2019-10-30 - Who's Your Daddy?

Finch and Ignacio spent the night at his and Raf's apartment, so the young woman could get herself together again after the shattering news from her Great Aunt at Western State Hospital, and the lead she left her grandniece with before they departed.

Gran is out at her stitch and bitch, making winter wear for Miss Mags. The little rat is perched on Finch's shoulder as she rummages in the kitchen junk drawer, looking for something. Everyone else was invited over, and they all sat quietly around the kitchen table with a cup of coffee before the woman of the hour decided it was time to go forth and find some answers to her mystery parentage.

She exclaims an "A-HA!" and holds up a ring full of rusty old skeleton keys. "I think these are the keys to the closed wing of the house," she explains, bringing them back over to the table. "Iggy can you open the cellar door and grab the flashlights on the shelf just inside? We flipped off the breaker to that area of the house too, so we don't have any electric there."

She looks at each of them in turn. "Thanks for doing this with me. I know yesterday was hard on everyone. I can't even tell you how much I owe you all for that."

August sips from his coffee and nods. He looks tired. Better, now that Finch has healed up that lovely gouge on his chest; the bandages from it are now in the trash can, and he's looking a bit less like a car ran him over. The coffee's helping too. He's in 'relaxation' clothes: a black, long-sleeved Henley, dark purple, UW hoodie, denim jeans, hiking shoes. He arches an eyebrow at Finch. "You don't owe us a damned thing," he says, "and you know it."

Ignacio seems to have rallied at least a little bit. He's talking, has colour in his face, and his insides inside.! Like the smartass he is he says "Yoooou already thanked me but you can go on if you need to." Flapping a hand he adds on his way over, "If you can't find the keys we can still make the door unlock." He's given Finch his NY Mets hoodie so he's got on his sweatshirt, jeans, same running shoes.

He trots over and it's some effort but he pulls his glipper together to pull those cellar doors up up, ah ha! Caught it with his hand to shove them open the rest of the way. th-thump--th-thump-th-thump goes his feet down down down into the basement. He's gone for a moment. He reach's back to finch's head to tell her Pajarito there is some COOL stuff down here. And a staircase up. I think it's prolly to the kitchen or back hall. There's a pause, Or doom. Could just lead to doom.

Itzhak is dressed as per usual in jeans and boots. He has a new hoodie, though, with a beautiful silkscreened illustration of his favorite Overwatch character, an enormous figure in gold power armor wielding a rocket hammer. As bad as he is at sitting around and waiting, he's prowling around the kitchen emitting anxietyons (like photons except Jewish). His craving to have an instrument in his hands or a cigarette or something is nearly visible. Agreeing with August, he shakes his head and tosses a hand dismissively. "Owe us? Please."

He tracks Ignacio going down into the cellar, and tries not to let on that all his warning bells are going off.

Finch snorts at August. "It was a hospital," she points at him, "and a prison," at Itzhak, "and an asylum," at Ignacio. "Shit all of you have serious and understandable issues with. Most people would have told me I was on my own when faced with that so yeah, I do owe you. Thank you for being my family." She smirks at the message from Ignacio in her head and yells down the stairs, "Flashlights now, Doom later!"

August watches Ignacio go into the basement with Itzhak in fretful tow. He looks across the table at Finch. He glances down at his coffee, seems to struggle with not saying something. He shrugs, tells her, "I'll consider it a debt cancellation on that time I drove up bleeding to death," and bobs his eyebrows. He finishes off his coffee, eases up from the table with a wince. "Also, there's zombies in the graveyard. I know that seems like a gimme but, you know, don't go there."

Ignacio yells up from the basement "You get me the best presents....why am I yelling?!" he's still not used to telepathy. He's still working on getting out of the basement. There's that alarm that raises all of the bells. Getting to the top of the stairs he looks calm. PERFECTLY. CALM. though much of the colour is returning to his face slowly. He waggles the mag lights and says not a DAMN thing about it. "We're good. " He hands August the other one and shrugs turning the light on without pushing the button. "Batteries are dead sooooo is us, jefe."

Itzhak, hovering around the cellar door, reaches down to offer his hand to Nacio if he needs it. He does it thoughtlessly like he's done it a thousand times before (he has). Sometimes Iggy needs it, sometimes he doesn't. Right now he looks like maybe he could use it for moral support if not physical. "When was the last time the batteries got changed in those things?" but then Ignacio turns the thing on without the button, and Itzhak can't help but grin at him. "Pretty slick, Slick."

Of course there are zombies in the graveyard. This is Gray Harbor and Halloween season. "Avoid the cemetery, got it," Finch quips back to August. She looks back to the boys. "I changed them a few weeks ago, before I got the flu. We lose power a lot. I should probably just keep them up here instead of the basement." But then where's the fun in Ignacio getting freaked out down there? "Are we ready?" she asks, swallowing hard as she picks up the ring of keys with a screechy jangle and falling flakes of rust.

August accepts the flashlight, glances down at it. Informs it that turning on is a thing, and it does. He moves to follow Finch, once again taking in the creepy old mansion. Makes a note to start helping her work on it becoming less old and run down. Creepy, well, that's probably a permanent fixture.

Ignacio just looks at Ignacio letting it flip off and back on again and says in a too-deep voice, "Where were you on night of the 15th?" With a lopsided grin. Little does he know how on the nose that joke is. Oh Iggy is proud of him there's no living this down now! He looks to August and says "No. No can do. I get the Carousel or the graveyard. They don't get both. Just...No." And man he looks pissed too and he does a... there is no angry march but an insolent hobble to the house. "Mags? Cover me, cutie."

"Am I being detained, officer?" Itzhak sasses back, smirking lopsided at Ignacio. Couple of idiots, these two, joking around to relieve the tension. He upnods to Finch. "Let's do it."

Finch leads them up the marble staircase in the foyer and at the top she turns left. Her and Gran's rooms and the guest room people have used are to the right. The left wing has a closed wooden door, and it takes her a few tries to find the right key to unlock it. She swings it open, and the hallway beyond is like looking into the past. Or a haunted house, take your pick.

Everything is covered in dust, and here and there piles of leaves have built up like sand dunes, falling through gaps in the roof and blown about by the wind snaking through broken window panes. A tricycle, probably used by Finch but clearly bought for someone many generations before, sits in the middle of the hall. Stacks of old newspapers and magazines are set beside emptied linen closets, now homes to various small critters. The old radiator on the wall is silent, and there are no electric lights on, just the sunlight filtering through holes in the roof and walls here and there.

"Yeah, you can see why we don't keep this part open. Watch your step, I can't vouch for the integrity of any of the floors. They've been soaked a lot from rains over the years."

"First time someone steps through a hole in the floor I'm patching the whole thing," August informs Finch, tone brooking no argument. He steps forward--as the heaviest, if the floor's going to give, it's going to give for him--sweeps his flashlight into darker corners. Tests his weight, takes another step. It creaks and groans, but nothing gives. Not yet. "I know using our power to repair this is a waste but Christ on a crutch am I tempted," he mutters.

Ignacio takes his time on those stairs. He looks to Finch and says, "... have thoughts. Ask me about them later, please." His jaw sets and he takes a deep breath. Right. "Let's hold there's no sentient black mold." He looks to August and says, "That would be the other solution..." He pauses, "Why do I still hear Mags?"

Itzhak sings softly, and the rotting floorboard hear him. He can't repair their molecular structure like Finch and August can (and that would, in fact, be a waste), but he can tell them to stay where they are. Nevertheless, he's diligent about following in August's footsteps.

"Last room on the right was Wren's," Finch calls to August. Not mom's, she won't even give her mother that term of affection. The floor creaks and groans with every step the quartet take down the hall. In a few spots the water damage is very obvious and can be easily avoided. A rat that is NOT Mags runs across from the newspapers into one of the leave piles with a skittering squeak. Mags wrinkles her little nose and hides under the back of Finch's hair.

She smirks at August. "Don't think I haven't considered it. But I also thought using that much power here, in the house, might bring trouble and I don't want Gran to get hurt." Gran has zero glimmer. She's just more awesome than them anyway, despite being mundane. At Iggy's question, she plucks up Mags and hands the little rat over to him. She's in a little winter scarf today.

"Yeah, probably would, knowing Those assholes," August says, voice low for not readily apparent reason. He glances up and around, clearly thinking, 'and this place needs no additional help to be trouble' though not quite willing to give voice to it. He remembers the Murray House, oh yes. Oh yes.

He tracks the path to the door, testing the floor with every few steps. Nothing disastrous happens, so he stands to one side, making space for Finch to unlock it.

Ignacio float-keeps Mags up on his shulder and funny enough does not leave the stairs for no good reason. He coos at teh rat, "Commere, mija. I got you." Looking to Finch he frowns, "If Gran gets back early I'll go look in on her. Make sure she's alright?" He follows carefully and pauses but sets a hand on her back. He looks to Roen and Itzhak worried ad nervous. He doens't want to say it but there's still the chance it isn't there. For her sake he hopes it's okay.

Picking up what de Santos is laying down, Itzhak flicks a glance at the door, then back to him, and nods with eyebrows up. "It's there. And...seems like a couple other things, too."

He's trying so hard not to think of the Murray House, or what he did to its roof when the dead thing came crawling down the stairs at them.

Finch moves to the door and she works through the keys until one fits in the lock. She looks back at the others and swallows once, before turning it with a CLICK. She turns the knob and the door swings inward. The room is mostly intact, with the single window in the outer wall still unbroken by some strange luck. The roof, however, has seen better days and the floor is a mess, littered with detritus. The flashlights shine through dust motes that dance with every movement they make, kicking up little clouds of debris with every footfall.

The bed has been shoved up against one wall, thickly built but only double sized, when the room could easily hold a Queen or King. An old dining chair sits in the middle of the space, with a water pitcher on it, beneath what was likely one of the roof's early holes. No doubt they tried to save the floors before it all became overwhelming on Finch and Dove, and they just shut up that part of the house. The wallpaper is peeling and moldy, the paint stained with rainwater, and the curtains are in tatters as every rodent from here to Tacoma has taken a nibble for nesting materials.

Finch steps inside and carefully makes her way to the bed. The post her mother had put the photo in was at the foot of the bed, the one not against the wall.

August steps into the room first, pointing his flashlight into dark corners, peering at the gaping holes overhead. He squints against the light shining down, eyes the bed. He steps aside, eyebrows raised in a silent question: you want to fish it out, or do you want one of us to?

Ignacio speaks up. "Finch?" Taking a deep breath his hand extends out and Mags runs down his arm to perch on his hand. He sighs and turns his hand over lifting her and placing her in it. He continues ahem "Jsut remember, no matter what you find? you get to decide what you want to do with this and no one gets to tell you what to do with it, okay? You don't owe anyone anything." Families are rough and Ignacio has more than a bit of practice trying to protect his own on that front with his sister and Raf.

"Yeah. What he said. It's your call, Fincheleh." Itzhak says it evenly, despite how unbearably creepy this room is, this wing of the house is, despite how his warning bells both mundane and shining are ringing. "We're just here for backup."

Finch turns to give them all a wan smile, her chosen family, the people she trusts most in this world. She knows they have her back, in this and everything. She nods and then she steps up to the bedpost. She takes in a deep breath, then she reaches both hands to twist it. It comes loose with some effort, stuck over the years with simple grime. But come loose it does and she lifts the finial off the post and tosses it on top of the bed. Inside is a little cache of items her mother had been squirreling away since childhood.

There was a fancy matchbox car stolen from Merlin, her mother's brother. And there was a locket with her best friend Myra's photo and hers in it from 4th grade. And there is a ticket stub from seeing David Bowie at the Paramount Theater in 1991, and the footprint card from when Finch was born at the hospital. And amid it all, a polaroid photograph which she pulls out carefully.

On the back is written, "he was Of the Meadow" in sharpie. She turns it over and squints at the image, well preserved by the dark inside the bedpost for so many years, and protected from water damage from the hardwood the bed frame was made of. There is her mother, just as they saw her in the nightclub, and the man is with her, his face visible. He looks Latino. Mexican maybe? And you can make out the tattoo on one arm, the choppy waves with a fishing trawler. A tattoo at least two of them have seen up close.

"He looks familiar?" Finch murmurs, handing it over to the rest to look at.

August peers at the photo. Squints at it. Leans in to examine the tattoo. Blinks, a look of comprehension dawning.

And the first person he looks at isn't Finch. It'z Itzhak. His mouth flattens as he completely, totally, refuses, to laugh. "Pretty sure I know who that is," he says on a sigh. He straightens so Itzhak and Ignacio can have their go at examining it, folds his arms. He leans back a little, like he's waiting for something.

Ignacio tilts his head boggling at Finch, "Pajarito, que? El es de la vega??" He boggles walking over to her murmuring to himself, "Que esto?" The name means nothing to him. but the eyebrow goes up looking to August and back to Finch. "Also I'm going to say the word 'Spores' and want you to consider that."

Itzhak, tall bastard that he is (as Iggy sometimes calls him, My Tallest), can see over shoulders with ease. When he lays eyes on that face and the fishing trawler tattoo, he makes a throttled sound in his throat. Ignacio confirms it, saying de la vega. Then Itzhak's turning away, fast, bolting out of the room without anywhere near the level of care he took on the way in. The floorboards like him, though, and they stay up under his feet.

Finch snaps her eyes to August. "Who is it then?" she asks, her brows knitting as Itzhak goes flying out of the room, panic leaping into her eyes. Is it like some serial killer mafia boss murderous thug dude or something!? "Slow down Iggy, I can't understand that well yet," she notes with his Spanish input.

"Shit," August growls, turning to run after Itzhak. He stops in the doorway at Finch's question, hand on the frame. "The police captain. From the other night. From when we were pulled Over There." And then he's running, ready to shore up anything that gives way. "Hang on, calm down!" he calls.

Ignacio blinks to FInch and boggles at her with a shrug. "No idea." He looks to Finch asking him to slow down and he does exactly the opposite with such alacrity and sincerity, "Puede que no seas alto. Nadie me ha hecho querer bailar de nuevo como tu. Esta habitación es muy mohosa. Donde está la biblioteca. Te amo más que respirar." He pauses and looks to August, "Police captain? Doesn't sound very responsible." he blinks and looks back to Finch, "Wait...wait wait wait... waaaaaaait..." He looks to the 'tall people and slowly says, "You're telling me we think her dad might be some dude...named de la Vega?"

"NO I WILL NOT FUCKING CALM DOWN!" Itzhak yells back at August as he rampages down the stairs. He is not using his inside-voice. "Jesus FUCKING Christ! Her dad's de la Vega!"

Finch's eyes go wide as saucers. The police captain? The guy who held on to her while she pulled them all out of that animated altverse? The one who showed up to help them cut up the tree before the dryads showed up? "My father is...a cop?" Among other things, like she's half-Mexican. The child of a military veteran. "What's wrong with Itzhak?" she whispers to Ignacio. She moves to put her hand in his, clinging to the polaroid with the other hand, and tugs him after her to follow. "What's WRONG!? Is he someone bad!?" Panic is in her tone.

"Fine! Don't calm down! But don't DO anything!" August is glad for the sheer amount of physical labor he performs, because Itzhak is many things, but slow is not among them. Over his shoulder he calls back, "NO!" then, "It's complicated!!" He growls under his breath, "Don't make me break your fucking starter, damn it, I will."

Ignacio looks to Itzhak with that half grin and then back to Finch. Either he's the only one that gets it or the only one that doesn't, "That's Spanish, baby. " And then Itzhak is yelling and The tall people are escalating the feeling in the room. ANd then something rawls up in Ignacio's spine and he gets all of his shit together at once. In an about face he l turns chest to chest with Itzhak and has that look in his eye devoid of all bullshit but there's no hostility. "Itzhak. Look at me." Talk about a total mood shift. Gently but firmly he says, "Not the time. I'm going to ask you, for Finch, to dial it back to like a three cause she's been trying to ask youse guys a question and all this emotion? Pretty freaky." The hand comes up and he takes a deep breath finding that OFF button in Itzhak's head also labeled: protect thy family.

"Don't you touch my starter, Roen!" Itzhak snaps over his shoulder, the threat to his car doing what nothing else has succeeded at in catching his attention. Then Ignacio talks to him, serious, brother-to-brother style, and activates those deepest bedrock instincts of Itzhak's to do what he has to do to protect his people, no matter the personal cost. Itzhak shudders, eyes closing a moment, tension draining from his face. He goes calmer, and when he opens his eyes he gives Iggy a dirty look without a lot of heat behind it. "I can feel you do that, you know." But now it's way less important to freak out than to take care of Fincheleh. "He's not bad," he says, grudging. "He's just... messed up inside. Kinda like me." Now he's turning red, and he glances sideways at August with a pleading tilt of one eyebrow.

Finch is now close to tears at Itzhak's crazy reaction to her parentage. She loves Itzhak like family; if he's freaked out it must be for good reason, right? Her hand in Iggy's trembles. She looks amid them. "How messed up? Slaughter your entire family messed up? Because I'm pretty fucking messed up myself!"

August pulls up short, gives Ignacio a consternated look when he feels him use his power to calm Itzhak. He seems to start to say something, stop, and instead choose to focus on Finch. He walks over to her and leans over, putting his hands on her shoulders. "Hey. It's okay. He's not reacting to anything related to you, alright?" He sighs, looks down for a second, back at Finch. "de la Vega's--complicated. He's been through some shit. Bad shit--like me, like you, like all of us." A glance to the side, like he'd be looking at Itzhak to include him in this, back to Finch. "I'll be honest with you, he's not handling it well. Or, at all, maybe. That makes him difficult. Dangerous, even, since he has the Gift. But I'm not gonna tell you 'don't tell him' or 'don't go see him'. Or advise that. Because like you said, you're complicated too. And it might be the only way to get rid of this Curse. So. You be careful when it comes to him," now he does look over his shoulder at Itzhak, "and we'll get over ourselves." Back to Finch. "Okay?"

Ignacio bites the affected side of his lip with the nerve damage and nods slowly. "You take an aspirin for a headache, you got an Iggy for an angry." He cops up to that one patting Itzhak on the shoulder, "I'm here to help you." Finch's hand gets a squeeze pulling it up and pressing it to his chest. Looking back to her he stays quiet while August talks truths. "Eh my dad's a lil messed up too. Remember, donor. Your family's right here now... I'm getting a low key screaming headache standing here. If we want to move to the kitchen I can get some coffee and scones." He sighs and looks to August, "He's allowed to have some shit. He tries to put some obligation bullshit or act like he's entitled to shit though? You might have to sit on me." He's been through that too long where his own dad and his brother were concerned. You don't get to not be there and then make choices for people.

"No. No, Fincheleh, sweetheart, c'mere." Itzhak goes to her to hug her and wrap her up in his long arms and sway her gently. Now he feels terrible for losing his shit. "He's had a long hard life. A lotta fucked up shit happened to him and it screwed him up inside." He nods along with what August says. "Roen's right. De la Vega's not a bad guy, not at heart, but he's hurt. Real hurt." ...How does Itzhak suddenly intimately know Captain de la Vega? "Yeah," he says to Iggy, "we can do that."

Tears slide down Finch's face as she looks up at the man who has been way more of a dad to her in a short while than anyone else in her entire life. She nods at August slowly. "Ok. Ok." Then she's wrapped up in Itzhak's arms and cries into the tall man's shoulder. "I need to talk to him. He might be in danger because of me, or my mother at least. He probably won't want shit to do with me anyway, it's not like I'm some cute toddler or pre-teen. I'm a grown ass adult and shit." She sniffles and wipes her arm on her shirt sleeve.

August arches an eyebrow at Ignacio. "Sit on you? No--we'll be taking turns." It's not a joke, not the way he says it. He moves aside so Itzhak can deliver a hug, folds his arms. "I don't know that he has kids, so he might be more interested than you think. You get to an age like ours and realize you wanted them, finding one randomly isn't the worst thing that can happen to you." His mouth twitches in an almost smile.

"If you want some of us with you when you talk to him, just say the word. But if you'd rather do it private, that's okay too." He doesn't actually want to let her do that, but he has to. He knows he does.

Ignacio lets go of her hand and looks thoughtful. Nervous? He is quiet which means he's taking in as much info as he can. His weight shifts to his good leg and his hand rubs the back of his neck. "I... I don't know if I get a vote buuuuut I wanna meet this guy." His jaw sets and his fingers rub his face before walking over to the door and leaning on it for a moment before rapidly pulling his hand back with a slight flinch. The eyeroll is enough chiding of himself for that slight comedy of errors. Looking back to Finch he watches quietly. The message is sent though, "Amazing grown ass adult. You left out the amazing part, yo."

"Cute? More like 'pain in the ass' toddler or pre-teen." Itzhak kisses Finch on her colorful hair and lets her go, so Ignacio can get back to her. "You're way better as is. Also, you're pretty damn cute."

Before he does anything else, though, he hugs Ignacio one-armed around the shoulder. "Thanks, boychik," he mutters quietly to him, and ruffles his hair lightly. Then he goes on towards the kitchen.

"I don't want to seem like I'm bringing an entire posse down on the man. Maybe just Iggy can come with me the first time? And we'll see how it goes?" Finch heads down into the kitchen, sinking into one of the chairs and looking at the photo again for a long time. "So, well, I guess I'm half-Mexican? Will that keep your pops from freaking out at you dating me, Ig?" she asks with a smirk.

August sighs. "Fair," he says, because it's true if there's three dudes all giving Ruiz dirty looks while Finch delivers this news it's going to go about as badly as it possibly could. Ignacio, though, is less likely to trigger problems. "Come on. Let's have some food. Talk this over if you want." Not that he really knows de la Vega. Well. He's met him, at least, and unlike Itzhak, August can discuss him without getting flustered and embarrassed.

Ignacio turns to Itzhak and pulls him into a hug. He tries and butchers the phrase just a bit. hey, he's a beginner. "es iz rekht tsu zerg far mshpkhh." (Uhhh no Iggy that means to run down in a swarm... oh chico). Still the idea comes across. Pausing he looks to Finch with that lopsided smile and bullshit charm of his, "I guarantee mi papa will find eomthing else to get nit picky abotu and give me jsut one more thing I don't care about in return. It's like... the gift that keeps on giving. And see that's the thing with him? His problem ain't you bein Hispanic or no. His problem is that Tobin isn't a girl and expects me to talk some sense into Raf which is something A- I will no do, and b-... well dad has some growin up to do." His jaw is tight enough to crush a walnut. The words are soft though, "Finch, no one gets to talk shit about you. And they better never do ti to me or they might learn real quick what that feels like." His fingers lift lighty and Mags stuffs her nose into his ear in the most obtrusive way possible making his posture slacken a bit again, "Love you too Mags. You can meet your bio-grand-human I'm sure. "

Itzhak can't help a snort of laughter at Iggy's, um, creative Yiddish. "You just said I should zerg rush my family, ya yutz." He hugs him back, careful with the broken parts (there's a lot of them) but strong. "Nobody gets to talk shit about you either. We got your back too. Don't you forget it."

Finch lets out a soft sigh. "Ok, once I get up the courage, I'll go see Captain De la Vega at the station. Thank you all, for being here for me. I need a nap now though." She gets up and scoops Mags off of Iggy's shoulder to take the rat with her up to her own room.