Cancer Grows Bigger and Bigger

 [2016/08/11 09:10] Dr. Clemens Vinter opened the door and entered the place in casual stride. For the diner to be relatively empty his contact person stood out like a sore thumb. The very moment their eyes should meet, Clemens offered a hospitable smile and nodded his greeting. Before he came to sit at the same table, however, he ordered a cup of coffee. As he sat down, "I miss Italy already." Despite that, the accent he spoke with did not fit Italian descent, a bit too smooth for an otherwise rough manner of speaking.

 [2016/08/11 09:15] Dorian Black had ordered coffee. It was fooge and he hated fooge coffee but he had ordered it because he didn't feel it right to sit here and wait without having ordered something. Like too often in this city, Dorian has ordered something and not actually touched it other than to prepare it to his liking, despite having no intention of consuming it. All for the show. When the door opens, those gold eyes would dart over and take in the white-haired man, a slender eyebrow lifting as he took him in from scalp to boot. "I haven't been in years." He admits. His own accent is distinctly Californian, but with a lilt of something else, caressing vowels and harder consonants, rolling off of his Rs. Knowing ears will pin it as Infernal. Most others will think it's Greek. He rises when the other approaches the table and extends one hand for a shake, as one does in polite society. "Dorian Black. You are.. Clemens Vinter, correct?" Handshake completed - or denied - he'd return to sitting.

[2016/08/11 09:21] Dr. Clemens Vinter lowered his gladstone leather bag with a confirming -thud-, insides rattling with the unmistakable tune of glass before he reached out to do the same. The duration of his handshake was a tad longer than most would consider socially acceptable. Perhaps he simply enjoyed the touch of his sibling and the hum of pneuma underneath his flesh. The alabaster head brought the steaming cup closer to his lips, blowing down to take away some of its heat, slivers of steam whipping up like the spectral hands of the damned. Yet drink of it he did not. "That is correct," answered after a long pause, a pause filled with silent scrutiny. "I was told to meet you here, Dorian. Can I call you Dorian?" Something in the pacing of his expression was off, like he was one beat too slow pulling the right arrangement of muscles together to form a pleasant smile.

[2016/08/11 09:27] Dorian Black did not seem to mind. His siblings were oddities and he among them. His skin is as soft as fine silk, to suggest he's never seen a day of labor in his life, and warm with the hellfire beneath it. Warmer than a human, certainly - it would suggest a high grade fever if he were - but his ivory skin doesn't seem to flush with the heat, which could mean he's quite comfortable. When he moves, it's with a fluid grace, to suggest perhaps that he lacks bones, or that he isn't entirely real; a fantasy given flesh. "Of course you may. Whatever you're most comfortable with, though I do ask my real name not be used in public." He closes his own hands around his mug, gilded claws tapping over the glazed surface. "What brings you out to my neck of the woods, darling?"

[2016/08/11 09:33] Dr. Clemens Vinter lowered his cup of black coffee — no milk, no sugar — and abandoned it upon the table much like his sibling had done before he'd entered the place. Why pretend when there was no one to witness all the effort they put into their little play? "What indeed," he mused out loud, some of that soft muddiness often associated with the Danish accent slipping. As he looked up at no particular part in the ceiling, "I wanted to have a taste of the American flavour, you might say. I tried Portland — poor Portland — but that did not quite give me the experience I was looking for. So I was told to try my luck here on this interesting island. Does it suit well underneath your wing?" As for mention about their true names, Clemens couldn't help but nod. "More than acceptable; I'd expect the same courtesy."

[2016/08/11 09:40] Dorian Black couldn't help the faint smirk when the coffee is abandoned on the table like his own. That it's there at all should be enough to appease the wait staff, though he will wave away the woman who will eventually come to ask them if they want food. Oh, he does enjoy to eat, as he does with most pleasures of the flesh, but not from here. He meets here because it's quiet. "Of course. We tend to keep our true selves under wraps within city walls, in accordance to local laws. Laws that are suspended under the whole moons, by the way." He drops that little tidbit of information, if only because they're less than a week off from the next. "I suppose Convergence is one of the last bastions of civilization as we knew it before the outbreak. Many days it seems entirely untouched, save that chocolate and coffee are hard to come by in their pure states and finding anything new in the way of electronics is impossible." He balances his elbows on the table. "The family here is small, but loyal." His words grow fond as he moves on to speaking of their little legion.

[2016/08/11 09:49] Dr. Clemens Vinter listened with apt concentration. Whether he was slipping in some behavioral norm with the role he'd taken upon himself, his posture leaned forward, elbows on thighs with arms dangling somewhere between. All until he gave the impression his attention was solely fixed on his sibling and no one else. "I look forward to the next full moon. It has been a few days since I could properly stretch." His chest swelled with a surge of excitement to the point of tensing the fabric of his suit... just to deflate as quickly, the border of his collar bone teeming with the activity of odd shadows, something eerie playing around underneath his flesh. "I wish we could say the same about Florence. A shame our little scuffle reached out as far as it did." The Angel-Demon War, no doubt. "How big is this family exactly?"

[2016/08/11 09:56] Dorian Black keeps his eyes trained on the other as well, though there's a softness about his gaze. Dorian is nothing if not apparently passive and lovely. In fact, if he didn't appear like a living doll, or move like he does, he'd probably pass entirely as human. "If you need to stretch in the mean time, the forest beyond the walls is always a possibility, though I do ask you avoid the Vesh camp and the Razor compound. They're both heavily guarded and have an understanding with our family." He drifts his fingers along the cup. "Let's see.." He starts to count on his fingers silently, tipping his head and letting his gaze slip upward. "If you don't include our damned or our adopted Shard, there are, I think, ten of us. You would make eleven."

[2016/08/11 10:06] Dr. Clemens Vinter had a less easier time blending. While he moved with an elegance that suited his dandy appearance, his facial expressions often felt off to people that paid closer attention to them. Even now, the smile he wore that started out as pleasant soon began to etch beyond the borders of strange. It was a bit too perfect in its stillness where others had long loosened up somewhat. "I have to say, it's just not quite the same. But I will be careful. Do not worry about me," he said, that likeable muddiness back in his voice. "Who else has this.. understanding with our family? All the people here? Some?" At mention of a Shard, however, the alabaster head ebbed into an unusual silence, one that begged to be filled in with an answer he hadn't uttered yet.

[2016/08/11 10:13] Dorian Black chuckles softly and warmly. "It's my job to worry about you, as it is to worry about all of our siblings." He considers his coffee cup. "I have done what I can to work out some kind of arrangement with everyone but the underkin and the wraiths, and of course, the Elohim. Though with the underkin and the wraiths it's simply because I've never had a chance to cross their paths to work out anything. Our closest allies are the mutants, however, it isn't a combat alliance." He waves one hand passively and moves to sit back. "My predecessors caused a lot of damage during their time here, and I've done all I can to minimize the lasting fallout. We are not well liked, nor easily trusted, but for the most part none of them seem to be actively trying to harm us now, which is good enough for me. Be civil, you never know who you're talking to." Dorian has few rules. The chief among them being not to create any more headaches for him than he already has to deal with. At the tilt of head, he goes on to explain. "Others like us, but from Gods other than Ael. They're incredibly rare."

[2016/08/11 10:52] Dr. Clemens Vinter 's brow furrowed before his smile slipped in short delay. "I wonder what keeps them so loyal to dear father now that they're out of their nest," he mused, an oscillation in body language as he leaned back in his seat, from open to somewhat closed. "It matters not. This city seems well-equipped to keep matters between us relatively placid." If he'd been in Convergence for a small time, he must've had a great eye to notice the finer details early. "The mutants... They interest me, to be frank. As do their human counterparts. Free will seems to come so naturally to them. I could almost rot away as envious as I am." Lips curved up at one side, lopsided with irony and stuck as such for a short while. "Do I need to know who these predecessors were?" Perhaps he'd heard of them during his stay in Florence. "Civility is important to me," he added, weaving his fingers together in his lap. "As for what I intend to do here; I hope to enlist as a psychiatrist at the local hospital. I have come to understand and enjoy the relationship a psychiatrist has with his patient. Its dynamic is quite satisfying." As for the Shard, Clemens nodded slowly as a multitude of thought processes whirled alive inside his brainpan.

[2016/08/11 11:08] Dorian Black tips his head slowly. "Their foreman is a good friend of mine. I have a standing invitation if they want to be compensated for providing us with samples and data at our public facility but no one has taken me up on the offer yet." He does notice the subtle mirroring of his posture, and files it away for later. "I have to warn you against the hospital, however. It's Elohim territory and the last I heard, though we haven't checked recently, is warded against our family from even entering the building. However, that doesn't stop you from opening a private practice, of course. In fact, I highly recommend it." His smile grows a bit wider, and faintly sinister. "The former prince Moloch is with us here and I believe that is what he intends to occupy his time with as well. Perhaps you should speak with him." He looks thoughtfully to one side, as if considering something that isn't there, before returning his gaze to the other. "As for my predecessors, only the most recent has his name still whispered around town. Alex, or as we knew him, Angarion. I was his second. He.. created more problems than he solved, up to and including threatening to stab the Vampire second-in-command of the time in the street, in broad daylight and in front of a crowd."

[2016/08/11 11:20] Dr. Clemens Vinter hums a note of pensiveness. "A shame," he muttered, looking to the side to catch a glimpse of Convergence in the sunlight that managed to filter through the dome. "A true shame... I had hoped to establish something there. But if that's no longer an option, I will simply have to adapt. How would you assume going about starting a small business here, had you been me?" At mention of a former prince, Clemens lapsed into the same silence of earlier, his expression evening out. Like the calm face of deep waters. "...Perhaps I should. The more the merrier, they like to say." He rapped his fingers along his knuckles until the predecessor, Alex, was shed light upon. A vile smile bloomed like a ripe wound. "Oh dear, oh dear, that won't do. He should've known better, all things considered." Another pause. "Tell me, he wouldn't happen to be a Hydri, would he?"

[2016/08/11 11:24] Dorian Black hums thoughtfully. "Probably the first step would be to find yourself some space to set up. Then it would be a matter of finding clientele." He folds his hands loosely in his lap to keep them still. He has a tendency to fidget when he's not paying attention. "Saiph, actually. No head for diplomacy. I swear we weren't wiped off the island by his antics because I stayed a step ahead of him with the other leaders of the city. Kissed many asses just to put out his fires." He considers his coffee, as if he might be wondering if he should take a drink for the sake of appearances, but decides against. Instead, he begins to rise. "Come and let me show you the labs at least. We'll get you set up so you can come and go as you please."

[2016/08/11 11:27] Dr. Clemens Vinter rose as well. While Dorian decided against, Clemens took his cup and drank heartedly from it. To order something and leave it be, well, he did say civility was of great importance to him. As he left the emptied cup behind, "That brings me great relief. We are shunned enough as is." Extending his hand as he motioned ahead with a gentleman's sway, "By all means." But not without taking his leather bag with him.

[2016/08/11 11:34] Dorian Black passes through security at the street level to head down into Altair. In the lobby, he pauses. "This is Altair Research, our public front. It's kind of a catch-all for the brilliant minds of the city. A think tank. If people need something looked at with a critical eye, they bring it here. We hire pretty much anyone who is qualified, and it's not exceptionally well known it's connected to Polaris proper." He explains and motions around himself, then turns to head toward the back, where a guard stands in front of a thick steel door. Dorian produces a key card and swipes it after leaning in for a retinal scan. The door beeps then hisses open, and he stands back, holding it, so that Vinter might go ahead of him. What follows is a long hallway, gently sloping downward.