2021-04-23 - You Guys Are Hazing Me, Right?

Noon time, and lunch, so Isi's here as promised. She hasn't stopped somewhere else for food but has her own little lunch box in hand. She has splurged on coffee though, and she brings one for Ravn. Hasn't the faintest idea how he takes it, so it's the basics with some of the cream and sugars stacked on top for him as he wants. She knocks, and then just comes in, because that seems natural. Calling out, "Count Ravn?" Her voice is FULL of irony, because honestly, inserting humor is the easiest way to process this.

Assault geese. Dear diary, today I was mugged by a cormorant masquerading as a Russian combat goose. It ate all my tic tacs and nipped me in the shin.

Ravn shakes his head as he walks into the front room of the former butcher shop -- now combined coffee room, reception, seating area, waiting room, and uh -- from the looks of that pile of books over there -- research facility on mermaids.

"Denny, don't leave your books everywhere," he murmurs, not really expecting the other man to hear; in part because the other man is not present -- but where Denny is concerned that's not really a guarantee ever. The homeless guy has a penchant for appearing out of nowhere if certain subjects are broached, and Ravn for one has stopped looking startled when a head suddenly pops out of a door to a room that was supposed to be empty. Denny has Opinions about mermaids. Apart from that, though, he's pretty easy going and as it turns out, pretty good with small repairs and random fixes too.

And then, suddenly, the voice behind him is not Denny's. The Dane turns around and greets Isi with a smile -- perhaps a little relieved because the morning's experiences in the park were the exact kind of thing that might prompt somebody to go 'screw this' and get on the next bus to Portland. He can't help a lopsided smile at the unusual address, though. "If I say there's no one here but us crickets, do I still get one of those coffees?"

"I don't know - do the crickets talk and eat tic-tacs? Because if they do, I might have to turn and leave. That was just a weird as fuck morning." Isi offers out the coffee anyway, not serious at all about those words. "You still got time to talk? I'm sure you're busy," and she glances about to see what else might be happening in this work-in-progress.

"Time to talk is kind of my job description," Ravn says, and from the look on his face he's not even joking. "This is a walk-in kind of deal. Talking to people and trying to help them make sense of this crazy town is part of the package. Are you all right with a folding chair, or shall I find you a nice and comfortable bucket to turn upside down?"

So the place is still very much in its, ah, early phase. It's obvious that work is being done -- in jumps and leaps, the way volunteers do when they have an hour here, an hour there, and really, you want it all spic and span by a specific date, hire somebody professional.

His quip about the chairs makes Isi snort a half laugh and takes the folding chair that's offered. "Do you charge a fee for that, or is it just a public service offered?" She seems to talk about money a lot, probably a failure of her profession. Having settled she quirks her head sideways. "Why didn't I notice that slight glow before? I mean, it seems obvious now, since it's dimmer, but I didn't connect it."

"No fees. All of this is a volunteer operation." Ravn settles on the other folding chair, cradling his coffee up in gloved fingers. "We get rent and utilities paid by private sponsors -- everything else, well, it's up to ourselves to make it work. What we offer depends on who's got time and skills to donate. Me, I have a lot of time and very few practical skills, so, well, don't expect to find me doing a lot of repairs lest I light the place on fire while trying to change a light bulb." He grins slightly. Must be exaggerating, at least a little.

Then he cants his head and looks at Isi for a few moments before saying, more seriously, "It's one of those things you don't really become aware of until somebody points it out to you. Have you ever tried to explain the concept of colour to someone who was born blind? It makes you realise, all of a sudden, how complicated colour is. But you never did before, it's just there, things have colour because, well, things have colour. To me it's a sensation of warmth -- a pull, sometimes. Makes me want to go find out who someone is, when they have that warm feeling about them. But until I came here, I had no idea that that thing even existed."

""Right - I think you said that before." Isi shakes her head at herself for saying something inane. She opens her lunch and takes out a nice simple sandwich and some chips. The latter get offered out to him - because coffee and chips, why not? This is one of those situations where WEIRDER THINGS HAVE HAPPENED RECENTLY.

"Alright," she says that a lot, "So this place. It's special. The spirits can come out here. That woman - she was a spirit? Like Spilyáy?" She's said that name before, though followed by the word Coyote.

"I'm going to have to confess to being very European when it comes to First Nations legends," Ravn confesses -- and steals a few chips. "I know Coyote -- but the other name is not familiar to me. That said? Pretty much. Except, she's not Baba Yaga the Slavic trickster goddess. She's the Veil's replica of Baba Yaga. That's splitting hairs, I know, but at least to me it's important -- I can't wrap my head around the idea of these things being real. I can wrap my head around somebody creating them to screw with us. Does that make sense?"

"Spilyáy is the proper name for what the white men call Coyote," Isi says, her voice taking on that deep sigh of one who knows their culture is little known, "Trickster, yeah, but also the spirit that makes life possible. He stole fire for us, like that Prometheus -" but she stops herself there and shakes her head. "It doesn't matter." Instead she turns back to what he has said specifically.

"So that's what you said that one time, about it being real, but not being real? What is this Veil? Is it a spirit itself?"

"Well, ultimately, your guess is as good as mine. But the general consensus is that it's a kind of barrier that separates realities -- and for some reason it's sometimes torn, and here, it's in bloody tatters." Ravn nods. "So we get -- all kinds of overlap from alien realities. Some of them are -- completely random, and the things that live there are probably as scared of us as we are of them. Others are -- far less random. There are creatures in there who feed on the power and on human suffering. Those are the ones we call dolorphages. Some call them Dark Men too, but, eh... Bit easy to get a racist undertone to that one, so 'pain eater' seems a better wording. It's a pretty prevalent theory that they farm us -- they put us through stuff in order to harvest our shine, or our fear and pain, or both."

"It sounds like the Tah-tah-kle'-ah. Though our legends say that they were destroyed by a higher power and haven't taken anyone for... a long time. Legends aren't generally good with dates." Isi's trying to fit everything into her own framework of reference. Chewing on her sandwich is a handy way of managing this and she falls quiet for a bit as she contemplates it.

"So not aliens though - you meant that more in like, 'something doesn't belong' sense? Not UFOs?" Because that is the LAST thing Isi needs to wrap her mind about.

"Well, you might easily get a dream experience about little green men from Mars sometime, not saying otherwise. But no, not aliens." Ravn shakes his head and steals another couple of chips. "If anything? Those old legends -- every culture has them. Things that steal people. Faerie worlds, spirit realms. Just goes to show that this kind of thing isn't new at all, and it's not particular to Gray Harbor, either. It's just very strong here."

Seeming lost, or at least inquisitive, a short, athletic brunette pushes the door open. Amber was wearing casual clothes, a wool jacket over a thin hoodie, some athleisure wetsuit paneled pants and some simple white trainers. Her eyes sweep around, taking in the ramshackle nature of the interior, but her eyes seeming to easily train on Ravn and Isi. She raises a hand to wave, “Hello! This is the volunteer center?”

Conner arrives quietly, as he often does, carrying his toolbox and humming faintly under his breath. He has some sort of ear worm it seems. Dressed in jeans, a denim shirt, and a t-shirt underneath, the older man, with his slightly messy hair, just looks a little rumpled as always. He steps in a short minute after Amber, and raises his hand in greeting behind her, catching the tail end of her question and not wanting to interrupt the answer.

A few more contemplative bites before Isi lets the food fall into her lap. "This all use to be native lands, so you're saying that maybe some of those stories we were told as children came from here possibly? This might be where Sho-pow'-tan met the Tah-tah-kle'-ah, and the parallels with other cultures stories might all be because of this veil and.... everything?" She's taking some logical leaps. Logic, it's a good way to avoid being scared as F* about all of this.

The arrival of the two has her turning away from Ravn and looking. No greeting specifically from her though, this is Ravn's pace to welcome or deny. She doesn't get up from her folding chair either.

The man in black occupying a folding chair in the middle of this not quite finished reception area (with a bit of funny smell too) looks up as people arrive in short order. He lights up in a grin at Conner -- and Conner's tool box -- and tosses that smile at Amber as well. "More volunteer than centre at this early point but we're working on it. Some serious coffee drinking going on right now for instance. Hi, Ravn Abildgaard. Looking for something in specific, or just taking in the sights?"

Man has an accent; one of those European ones that really wishes it was British but probably isn't.

“Well, I like to volunteer?” Amber answers, though still a question, walking further into the establishment, “I’m Amber.” She seems distracted for a moment as she senses someone behind her, looking back to Connor. She reaches up and rubs her eye like she had something in it, then remembers to be polite, her surname given to Ravn, “Reyes.” She eyes the man now, not having expected an accent like his in a place like this. “I just like finding volunteering places where I live. Also helps me meet people in town.” She breaks into a friendly grin.

"Hey Ravn," Conner says, in his gentle tones. He offers a shy smile as well, and says, "Got something you want worked on in particular today? Otherwise I'm just going to tackle the drywall patches. Nice to meet you, Amber. Ma'am."

This last is to Isi, who receives a quiet dip of Conner's head before he steps more fully into the building. He seems to realize, three awkward seconds later, that he forgot to offer a name himself. "Ah. Conner. Hawthorne."

Ravn blinks and for a moment one could almost be forgiven for thinking he thinks he misheard something. Then he seems to catch his bearings and gets off the chair to offer Amber a hand gloved in black kidskin. "No relation to the gangster boss, I presume? Sorry about your relative if I am mistaken. Although not very sorry, given his goons' penchant for shooting up mall expos."

He lights up in a somewhat less startled smile. "Not going to lie, we can use every hand we can get. As you can probably see, we've only just managed to take over the lease on the property, and it's more than a bit of a mess. I'm honest to God no handyman, so people like Conner here who turn up with tool boxes and make magic happen? They are life savers."

Isi nods back at the people incoming, but doesn't offer up her name just yet. They are here for their work and she's just thinking out some of the different hings that are rocking her world.

It's only when Conner talks to her directly that she tosses out, "Isi Cameron, Ravn's explaining... Gray Harbor." That makes sense to everyone, right?

“I have a pretty big family, but I’m pretty sure none of them are a gang boss.” Amber narrows her eyes a bit at Ravn for a moment when they shake hands, and something feels a little off, but she blinks and shakes her head. She breaks into a smile soon after, “I’m not that handy myself, but I can carry things and paint?” She offers. Connor and Isi are both given friendly smiles when their names are offered.

On the matter of Ravn explaining Grey Harbor: "Is he now? Well, I'm glad I stopped in today then because I've lived here all my life and there's still plenty that goes right over my head. The price of acting like a hermit for most of it, I suppose."

For Amber's benefit: "You said you're new? Our town's real weird."

That's his contribution. To explaining Grey Harbor.

He pulls on gloves and a pair of safety glasses, then crosses to the back of the room, settling down next to a hole in the drywall. The other day, he'd just brought in some patch pieces and set them down in here, so he's ready to go on this project. He holds a patch over the jagged hole, then pulls out a small pencil to stencil out the neat square that it forms in light lines on the wall.

Ravn shoots Conner an appreciative look, in the fashion of a man who has ten thumbs and probably could manage to break seven of them trying to hammer a nail into a wall. How this guy maintains a sailboat is anyone's question; maybe barnacles are a more grateful target.

"I'd say welcome to town too, but truth of the matter is, I've only been here since -- August I think? I'm pretty new here myself." He smiles at Amber (and lets Isi have a few moments to mull, perhaps). "We can definitely use you -- whether you paint, or carry things, or are willing to just be here when people need to talk. Town has a lot of people having -- unusual experiences." He trails off, perhaps because how exactly do you breach this subject with someone when you have no idea whether they have any idea what they walked into?

"It's flying over my head a little bit," Isi says honestly, scratching the back of her head lightly before finishing her food. With the others working it's pretty ghache to keep sitting doing nothing. So Isi rises and settles her food off to one side. "I can work while we talk if you want?" That's offered up to Ravn.

Amber gets a glance, "I'm only a couple weeks into living here myself. I'm not quite to the point of believing the whole "everything is dangerous holy crap I believe" spiel I've gotten a few times, but... getting there."

"Everyone thinks their home town is weird." Amber laughs, looking at Connor. "Gray Harbor seems really nice. I like it around here. Much less busy. People have good energy around here too." All three of them get a dazzling smile, since she felt that exact good energy from them. At Ravn's suggestion, she nods, "I teach yoga classes over at the community college. Maybe I can volunteer my time once in awhile for a free class or some guided meditation?" Her expression gets slightly concerned at Isi's statement, though, "I've been here a few months." The words seem of mixed emotions, like she were trying to be friendly but not sure why they were comparing.

"Yet you seem to have put in the work," Conner tells Ravn, "of finding out what you need to know."

He takes out a pen light and shines it into the hole, putting the patch down for a minute. His lips twitch a little, at 'good energy.'

What he says to that is, "Just remember fear is the real enemy, ma'am, and you'll do okay."

Whatever that means. Yet that's his takeaway from the little he's learned. He seems...completely oblivious to just how 'insular small town' that statement might really sound. Or...awkward random eccentric dude. Take your pick. He's too busy looking to make sure he won't slice through a stray wire, or a pipe.

"I'm a folklorist, finding out how stories work is literally what I do," the Dane replies. Then he looks at Amber and says, "Honestly? All of it. A lot of people here need to -- connect with others. Feel that they have some worth, some value. Explore some of the crazy that other people keep telling them that they are. Gray Harbor has a disproportionately high number of people with mental issues. We want to try to help them help themselves back on their feet, so to speak."

He glances at the stack of books on mermaids still sitting in one corner. It's a perfectly normal interest. Right?

"I have to admit that my home town is ... not this weird," the Dane adds. "We've got the usual eccentrics and of course we've got a couple of old local legends, but nothing like Gray Harbor. Even if you leave out the -- unusual -- this place has a pretty intense history. Serial killers, family feuds, hauntings. One of our volunteers here is convinced that there are mermaids in the harbour trying to lure out the people who live under the boardwalk, to eat them."

How do respond to a story like that? Amber laughs, because she has little else. She tips her head in deference to Ravn’s information, though. “I wonder if it’s the weather. There’s studies to show that low sunlight affect people’s moods, and it’s cloudy around here pretty often.” She shrugs, but smiles, “I’m sure that’s all just urban legends,” she dismisses it all easily, too positive a being for this to curb her attitude, “Portland? Where I’m from? There’s apparently really spooky tunnels where they used to drag sailors out to kidnap them onto ships. I used to work in a studio in Chinatown where they were. All just wild stories, though.”

"Didn't mean to offend," Isi says to Amber, now stepping back a bit and scratching at her cheek lightly. Amber's words make a little more sense and she nods slightly. "I want to still think like that," she says more to herself than anyone else. "Ravn, give me a job? And maybe more about these Dolowhatever... or dark men or whatever?"

Words are hard.

"Fear eaters," Conner supplies sagely, because he can't remember the exact longer word, and he doesn't like dark men as a term for all sorts of reasons. He takes out a drywall saw and starts cutting out a square. He gives Amber a slight smile, one that says he isn't going to contradict her but doesn't entirely agree, either.

Yet he's got his own job for the moment, and it keeps his hands busy and his mouth shut, other than to ease in with that one comment.

"Dolorphages," Ravn says gently and opens the door to what was once the butcher shop's back room. The smell is stronger in there, and while it is obvious that somebody has been washing it all down with water and copious amounts of household chemicals, the place still looks like what it is -- a combination of office and storage area. There are shelves full of old junk to sort through; a desk with drawers to which the keys are no doubt long gone -- and debris, all the sort of debris you get when a building is left abandoned and boarded up for a decade and no one stops kids from sneaking in to make out, or homeless people from seeking shelter from the rain.

"Want to help me sort through all this crap so we can get rid of or recycle anything we can't use? Be my guest and please and thank you. I'm half-way through old business receipts and correspondence, and I still have no idea why the former owner simply got up one morning and walked out, never to be seen again. Shop's finances seem to have been fine. Anyhow, dolorphages. Pain eaters -- they're what the locals believe cause most of the nightmares around here. They feed on suffering and negative emotions -- which is why those dreams are almost always pretty disturbing. The general sentiment is that if you do find yourself pulled into something insane -- some kind of shared hallucination -- then the only out is through it. Let the story unfold, try to get yourself and others out of there in one piece."

A small wry smile flits across the man's lips. "And, because what kind of horror story would this be if there were not consequences? Any injury you sustain in such a dream stays with you when you wake up. That's how I got the scar on my arm -- insane madman in a dream flesh factory, chasing me with a meat cleaver."

At least this place is fairly open -- it's easy enough to hear people talking from one room to another. Including the bit where Ravn adds, "If I call for a pizza for the help squad, will you also help me dispose of that? I mean, arguing whether pineapple goes on it has been known to be a dangerous venture."

“Oh, you didn’t offend me!” Amber was quick to tell Isi, smiling brightly at the other woman to show she was genuine in the sentiment. Amber listens to Ravn with interest, head tipping again at the strange word. At a certain point, none of this seems to really strike Amber as an odd thing to hear, because at that certain point, this all seemed like some wild tale someone who labels themself a folklorist would tell. Clearly, she was the new person here, and she was being hazed. She’d been in a sorority before.

“Oh! I like pineapple!” She chimes in when the subject matter returned to the mundane. She was already moving toward the task Isi had likely been assigned, assuming it would likely take two (or more) people and she could offer help there, and it was the first suggestion that sounded easy enough for her to help with. “Or margherita.”

"I already ate, so no biggie on me. I can pick the items that don't belong on pizza off. Isi says wrly, not ready to start a fight about Pizza. Except that she ABSOLUTELY has opinions on the matter. That kind of conversation is better over a few drinks.

Headed into the office/storage area Isi smiles at Amber and lifts down a box that needs dug through. Through the doorway to Ravn - "If you want someone to comb through those financials with a finer comb, I can do that. Maybe their money was coming from the mob or something so they had to skip town." Yes, she will laugh at her own jest there, because seriously, the mob? Nah.

"These fear, pain eaters - so they can touch you? Like the grandmother with the goose, how I could touch her needle... was she one of them?" The last question is added as an afterthought.

"I'm partial to sausage, but when someone else is buying, I'm of the mindset, like Isi here, that you pick off anything you don't like and you don't complain," Conner says, his lips twitching a little bit. He grabs a couple pieces of wood and measures them next, and he definitely does measure twice before marking. He's going slow, going steady. This isn't second nature to him but so far the work is getting done.

"Not going to say no to having someone who understands accounting look at the paperwork," Ravn returns. "I don't think anything illegal happened here. I think the guy just... decided to get up and leave some day, like people sometimes will. For all we know he's retired to Mexico and is living his best life. Not everything has to be tragic. Except pizza without pineapple, that is in fact very tragic." He gestures at the piles of papers -- which appear to have been sorted into 'I have looked at this and found nothing' and 'nobody's looked at this stuff yet'. "I'm about half-way through reading various business letters."

With a glance back to Isi the Dane explains, "Baba Yaga is -- whatever it is she is. No one's actually ever seen the dolorphages that I know of. They're this local slenderman-like myth that everyone in town has heard of but when you start looking into things? There's no physical evidence or proof. Just an entire laundry list of advice compiled over a few centuries, about how to deal with things. Get through the story. Don't try to fight it, don't try to walk away, it won't let you. Just, have each other's backs, look out for each other, get everyone through. Bit like real life, really -- if you're a team player."

One paper that is identifiable on that desk is the local pizza parlour's menu sheet. Ravn takes a moment to tap an order into his phone. "Pineapple, sausage, margharita -- think we might just be able to cover all of our bases if we steal a bit from one another's plates. Or, well, pizza boxes."

Amber begins pulling down boxes, opening them and sorting. Paperwork like accounting or taxes are set in neat piles for Isi, while things like food safety regulations or HR hiring were probably safe to be set aside into piles, also sifted through so cardboard and paper would both be easily just lugged out for recycling as Ravn suggested. Saving the environment was important. She continues to listen to them as they talk, all the while looking as if these were just the audio book stories she chose to be listening to today.

Isi abandons her box of things for the paperwork that is being set aside. One leg gets stretched out and the other curled under her in a relaxed pose. She starts making more piles from what Ravn and Amber set aside of her, pausing sometimes to examine something more closely before it gets filed. "How much of this do you think you want to keep? Tax records from 1999 might not be the most helpful."

To the conversation about creepy things, "So she isn't one of the fear things? Are there benevolent spirits too? "

"Of course there are," Conner says with a smile. "There is as much that is wonderful here as is terrible. If you go down to the park, you should say hi to the carousel animals. They are tied to spirits who are bound to help children...and they're pretty cool guys all things considered. Not everyone is a fan...but I certainly am. And some are just misunderstood, or need help. Sometimes they aren't always pleasant but...anything that's not actively hostile is better approached with a sense of curiosity, in my opinion. If something is actively hostile...like Ravn said. You look out for folks, and they'll look out for you, too."

He smiles fondly, even as he drills some holes, and adds, "The things you'll see and experience here are as varied as people, I think."

He clears his throat, as if a little embarrassed to be offering so much opinion in one go there.

Ravn is by now not at all unaccustomed to the idea of dropping information on people and when they inevitably find themselves face to face with Cthulhu, maybe some of it sticks. Sometimes, the right thing to do is show people. Sometimes, it's not. Gut feeling says now is perhaps not such a time. Instead, he looks at Amber curiously and asks, "So what brought you to Gray Harbor? Of all the small towns on the west coast, why this one?"

An inconspicuous question, no? "Myself, I came by hitch-hiking for Portland, back in August. Got into an argument with the guy I was hitching a ride from, and he dumped me in Main Street. Kept telling myself I was just going to be staying a few days, hear all these crazy stories about dreams and monsters. Before I really knew it I'd gotten a job and rented a boat to stay on. And, well, I'm still here -- though I did end up quitting the job, bartending wasn't really my thing."

Then Isi asks questions and the folklorist nods. "As soon as we're sure there's no clue as to where the butcher went, toss it. No reason to keep it beyond that, if there's nothing irregular going on. No, Grandmother is -- something else. There's more than just one story in Gray Harbor. A lot of the time, it can be a nightmare to sift through which story that's on the table. The dolorphages are basically about hurting people. Baba Yaga is neither good or evil -- when we encounter her in folklore, she portends change. And change, well... it can be good or bad."

A wry glance back at Conner. "That damn carousel horse bit me. Just saying." But perhaps also a hint of gratitude for the support. After all, why should Ravn Abildgaard monopolise sounding like the town nut job?

Now that she'd started moving things, Amber takes a moment to pull her jacket and hoodie off, revealing a simple tight fitting navy tank with a mandala in white on the ribs. She raises her arms up and coilsnher hair into a single tail, stretching a tie from her wrist around it, then pulling taut, "Oh, sorry, I didn't look at the date." She apologizes to Isi, "Don't you ever only ever need like your last seven or something?" She asks curiously. More sorting, more sifting. Oh, was story time over?

"Oh, uh, I just wanted a change of scenery," a playful tip back and forth of a ponytailed head, "aaaand I needed to move out of my parents place. I was done with school, I figured it was time. Got a good job offer, low cost of living." She shrugs, simple as that.

"Maybe you just don't have enough child-like wonder." Isi tosses towards Ravn, with regards to the carousel horse biting him. "Or maybe you eat children." Because that sounds as natural as anything else that she's heard about.

To Amber, "That's not too different from me. I lived in Seattle for a bit after grad school, but the city wasn't for me. Needed a paycheck though, so," a shrug.

"Conner - right?" making sure that she gets the right name in place, "So, how do you tell between the benevolent and the not-so-much? "

Conner's lips twitch, and when he speaks he's gently ribbing Ravn. "I mean. Dude. You did stick your hand right in his face before you said hello. I might try to bite you too if you patted my nose before getting to know me better." His eyes are twinkling with bright good humor, and it's like there's a grin just dying to burst out on that otherwise very reserved face.

Isi asks a good question, and he sits back on his heels, rubbing a thumb thoughtfully along his jawline. "Well," he says softly. "I think...I just...give the benefit of the doubt until and unless they are actively attacking me. A thing can look absolutely horrifying and be anything but. If you're still able to ask questions, if you're still able to converse, then...do so. If it's a thing coming at you claws and teeth bared, or swinging weapons at you, then...react accordingly. Healthy respect. Some things respond to what's in your heart as much as what's in theirs, if that makes sense. But not everything. Make no assumptions."

"Out of your parents' place? Girl, talking to the expert of I'll go live on different continent than the rest of the clan," Ravn grins back at Amber before shaking his head. "I may eat unspeakable horrors such as pineapple on pizza, but kids are too sticky for me. Never know where they've been, pretty sure that eating them is against all kinds of health regulations."

He looks up to wink at Conner. "Memo to me. No patting you on the nose."

Then another pile of already inspected receipts go in the pile of 'stuff to spread on the floor when we paint so we don't ruin the floorboards'. "Have to agree, though. Intent and narrative. But also not being afraid to -- not be able to do everything. Open mind is really a pretty good start. But also, try to be genre savvy. A lot of the time, you do know the story, even as it's being told. You're in a hallway with ominous music and closed doors? It's going to be the last one, and what's in there is going to suck. The pretty fish lady sings to you about joining her in the ocean? Take a good look at her teeth, and ask yourself if you can in fact breathe water."

Again, Amber was as a loss on anything to do but laugh. It did seem pretty genuinely funny to the woman, the parts about knowing your genre getting a giggle too.

"Oh? What do you do?" She asks Isi, also looking over toward the door and the two men, "And you too, Connor? What about you?"

To Ravn, she looks to be considering words, then finally says frankly. "You know, if you're really trying to help people hear, maybe try some less foreboding fairy tales. Like maybe Ananse?"

"Auditor at town hall," Isi replies to Amber, "As for keeping documents yeah, something like that - only if you have losses through or file for extra deductions...." that has Isi trailing off and she looks up. "Gray Harbor doesn't get many federal tax audits, does it, if people generally forget this place exists?" That is said while glancing between Ravn and Connor, as if either of them would have that kind of information. Which it would be weird if they did honestly.

"Alright then -if the impossible is possible, how do you tell the difference between the mentally ill and just someone who has... experienced something?"

Now the grin does break out, and Conner's shoulders shake with silent laughter, genuinely delighted by Ravn's response.

But then, Amber's asking him what he does, and there's this discussion of taxes. "I've never gotten one," Conner says with a shrug. "But I'm also honest on my taxes. I manage the Broadleaf Apartments. So if you find yourself needing a place, come by and I'll show you a unit. I don't know if you're set up somewhere yet or if you're staying a hotel or something."

It's the only sell she'll get, low-key mentioning.

Isi asks another good question, and he thinks about that for a minute before responding. Then: "Usually the experiences are verifiable. Others will be with you. Or will have similar encounters that you can ask them about. You also aren't required to take anyone at their word. Trust your senses. If someone is having a Moment and is...swinging hammers at the heads of actual people because that person sees demons, well...people here get it and are likely to gently disarm that person and help them settle down. It's a good question to ask, to know that what you're dealing with is sometimes someone having a medical problem so that can be dealt with. Or is having their mind messed with. Rigid categories aren't helpful...solution-oriented thinking is."

"A lot of the time, you don't -- because the someone who has experienced something they didn't know how to process might well have been declared mentally ill because of it," Ravn says frankly. "When I tell you that a madman in an imaginary factory made from flesh tried to take my arm off with a meat cleaver in order to sew a deer's head on my corpse, do I sound mentally ill? Thing is, though, I've got the scar from the damn meat cleaver. Or, you know, maybe I just cut myself so you'd believe me. Sometimes it's best to just take people's crazy stories at face value."

He nods at Conner. "Honestly couldn't put it better myself. We try to have each other's backs. Doesn't always work but, most of the time it does. Also, you stay here for a while, you end up finding out whom to talk to about -- things. There's a couple of people who can heal very severe injuries. Wouldn't have a hand still if not for one of them. Other people who know things. August Roen, for instance -- he runs a garden shop out on the outskirts, and he's probably one of the most knowledgeable people in town about these things. Bloke like Ignacio de Santos? Same, when it comes to how to fight the monsters."

Well a tirade like that wasn’t convincing Amber that Ravn was something other than mentally... eccentric? She was trying to e nice. Either way, she had one load of paper and recyclables all piled into one box and figured it was about as good a time as any to make the first attempt at cleaning things out of the office. She goes looking for the back entrance and hopefully the recycle bin.

"so... that would be great if I never see that - the hammers" Isi shakes her head slowly and shuffles through the paperwork steadily.

"I'll have to come back and look at this stuff... but I should probably get back to work right now though." Isi pushes herself up from the floor and then goes to move the papers to a place out of the way and safe for either. Coming back into the main room she asks, "Can I pick more of your brains later?" That is directed to both Ravn and Conner. "I'm not sure I am completely on board with this... but it makes sense for the myths to come from... somewhere. So I'll bite at least that much."