ooc/ Sorry I'm a bit delayed at starting, working on getting my nursing license, and studying takes forever. I'll try to be active today.

bic/ Cooper eyed her gas gauge, the needle floating between 1/4 full and empty. "Should've stopped at the last gas station Coop." she told herself. She disliked driving in the rain and a storm seemed to be brewing down the road. A motel light flickered on ahead, she didn't see anywhere else to stop and didn't want her hunter green Explorer to die from lack of gas in the middle of a storm. As she drove closer to the motel, slowly since her windshield wipers were in serious need of replacement and barely did anything to clear the rain streaking down the windshield, she noticed a flurry of commotion at the rear of the motel.

"What the -?" she shouted, again to nobody. Her brain felt like it was spinning in circles, trying to comprehend the amount of supernaturals in one place. She slammed on her brakes, leaving the vehicle safely out of harms way near the road, but far off enough that anybody driving wouldn't hit the SUV. "And here I thought I was done with all of these shenanigans for awhile. All I wanted was a nice place to rest, out of the rain, and this is what I get." she grumbled, reaching into the cluttered backseat, grabbing her knife and rain jacket.

Stepping out of the car her brown hair was immediately soaked along with her pants and boots. "Stupid rain." she thought, glaring up at the sky, before approaching the scene. She'd seen a variety of supernatural creatures in her short life, but the creature crouching in the middle of the scene was a new one. Her body wanted to run, the patchwork of skin and shape was frightening, but her determination to have a night of rest won out. She didn't recognize the words that it spoke, but it looked like it had surrendered. She took a position on it's left, rotating her blade up so that it was hidden in her sleeve. Her stance seemed casual enough, but she could move quickly if the need arose.

Keeping an eye on the monster, Cooper's grey eyes scanned the others, trying to identify the others supernatural status. Clearly a marshmonster was hurt, the other people surrounding the beast weren't as easy to identify. She wondered why somebody was on the roof, but figured the person was at least safe up there. "This looks like a nice quiet place to stay." The excitement of a potential fight got the better mouth, she instantly regretted the joke, but said nothing otherwise. Instead the woman focused on the monster, not wanting it to hurt anything or anybody.

(not entirely sure who to tag)

The Wendigo summoned up a quiet growl as some other woman approached and flicked their wings weakly, but that was all. They slumped even further onto the ground, some part of them - maybe the part that once lived happily with his beloved family and wanted nothing but to serve his country - hoped that the stranger had a knife for their throat or a bullet for their brains. Not that they were sure it would kill them.

Jervis was obviously weighing up the pros and cons of telling Selphy more. He crossed his legs and put his hands on his knees, looking at her with his head cocked in a slightly birdlike manner - or maybe his fine blond hair made him look more like Riley the golden retriever puppy. He spoke again after a handful of seconds, having made his decision.

"I was a neuroscientist. I was studying, uh, how the brain worked and the possibility of... communication between two minds without speaking - telepathy, to put it simply. If it was possible to use technology to simulate the phenomenon and open up an entirely new form of communication, a new frontier in technology... It didn't work." he added sadly.

Jervis took a deep breath, preparing to confess something he'd never confessed to any living thing before - not even Tea and Cake. "The thing is - and I do hope you won't hate me for it - the thing is... I'm psychic. Always have been, as long as I can recall. I can hear people thinking, even move objects with my mind when I try very hard. That's how I knew you were afraid of dogs - I... I heard you think it. I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to pry but I can't turn it off. I can hear everyone in this motel thinking, every single minute of every single day. Like dozens of radios all tuned to different stations."

Coventina had leapt down from the roof in the aftermath of Jackie's crash into the wall. She stood in the gap of the hole, staring at the creature and at Tim's mangled form.

The Marshman had blood running down his body, unsettling Covie and only serving to stoke her sense of how strong this creature was. She did hope that Babs stayed away - this creature put up a strong enough fight against Tim, whose species was innately strong and used to abuse from other species. She prepared herself to step forward and incapacitate it, but Jackie beat her to the literal punch.

The creature rolled off of Tim, thankfully, and curled into a ball. Covie could feel the rage rolling off of Jackie in waves, and stepped forward to cautiously put a hand on her shoulder.

The creature started speaking in mangled Russian - the voices it spoke with were plentiful and pained, begging for forgiveness from its - wife and family? This creature.... something must have happened to let such a soul linger in such a horrific body. "Wait, Jackie. I must know what this creature speaks of."

She stepped forward, slowly, letting the rain slacken and slow behind her. "Do you know your name?" she asked lowly.

Selphy stared back at Jervis as he seemed to consider something, and was prepared to tell him not to worry about it, that she was sorry and didn't mean to pry, when he apparently made up his mind and began to speak. She listened with rapt attention, happy he was confiding in her.

"Oh...that's still really amazing, though..." She was in awe of smart, wonderful people like Jervis. Whether or not his experiments were successful, she didn't even know where a person would begin on a project like that! Maybe she could ask him more questions about it some other time.

The weight of whatever Jervis was about to say wasn't lost on Selphy when he took a deep breath, and she made sure to give him her complete attention. Her violet eyes widened considerably throughout his speech, and she put a hand to her mouth at the end. "Oh..." She thought back to what had just happened to her outside, how overwhelmed she'd felt by just a handful of stimuli compared to what Jervis was talking about. Sympathy welled up inside her.

"That must be really tough...I don't know if I could handle it," she said, looking at him sadly. "Don't worry, I don't mind...actually, it's sort of a relief? Because if you can hear what I'm thinking, but you still want to talk to me, then you must not mind what an awful coward I am." She smiled. "I really had no clue. You must be strong, to go through all that and still act normally all the time..." She was pretty sure that she would spend all day curled up in the fetal position if she had a bunch of voices in her head all the time.

((OOC: Yay! I'm excited! ANd I totally missed him saying Hi to Mara! :O))

Mara looked up at the ghost who was now introducing himself to the Riley. Riley let out a playful bark as he started wagging his tail. Mara sighed, "That's Riley, Andrea's dog." She told him, "I'm Mara." She introduced as the ghost was very friendly. Mara waved her hand at the ghost, "I'll be fine. I just need to breath." She told the gho-Buttons as she did not want to talk about her problems. "I thought ghosts were to look like people or black masses not cartoons." She stated to Buttons. Of course she got her information from Andrea's stories of her run in with ghost and ghost tv shows that Andrea would watch. Mara started to scratch Riley in some sort of way to clear her head as the memories of her past persisted to be remembered. Her head perked up as Jervis had told the girl that he was psychic. So there was another like Andrea in their midst. 'Great' she thought. That meant she had to keep her thoughts blocked behind a wall. Though she was sure her roommate didn't read her thoughts as she often had the 'psychic switch' turned off. She saw how drained her roommate would get if she used them too much.

((OOC: No problem! It seemed to fit Mara's personality (not to mention the dangerous situation), so I didn't even realize. 😄 ))

Buttons was excitedly (but slowly) bobbing up and down, ecstatic to have met so many wonderful new people in one day. "It's nice to meet yooooou, Riley and Maraaaa!" He did a little twirl as he spoke; it was always harder for him to stay still when he was happy.

"That's truuuue...others have said that to me befoooore," he answered thoughtfully, not at all bothered by the question. "I've aaaaalways looked like this...or, at least, since I became a ghooooost..." He turned upside down, floating in front of Riley and watching his tail wag. How cute! Did that mean that Selphy had a tail...? He would have to ask later. He flipped over to look at Mara. "I'm happy that I took this foooorm, since it doesn't seem to scaaaaare people..." He flipped to look over at Selphy and Jervis for a moment, then turned back. "Well...mooooost people..."

He got close to Riley again, watching as Mara scratched him. "Ooooooooh...is he soooooft? I've never seen such a fluffy person befoooooore..."

The Wendigo stared at the floor a few seconds, the souls in their head making such a chaotic fuss that they were having trouble understanding the question - let alone answering it. Eventually they managed to seize the answer from the tumult in their head, rasping out an answer. Nobody had asked their name for over a century. In fact, no human being had talked to them at all since their accident; it was all screams of terror, yelled orders to get back or go away, or the sound of gunfire. In over nine decades, they hadn't heard a single kind or even neutral voice.

"I... Menya... zovut Eduard. D-doktor... Eduard Jac... Jacobi." they said quietly, then turned to stare at the woman who had asked their name with a pleading expression. "Please... Tak bol'no... Pozhaluysta. Sdelat' bol' uyti..."

They heaved another painful breath. "Tak bol'no."

((Translation: "My name is Eduard. Doctor Eduard Jacobi. It hurts so much. Please. Make the pain go away. It hurts so much."))

"I don't know about strong. I have... had time to get used to the voices - I've been hearing them since I was born. Most of the time it's just... Well, it's just noise, like bird song or the traffic going past the window. I think the hardest part was learning to tell what people's brains had said and what their mouths had said." I did used to get into all sorts of trouble for that, saying all sorts of strange things. Oh, the names they used to call me... The things they used to throw at me... he thought to himself. No, his school days were not happy days by any stretch of the imagination.

Jervis looked at Selphy very seriously. "Thank you for not judging me for it. I've never told a single soul before you, I was honestly terrified that you would run out the door or... Or dose me in holy water or something. See, I'm a bit of a coward myself sometimes." he added wryly.

Riley let out another playful bark at Buttons, "He is and he's a dog. He is not a person like I am or you were." She told Buttons as he was watching Riley. "Aren't you curious about how you looked before this? Whatever form you could have taken might have had the same effect." She stated as Riley started to squirm in her lap. It seemed that he wanted to play with Buttons. Mara let Riley go as he went and sat in front of Buttons and wagged his tail. "it's nice to meet you too." She spoke before looking down at her hands. Why was she even talking to this ghost anyway? Of course she didn't want to be too rude to the girl's roommate as she gave her shelter from the creature but could this spirit haunt her as well?

Selphy felt sad again, listening to Jervis talk. This was obviously a source of a lot of emotional pain for him, and she felt a little guilty for asking the question that led to him talking about it.

She felt a little shy under the serious look he was giving her, and glanced at the floor, hands grasping each other tightly. "No...I understand. Thank you for telling me." She was the first person he'd ever told...? Wow. She felt a bit lightheaded at being given that sort of responsibility. Still, some of the things she'd seen in her life...some of the horrible people...

She forced herself to look back at him, not wanting her shyness to be mistaken for insincerity. "You know...you're a very nice person." She turned her hands onto her knees, her fingers digging into the fabric of her skirt. "I've met a lot of bad people, and with all of them--well, it didn't matter what they were capable of. That's not what made them bad. It was the things they chose to do that made them that way." This was more than she generally talked, and so she hesitated, but she'd come this far, and ultimately continued. "And so...well, I think you see what I mean. You didn't ask to be able to do this, and you don't use it for anything bad. You're just trying to be yourself... So, I think that if I judged you for it, that would make me the one who was bad."

She glanced away again, now caught in some memories of her own. Memories of murderers, of monsters, of many, many things she'd rather forget...and someone as nice as poor Jervis had to worry about people hating him? It just made her sad.

Buttons was delighted when Mara put Riley down, and he floated around him in a circle, watching his reactions with glee. "A dooooog? I see..." He would have smiled, if he could. "I like dogs, they're very adoooorable..."

Her next question gave him pause, and he looked up at Mara again. "Oooooh...that's a good questioooon..." He considered it. "Hm...I'd have to say that I've neeeeever thought about thaaaat," he responded finally, content with the conclusion he'd reached. "After aaaall, I can't remember, and from what people have toooold me, the circumstances that made me this way were prooobably not happy oooones..."

He resumed playing with Riley as best he could without hands, darting around the little pup with as much speed as he could muster. "I'm happy just to meet new frieeeends, you seeee..." He floated up a bit higher, facing her for a moment. "What about yoooou? Is there anything yooooou wonder aboooout?" He wasn't the most skilled at making conversation, but he was always eager to speak with everyone he met.

Riley followed Buttons around and playfully barked. When Buttons spoke she looked at him, could his previous form be a different personality all together? Andrea would have a ball if she was having this conversation with Buttons. When he asked her about what she had wondered about she opened and then closed her mouth. "No." She said sternly. Often times her mind had wondered to what had happened and if there was any chance that he could be alive. Mara knew that it was all wishful thinking and when these thoughts resurfaced she often started drinking to forget. "Is there any alcohol to drink here?" She asked the ghost.

Jervis smiled shakily at the praise Selphy was heaping on him. "I wish you were right but... I have hurt people in the past. Sometimes I'd lose control of my abilities and... Well. Being a human poltergeist was the least of my troubles. I think you're far kinder than I am, besides, accepting me and my weirdness like this..." he said. Then his nerves - still a little frayed from his fright earlier and frayed still further this very serious conversation - got the better of him and he started quoting before he could help himself. "'Well, now that we have seen each other,' said the Unicorn, 'if you'll believe in me, I'll believe in you. Is that a bargain?'...Sorry! Sorry."

Buttons stopped playing with Riley (though, honestly, he was having the time of his unlife) and floated back up to Andrea. He had always seemed to have a knack for what people were feeling. "Oh nooooo, I've upset you...I'm so soooooorry..." He floated about the front half of the room, searching. "I don't thiiiiink there's any heeeere...but if I had arms, I could make you some teeeeea..." He looked at the ground in shame (quite literally, as his entire body had turned horizontal). "If there's anything I can dooooo, please tell meeeee..."

Selphy looked back at Jervis, feeling a little guilty; it was easy for her to say things like that, but of course there was more she didn't know, so she had to be careful not to make him feel guilty. She had no doubt that, no matter what had transpired, he was still a wonderful person, but resolved to speak more carefully, a resolution that doubled when he began quoting again, presumably out of stress.

"Oh, please don't apologize...I only wish I remembered enough to quote back to you." She smiled faintly, then looked down, wracking her brain. "Let's see...um...'All of us are are mad here. You're mad, and I'm mad." Her smile was more sheepish now. "I don't think that was quite right, but...the point stands."

((They're friends and it's cute. I want to draw them now.))

"'How do you know I'm mad?' said Alice. 'You must be,' said the Cat, 'or you wouldn't have come here.'. Hmm. This motel certainly does attract some awfully queer clientele, doesn't it? If I ran the place my hair would have turned completely white in a fortnight, and I'd probably have taken up drink." quoth Jervis thoughtfully, watching Buttons float above the floor like a melancholy handkerchief. Something of the little ghost's words reached the blond man's ears and he perked up at what he heard. "Did someone mention tea? I have lots in my room, and a very nice set for drinking out of. A nice cup of tea might be just the ticket for calming us all down after that dreadful scrap outside."

Mara looked at Buttons as he was searching. "Don't worry about it. It's okay." She spoke as she picked Riley back up to put him on her lap. "I have some at my apartment, I can drink when it's safe." Mara told Buttons in hopes to calm the ghost down. She took a deep breath in and let it out. She sat quietly as she looked at Riley for the next few minutes. "It has nothing to do with you. Thank you for the offer. It is kind of you." She thanked Buttons before scratching Riley again.

((OOC: Oh my gosh, yeeeees, I was thinking the same thing! I actually doodled Selphy and Buttons yesterday, I would be stoked if you drew a ref of Jervis at some point. C: Social Anxiety Pals!))

Selphy smiled as he finished her quote. "Your memory is much better than mine." Privately, she agreed with him about running this place, since just living here was giving her enough angst to last a lifetime.

She looked over at Buttons, who it seemed was getting on well with Mara. She was glad...after all, she was too frightened of him to be very fun to talk to. She tensed slightly and let out a tiny "eep!" when she saw Riley in Mara's lap, however; a dog, in her room?! How had she not noticed until now?! Timidly, she stood and backed a couple of steps away, hoping it was at least somewhat subtle.

Buttons flopped over, looking at Jervis upside down. "Ooooooh, yes! You should gooooo...so that everyone will beeeee happy..." He righted himself, so that now he was facing Mara. ""Yooooou're welcome...but I really think yooooou should have some teeeea," he moaned. He was happy to hear her thanks (he'd been helpful!), but could tell that she was still bothered by whatever it was that had upset her in the first place.

He sensed Selphy's discord as well, and turned towards her and Jervis. "You tooooo, Selphyyy...everyone should have some relaxing teeeea with Mr. Jeeeervis..." Buttons, of course, wouldn't be able to attend, tied as he was to Room 14. But he cared more about everyone being happy than himself having company.

((As regards to refs, Jervis is the spitting image of Jervis Tetch (aka the Mad Hatter) from Batman: The Animated Series, 'cos he's pretty much a magical!AU version of him. This also explains the AAiW obsession. Take away the headband and here's him.))

"Yes! A tea party in my room - that sounds just wonderful!" Jervis threw back the covers and swung himself from the bed, pausing to lay the blanket back down neatly again; he smoothed them with a fastidious hand and tutted to himself about the mess he must have made to poor Selphy's mattress. Getting into bed with his shoes on, what was he thinking? He'd have to talk to her later about recompensing her for the cost of cleaning them. Jervis adjusted his wrinkled shirt as he looked around the room.

"And - sorry, I didn't catch your name - is welcome to come, too." (He made a little bowing motion towards Mara at this point.) "The more the merrier, there's always room! I have all sorts of tea in my stores: English breakfast, black, green, oolong, redbush, nettle, mint, decaffeinated, liquorish..." He listed them all off on his fingers. "You get the idea, I think. I think have some cake in my kitchen cupboards, too. And fruit juice and lemonade, if you don't like tea. Whoops, there I go - babbling again. I may be a little overexcited. Ahem."

((OOC: I am SO annoyed with myself for not getting that reference, B:TAS was my life growing up! Man. cx Going to have to revisit those episodes now, I have the DVD set.))

Selphy held out a hand as Jervis fixed her bed, wanting to intervene; she didn't mind, since, after all, it had been an emergency, and she could fix it up herself. But she was distracted keeping one eye on Riley, and in what felt like a second he had finished smoothing out the covers and turning to the room at large before she'd figured out what to say.

Buttons seemed much happier, reflecting Jervis' enthusiasm. "That sounds wooooonderful...have a good tiiiiiime, everyone." The ghost was taking it for granted that they were all, Mara included, going, because he'd come to the conclusion that this was the happiest, healthiest course of action.

Selphy didn't move from her spot in the corner, eyes flicking nervously between her door and the dog. "But...is it s-safe...?" Now that her focus was off of comforting Jervis, her fright was coming back in spades.

((Holy dooley, it's 3am here. I'm off to bed. I bet someone's gonna reply as soon as I go, but oh well. XD ))

Okay, yeah I get it now!

"DAAAMN!" Lee screamed as he watched Chevelle plow through the building, his eyes darting to Babs who gave him a disapproving look, and he cringed. He hoped the goddess had a plan for explaining that one! "What is it?" Lee asked Andrea. "Aw man, I hope you know what you're doing!"

Chevelle watched the beast curl up into a ball and whimper pathetically, it's antler flung off somewhere from the force of her blow. She snapped her fingers and unsummoned the spirit, which faded out into the air. Her other arm was still raised, lip curled in a snarl, and it babbled incoherently in some language she couldn't recognize. Though it sounded like it had asked to die. "I can do that-" She snarled, but Covie intervened. The sea goddess' hand on her shoulder made her slowly drop her fist, but she wasn't any happier. This thing had attacked someone, and who's to say it wouldn't keep doing it? It didn't seem to have much sense, or rather, it seemed to come in spurts. She cracked her knuckles, but let Covie deal with the creature, and ran over to Tim. "You think you can get up?" She looked at the damage. His brown blood leaked everywhere. Ugh, who even knew where that thing had been. It looked half-dead as it was, which didn't say much for the state of Tim's wounds. They'd have to be cleaned, but how did you stitch together tough skin? Maybe Covie could help with that. As a Marshman, he'd have a connection to water as well, right? That eye didn't look good... "I mean if you can't I can...uh...carry you. I mean..." It was good Tim couldn't speak much English; he'd probably confuse everyone else describing to them what he saw. But it would also keep her cover. "We don't need to take any more time sititn' next to this thing then we have to." Something dripped into her eyes, not the right viscosity for rain, and she wiped it onto the back of her hand. Black oil dripped from a wound that appeared on her forehead, and she stared at it a second. She must have done more damage to herself than expected, but it would pass. A slight dribble fell from the corner of her mouth, but she wiped that away too, hopefully before anyone else could see. Repairs could come later, but that was a pretty sturdy wall she'd barrelled through.

"Mara and I'm not a tea person. I really should get some sleep if I have work later." She said to the man, Thank you anyway." Mara spoke as she got up and poked her head out the door to see Andrea and Lee still standing there. "Is it safe?" Mara asked her roommate as she would like to go sit in her room and drink.

"It's a Wendigo." She stated, "And I think I do." Andrea spoke to Lee. She turned as her roommate looked out the door, "I don't know. There's a hole in the hotel." Andrea told Mara as Riley started squirming, "I suppose you could look through the window in our room and find out what's going on." Andrea suggested to the girl. She watched as Mara stood there for a second, "Or I'll go." She spoke, "You can follow or stay." She told Lee before she started heading to their room. As she entered she saw the cryptozoology tossed on her bed. Andrea moved towards the window to see that it was cracked. She sighed as it would come out of her paycheck. She looked to the right a bit to see it sitting down with Tim in a ball and Jackie and Covie there.