Home to a variety of cultural backgrounds, Lamenolai is a citadel city with stone walls that encompass the whole city and stone 'guardians.' It is also home to the Headquarters of the Purines, an opposing organization to the Imperialists of Lambastia. (+2 Defense, +2 Fame)

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Re: ✄ Making Cold Cases Hot Again [Mousen & I; E]

Postby Mousen » 08/20/2016 6:37 PM

This was a troubling development. The girly laugh could be put aside, that was a surprising rather than troubling. No, what was bothering Abner was this: Verniy was adorable. Rather than dwell upon this when there was practical matters to attend to Abner pushed the realization to the back of his mind to deal with later.

He couldn't help but be amused by the little outburst. Verniy was like a child at Christmas and as cold-hearted and curmudgeonly as he could be he just didn't have the heart to start bursting bubbles again. "I'm exactly like one of the detectives in the movies. Dunno why it took you so long to notice, Valkova. I'm roguishly handsome and dashingly intelligent, I'm a regular old Hollywood adaptation of Sherlock Holmes."

From behind the counter Juanita's laughter quickly transitioned into fake coughing. Abner shot her a look.

Juanita had evidently recovered from her coughing fit well enough to bring over the coffees, setting down two tall coffee-filled latte glasses. She smiled at Verniy, and wandered back over to the counter.

Abner used his spoon to scrape some of the rapidly melting whipped cream off of the edges of the glass. "Spoken like a true student." And well, if the rookie wanted to earn a few brownie points, Abner had more than a few suggestions... Wait. No. Bad Abner. No. Work colleagues. Professionalism. No. Abner blinked, his train of thought swiftly derailed and promptly buried (with any luck, it'd never see the light of day again). "Let's see, that's one point for enthusiasm, another for shirking on your work, another for having absolutely ludicrous taste in coffee, and one for abandoning formality within an hour of meeting me. All in all, I'm reasonably impressed."


We’re all hysterical & going nowhere together.

C’mon rapture. Let’s go bedazzling.

Nothing gets futured without its own spitshine
& I’m already not not not not not not miraculous.


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Re: ✄ Making Cold Cases Hot Again [Mousen & I; E]

Postby Atoli01 » 11/06/2016 5:14 AM

Hah. What a joker. Verniy's right eyebrow arched up in amusement. "Oh yeah? Well it's one thing to look as handsome and charming as Sherlock, but how good is your impression on the field?" she teased. Verniy remained oblivious to the implications of her question, perhaps because she herself didn't even realize it then. In all fairness, why would she? It's not like most people walked in on the first day of work and went, "Well hot damn, my new co-worker is at least a solid 9/10."

For a split second Verniy came back to her senses. She was sitting there with her new co-worker-slash-mentor who she had just met this morning and she already broke down laughing and was poking fun at him as if he was an old friend. Truth be told she had half the mind (maybe three-quarters) to apologize for her behavior, but Juanita swung by the table just as Verniy opened her mouth. Needless to say, her attention was quickly diverted.

Verniy chirped in delight at the delivery of their morning coffee and returned Juanita's smile as thanks. She stared on in awe at the whipped cream pile sitting on top of the coffee's already foamy surface. Juanita really wasn't playing around.

Slowly, ever so slowly, Verniy picked the coffee cup up to her face and blew on the hot beverage. She had a surprisingly high heat tolerance, but she wasn't invincible. Her whipped cream conquest was interrupted by Abner's praise. She wasn't actually serious about the brownie points thing, but no way she'd turn them down if he was offering. "You better be careful with that positive reinforcement, now,", she muttered, "Or else I really will take all of that to heart. And I mean all." ...Ridiculous coffee choices and a lazy work ethic included.

Hesitantly, she took the first sip of her coffee. Sweet, but not overly so. Verniy pulled the cup away as later sips began to singe her tongue. She didn't notice however her nose's brush against the whipped cream as she drank, nor the small glob of whipped cream she moved her finger into when she adjusted her grip on the cup's handle. Instead she stole a glance at Abner. Her eyes wandered to Juanita, standing behind the counter. She found herself wondering how they met, and how they must have broke up on good terms if they could still bicker like this, right? It was little more than the giddy curiosity of a natural-born detective.


A beautiful moon shines above again tonight,
And it sheds light happily over the world.
As for me, I'm just worthless, good for nothing,
Dreaming at daybreak, creeping at dawn.

Still I'll scream into the sky, hoping that somebody will find me.
I want to run, but there's no way out--
No bright future in sight.
But I still fly up like a butterfly, hoping that you'll find me.
A crescent moon, ugly children of the stars, flying with broken wings...!


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Re: ✄ Making Cold Cases Hot Again [Mousen & I; E]

Postby Mousen » 12/27/2016 3:55 PM

It took Abner a moment, but he resisted the urge to make a crude comment. "Exemplary, my dear Watson," he replied, scraping up melted whipped cream from the edge of his glass with a spoon. "I'm your boss, after all." Boss was a bit of a strong word, but as far as chain of command went, Abner was close to the top. The other detectives in the building came and went, but Abner had been with the agency a good while. They took a relatively hands-off approach to detective work, and Abner was perfectly content to be left to his own devices. He worked best like that.

"Then I'll have to set you some work, won't I?" Actually, while there was no pressing case to work on... there were a few introductory tasks Abner could set for the budding young detective. "How are your research skills? Are you used to finding what you need in libraries and archives?" It'd be a bit of a wild goose chase for Verniy, but Abner was sure that he'd be perfectly used to the system afterwards.

The detective looked up just in time to see Verniy end up with whipped cream on the end of his nose. The aforementioned realization that Abner had worked to hard to hide at the back of his mind worked its way to the forefront. He blinked slowly. He would be sensible, dammit. Sensible. "Say... Verniy?" he pointed to his own nose. "You've got something there."

Abner's phone began to ring, with it's cheery, but surprisingly generic ring tone. (Apparently his original choice was "unprofessional" and "not appropriate for a crime scene".) He stood up. "Give me a sec," he said, excusing himself and moving to just outside the little coffee shop.


We’re all hysterical & going nowhere together.

C’mon rapture. Let’s go bedazzling.

Nothing gets futured without its own spitshine
& I’m already not not not not not not miraculous.


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Re: ✄ Making Cold Cases Hot Again [Mousen & I; E]

Postby Atoli01 » 04/15/2018 5:14 AM

"Bring it," the novice detective replied, a smirk forming on her face. "With all the research papers I had to write for school-- especially for my minor, oddly enough-- I know how to find what I need. I may need to adjust myself to the archival system is used in the office here, but it shouldn't take me long." She could still recall the late nights she spent in her dorm scouring her university's online research database. When what she needed wasn't available online, she'd make the trek across campus to the library and walk back to her dorm with an armful of journals and texts. With it came memories of the cheap coffee and the headaches and the pills scattered across her desk and of the dorm air conditioner that hummed just too loudly to ignore.

It was all for this, Verniy reminded herself. It was all to be sitting here on the first day of the job taking an early morning coffee break with her new senior detective and... whipped cream on her nose, as said detective pointed out. Brushing her finger across the tip of her nose confirmed her suspicions. "O-oh. Uh, thank you," she stuttered. Her cheeks tinted pink as she reached to the end of the table for a napkin. What an impression.

Abner's phone ringing reminded her that her own cellphone existed. As he stepped out of the shop, Verniy pulled it out of her pocket. No new texts, as usual. She absentmindedly thumbed to her browser and closed an article entitled A Day in the Life of a Private Detective. She knew it was clickbait, but insomnia had hit her hard last night. Or maybe it was nerves. She wasn't quite sure. Anticipation? Either way, the silly article did absolutely nothing to prepare her for this morning.

With nothing to do while she waited (she already got whipped cream on her nose; she doubted her senior coming back in to see her playing Alphabear would repair her lost dignity), she flicked the screen off and laid her cellphone on the table beside her. Her fingers danced across the frayed edges of the silk talisman attached to it. A gift from Valentin, just days before he disappeared. He told her the script on it read success. She attached it to her phone when she finally realized he wasn't coming back. Had he meant something by it? Did he know something horrible was going to happen to him? Or was it simple coincidence? She wondered if she'd ever have a concrete answer to those questions.

Verniy took another sip of her coffee, this time careful to keep her nose away from the now melting whipped cream. Her head pounded.


A beautiful moon shines above again tonight,
And it sheds light happily over the world.
As for me, I'm just worthless, good for nothing,
Dreaming at daybreak, creeping at dawn.

Still I'll scream into the sky, hoping that somebody will find me.
I want to run, but there's no way out--
No bright future in sight.
But I still fly up like a butterfly, hoping that you'll find me.
A crescent moon, ugly children of the stars, flying with broken wings...!


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Re: ✄ Making Cold Cases Hot Again [Mousen & I; E]

Postby Mousen » 05/20/2018 1:02 PM

If Verniy was watching him, she'd find his posture had tensed, a stiffening of his shoulders. He started to pace a little too, his strides measured. He faced away from the coffee shop windows, but glanced back inside momentarily, his eyes flicking to Verniy's then away again. He pulled at a little bit of his hair, the afro curls stretching and springing back into place. He wasn't making himself difficult to read. It was clear that this was a work call. This was a case.

"Yes. Of course. I'll be right there." he went to hang up the phone then paused, remembering something. "Wait, wait! I'm bringing my, um apprentice-- is that the word? With me. Yeah. Listen, its non-negotiable, the agency. Listen, they bring me too many clients. I know-- I know. Believe me. He's a good kid, lot of potential. He just needs to shadow me. Of course I got him to sign the non-disclosure agreements, what do you think I am? Some kind of moron?" Abner rolled his eyes. "Yeah, I walked into that one. So, I'll meet you inside the station as soon as I can. Fifteen minutes?"

There was something electric about him as he returned to Verniy's table, his eyes shone. "Vern-- can I call you that? Anyway listen, we gotta go. I'll fill you in on the way, but they've just pulled a guy off of the street that I've been trying to track down for years. We have to be there when he's interrogated. I'm not missing this." There was a kind of desperation in his tone, something honest. If Verniy wanted to get a good look at the detective underneath the acts, this was a good of a chance as she was going to get.

He picked up his coffee and downed a good portion of it, reaching over the table to grab his jacket. "Ready?"


We’re all hysterical & going nowhere together.

C’mon rapture. Let’s go bedazzling.

Nothing gets futured without its own spitshine
& I’m already not not not not not not miraculous.


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Mousen
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