid
[because we might have other mages come woo!:  awareness!]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 4, 5, 7, 7) ( success x 2 )

Patience Mason
[Paradgmically scanning]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (3, 4, 5, 5, 7, 9) ( success x 2 )

Patience Mason
It was a day for shopping, some had cut work early to be here, in this tiny little plaza in search of food or clothes or who know's what. The two young magi were standing about, perhaps leaning against the reassuring frame of Sid's pickup truck the duo preparing to go elsewhere, but in no hurry to do so.
The sound of a vehicle can be heard nearing the entrance to the parking lot, the deep thrum of its motor reminding those who heard it of a motorcycle except slightly off, there was no heavy base to this machine, no hearty roar, just the feeling and sound of parts moving and pavement being eaten up as the machine moved into the parking lot.
It is down the lane in which Sid has parked her truck that the machine turns, an unusually wide machine with an even more unusually designed appearance. Most motorcycles are a lesson in practicality, or at the most, attempt to convey just how much of a rebel, how bad ass their riders are. The machine which pulls into the parking lot now however is all smooth lines and subtle features, the design undoubtably art deco and though it bares a style utilized so often these days...because of what it had been used upon, it held a striking appearance unlike most machines of its ilk.
The woman astride the machine is equally unusual, so much so that it is a hallmark of her existence much the same as Shoshannah, dressed in riding leathers and a pair of dark riding goggles Patience Mason rolls slowly into a vacant parking spot and cuts the unusually quiet motor. A moment later the sound of a kickstand can be heard scrapping against the pavement,  before Patience herself is seen rising above the cars and pulling up her goggles, and then pulling off the old leather riding helmet she wore.

Shoshannah
"................no, I don't do drugs."  There's a hint of indignation there, a bit of teenage huffiness and upped defensiveness that implies that, like most people her age, Shoshannah has at least tried a thing or two in her travels but doesn't do anything regularly gawddo you think I'm stupid or a burn out or something?  "Do you?"
And then there's a motorcycle pulling up, and the somewhat familiar Patience rising from it; as the various approaches haven't stopped (and have, in some ways, gotten worse outside of the store where there aren't rules that could get one kicked out - someone spits at her feet, someone calls her puta fantasma (ghost bitch) several people go out of their way to avoid her.  She's not an easy girl to hang out with, Shoshannah isn't.

Sid
[WP not to beat the ever-living fuck out of whoever spat at Shoshannah]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 10) ( success x 2 )

Sid
Shoshannah's indignation washes over Sid like a warm summer breeze.  Ever since that one time, so long ago now, that she saw through that momentary crack in the girl's armor, Sid has largely viewed her huffiness as protection.  And after witnessing that ghostly mass surround Shoshannah, she understands a little more the reason for it.  She neither attacks nor judges Shoshannah for her answer, nor does she appear relieved.  She didn't ask to make sure that Shoshannah is straight edge.
She nods her head once, accepting the answer.  Before she can continue someone comes along and Sid freezes.  Her dark eyes narrow behind her glasses and, very slightly, she begins to tremble.  With rage, yes, but mostly fear.  Fear that if she speaks out he'll come back and, well.  That fear, it courses through her veins, sending an icy chill up through the base of her skull.
She uses that fear, harnesses it as she watches the man walk away.  Reaching out with her mind, she finds and bends and twists the little threads of his fate.  Not a lot.  Just enough to really fucking ruin his day.
[Hex: Entropy 2, +3 (coincidental), -1 (appropriate resonance), +1 (fast casting/making it up), droppin' a WP to guarantee successs]
Dice: 2 d10 TN5 (6, 6) ( success x 3 ) [WP]

Patience Mason
Patience had of course, noted the two women down the lane of the parking lot, noted them as she had pulled into the lot itself. But now that she was closer, pulling off her gear and stowing it in the motorcycles sleek and well hidden cargo pods she noted that there was a considerable number of people who seemed to be less then pleased with Shoshannah's presence. She frowned at this, less then pleased by this fact, because she too had experienced this sort of treatment before.
She strode towards the others now, those sky blue eyes fo hers taking on a steely patina as she watched these ignorant savages move this way and that, and recieving her own share of glares. It was only because of her size that most of them didnt go any further, but one spoke ill of her, swearing at her in a language she didn't understand....she simply kept walking until she stood before Shoshannah and Sid.
"I have ascertained and visually affirmed a drastic decrease in overall noospheric cohesion and positivity in this locality by a minimum of 23.532%." She shook her head in displeasure. "Such degredation within the sociological gestalt consciousness is reprehensible."

Shoshannah
It's to Shoshannah's credit, perhaps, that she doesn't try to hide.  She stands tall (not compared to Patience, perhaps, but the Dreamspeaker is well over the average height for an adult woman at her five foot, nine inches) and proud and appears to let it all roll off her back like so much water on a duck.  Given the size of the easily evident chip on her shoulder, though?  She wasn't always so good at it.  Sid twists reality just slightly, with a subtle flare of resonance, and the look Shoshannah gives her is sudden and unreadable other than in its assessing quality; this is not the first time the Orphan has stood up for her or defended her in some way.  It's an oddity to the younger girl, something uncertain.  People spitting and hissing and cat-calling and harassing in so many different ways, she's used to.  This . . . this sort of solidarity, though?  It's foreign.
And then there's Patience, and Shoshannah still has no idea what 'noospheric' means - though she knows the rest, at least, even if she's never met anyone who actually talks in such a way in real life before.  She can make an educated guess, at least, and gives a shrug when she comes to her internal translation.  "This actually isn't that bad."
Which is to say, she's had it so very much worse.

Sid
It may surprise Shoshannah further to know that, despite her apparent potential, Sid has only recently begun to fully explore it.  A few weeks ago all she might have done as these people harass her friend would be to frown, maybe shrink away.  Because to confront people like that would be to invite physical conflict, which is the think Sid fears above all others.  Everything else is tied to that knot at the middle.
And yet, with very little provocation, the air around her shifted to the desperate.  As the man and his cronies walk away, one of them catches a rather large nail with the toe of his boot.  No matter to him, his shoes' soles are thick and durable.  But that nail happens to land in just such a way that, as they pull their vehicle out of their parking spot, it drives clear through the rubber of the driver's side rear tire and the inner tube as well.  They all clambor out and curse their fate, their lack of luck.  They, or rather their driver, doesn't yet realize that it's only the beginning.
Someone says something rude to Patience as well, and it keeps Sid's hackles from lowering even a little bit, but if she railed against every single person who threw these protected, special people, well, Sid would collapse before the hour was out.
"That doesn't make it okay," is her reply to Shoshannah, though her eyes are focused on the efforts of the man who spit at her friend.  There's a light in her eyes that seems counter to what they've seen of the quiet, shy woman.  It's faint, but it's there in the slight lift of her chin and the fainter curve of her mouth.  Smug satisfaction.
Turning her head away from the men, she looks up at Patience and that smile widens to something warm and genuine.  "Hi Patience.  I was just about to tell Shoshannah.  A few of us ran into a, um, a paradigmically active person.  She dropped a bottle of PCP.  If you party, uh, just.  Be careful."

Patience Mason
Patience looks about after Shoshannah's declaration of the fact that this wasn't at all that bad, an eyebrow raised dubiously, perhaps Patience hadn't experienced the levels of disgust and anger that Shoshannah has, or perhaps she simply has a much lower tolerance for it. Regardless she eyes anyone else who is coming near before speaking to Shoshannah with a cool tone. "Even a variation in the gestalt consciousness of 10.43% requires a direct and immediate correction. The geographical locality within which we currently exist is not that of the ideo-political republic indexed as the 'the Congo'." She said with a frown.
"These coordinates within which we physically, noospherically, and paradgimically exist reside within the continental geo-political boundaries of the nation indexed as the United States of America." She shook her head before eying another person who drew near before she let out a gentle huff and  tried to smile.
"As Sid has stated verbally, such degradation is unacceptable." She then looked at Sid and her smile brightened as she listened, when she has a moment to process it she simply shakes her head and waves a hand with a laugh.
"Any noospherically altering chemical compounds which I may utilize in any capacity are strictly controlled, manufactured, and cultivated within specific conditions and environment's of my own design Sid, such concerns for my sociological and physical nominality are acknowledged in a positive register, but are unnecessary."

Shoshannah
"I've smoked some weed, eaten some mushrooms, and had the occasional glass of wine at dinner or sip of someone's drink at a party, but that's about it.  And about all I ever intend to do other than on special occasions."  Like twenty-first birthdays, that sort of thing.  And, given people's reactions to her here and now, it's kind of difficult to imagine Shoshannah at . . . well, any sort of party that wasn't Awakened-oriented, really.  So she's not straight edge, per se, but close enough - and she still sees with the totalitarian eyes of youth - and younger ones than she should, perhaps.  She hasn't told anyone here much about herself - is, in fact, a very hard nut to crack - but what one can pick up from her in conversation is that things have been the way they are for her for a very long time.
Then, there's that smile that breathes wry not-quite-bitterness and leans far closer to smirkiness than anything else.  "No one invites me to parties, anyway."  Not even other Awakened folk.  Her presence isn't particularly easy for them to bear, either.

Sid
Sid gives a little, emphatic nod at Patience's words.  That's right, this isn't the Congo.  This is America.  A place where people have come to regard "free speech" as meaning "I can say whatever I want without consequences."  Sid is prepared to prove those people wrong if their words get aimed at her friends, particularly those who have somehow fallen under her sphere of protection.
The words of the Etherite that follow Sid's warning are met with a frown and a constriction of brows.  Her head lowers, down, then a little away, and then lifts again toward Shoshannah.  Her mouth quirks, then, but she says nothing.  At least, she doesn't list off any drugs.   Maybe she's never done any.
That quirk melts into a thoughtful frown.  "That's not true.  Is it?" she asks, more for verification than out of disbelief.  "I thought Sera invited everyone over."

Patience Mason
[Per+Aware your secrets sid, give them to me.]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (3, 6, 7, 8, 9) ( success x 4 )

Sid
[no!: subterfuge]
Dice: 5 d10 TN6 (1, 1, 3, 4, 4) ( fail )

Shoshannah
"I only met Sera that one time, not counting the cabin."  The girl shrugs and she knows there's reasons that aren't just bound up in her being creepy and wrong and not entirely of this plane - like the part where she's underage and doesn't even have a fake ID - in this particular case, but that doesn't take the sting out of it.  This, though, goes unseen; Shoshannah isn't kidding when she says she's 'used to it', or 'this isn't that bad'.  She's had plenty of time to learn to cover when it bothers her.  "If she invited everyone, I wasn't in the loop."

Patience Mason
This was not the experience that Patience had anticipated having today, she had not expected to be talking about drugs, or parties, or the state of the worlds social conscience. But here they were, in a parking lot talking about those very things, its awkward in its own way, but wonderful as well. Patience reaches up and runs a hand through her messy hair, made that way by the helmet she wore as she watched her compatriots.
The frown from Sid is noted and Patience's own brows furrow for a moment before she shakes her head with a gentle laugh. "I can assuage any intrinsic or ephemeral disturbances in your noospheric attitudes Sid, these drugs are specifically and primarily, secondarily, and tertiary manufactured soley for immediate scientific utilization, and in on regard utilized in any method of recreation." That said, draining all the fun out of the idea, she settles her hands upon her hips let out a sigh.
"Do either of your biological structures consider the concurrent atmospheric settings to be approaching a state of sub nominal attitude in regards to the dermal and internal stability of your structures?"

Sid
That first time Shoshannah met Sera was Sid's first time, as well.  Pan had been there, too, a quietly imposing figure in black who didn't quite fit into the bar scene.  He had been very parental toward Shoshannah that night, at least in Sid's opinion.  Making sure she'd eaten, things like that.  That might have been a large part of why Sera hadn't included Shoshannah in that party invite.  She's underaged, after all.
If Sid were the type to throw parties anymore, she would invite Shoshannah to one, definitely.  But she's not, and so there's nothing more really that she can say to that.  She, herself, doesn't go to parties, even if she happens to be invited.
Patience assures her that the drugs she manufactures are intended only for scientific purposes, which get another frown, but this time it's confusion.  It's then that she realizes they might not be thinking of the same sorts of drugs, and that more than anything is what makes her feel very very very slightly relieved.
"It's getting hot," she agrees, reaching up to run her fingers through the hair at the base of her skull, lifting it from her shoulders a little in a vain hope of cooling off the back of her neck.

Shoshannah
"It is, yes."  Shoshannah's wearing a pretty patchwork-and-lace hippie sort of tank top and light, possibly linen pants with wide enough legs to potentially be mistaken for a skirt.  Her hair is caught back loosely and somewhat messily (though it's still lovely in a way that isn't entirely of this world, as Shoshannah can't help being) caught back from her face in a low ponytail that trails down her back to the bottom of her shoulder blades, but for the stray bits that straggle out and curl more tightly around her face.  Her wrists and a good portion of forearm are covered in patchwork bands made of the same materials as her shirt - basically, she'd gone for easy, but still pretty and light when she left the house.
"I've got what I need, if you guys want to go somewhere else."

Patience Mason
The Etherite surely has the worst of it standing there in the dark brown of her riding leathers, her long limbs and torso encased in leather which held close to her form and seemed to have not a single slit for ventilation, it is likely that the woman was currently getting ready to stew in her own juices, yet she shows very little sign of external discomfort.
Patience considers the options, looking between the two women with whom she stood, and the store she had intended to visit, sitting barely fifty yards away. There is a moment where she seems to chew on her cheek in contemplation and then she simply gives a gentle shrug and looks back to her fellow Magi.
"The previously assigned locality intended as the primary objective of planar movation has now been downgraded to a tertiary objective. If your individualized personages are of the distinct noospheric configuration to proceed to an alternate locality of interest, this personage would not be negatively predisposed to such a convergence."

Sid
They all agree that it's getting hot and uncomfortable, though of the trio Shoshannah is clearly the best dressed for the weather.  Sid's clothing is old and a bit oversized, masking the exact contours of her figure, so at least she can breathe a little.  She would expect Patience to be dying in that outfit on a hot summer day like today.
She turns a little, following the Etherite's gaze back toward the shopfronts and then looking back at her.
"I'd like that, but.  If you need something that's right in there.  I mean, are you sure you're alright with coming back?" she manages, starting and stopping until eventually she gets it all out.

Shoshannah
"There's a taqueria right there - no air conditioning, but outdoor seating and great virgin daquiris and margaritas if you're into that kind of thing," Shoshannah offers; a good part of her reason for coming to this part of town rather than somewhere else had been stated as knowing where things were, and it's true.  The question is, however, whether or not she'll be able to get someone to serve her.  This is always a question on the occasions that she goes out and about, this girl who makes even many of her Awakened acquaintances so uncomfortable.
"I mean, I have to get back eventually, but it's nice to be in town for awhile."

Patience Mason
Sid offers a way out, the reason Patience came all this way must be of some import after all. Shoshannah offers a potential destination however, and the Etherite considered that for a few long moments.
It only takes the return of the sun from behind a lonely little cloud to seal the deal, Patience reaches up and unbuttons half the jacket, letting it swing in the still air as she reached up and flapped one side to try and cool herself off even slightly.
"Let us movate towards the physical structure indexed as a Taqueria. A substantial reduction in internalized thermal levels is required immediately, and Shoshannah's aforementioned ethyl alcohol infused liquid state nutrient packets sounds supremely positive given the current state of this bio-physical structure."
"Females....let us movate?" Its not the most pleasing thing to the ears, but the confidence with which Patience delivers the line is solid and palpable. She smiles at her companions and gestures for them to go, off to the taqueria for cold beverages and maybe a hint of food, and if some waitress refused to serve Shoshannah, they would have two other very insistent women to compete with.
It would be a battle any server would lose.