Difference between revisions of "2019-09-09 - Shopping For Answers"

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Shopping For Answers

Summary: Constantine goes for a stroll in Ray's Occult Books and we finally get to meet the store's manager.



Who: Kylie Griffin, Constantine
When: September 9th, 2019
Where: Rays Occult Books


Constantine-icon.gifKylie Griffin-icon.gif

The information contained within this log is to be considered information gained Out of Character (OOC).
This information may not be used as In Character (IC) knowledge or in roleplay unless it has been learned in-game or permission has been granted by the parties involved.

Questions should be directed to staff.


Ray's Occult Books(#2746RV)

Walking in the door, you are immediately assaulted by the smell of stale patchouli oil and incense. Is this the smell of knowledge? Ray's Occult is a densely-cluttered secondhand bookstore with stacks of books anywhere there isn't room to place them nicely on shelves. A glass display case makes up the counter which the register rests upon. Inside the case are random 'cursed' objects (which look suspiciously like things bought in a yard sale) mixed in with old 1980s Ghostbusters memorabilia.

The view of the street outside is obscured by several rotating racks of comic books lined up in front of the window. No human would order comic books like these. Titles featuring most of the citizens of Twisted are the most prominent; including everything from Batman to Gundam, with a few indie titles like "I Feel Sick" in the mix. Either someone is deliberately ordering these books from somewhere to compile a geeky who's who of Twisted, or Ray's Occult just has the most ironic random collection ever.

Speaking of the obscure, in the back of the room behind a wall-mounted television, is a dusty and hard to read sign that states 'Any book can be purchased here. Challenge us!'

http://marrowproductions.com/Twisted/wiki/images/2/2a/Ray's_Occult_Books.png


When exactly Kylie Griffin came to Twisted and resumed working at Ray's Occult is something of a mystery, not that it matters in the slightest for the goings on today. What matters today is that she's slumped against the front counter beside the register with a deck of tarot cards doing a reading on herself and jotting down notes on a pad of paper beside her. "The Devil, inverted." She puts down another, "The Tower." And another, "The Fool." The girl frowns and looks over at her cat, Pagan, who is currently sitting on the counter beside her. "That couldn't get any more ominous, could it? I bet any second now some gruff asshole is going to stroll in with a..." she gestures in the air, "mysteeeerious back story and we're going to get roped into listening to them try to convince us the supernatural is real." There's an audible thump as her head hits the glass and she sighs, "...for the third time to this week." She lets out a heavy sigh, "I swear, there were less weirdos in New York."

Enter, one gruff asshole and damned soul. Not that there's any sign of the latter to the casual observer. Rather, the man who enters to the faint chime of the door looks like, well. A scruffy guy in a trenchcoat, maybe a PI, maybe a guy who desperately wants to play a PI on TV. Dirty blonde hair, beige coat, and a very, very slight limp right now. Courtesy of that demon, natch. "New York? Weirdo central, in my experience," he says in response to the comment he came in on. British accent. Liverpool, to be precise.

Kylie points at Constantine with the eraser of her pencil and stares at the cat, "See? Right on time." She crosses her arms, "And here Egon says Tarot isn't scientifically accurate." Reaching over to scratch her cat behind the ears, Kylie finally greets the gentleman. "Welcome to Ray's Occult. No, I am not Ray. No, I am not a 'Ray of Sunshine' and if you try to hit on me I'm going to introduce you to the business end of a neutrino wand. Can I help you with anything?"

"Don't worry, love, plenty of people would very much *like* me to hit on them." What? He's never had problems finding somebody. The tone of the love is the British endearment tone, the one which to those familiar indicates that he calls everyone that: male, female, young, old, probably the cats and dogs too. "And perhaps. I *seem* to have a book shortage right now." He looks over the comic books and arches an eyebrow. Then the cursed objects get...the eyebrow lowers then goes right back up again.

Kylie raises her hands up and gestures wildly around the room, "Oh, modest and smart. A dangerous combination." She smiles at least a little genuinely. "Feel free to browse but the good stuff is kept under lock and key. What's your poison... 'mate'?"

"Never said I wasn't dangerous." He gives another quick glance over that part of the collection the vendor deems safe to be out. Looking for anything on which he would disagree. It's a good way to assess how smart *they* are. "Demonology, mostly."

"Local stuff would be ideal," he says. New arrival, then, most likely. "Some of them probably *are* the pointy horned kind with pitchforks, mind." Demons aren't always original...the classic appearance *is* quite popular.

Kylie scoffs, "Popular with the kids down at the local arcade, maybe." She shrugs. "Well, you got a few choices, there's not a book specifically dealing with the demons in charge but if the hit list Dr. Spangler put together is up to his usual standards I can point you in a few directions. You won't like a couple of them." Instead of walking in the back, she goes over to the comic book rack and fishes out a few comic books putting them on the counter with the titles turned to face him. The titles read 'Johnny the Homicidal Manaic #6' Squee #3' and 'Silent Hill: Dying Inside #1-4' "As for the others, your logical deep dive into the usual stuff will probably do. Dante's Inferno, The Lesser Key of Solomon, Essentials of Demonology, Demonologe and Devil Lore, and maybe some Tobins for good measure." She shrugs, "The classics are always the best."

John Constantine nods. "Unfortunately, my copy of the Lesser Key is on a timeship somewhere. Might have to get another." Okay, that's good. Her hit list indicates that there isn't that much difference, despite the fact that he may or may not have crossed the multiverse. The comics get a slight raised eyebrow, but he picks up the first one and flips through it anyway.

With a nod of her head, Kylie walks into the back leaving John with his comics and the cat. She's gone more than long enough for him to find at least a picture or two of Senior Diablo or the monsters of Silent Hill, depending on which book he's picked up. She comes back with a dog-eared copy of the Lesser Keys of Solomon, frowning at the lack of any sort of style on the cover. "You'd think when they're trying to get monkeys to buy this stuff they'd put a picture of a topless demon girl or Baphomet on the cover. Even the symbols Rob Zombie stole for his Sinister Urge album would be more interesting than this old thing." She tosses it down next to the comics and stares at the fact that Pagan hasn't moved much at all. "Huh. That's new. Normally he runs to the back when someone new comes in. What version of New York are you from?" That's totally a valid question in this place.

John Constantine glances at the cat for a moment, then shrugs. "Cats are weird," he points out. "Ain't from New York, but lived there for a while. Don't know how I'd differentiate the version." He's found a picture of the local Devil, that's for sure. He's studying it. Possibly memorizing it.

The young woman shrugs, "Well, for starters was there a thing called the Ghostbusters? Was it a movie or a franchise? What about Spiderman, Batman or giant mutant Turtles?" Sadly these are almost all things she's met in her life, "Like, I'm not sure I come from the same New York as my boss but he treats me the same so who am I to argue?"

John Constantine purses his lips. "Batman supposedly retired a few years back." And then he shrugs. "I suppose it doesn't matter in the grand scheme of things, does it?"

Kylie snaps her fingers, "Ah-hah! See, that narrows it down a lot." She frowns at her cat, "...doesn't explain the cat though." She puts her hands on her hips as she considers offering him to Egon for one of his experiments, "I-I'm sorry. Was there something else you needed? I can find just about anything if it's in print. Longest it took me to find a book was six hours once but that's because we didn't have anything to go by for a case but a guy in a nuthouse who was possessed by a Class V Focused Phantasm and kept scribbling runes on the walls."

"Well, for now, I'll take..." He checks the dog eared copy of the Lesser Key, making sure it's not a fake. It happens. Then adds the comics. And, for good measure, a random copy of the first Hellraiser trade paperback. Just because.

Eyeing the cover of the paperback elicits an "Ooooh" from the girl, "Clive Barker. Good choice. I used to have the first issue of Harrowers of the Abyss on my wall. The glow in the dark cover was just wicked cool." She rings everything up, letting John read the total off the register as she stares at the book a little longer. "Hey... um.. how much do you believe in this stuff?"

He's got money. We won't ask *how* he has currency that works in Twisted. He probably found a moneychanger. "Love, you live on a chunk of rock that can't create the gravity we experience, or so I'm reliably told, and you have the fantasy that you can just...not believe in stuff?" He's amused.

Kylie shakes her head, "No, no." She taps the graphic novel, "Hellraiser, specifically. Like, in my world this was series of movies, but we've got one of those puzzle boxes in the back." She rubs her brow trying to remember the actual name, "Ungh, Philip Lemarchand. Lemarchand's Box." She snaps her fingers again, "Lament! A Lament Configuration! It's supposed to open doorways to Hell. Ray keeps it in a locked case because the PKE valiances off of it are off the chart."

"It opens doorways to Hell," John says, simply. "I hope it's in a locked case that's also fireproof and generally as close as impossible to open as you can get." She's looking right at the comic and at him. She'll get it in a moment, surely, even if he doesn't look QUITE the same as the alt-u version of him...

Kylie eye's fall on the comics again as she puts everything away in a bag for him. "Trust me, if you only knew how many fires those guys..." Her head tilts and she flips through the pages. "I swear this was a copy of the Clive Barker's Hellraiser comics and not Alan Moore's Hellblazer." She looks up from a page that shows John Constantine standing in... just about the same pose he's standing in right this second. She simply puts the book down into the bag and rubs her eyes, "That's it. I've lost my mind, Pagan. I think I need more days off."

There IS one big difference: The John Constantine standing in front of her isn't smoking. That's really...the only difference. Oh, and the subtle degree of the smirk he's now wearing.

If he were here Ray would help fix that. With Kylie not so much. "You think I'd be used to this place by now. I'm sorry. I'm having a day. This guy with a red coat came in here earlier and I had to chase him off because he kept going through cookbooks and making Nazi jokes. I'm off my game."

John Constantine shakes his head. "Don't worry about it, love. I'm not exactly on my A game either. Got slightly beaten up." Hence, presumably, the slight link.

Leaning back against the shelf behind her, Kylie crosses her arms, "Wait, around here? Really? You didn't go shouting about demons at the Police Department, did you?" Her eyes narrow, "That's not why you were in here getting books on demons, right?" She sighs, "I am not going to be an accessary to someone else again unless I get to blow something up." The sad part is that she's speaking from experience.

John Constantine shakes his head. "No, that was the demon that followed me here, which is now back in Hell where it belongs, I assure you." Get to blow something up?

Kylie ah's, "Good. Well, not good for you but... I really hate sitting in jail cells." She leans forwards and taps on the glass drawing attention to the Ghostbuster merchandise on display, "I run with some pretty crazy scientists sometimes." She points at a larger picture frame of a Dan Aykroyd-looking man with crazy high-tech goggles on his head, "That's Dr. Ray Stantz, I manage this fine establishment for him." There's a few newspapers in the case with headlines about saving the city and gateways to Hell.

"Seems like somebody I should probably sit down and have a chat with," Constantine said. "Might know what's going on around here."

The girl shrugs her shoulders again, "Well, yes and no. I mentioned they're scientists, right? Even with that puzzlebox in the back I mentioned they'd still sooner dissect your brain than give you a straight answer." She lets out a sigh and reaches to pet her just as he gets bored and hops down to find somewhere else to nap. "They're good guys, but unless you're looking to get rid of a spirit they might not be the best guys to sit and chat with."

John Constantine shrugs a bit. "Maybe. Not *all* scientists are into dissecting people's brains." He doesn't mention he can get rid of spirits himself. Most of the time.

Kylie rolls her eyes, "Well, yeah. Some of them also fancy themselves talk show hosts or carnival barkers." Shrugs, "Anyways, if you're looking for someone to talk to, the Usual is a good place. It's a Restaurant down on Twisted Street that doesn't charge for food or drink. Just stay away from there on Thursdays."

"What happens on Thursdays?" the man asks. "Karaoke night?"

The young woman is quick to shake her head, "Nothing that heinous. You're just less likely to find anyone there - including the wait staff. Something to do with that awful John Wayne marathon they do on TV here every week. "

John Constantine ahs, "Got it. So, Thursday is a waste of time." But free food? He's not going to turn that down.

Kylie nods her head, "Yeah. Pretty much." Here's that part of the conversation where she realizes she should probably let him leave the store already. She looks down sheepishly for the briefest of moments before coming back to her normal self, "Anyways, if there's anything else I can help you with feel free to come back by. We're open 'till 7 on weekdays, midnight on Saturdays. I'm here most of the time."

John Constantine nods. "Thank you." He pays for his books. He will be back...this is the best place to check for books, after all. They might even be able to find some things he didn't think he'd see again. "I'll...see you around, love." And then he disappears from the store.



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