Difference between revisions of "Ciao, sescu"

Kai dials the number in the evening. A heavily accented, deep voice answers immediately. "Adamescu."

"Hi, Mr. Adamescu," Kai says, casually. "I'm interested in your burger truck. I stopped by to talk but you weren't around."

A shuffling can be heard as the man sits up at that, and sighs. "Tori gave you the number. And she quit on me today. Are you looking for a job? Easy work. Sit at desk, take my calls."

"Nah, I'm good. I've got twice the transportation problems she does." Kai is not the world's most effective liar, but she doesn't particularly care if that comes off straight; she's moving on. "I admire your work. Especially the cultivation you have going on. I'd -love- to know what you're trying to do with it." That's not -quite- maximum directness, but it's pretty damn forthright.

CREAK. The man leans forward in his chair, and sighs again. "You were snooping." *sigh* "Look lady, I tell you the truth. I spread contentment and good food. That is all."

<<DICE>> Kai rolls Perception + Empathy, difficulty 8 
<<DICE>> 1 success (1 8 10, Specialty: No, Willpower: No)

Kai gets no particular sense that he is lying.

"Yeah, I'm nosy," Kai says. "But I'm not the magic police. I said I admire your work, right? Why don't we meet. Maybe we can learn from each other."

Adamescu rumbles low. Not a purr. Too annoyed. "Tori said there were two of you. Meet tomorrow night. My office. I bring gun. You don't try anything funny." *click*

Kai laughs when he hangs up on her. "You get that?" she asks Jamila, pocketing her phone. "He shoots me, I might change my mind about the 'magic police' thing." She shouldn't sound so amused.

Jamila nods. "I got that," she says, a dark look in her eyes and a smirk on her lips. "I don't know why he'd need a gun when it's just two harmless ladies such as ourselves."

"I make people suspicious," Kai says merrily. "Pick me up tomorrow at six?"

By the time the pair arrives, by whatever means they choose (Ride from Jim remains an option if they want something with 4WD), it's getting dark. The truck itself - in the flesh - is backing into a parking spot right in front of the building, and Adamescu himself is seen walking around to the back.

It's Ladies' Night Out, so Jamila picks Kai up in her Prius and parks it a couple blocks away. Any quick get-away they'll need to make would be better not tied to her license plate, and a quick get-away doesn't seem likely to be needed. "You want to get a story straight before we go in?"

<<DICE>> Kai rolls Arete, difficulty 4 
<<DICE>> 3 successes (4 5 6, Specialty: No, Willpower: No)
<<DICE>> Kai rolls Arete, difficulty 4 
<<DICE>> 1 success (1 4 6, Specialty: No, Willpower: No)
<<DICE>> Kai rolls Arete, difficulty 4 
<<DICE>> 3 successes (7 9 10, Specialty: No, Willpower: No)

Kai shrugs after she exits the car. "We're interested? I mean, I wasn't lying. I admire his work. Not a lot of herbalists around. I'm not about to pronounce him 'evil' unless he's fucking with people a lot more than contentment." A pause, then, and she adds: "Though a good meal is usually enough for 'contentment'. So I could be wrong."

When they approach the back door, he was clearly listening and watching for them. It was an appointment after all. As they come around the corner from the garden, the door opens up. A balding man with a southern European complexion stands there. White wife beater, blue jeans, and a large shotgun in one hand, pointed at the ground. "Come in, or stand outside if you prefer. You look unarmed." He then leaves the door open as he walks back to his desk, and leans the shotgun on the wall behind him, where the ladies would have to reach around him to get at it. He's sitting at the desk, in the same seat where Tori was last time.

Jamila looks at the man, glances at Kai, and then shrugs and enters the office, standing just inside the door, making room for Kai to come in. She doesn't _say_ anything just yet, but instead glances around the office, her eyes alighting on the man, the gun, the desk, the kitchen, and then finally coming back to the man.

Kai makes a show of lifting the corners of her open jacket (unseasonably warm weather ftw); there are no lumps or bulges or weirdly-weighted spots, because she is in fact not packing a gun. Maybe there's a Bic in one of those pockets. She comes in as well. "I was being straight with you, dude" she says, flatly. "You're spreading comfort and joy? Great, I'd love to learn how." She doesn't smile, really, but she isn't glowering or menacing either. It's a factual sort of conversation.

Adamescu gets up when the women enter, and reaches to close the door before sitting again. Just in case they make a move at the shotgun. "Alright. Let's say I believe you, and you're just curious. Talking about my garden. Asking to buy my spices. Calling yourself magic police. What do you really want? You want me to teach you the old ways?"

This stuff is all just above Jamila's head, and so she just stands there and looks pretty. She's good at that, even if it's an intimidating sort of pretty. She's really just the muscle here anyway.

"I said I'm -not- the magic police," Kai clarifies. "And sure. Why not. I'd love to know how the Old Ways found their way onto a burger truck. Spreading contentment? That's like - missionary stuff. I haven't met a lot of missionaries of the Old Ways." When she says 'Old Ways', the capital letters sound decently capital.

Adamescu chuckles, and grunts, getting up again. Gesturing for the ladies to watch as he crosses into the prep kitchen. Stepping right up to that well prepared cutting board from before. And the knives. "I am no missionary. You don't have to believe what I believe, in order to feel better eating my food, lady. What about you?" He looks to Jamila. "Don't you speak? Anyway, I hate to tell you, but even if I show you how I do it, you can't ever do it yourself, unless you have The Drive within you."

Jamila glances at Kai and then back to Adamescu. "I speak," she says. "I am, however, deferring to my friend here as this is her area of expertise and not mine. You brought a gun. She brought me." Jamila's tongue slips out to wet her lips, in the least sultry manner possible. It's almost a challenge. "I wouldn't presume to intrude on her discussion of magick."

Kai looks aside at Jamila, then back at Adamescu, lifts a shoulder. "I bet I could reach deep down and find 'The Drive,'" she says. "But if I don't, there's no harm in showing me. And I tell you what - you show me something good, it doesn't have to be a one-way street."

Adamescu sighs, and smiles "When I was small, we had to keep quiet. Ceausescu would keep down anything he didn't understand, including what we could do. She would always say, <<Romanian intensifies>>, which means uh, You, uh, you do not overpower opponent, you make him complacent. She taught me how she would make government agents relax. I bring relaxation to the many." He goes into the refrigerator, brings out some herbs from in there, and lays them out on the cutting board. He's not doing it randomly. leaves are placed on specific points on the carving, everything is arranged just so.

Jamila doesn't really pay attention to the herbs, but rather the man and his knives. She watches very closely for any funny business. As if the entire business isn't just a little funny.

Kai, on the other hand, does pay attention to the herbs - and the board, and the knives, and the man. There are a lot of moving pieces, and she has the snap to realize that - if friend Adamescu is not being forthright, things can go extraordinarily wrong rather quickly. "People get pretty nuts trying to get to your burgers," she observes. "Like poppy-milk." She moves a little closer to watch what he's doing, leans against the fridge. "We're not your opponents, you know." That last part is sort of uncommonly gentle, particularly from Kai - like it's a reminder of a thing already established, not a correction.

The man is very intent on what he's doing. He breathes slowly, eyes focused. As he takes a knife, his movements are very careful, and precise. He begins to cut. The cuts come fast, but the stries of the knife to the board match where cuts have been before. It's over fast, but it's clear he's doing things exactly as he's done many times before, and presumably exactly as his grandmother did them. "These, you meay keep," he says, taking a baggie, and a small brush, and carefully dusting the herbs intot he baggie. Wasting as little as possible.

<<DICE>> Kai rolls Perception + Awareness, difficulty 9 
<<DICE>> FAIL (2 3 4 5 5 5, Specialty: No, Willpower: No)