Owner	Pose
Jonathan Sims	The Laughing Magician is quiet tonight. Chas is in the back, going through books. Most of the rest of the Night Brigade are off doing other things. The bartender and cook on-duty are the sorts who are likely to quit within two weeks, unable to handle the various goings-on at the place. Not that they're ever /around/ for the rituals and shouting matches and who-knows-what-all, but having your hours be so weird isn't conducive to a good work environment.     So really, other than them, it's Jonathan Sims holding down the fort tonight. Not officially, but he told John he'd keep an eye on things while he was gone, and he meant it. He sits at the bar smoking a Silk Cut and drinking the cheapest beer the place has, a few stools down from John's Pauper's Throne, looking weirdly like he /belongs/ there in his too-large green cardigan and jeans, chalk dust in his hair. It's the 'rumpled professor' look, but it fits, somehow.
Lydia Dietrich	Lydia's forays to Earth have been limited since she'd been turned. Now that they have her feeding schedule all laid out and the chance of her going into a hunger frenzy is down to a minimum, she's allowing herself a little more freedom to go out and about. One of the first orders of business was to check in with John. He wasn't responding to her texts so she figured that he was either asleep (not likely) preoccupied (possibly) or dead (likely). Still. She said that once she was safe to be around, she'd swing by and check in so here she is. She walks through the door and physically blanches as the assault of smells hits her like a sledgehammer. This place didn't smell the greatest back when she /didn't/ have enhanced senses, and now the potent smell of body odor, stale beer, and cigarette smoke easily overwhelms her sensitive nose. She brings her hand up to cover her nose even though she could just /stop breathing/ as an automatic reaction to the assault and steps on in. Tonight she's wearing a charcoal grey woolen a-line skirt, and a forest green turtle neck sweater. Her ectoplasmic aura has changed since her death. It now looks like fat flakes of black ash constantly falling all around her. She looks around the bar and sees only Jon there, so she walks up to him. "Hi," the pale woman greets. "You're new. I'm looking for John, is he around?"
Jonathan Sims	Jon looks up, blinking only briefly at the ectoplasmic aura. He has, in fact, seen stranger things in his life. "John is out, just now." His voice fits his look--an English accent so crisp and stereotypical and /posh/ it belongs on some BCC costume drama. Do people really /talk/ like that anymore?     "Can, ahh... can I ask what it is you need? Are you a potential... client?" He looks... very awkward about asking the question. He takes a drink of the terrible beer to cover it.
Lydia Dietrich	"I'm an associate," Lydia says smoothly, slipping into a stool beside Jon. "He wasn't answering his phone, and I promised to check in with him so here I am," she says. She holds out an ivory white hand that's ice cold for him to shake. "Lydia," she says introducing herself. "Lydia Dietrich. Is Chas here, or are you tending the bar as well."
Jonathan Sims	Jon blinks slowly at the ice cold hand he takes in his own. He runs cold, but... /damn/. "Jonathan Sims," he says, and then on impulse, "the Archivist."     He's really not keeping that secret very well, is he?     "I, ahh... am also an associate." He drains the rest of his beer and flags down the bartender, a surly-looking 20-something with a kind of half-hearted goth look, who comes over and kind of glowers at them both. She probably wants to be done with her shift.     Jon smiles at her brightly. "Another one of these, and whatever Ms. Dietrich is having?" He pulls out a fifty dollar bill and hands it over, then pulls out a five and hands /that/ over too. "The fifty goes in the till again, please."     The woman rolls her eyes and looks to Lydia for her order.
Lydia Dietrich	Lydia Dietrich says, "A Manhattan, if you please," Lydia says, naming her poison of choice. Hopefully this woman will know how to make it. Chas is still trying to figure it out, to varying degrees of success. "So the Archivist," she asks with a curious quirk of a brow. "What do you archive? If we're giving out codenames, I'm Spectra, but unless you pay attention to mutant news I doubt it'll mean anything to you.""
Jonathan Sims	Jon coughs in the middle of taking a drag on his cigarette. "O-oh? Oh. Well. Ahh. Pleasure to meet you, Spectra." He hesitates, then adds, "I... collect experiences. Stories. For the god Thoth." He picks up his beer as it's handed over and takes another long drink.     The bartender /might/ know how to make a Manhattan. One can hope.     "Chas is in the back doing some research. John is alive and..." He stops, literally the word tries to come out and it can't. Finally, "He's not /well/, but... as well as can be expected. He's in Arkansas."
Lydia Dietrich	Lydia rolls her eyes, "When is John /ever/ 'well'. That would require him to take care of himself and anybody who knows him, knows him better than that." She takes the drink from the woman with a kind smile, "Thank you," and gives it a tentative sip. "Mm. Not bad. A little heavy on the vermouth, though. Much better than whatever it is that Chas thinks he's making." Lydia doesn't look surprised at all to learn that Jon works for Thoth. "Hanging around John is a good way to collect experiences, I'd think," she muses. "How'd you two meet?"
Jonathan Sims	"Oh... years and years ago, in Liverpool. In this very bar, in fact." Jon smiles; he seems suddenly in his element, telling a story. "My then-boyfriend and I were up for a football match--he was from Manchester--and Manchester United lost. Martin wanted to start a fight, so he went to this dive looking for trouble." He rolls his eyes, something fond and pained both lingering in his tone. "Instead we ran into John, looking for his own trouble, falling over drunk. Took him back to the room to help him sleep it off and..." He shrugged. It's the kind of thing friendships are made of, in an odd sort of way.     "We lost touch, though, about a decade ago," he says. "I've only just come back, as it were. I, ahh... well. I'm new to the Thoth business. John /is/ a good way to collect experiences, though."     And then, suddenly, like he's only /just/ put two and two together, he snaps his fingers and says, "Lydia! On the blackboard, the problem John can put aside for a while! You're /that/ Lydia."
Lydia Dietrich	Lydia can't help but perk up when Jon tells his story about his then-boyfriend. She knew her gaydar was giving her signals and it's always good to meet another one of the community out in the wild. "That's always something I found fascinating, was how rowdy football fans could get over there." She shakes her head, "I've never heard of riots happening after a team lost here in America." She chuckles, "Then again I think I can only name three football teams here, that's how much attention to sports I pay." When she learns that she's on the blackboard she scowls. "I don't /have/ a problem that can be /fixed/," she says firmly. "I don't know how to get that through to him."
Jonathan Sims	Jon's mind is still going tick-tick-tick-tick-tick as he stares into the middle distance. "Lydia's a problem. Right after... the ritual he's doing for... Hmm. So he thought of you after he thought of /her/. Your skin is cold. Your aura looks different. Oh! You're a--" He stops. Blinks. "No, no, Jon, stop saying things like that with the normal folk about."     He focuses again, blinking slowly at Lydia. "He didn't give you an ugly amulet or anything, did he?"
Lydia Dietrich	Lydia can fill in the blanks on what Jon is thinking and gives him a toothy smile. "Have been for about a week. Still getting used to it." She takes another sip of her almost-Manhattan. She closes her eyes to enjoy the sting of the alcohol and the slight warming sensation it leaves in her stomach. If only it was really warming her up. "He did," she says about the amulet. "But I lost it the same day this," she gestures to the paleness of her face, "happened to me. It's a long story."
Jonathan Sims	Jon blinks at her. "Oh... oh, no I don't mean..." He fishes under his shirt, to pull out a raw sapphire wrapped in copper, on a leather cord. "I have one of those, if that's what you mean. No, it's... never mind."     After a moment, he glances to the bartender, then lowers his voice. "I could shoo them out if you need to talk. Or not! We only just met. But..." He runs a hand through his hair. "Maybe I can help you convince John you don't need fixing?"
Lydia Dietrich	Lydia considers Jon's offer to talk for a while, staying unnaturally still, even not breathing. The only movement is her eyes as she sizes up the man she just met. He's got one of John's communication amulets, and seems to be on the know. She breaks the stillness with a nod and gets up from the stool, and grabs her drink. "Alright," she says. "You seem like a decent enough fellow. Let's go grab one of the booths. That should give us privacy enough." She walks over to one of the booths in the far end of the bar, out of earshot and eases herself into it.
Jonathan Sims	Jon takes the last drag on his cigarette, puts it out, grabs up his beer, and follows Lydia along to the booth. He peers at her as he sits down on the other side; it might seem slightly odd.     Then he says, in a voice pitched just for the booth, "I didn't realize it, with just J--the other vampire I know, but I /can/ still see your minds. Yours is guarded, not as strongly as John's, but it's... hmm. You seem just as 'alive' as anyone else. Interesting."
Lydia Dietrich	Another curious quirk of the eyebrow. "There's another vampire? Should I be jealous?" She grins as she sips on her kinda-Manhattan. "I've had another telepath do a deeper probe just to make sure that I'm me. As far as they knew I could have been some demon or something wearing a Lydia-suit and as far as I knew, I could have been something else with Lydia's memories. But..." she shrugs. "It's all me." "But I'm /not/ alive," she points out. "At least not in any kind of biological context. I'm sentient, sure. I still have a soul, and I'm ambulatory. But alive?" She spreads her hands in a shrug as if to say, 'who knows?'
Jonathan Sims	Jon smiles. "What else is there, really? Perhaps I have an odd view, but I /am/ supposed to be helping to judge souls for their potential trip to the afterlife. My ancestors thought /all/ of it was quite real and tangible. The mind, the soul, all of it." He shrugs. "Who's to say they were wrong?"     He sits back a bit, taking a drink of his beer. "That said, most people do consider your... condition to be..." He frowns. "Well, I get why John is worried. He doesn't want you to have to... ahh." He pauses. "To have to /eat/ people, I suppose." He makes a bit of a face, at that, and takes another swig from his beer.
Lydia Dietrich	"It's not ideal, no," Lydia admits. "But it was the best possible outcome considering the circumstances. I could be dead, or I could be serving the Dark. At least this way I can still serve the Light despite my unusual dietary requirements." She takes a moment to take another drink from her quasi-Manhattan. She closes her eyes in pleasure, "Mm. At least I can still enjoy a good drink." She quirks a grin, "Well, a good /enough/ drink." "But I understand why John is taking it upon himself to try to 'cure' me," she says. Her gaze goes to look contemplatively out the window. "But there isn't one. And even if there was, whatever the price would be, John would try to pay, and I won't bring misfortune to a man for a state that fate has seen to send me in."
Jonathan Sims	"You have, ahh... you can feed, I take it?" Jon quirks a brow. "I... would not want to make assumptions, they're doing good work now, especially in Genosha, but one /figures/ the Brotherhood has... access to blood." He says it in that way people do, when they're trying not to be insulting to a group they're not a part of. Straight people talking about gay people, 'normal' people talking about mutants. And vampires, as it happens. He doesn't want to be insulting, but he doesn't know the right words, either.
Lydia Dietrich	Lydia doesn't seem that insulted. She turns her gaze back to Jon and nods, in fact. "I have a stable of donors, and a feeding schedule, with emergency contingencies and redundancies." She gives him a wickedly sharp grin that comes off as sarcastic. "It's all on a spreadsheet." "It's another reason why I don't want John to worry," she says, leaning back into the booth. "Other vampires starting out usually don't have the same kind of resources at their disposal as I do. I have an elder vampire and some very keen tactical minds doing their best to keep me from being a danger to innocents." Those who aren't innocent... well... that's another matter entirely.
Jonathan Sims	Jon sighs. "And... I suppose you told John all of this, and he decided it was going to be his business anyway?" He rolls his eyes, smirking. "Bloody fool." There's fondness there--a /lot/ of fondness. Lydia's particular skills, a writer of romances, can probably put two and two together: somebody has a crush on his friend.     "I will admit to curiosity about your... circumstances, but I will not ask." He makes a face. "I have a habit of forcing Stories out of people, when I ask. But if you ever want to tell me, to get it off your chest... only the Archivist will ever know, and the Archivist is good at keeping secrets."
Lydia Dietrich	Lydia shakes her head. "Not all of it, no," she says. "This is why I'm here, to give him the rest of it." She drains what's left of her drink and stands to gather her things. "I must be off," she says. "It was good meeting you, Jon. Perhaps one day you'll get the whole story." With a grin and a nod of her head goodbye she turns to leave the pub.