OOC:Okay, I'm back now.

IC:
Ma'dat, unlike most of the others, was still asleep in bed. He hadn't gotten a very good sleep, his thoughts clouded with worry about the Mages Guild and their upcoming investigation of the Terra Guild. The thing he was most afraid of was, of course, the Mages Guild somehow being able to prove them being involved in illegal activities such as Dwemer research or Daedric summoning. Either of those would definantly get them the death penalty, and he wasn't ready to die yet. Other thoughts made him fearful, such as what the rest of the town would think of them because of this. Sure, they might be cleared officially, but being under investigation would mean rumors and gossip about them that could destroy the guild's reputation and endanger it's members.

All of these thoughts, however, were soon drowned out by the sounds of Frank's alarm clock followed by yelling and the smell of breakfast. These three things combined to create the perfect wake up call for Ma'dat, though he was still relatively groggy when he got up. Rubbing his eyes as he sat up, he tried to grab his robes. They were just right of reach for him, however, and soon he was tumbling onto the ground.

"Well, that woke me up for sure." He said, rubbing his now aching head. Grabbing his robes, with success this time, he got himself dressed up and ready for the day. As he headed out the door, however, he wondered if he really should be wearing them. They were the clothes of a monk, something he was not anymore. Would it really make sense for him to wear it? Would it be suspicious to the Mage's Guild?

"Ma'dat, you've gotten yourself paranoid over this. They won't be suspicious because you're wearing a robe." He said to himself, shaking such ridiculous thoughts out of his head.

Heading downstairs to the kitchen, making sure to try and not interupt any ongoing conversations, he started grabbing together a small breakfast for himself of bread, eggs, and if there was any left, milk.

ooc: I hate being a non-admin on a computer. Windows updated and rebooted the computer without asking me if I was busy. I was almost done with a post too. Urghk!

Anyway, as I was saying, nothing's moving here and I'm bored. But you gave me an excuse to post, so you get hugs. :hugs:

ic: Jo'Rokku finished his oatmeal whilst reading and listening to Karst and Frank. When Ma'Dat came down, the Khajiit looked like someone had literally thrown him out of bed. He looked up at his fellow feline over the top of Poison Song and smiled a little.

"So, did Psycho-Happy-Kitty wake you up?" he asked nonchalantly, then went to take a drink from his coffee. Upon lifting it to his lips, though, he was puzzled to find it empty but for a few drops. Dammit, this thing was almost full! Death Princess drank it all.. he thought, then got up and looked up the stairs towards where he could hear her still, And she does not need that much caffeine. Not in this state. She's loony enough as it is.

Getting up, he walked over to the pot and poured himself another cup. Making coffee the old fashioned way, by boiling it, made for a much stronger brew. And a bit grittier too. It took him the whole time he'd been in Tamriel to get used to the strength of it and he still could only stomach a small gulp at a time. Seeing as Karst had gulped down a cup in about three seconds, he wondered just how long she'd been hooked on the stuff.

Frank came near to a blush as she reprimanded him and grabbed his wrist, healing his wound. "I woulda been fine if not suddenly distracted. And what if they search your place after noticing a connection?" He rubbed his wrist and looked at the healed skin as he spoke. "We can't continue to use you as a storage unit Karst. It's putting you in a tight and dangerous spot. Not everything can be stored away."

Maybe he was being stubborn, but Frank did have that tendency to be hell bent on his view when he had one. And he had yet to find another alternative. When she commented on his 'bedmate' Frank came even closer to a blush, and for a second was speechless as he tried to form a reply. Naturally, he said the first thing that came to mind. "I was under the impression I never had you to begin with." He raised one eyebrow at this inquiringly, his voice smooth as he managed to toe the line between jesting and seriousness once again. "Besides, she is far too injured for that kind of thing, and we just met. You know I'm not like that, Karst." He chided her, before moving to towards the nightstand.

The entire time Elbereth remained rather quiet, a slightly unsure expression on her face at Karst's remarks. She decided to just let Frank to the rebuttals and instead answer the question. "About as good as you can with a torn up gut." She pulled a smile, then motioned towards Frank. "I imagine he hadn't though. Slept in a chair and fell out to his own alarm... thing." Elbereth slowed her speech as she turned to look at Frank, who was standing in front of the nightstand and grasping the top of the melted clock tightly. His eyes were closed, as if concentrating. A moment later he whipped around and flung the clock towards the opposite wall.

It slammed against the wall and shattered like fragile glass into a mess of shards and strips of bronze and steel.

ooc: Holy mother of Vault Boy, IT LIVES!

BTW, has anyone played any of the DLC packs for Oblivion besides KOTN and SI? I just downloaded them, save for Horse Armor, off Live this morning. (I don't use horses much, wasn't worth the 200 points to me.)

And where is Pickpocket?

ic: Karst sighed at Frank's argument, the sort of exasperated sigh one made when someone sounded ridiculous to them. "'A tight and dangerous spot'?" she almost laughed, "What, you think I can't lie my way past some robed dweebs with their thumbs up their asses? C'mon, it's like you don't know me at all. I doubt they'll ever find out I have a place in town; I've got no ties here besides you guys and I can just hide it all somewhere else before they show up if they do manage to figure it out. Not like I'm gonna tell." she said, then laughed, "What're they gonna do, torture it outta me?" Karst almost sounded like she found the idea of the Mage's Guild torturing her amusing. As a sort of afterthought, she added teasingly to Frank's little comment, winking afterwards, "And yeah, you do have me, just not how you'd like to."

When Elbereth finally spoke, Karst got the feeling that she made the woman a tad uneasy. Either that or the Bosmer just didn't quite know what to think of her. Either way, Karst was used to it. She patted Elbereth's thigh in a motherly fashion. "Well, that's good. For you at least. Frank's always been more or less chivalrous, so I can see 'im sleeping in the ch- Aah!"

As the clock exploded against the wall, Karst jumped and yelped, her tail that lay across her lap puffing up. She stared at it a moment, then at Frank, and made a growling, sighing noise at him. "Dammit! What the hell'd ya do that for? You're more destructive than me.. You ever think that you'll have to clean up those strips and gears before they get here? Sheesh.. You scared the [censored] out of me."

"Sorry." Frank apologized sheepishly, receiving a glare not only from Karst, but from Elbereth as well.

"She's right, you do have issues with destroying things." The bosmer commented semi-casually.

"But I destroy things with a reason, not on a whim." Frank snapped back defensively, approaching the mess of metal and picking up the pieces. "It is far easier to explain that I am studying the use of metals in alchemy, than to explain the existence of a half-melted broken dwemer-esque clock on my nightstand." He spoke with matter-of-fact-ness that was rather blunt, moving towards his alchemy table and setting down the metal shards.

"Well... You've got a point there, but still... There's an issue there." Elbereth replied, looking around at the empty walls. "I mean, you could have allowed Karst here to take your pictures. But you had to burn them."

Frank sighed, looking sheepish again as he went to his dresser and pulled open a drawer. "I'll admit that was hasty, yes." He grumbled, pulling out a ragged looking book. It looked like it was opened and closed more often than could be considered healthy. This he handed over to Karst as he walked up to the bed. "This is all I want to give to you. It's the only truly important thing I have here, and the only responsibility I am willing to place on you. It's my journal slash notebook. It has the schematics on the clock, the originals and the newer versions I have designed over time, as well as my studies in Alchemy, spellcraft, and the Liminal Barrier. Anything work I destroy, is outlined and reproducible through my memory and this journal."

OOC: Here I am. Sorry for disappearing.There hadn't been any new posts, and when that happens I tend to get into a "procrastination" sort of mode. I really need to work on that...

IC:
"No, Karst didn't wake me up at all. I'm naturally an early morning person, though apparently not enough to escape falling out of bed." Ma'Dat replied as he finished making up his own breakfast.

Bread and some fruit wasn't much (being from the South he had occassionally had really big breakfasts with eggs,bacon, and the works), but it was enough to take care of any needs he had in the morning. Unlike his fellow feline friend, however, he preferred water or milk. Coffee was never of any interest to him.

As he was taking a sip, however, he heard the smashing of some big object upstairs, causing him to jump in surprise and spill some water over himself. It was times like this he enjoyed his robes; they teneded to absorb stains and moisture pretty well. Still, he would eventually end up upstairs trying to dry it out.

"What in the world was that?"

Karst attempted to smooth out her puffed up tail, but the fur refused to lay down. Her heart was racing and she looked genuinely put out and perhaps a bit embarrassed. She played nervously with the tip of her tail, looking up as Frank finished speaking to her about holding onto something for him. The tip of her nose bumped the edge of the book and her tail fluffed up a little more at the shock of having something suddenly in her face. She startled and stared at Frank a moment, then took the book and moved to stick down her shirt, stopping when she remembered she actually had pockets in her jeans. Karst was so used to her only pockets being in her coat that this was second nature to her when she was without it. In hindsight, it might've been a tad disturbing to Frank for her to shove his journal down her bra and she was glad she'd caught herself.

Once the little book was safe in her pocket, Karst fidgeted with her right toes through the sandals she wore from where they sat across her left knee. "You.. really need to not surprise me like this in the morning. You made me poof." she said quietly at last, her ears back a notch, sounding ashamed and poking the tip of her tail that was currently about three times its normal diameter.
_______
"Hell if I know." Jo'Rokku replied, sitting down. He'd jumped ever so slightly at the clatter and failed to suppress a smile and a chuckle at hearing Karst yelp. It reminded him of a kitten being startled; a high-pitched squeak of shock that had a few of the qualities of a meow. He briefly wondered if Frank had managed to get her tail to fluff up. He loved doing that to her, despite the fact she usually abused him afterwards. With the padding and fur on his feet, he made almost no sound on the floor and could sneak up on her easily while she was distracted. It was a sort of hobby to Jo.

Putting his book down and yanking out a gray hair to use as a bookmark, Jo looked over at Ma'Dat. "So.. what all'd you do to get ready for the invasion later?" The Khajiit sounded latently pissed off about this whole Mage's Guild thing, but he was trying not to let it irk him too much. In all honesty, it seemed to get Karst fired up more than him.

Seeing as there wasn't much left he could do to get the water stain out of his robe outside of changing it, Ma'Dat decided it would be best to just sit down for now. There was plenty of time before the Mages Guild arrived so he had no rush. Besides, he needed to talk to some of the others now more then ever.

"Uh, nothing much really. I had some books and manuscripts I needed Karst to hide for me. Back on Earth I was really into philosophy and stuff, so when I arrived here I wrote some books based on the philosophy of people like John Locke and such. Since they actually got published, and why I'll never know, there was no point getting rid of them. There was some other stuff, however, that I had been in the process of writing that I thought I might want to get rid of. That, and a small history of Earth I was working on so I didn't forget it since history was one of my big things. Thought it might be considered proof of either radicalness or craziness."

Frank took notice of her near shirt-shoving of his journal, but grinned when she soon after put it in a pocket instead. When she ashamedly mentioned her tail being larger, Frank grinned even wider and rubbed her shoulder. "I'm sorry Karst... I'd figured a tough girl like you would have been fine. Besides, puffy tails are softer."

"Ehem..." Elbereth cleared her throat, making Frank turn his attention to her instead. She looked quite displeased. "Before you two get a little too intertwined in your own affairs, care to give me a once-over and the okay to leave?" She inquired, to which Frank nodded and removed his hand from Karst's shoulder, motioning with the same hand for the Khajiit to rise off the bed. Turning to his shelves, he grabbed a needle and spool of thread, then headed to the nightstand. Setting them down beside the healing and disease curing potions, he then got on one knee near the bed.

"First test; how well you can get the bed sheet off you. Don't help Karst, I need to see how her muscles are recovering."

ooc: My friend just got home last night from a military academy, and he's only here for five days, so in those days I may be gone 3/4 of the time.

Karst set her ears back a tad and blushed. "I.. I'm a Khajiit. With ears like mine, I'm sensitive to loud sounds. Especially if I'm not expecting them.." she stammered in embarrassment before Frank added the bit about puffy tails being softer and realized she wasn't actually being judged or ridiculed. She then pulled the oversized appendage protectively into her arms and glared playfully. "I've told you not to touch my tail before.." Karst couldn't recall if Frank had been there or not for the explanation on just why she didn't like her tail touched, but if he hadn't, she really didn't want to repeat it. It was rather embarrassing.

Getting up when motioned to, she let go and allowed her tail to fall back to dangling behind her as it usually did, the black tip flicking back and forth in idle where it stuck out at about halfway down her thigh from under the purple hem of her long shirt. The contrast of the her various exposed furry parts against the stone gray jeans and eggplant shirt was rather striking. Setting one white hand against her hip, she smiled at Elbereth and Frank.

"Well, okay. If you two haven't made breakfast yet, I'll go make you two something. Whatever you want as long as you've got the supplies and equipment for me; I'm in a good mood today." Karst informed them cheerily, leaning her shoulder on the wall as her hip jutted the other direction.
_______
"Manuscripts and philosophy?" Jo'Rokku asked with a chuckle, then shook his head and sipped his coffee. "You're a lot more complex than me culturally. I just stick to my own little world. Or I did, before the switch."

Shaking his head, gray hair shook with it and he smiled a little and looked into his cup at the swirling brown contents. "Y'know, I still have to wonder.. If I hadn't met Karst that day, then run into Frank, I may have never known until maybe about now that there were others. I.. may not have even made it." As he looked at the coffee, he took a drink again and glanced upstairs. "I owe everything I have here to that girl. She's the first one that didn't just look at me funny and skitter off. I just.. I wish I could get the nerve to tell her how much she freakin' means to me. She knows kinda, but.."

After a few seconds of staring into space, he sighed a little, then flicked up and looked at Ma'Dat again. "You have anyone that really helped you acclimate? Someone you might be dead without? Or did you just, like.. do it all yourself?"

Ma'Dat smirked a bit at the compliment about being cultured. The only reason he had ever read all of those books were a mix of boredom as well as a genuine interest. Besides, they were of great us in an argument, or at least would have if anyone outside of his teachers understood them. Still, reading books like that didn't make one cultured. But who turns down a compliment?

He just sat quietly as his eating companion talked about Karst and her affect on his life. It was a touching story, and he could see his point. If it wasn't such a serious topic he'd probably joke about it. But he knew when it was time to get serious, and besides, he could always tease him about it later on. But his little question kind of caught him off guard. His eyes rolled around for a moment as he tried to think of an answer before he actually started talking.

"Well, there was this one girl I met back at the Imperial City that I hung out with for a little while. A Breton if my memory serves. She was like us, from Earth and all of that. The two of us travelled to Bravil together, but after that point we split up. She joined up with the Mages Guild while I had to travel for Imperial Cult. I basically survived on dumb luck after that before getting here. Besides, minus the whole storyline of the "Knights of the Nine", nothing bad ever happens to Cult members."

ooc: *attempts to resuscitate thread*

ic: Jo'Rokku smiled at the Knights of the Nine mention. Tamriel had been real to him so long that he'd almost forgotten about the games. "Yeah, just stay clear of the Chapel of Dibella and you should be fine." he laughed, then drained the rest of his coffee and stood up. "Well, I suppose we ought to make sure everything's in its place before the robed ones march in and have their way with our stuff, eh?"

After putting his mug in the sink and patting Ma'Dat on the shoulder, Jo padded up to his room, pausing only to reach out and poke Karst's ear as he went by. The ear flicked and she raised a middle finger up nonchalantly, knowing all too well who it was. Jo messed with her constantly. He laughed. "And good morning to you, too, princess."

"Oh yeah, I certainly feel the love." she said flatly, then muttered, "Ass."

"And proud of it!" Jo called before shutting himself in his room to arrange things.

After a small chuckle, Karst turned looked over at Frank and Elbereth, an eyebrow raised. "Sooo.. you ladies hungry or not?"