Encounterlogs
Zoes Odd Encounter Sr Iakres 240616
Zoe Androulakis' peaceful evening of baking brownies in her trailer is interrupted by the arrival of what appears to be a police officer, claiming she's under arrest for illegal trafficking of weapons. However, Zoe, a skilled mage, senses something awry due to the swirling red aura surrounding the officer, indicative of Sanctuary's rejection of murderers. Despite the oppressive heat and her attempts to dismiss the officer's claims, her situation takes a turn for the worse as he attempts to handcuff her with what briefly appeared as a set of sinister, serpent-like cuffs. Just as the situation escalates, a formidable werewolf, known only as Moore, intervenes, challenging the facade of the officer, who is revealed under duress to be a faeborn with lethal, illusionary capabilities.
In the chaotic confrontation that ensues outside Zoe's trailer, the Moore clan rallies against the faeborn, showcasing a ferocious battle that bleeds into the realm of nightmares, visible to Zoe through her incomplete protective ward. While she struggles to maintain focus and complete her magical defenses, the Moore wolf warrior, severely injured, seeks refuge inside her home, advising her to finish her warding ritual and stay out of the physical fray. The battle outside proves too intense for the singular intruder, ultimately falling to the relentless might of the Moore pack led by an imposing she-wolf, while Zoe, amidst the tumult of supernatural combat, narrowly maintains her composure to protect her home. In the aftermath, the grateful Moore warriors claim Zoe's freshly baked brownies as their spoils of victory, leaving her and her husband, who awakens oblivious to the night’s events, surrounded by werewolves nursing their wounds and indulging in the reward of their fierce protectiveness.
(Zoe's odd encounter(SRIakres):SRIakres)
[Sat Jun 15 2024]
In a modern kitchen within a trailer
Were it not for new appliances, gleaming black against a white corian countertop and dark brown cabinetry, you can almost see the old avocado green refrigerator that surely was here before. The floors are worn from traffic, the near-black wood faded where feet have shuffled numerous times. A small window peers out into a mostly private yard, and a rattling door leads out to it.
It is night, about 93F(33C) degrees, There is a waxing gibbous moon.
(Someone has sent the state police after your target. Perhaps they're a real criminal or perhaps they've been framed, in either case it's up to them to get their arrest warrant handled and removed.
)
It's a balmy, hot evening - too hot to sleep easily, for most. Zoe, of course, has chosen this time to bake some brownies, filling the air with the delicious scents of baking chocolate and sugar. Sure, she might also be baking /herself/, but it's not as if staying in tip-top health is a very viable goal for her right now. Opening the back door for fresh air doesn't do a great deal to help, unfortunately - it's just too hot of an evening.
There's a single, long hoot of an owl that'd perched for a moment on the roof of the trailer, perhaps drawn by the smell, but the tapping of talons against the roof before a nearly-silent takeoff signals its departure. Maybe the heat is too much for it. Or maybe it's the crunch of loose gravel and the brief whine of a car rolling to a stop right outside - and then a comparatively shrill BLOOP of a police siren, just for a moment. A moment later, there's a knock at the front door. "Police," calls out a gruff male voice. "Open up."
What little wind makes its way from the enclosed backyard into the kitchen is enough for Zoe, even if she's got a sheen of sweat upon her brow while she whisks at the brownie batter, its chocolaty smell filling the kitchen even before she's gone ahead and poured it into a tray to be baked in the oven. It's already pre-heated, of course, and she's just dropping a healthy amount of chocolate chips upon the top of the batter by the time the car pulls up outside, the elderly woman paying little heed to it - the Moores do tend to be night owls most nights, perhaps it's just one of them.
The Moores, however, do /not/ tend to run with the police, and there's a confused little blink at the BLOOP and the knocking at the door, though Zoe quickly wipes her hands upon her apron and makes her way to the living room, her brownies starting to bake away in the oven. There's a detour to crack open the door to the bedroom - is her husband asleep in there? - before she opens the door a smidge and peeks through the crack out at the officer. "Good morning, officer. How can I help you?"
Iakres is finally sleeping, yes - it seems to be getting more and more common that he's sleeping while Zoe's up. Or maybe that's just a symptom of just how much the old woman has been needing to sleep, lately... Not that she could be blamed for her enervation. More concerningly, this isn't one of Haven's deputies. This is a state police uniform, worn by a man of average size, average features, average everything - but /that's/ not the concerning part. It couldn't be concerning. Zoe couldn't take enough note of that to be concerned. The swirling red aura around him, though, /does/ stand out. Even a memory cloak can't hide away Sanctuary's rejection - and the largest demographic affected by those are murderers.
"Good evening, ma'am," he murmurs, perfectly congenial. "I'm Officer Somebody of the Massachusetts State Police Department and I'm here to speak with Missus Zoe Androulakis. Would that be you, ma'am?"
There's a glance behind her, the wrinkles upon Zoe's face growing more pronounced with her concern, and she steps out instead of opening the door further to let the deputy in - she knows all too well the face her husband would make if she let a police officer into their recently-refurnished living room, especially this time of the night while he's asleep. The door clicks shut behind her, and Zoe finds herself upon the porch, still in her apron stained with flour and chocolate here and there. "Yes, that's me, officer." She doesn't attempt to repeat the name back; it's slipped her mind already. "Is something the matter?" She's just the image of kindly old grandma, really, peering up at the officer with concerned eyes.
A sinister smirk crosses the cloaked officer's face as Zoe steps out past the threshold of her home, and whatever wards might have lain within. "I'm afraid," he continues, maintaining that even, friendly tone, "You are under arrest for the illegal trafficking of unregistered firearms and exotic weaponry across state lines." He reaches down to unhook a pair of handcuffs from his belt, which he jangles unpleasantly. And they /are/ handcuffs; but for a moment Zoe sees something else entirely: a pair of thin, crimson serpents, each in the middle of swallowing the other's tail - a lemniscate, or some sort of double-ouroborous. It's only a flash, though, and then they are handcuffs again. "Please turn around, ma'am, and put your hands behind your back. I can see you're not doing too well, so I promise to be gentle as long as you give me no reason to act otherwise. Please don't make a fuss, or I'll have to do these tight. It can be rough on old shoulders."
Despite his geniality, this doesn't seem to be the best idea, mostly owing to the red aura swirling around the otherwise totally normal, unsinister man. Zoe's a proficient enough mage to recognise a memory cloak, of course - but knowing it's there and /remembering/ it's there does put a strain on things. If she just relaxed, it'd slip her - and it wouldn't seem like such a bad idea at all. Oh - a distraction. What was she thinking about, again? It must have had to do with the huge, lumbering Moore she'd met in the past week or two - he's strolling down from Dandelion Parkway, his features twisted into a scowl. Had she upset him..? No, right, the memory cloak. Better not to look away from the officer, if she doesn't want to forget. Turning around could prove disastrous.
On the plus side, the officer doesn't seem to have taken note of the approaching werewolf. He's paying too much attention on Zoe.
"I'm not sure what you're talking about, officer." Zoe lets out an uneasy laugh, eying the handcuffs for only brief moments before her eyes are upon the unremarkably-featured police officer again. The Moore in the corner of her eye is more an afterthought, does Zoe does step back towards the door just slightly, both the men in her field of vision now. "I think you have the wrong person." Even if he /does/ have the right person - where did Iakres get his weaponry from anyway? - she knows better than to let him bind her with those cuffs in particular. "I do not deal in weaponry, I am just a simple gardener." Stall, stall, stall, maybe she'll have help from the Moore there? She's certainly not turning around to offer herself up to be put in cuffs, in any case. "Maybe you should see if there is a different Zoe you are looking for?"
"You've already confirmed your identity as Zoe Androulakis to me," the fed replies patiently, though his tone is now more neutral than friendly. "And I am making this arrest. Anything you say from this point on can and will be used against you in a court of law." He leans in a little threateningly - only a little, given the cloak of blandness worn around him - and puts a hand on Zoe's shoulder, at which point the Moore breaks into a run and barks out a furious, "HEY!" The cop does notice /that/, and he twists around in frustration, then stiffens in alarm as the bulldozer werewolf gets right up in his face.
"I don't know who the /fuck/ you think you are," snarls the Moore, openly hostile from the word go. "But I can /smell/ you. You're not human. That means you play by the old rules in our fucking territory. Get your fucking hand off our guest." And the officer does, freeing Zoe to fully face the Moore, ready to bite out a vicious retort, before his nose explodes in a shower of gore as the space it once filled is taken up by the bigger man's forehead. As the cop staggers and falls, the Moore whips his head towards Zoe and commands, "Go inside. Lock the door. Raise a ward. Now. Go." His voice seems to tear towards the end there as he grows taller and taller, dark grey-and-brown fur sprouting from the base of his throat before he grabs the cop by the ankle and the both of them disappear into the nightmare.
That doesn't hide them from Zoe, though - and with the officer's destroyed nose, his memory cloak fails, revealing the faeborn beneath. In the nightmare, his ears end in bladelike tips that poke a foot into the air. His teeth are long and needle-like, and his fingers outdo his ears by ending in literal blades, dripping with gore. In place of his statesman's cap, a slouching hood of crimson gore covers his - its hair - and it looses what must be a horrifying bellow at the glorious, hybrid figure of the Moore warrior. It's a good thing that Zoe can't hear them, really - Moore bares his teeth, and looses a growl so deep and so resonant the grasses around them shift and shiver in response - and then the two launch into each other in a flurry of claws and teeth.
It might be quite prudent for Zoe to make that nightmare ward, actually.
There's a shocked gasp that escapes Zoe when the Moore starts negotiations by punching the officer right in the face - hopefully she doesn't catch any stray drops of blood with that move - but she doesn't need any more hints before she's nodding her head furiously and scurrying back into her living room to lock the door, and then double-locking it just to be extra safe. She goes for her handbag first, retrieving her small revolver from it - does she have a lot of practice with it? Not at all. Is it going to give her a /tiny/ illusion of safety regardless? Probably.
Her gun is clutched close and the curtains are drawn back from the window so she can keep an eye on whatever's going on in the nightmare outside while she begins setting up the nightmare ward - she doesn't expect it to /not/ go in the werewolf's favor, unless the officer is good enough of an Illusionist to fool his senses and get away, but she's still going to watch in case he needs help, for whatever her help is worth.
Well, it doesn't seem like the redcap's only trick is illusions: the Moore seems to be stuck in combat with a fellow shapeshifter, too. The redcap shifts fluidly between forms as he strikes, biting the lupine saviour with snake's fangs before clawing him with a bird's talons, and illusions fire every which way. Not that Zoe can see them through the nightmare, really - but she can recognise the little gestures that come with mancing, even if they're not her own discipline. The Moore, in contrast, is a purer creature - tooth and claw, fist and forehead, he tears through glamoured flesh with a fury not possessed by the fair folk, and with a sheer power not possessed by damn near anyone Zoe's ever seen before. Whoever the Moore is - first name unspecified - he's old and he's strong.
It's hard to do ritual work with so much of a distraction, and while trying to aim a gun. Lots of these things take two hands. Forming clean lines with the soil, for one; cleanly opening a vein without spilling too much blood for another. Still, the magic in Zoe burns as bright as any other, even with her sickness, and the ward begins to slowly stretch out from the circle's outer boundary along the floor, crawling towards the walls. They won't hold independently until they've finished sealing the whole room, but this fight is faster-paced than the gradual eking-out of a hard boundary. If the pair come crashing towards her walls, it'll be her strength against theirs to try and hold them back. Iakres might fashion himself the warrior of the pair, but Zoe has her own battle ahead.
It's a good thing Zoe can't hear anything through the nightmare, because while she may be somewhat proficient at casting rituals through mild distractions, a full-on shifter versus shifter-illusionist battle may be a bit too much to keep her grounded and in tune with what she's doing. The revolver is tucked into the pocket of her apron for now so she can free up her hands - she doesn't dare put it out of reach for the time being - and Zoe inhales a deep breath before starting to work, her pocket knife at the ready and her hands steady and certain as they move through the motions made a thousand times before.
The fact that the house is smelling of brownies that are almost ready to be taken out of the oven is a distraction she can't afford to pay attention to for the moment. Poor brownies.
The nightmare-trailer rocks in place as the werewolf slams his shoulder into the redcap's gut and nails him against the wall with an All-American football tackle. Thank god for the selective tangibility of the environment in the nightmare; the ward hadn't even stretched out to the walls, yet. The Moore holds his advantage for now, flipping the faeborn up over himself and slamming to the ground behind him with an amazing suplex - then looses a canine yelp as an iron boot crunches up into his spine for the effort. He rolls away and gets up unsteadily onto his feet, visibly injured, and the redcap smirks. He knows he'll win this fight.
The woods, then, explode into a cacophony of furious howling. It's audible even to Zoe - and then it isn't. It's a good thing those wards aren't quite done yet, because shortly afterwards, a pair of snarling wolves bolt in from the kitchen, then pass through the walls to throw themselves upon the faeborn, who curses and explodes outwards into a wicked, reptilian form, sprouting wings and teeth to rival a dragon. More and more wolves pour out of the woods from all direction, until there's easily over a dozen of the damn things throwing themselves against the bleeding redcap, and the wounded hybrid limps himself into the trailer in turn, phasing out of the nightmare as he does. "Don't mind me," he pants, pulling off the tatters of his shirt to look at himself in the bathroom mirror. His back's a mess - it's a /miracle/ he's even walking. "That's going to take a minute to fix itself," he mutters. "Keep working on the ward. We're all good. /Fuck/, that hurts."
There's redcaps and hybrids and wolves a dozen all surrounding her trailer and engaging in shenaniganry while Zoe's attempting to focus, which doesn't really bode too well for the concentration. It's a good thing she has elderly people superpowers of not giving a fuck after living close to seven decades of life, which is probably why she's almost done with the ward by the time the werewolf phases out of her bathroom adjacent to the living room. "Go lie down, young man," Zoe tells the Moore, since she isn't using the couch for the moment, and then does little else while she finishes up, letting the last few drops of blood ooze free of her wrist, and the last couple of lines be etched in soil with perfect precision. And then, finally, the complete ward snaps into place, and Zoe lets out an audible sigh of relief before she turns to the werewolf with concern.
"I have a first aid kit," she offers, unsure of how much the hybrid is in need of it. "And my husband has a walking stick, if you need it?" She's still got half her attention to the window though - can she still see what's going on out there on the front lawn through the ward? "Who is that man? He is not really a police officer, is he?"
"Don't talk to me while you're doing magic," replies the wounded werewolf, with typical Moore charm. "Makes me feel dirty." He chuffs out a canine laugh, then shakes his head. "Naw, I dunno. Smells like New York. Harassment's one thing, but we can't abide no fuckin' killers on our land. Not if they're after our guests, anyway." He coughs and hacks up a little blood into the sink. Iakres murmurs and turns in his sleep. His hearing's bad enough that even this won't rouse him. "For real though, don't touch me. I got my blood up. Lotta, uh, instinct going on, there. This'll heal." There's something of a bounce off the trailer's roof as someone falls from the air and smacks into the ward, but the Moore doesn't seem to notice it. Zoe does, though - a little runty teenage Moore stands up with a broken arm just past the kitchen window, injured but bearing a wicked, bloody smirk as he returns to a human form. He's out of the fight, too - but that's a naked teenage boy, so Zoe shouldn't stare too long. He limps off as well.
Things continue like that for a little while, with the injured Moore opting to remain with Zoe while the wider Moore pack accrues injuries and slowly peel off. The faeborn falls before the last of the Moores, though, and crashes down in a colossal heap on the pavement before an elderly she-wolf approaches on foot, slow and regal, before latching her jaws around the thing's head and physically ripping it off. She lifts her head in a howl of victory that Zoe cannot hear, and the fight is done. Over the next few hours, her brownies are demanded as tax for the warriors who had defended Zoe in her sleep, and even someone manages to awaken for the procession of lupine booboos that pass through the trailer's doors. Thankfully, with the corpse in the nightmare, there's no forensics for the pair to have to clean up, and even the police cruiser gets pulled through the nightmare to end up somewhere deep under the bay. Zoe and her husband are safe - and a few meta-shifting werewolves get a stomach ache from all the chocolate.
"Don't talk to me while you're doing magic," replies the wounded werewolf, with typical Moore charm. "Makes me feel dirty." He chuffs out a canine laugh, then shakes his head. "Naw, I dunno. Smells like New York. Harassment's one thing, but we can't abide no fuckin' killers on our land. Not if they're after our guests, anyway." He coughs and hacks up a little blood into the sink. Iakres murmurs and turns in his sleep. His hearing's bad enough that even this won't rouse him. "For real though, don't touch me. I got my blood up. Lotta, uh, instinct going on, there. This'll heal." There's something of a bounce off the trailer's roof as someone falls from the air and smacks into the ward, but the Moore doesn't seem to notice it. Zoe does, though - a little runty teenage Moore stands up with a broken arm just past the kitchen window, injured but bearing a wicked, bloody smirk as he returns to a human form. He's out of the fight, too - but that's a naked teenage boy, so Zoe shouldn't stare too long. He limps off as well.
Things continue like that for a little while, with the injured Moore opting to remain with Zoe while the wider Moore pack accrues injuries and slowly peel off. The faeborn falls before the last of the Moores, though, and crashes down in a colossal heap on the pavement before an elderly she-wolf approaches on foot, slow and regal, before latching her jaws around the thing's head and physically ripping it off. She lifts her head in a howl of victory that Zoe cannot hear, and the fight is done. Over the next few hours, her brownies are demanded as tax for the warriors who had defended Zoe in her sleep, and even Iakres manages to awaken for the procession of lupine booboos that pass through the trailer's doors. Thankfully, with the corpse in the nightmare, there's no forensics for the pair to have to clean up, and even the police cruiser gets pulled through the nightmare to end up somewhere deep under the bay. Zoe and her husband are safe - and a few meta-shifting werewolves get a stomach ache from all the chocolate.
In the chaotic confrontation that ensues outside Zoe's trailer, the Moore clan rallies against the faeborn, showcasing a ferocious battle that bleeds into the realm of nightmares, visible to Zoe through her incomplete protective ward. While she struggles to maintain focus and complete her magical defenses, the Moore wolf warrior, severely injured, seeks refuge inside her home, advising her to finish her warding ritual and stay out of the physical fray. The battle outside proves too intense for the singular intruder, ultimately falling to the relentless might of the Moore pack led by an imposing she-wolf, while Zoe, amidst the tumult of supernatural combat, narrowly maintains her composure to protect her home. In the aftermath, the grateful Moore warriors claim Zoe's freshly baked brownies as their spoils of victory, leaving her and her husband, who awakens oblivious to the night’s events, surrounded by werewolves nursing their wounds and indulging in the reward of their fierce protectiveness.
(Zoe's odd encounter(SRIakres):SRIakres)
[Sat Jun 15 2024]
In a modern kitchen within a trailer
Were it not for new appliances, gleaming black against a white corian countertop and dark brown cabinetry, you can almost see the old avocado green refrigerator that surely was here before. The floors are worn from traffic, the near-black wood faded where feet have shuffled numerous times. A small window peers out into a mostly private yard, and a rattling door leads out to it.
It is night, about 93F(33C) degrees, There is a waxing gibbous moon.
(Someone has sent the state police after your target. Perhaps they're a real criminal or perhaps they've been framed, in either case it's up to them to get their arrest warrant handled and removed.
)
It's a balmy, hot evening - too hot to sleep easily, for most. Zoe, of course, has chosen this time to bake some brownies, filling the air with the delicious scents of baking chocolate and sugar. Sure, she might also be baking /herself/, but it's not as if staying in tip-top health is a very viable goal for her right now. Opening the back door for fresh air doesn't do a great deal to help, unfortunately - it's just too hot of an evening.
There's a single, long hoot of an owl that'd perched for a moment on the roof of the trailer, perhaps drawn by the smell, but the tapping of talons against the roof before a nearly-silent takeoff signals its departure. Maybe the heat is too much for it. Or maybe it's the crunch of loose gravel and the brief whine of a car rolling to a stop right outside - and then a comparatively shrill BLOOP of a police siren, just for a moment. A moment later, there's a knock at the front door. "Police," calls out a gruff male voice. "Open up."
What little wind makes its way from the enclosed backyard into the kitchen is enough for Zoe, even if she's got a sheen of sweat upon her brow while she whisks at the brownie batter, its chocolaty smell filling the kitchen even before she's gone ahead and poured it into a tray to be baked in the oven. It's already pre-heated, of course, and she's just dropping a healthy amount of chocolate chips upon the top of the batter by the time the car pulls up outside, the elderly woman paying little heed to it - the Moores do tend to be night owls most nights, perhaps it's just one of them.
The Moores, however, do /not/ tend to run with the police, and there's a confused little blink at the BLOOP and the knocking at the door, though Zoe quickly wipes her hands upon her apron and makes her way to the living room, her brownies starting to bake away in the oven. There's a detour to crack open the door to the bedroom - is her husband asleep in there? - before she opens the door a smidge and peeks through the crack out at the officer. "Good morning, officer. How can I help you?"
Iakres is finally sleeping, yes - it seems to be getting more and more common that he's sleeping while Zoe's up. Or maybe that's just a symptom of just how much the old woman has been needing to sleep, lately... Not that she could be blamed for her enervation. More concerningly, this isn't one of Haven's deputies. This is a state police uniform, worn by a man of average size, average features, average everything - but /that's/ not the concerning part. It couldn't be concerning. Zoe couldn't take enough note of that to be concerned. The swirling red aura around him, though, /does/ stand out. Even a memory cloak can't hide away Sanctuary's rejection - and the largest demographic affected by those are murderers.
"Good evening, ma'am," he murmurs, perfectly congenial. "I'm Officer Somebody of the Massachusetts State Police Department and I'm here to speak with Missus Zoe Androulakis. Would that be you, ma'am?"
There's a glance behind her, the wrinkles upon Zoe's face growing more pronounced with her concern, and she steps out instead of opening the door further to let the deputy in - she knows all too well the face her husband would make if she let a police officer into their recently-refurnished living room, especially this time of the night while he's asleep. The door clicks shut behind her, and Zoe finds herself upon the porch, still in her apron stained with flour and chocolate here and there. "Yes, that's me, officer." She doesn't attempt to repeat the name back; it's slipped her mind already. "Is something the matter?" She's just the image of kindly old grandma, really, peering up at the officer with concerned eyes.
A sinister smirk crosses the cloaked officer's face as Zoe steps out past the threshold of her home, and whatever wards might have lain within. "I'm afraid," he continues, maintaining that even, friendly tone, "You are under arrest for the illegal trafficking of unregistered firearms and exotic weaponry across state lines." He reaches down to unhook a pair of handcuffs from his belt, which he jangles unpleasantly. And they /are/ handcuffs; but for a moment Zoe sees something else entirely: a pair of thin, crimson serpents, each in the middle of swallowing the other's tail - a lemniscate, or some sort of double-ouroborous. It's only a flash, though, and then they are handcuffs again. "Please turn around, ma'am, and put your hands behind your back. I can see you're not doing too well, so I promise to be gentle as long as you give me no reason to act otherwise. Please don't make a fuss, or I'll have to do these tight. It can be rough on old shoulders."
Despite his geniality, this doesn't seem to be the best idea, mostly owing to the red aura swirling around the otherwise totally normal, unsinister man. Zoe's a proficient enough mage to recognise a memory cloak, of course - but knowing it's there and /remembering/ it's there does put a strain on things. If she just relaxed, it'd slip her - and it wouldn't seem like such a bad idea at all. Oh - a distraction. What was she thinking about, again? It must have had to do with the huge, lumbering Moore she'd met in the past week or two - he's strolling down from Dandelion Parkway, his features twisted into a scowl. Had she upset him..? No, right, the memory cloak. Better not to look away from the officer, if she doesn't want to forget. Turning around could prove disastrous.
On the plus side, the officer doesn't seem to have taken note of the approaching werewolf. He's paying too much attention on Zoe.
"I'm not sure what you're talking about, officer." Zoe lets out an uneasy laugh, eying the handcuffs for only brief moments before her eyes are upon the unremarkably-featured police officer again. The Moore in the corner of her eye is more an afterthought, does Zoe does step back towards the door just slightly, both the men in her field of vision now. "I think you have the wrong person." Even if he /does/ have the right person - where did Iakres get his weaponry from anyway? - she knows better than to let him bind her with those cuffs in particular. "I do not deal in weaponry, I am just a simple gardener." Stall, stall, stall, maybe she'll have help from the Moore there? She's certainly not turning around to offer herself up to be put in cuffs, in any case. "Maybe you should see if there is a different Zoe you are looking for?"
"You've already confirmed your identity as Zoe Androulakis to me," the fed replies patiently, though his tone is now more neutral than friendly. "And I am making this arrest. Anything you say from this point on can and will be used against you in a court of law." He leans in a little threateningly - only a little, given the cloak of blandness worn around him - and puts a hand on Zoe's shoulder, at which point the Moore breaks into a run and barks out a furious, "HEY!" The cop does notice /that/, and he twists around in frustration, then stiffens in alarm as the bulldozer werewolf gets right up in his face.
"I don't know who the /fuck/ you think you are," snarls the Moore, openly hostile from the word go. "But I can /smell/ you. You're not human. That means you play by the old rules in our fucking territory. Get your fucking hand off our guest." And the officer does, freeing Zoe to fully face the Moore, ready to bite out a vicious retort, before his nose explodes in a shower of gore as the space it once filled is taken up by the bigger man's forehead. As the cop staggers and falls, the Moore whips his head towards Zoe and commands, "Go inside. Lock the door. Raise a ward. Now. Go." His voice seems to tear towards the end there as he grows taller and taller, dark grey-and-brown fur sprouting from the base of his throat before he grabs the cop by the ankle and the both of them disappear into the nightmare.
That doesn't hide them from Zoe, though - and with the officer's destroyed nose, his memory cloak fails, revealing the faeborn beneath. In the nightmare, his ears end in bladelike tips that poke a foot into the air. His teeth are long and needle-like, and his fingers outdo his ears by ending in literal blades, dripping with gore. In place of his statesman's cap, a slouching hood of crimson gore covers his - its hair - and it looses what must be a horrifying bellow at the glorious, hybrid figure of the Moore warrior. It's a good thing that Zoe can't hear them, really - Moore bares his teeth, and looses a growl so deep and so resonant the grasses around them shift and shiver in response - and then the two launch into each other in a flurry of claws and teeth.
It might be quite prudent for Zoe to make that nightmare ward, actually.
There's a shocked gasp that escapes Zoe when the Moore starts negotiations by punching the officer right in the face - hopefully she doesn't catch any stray drops of blood with that move - but she doesn't need any more hints before she's nodding her head furiously and scurrying back into her living room to lock the door, and then double-locking it just to be extra safe. She goes for her handbag first, retrieving her small revolver from it - does she have a lot of practice with it? Not at all. Is it going to give her a /tiny/ illusion of safety regardless? Probably.
Her gun is clutched close and the curtains are drawn back from the window so she can keep an eye on whatever's going on in the nightmare outside while she begins setting up the nightmare ward - she doesn't expect it to /not/ go in the werewolf's favor, unless the officer is good enough of an Illusionist to fool his senses and get away, but she's still going to watch in case he needs help, for whatever her help is worth.
Well, it doesn't seem like the redcap's only trick is illusions: the Moore seems to be stuck in combat with a fellow shapeshifter, too. The redcap shifts fluidly between forms as he strikes, biting the lupine saviour with snake's fangs before clawing him with a bird's talons, and illusions fire every which way. Not that Zoe can see them through the nightmare, really - but she can recognise the little gestures that come with mancing, even if they're not her own discipline. The Moore, in contrast, is a purer creature - tooth and claw, fist and forehead, he tears through glamoured flesh with a fury not possessed by the fair folk, and with a sheer power not possessed by damn near anyone Zoe's ever seen before. Whoever the Moore is - first name unspecified - he's old and he's strong.
It's hard to do ritual work with so much of a distraction, and while trying to aim a gun. Lots of these things take two hands. Forming clean lines with the soil, for one; cleanly opening a vein without spilling too much blood for another. Still, the magic in Zoe burns as bright as any other, even with her sickness, and the ward begins to slowly stretch out from the circle's outer boundary along the floor, crawling towards the walls. They won't hold independently until they've finished sealing the whole room, but this fight is faster-paced than the gradual eking-out of a hard boundary. If the pair come crashing towards her walls, it'll be her strength against theirs to try and hold them back. Iakres might fashion himself the warrior of the pair, but Zoe has her own battle ahead.
It's a good thing Zoe can't hear anything through the nightmare, because while she may be somewhat proficient at casting rituals through mild distractions, a full-on shifter versus shifter-illusionist battle may be a bit too much to keep her grounded and in tune with what she's doing. The revolver is tucked into the pocket of her apron for now so she can free up her hands - she doesn't dare put it out of reach for the time being - and Zoe inhales a deep breath before starting to work, her pocket knife at the ready and her hands steady and certain as they move through the motions made a thousand times before.
The fact that the house is smelling of brownies that are almost ready to be taken out of the oven is a distraction she can't afford to pay attention to for the moment. Poor brownies.
The nightmare-trailer rocks in place as the werewolf slams his shoulder into the redcap's gut and nails him against the wall with an All-American football tackle. Thank god for the selective tangibility of the environment in the nightmare; the ward hadn't even stretched out to the walls, yet. The Moore holds his advantage for now, flipping the faeborn up over himself and slamming to the ground behind him with an amazing suplex - then looses a canine yelp as an iron boot crunches up into his spine for the effort. He rolls away and gets up unsteadily onto his feet, visibly injured, and the redcap smirks. He knows he'll win this fight.
The woods, then, explode into a cacophony of furious howling. It's audible even to Zoe - and then it isn't. It's a good thing those wards aren't quite done yet, because shortly afterwards, a pair of snarling wolves bolt in from the kitchen, then pass through the walls to throw themselves upon the faeborn, who curses and explodes outwards into a wicked, reptilian form, sprouting wings and teeth to rival a dragon. More and more wolves pour out of the woods from all direction, until there's easily over a dozen of the damn things throwing themselves against the bleeding redcap, and the wounded hybrid limps himself into the trailer in turn, phasing out of the nightmare as he does. "Don't mind me," he pants, pulling off the tatters of his shirt to look at himself in the bathroom mirror. His back's a mess - it's a /miracle/ he's even walking. "That's going to take a minute to fix itself," he mutters. "Keep working on the ward. We're all good. /Fuck/, that hurts."
There's redcaps and hybrids and wolves a dozen all surrounding her trailer and engaging in shenaniganry while Zoe's attempting to focus, which doesn't really bode too well for the concentration. It's a good thing she has elderly people superpowers of not giving a fuck after living close to seven decades of life, which is probably why she's almost done with the ward by the time the werewolf phases out of her bathroom adjacent to the living room. "Go lie down, young man," Zoe tells the Moore, since she isn't using the couch for the moment, and then does little else while she finishes up, letting the last few drops of blood ooze free of her wrist, and the last couple of lines be etched in soil with perfect precision. And then, finally, the complete ward snaps into place, and Zoe lets out an audible sigh of relief before she turns to the werewolf with concern.
"I have a first aid kit," she offers, unsure of how much the hybrid is in need of it. "And my husband has a walking stick, if you need it?" She's still got half her attention to the window though - can she still see what's going on out there on the front lawn through the ward? "Who is that man? He is not really a police officer, is he?"
"Don't talk to me while you're doing magic," replies the wounded werewolf, with typical Moore charm. "Makes me feel dirty." He chuffs out a canine laugh, then shakes his head. "Naw, I dunno. Smells like New York. Harassment's one thing, but we can't abide no fuckin' killers on our land. Not if they're after our guests, anyway." He coughs and hacks up a little blood into the sink. Iakres murmurs and turns in his sleep. His hearing's bad enough that even this won't rouse him. "For real though, don't touch me. I got my blood up. Lotta, uh, instinct going on, there. This'll heal." There's something of a bounce off the trailer's roof as someone falls from the air and smacks into the ward, but the Moore doesn't seem to notice it. Zoe does, though - a little runty teenage Moore stands up with a broken arm just past the kitchen window, injured but bearing a wicked, bloody smirk as he returns to a human form. He's out of the fight, too - but that's a naked teenage boy, so Zoe shouldn't stare too long. He limps off as well.
Things continue like that for a little while, with the injured Moore opting to remain with Zoe while the wider Moore pack accrues injuries and slowly peel off. The faeborn falls before the last of the Moores, though, and crashes down in a colossal heap on the pavement before an elderly she-wolf approaches on foot, slow and regal, before latching her jaws around the thing's head and physically ripping it off. She lifts her head in a howl of victory that Zoe cannot hear, and the fight is done. Over the next few hours, her brownies are demanded as tax for the warriors who had defended Zoe in her sleep, and even someone manages to awaken for the procession of lupine booboos that pass through the trailer's doors. Thankfully, with the corpse in the nightmare, there's no forensics for the pair to have to clean up, and even the police cruiser gets pulled through the nightmare to end up somewhere deep under the bay. Zoe and her husband are safe - and a few meta-shifting werewolves get a stomach ache from all the chocolate.
"Don't talk to me while you're doing magic," replies the wounded werewolf, with typical Moore charm. "Makes me feel dirty." He chuffs out a canine laugh, then shakes his head. "Naw, I dunno. Smells like New York. Harassment's one thing, but we can't abide no fuckin' killers on our land. Not if they're after our guests, anyway." He coughs and hacks up a little blood into the sink. Iakres murmurs and turns in his sleep. His hearing's bad enough that even this won't rouse him. "For real though, don't touch me. I got my blood up. Lotta, uh, instinct going on, there. This'll heal." There's something of a bounce off the trailer's roof as someone falls from the air and smacks into the ward, but the Moore doesn't seem to notice it. Zoe does, though - a little runty teenage Moore stands up with a broken arm just past the kitchen window, injured but bearing a wicked, bloody smirk as he returns to a human form. He's out of the fight, too - but that's a naked teenage boy, so Zoe shouldn't stare too long. He limps off as well.
Things continue like that for a little while, with the injured Moore opting to remain with Zoe while the wider Moore pack accrues injuries and slowly peel off. The faeborn falls before the last of the Moores, though, and crashes down in a colossal heap on the pavement before an elderly she-wolf approaches on foot, slow and regal, before latching her jaws around the thing's head and physically ripping it off. She lifts her head in a howl of victory that Zoe cannot hear, and the fight is done. Over the next few hours, her brownies are demanded as tax for the warriors who had defended Zoe in her sleep, and even Iakres manages to awaken for the procession of lupine booboos that pass through the trailer's doors. Thankfully, with the corpse in the nightmare, there's no forensics for the pair to have to clean up, and even the police cruiser gets pulled through the nightmare to end up somewhere deep under the bay. Zoe and her husband are safe - and a few meta-shifting werewolves get a stomach ache from all the chocolate.