2311/Grief Core

Grief Core
Date of Scene:	09 January 2017
Location:	Earth Court Frat House - Roof
Synopsis:	Kunzite and Miss White meet, ostensibly to negotiate over Clotho and the grief seed. Except that Miss White is having much bigger problems right now.
Cast of Characters:	Hannah Sharpe, Kunzite

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Hannah Sharpe has posed:
Part of being a CEO is knowing how and when to make an arrival. Today's likely more business than social unlike last time. Not that she's afraid to mix the two, but getting information through a fellow Employee lends a certain amount of seriousness to the whole thing.

And so the rooftop would find a sudden uptick in wind magic as dimensions shift and pulse to spit out Miss White. Landing, she straightens her barrier jacket's jacket, followed by a comb ran through her hair. Convinced she looks presentable, she waits.

Hannah's confident her arrival will get noticed. Her teleports are about as unsubtle as one can get, much like the mage herself. R.T.'s still in her pocket through, she's not exactly here to break the Rules.

Turning to the edge of the roof, hands in her pockets, her jacket sways in the wind as she awaits her shadowy friend-informant-tallness-incarnate.

Kunzite has posed:
The rooftop has been steadily more tailored to the needs of the locals, but tonight, it's rather more open than not; there's a fair space left clear, barred from the greenhouse tent and the telescope by rows of evergreens. The plants does not resist the wind magic entirely, but they blunt it a trifle. Off to one side rest a small table and two chairs, waiting on the off chance that a guest prefers them.

And especially when someone knows when, more or less, to be listening --

Kazuo does not come up to the roof in uniform. The black wool coat has a military air, all the same, sharp enough on him to clearly have been someone else's choice. Given that his personal preference in fashion seems to be 'bother precisely as little as possible.' The thermos he is carrying is, of course, far more important.

"Miss White," he says, calm and polite and grave as always. "It is once again a pleasure to host you. Coffee?"

Hannah Sharpe has posed:
Clack clack. Dress shoes eat up space as a familiar figure walks up onto the roof. As that voice calls out and R.T. pings her, Miss White turns with a warm, if very wolf-like smile. She has a reputation to uphold as CEO, after all. It lasts for about thirty seconds before she's over there, and that thermos is being risked by a friendly swat on the back.

"There you are! How's my favorite guardian of Magical Girl Chaos Central, huh? Bundled up good? Don't want either of us freezing."

If there's natural wind, a slight shift of the hand will have it flowing /away/ and around from the pair. Out comes of seat, she turns it around, and then straddles it. Arms hold up her head. This close, Hannah looks exhausted. She did last time too, but exam studies makes that a common affliction.

Her body, notably, looks tense despite her radiating confidence.

"Coffee'd be great! Sugar and cream please."

One hand goes to rub the back of her head. "Soooo. A very flustered, very...ah...let's just say Clotho-chan's an odd duck. But she said you had some information for me." There's that spark in her eyes. Greed, hungry ambition lurks without shame or need to hide it.

"Something about a Witch. And you /know/ how I feel about things like that. So. What's it worth to you?" Seems Hannah's come here expecting a business transaction.

Kunzite has posed:
Kazuo survives Nephrite as a housemate. He knows to wait for the swat before opening anything. Particularly when Miss White's in that guise.

"So Mamoru said." The thermos has been pre-prepared, and there are two cups. Nor it is Mamoru's usual coffee. For the visiting CEO, nothing but a dose of the Death Wish that Usagi gave Kunzite will do. He presents a cup, trading it to Miss White's free hand, before saying anything at all.

"I suspect," he says, "that you already know that Naru had an anonymous warning that Witches are likely to become more common shortly. Apparently shortly means now. Clotho happened to be nearby when a group of us encountered one, and was caught in the labyrinth with us. She yielded us the grief seed rather than fighting us on the chance she could bring it back to you."

His own cup has been poured by now, he caps the thermos and takes a swallow before continuing. "I'd prefer to reward cooperative behavior, when possible. Grief seeds are likely to become more common soon, so the value isn't likely to be what it would have been the last few months; but we may be able to make up some part of it on her behalf. If, that is, you haven't encountered one of the burning Wraiths for analysis yourself yet."

Hannah Sharpe has posed:
Hannah belts out an excited laugh. "So I've been told! Who knew little Naru-chan was a Witch forecaster! Can't you just /taste/ how fun things are going to get!? Finally, all the Puella Magi are going to start piling out of their hidey holes, so many more grief seeds to get, more test subjects...ahhhh, Kunzite it's WONDERFUL!" Who else but Hannah would see this as a /good/ thing?

Give her a minute Kunzite, she's being Evil. Thankfully as it turns out, Usagi Demon Coffee is good at turning it down a notch. Siiiiip. Then she's downing it.

"Oh man, not bad. No Gullwings, but not bad."

Miss White does, however, visibly twitch just a moment. A single finger runs along her brow. There's a vein bulging on her forehead.

"I have /so/ much work to do on that kid. She should've at least tried threatening you guys. It what I would've done." A shrug. "But I won't go too hard on her. She's too high strung and /new/. Better she make mistakes now than when it really matters. Alright. Let's negotiate."

Her tone loses just a little of it's warmth as she sinks into Boardroom Mode. Her smile dials down to challenging smirk levels. "You can tell me about the fight. Was Mercury there? If she has any data on the thing, send it to me. How was it, compared to Witches previously? Any noticable difference in intelligence, coordination, numbers of Familiars or powers?"

A shrug. "Haven't had time to get one myself yet. Lots of other projects I'm juggling. Exams, too." Ugh. "Actually. I wanted to come get your advice on something anyway. How about this? You help me out with my problem, give me a bit of info, and I'll let you off the hook on going out with me to capture one of these new Witches and wraiths."

Kunzite has posed:
"Two reasons not to go too hard on her," Kazuo says, evenly enough. "I'd already warned her I'd kill her if she turned into a liability in the labyrinth, and she'd already seen me in a fight. This way, at least she made it back for you to work on."

And yet here they are, all the same.

He's not Nephrite. But his eyes gleam in return all the same, an answer to that smile. "I don't have access to any data Mercury might have, much less the right to send it. If you want that in future, ask her yourself. Nor am I on any hook for you to let me off. This is a goodwill gesture, not an obligation."

And yet -- it is a goodwill gesture, which means he eases back again, with another sip of coffee. Of hideously adulterated coffee. How she can drink something like that... "Mercury was there, for the Witch. Though preoccupied. Not noticeably more intelligent than any other, and responded to distraction tactics as many of them do. Physically very strong, though, and a wildly disproportionate number of familiars; we dealt with dozens, and saw hundreds. Good odds that there will be subsidiary infestations off of however many weren't at home at the time. Given that it seems likely not to have been resident for long -- it came from somewhere, rather than manifesting from scratch. Nothing too much. The new Wraith's the interesting part."

He pauses, inclining his head toward Hannah. "Unless, of course, there's something else of more interest to you. I won't promise sight unseen to help you with something. I will listen."

Hannah Sharpe has posed:
Miss White's eyes gleam once again. "Now that explains why she was so out of sorts. I don't blame her. You're a beautifully frightening man, Kunzite. It's a relief, knowing Mamoru and the others have someone like you around."

Eyes close. "Mmm. Normally I'd argue, but Clotho is less my employee and more 'on loan' whenever I can grab her. You win on that point." Concedes Miss White politely. She knows when she doesn't have much ground to stand on. The chair gets flipped around, and she's crossing her legs in between more coffee. Pour. She all but sucks this one down.

A hand pokes R.T., and there's the audible click of the Device going onto record mode. Eyes close as she takes it all in.

"Good information. That's...odd. Normally you either get one that grows from a Familiar or...heh." Her gaze darkens into anger as she trails off. Her attention slips from Kunzite for a moment.

She shakes her head, and pours more coffee with even /less/ additions to keep her head in the game. "Less interest, and more a situation that's more dire than I thought. It's better that I show you. ...Kyouko's out I hope?" Standing up, setting down her coffee, she takes a deep breath. Both hand reach out in front of her chest, and there's an emerald glow. If Kunzite has spent time around other Mages like Hannah, he might have seen this before. Slowly, an emerald green ball emerges from her chest.

"I'll give you the quick version of Mage 101. We're all born with a concentration of magic called a Linker Core. It's what our Devices and we tap into in order to perform magic. Like a Soul Gem of sorts, though not so direct and life threatening. Normally."

A shrug. There's also something else around her Linker Core that's very not normal. A small rotating shield of wind, almost like one of her Barriers.

"One of my experiments on Grief Seeds was to be able to change them so that a mage like me could make use of their power. I succeeded. But...well, ask Mamoru, he saw the results. Uncontrollable, so I shelved the project until more options came up. It involved me taking control of the Grief Seed by injecting it with melted portions of my Linker Core. As it turns out, doing that can cause a Grief Seed's magic to be absorbed by a Linker Core, as it thinks they're the same thing."

"Raging Tempest, release Seal Number Sixty-Six."

The barrier around her Core dissipates, and Kunzite will get an unobscured view of Hannah's Linker Core. It's shocked through with cracks, leaking blackness entirely at odds with her own passionate energy. Malice, rage, hate, bloodlust, all waft from the thing, leaking out now that there's no protections in place.

It's nowhere near as potent, but the pure emotional leakage is far too close to the feeling of being around a Witch.

"It's gotten worse lately. It used to be just a crack or two and some discoloration. Kunzite. I've always had a theory that Puella Magi and Mages are related, that Kyubey used my kind as a base. I'd rather not get proven right this way."

Kunzite has posed:
The term 'beautifully frightening' wins her a glimpse of his teeth, and a fractional inclination of his head; but that's not what they're there for. He keeps his attention focused, though, mostly silent. Mostly. "Kyouko's out," he confirms. "The times I suggested were times I knew she'd be elsewhere for a while." Three-hour windows. If Kyouko wouldn't be out for three hours, it would be a bad time. Just in case. Margin for error, and for error's recovery, if need be.

He has seen this before. He has seen this before exactly once.

It's a different kind of horror than Riventon's was.

His focus is intent, his expression almost still but there are faint, faint tells. Enough for Raging Tempest to pick up, perhaps. Uncontrollable: the slightest intensification of his frown. Shelved: the slightest more. Melted portions of her Linker Core -- there's a shift in the size of his pupils, barely perceptible to a human. He recognized something about that.

The hiss of his breath when she releases the seal -- that's a kind of recognition, too.

"You shelved the project," Kazuo says, without so much as a beat between her ceasing to speak and his beginning. "Literally? Did any of the Seeds involve survive? Any of the Witches?"

Hannah Sharpe has posed:
In spite of the obvious damage, the risk she's put on herself, Miss White stands proud. There's no regret for her work, her experimentation. It's simply natural for the powerful and those who seek to be powerful to reach dangerously, to change, to tamper, to turn tools for others into tools for themselves.

Raging Tempest relays the tells, especially that shift of the pupils. The knowledge makes her giddy inside. Rather than horror, she sees it as a twisted accomplishment, of almost approval. Hannah's spent too much time around Takashi.

"I have ten remaining ones. Mothballed under heavily guarded and magically warded containers. Each one has an automated flush system similar to the one I use to make sure Bob or the Familiars I've collected don't escape or hurt any of my employees. High clearance, don't worry. Puella Magi using them....well, Kyouko knows what happens. But they're not something that's ready for any kind of combat use. Too risky to the user."

"And no, the Witches are long dead, most of the ones I captured for initial study didn't survive my probing."

Kunzite has posed:
But there are ten Grief Seeds remaining. Ten potential altered Witches, sleeping, ready to rise.

And the Witch that they fought -- moved.

"Mn." That particular sound, from him, always means something. Some objection, not made. Some idea, not voiced. "You said it's gotten worse lately. When was the transition, and did it get worse in one jump, or has it been continuing to decay?"

He does not ask who or what Bob is. Either he already knows, or he knows he doesn't want to.

Hannah Sharpe has posed:
This time, that seal returns, and that feeling vanishes. She'd rather not attract hungry Puella Magi looking for a meal. That might mess up the roof. Hannah /likes/ what Mamoru and company have done with the place.

"Three days ago. I've been focusing on developing a lot of new spells in anticipation for things to get busy. When I tried to use a bombardment spell..."

Raging Tempest comes out, and the Device makes a beep. It projects a small video dated three days ago. It shows Miss White punching what looks like some sort of Barrier or hardened Shield magic. But in the middle of her punch, black energy seeps out of her chest and she falls to the ground visibly in agony.

"Next morning, my Linker Core is like this. I've tried using it up, modifying it, cutting and melting...it doesn't matter, the cracks remain and so does the energy leaking."

Kunzite has posed:
"Two days ago," Kazuo says, "we found that Witch." He's silent for a moment, before he adds, "Four days ago was Naru's warning. I'd check those seeds, if you have a Puella who you trust to do it. And I'd be well away from them at the time. Especially if that was a spell you've ever used before."

Hannah Sharpe has posed:
Miss White sudden sits up. Worry blossoms for just a moment. "You don't think...alright. Yeah. I'll have someone get a headcount. It was my first time using that spell."

She shivers at the thought of one of her Puella getting hurt, but she doesn't see any alternative to the risk. A single finger raises and she walks off to make a phone call.

If one listens in, she's getting Kunzite's advice in place. Clearly message received.

"Should know in a few days. Back to the immediate problem. I'm honestly at a loss. Part of me wanted to ask Mamoru, but that might put him at risk. And besides, he'd probably slap me for keeping those things around still."

"You can still use Dark Energy, right? It's probably not the same, but I'd be willing to let you try anything you can think of, or at least point me in the right direction."

Kunzite has posed:
He waits till she returns, then says, "It might have been the spell, then. Some unanticipated effect. But that seems unlikely unless there were some kind of pressure being applied as well, within the Core, or external fuel for the spell itself. Some lingering damage from that sword a few months ago might also have been a candidate, but I doubt it would've lasted this long."

Or been called there.

He's silent for a moment at her question ... but she's earned a straightforward answer, no matter how much he hates to give it to her. "I'm still capable of using Dark Energy," he says, tone a little more flat now. "I don't. It's a possible idea; I was able to use it, back before, to insulate myself against the effects of having absorbed a labyrinth-based spell of Riventon's. But it required ... unfortunate quantities. And that spell wasn't resident in -- call it my soul gem, it's close enough to that. Using that here does not strike me as likely to be an improvement.

"The remedy I'd be inclined to try would be destroying the modified Grief Seeds; getting rid of the likeliest source of the contamination." Or calling Madoka. Or one and then the other. "Did you collect or modify any of those seeds in November or late October of last year, by chance?"

November or late October.

When an ethereal, ghostlike flower spread its petals over Tokyo's sky.

Hannah Sharpe has posed:
Hannah considers. "Possibly. My working theory is that the corruption had been growing inside, putting pressure. I'd been having a few headaches, but I passed them off as exhaustion. It's possible I simply used too much magic, and something had to give."

Well, there's one idea down the tubes. "As much as I hate to admit it, you're probably right. And I don't want you getting in trouble with Mamoru. Just tell me that much is a large risk to you. Well, I won't say I won't use it against you, but I won't spread it either. Our little secret." A chuckle.

"No. I worked too hard on them just to throw away their potential." Comes Miss White bluntly.

A shake of the head. "No, I'd had them sealed away for months prior. I don't think there's a connection there." Adds the girl, already seeing where he's going with things.

"But mostly I just want to get my Linker Core fixed. I'm a C-rank mage at best, so if this keeps up, it might either kill me or weaken my magic. I need every ounce of power I can get if I want to see my dreams through. Getting weaker isn't acceptable. I'm already too weak as it stands." That inferiority complex slowly creeps into her voice.

Kunzite has posed:
"If you remember when the headaches started," Kazuo says, "it might be interesting to compare them against a couple of known dates. November thirteenth; November twentieth; December second." There's a brief inclination of his head before he adds, "Most likely no correlation, but if there is, it's one you'd want to know." Whether or not Hannah does know what those dates mean is another question. The date that Madison Perry stole a certain Seed from Homura. Two dates that she attempted to collect a significant amount of emotion, all at once, to feed it toward consciousness.

He does not give the dates of the dreams. If those were significant to her, she'd know already.

The glitter of his eyes a moment later is an amused thing; two predators with enough territory between them to be amiable. A large risk? "Nothing you couldn't reason, if you took the time away from your other projects. And no, I didn't think you'd be willing to throw them away. Your time and effort is valuable to you; it's all we have of our own, in the end. It may still be necessary to destroy them. But for you it's the last choice, not the first. For the same reason that dark energy is the last choice for me, not the first."

It is almost worse than seeing her Linker Core to begin with to hear the way she phrases the possibilities. As if weakening Hannah's magic were a worse possibility than her death.

(He used to be the strongest of the Shitennou. A great deal of his time, now, is spent hiding the fact that in many ways, for all practical purposes, he's become the weakest.)

(He can, in a certain fashion, understand.)

"I presume you've already tried the obvious route," Kazuo adds, almost as an afterthought.

Hannah Sharpe has posed:
Much of the significance is lost on the dates, but she records them anyway. Nor does she press. Even if it hurts to admit, Kunzite is definitely being charitable here. As much as she loves everyone in this apartment, she's rarely hesitated to fight or put them in danger.

It's a calculated risk.

"And this is exactly why I came to you, instead of Zoisite, Mamoru or Usagi." Pause. Sigh. "Please don't mention anything to Usagi. I'm already going to have Haruna all over me. Usagi will have me trapped in a sea of blonde hair, hugs, and milkshakes."

A small nod. "I've had a contact or two try purification, but it hasn't worked. Chances are I'm going to need a specialist. If you know any experts in Linker Cores, I'd appreciate it. Or specialists in purifying strange edge cases. Healing's not my area of expertise after all. ...I suppose I could ask Mamoru, but frankly I don't want him wasting energy on me. If Witches are returning, I think you all will need those talents in house."

Pause. "Did everyone get out of the fight alright?" Hannah Sharpe, indeed, does care. Even if she sometimes wants to devour them for what they're capable of.

Kunzite has posed:
"Gut wound, broken arm, something reasonably horrid to a knee." The list of problems is short but telling. Especially if Clotho admitted there were only five of them altogether. Minus Clotho meant four heroes. Four minus three equals perhaps the least heroic. Murder might very well have been a possibility. Particularly with the gut wound not giving him time to wear her down.

"The local purification specialist, you just asked me not to mention this to," Kazuo points out matter-of-factly to Hannah. "Though she's something of a cannon, and this is ... subtle." He hesitates. There's a hint, just a moment, that he might be about to offer something; then he shakes his head, slow. "I don't know experts that I know of. Novices, yes. But still." The likeliest to be able to purify that, he can't suggest. On a half-dozen levels. Damn it.

"Did you see whether a grief cube would take it?" he adds as almost an afterthought. "I don't think I'd recommend that as an experiment. But it seems like something you might have tried."