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Gathering: New Guest Reception

The black sign positioned in front of the Dining Hall's main entrance reads:

New Guest Reception
TODAY
6 PM - 8 PM

All guests welcome

In the Dining Hall itself, the chairs have been pushed up against the walls and the long dining table turned into a buffet stocked with finger foods. At the far end of the room is a small bar serving beer, standard cocktails and non-alcoholic drinks.

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It's been yet another strange day. Arthur had closed his eyes to sleep and found himself on an airplane in Los Angeles. The loaded die had been rolled, assuring him (again) of his own wakefulness. After settling in–this time not in a hotel but in an old, beloved bed and breakfast–he's once again woken up (or dreamed?) of the strange hotel.

Just as in LA, he's in a new suit, this one charcoal gray with a crisp, ivory shirt and a darker gray waistcoat lined with silk the color of old gold. Concealed in a shoulder holster is a lightweight pistol, one that's easy to disguise with rigid posture and well-tailored clothing.

With a drink in hand, he could be any number of businessmen passing through a normal hotel as he surveys the others.

Arthur just hopes he won't have to kick himself out of the dream with any inelegant methods.

Nick approached the other Nick with an easy smile, nodding towards the drink in his hand. He waited until he'd caught the guy's eyes.

"Found that drink, I see," Nick said, adding the signing in as well for the hell of it.

"Have I?" Arthur asks, wondering who the stranger is that they are apparently on such familiar terms.

Well, shit. This again?

As soon as he heard the voice he knew this guy wasn't Nick. The other Nick. Thankfully, it also wasn't his first trip with clones, or dopplegangers or whatever the hell made two different people share exactly the same face.

"Yeah, nevermind that comment. You look like someone I met the earlier, but since he's deaf, and mute, I think, you're clearly not him." With that, he extended a hand towards the guy. "Nick Gautier."

"Arthur," he replies, shaking his hand. "And I've met him. Nick, isn't he?" He keeps it calm and professional, as if it's no more peculiar than a job interview.

"Other than a face, I don't know how much he and I have in common."

"Nice to meet you," Nick said by rote, then broke into a laugh over the next comment. It didn't take Nick any time at all to sense the difference in the two men, no matter the face they wore. This guy didn't have any sort of dark struggle behind his emotions. He just seemed, sort of normal - or as normal as anyone stuck in this place was.

"Not that I can see," he agreed. "Strange as it is, though, it's not the first time I've seen shit like that."

"I'd love to know how it is you've ended up old hat at these things."

Like a safe in his mind, he has no choice but to lock fear away and give away none of himself or his own thoughts.

"I've just come from somewhere even more fucked up than this place," Nick shrugged. "An island where we were all pulled from our lives, dumped onto an island that existed out of any known universe, and stripped of anything preternatural to live as humans. You learn to accept the totally fucked up pretty fast there."

What he says doesn't testify well to Arthur's suspicions of limbo and his own lost mind, but he maintains his pleasant face.

"Are there preternaturals in your world?"

"There are," Nick grinned, a little too wide, "you never know when one of them is going to pop up somewhere."

The smile and speaking combined, he knew his fangs were probably visible. He'd stopped caring years ago on the island - everybody knew and, really, they weren't that unusual. Here? He had no idea.

This is the strangest dream he's ever had, if he is asleep. Despite all efforts to wake himself up (short of using his Glock as an inelegant means of shocking back to reality), Arthur is already unsure whether or not this is.

"Dare I ask?"

Nick was honestly confused. "Ask about what?"

"The fangs," Arthur admits. "What were you in a past...current life? Besides a fine conversationalist."

Nick couldn't help the laugh. Yeah, he liked this guy a lot. "That'd be current life, but they're just for show. I don't go around snacking on humans as a rule. You're safe enough."

It was true. Even when his demon powers were strong, he didn't want human blood. It wasn't powerful enough to do anything for him. Like iceberg lettuce. You could eat it, but five minutes later you were hungry again.

"Well I'm glad to know I'm off the menu." Arthur's readily hitting the point where he's just going to stop asking questions and roll with whatever game this reality is playing.

"Well, you're off mine," Nick qualified with a grin. "I can't vouch for anyone else around here with fangs, and there are a few from what I've sensed. But I will warn you that it's not a good idea to be around me if I'm pissed off. Doesn't happen often, but it can get ugly pretty fast. Enough about me, though. Where were you before you turned up here?"

"I try not to be on anyone's menu," Arthur promises. "And to stay out of the way of people who disagree."

"Always a good plan," Nick commented, then leveled an eyebrow at the guy. "Am I supposed to take the lack of answer to where you're from as a comment that you're not answering and not push or just ask again?"

He'd been a law student once for a reason.

"Mostly because I don't have a set answer." Arthur shrugs, looking around the hotel. "I travel so much it's hard to say."

Nick had heard enough non-answers in his life past becoming a Dark Hunter to know that further questions were not going to be answered any more than that one had been. If the guy wanted to keep his life quiet, who was Nick to pester him about it?

"Fair enough," he answered instead.

"I was headed to Los Angeles when I started this side trip," Arthur admits. What can this man do if he doesn't know Arthur's an extractor? "I have an apartment in Chicago, but at this point it's an expensive storage unit."

"Sounds like my house in New Orleans. Lovely little place on Bourbon Street that I technically haven't been in for nearly two years, but I'm not sure if the time I was on the island counts, just like I'm not sure how much the time I'm in other realms counts. It's enough to make your head hurt," Nick laughed a little.

Arthur nods politely, thinking about his own perception of time. He can count hours in minutes these days.

"Island?"

"Yeah, I didn't come here from my home in New Orleans. I'd been stuck on an island kind of like this hotel. You know, can't leave, no idea how you got there, all that fun stuff. For most of the people there it was weird, for me? I'm used to going into other realms. So, bottom line, I'm not sure how long it's been since I've been in my house or if anyone even knows I'm missing."

But he was starting to think he'd need to find some way to check.

"I feel like I'm in the rabbit hole and hitting my head over and over again the deeper I go," Arthur observes, shaking his head.

"Tricky thing is, I went back to LA and then here I am again."

He shakes his head, trying to make it shake into sense.

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