001-003 » a chilling mathias welcome

[villagemod]

WHO: Everyone.
WHERE: The east end of Mathias, along the waterfront.
WHEN: Days 001-003
WHAT: The newest residents of Mathias Township are welcomed with a storm.
WARNINGS: Will update as necessary. PM this account to have a warning added!
NOTES: A small love letter from your mod. This spot can be used for plotting.

RECOMMENDED ♫ Deadly Avenger "Mara"

DAY 001
THE ARRIVAL BEGINS

Is it the whooshing crash of waves on dark jagged rocks that wakes you? Perhaps. It might also be the near-continuous rumble of thunder growing closer every second, the vibrations almost seeming to come from the wet sand beneath your hands. Or maybe it’s the shivering of your own body as water recedes from the pebble-covered shore, the cold sinking into your very bones as a chilled wind picks up. It could be any of these things that rouse you from a deep slumber that leaves you feeling groggy and out of sorts--

But it’s the fear that gets you moving. A deep, intense terror grips your chest and squeezes the breath right out of you, and you know without a shred of doubt that you have mere minutes before whatever it is you’re so afraid of arrives on that stretch of rocky beach to greet you. Even if you want to stay rooted to that spot and faced it head-on, your body betrays you, a survival instinct etched into your genetic code forcing you to seek shelter.

Welcome to Mathias. You should probably run now.



THE STORM ARRIVES

When the storm crashes into the small township, it's hard to remember what life was like before it. The ocean becomes a raging thing, waves rising and falling as if trying to attack whatever they can reach along the coast. Any foolish enough to venture along the beach have no hope of surviving the encounter; their bodies will be swept out with the current, gone in the blink of an eye.

The wind is a howling beast, screaming between buildings and driving spikes of cold into any crevice it can reach. The rain is just shy of freezing, every drop like a shard of icicle trying to itself into your skin. It will bite at your nerves and leave you shaking if you stay out in it too long, so you had best get inside if you haven't already. You certainly don't want to attract the attention of the lightning that arcs in the sky like a vengeful god ready to unleash its wrath.

The Grey Gull restaurant sits at the edge of the town along the beach, and just a few yards away are two parallel rows of houses lining what might be a picturesque street if the world weren't beginning to resemble an apocalyptic landscape.

Move quickly, and choose wisely.

DAY 002
THE STORM RAGES ON

The storm has somehow become even more violent overnight. The world outside your shelter might be trapped in an endless night, for all you can see through the thick covering of storm clouds. Lightning continues to streak across the sky, thunder following almost immediately in its wake, threatening just how near those spikes of electricity truly are. You can see them touch the shore at times, even the street between the homes, but never the buildings themselves. A blessing, perhaps, or an oddity to take note of?

Some may be foolish enough to try venturing outside. They are welcome to, of course, that is their right, but the rain is still like ice and that lightning is so very near. You may try heading further into town, and you can certainly see buildings beyond this row of houses, but should you walk toward them...

Well. It is far from a pleasant experience. Exhaustion sinks into your bones so quickly that it leaves you reeling, and every second you push through it makes you physically ill with a feeling that you might collapse at any moment. The second you turn away from that path, however, you feel infinitely, and even more so each step back the way you came.

Something wants you to stay where you are. Perhaps you should.

DAY 003
THE CALM DESCENDS

The third day begins much as the second, with waves crashing upon the shore and thunder booming with such force that the ground seems to shake. It feels very much like the world might end right there, torn apart by a force of nature unlike any seen before. Any who venture outside at this time are almost immediately afflicted with a terror so intense that they can make it no more than a few yards or the short distance to cross a street before they become incapacitated by the fear that sets their heart beating dangerously fast. The term scared to death may very well become literal this day.

And then, suddenly it stops. The rain, thunder, lighting— all if it just stops and the silence that fills the night is deafening. There are no sounds of life within the town, no car motors or dogs barking or the voices of anyone beside those new arrivals in the immediate vicinity. In fact, none of those things even exist in Mathias. There are no cars, no animals or insects, no other people. There is just... emptiness and silence.

It may be best to wait until daylight to move further inland.



THE NIGHT DARKENS

For those who are foolish enough to leave the relative safety of the cluster of houses near the Grey Gull, they will find their journey quite chilling, in a very literal sense. There is another row of houses beyond where they had been, branching off on either side into a neighborhood. There are no lights on in any of these homes, though there are occasional streetlights illuminating their way. But as they continue further, reaching a third block of houses, those lights begin to dim, until they have gone out completely, and what had previously been a simple fall chill becomes biting cold as the temperature sharply drops.

In all of this, there is silence. No sounds travel through that night air to comfort them, and even looking up to the sky stretched out above them offers little reassurance. That sky is black, without a single star and not even the faintest outline of the moon to guide them. All that reaches them here is the barest hint of light traveling from the way they've come. The longer they linger outside in this place, the colder it will become, and any light they carry with them will slowly begin to dim as well.

Truly, they should have waited until the sun rose once more.

---

LOCATIONS

THE GREY GULL is what one might expect of the most frequented restaurant in a small coastal town. The wrap-around porch is lined with white chairs characterized by peeling paint. Exposed wooden walls and worn seating speak to its many years of existence, and the mishmash of décor confirms that the owner never much cared for how the place looked. What mattered here was the food, and faded chalk menus advertise soup specials and a daily pie. The bar appears to have once been well-stocked, but all the bottles remaining are unfortunately empty. There is, however, quite a bit of food in the kitchen that is somehow as fresh as if it were purchased that day.

The second floor of the restaurant is a sparsely furnished apartment. There are no personal items to be found; perhaps it was waiting to be rented out to someone.

THE HOUSES are well-kept, middle-class homes, four lining either side of the street. Their doors are unlocked, windows unshuttered, and everything within feels like the owners might return at any second. There is running water and electricity, fresh food in the fridge, photographs on the wall... but also dust everywhere. If you didn't know better, you'd say the place had been abandoned for years, and yet nothing has aged. It is both strange and unsettling, and yet no matter how hard you search, no answers may be found within these homes.

What can be found within them, however, is a phone. One single black phone within a main room of the house, and beside it, a list of handwritten numbers and names that have been crossed out.

1302 8-5491 Thomasen
1304 8-9256 Lyrie
1306 8-4712 Anders
1308 8-3201 Mulcalley

1301 8-0415 Sanderson
1303 8-6762 Reese
1305 8-9132 Evers
1307 8-9025 Hirano

Should your character choose to shelter in one of the houses, you are welcome to choose the features of that particular unit. Please reply to the comment thread below with the details you decide upon, specifying the house number in the subject line.

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Day Two

[tinstar]

There was something about the way the storm raged more incessantly outside the shutters of the Grey Gull that had Raylan stood staring out the window like a statue for a good hour before breaking into a casual pacing path, back and forth over the worn wood of the Gull's floors. Thumb propped against his bottom lip, he eyed the outside, recalling what he'd been able to see from the beach. He hated being pinned in somewhere without good reason. The storm, however violent it was outside, was a concern but not a reason in of itself to stay inside. He'd been wet before and hadn't melted, so he doubted the rain turned deadly. Just abusive. Well, that he could handle, even though his clothes still didn't feel fully dry.

There were no weapons here, not even a baseball bat which felt like some kind of small town sin to him, and that made him as antsy as diving back into the proverbial pool. The fear that had driven him in here was still sat low, coiled around the base of his neck and lifting all it's hairs. What if they were attacked? He could brawl but he'd rather have some leverage.

"To hell with it," he said to no one in particular as he walked over to grab his jacket and shrug it on. "I can't stay in here anymore, I'm pushin' further inland, as far as I can. Better to beat the storm surge, if there's going to be one." Living in Miami had given him some insight into hurricanes and this was as close to one as he'd seen.

"Be damned if I'm left stranded on some roof." Raylan headed towards the door, popping the collar of his jacket to wrap around him as tightly as he could to try and protect himself from the rain, one hand holding his hat in place.

House 1307

Raylan had pushed himself as far up the line of houses as he could, stopping frequently to try and catch the breath that the wind stole from him with every draw as he willed some of the feeling back into his fingers. He wasn't a smoker, stayed in shape, and had suffered all kinds of weather. Nothing quite like this and cowboy boots were shit in sand. Peering around the corner of the last house in the row, Raylan could barely make out the buildings in the distant but they were there. Good, he could deal with goals. He could make it that far.

Taking one last breath, Raylan pushed out into the wind again and past the house, fully intent on finding safer, better shelter. Within seconds, he felt like he was in quicksand or weighted down and had been struggling for hours, vision blurring around the edges as the urge to lay down right there threatened to overtake him. It was so strange that Raylan assumed it was from exertion and pushed forwards another three steps before collapsing onto his hands and knees, panting and trying not to hurl from it. What the hell was happening to him?

Day 3 - House Hirano

[tinstar]

Having gotten himself into the Hirano house, Raylan had opted to stay there. At least here he could be alone and get his thoughts in order. Winona and the note on the counter were the least of his problems right now, something he knew he oughta be grateful for, but it only made him itch for more whiskey. Instead, he had focused on not freezing to death.

By the time the third morning broke, he'd started a fire in the fireplace, ransacked the house for anything of interest from the closets, to the walls, to the floor and judging if any of the boards were loose. By hour four, Raylan was pulling photos off walls and checking behind them, praying for anything to give away some kind of normal deviant behavior. Maybe he was just looking for comfort; it kept his mind off the gnawing fear in his gut that had him glancing at the front door constantly.

Finally, he drug a dresser out and pushed it against the front door and propped one of the kitchen doors behind the knob of the back door before sitting down and waiting.

Even when the storm broke, all Raylan could dare to do was get up and glance out the windows into the darkness.

No. Whatever needed seeing would be there to be seen in the daylight.

[torsion]

There was nothing particularly pleasant about this experience to her. It all felt purposeful, even though weather surely couldn't be manipulated in such a way... then again, she didn't expect to be living in what she's now accepted isn't just a vivid hallucination, either.

The cold is a lot to take when she's just in the battlesuit, but it's efficient for fighting, still. She wouldn't mind getting rid of it (and dyeing her hair), but that's hardly what she should be focusing on now. There's too much at stake back home. She needs to see it all through and be there to protect Chris, if she can. If everything she went through was for nothing, she'd never forgive herself.

But she can't do that if she isn't out of here, if she isn't back home.

The cold digs and the storm doesn't seem to be breaking; like needles of ice pricking any skin laid bare. It feels more violent and the darkness is so encompassing, enough that she sees shape in the inky darkness, blotting into familiar shapes that she needs to blink away. Some stay, feel like they are inching nearer even though she knows logically it isn't.

The nearest house is what she goes for. The front door's lock is easily picked considering her skill and that she'd come with a lockpick set, but something is in front of it. It should be audible, even over the roar of thunder that it's been moved, violently pushed but let go instead of being broken. The back door is nearly the same and, with great frustration, goes for a window. She can't tell what it is through the darkness, but she eventually pulls it open with a little skill before swinging herself up and inside. Her heels are audible and looking around, she's sure it was some kind of bedroom.

She's wet and it trails her somewhat on the floor as she walks around, not far from the living, she follows the light and warmth of the fire. Someone's in here; perhaps they were the ones to close it off and not the people who might've been here before the little ragtag group of people that came here at the same time as her?

Jill announces herself first, deciding it's safer than being sneaky.

"Hey, anyone in here? I'm not here for a fight, just looking to ride the storm out."

Some bullshit this is.

[tinstar]

Somehow, Raylan had found a little peace in the storm, a tightwire balance walk of staying calm while pushing his attention to it's edges, listening to the house around him without letting every little squeak and sound freak him out. Without that, it all might have, and rightly so; it wasn't the storm that spooked him, but the feeling in the bottom of his gut. Still, the fire helped almost as much as his feet being dry.

The only good thing about all this was that it gave his mind something else to chew fanatically over that wasn't his situation at home.

It wasn't just the sound of soft footsteps that alerted him to the fact that he wasn't alone - the sound of the air changed when she entered the hall, but he didn't move, already having the best view of all the exits in the room. The chair leg he'd beaten out of full chair form was laid over his knees, his ringed right hand laying over it in case he had to use it.

He narrowed his eyes a little at the doorway as she steps through, smirking slightly at the announcement.

"Normally fires aren't unattended, but considerin' where we are, I get why you might ask." It was a Southern Drawl if one was ever spoken but not heavy or stupid. It was casual velvet.

"C'mon in if you're a peaceful type. Fire enough to share."

[torsion]

The storm doesn't worry her so much as everything else. Just being here, where she shouldn't be, where no logic can place her... that's enough. Jill supposes she should be grateful that she's unscathed, but nothing feels right. Not what dug deep inside of her in that forest and threatened to spill over, that gut-wrenching feeling of anxiety that surely wasn't just her instincts on overdrive. Not here, not now.

But you had to make due.

She spots him and raises a hand in greeting, a gesture of friendliness in its own right.

"Normally, no. But nothing about this place seems normal to me." Shadows filter across her, though she's more visible when the slices of darkness disappear into the warm glow of the fire. Jill remains standing, though she lessens the distance and offers a gloved hand. "Wouldn't call myself peaceful, but I'm not out for a fight, either. Jill Valentine. I saw you at the Grey Gull before."

[tinstar]

It was the offer of the gloved hand that got him onto his feet, stepping close enough to shake it with a firm grip and two pumps, empty leather gun holster still on his hip. Barefoot, in jeans that were only just drying and black button up that was opened to show the white undershirt beneath it, Raylan's salt and pepper hair was still combed back, by virtue of it drying that way. Not exactly battle suit get up here.

"Raylan Givens. My fire is your fire," he said, gesturing towards the dry couch in invitation before pulling his chair forwards a little so he was lurking less.

"Mighta paced a hole in the Gull's floor but I think I saw you come in. Decided to go explorin', huh?"

[torsion]

Seems like he was left bereft of weaponry, too. If it was being dried out, it would likely be within his line of sight. You can't be too careful, especially when you've been kidnapped. Her smile is slight, but honest and warm; as genuine as she may offer.

She clasps rather than shakes. It's clear her aim was his wrist, but she makes due. No big deal. Quietly thanking him for the offer, she takes him up on the sofa and tucks herself into the corner nearest him. Although there's the urge to pull her legs up, she's considerate enough not to do so.

"Good to meet you, Raylan." She hopes, anyway. "Nothing's going to get done if we just sit around. Unfortunately the weather isn't exactly ideal for something more long-term. At least not without a good coat."

She lifts her head, tilting it toward him, indicating the holster.

"What were you packing? If you don't mind a gal being forward."

[tinstar]

She was right; if he had been drying it out, it would have been laid out on the table, but just like her, he'd been robbed of his guns and ammunition.

Unfamiliar with wrist clasps and that whole thing, Raylan settled back in his chair and laid the claimed leg over his lap again. "I'd say the same, but considerin' the circumstances..." Well, they'd all rather have different ones.

"Not even with a good coat, my jacket is still soaked through and probably about fifty pounds. Can't do much in this weather." He glanced down at his holster. "Glock 45. Standard issue for Marshal's Service." He couldn't help but glance her over to see if she had any empty holsters of her own.

"You shoot?"

Above them, another thunderous clap of sound shook the house a little, jerking Raylan's sharply attentive eyes to the ceiling for a long second before dropping them back down, jaw tensing slightly. He didn't mind a storm but the atmosphere here, everywhere, needed to break.

[torsion]

They can use their holsters to carry snacks now, at least.

"Whole lot of bullshit, I know. Don't remember being kidnapped and to get wherever we are from Africa... I don't know." She gives up halfway through, like she's exhausted considerations on how it could've happened or where they are.

"I've been through worse weather." The torrent of snow in the Caucasus Mountains had been intense. She could barely see anything in front of her eyes. All blinding white. She gently taps the empty ones at her hip. "Had two Škorpion vz. 61 MGs on me. You a Marshal, then, US? Former US Army Delta Force, myself."

Jill doesn't budge, but she pauses like she expects things to go silent. Like it might mean something.

[tinstar]

"Another middle of a continent, huh?" He shook his head, jaw tensing again. He had no way to rationalize it. At all. But he pushed himself away from that growing issue before continuing. "Lexington, Kentucky." But it was good to know the reach wasn't just the Eastern Coast of the US.

"Nice," he said of her guns with a little nod of his head. "Never much played with full autos, myself." That kind of firepower? That was war or merc type firepower.

"For the last 20 or so years, yeah. Not much to stack up against a Army Delta Force, but I taught firearms at Glynco for a few years." Still wasn't enough to stack up; he knew that well and good. "I'd ask what you were doin' in Africa but somehow I don't think you'd give me a straight answer, would ya."

[torsion]

"Definitely not Kentucky. If you're asking me it's east coast, maybe. Based on the architecture I would say New England." Jill figures this, at least, though it could be Jersey or Virginia. They have plenty of forestry, but the ocean... hm.

"It's my specialty." She says with a hint of humbleness. She enjoys them, frankly. "But the feel of a revolver's just as well." The power, too.

She puts a hand on her ankle and another on the heel of her foot, holding it but not with any weight to it. An idle gesture rather than one of anxiety.

"Work. I'm a special operations agent with an anti-bioterrorism NGO called the BSAA -- Bioterrorism Security Assessment Alliance." And naturally, where vulnerable people are, there's someone taking advantage of them. "Was finishing a mission, but it would be HQ in Canada afterwards and if I'm lucky, back on home later."

If she had one still. She doesn't want to think on it. As long as the people were still there, though, she had that at the very least.

"Can't say this was exactly part of my plans."

[tinstar]

He laughed softly. "No. That's where I was before this. This is northern woods. My bets on the east coast too but I haven't seen much of the northwestern coast." Raylan considered her as she answered his not!question, eyes narrowing softly at the mention of Bioterrorism.

"Never heard of it, no offense, though in this day and age, I've got no doubts that the government has that. Nor that it's not exactly top headliner in the general public. Probably better for that," he conceded with a bob of his head.

"Though I don't think this was part of anyone's plans."

[torsion]

"Wonder how far away we are from other cities? I'm betting we're near a National Park with how it looks." It doesn't feel just like a small forest in between a city or two. It has to be big, perhaps insurmountable by foot.

"We're worldwide, so that's strange." Jill hasn't put two and two together yet. Even if she had, she'd have a harder time believing that than just being kidnapped to another country. Who knows? She might've hit her head harder than she thought. "It's part of the ecosystem, especially after what happened on the coast of Greece. Have you heard of the Raccoon City Incident?"

There was never any public admittance of what actually happened in Raccoon, but people knew it was bombed. He'd had to have heard of that, right? Jill folds her hands over her knee, idly bouncing her leg in a faint way.

"Guess if it was in someone's plans, they're the one that we've gotta talk to. Speaking of looking for people, though, if you see a guy about six feet, two-fifty pounds who is tanned, with dark hair, got arms about two, three times the size of mine? Let 'em know I'm lookin' for him. Don't imagine there are many that could be confused for him."

Day 2: By House 1307

[waywardsister]

Claire is huddled up against the wall of one of the houses, nothing but a dark speck in the shadows with her hood pulled up. It does nothing to prevent her from soaking through, but it keeps her long blonde hair out of sight for now.

And then she sees someone move past, move away from the shelter of the buldings, and she bites her lower lip, hard.

That's not... shit.

Claire huddles there for a moment, watches the man move through the storm in his ridiculous John Wayne getup. She's still shivering, still barely got herself together enough to get back to shelter, and really, it's... it's not her problem. Right? She hunts monsters and saves people from monsters, she's not responsible for some grown ass wannabe cowboy getting himself dead in a storm.

He falls onto his hands and knees.

Claire grits her teeth, slowly breathes out and pushes herself to her feet, blue eyes hard with determination.

"Hey!" she calls out, loud as she can, hoping her voice carriers through the storm. "Turn back!"

[tinstar]

He very nearly does hurl as he took one more futile steach of his limbs towards the building, still fundamentally not understanding what or why he was feeling the way he was. It took a second for his brain to register that the noise he just heard wasn't more of the wind and rain, churning into something that sounded like a voice - it sounded a little more.. real.

Raylan carefully looked back and could barely see the girl standing out from the edge of the house. She looked like she was shouting.

What? He looked at the buildings in the distance once more, letting the next wave of nausea convince him to go back. Maybe slip into that last house so he could get his bearings and breath again. It took just as much work to turn around as it did to get where he was, but as soon as he did, the feelings lessened and the ape in him caught on to at the least basics of this fuckary. That way bad. This way good.

A few seconds later and he was back on his feet, lean frame bent into the storm as he headed her way. The closer he got, the better he felt and by the time he got back to her, he was over it. Instead of trying to have a conversation out in this, he cocked his head towards the front of the house and went that way himself to the front door. He expected to need to shoulder the door in, but he tested the handle first and was surprised to find it open, pushing in without question or issue.

He'd apologize later to anyone, if he had to.

[waywardsister]

Claire followed, shoulders hunched, teeth chattering in the cold, and numb fingers flexing on the poor man's baseball bat, as it had been dubbed - it looked like a broken off chair leg - and in fact, if he had been at the Gull before, he might connect the dots to a chair that seemed to have been kicked over, a leg broken off, early on that first day, but she wasn't currently hefting it aggressively, just holding on to it.

She stayed near the door - no clue if anyone lived here yet; she'd claimed a different building for herself, but still. She had no idea who cowboy over there was. Plus if push really came to shove, she had a butter knife literally up her sleeve - for the persistant, as Five had claimed.

"So," she drawled, casually as she could manage. "That went well."

[tinstar]

He was more than happy to give her ample room, striding further across to the further point of the living room with a full body shudder as he took off his hat and tossed it into a chair so he could run a hand through his salt and pepper hair.

"I don't know what the hell happened, I shoulda been able to keep going," he protested, eyeing the fireplace against the far wall before glancing around the house and landing back on the young woman in the door.

"I don't know what you yelled at me, but I can take a guess. How'd you know? Already try?" Did she know or understand something more than he did about what the fuck just happened? He was grateful for her yell, for the reason to come back but now that he was here, he had questions.

[waywardsister]

"Yelled at you to come back, honestly. Whatever this storm is, I don't think we're gonna push through it."

Not today. Perhaps not even tomorrow. Or in a week. Not knowing didn't sit well with Claire, whose eyes tracked over the room, noting the exits and layout. It's different than the one she's sheltering in.

"Yeah, I tried. Same thing happened to me - couldn't keep going. Had to crawl back through the muck."

She could still feel it deep in her bones, more exhausted than she should be after an attempt like this.

[tinstar]

He didn't like it. It was just rain for fucks sake; there should be no reason they couldn't push through it. He didn't understand it and with no apparent answers, it added itself to the growing list of things to chew on as soon as he found a place to sit and calm the hell down at.

He shook his head, jaw tensed as he looked around the room and set into a short pacing to keep himself moving and warm. Though Warm seemed like a long lost memory that he couldn't quite remember. "Don't make any sense. Never met rain I couldn't walk through."

He looked back over at her. She was young. Well, he supposed that meant that what happened to him happened to everyone.

"You just show up, or you come in last night with the rest of us?"

[waywardsister]

"Think we all came together."

Claire rubbed her arms a little, then shrugged. It was more a gesture of overall discomfort than anything else.

"I've been pretty holed up, but... hated just waiting around. Now I just wanna find out what this is holding us here."

Might be witches. Ghosts, maybe? Though she can't imagine what kind of ghosts could conjure up a storm like that. Witches harnessing ghosts, maybe...

Further research is needed.

"Seems no one's got a clue what's going on."

[tinstar]

"In waves," He replied, a bare shot at a punny reply. He hadn't seen anyone else on the beach, only meeting people at the Gull, so that meant their times must have been staggered.

He couldn't stand in his own wet anymore and eyed the empty fireplace before eyeing the kitchen.

"Well if you find some big invisible fence, let the rest of us know," he said as he headed for the kitchen to start rummaging through drawers. "Only thing I know is we're in a place called Mathis Township. If that's any help to ya."

It wasn't to him.

The rattle in his hand said 'matches' but he still had nothing to burn... Until he saw the woodend kitchen chairs. Hefting one, he walked back into the main room.

[waywardsister]

Claire shifted a bit, taking up a vigil leaning against the wall.

"Funny. Morbid, but funny," she commented on the pun, one eyebrow raised slightly. Well, she could appreciate some off beat, perhaps even black humour. Better than despair in the face of their fate, which they don't seem capable of deterring.

"I think the storm is our fence, for now. No idea if it'll ease up, but I'm itching for it to. I hate being stuck indoors without being able to try and figure this whole situation out."

[tinstar]

He bobbed his head with a little lift of his eyebrow; a silent thank you.

"If it doesn't, we got a whole different set of problems, bein' this close to the beach." He tossed the matches up onto the mantle and glanced over. "Sound warnin', if you need one."

The chair was hefted into a better position and Raylan slammed it on the ground, breaking off the back completely and fracturing the seat. It was good enough to start. He dropped the seat and squatted down to start picking up the wood.

"Got a name I can call ya?"

[waywardsister]

Claire hesitated, biting her lip, and watched him work to make a fire. She was paying close attention - the guy looked like he knew what he was doing. While Claire had no issues setting something on fire, building a nice fire in a fireplace was a different beast.

"Sure. The name's Claire. What's yours? Or do you want me to just call you 'cowboy'?"

[tinstar]

He smirked as stood and moved over to the fireplace to start stacking it all up, using the fragments that busted off as his kindling.

"Raylan is fine," he answers as his busy hands continued, striking a match and cupping it forward to try and light the kindling. "You sound a lot more comfortable with this rain as fence thing," he said before cussing under his breath as the kindling refused to light. Not stupid enough to waste more matches just yet, he stood up and started looking around. A magazine, a book, anything.

"Mind if I ask why that is?"