Egad

[West]

West considered his options, which quickly narrowed down to one.

That was how many Mages left in the city had been here longer than him, and how many of the original expedition team remained.

And so he found himself juggling a pair of hot coffee cups and making his way to Gina's desk. Anyone else might have mentioned, or congratulated her, on the recent vocal triumph she'd graced them all with, but that was just too much like... being social. Small talk.

"Is Dr. Primoria in?" he asked.

Besides, after two years of that question being the extent of their interaction, he didn't want to give her the wrong idea.

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[ParanoidAndroid]

From her desk, Gina spares barely a glance for the Magister. She takes barely a glance at the list to make sure he's still there (hey, it's been known to happen), and responds in the one word she knows well. One she knows in roughly seventeen different languages. *Pop!* Huh, sounds like German this time.

She hooks a thumb down the hallway towards the Curator's office. Tyria herself is, at the moment, reviewing the Museum's next exhibit, flipping through page after page of plans and pictures. It just wouldn't do if its placement destroyed what she'd worked very hard to make of her Museum.

[West]

West sets a cup down, but doesn't interrupt.

It's tempting to make the obvious joke: peek ahead and see where she would put it, then suggest it.

He does not.

When she comes to a stopping point, he finally speaks.

"Hey. Question... do you have a list of the original expedition that came here? I'm looking, uhhhrrrmmmm, for someone whose name begins with an 'E' or something like that..."

He made a wry smile, knowing how ridiculous that sounded.

[ParanoidAndroid]

The Curator stops looking at the floorplan she has in her hand, sighing as she puts the sheaf back on her desk. She looks at the other Acanthus, and hmm's thoughtfully for a just a moment. "I just might," she answers. She opens the bottom left drawer of her desk, and pulls out a manila folder, offering it to the Magister while she takes the cup in her other.

She watches him over the rim as she takes a careful sip, warming her hand on the styrofoam container.

And inside the folder is indeed a list of the Awakened that first came to town. Their Shadow Names, at least. Which may or may not be what Cartright had in mind when he mentioned a specific letter to start a name with. Whether the list is an original, and why she might have that kind of obscure information in an easily-accessible drawer remains a mystery. It's not like she could have possibly known someone would be needing that list soon, right?

[West (The Mage)]

West unceremoniously stuck the cup between his teeth, holding it there as he opened the folder and skimmed it. Some habits die hard, and there's rarely a place to put your cup down 'out in the field'.

Satisfied, he handed the folder back to her. There was really no point in him keeping it.

"Two more questions," he said, taking his cup in one hand, and resting the other on his hip. It was that same unconscious gesture that police often develop.

"One. Did Armadia and Cartright have any history? Two. Any chance Deacon Eclipse wanted to create an opportunity badly enough to kill Cartright?"

He didn't mind her knowing what he was digging in; if she'd asked, he would have told her. Since she didn't, he assumed she'd deduced it.

[ParanoidAndroid]

Tyria makes a small gesture of invitation, her hand indicating the table, her head bowing just a tad. No, you don't get more than a tad, Magister. "They hid it well, but there was a brief stint where they came across each other. Chicago, in 1993 or so. From what I gather, she was the sword-arm that helped carry his will through. Sometimes not with the entire Consilium's approval." The way she says it is fact, collected and exact.

"As for Deacon Eclipse, I don't think so," she states. "If he did, he would probably have taken the opportunity to go higher." She takes a sip from her cup. "I'd hate to think that the Ladder value murder as only worthy of a Councilor position." A slight pause. "Even if he did manage to convince Andrade that he would be her successor when the time came."

"Has something happened to make you want to dig for something most of our current residents have left behind them and forgotten?", she asks, with only the barest air of innocence. The rest is cool, calculating Curator.

[West (The Mage)]

West almost smiled.

If you only knew that in some of the Middle East shitholes we 'police', sometimes murder's only value is a good issue of Penthouse.

Of course, good catechism would answer that the Ladder was far more enlightened than that.

As far as Armadia went, he wasn't surprised. Which wasn't at all like saying he disapproved.

"I found a shade of Cartright in the Temenos," West answered bluntly. While some might untuit that quid pro quo was excellent strategy with the Curator, he had always been hard-pressed to deny anything to anyone he cared about.

"He claimed that someone who's name began 'E-something' had killed him," he elaborated, shrugging slightly.

"Armadeeeee-uh. Deeeee-con. Eeeee-clipse."

Hopefully she wouldn't answer with Kai-eeeeee.

He really didn't feel like an argument.

[ParanoidAndroid]

Tyria hides her moment of reflection behind another sip from the warm cup. "Aneeee-mus," she replies, with just the barest hint of sarcasm. To say there was doubt the now-Hierarch could commit murder is an understatement. "Teeee-ria." Which could either stand for some kind of joke, or a veiled accusation that the Magister was investigating her.

"The list could get long," she states simply. Not that she wanted to name them all. Peeee-ter was still a possibility as well, though she didn't state that one. Simply too unlikely. "Some way of narrowing the field would save you the trouble of chasing them all down to ask them to pronounce their names." There's a slight pause. "If the shade of Cartright knew the first letter, then how much would the real Cartright have known?", she asks speculatively.

[West (The Mage)]

"Well, not really," West replied, frowning. He didn't particularly like disagreeing with her, mainly because he knew she was smarter than he was... but threat assessment was something he was willing to, on.

"Wouldn't one of the requirements -- besides the name -- be capability?"

Motives didn't really matter to West, but how many people could go toe-to-toe with the Hierarch and kill him? He had no idea, because he didn't know Cartright's abilities. Still, he was willing to rule out quite a lot.

At the next question, he shrugged.

"Or what Undrichmann found out."

IIIIIII-o-dor.

[ParanoidAndroid]

"Or the opportunity to catch him unaware," the woman adds to the stipulation of capability. "Peter Cartright made more than a few enemies on his way up the Ladder." Another calm, measured sip of the latte. "It's unlikely one of them would come all the way from out of town just to deal with him. But if one of them were in town, or had an ally in town willing to do the job," she continues, leaving the rest of the sentence to hang like a gutted fish.

So, in other words, the sum of capability and motive. Or even second-degree motive. "Undrichmann would certainly have been capable. But he doesn't seem the type to do someone else's dirty work, and I've never found any direct reason for him to want to." The way she says it makes it sound almost like a question. Almost like she's asking the other Acanthus if he ever found a reason like that. It's not quite a question, though.