"Core will be able to help you with it, so long as- well, if you get caught your first priority will be to destroy the keys, the second to kill yourself.  The only way we can guarantee a key will work is if it's a master key, and I know he has one.  Getting you the clearance for it will be a harder matter."

"No idea how we could be sure it was secure enough. Or that destructive measures were sufficient," Grunt told her, "But yes, I'm going to have to start sleeping in full kit. It'll be like training all over again."

"A microUSB with a macro ought to do the job; explode it with a grenade and not even the Neverborn can put it back together again.  But that's not my bailiwick." She stands up, "I'm going to get more from the bar.  Would you like anything?"

"No. This would be one of those 'the more I drank, the more I drink' nights and lucidity seems fairly important. Besides, if we're here much longer someone is going to be drunk enough to spot you," Grunt told her, "And we've been lucky not brawls kicked off already."

"Luck has nothing to do with that."  Juno tells him, "I'll be back in a bit.  With some equipment for you.  If I were you I'd spend the time to think long and hard and start developing a support network, start thinking about what to take... you know.  Preparing for your life."

"All right," Grunt agreed, "And, for the sake of politeness even though I doubt you'd lose track of me if I tried, I'm headed to my berth for now. If nothing else there's the personal arms to carry for now."

"If you'd like I'll leave you be and drop a package off for you."  Juno says to him.  "I understand you've had a rough 24 hours."

"I don't mind your company but being drunk, maudlin, and armed in public areas is problematic," Grunt told her, "And tying up part of Command for much longer would be silly of me."

"Command does not get tied up.  Command does what it needs to do," She admonishes him, "It'll be in your bunk when you wake up.  Take care of yourself, Grunt.  I'll speak with you later."

Then she's gone.

A few minutes later a fight breaks out further in the bar, anima fluxes burning and twisting, forming an elemental tornado before the heavies jump in.  Right around that time another one of Grunt's compatriots, a Wood-Aspect, Renee Lefebvre, swings on by to his booth.

"Hey Gabe,"  She waves, "Drinking alone again?"

"Evening Renee," Grunt said companionably, "I wasn't, but now I seem to be sobering up that way. Was headed to the berth in a few minutes but no real rush. Scimitar and Peregrine were in earlier, he had to help her home."

"Yeah, I'm surprised she didn't try to fight or fuck anyone,"  Renee sounds amused, her French accent timbering off into a light buzz, "Then again they'd prefer her to do one and not the other, hohn hohn?  Between you and me has Scimitar spoken to you yet?"

Ah.  Renee is VERY amused.  There's nothing Renee likes more than to act matchmaker and by now she's as transparent as the finest fiberoptic quartz.

"Hope you don't expect much to come of it, she was at the break out the mop point, not the head over waste disposal one," Grunt told Renee as he cleared a spot on the table for her drink. There was a collection of the fallen covering things. He gave a nod. "I'm supposed to blow rainbows up some new recruits' asses."

"Hahahahah... rainbows..."  Renee chuckles to herself, "Oh, no need, I'll be circulating around.  All over,"  She waves a hand at the bar.  "I'm not the type to sit around and sulk... but if you insist!"

She takes a seat and leans back on her chair, green eyes dancing in the booth's light.

"Haven't seen you around much, lowering the tone of places like usual."

"I've gotten popular the last week or so. Never a good sign," Grunt agreed with her, "So, what in the vacuum has been happening? Feel like the rest of the Blooded are playing a new game and I missed the rules."

"Well, we've hit a quiet spot.  The taking of the Asset definitely helped.  Things have been relatively quiet with the Dead recently.  You've seen more action than everyone else combined this past month."  She says, "It's causing a bit of social churn.  This new baby-making directive isn't exactly helping.  That's partly... well... one of the reasons why Scimitar was approaching you first.  We're moving less from spearhead to more of a fine point of the spear."

"Fewer massed battle. Or at least fewer where the hordes mean much," Grunt shrugged uncomfortably, "And they're a bit obsessive about quantity, not quality, of life in some regards."

He snorted slightly.

"And we may be just slightly more courageous, or suicidally stubborn, than the remaining Celestials."

"So yeah, there's a feeling that Gap has been attained." Roarke's Gap, named after a Dragon-Blooded who'd seen the coming war and theorized it would be worse than ever; Roarke had not survived to make it to the Last Refuge.  It was the point that the power difference between the Abyssals and Dragon-Blooded would be too strong to justify sending them out except in large numbers for very, very specific goals.  In short, it'd be using them as Reserves first.

"And they're going for blood purity, like the old days, but the Spreaders are in action again."

The spreaders- the Dragon-Blooded who believed humanity's survival meant passing the Gift to all humans.

"So a lot of us are pretty much lost right now.  And it's happened so quick!"

"It's less that they're so much innately stronger than the fact that they get to spend all their time getting better at killing us. No civilians to protect, no air purifiers to maintain, crops to grow, they don't even need coitus to increase their numbers. Gotta be a boring ass existence but great for task focus," Grunt opined dead pan, snorting at the Spreaders, "They just want an excuse for what they wanted to do anyway. A population of nothing but us? Eugh."

He mused for a moment, in that state of approaching but not yet arrived sobriety.

"Might be time we had a project."

"A project?  Do tell.  I love projects," She purrs, "I'm not the only one with that either if my judgment of Scimitar is correct.  So go on.  Do tell."

"I turned up a few souvenirs during a recent mission. Maybe I can guilt Command into handing them over. Only twenty percent are in my bailiwick but that just means people will have to stop complaining about my privileged status," Grunt told her as he stood, "Time for me to head home. Don't push any crack ships."

"Souvenirs?  Come on, don't do this to me,"  She says as she stands alongside him, reaching out to grab his arm, "Don't tease me like that, you know I gotta know this kind of stuff..."

One of the dancing Dragon-Blooded on the floor perks up and looks over, "Oh hey!  Renee!"

"HEyyyYYyyyY!"  Renee turns and waves.

Grunt took full advantage of the moment of distraction to try and slip away.

Stealth 100, success!

He manages to escape the club without being accosted by any of his incredibly annoying brethren!

It wasn't a disdain for his brethern, so much as he still wasn't armed and it had been a rough stretch. Grunt would feel better when he was properly attired for a dead universe.

He made his way towards his berth.

((Good time to end this thread; we'll have another one for you soon))