Currently the moon is in the waning Gibbous Moon phase (62% full).

A doorway under the curve of the stairs leads from the main floor down to the basement. The exit from this part of the house is through a heavy door in the living room, which leads out to the area set up for communal use by the Sept's Garou.

Though the smell of paint still hangs in the air, the hydraulic paint sprayer so much in use yesterday and Sunday sits empty on the other side of the half-wall, just visible from the doorway. Natalie has finally opened the bundles of composite wood and is slowly building, like a two-dimensional Lego project, a covering for the floor. Yet another of her esoteric power tools lurks nearby, the cord twisting to an outlet, and the Galliard herself is dry-fitting lengths of flooring, setting tongue into groove.

Tu comes into the Glass Walker area, hair and clothes still damp form the light rain which is falling. He heads over to the Elder, stopping a good distance away so as not to disturb her floor work. "Hey.", he says as way of greeting. "Can I bother you for a second?"

Natalie glances back and up, eyes widening at finding the Ragabash there, but nods. "Sure. What's up?" She frees one hand long enough to beckon him closer, then returns to thumping the wood with the heel of her hands to try and get the fit just a little tighter.

The Ragabash gingerly steps around the work area, stopping on the unfinished part of the floor. "Couple of things, actually.", he says looking away from the galliard and around the space. "The place is coming along nicely."

"Thanks," Nat says, aiming a brief scowl at the recalcitrant wood before yanking it free. "I figure it ought to be done in a week or so. Faster if you helped," she adds with a wry teasing smile. "I've got a question for you too, actually - I was going to call you with it on one of my breaks. But as long as you're here..." Turning, she slides the 'bad' plank off to her left before rising to cross to a loose pile of more of them. "But you go ahead first."

"Thanks," comes the reply. "I've been meaning to spend more time here lately, but the totem quest for Birdseye took longer than I thought it would, and I've been trying to learn the area we're claiming." He crosses his arms and shifts his weight from foot to foot, before suddenly dropping to the floor and sitting crossed legged. "And trying to start up my company before all of my savings are gone," he continues now that he's on the same physical level as the Elder. "Anyway, I was sorry to hear about the cub. I know it's part of the life, but still."

Natalie grimaces and nods, yanking a length free with a bit more force than necessary. "Yeah. It... dammit, he wasn't supposed to die. And he never got anywhere near that bane he was aiming for." With visible effort she mashes down her emotions, then 'walks' the board up and into her arms. "So, yeah. That sucked."

Tu nods. "Yeah," he says, "Yeah." He lets a silence hang between them for a while. "How's the other cub adapting? The Get seemed to have messed with his head, a little."

"--Kevin?" As though perhaps some other cub had slipped in without her noticing. "Reasonably well, I think. Jer's going to get him set up with all the bells and whistles, and I want to introduce him around once the moon's a little smaller." "--I was hoping you'd be able to take over most of his teaching actually," she adds as she heads back to her working edge. "Being as you're both Raggies."

Tu says "Yea, Kevin." He shrugs slightly at the suggestion. "Sure. I wouldn't mind showing him the ropes, at least as far as I know them." Another pause. "Speaking of duties," the Ragabash says as an awkward transition, "Things with my dues aren't going so well. I've been passed around like a football, and now I can't seem to get the guy I'm supposed to talk to call me back."

Natalie stops to look back at him again. "Oh yeah? That's what I was going to ask you about. Have you gotten to do anything for your Chiminage? What stage are you at?"

Tu says "I've accomplished more in my ultimate plans to become Alpha of the Sept, than I have been able to do on this thing," comes the frank reply. "I talked to Signe, and she sent me to Tobin. I Talked to Tobin, and he said I needed to work with this guy named Jervis, whom I've never spoken to. I've left a few messages and tried to get to see him, but he's harder to track than a Gnawer in the sewers. So, I'm feeling a little stuck. I guess I could just go and do some recon myself, but I don't want my actions to be a liability to other things which may be going on."

Natalie grunts a 'hnh' and is silent for a few seconds while she maneuvers the wood into place. "Well, sounds to me like you need to backtrack a bit. Talk to Tobin and tell him you can't find Jervis, and tell Signe, too. 'Cause her Challenge depends on your guys' scouting, and if Jervis has dropped the ball she'll probably want to smack him around a bit. Then see what she wants you to do."

Tu frowns slightly, obviously hoping for a different answer, but doesn't object. "Okay, I'll try and track down Signe and go from there. I just want you to know that it not a lack of effort on my part."

"Noted," Nat says, nodding. "If Signe tells you to go back to Jervis, then come talk to me. I'll talk to her. Gunnar got his Chiminage done in two months, and you ought to be able to do the same."

Tu looks about ready to push to his feet, but then settles back down. "Random question," he says without preface, "What's your view on vamps?" He studies the face of the Galliard intently as she replies.

If Tu was hoping for a show, he won't regret it. Nat's face goes through a slideshow of expressions - from surprise to suspicion to alarm before settling into a wary sort of alertness. "--Why do you ask?"

Tu obviously considers his words carefully as he replies. "I'm not worried about where you spend your nights," he says with a slight smile. "It came up in our pack and my views seemed ...inconsistent with that of the others. I was curious as to how the tribe here dealt with things of that nature."

Natalie flashes him a tight-lipped grin. "I've seen Jon in the daylight. --Well, my views on vampires are a bit different than those of my pack, too. Lemme put it this way: As elder, I want to deal with them on a case by case basis. We find any that are being naughty, and we put them down. If we can use them, though..."

Tu nods, not needing the thought to be finished. "That's my approach as well. I guess my being used to having a greater number of like thinkers in San Francisco made me less worried about sharing that view. An approach it looks like I need to curtail here."

"Just don't, ah... spread it around," the Galliard suggests. "Consider it a tribal matter. If you see any hint, let me know. I figure that the entire city is our protectorate, not that you'll hear me spouting that at the next Moot, either. I got into enough trouble over..." She stops, frowning at the Ragabash. "I told you that story, didn't I? About our kin-turned-leech and that damn Gnawer?"

Tu shakes his head, a curious look on his face. "You must have skipped over that one when you were insisting that you weren't really the elder here." A slight jab, though not a serious one.

Natalie acknowledges the hit with a wry smile. "I wasn't. Then. OK, deal. Hand me lengths of wood when I ask for 'em and I'll tell you the story."

Tu does stand up now, long enough to unbutton his shirt and take it off, draping it safely away from the dust and dirt of the floor. That done, he gets down on his hands and knees between Natalie and the needed boards, an unspoken acceptance of the deal. "Just tell me what to do."

"Right." She settles back onto her heels, tossing a nod toward the woodpile. "I need a length about oh, seven feet long. If you want to sort 'em by length, go ahead - I just pick them as I need them." While he's doing that she moves sideways into the 'hole' made ready for filling. "So once upon a time Thomas Walker, nee Jack Salem, was elder here. That was just about a year ago. The only reason he comes into it is because on his watch one of our kin got turned. He was a man named Ebony, used to be Jeremy's roommate."

Tu hands over a board to Natalie, then sets about sorting them by length, as he listens to the story. "Turned to a vamp?", he asks in regards to the kin.

Natalie drawls, "Ayyep. Perfect, thanks." While he sorts she gets the board settled into the proper slot as well. "So anyway, Thomas hid it - I don't know who all from, but I know he sure as hell didn't tell me about Ebony, and he was still around when I claimed Elder. A few months later Jeremy calls me in hysterics - he's discovered Ebony, or found out he's dead..." She settles back onto her heels again, staring at the ceiling. "No, he'd learned that he was dead. At that point I think he told me Ebony was a vampire, but hey, he was still our kin. He was under our protection."

Tu tries to anticipate the next size board, handing one he thinks will fit. "Wow. Vampire Kin. I can't imagine that went over too well with the powers that be."

"Couple of days later," she continues, turning to request another board, "--And I'm going to need, um... Oh, thanks. Anyway, Jeremy calls again, telling me that he knows who's done it. Who killed my kin. It's some Gnawer named Yi. I was all set to go over there and blow out her brains, right. Only by the time I get there he's got some protection posse all set up - he's there, Dakota, Rina, and they're all set to blow me out of the water. So I arrange things with Yi to meet another time and tell her she won't be hurt."

"Wait, wait, wait. You meant that Jeremy found him killed after being turned a vampire. So Yi took it on herself to do in a Kin vamp without checking with anyone?" Tu's interest in the story has obviously eclipsed his interest in passing boards, as he's stopped doing it.

"Bingo." Nat doesn't notice the lack of boardage immediately; she's trying to fit the latest board into place and finding it a few inches too short. "Crap. I need one about four inches longer than this one, Tu. Yeah, so then she argues that she's 'only following the Litany'," her voice twists up into a sanctimonious whine, "by killing him, completely ignoring the fact that as he's my kin, she's just tromped all over my territory. So then she goes and runs to tattle to Megan, whose pack she wants to join. Honorless worm," she adds in an undertone.

Tu takes the board back and looks for a longer one. Finding one, he lays both of them on end, comparing the lengths of them before handing the longer one over. "Yea, that essentially was the reaction from Cole and Auggie: 'Litany says'. Opportunistic reading of the laws, it seems to me."

Natalie waits, twisted about, until the new board is in her hands. "Or selective interpretation, yeah. So by the time I get to Megan, she's made her decision, and it's not what you'd call in our favor. I think only the fact that I didn't know about Ebony before that Gnawer killed him is why she didn't rip out my throat." Another grimace and she turns to place the new board. "Perfect. Anyway, I said - and still say - that Yi should have come to us, to me, as soon as she realized who Ebony was. Even better, you see, is the fact that Yi knew who he was, and that he was Walker kin all this time. After that, then yeah, I either better follow the Litany or be damn good at covering my tracks, but she screwed up."

Tu waits to be asked for the next board, as his estimation skills don't seem to be well honed. "Well, I'm not sure how she can use one law to justify breaking another, but that may explain why I'm still a Cliath."

"It's because you're a slimy Walker," Nat assures him breezily. "OK, last one - um, about eight feet, I think, and that'll be it for now. I've finished dry-fitting this section, and it'll be time to nail them in." A vague gesture toward the blocky power tool waiting so patiently. "If you do find evidence of a vampire, and you're in a situation where your hand isn't forced, come tell me, please. We'll take it from there. I'd also like to know if you find any vamps, so I can try and figure out how bad the problem is."

Tu passes the final board with a nod. "I don't have a line on anything. I was talking about my past, which is what brought it up. I'm sure, city this size, there's more than a few of em hiding. I'll let you know if I find anything, though I'm not really actively looking."

Natalie says, "That's all I ask," as she slides the last piece home. "Hah. Thanks. Oh - I'm also looking to Challenge at the next Moot. I wanted to Challenge Alicia, but that d..." She forcibly swallows her words and replaces them with, "the Wendigo elder already Challenged her. So I'm still looking. If you've got any suggestions, I'm open."

Tu laughs softly at the last bit, standing up to reclaim his stuff. "I'm still learning the players, so I don't know that my advice would be too useful. Good luck, though. It will be nice to have a little more political power for the tribe." He pulls his shirt on, and begins to button it. "I have to go downtown and take care of a few things, but I can come back later and help more."

"I'm going to be doing this all day," Nat says, rocking back onto her heels again to watch him. "I've got all the first floor to do - don't think it'll all get done today, but I want to get in a good start. Give me a call if you can make it, but do what you need to do downtown first. Getting your business up and running is at least as important as nailing down this floor."

Tu nods. "Though, it will take a much longer time.", he says with a smile. "Thanks for story." With that, he's on his way out.

"Cockroach watch you," Nat replies, carefully sliding apart all the work she's just done.

[End of log]