A large estate on the edge of town, with access to the waterway as well.  The house looks unassuming, a four bedroom, two story house with a lovely greenhouse on one side, externally.  Inside the house, there is far more space than it appears, but only if you have been invited within by the owner, one Megaira Kattakara.

  Meg was setting out her picnic tables on the lawn, enough chairs for all the New Age Defenders and anyone they wanted to bring a guest with.  She had the big brick barbecue fired up, and had a selection of barbecued chicken, hamburgers, bratwurst, and Gyro meats for the gyros.

The bus pulled up in front of Meg's new house and Bill, with Darren in tow, stepped off. Walking hand in hand they moved over to Meg. "Hi Meg, this is the place huh? Nice/"

  Meg laughed, and said "Got it exactly.  Come on in, I have picnic tables and folding chairs.  We can all eat good barbecue, and then play in the pool.  I want to have a tour of the house once we all eat."

Ozzy, having moved in after things heated up at Gysbourne Manor, was manning the grill while Meg took a break. He turned and waved at Bill and Darren, grill spatula in hand as he said, "Dudes! Sup? How are ya?"

There was the roar of a motorcycle heard before a harley pulled into Meg's driveway parking to the side to allow anyone else with a vehicle plenty of room. The rider reached up with both hands removing his helmet and shaking his hair a bit before turning and smiling at the girl behind him. "Alright so time to meet your family, y'know most girls settle with just meeting the parents, not everyone at once"

  Bella laughed as she took her helmet off, and handed it to Aaron.  "MOST girls don't have two Dads, and an Aunt, as well as a whole bunch of other aunts and uncles that aren't technically blood.  Come on, we'll have fun.  Meg has a pool, so I had to do some fast shopping this morning."  She grinned at him.

  Meg chuckled, and said "I think we timed the grilling perfectly, Ozzy.  It will make it a LOT easier to have barbecue parties with two of us switching off on cooking."

In reply to Bella Masters (msg #7):

"Alright point taken." Aaron said as he placed both helmets atop the bike. "A pool? Shopping trip? Is this something I should be looking forward to?" He chuckled as he moved toward the barbecue setup.

  Bella giggled, and said "I didn't have a swimsuit.  So I had to go get something to swim in, Aaron.  Come on, my Dads are over there.  Yes, I know, I look about as old as they are."  She held his hand, and bounced over, moving at a speed he could easily match.  "Heya Dads!  I brought my guest along.  Meet Aaron."

Bill smiled as Bella approached. He gave Aaron a long look before finally saying. "Nice to meet you Aaron. I'm Bill"

  Darren smiled, and offered Aaron his hand.  He said very conversationally "Pleasure to meet you, Aaron.  Break her heart and I promise you will be a very, very sorry young man."  Which made Bella facepalm.

A Prius pulled into the driveway parking on the opposite side of the motorcycle. Jack stepped out of the drivers seat and stepped over to passenger side to open the door for Penny. He held his hand out to her to help her out of the car.

  Smiling as she put her hand in his, Penny said softly "The food smells great, doesn't it?  Lets find a good spot to sit, Jack."  And leaned against him, her arm sliding around his waist.

Ozzy grinned, turning all the way around this time to wave. He was wearing shorts and a t-shirt, as befit the weather, with a bright red apron that declared that 'This Shit Is Going To Be DELICIOUS'.

"Jack! Penny! Wassup? Hey, anyone particular about their burgers? They're about to the point where I can take 'em off, if anyone likes 'em to still moo on the bun!" he called.

  Penny giggled, and waved at him as she answered "We came and we brought our appetites!  You better have lots of food!"

"Food? I'm cooking? I thought I was making a burnt offering to Loki!" he said in a joking tone before answering seriously, "Yeah, no worries, we got lots of food. We were expecting a bunch of hungry teens, after all. Not to mention Andy."

  Andy and Vic arrived on a big Harley.  He'd found one and been puttering around with it.  The paintjob still looked like hell, and the exhaust system wasn't done yet, but the motor was purring.  He had no helmet on, but he had Vic behind him and grinning as the pulled up.  He called to Ozzy "Hey, throw these on the grill!!"  And heaved a zippered cooler-bag at Ozzy, the thing spinning to land about a foot from Ozzy's feet.  Inside were several porterhouse and t-bone steaks.  He liked a LOT of meat.

Ozzy nodded, catching the bag in midair with a paint-appendage. Wouldn't do to have it bust on the lawn, after all.

 "You got it, Andy! Let's get these things cooked up!" he said as he started to put the meat on the grill. Once that was done, he turned and said, "So, you want me to paint your bike for you, once you get the mechanical stuff done? I figure it'll be faster and cheaper than any body shop, not to mention the fact I can put stuff on there they only WISH they could."

  Andy grinned, and said "Sure.  I'm not done cleaning the engine, exhaust and all out, but once I have it running the way I like it, then you can paint it for me.  I'd love a portrait of Vic on the tank, and maybe a Demon on the other side.  Strikes me as appropriate."

"I've heard about and seen some of your work, Ozzy. I look forward to viewing the finished product." Vic said, getting off of the bike.

Ozzy nodded, "Sounds like a plan. Just say the word, and I'll get it painted."

They would indeed have seen some of his work, especially if their duties took them in the alleyways of the city. Several walls in Weston had beautiful graffiti on them. Some were original, and some were modern re-imaginings of classical paintings, but all had a 'signature tag' that Vic would've likely recognized as a mage's mark. Specifically, it was the same rune that adorned the chest of his Painter armor, just in different colors.

  Meg laughed, and teased "Oh, like me telling you I wanted you to paint all the ceilings with skyscapes isn't enough work on your plate?"  She'd requested sunsets in the west, sunrises in the east, starscapes with the aurora borealis in the north, and a south-pole version for the rooms on the south side of the building.  And in the center, sunny noontime skies.

"Psssh. Skyscapes. For daytime? Some blue, the sun, a happy cloud or two Bob Ross style, and BAM, done. This house has been done for how long now? And I'm already mostly done. Just gotta get the blending PERFECT between rooms. Have the whole ceiling be one big work of art. I even went so far as to get images from various locations to use, to make things more difficult."

Which was true. To make the home fit the owner, the 'eastern' rooms were pictures from various locations in China, with the sun rising over the Great Wall, Beijing, and Mount Everest. For the west, he was working on sunsets behind the Parthenon, Mount Olympus, and Navagio Bay. The 'aurora' rooms had photos from expeditions to the Poles. Of course, the more western rooms were still works in Progress, since he'd been travelling from East to West, much like the sun did.

  Bella grinned, and went to check out the pool.  As she went, she pulled off her t-shirt to reveal a skimpy little purple and black bikini top.

  There are times where you just gotta walk.  These times include when you don't have a car nor motorcycle, and more acrobatic forms of travel are less than a good idea considering the drinks you are carrying around in a cheap plastic cooler... Wait...  In hindsight, Matt could have done a triple back flip off a trampoline onto an inflatable moon walk and still leave the soda in a condition it would not explode, doh.

  Matt is still wearing his usual generic clothing goodness of his hoodie, jeans, and sneakers combo.  Though he's taken advantage of convenient alien technology to actually have a face today.  Not his old one of course, he didn't quite feel ready to walk around sporting a look last seen in an obituary photo.  Just an average generic white male look like several stock photos had offspring.

  "I come bearing sodas and chips with ridges.  I guarantee not a single broken chip among them.  Also bugles, for anyone who wants to beat 'most stacked bugles eaten at once' records or something."  It's no array of high quality meats, but at least he's not throwing it at people?
This message was last edited by the player at 02:17, Sat 26 May 2012.

  Meg laughed, and waved him in.  "Come on over here, I have the non-refrigerated stuff over here, there's a table under the collapsible gazebo-tent."  She'd worked with Jack and Ozzy both to get the whole back yard set up for this, with two tent-gazebos up to cover the food and umbrella shaded tables for everyone else.