[h3][center][color=#ffd700]Wulde[/color] & [color=f7941d]Kessler[/color][/center][/h3] [center][img]https://cdn.imgchest.com/files/yxkczqqo5j7.png[/img][/center] [center][color=black][sup]____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________[/sup][/color][/center] [center][color=#812442][b]Location: [/b][/color] Neon Dream Rink[color=#812442][b]Time:[/b][/color]Late night[/center] [center][color=#812442][b]Interactions:[/b][/color] [@deegee] Kessler • [color=#812442][b]Mentions [/b][/color] [@Oso] Dominic Blackmoor , [@Tpartywithzombi] Dane Verren [/center], [@FunnyGuy] Sean Stone [center][color=black][sup]____________________________________________________________________________________________________________________[/sup][/color][/center] [hr] Wulde set his own chair the right way round, although pulled back a bit from the table and turned partly to the right, so that he wouldn’t bump his legs if he had to get up suddenly. He draped his coat over the back, then set his gym bag down on another chair that he pulled next to him before sitting down. The only weapon he carried was an expandable baton strapped to his right thigh. The Warden had requested a silvered one a couple days before, upon getting the assignment to peep on the Iron Fangs with Barton, and to his pleasant surprise had been issued it right away. From a side pocket of the gymbag he extracted his phone and began pressing some buttons. [color=#ffd700]“I’m going to mute any notifications so we aren’t disturbed,”[/color] he explained, which was true -although he also took the opportunity to press some other buttons as well before putting the device back in the bag: [color=#ffd700]“And yes, I’m recording this,”[/color] Wulde added, almost as an afterthought. [color=#ffd700]“Price of admission.”[/color] He grinned as the double meaning of that last phrase occurred to him. [color=f7941d]“...So, tell me why it’s you I want to talk to, and how you knew I was looking for a conversation.”[/color] Wulde had let the visitor’s request hang in the air while he attended to preliminaries, but now he sat back and contemplated, as if noticing it for the first time. After a pause he said: [color=#ffd700]“It is customary for somebody initiating contact to identify themselves and state their business. I’m guessing that you aren’t much for etiquette and formalities, so I’ll ignore that and play along. “I am a Warden. My name is Wulde Riddenhouse. You are an Iron Fang. I don’t know your name offhand, but I could probably look it up easily enough.”[/color] He gestured with his hand towards Kessler: [color=#ffd700]“Or, you could just tell me.”[/color] Wulde did not wait to see if the lycan would do that, but instead pressed on. [color=#ffd700]“Whatever your name, you have some status in the pack. You might even be here talking to me at Dominic Blackmoor’s behest. “Why are you looking for a conversation? Because you want to know if the Wardens had anything to do with what you all found in that warehouse. I won’t keep you in suspense: No, we did not.”[/color] Wulde stopped to peer inquisitively at his guest. [color=#ffd700]“How am I doing so far?”[/color] Kess ignored the human’s request for validation. He was, at the same token, gratified that his hunch had been right about finding a Warden in this area. That he had tracked one down at only his second port of call, was simply good luck – but he didn’t feel the need to edify this Human any more than he felt was necessary. [color=f7941d]“In the Pack I am known only as Kessler. A long, long time ago though, I had a name from your world. Damon.”[/color] His mouth forming the shape of his Christian name felt foreign to him, even as the word left his mouth. The broad-shouldered man felt no need to clarify whether he ‘had standing’ within the pack. [color=f7941d]“Perhaps that is why I’m here, rather than out there, cracking skulls. It’s good to meet you, Wulde.”[/color] His salutation bore no discernable sarcasm, or animosity. It merely was. [color=f7941d]“We lost a brother last night. Someone took him from us. Someone without respect, or decency. Someone either very stupid, or very much the opposite. It was either a calculated hit by someone looking to start a war, or the work of rank amateurs who simply didn’t know that they were standing in a lake of gasoline, about to strike a match.”[/color] He leaned forward, close enough that Wulde could make out the scent of his breath. [color=f7941d]“I don’t believe it was the latter. *a pause* Now, it is my good fortune that I met you. A Warden willing to talk to the likes of me. Don’t think I would take that for granted. I won’t. You say the Wardens had nothing to do with Logan’s death… convince me.”[/color] Wulde listened closely as the lycan spoke. He nodded to acknowledge the name. “Kessler”, he repeated. It was a name he thought he remembered seeing or hearing in conjunction with the Iron Fangs. The older human name was not familiar. The Wardens might or might not have some dossier on that somewhere. Still, Wulde filed the name “Damon” away. One never discarded anything unless necessary, especially not information, no matter how insignificant-seeming. He also filed away the other name Kessler dropped: Logan. Lieutenant Grant had spent hours in video conference with the Bastion, poring over the faces captured by their camera outside the warehouse that night, cross-checking them with known associates of the Iron Fangs and attaching names to them. The list of known Iron Fangs who hadn’t showed had dwindled to just a handful of names by the time Wulde and Barton had taken their leave of the South Halcyon Friends Meeting House. “Logan” was presumably one of those names. Now Wulde had confirmation. At Kessler’s concluding request, the human frowned. [color=#ffd700]“Convince you? Not sure how I’d prove a negative to you,”[/color] he pointed out. [color=#ffd700]“I can tell you this, though: I spent the better part of an hour poking around that warehouse after you guys left, after somebody had smoked it out- they actually pulled me off another assignment in order to do that poking. I don’t think my superiors would have diverted resources like that if they already knew what happened.”[/color] Kessler’s eyes narrowed, though he made no move whatsoever. [color=f7941d]“I don’t think you understand, Wulde. I came here to find a Warden. I’ve found one. I either leave from my talk with a Warden, convinced that war is coming for you and yours, or convinced that the path to the truth lies elsewhere. Now, if you can’t prove to me that the Wardens had nothing to do with Logan’s death, then we best be on our way to someone above you, who can provide me with some proof.[/color]” His eyes were hard. He stood, and walked over to the service counter to the closed cafeteria, grabbing a coke from under the counter, and leaving a fiver on the counter-top. He popped the tab. [color=f7941d]“This is your chance. There is only one. I either return to the Pack with concrete evidence that it wasn’t the Wardens, or I return to tell them all Wardens need to die this night, or you kill me, and I don’t return, in which case… see option two.”[/color] He smiled thinly. [color=f7941d]“Guilty until proven innocent. So. Again – convince me. Clear your good names.”[/color] Wulde could only stare at Kessler in disbelief. The problem was not that he could think of nothing to say in response to the Iron Fang’s ultimatum; it was, on the contrary, that he could think of hosts of things to say, almost all of them bound to make the situation worse. The lycan took a moment to grab a soda, which gave the Warden a moment to craft a diplomatic response, something well outside his usual skill set. Wulde took a deep breath, trying his best not to make it sound like an exasperated sigh. [color=#ffd700]“I don’t understand what you expect to walk out of here with,”[/color] he said, as calmly as possible. [color=#ffd700]“A signed note from Commander Verren saying it wasn’t us? A taped confession beaten out of some rogue vampire? The only way to prove we didn’t do it is to find out who did, which we are attempting to. Unfortunately our ability to do that has been pretty badly hampered by the fact that *someone* torched the scene before we had a chance to investigate it proper-.” [/color] The Warden realized that he was getting angry and…not diplomatic, so he broke off and took another breath and made “prayer hands” before resuming: [color=#ffd700]“Look, maybe you *want* to start a war over nothing more than your hunch and my inability to prove a negative, but I prefer to believe that you don’t. We don’t have much to go on, but I’ll give you what I can. Here.”[/color] He reached into his gym bag to pull out his phone and searched through some images. He found and expanded the one he had of the strange crew van and the masked individuals hauling a heavy burden (presumably a bagged Logan) into the warehouse. He showed it to Kessler. [color=#ffd700]“Some of my colleagues got a tip a few days ago that there was ‘suspicious activity’”[/color] here he waggled his hands to emphasize the frustrating vagueness of that expression: [color=#ffd700]“at that warehouse, which hadn’t been visited by a soul, not even by squatters or junkies, in a couple months prior. They set up a motion-activated camera and it caught this image. This was from the day before your people found Logan’s body there. There’s a few other images, but they don’t show much more, just the truck coming and going.”[/color] Wulde glanced ruefully at the screen. [color=#ffd700]“There’s no way to know who any of the people in this image are, if they’re Wardens, if that’s Logan… We ran the plates on the van, but they were both expired and stolen.”[/color] He looked back at Kessler. [color=#ffd700]“It’s what we have. If you want more, we’re going to need to go get more. We would need to try to find that van, though I suspect it’s been ditched and torched by now. And we would need to hit the streets and find out if anybody saw anything. It’s your territory, so people might be more likely to talk to you than me.”[/color] The Warden leaned back and looked questioningly at the lycan. [color=#ffd700]“I have the sense that this discussion is going to wrap up soon, and afterward we’ll both need to go back to our cohorts and tell them something. We can tell them we’re working the problem, or we can tell them we’re going to war over it. I prefer the former, what about you?”[/color] The Human’s response started off less-than-forthcoming. Sarcasm, deflection. Kessler was patient throughout Wulde’s bluster and increasing temperature, a neutral expression on his face. It was all a little amusing, honestly. Finally, the Human produced his device, and showed Kessler the goods. [color=f7941d]“See – that wasn’t so hard, was it, Human?”[/color] Kessler pulled out his own phone, holding it close to Wulde’s. [color=f7941d]“You wouldn’t mind making those pictures sharable, would you? Sure would appreciate it.”[/color] After copying the photos to his device (which was otherwise security-protected, so there was nothing Wulde could glean from Kessler’s mobile, other than some progress pics of his bike. He didn’t use the phone much, honestly…) he rose. [color=f7941d]“So… about that signed letter from Verren…”[/color] He broke into a grin. [color=f7941d]“That was funny as fuck. *a pause* I agree with you. We should report back, tell our superiors that we’re on this. I’ll put an ear to the ground about this van, too. Let’s meet on neutral ground at midnight tomorrow. I’ll bring any new intel I have, you do the same. We might just avoid a war, here...”[/color] He grew serious. [color=f7941d]“Bring Verren. I’d like to meet him.”[/color] He walked for the door. [color=f7941d]“Don’t go giving me reason to doubt you, Wulde. We got a good thing going on here. Not likely to find too many Lycans willing to talk like this. I’d rather this, then the other alternative …Thanks for the intel.”[/color] Wulde watched Kessler leave, then slumped back in his chair, exhaling in a loud, horsey blow. That sound faded into silence, broken by the bustle of the rink staff’s cleaning and by his own thoughts. The latter were both louder and harder at work than the former. He had breached security by sharing that image and information, and had exceeded his authority by agreeing to help Kessler, but this was very much an “apologize rather than get permission” situation. While he wasn’t entirely convinced that the Iron Fangs would go to war just on Kessler’s say-so, he was not about to risk anything of value on that suspicion. And he really did think that they were more likely to figure out what had happened to Logan, and who was encroaching on the Iron Fangs’ territory so brazenly, if they worked together. The question was whether he could get the Bastion to agree with him. Looking at his phone, Wulde realized that the audio was still recording, so he stopped that and then started uploading the audio file to his cloud. A copy of that audio would go with his report. A report which he was now going to have to spend the next couple hours writing, instead of punching his trash-talking co-workers. A report which would be going straight from his workstation into Commander Dane Verren’s inbox, protocol be damned. Just as he was readying to leave, he noticed a message notification from a fellow Field Warden he had missed earlier. [b]REPORT. Sometime during the last 24 hrs, an unknown party killed Logan Delaney, Second In Command of the Iron Fangs lycan faction. Iron Fangs members continue to search for the culprit. Be advised that their presence and activity within Halcyon may increase. Time of Acquisition: ~1900hrs Source: Informant with high veracity NFI[/b] Wulde, upon reading the message, could only laugh.