88/Fathers of Fables

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Fathers of Fables
Date of Scene: 20 April 2017
Location: New York City
Synopsis: Summary needed.
Cast of Characters: Loki, Bigby Wolf




Loki has posed:
The Bronx earned its reputation as a rough corner of New York ages ago, reinforced through the industrial character of the place. Even the futuristic buildings don't feel anything more than modified from an old template, low-lying warehouses without windows and anonymous buildings standing shoulder to shoulder around potholed roads. Such is not where the rich and powerful will ever show up, and most New Yorkers prefer to think the other half of society works out of sight, out of mind. If only that were the case.

Loki Odinson has his reasons for loitering about. The art centre might be the natural spot he chooses to be, but no, fate has to go and cast him a line into some squalid office with mismatched art and ugly desks, where he stands out worse than a shark over a seafloor studded in bivalves. "Yes," he's presently saying. "I truly don't care. I want my package. How hard is this to understand?"

Two employees messing around with a delivery drone are watching him from the corner of their eye. The supervisor hauled out from his sad little corner to the office is clearly a bit surprised. "We can't get it for you, sir..."

Which is about the time fourteen drones randomly wake up and start buzzing around, sorting through boxes and warehouse shelves with a mind of their own. The one outside starts buzzing around and spitting out yellow smoke, forming the company's trademark smile.

Bigby Wolf has posed:
This was meant to be his night off.

That is what Bigby Wolf told everybody back at the office. Wait. //He's// the only one who works at his 'office' -- well, sort of. 'Wolf Investigations' is all him, when it all comes down to it. Maybe it should be 'Lone Wolf Investigations' -- but that just sounds a trifle dour to the grizzly-faced, long-haired man with a cigarette always clamped between his lips.

And what brought him here? Here, of all places? Rumours and smell. Rumours first, smell second. The rumours had nothing to do with Loki's presence. The //smell//, however...

"I never ferget me the tang of 'supreme self-entitlement'," says he from the entrance. There's a smirk on those lips, amber eyes agleam. "Especially when it's an ego I've smelled before..."

Wolf grins.

"I'd offer ya a smoke, but ya seem to have all the 'smoke' covered..."

Loki has posed:
The humming drones spin from place to place with an apparent mind and will of their own. That would be fine, if they weren't the sort of objects buzzing to and fro with very specific programming.

Programming now overridden by some uncertain source.

Loki crosses his arms over his chest, content to wait. The spell takes precious little effort for him to manage, and in the meantime, the supervisor sweats and frowns. Excuses are a trifle ridiculous. "I have paid. I have waited. You have a service, and you have failed to provide this service I seek," he explains, eminently reasonable, to the man barely five years older than him. "Giving my money back is not satisfactory. I require my order filled. It is //important//."

Then someone has to go and spoil all the fun. He looks over his shoulder at the shape ghosting the doorway. The other two workers have fled from the smoke-shooting drone, off to get their cameras. It could be their lucky day or their certain death.

"You," the Asgardian god says. "You can explain to him. He does not seem to understand. This is a present. A present late is unacceptable."

Bigby Wolf has posed:
Bigby Wolf, known among Fables (and some other circles) as the God of Wolves (which must really irk another contender for that title... Loki's own son, Fenris)... blows out a cloud of spicy cigarette smoke and gives a grunt.

"Do I look like yer lapdog, bud?" He doesn't use Loki's name -- not in front of 'Mundanes'; the wolf has some discretion.

A pause.

"Since when did you go legit?" he suddenly inquires, eyeing the mayhem with the drones with a sardonic smirk that must add some colour to his idea of 'legit'.

Loki has posed:
That self-same wolf is slated to end the world, unless completely barred, but one never ought to underestimate creation's ability to keep rolling along. The sly bastard doesn't have the least trouble responding to the grunt.

"I thought you might have a better go of it than I." Loki shrugs lightly. His coat shifts across the breadth of his shoulders, hanging open. "I spent twenty minutes on their help line. I came down. I have done all I was asked to do. A fair bargain."

Green eyes slant to the supervisor, who seems halfway to sitting at his desk or running back to the safety of an internal office. Pity the site manager is likely running around with his hair on fire -- not literally.

"Since when did you take that infernal habit? Bad for your lungs. I thought cigarettes could only be purchased... no matter." One of the drones comes swinging through the warehouse, bursting out an automated door and swinging around to join the yellow smoker. A smile widens upon his thin lips, briefly. "There we are! I do so love technological efficiencies. Never forget the human element, either. Aren't we all full of surprises today?"

Bigby Wolf has posed:
"Ain' done me no harm yet," Wolf replies, removing the cigarette from his lips and looking down at it with his amber eyes. He has his reasons for it, and until he starts smoking //silver//... it won't do him any harm.

Or it shouldn't, at least.

The man grunts again.

"So how would you rank yer experience of the service here at -- wherever this is? I reckon they'll have a survey for you ta fill out next. All... domesticated now, is that it?"

Loki has posed:
"Amazon. Nile. Something after a river," Loki dryly adds. He turns on his heel and strides outside, holding out his hands. The drone obediently sweeps over and drops the package from its gripping feet, allowing it to fall. The programming normally wouldn't allow this.

The Trickster has nothing to worry about with the programming. "Excellent. And very well, all is superb. How narrow-minded and bestial a view of things you have, old bean." Smoothing the corner of the box, he tucks it under his arm.

"Even birthdays matter, for the right people. I have no doubt you will figure out why people care in a decade or three. Wait until the wrinkles start to show."

Bigby Wolf has posed:
More smoke forms a cloud around the werewolf's head and he smiles at Loki through it. "My story's goin' strong, Pumpkin," says he with one of his best, toothy smirks -- Bigby won't be aging any time soon... he hopes. The hairy man hesitates a moment later when one of the Amazon employees approaches.

The fellow is young -- likely in his twenties -- with a reedy voice and a thin nose, and he addresses Loki. "E-excuse me, sir," says he a trifle timidly, and offers the godling a gift card. "Amazon would like to apologise for any inconvenience..." (he sounds like he's reciting from a customer service guide). "And offer you, a valued customer, a thirty-dollar gift voucher for use on your next purchase. Enjoy the rest of your day..."

Loki has posed:
"No doubt a chronicle for the ages. Young ages, at that." Loki aligns himself to the pathetically potholed road, striding triumphant across the ground with a stride that would make it hard for a wolf to keep up. He waves his hand at the startled young man.

"Keep it. I have no need for the largesse, having obtained what I want. You might want to be at the gaming store early, though, for a windfall." Jaunty, he builds up a rather rapid pace that will bring him closer to the main drag in this network of distribution centres and shipping containers. One has to presume the stories will follow the storyteller.

Bigby Wolf has posed:
Bigby follows.

"You haven't changed //that// much..." he mutters, quite aware that Loki can hear him. "All 'diverted' then? You've had your yearly 'slumming it' with the lowly mortals and now... what? I've got a keen nose on me, Loki -- an' you //still// reek of fish."

Bigby smirks to himself at that, drawing up alongside the Asgardian princeling. Part of him admires the Trickster... Loki could be several Fables rolled into one -- and that's a scary thought.

Still, the 'Big Bad Wolf' doesn't really suffer 'scary' -- he lives it. Maybe that's where the admiration comes from.

Loki has posed:
"Fish?" An arch to one tapering, dark brow speaks magnitudes. "You smell the river, not me."

Truth. Cleanliness is next to godliness; or a cat. And Loki has more in common with cats than he does with hunting hounds and the dogs flopped on their sides. To be sure, most of those tend to favour Thor, bluff and hearty as he is. Dumb as a golden retriever, the other Prince.

"Disappointed in you. All the options in the world and you choose to smoke and disturb the keen nose stories gave you. Such a sad state of affairs." He continues jauntily moving down the road, keeping to the middle rather than the sidewalk. No one is coming, to be sure. The Fable is one he can acknowledge, having told the story many times over.

A moment of curiosity. "You've been seeking a den about the city, haven't you?"

Bigby Wolf has posed:
"I have an //office,//" is the werewolf's terse reply. True. It's even one of those 'bigger on the inside' places common to his Fablekind... still. It's an office. Not a home.

//And// it's right in the middle of 'Mundyville' as Fables call Earth and her cities. Bigby lights up another cigarette and grunts.

"You try hearin' -- an' //smellin'// -- everything that //I// do, Yer Mischiefulness, and see how YOU like it." A pause. "I smell a scheme. What've you got in mind, Laufeyson?"

Loki has posed:
Is the office a blue police box? Or a phone booth for Bell or AT&T? That might be an exceptional choice for a man out of the history.

"Oh, but I do." The grin is broad enough to show his teeth, flashing white, and his eyes crinkle in the corners with false impressions of age. Age that will never find him, all things said and done. Age that he banished from his presence, and burned. "Try arsenic and old lace. I hear it does wonders blunting the impressions just that little bit. Gets the edge off." Also potentially poisons mortals, but that's hardly his problem in the first place, now isn't it?

As to his schemes, why even ask? The answer isn't likely to be true. A bald-faced lie or a diversion, right? "Oh, plenty. Little of this, little of that. A pastrami sandwich, I think."

Bigby Wolf has posed:
Bigby removes the cigarette from his lips, blows out a cloud of smoke and then gestures toward Loki with the cigarette in his hand. "Ain' no foolin' this nose, Laufeyson," says he... although that is not entirely true. With the God of Mischief one can //never// really tell what's what.

"Fortunately," he continues. "You aren't the reason I'm here; not on anybody's leash now..." Bigby grins and draws on the cigarette again. "Kinda like it this way. Still... am I gonna have ta watch you?"

Loki has posed:
"Call me Laufeyson one more time, old bean, and you'll smell naught but artificial cherry syrup and gym socks for a week." Hand in the pocket of his coat, the other secured around the box, Loki stops at the corner of no avenue and somewhere street. No need to check on that. "You like watching over me, or you like having a lick of freedom? No one would blame you for the taste of freedom. That's what life is all about."

Truer words never spoken, and all that jazz. He raises his shoulders. "You won't stop me from unleashing a scourge upon rye and the most mouth-watering of meats, properly seasoned, falling off the bone. I refuse to be distracted. Have you never tried a good sandwich, man? You ought to."

Bigby Wolf has posed:
Bigby smiles to himself.

So he got a little under the godling's skin... He likes that. Satisfying -- dangerous, but satisfying. Dropping his cigarette to the ground, he squashes it beneath his boot and rolls his shoulders.

"A sandwich sounds fine," says he with a nod. "But who's buyin'?"