revenance_rpg | The Witching Hour

Characters: Granny Weatherwax and whoever she runs into
Content: Traverse gains a witch
Location (including world): First District, Traverse Town
Time of Day: Afternoon (such as it is)
Warnings: None

[Granny was no stranger to dreams. Anyone had ‘em, from the entirely mundane and embarrassing sort of dreams* to the sorts of dreams that set people on a path and kept ‘em following it. Those were the dangerous ones, if you didn’t keep an eye out for the warning signs. The mad could dream, and the dangerously sane too. She was not, however, particularly familiar with dreams like this one**, and couldn’t be having with this sort of thing anyway. Dreams were all well and good, but there was no call to have animals with puffballs stuck to their heads and bat wings. It was against the natural order of things. Even the idea of creating something out of bits and pieces of things was something she couldn’t really be having with.

Accordingly it took some time before she finally admitted that maybe she could put up with another hanger-on she’d never wanted, ridiculously colored though the things seemed to be. Dream though it was there was a difference between accepting that fact and bending to the ludicrous rules of this dream. Besides, she was perfectly capable of defending herself. She’d simply decided she might as well see what all the fuss had been about. It certainly wasn’t anything to do with curiosity and anyone who thought otherwise didn’t have the slightest idea what they were talking about.

It wasn’t like she needed a lizard anyway, even if it was traveling with her. Thus, she payed it no real mind as she set about seeing what she could make of the town. It might have been no dream she knew, but that was absolutely no call to not assume there was a perfectly good reason for her being there. It was just a matter of figuring out what it was.

* Which she quite adamantly did not have, thank you very much.
** Not that she would have admitted to such. Her pride would never have allowed it.]

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Sparky noticed the woman first, and quickly alerted York that there was someone new and interesting to meet. York frowned to himself and headed over right away; most of the people here seemed pretty surprisingly able to take care of themselves, but he wasn't as sure about an old lady walking around with all the nightmares attacking. It'd be nice to say hi and make sure that she could handle herself.

"Good afternoon, ma'am," he said. Sparky headed over to say hello to the other hebby repp, bouncing with enthusiasm.

Well, this one at least had the sense to be polite. Granny couldn't say she much approved of the rest of what she saw*, but it was better than she gotten so far. Even if her own lizard did insist on offering its own hello in turn.

(There was, of course, a slight internal debate about whether 'ma'am' was an acceptable replacement to the more familiar 'mistress,' but in light of the fact that it was at least relatively close, she figured she could let it pass this once.)

"And to you," she answered, utterly unconcerned about the fact that it didn't look like afternoon and in the sort of tones that implied that she was mostly answering for the sake of social niceties, such as they were.

*Not much, given the armor that got in the way, but she disapproved of that too, just to be on the safe side.

Okay, and he now faced the challenge of asking if she was fine on her own without being insulting. "I don't think we've met, are you new to the town? I'm York; it's good to see a new face around here." Maybe edging into it slowly was for the best. Feel her out.

Under general circumstances, York's idea was a good one. Most new arrivals were more than willing to meet a relatively friendly face, or had one of several questions* that they figured needed to be answered. This general pattern crumbled in the face of Granny's surety of self, and general disinclination to ask anything that resembled a question.

"We ain't met," she answered, looking York in the eyes** and fixing him with the full force of her best look of disapproval.

*Of varying importance.
**Or at least where she assumed his eyes were.

She sort of reminded him of his Nana, actually. That was pretty terrifying. He felt D stir in the back of his mind and a definite sense of refusing to deal with this, thank you, so don't ask.

Well, there was nothing for it but to jump in. "Is there anything I can help you with, ma'am?"

It was probably for the best that York was the only one Granny had to deal with. She'd certainly seen a lot of things in her long life, but that didn't mean she was going to be having with the idea of any sort of AI, regardless of how helpful it was supposed to be.* As such, there was only flicker's worth of silence before she answered the question.

"You can take off that helmet, for one. 'Taint right, goin' about hidin' one's face like that."

*What was the point of having an artificial intelligence when a real one worked just fine?

York pulled off the helmet and tried to make his hair behave a bit. He'd given up on gel a long while ago so it was in a sort of perpetually messy state these days. Hopefully his eye wouldn't put her off; probably not, she seemed like a tough old bird. That didn't mean she could handle Nightmares, though.

Given that Granny had dealt the sight of a battered old tomcat suddenly turned human, a missing eye was hardly about to startle her. Instead, she simply nodded to herself. She wasn't about to admit to the fact, but it was certainly a good deal easier to look York in the eye this way.

(Which was, she had to admit, probably the point, but damned if she was going to let York know that.)

"Better."

York smiled; she really reminded him of some of the older ladies he'd known. Which meant she probably wouldn't approve of the smile, and hopefully he wasn't in for a lecture about what he was smiling about.

"Do you have a place to stay, ma'am?"

She didn't approve. There wasn't any call to go smiling at people you'd just met, especially when just about the world seemed to have taken a turn around the far end of the bend. Certainly not when no one seemed have any inclination to understand the meaning of what she was wearing.

"That ain't you thinkin' about offerin' help I hears, is it?"

"I thought you might want directions to the hotel." And help getting there. Well, she definitely didn't want help getting there, but she might need it. "I'm heading there myself."

Requiring directions would mean needing to admit to being lost in the first place. Unfortunately, this ran into problems when compared to the fact that Granny was never lost. Being lost required vulnerability, and that was something Granny couldn't abide by in anyone, least of all herself.

"Then you ain't thought enough, boy."

York nodded to the woman; clearly she wasn't going to budge an inch, so he'd have to look out for her. "I'll be heading on to the hotel then, ma'am. I hope you have a good evening."

The Witching Hour

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