"_Something_ is playing tricks."

[hazlogs]

It is currently morning on Fri Dec 5 2003.

Currently the moon is in the waxing Gibbous Moon phase (76% full).

Cockroach Mansion -- Downstairs

The heavy, dark opulence to this mansion known as Dominion is perfectly exemplified by the room vistors first enter, this front hall. Dark-stained wood serves as paneling on the walls, gleams with high gloss in the hardwood floor, and supports a semi-circular balcony in carved pillars. The heavy double doors, made of oak, open into the hall from the south, opposite the huge, hourglass-shaped staircase composed of red and black gneiss which soars up to the balcony; both are fenced in with a wooden railing of simple spiraled posts. Several doorways can be made out on the second floor, nearly blending in discreetly with the back wall. The wall to the left of the front doors is composed entirely of windows which run from the forty-foot-tall domed dark wood ceiling to the floor; if drawn, the heavy velvet drapes of deep red would completely mask them from view, but when parted, as they often are, one has a marvelous view of the grounds outside.

A doorway to the right of the front doors leads to a parlor, and towards the back are the kitchens, the large dining room, and Salem's office.

You paged Mel with 'Um. Big, clean, lots of cabinets and counterspace. There's a table for eating at that's a lot cozier than the hy00j long table in the dining room. And big. The kitchen, that is.'.
From afar, Mel noddles.
You paged Mel with 'The whole house is too big for the amount of people living here. :) SO DECADENT. :D'.
Mel pages: Heh. Another thing probably driving Mel nuts. :)

It's somewhere between eight and nine in the morning and Salem -- finished with his morning run and shower and dressed in t-shirt (white) and jeans (black) -- has the massive kitchen to himself. It's just him, a cup of coffee (black, natch), and today's copy of the St. Claire Tribune.

The redhead announces herself with a yawn, as she pads down into the kitchen. Just woken, she rubs at her eyes sleepily and doesn't bother speaking. Clad in some tight, pale-blue things that are probably meant to be 'shorts', and an even tighter t-shirt, it's not intentionally provacative - a gown of deep maroon is just left open out of laziness.

The kitchen's temperature begins to sink once the room has two occupants. Though the thermostat registers a comfortable heat-level, it gets positively chilly in here, as if someone had left the freezer door open and it was leaching warmth out of the air.

You paged the room with 'How fast is the temp dropping?'.
Snaik pages: Steadily. It's noticable.

Salem glances up as Mel enters, one side of his mouth twitching upwards. "Morning," he says. Then he frowns and eyeballs the thermostat. He can already see that the freezer's not been left open.

Mel shivers without really thinking about it, manouevering herself to the cupboards to find coffee. She frowns at the temperature, but it's an absent thing. "Mn'ng," she mumbles, hunching up in the dressing gown and fumbling for a mug.

The thermostat is innocent! It's recording a healthy 27 degrees C, apparently oblivious to what the room's occupents are feeling.

The coffee's already on, the maker still nice and warm from when Salem started it earlier. "Jesus on a flagpole," the Walker mutters, getting up to take a closer look at the thermostat. He taps it with a finger -- oh, how very high tech -- and then scowls at the room at large and stalks briefly out into the hallway to see if it's gotten chilly there as well.

Snaik pages: Like walking from shade to sun, the temperature is instantly different once you step out of the room, and then cold again when you return.

Mel pours - black - and sips, expressiong twisting as bitter as the brew. "That's better," she murmurs, before looking after the Walker with half-lidded green eyes. "Nice to see you, too."

Salem returns within a few seconds, frowning. "Does it feel cold in here to you?"

Her reply is a disgusted-sounding, 'Bleuargh...' followed immediately by an annoyed, accusatory, "/Jack/...?" Mel's tongue is stuck out part-way, her expression similar to a cat just been forced to eat a worming pill.

Salem's brow furrows at the redhead. He studies her for a moment, then goes over to the table and tries his own coffee. Which tasted _fine_ a moment ago.

Snaik pages: Tastes fine. :)

Mel narrows her eyes in mild annoyance. "Jack Salem..." she begins, in grumbling reprimand. "/What/ is going on?"

The temperature begins to sink again slowly, until it reaches a frigid 0 degrees. Both cups of coffee are steaming, and plumes of white breath are visible when someone speaks.

Salem shivers, his jaw tightening. He was quite content and relaxed a few minutes ago; now he's steaming from irritable to angry. "_Something_ is playing tricks," he says, answering Mel without looking at her. His fingers twitch as his gaze moves around the kitchen, eyes narrowed. "Ghost or spirit or... hrmph."

Snaik pages: Very, very softly, almost beyond the range of your hearing, you just about catch a soft whisper. "I know what you are." It would be easy to dismiss as being imagined, if not for...everything else.

Thoroughly annoyed, now, Mel tips her mug out into the sink and grunts, "/I/ am not part of this. /I/ am human. /I/ work at Safeway, and study at College. /I/ am going to /bed/." A pause as she starts pacing back towards the stairs, for her to snap tersely at some space just above her and to the left, "/Get out of my head!!/"

You paged Mel with 'Oh, yay! Quit Denny's and went to SCCU after all, huh? :)'.
Mel pages: Yar. :)
Mel pages: She tends to make a habit of going to school in her uniform, with accessories.
Mel pages: || "I don't care if they stare. I go to work and go to school and go back to work. I'm not getting dressed up just for those freaks to keep their precious illusions that everybody's daddy pays for their binge-drinking holiday..."

Salem twitches subtly at the girl's sudden explosion. He bares his teeth briefly at the air, then follows the kin-girl out of the kitchen, albeit much more slowly and taking his coffee with him. At the doorway, he stops and addresses the empty space. "You're perilously close to crossing the line. I've been extremely tolerant up 'til now."

Now both of you can hear the words, soft though they be, seeming to come from multiple voices in different directions, as if the sound were bouncing off walls and furniture. "Do. Something. About......It!" they exclaim ever-so gently, before soft laughter overtakes them, whoever 'they' are.

Mel stops short, at the stairs, turning and growling, "JACK. What's the Garou equivalent of the Ghostbusters?"

Salem prowls toward the stairs, shaking his head irritably like a dog with a bug in its ear. "Theurges deal in spirits, but most spirits can't _do_ things like this." He frowns.

"Well are they not spirits? Ghosts are spirits, aren't they? Or what? /Someone/ has to be able to deal with this shit. Shamans are real, aren't they?" Green eyes are wild with vengeful thoughts.

More laughter, this time mocking, before the sound fades into obscurity along with the more tangible signs of haunting.

Salem gives his head another shake. "Ghosts are a different kind of spirit, outside of Gaia, outside the Triat. Ghosts were once alive, and spirits never were... not the way _we_ are." His tone is abstracted. After a moment looking about, he adds, "Damn Sepdet for disappearing. She'd know, probably."

Mel narrows her eyes, coldly determined and half-lidded. "I'm going to sit in bed for a while. And then I'm going to go to work. And /then/ I'm going to hunt down a shaman and drag him out here. By the balls if necessary."

Salem's eyes snap toward the redhead. "You're not going to bring some random stranger _here_."

The Fianna kin winces and her expression turns exasperated. "Jack, this is nuts. Fucking nuts. This house is so huge none of us fill it enough, there's... /things/ always happening, I can hear /echoes/ in the bathroom, and I need to take a cab just to get to the end of the /driveway/. And now those bastards are /talking/, and pulling pranks, and if they're in some kind of supernatural angsty pain, they're being serious /assholes/ about it."

Salem makes a 'hrmph' noise and gets a stubborn look on his face. "It's an old house. I suppose I should have expected it might have... issues." He remembers the mug of coffee in his hand and takes a sizeable swallow from it. "We'll take care of it," he says tersely. "Just don't bring in some crystal-waver off the street, all right?"

"If I find someone who seems the real-deal, I'll get you to inspect them first." A hand rests on a jutted hip.

Salem stares flatly at the girl for a moment before grunting. "Fine." His eyes narrow at a sudden thought, which he keeps to himself.

She waits expectantly, expression unchanged in its determination.

Salem notes her expression and shakes his head. "Nothing." He swallows more coffee, then turns and starts back toward the (hopefully warm again) kitchen. "Need to get a theurge to make _sure_ it's not something normal."

Mel's eyes widen, as she mutters, "Normal!" in faint disbelief. She blinks a few times and shakes her head before turning and heading back upstairs for the cosy embrace of quilted covers.

Normal... for a shapeshifter who regularly defies the law of conservation of mass, yes. Salem turns back around to watch the girl flee upstairs, then shakes his head with a scowl and stalks back to the kitchen to his newspaper, his peaceful morning quite ruined. Stupid ghosts.