The Basement VII

You descend the stairs from the spiral above and discover a door locked with a key card. If you have gotten yours from the Old Man; the door opens into a pool room. The most noticeable thing about this room is the Basement Board.

There is also a kitchenette area with a coffee pot and the means to make hot beverages. A cabinet reveals the top shelf liquor.

Plenty of stools and beat up chairs are flecked about the room. A few lobby style couches hold down the wall. The basement looks like a bunker.

How this works

This is the Hunter only area of the Spiral. Free from Mortals; it's where you can talk freely. This is a sub-board and operates with the same rules as The Spiral does.

Another night at the basement of the Spiral.

It was rapidly becoming like Cheers for Ryan - where everybody knew his name. Then again, it seemed like there were only ever four of them down there at a time. Sacramento hadn't seen a new Hunter in quite some time aside from Doctorow, who didn't come in; then again, Ryan remembered what he had had to do to get access from the Old Man.

In his hand was a large box of nice hot pizza. Half-Hawaiian, half-Meat Lovers. One slice of each was missing. It wasn't the healthiest choice, but then, neither was the Vigil.

Noticing he was the first in, he shrugged, grabbed a cup of water from the sink and took a seat on the couch to enjoy another slice of dinner. In the battle between pineapple and animal flesh, flesh won. Meat Lovers entered his face and teeth gnashed.

Mmmm... pizza.

Mike came in through the back door, as per usual, with no particular expression on his face. This was chiefly caused by the fact that his braincells felt like they were trying to vacate the premises through his ears.

The huge Athlete lurched over to the coffee machine and silently made himself a cup. His eyes were red, and his hands were a fraction more unsteady than usual - and Mike was normally quite deft for such a giant of a man.

He drank the entire, steaming cup without flinching, and refilled it.

He'd feel that later, too.

"Hi, doc."

Completely unknowing that Doctor Marcus had handily brought dinner - which was just as well, since Harlowe had foregone breakfast and lunch - she had brought dessert. It was not that she was feeling festive or "Halloween-y" or, God forbid, domestic; but sometimes the embittered captain felt like de-stressing by cooking.

And actually, she wasn't too bad at it either. Desserts were generally her specialty, not that anyone would have known it from the way she downed Poptarts. Frankly, it was fortunate she trained as frequently as she did, because those things were not a healthy breakfast snack.

Very carefully Harlowe nudged open the heavy door to the basement, using her toe to prop it open as she sidled through. The scent of chocolate preceded her, and naturally it wasn't a bad smell in the slightest.

And if the guys disliked dessert, then there was more for her.

She set the box down and a knife, and grabbed a cup of coffee before actually speaking. And when she did acknowledge the two men, it was over the rim of the cup. It looked as though she'd barely slept either.

"'Sup?"

Cake

  14 successes

Date		Action		Roll		Result
2012-10-14 14:19:57		[04] Harlowe rolls 6 to Cooking (10 Again)		6, 9, 10, 2, 10, 7, 9, 10, 6		5 successes
2012-10-14 14:19:57		[03] Harlowe rolls 6 to Cooking (10 Again)		6, 7, 9, 3, 10, 7, 5		2 successes
2012-10-14 14:19:57		[02] Harlowe rolls 6 to Cooking (10 Again)		1, 9, 4, 9, 10, 7, 3		3 successes
2012-10-14 14:19:57		[01] Harlowe rolls 6 to Cooking (10 Again)		5, 9, 1, 8, 9, 6		3 successes
2012-10-14 13:50:41		Harlowe rolls 6 to Cooking (10 Again)		1, 6, 3, 4, 7, 9		1 success

Zinging her keycard at the door to the basement, Daysha walked down in a normal fashion, crabby. She was hit instantly by the aroma of pizza, which reminded her of Aaron and Darrin. Next was the small of chocolate... What on earth?

"Hey Doc, Mike, Sara." Daysha glanced around first to see who was all there. She didn't see Derevko upstairs, not a good sign. That was starting to frustrate the ever living fuck out of her.

As she finally hit the lower level, nodded to everyone and then made a confused expression. "So, who the hell decided to be clever and figure out my birthday is tomorrow?" If it was anyone other than these three, and Doctorow , she'd probably be pissed they dug around and found out.

"Harlow, that cake is amazing." The detective looked long and hard at it. "I mean really, more amazing than I've seen in the store." Turning back to the Captain a smile had cracked on the Detective's almost always irritated face. "Did you make that?" It was seriously amazing how much a cake could brighten spirits.

OOC

No joke, Daysha's birthday in the system on EoD is October 13th.

Ryan raised a hand in greeting as Mike came down. "Hey, Mike, how are things?" he asked pleasantly. The doctor noted the man's demeanour, but wasn't about to get up in his business unasked. "Care for a slice?" he motioned to the delicious-smelling pizza pie on the table before him.

As Sara came down, he waved to her as well, grinning at the cake in hand. "Evening, Harlowe! That... smells outstanding," he said with a grin, the scents of pizza and chocolatey goodness mixing together into the most unhealthy and delicious scent known to man. He was curious what the occasion was...

...and when Daysha came down and greeted them with a mention of her birthday, Ryan naturally concluded that that was what was going on. "Wasn't me," he said, smiling at the cop. "Happy birthday tomorrow, Daysha," Could it be tonight was a birthday party? That wasn't something he'd ever expected to do down here... but it was a happy thing nonetheless. A Hunter surviving another year was always cause for celebration.

"They're things, Doc, same as always," Mike said as he glanced up as Sara. He developed an expression of unrestrained surprise, as the Captain revealed probably the most delicate chocolate cake he'd seen in a long time. His jaw dropped a little, not exactly looking his best with the bloodshot eyes and the brutal aftereffects of his last drinking session still written all over his face.

"Fuck, Captain, I didn't know you baked," the Athlete said, resisting the urge to prod the decoration to see how solid it was. It looked pretty solid - and delicious. "Either that or you held up one fuck of a bakery store..." He scratched his jaw, sipping the burning hot coffee, before blinking at the Detective.

"It's your birthday? Fuck. I'd have gotten you a card or something..."

I don't think there's a 'Fellow Hunter' section at Hallmark.

Generally, compliments on cakes - her cakes was not something that Harlowe was especially used to. That might have had a little something to do with the fact that she did not show them off to anyone. Uncle Tommy and Samuel liked them well-enough; but they the latter tended not to eat desserts very much and the former was well and truly a meat-eater.

As a result, when the compliments came, Harlowe could not quite help but smile.

"It's relaxin' sometimes," she answered. "Glad y'like it."

With Daysha's admission, she let out a short laugh. "Didn't know, but I think somewhere it's written that it means y'get a second slice. Or the biggest slice or somethin'. Happy birthday."

Daysha kept breathing in the amazing aroma of the chocolate. Decadent and sweet, it looked like a masterpiece of icing and whatever that other pretty shit was called.

“Alright then, random coincidence.” The detective didn’t really believe in coincidences. But apparently she’d have to make an exception this time.

Unless Doctorow sent them all an email and they were to be hush hush about it. Wouldn’t surprise me, but what a stupid thing to blackmail people over.

“Hell I didn’t know you baked either Harlowe, nice work. Truly impressive.”

Daysha shook her head. “Second piece? At my age I should just smear it on my thighs cause that’s exactly where it’d go.”

The detective wasn't impatient and she had grabbed her routine coffee and took a seat. "So what's the occasion? And how is everyone anyway?" It was probably a really weird thing to see the crass and crabby Jackson actually quite perky.

Doc Marcus grinned, looking at the pizza for a moment and thinking about how much he could eat while still leaving room for dessert. His metabolism was doing a bit better now that he'd started exercising, and so he felt like he could stuff his face with a couple more slices. Still got the appetite of a seventeen year old...

"Eh, not bad!" Ryan said. And it was true. He looked a hell of a lot better than the last time he'd been in. Like he'd been sleeping again. Like he'd managed to get his mind around what had been going on lately. "No more biker incidents at the hospital lately and I actually saw my kids recently for more than two hours at a time, so that's positive. How about you?"

Chomp, Hawaiian-style.