2019-07-17 - A Wake of Buzzards

Morning. Christ almighty is it ever morning. Finch and Ignacio woke up in the ruins of their pillow fort, with empty bottles of booze littering the coffee table, and hangovers that might make death seem preferable. It was awkward in the extreme. Moreso when they checked their phones to find urgent texts from their boss and Itzhak.

After a brief discussion, Finch texted them back, “Meeting at Gran’s house ASAP. We’ll make breakfast. Bring coffee filters.” No way in fucking hell were they braving the searing power of sunlight this hungover. Showers were taken, Iggy has taken over the kitchen, and Finch cleans up the mess in the living room.

The little bird is in hangover clothes today, black yoga pants, an oversized tee with a glasses-wearing, grammatically correct owl emblazoned on it declaring, “whom”, and fuzzy blue slippers which look like she skinned Sully from Monsters Inc. Her blue hair is still wet from her shower and looking slightly faded from the washing. She hasn’t reapplied her poser paste yet.

Ignacio slept on the floor and woke feeling like death. After being slapped int the face and given enough aid to help get his leg in sot of working order he staggered to grab his shower and started immediately working, zombie shambling through the kitchen to make pancakes happen. By the time the team rallies at the big creepy house, now with destroyed but unhauntd fort, he's climbed into jeans and that's as much effort as he's putting into today. There are scars that look deep, once up the left side of his abdomen just past his jeans and several that cross his left foot as well. Things he doesn't talk about but is too damn tired to worry about half awake and still with his head ringing.

What is happening is bacon, pancakes, and some sort of heavy cream based sauce with honey and cinnamon happening for some pancakes. Hangover veterans that can cook: always a plus in one's friend repertoire.

August arrives in a rust red waffle knit Henley, jeans, and workboots. He looks tired but functional, the later courtesy of coffee from Espresso Yourself. He's got a canvas shopping bag which cannot in any way be holding only coffee filters, not with how things are poking out the sides. He knocks on the door, yawns, sips from his coffee.

Itzhak shows up in a sorry state like the rest of them. Like he hasn't slept: sunken, reddened eyes, curly hair only given a token amount of wrestling into behaving, unshaven. To be fair he's usually unshaven. Yet all this has just made his aggravated energy worse. He's tense, his brows furrowed in a way that portends trouble for somebody. Also his left hand looks terrible, swollen, red, and bandaged. Like August, he's got a grocery bag full of things.

"You look like I feel, Roen," he says to August as he stomps up the porch steps.

The Queen of the Mallard House Shot Contest opens the door wearing dark sunglasses. She didn’t even bother with a bra under her tee shirt, because the idea of anything constricting her dehydrated body sounds horrific right now. “Kitchen,” she mumbles to August and Itzhak, jerking a thumb before doing an about-face and trudging back down the hall towards the smell of food.

Ignacio mumbles a greeting, still slightly slurred, half undressed, half awake, half-caffeinated, and likely still half-drunk from the night before, hair clumped from being damp from his shower still. Eh if you're gonna have to look at a trainwreck, might as well be a pretty engine and a decent caboose? "Diga. No doom before bre'ffas." He points to the counter and then to the coffee pot. Make your best judgement. Choose wisely. He says something to Finch, which might be useful...if she spoke drunken Spanish. There's a following grunt to Itzhak who might double down on the question once: What the hell happened to you? The only answer he might get right now is Fireball.

August looks askance at Itzhak, starts to say something, stops. There's a distinct sense that he's not looking at Itzhak's hand. He licks his lips, lets out a slow breath. "Yeah well. Someone has to feel pretty." His smile is somewhere between coy and fierce.

He peers at Finch's shirt when she opens the door, gives her a judgmental Look. "You know less than half of all owls make that sound," he says as he steps inside. He offers the bag. "Coffee filters. Also, duck eggs, and some other stuff." 'Other stuff' includes fresh rosemary, basil, and thyme. He comes to a stop in front of Ignacio, sighs at him. "I can clear up a hangover, unless you're enjoying yourself."

Itzhak's eyebrows pop up at August's sally. He snorts. "I didn't know better, I'd say you were flirtin' with me."

When Finch lets them in, he looks her over with a tight twist to his mouth. She looks terrible! "Hey there, Fincheleh."

In the kitchen, Ignacio is half dressed, which isn't that unusual from what Itzhak remembers, but those scars are sure different. Itzhak looks at him, going over him, taking his time to mark the scars. Then, he looks back at Finch, draws A Conclusion, but doesn't say anything. He dumps his bag on the counter for unloading. Bagels and rugelach come out, accompanied by tubs of shmear and lox trimmings. This is a serious war conference and it requires serious food.

"Punched a tree," he says brusquely to Ignacio, in response to the grunt.

Finch grunts a hello to Itzhak and flips Roen off over her shoulder. “Great Horned Owls do,” she retorts in a voice that sounds like she drank gravel this morning. She grabs coffee mugs from a cabinet, all sorts of mismatched ones, one of which is a big ass tumbler. That’s hers. Fuck off even thinking of taking it. She fills it with coffee, cream, and sugar before sliding into a chair at the kitchen table and resting her forehead on the cool laminate top.

Ignacio turns to August and just dead stares into the bossman's eyes like this is some glassy eyed stare down. The words are soft and have zero to do with the question asked, because it's Ignacio and he left lucidity swirling the shower drain. " Fewer. Less implies a judgement of their value to society." Yeah. Drunky the Wonder Squirrel is defending the meritorious esteem of the owl population. He blinks and a slow groan considers the rest. Instead of saying 'yes' he points the spatula at Finch. ''that one'' is what it seems to suggest.

"I don't flirt," August says, deadpan, and bobs his eyebrows. He hmphs at Finch, who doesn't fall for the bait, arches an eyebrow at Ignacio. "You ever heard a baby barn owl? I'll judge them every day of the week and twice on Sunday."

He takes in Ignacio's gesture, glances at Finch for a spell. But she's not the one he goes after first. He snaps his fingers and gestures at Itzhak. "Let's see it."

"Jesus, are you still drunk, de Santos?" Itzhak says to Iggy, kind of impressed despite himself. "Drink some goddamn coffee, we need you." Then he snickers at August. "Ya think you'd know better than to get in an argument about birds with an ornithologist."

Any humor fades with a quickness when August demands to see his hand. He slams down the tub of cream cheese and hits August with a glare. It's a real fucking mystery why he's so bristly about this, other than he's just a dick in general.

Finch lifts her head just enough to slurp coffee through the tumbler’s straw, then lowers it back to the table. “I am never drinking again. Never.” Sure sweetie, keep telling yourself that. The slamming makes her head pound and she shoots Itzhak a LOOK. “Don’t be a dick, let him fix you, so he can fix me, because I may die in the next ten minutes if he doesn’t.”

Ignacio is layering up the pancakes and in his tired, lopsided grin points to Itzhak with the flipper, "Haaaa you in trouble." He turns and serves Finch a plate of pancakes first with the sauce to get the blood sugar back up, but also? The one food tha if, unfortunately revisited, isn't terrible. Let's hope the carbs help. "Itzhak, Is not my problem that mi abuela can out drink you. Yooooou are looking... at a professional." He pauses adding, "Need me? The hell for? Look, I had two discussions with Skeletor an' he aint't havin it. I'm here fer pancakes, man."

August rubs at his eyes. It's too early for this. (It's not, actually, but who's counting.) He grunts a laugh at Finch and Ignacio. "Don't wind him up," he says on a sigh, clearly agreeing with them but lacking the patience to play referee.

He turns to Itzhak, hands on his hips. "Get over here, or I'm gonna have her," he nods at Finch, "sit on you."

"Your abuela could drink Hemingway under the table, de Santos!" Itzhak is in fact getting wound up for a fight with literally everyone in the room except then August threatens to sic Finch on him. Out of everything, this makes his eyebrows go up in alarm. "You wouldn't."

Finch cracks one eye open, and gets to her feet, moving to shove Itzhak into a chair and then sitting on him, as directed. Like he couldn’t break her into a million pieces with a thought. She stabs a pancake across the table with her fork and nibbles at a piece carefully, as if afraid it might bite back.

Ignacio goes to warn Itzhak. There's a lot he could say, and it's read on his face. Very wisely he goes back to minding breakfast and pot of coffee numero dos. "She's an impressive woman. What can I say?" Really what can he do in this situation? He can get people food. He can do the small things to make the... what? team? A misfortune of flappy flaps? They have no collective noun. This would require them being collected first.

As Finch deals with Itzhak, August asides to Ignacio, "Seriously, though. I can clear yours up too, if you want." Hangovers are a lot easier to deal with than sprained or broken hands. "Duck eggs in the bag, there. They make killer omlettes."

He watches Finch get comfortable, folds his arms. "You want up, let's see about this hand of yours," he says.

Itzhak protests in a wordless complaint as Finch steers him over to one of the vinyl chairs and pushes him into it. He puts up zero resistance, and when she actually climbs in his lap, he blushes like a tomato. Meekly he holds out his injured hand to August. Who knew all you had to do to get him to shut up and obey was put a cute braless girl on him?

Finch seems to decide the pancakes are not going to make her vomit like a vampire from What We Do In The Shadows. She chews a mouthful, brows going up at the taste because damn, Iggy can cook. As for braless, it’s not all that noticeable, she’s not exactly busty. She gestures at Ignacio with the fork in silent approval of the food.

Ignacio murmurs to August without theatrics, "Ain't inhibitin me cookin. Take care of em." His situation is neither dire nor foreign. Looking up he catches the fork poked at him. It's answered with a wink, all ego. Yes. Yes he can cook. He's also a master at figuring out hangover cures from regular practical application. He gets food out for the others and scoops up the duck eggs and the other bits pausing for a moment to get his bearings as the frying pan drops onto the stove with a CLANG!. He stops leaning on the edge of the counter shifting his weight to the good side. Ow... ow...aaaaand well fuck.

August sighs at Ignacio, scrutinizes him. Eventually, he says, "Alright." It has the air of a promise: you're getting patched up sooner or later, de Santos.

He moves to Itzhak and Finch, saying, "See how easy that was?" and reaching out for Itzhak's hand. He jerks in surprise just before the pan drops, grits his teeth. He casts a critical lookover his shoulder at Ignacio ('I'm coming for you, de Santos'), looks down at Itzhak's hand again. He rests just the tips of his fingers across Itzhak's wrist. He doesn't dare touch the injury itself.

Victory comes at a price. He swallows, sets his jaw, puts the thought of the food in the room out of mind. "You should've let me take care of this yesterday," he says, eyes half-shutting.

Then sensation of being healed like this is, at first, not much different than pain medication kicking in. The throbbing and the aching recede and vanish. The taut feeling of his skin stretched over his swollen hand fades. Only when the injury's almost entirely gone, Itzhak can get a better feel for what's happening: little by little, a bit at a time, August is correcting everything that's wrong, layering the adjustments on top of one another until the hand's back to how it was.

Itzhak groans long and low in relief. Quite a lot of the ferocious tension he was carrying around ebbs away. Like a lion with a thorn in his paw he is, it seems. He even tips his forehead against Finch and slides his other arm around her waist, his breathing relaxing. Within his hand, it's clear a metacarpal or two was at least fractured, maybe broken, as the bones shift back into place.

That must have really, really been hurting him. Stubborn jerk.

"Yeah," he mumbles. "Probably, I shoulda." He lifts his eyes to Roen. "Her next. If you can." He doesn't know how the healing works.

Finch seems amused at the arm around her waist and she pats that hand on her gently to try and soothe poor Itzy through the repair. “If you can make the headache go away, I can cope with everything else.” Everything else is that she’s sore and tired and worn right out from last night’s floor acrobatics. Ahem. Iggy’s wink gets one in return from her.

Ignacio is focusing on teh omelettes and that's actually a good spot for focus. The funny thing is pain killers don't fix shit, they make you forget shit is broken. It doesn't mean you can suddenly turn left. So in the most Zoolander of ways he turns rught and makes peace with not being an ambi-turner and says, "Hey, so Skeletor tried to be a real dill hole at us...that was... rude. I'm gonna say blowing up the phones yous guys had somethin of the same." He looks to Itzhak, "Hey you, the anti-botanist. Roen's okay. We don't need the job security. Maybe leave the trees alone and stop hurtin my pal, yeah?"

August blinks and nods at Finch and Itzhak when they speak, but he's almost entirely focused on what he's doing. By the time he's done, he's sweating and a bit paler than usual. He jerks his hand away from Itzhak and steps clear, takes several shuddering breathes in and out. Only when he's sure he's not going to throw up does he come back towards Finch and Itzhak. "Headache," he says. "Right."

He manages a laugh for Ignacio. "He's right. Don't beat up on the trees." Finch's headache's much easier to manage; August just rests a hand on her shoulder for a handful of seconds. He winces when he's done, pulls away. He moves to the kitchen counter, but doesn't mug Ignacio immediately, just leans back against it and tips his head back.

"That tree had it comin'," Itzhak mutters, humor returning. "...wasn't what I wanted to hit, but what I wanted to hit suddenly weren't there no more." So what was he going to do, NOT punch something?

He stays put, one long arm loose around Finch's eensy little waist. Now that he's here, he's reluctant to leave. One might suspect him of being touch-starved and lonely, if one had an ounce of perception.

Frowning at August, he almost asks him if he's okay, but refrains. August doesn't seem that okay. "I really wouldn't have let you do that if I'da known it'd make you sick," he says, annoyed. Glancing over at Ignacio, he grunts and tips a nod. "Yeah, the prick talked to me. Was a real asshole about it, too."

“Rest boss,” Finch insists. “I can fix Ig now that the headache is gone,” she points out. She gets out of poor Itzhak’s lap and kisses his cheek gently, before she moves to Ignacio, setting her hands on his bare back, and letting those silver strands of Spirit slither into his skin, healing his hurts, the ones she can at least, the ones derived from the hangover and last night. His leg though, she can only buy him some painless spans of time, and he hasn’t asked for that today. Maybe some day, when she’s stronger, she can repair that damage.

Ignacio actually stops and lets this shit happen. There's no value being a martyr. Not really. Eyes narrow to Finch and the tired wears off suspicious. "Yooooooou are looking for a bacon bonus. I'm on to you, woman." Still, fair is fair and he hands her the flappy ribbony bacon strip from his plate and sighs as if very put out. Welcome to the deSantos thank you. Looking up he blinks, eyebrows raised, "He... talked to you. Talk talked or pontificated large amounts of petulant whining or... set your mattress on literal fire levels of 'talked to'?"

August doesn't protest Finch taking care of Ignacio. He stays where he is, pinches the bridge of his nose. "Not your problem that it makes me sick. I've got to get over it somehow." He falls quiet for a spell, relaxing visibly when Finch finishes easing some of Ignacio's discomfort.

Eventually, he says, "Not sure he was in mine. There was a tree. With skulls that wept blood. And something pulled me into the hole down into the basement." He straightens, looks at Itzhak. "The one you made. And...there was something down there. Stalking me, in the dark. Something on my chest." He rubs it as just saying those words brings up the memory. "Like I was buried," he murmurs.

Itzhak reddens up again when Finch kisses his stubbly cheek, but half-smiles anyway. He flexes his left hand, opening and closing it to reassure himself. With a sigh he stretches his legs under the table and props one boot up on the other. Answering Ig, he says, "Talked, but I'm gonna say 'petulant whining' covered it." He pauses. "And threats. Them too. He said I'm the only one who managed to hurt him, so it's war now, between me and him." And yet, the prospect isn't displeasing. "More stuff happened, I'll wait till after breakfast for that."

He grimaces at August's story, mutters, "Oy vey."

“I was back in Murray House, and the hole in the floor was there, the one Itzhak made after I set that thing on fire,” Finch says quietly. She takes the bacon with a little smile, her happy diminished by memory of the nightmare, and slides into her own chair once more. “I walked up to the put and there were fallen birds at the four compass points. Robin, Northern Cardinal, Tropical Kingbird, and they died as I watched, all at once. Then a purple finch flew down, bright pink like my hair was, and a skeletal hand came up from the hole and slapped down on it, crushing its bones. Blood was flowing towards me, and I could still smell it when I woke up.”

Ignacio leans back against the counter still letting bagels and things pop. The man stays busy and food makes a great damn distraction. "Same, but... felt like it was imploding my chest til it cracked. Fun shit. Poor birds got smashed flat and dragged intot he damn basement." He glances to Finch and back. "All the way down the damn hall, same damn dream man."

August surveys each of them in turn. He frowns at Itzhak's description. "He threatened you? Huh." scratching his beard, he says, "Not bad--you managed to piss him off." He doesn't actually sound bothered by that, just impressed.

Once Ignacio and Finch have given their descriptions, he says, "More threats. Not sure about the birds, though." He glances at Ignacio, seems about to ask him something, then doesn't. He frowns. "Robins are all over the continent. We don't get cardinals out here, just grosbeaks." Speaking now to Finch, he says, "And kingbirds are equitorial, aren't they? Central American?"

"Was only one bird in mine. A finch. In a cage." Itzhak gets up to snatch a bagel out of the toaster. "Pink like you said."

Finch swallows her bite of bacon before perking up slightly at the bird questions. “Northern Cardinals are east coast, Robins are pretty much everywhere, they’re exhibit vagrancy, even popping up where they aren’t known to be. Kingbird ranges from Southern Arizona as far south as Argentina and Peru.” She swallows without any food at Itzhak’s mention of a caged finch. “That...doesn’t make me feel better at all.”

Ignacio gives August a very flat look. He informs patiently, "I'm not a tropical bird." That is to say, no, he's not Latino and he's explained that about 8x this week alone. To that effort he's not starting a new argument. When Finch starts getting nervous about the bird in a box he reiterates their discussion at ground zero. "Doing... great.... You're on a roll."

August tilts his head at Ignacio, confused. "Who said you were?" His expression darkens at the mention of a caged finch. "Yeah well that asshole has to get through all of us first, so he can come get some." He makes himself stop, realizing how he sounds, takes in a breath. "We should have flattened that fucking house," he mutters, starting to pace. His eyes finally fall on the food, and he realizes that, nausea overwith, he's starving.

Moving to the bagels to begin preparing one for himself, he says, "So. I felt like I was buried." He pulls a face, focuses on the task of putting cream cheese all over the bagel. "Which is something that's happened to me before. But," he glances up at Ignacio, "maybe not you. So that might just be a coincidence, for me, and imply something else. Like maybe there's something--or someone--buried under that house. Except for you," now Itzhak, "it sounds like we wound up in there, one way or another. Or something reached up for us, or the," his eyes move to Finch, "approximations of us." He stops here to eat a rugelach.

Itzhak, mechanically applying cream cheese and lox to a bagel and then mechanically eating it, shakes his head. "Somethin' he said to me. Said I took his children from him. I'm not so sure those birds were supposed to be, you know, us. Maybe they're people he already killed." In the language of the dream, that would mean Finch is next, and Itzhak can't avoid glancing at her. He looks away again. "He thinks those kids he takes are his."

“Could be,” Finch agrees, then she frowns, because she too grasps what that might mean for her. Instead of commenting on that, however, she pensively stuffs her maw full of pancakes now that she’s hangover free. Her eyes flit to Ignacio frequently though. Something is clearly up with those two knuckleheads.

Ignacio didn't miss the implications and doesn't ell Itzhak he's wrong either. He looks back to Finch and seems to pick right up on the statement riding the backbone of their ground zero discussion on it. Both eyebrows go up like some sort of 12 step coach telling her, "Doing. Great." Which may make her facepalm or feel better or just throw a pancake at him like a Frisbee. We'll see. With that calm he seems to hold onto there's a nod and objective tone that follow, "A'ight so that's... one thought on it. but before we get all worked up it could be anything. I mean the fucker's insane. I wouldn't take the rest too seriously other than to acknowledge eeeh he's creepy, dead, and pretty pissed. Instead of freaking ourselves out let's... focus o what we have and what we can DO and what we can find out. So... we find people in town that know a thing about a thing about it starting with Finch who is our only real deal resident and from there we fan out and get smart and not sloppy about this." He shakes his head and looks to the three of them, "Don't go runnin up the stairs on me, ok?"

August reiterates, "He's not getting anywhere near Finch," with calm finality. He considers Itzhak and then Ignacio, shakes his head. "Could be." He allows it with extreme reluctance. "But it's worth keeping in mind. There's something down there--in the basement, or under the house." He sighs, finishes assembling his bagel and has a few bites. After washing it down with some water, he adds, "We probably should look up the house's history. Find out who all's been...in it." He makes a face. He doesn't want to say 'killed there' but it's what he means.

"Please, do I look freaked out?" Itzhak says in a tone of high aggravation to Iggy. To be fair, he doesn't. He looks like he wants to get in a fight, though, with the way he's holding himself and the troublesome glint in his eye. On the other hand, this might be his version of being freaked out. Too ready to solve problems with his fists.

He goes after pancakes next. Dude needs calories, apparently, though it's a mystery where he puts them all. "Listen, I know someone who's studied the shit in this town all her life. If anybody knows, it might be her."

Finch swallows down her mouthful of breakfast. “Right. We need to get together with the other people who were there, and who know other people who have been, and get all our cards on the table, see what everyone knows. Make sure everyone is up to date on the threats.”

Ignacio gives Itzhak a dead stare. "You shook down a tree asking it to leave...Eeeeeeeeeh," now he sounds a bit like Itzy there with a bobble of his head and the fork waving in a vague circle, "I'd say that's you freaked out. Yeah. I mean I ain't sayin..." but he's sayin. Looking back to Finch he says, "Cole. That's the name of the guy. Ran back into him at the chicken thingie." The cooking class they all attended.

"Stop," August says to Ignacio, voice flat. "Even if he is, you coming at him about it makes it worse, not better." He looks at Finch, nods, then gives Itzhak a complicated, almost defensive look. It fades when he seems to realize something, and blinks.

"Good idea," he says, gesturing with his bagel. He pauses as something seems to occur to him. "You might, ah, want to ask her if she's sure she wants to get involved, though." His face tightens. "Not everyone does. Some of them would rather avoid the fuck out of it."

Itzhak makes an awful face and flings his newly-healed hand at Iggy. He's still standing, one narrow hip propped against the counter, stuffing down pancakes like he might actually collapse into a neutron star without the padding. Swallowing, he glares at him. "That's not why I punched the tree." Get it right de Santos, his motivation for tree-punching is VERY IMPORTANT.

He meets August's eyes, briefly, then looks down at pancakes. "She's already involved."

Finch seems less morose now that they have a plan of action, even if that plan is just “Have a meeting” it’s better than nothing. She lets out a breath and pushes her plate away, almost empty. “Why did you punch the tree, Itzy?” she asks. Yup, he is nicknamed now.

Ignacio sees the fist and god it in a way feels damn good for a brief moment for something familiar there. But there are two New Yorkers with a /lot/ of history revved up in the kitchen. And he madder Itzhak gets the cooler Ignacio's demeanor gets, but even in that bleary hangover morning haze he's leaning off the counter standing up. "Ah yeah? It owe ya money? I can super see why you'd be pissed. What? You gonna come at me to?" There's that lopsided smile and a squint as if deciding eeeeh sure why not. What follows is some very casual Spanish in quick, short form and a chuckle but the word 'culo' was used.

What Itzhak can parse more because he knows deSantos and less for mastery of Spanish is: Hey buddy, I got one good leg but I'll kick your ass with it. Yeah. Itzhak might not be the only person in the room ready for a throw down, but at least it's given in a way to oblige.

August nods at Itzhak, toys with his bagel. "Okay," he says. "Long as she's already on board. It's dangerous, what we're getting into. No one should have to take it on if they'd rather not."

He pre-emptively moves to stand between Itzhak and Ignacio. "Stop, or, I'm putting you down for a nap, and you won't like how I do it." He raises an eyebrow, takes a bite of bagel.

Itzhak stares back at Ignacio, his expression odd. Pissed off, certainly, but also kind of bemused. In the old days, they might already be scrapping it out. Today, all those scars on Iggy give Itzhak pause.

Something happened to the kid, and he still doesn't know what.

Then Roen steps between them, breaking the spell. Itzhak snorts and goes back to eating. "Ehhh, <<y tu mama tambien.>>" Spanish insults slurred in a Yiddish accent is so New York.

He dips his head towards Roen, telling Finch, "We ran into some kinda ...thing. Like a messed up bear. There were kids around, it'd already torn up a dog. So I was gonna get into it but it vanished." He shrugs, takes the plate over to the sink to wash it. Angry dishwashing and going after monstrosities bare-knuckled; it's how he shows he cares.

“Well shit. A dog? I’d have hit something too,” Finch admits. Granted, she wouldn’t have use her hand physically. She can do that shit with her mind. Much less owwie.

Ignacio is absolutely fronting looking up at Itzhak, and doesn't press it when he starts spitting words back but the ire seems to go to ground. Then there's all 6'2" of the bossman stepping between them. Ignacio slooowly lifts up on his toes favoring his better side. It...doesn't come close to letting him see past Reon but it doesn't keep him from trying. His hand points matter-of-factly over his shoulder as if continuing this conversation in puppet theater presents a point: "Hey! We agreed to leave the moms outta it."

He doesn't come close, but he's still gonna try. Some might wonder if the kid is too stupid to quit sometimes, but the truth of it comes out. "Shiiiit that sucks man. The kids okay?"

August leans slightly, continuing to block Ignacio from Itzhak like a large tree. He spreads his hands in the timeless gesture of, 'What is this? What are you doing? What do you expect to accomplish?'

But then they're on to the subject of the manbearpigwolverinebadger...whatever, and he just gives Ignacio an 'I see you' look. He makes a low sound, washes down the bagel with some coffee. He blinks. "Christ, that's strong." He has another sip. "I've got someone looking into that. We'll see where it goes. I kept a little blood so if we have to, we can," he makes a vague gesture with his coffee mug, "try a ritual. Or something."

Itzhak can't help snickering as Ignacio attempts to continue posturing via hand puppetry. "Yeah, yeah." He grabs the skillet for washing. "Bring over them plates, would you?" He looks over his shoulder at the others. "Kids didn't get hurt. That whatever-it-was killed the dog instead. Big dog, not some purse dog. Thing just vanished, so I maybe got a little frustrated." So he broke his hand on a tree. Perfectly appropriate reaction.

August rolls Alertness+Glimmer (8 8 8 7 5 4 4 2) vs Ignacio's Stealth+Glimmer (4 4 1 1)
Crushing Victory for August.

Both of Finch’s brows go up at the idea of them doing a ritual. “Do those things even work on, you know, the bad things?” she asks. She has a little knowledge but no deep knowledge.

Ignacio tilts his head looking at Roen very fucking confused and even the space around him seems to try to shift, like the strands around him are trying tounscrew a very jammed jar lid and manage, with the same curious dexterity of an inch worm try to deconstruct Roen's expression. He blinks and turns from him pointing with no energy left to do this, "Abuela's got a scrubbie in the ceramic frog thing." He doesn't comment on the rituals at all. Buddy boy's not ramping up the anxiety in the room anymore,and that's gonna have to do. He turns and toddles off to go get a coffee refill.

"I dunno, but would it be so weird?" Itzhak says to Finch, plucking the scrubbie out of the ceramic frog thing. "There's gotta be a way to control this shit, right?" His eyes track Ignacio, and for a split second, his eyebrows tick up in concern. God forbid Iggy catch him making that face, though, so he goes back to scrubbing.

August frowns at Ignacio. A silent war of not exactly wit and will carries on for a second, then August blinks. "Don't try that again," he says, and sips from his coffee.

He admits to Finch and Itzhak, "I was thinking just, track it." So they can do the obvious. "But maybe that'd work too. Either way, we can't let it just run around. It's probably already found another meal." It's also occurred to him it might come after one of them for payback, but that is, if anything, a much more ideal scenario than it eating random kids.

“I have no idea,” Finch admits to Itzhak. “I don’t know if this stuff is, like, magic, or some kind of evolution of the brain and all science or something. I dunno if that other place is magical or a universe all it’s own or something. Basically, I know nothing, Jon Snow.”

Ignacio is tired and it's a right shit morning. Itzhak is cleaning up the kitchen leftovers though so that's less stress on the cook for later. Exhausted he looks to Roen and holds up both hands just confused, "The fuck you talking about? You've been up my goddamned ass since you got here." Shaking his head he limps over to, yeah there's his shirt head back to the bathroom.

"Don't be mad at him for trying," Itzhak says helpfully to August. Like he wasn't just posturing at Ignacio. "We have to work these things out. Like little kids tryin' to put everything in their mouth." He stacks dishes in the drying rack.

Finch watches Iggy go with a grimace then nearly snorts coffee through her nose at the mention of them trying to put things in their mouths. “Ok, I think I’m calling this meeting of the Dysfunctional Scooby Gang to a close. We can reconvene soon, when we’re all in better moods? Thank you all for coming though, last night was some scary shit.” And some awesome shit. And some drunken shit. But the scary happened first.

August grunts at Itzhak. "That's not what I mean." Well, it's half of what he means. He narrows his eyes, huffs a sigh in resignation. "Just so we're clear, I reserve the right to heal and then puke on both of you, if you do 'work it out', so consider that when you're sticking things in your mouths." Did he repeat that phrase on purpose? Damn right he did.

He moves to help Itzhak with the dishes, taking over the much-lamented job of drying them. "Yeah," he agrees with Finch. "I've gotta get over to Bayside. That magnolia finally fell over, so now it has to get cleared up."