mass spectrometry for fun and profit [attn: Sid/Jim/Lena]

[jamie]

Sometime after someone gets an ice pack on Jim's head and the effects of his botched casting subside the trio turn to the matter of what's in the bottom of the vial fallen from the woman's pocket before she disappeared.

The vial's intended purpose was to hold beads or essential oils or some other innocuous substance the average craft store patron would think to put in a small plastic container. That was not its fate. Blue flecks stain the bottom where the powder formed a remnant film and they have to scrape to amass enough of a sample so Sid and Jim can attempt to analyze it*.

The tests take the rest of the night and they may have to employ liberal use of caffeine. Lena with her addiction keeps some on hand at all times. If she can't help them with the chromatography or the microcrystalline test or the qualitative analysis she can at least keep them from falling asleep.

The blue hue disappears during color typing and the end result is: 1-(1-phenylcyclohexyl)piperidine. Phencyclidine.

Jim can translate what they're looking at. PCP, cousin to ketamine, dextromethorphan, and good old nitrous oxide. Excellent if you want to enjoy a night of dissociative anesthesia, not so much if you want to pull the same stunts irresponsible Awakened or madwomen tend to pull.

---
*Mild sarcasm. Even rolled at diff 9 they would have successfully analyzed it. Goddamn overachievers.

Jim
[ Intelligence + Science. He will be sober and healed when this happens I think. ]
Dice: 6 d10 TN6 (3, 6, 8, 9, 10, 10) ( success x 5 )

Sid
[int+sci]
Dice: 8 d10 TN6 (2, 3, 4, 4, 5, 8, 9, 9) ( success x 3 )

[errin]

If it hadn't been for Jim collapsing to the pavement Sid would have collected a sample of the substance right then and there. She probably would have taken her first look at the stuff there, too. Biochemistry is sort of a hobby she'd told Lena once upon a time, and the woman has already once seen the fervor with which the quiet redhead pursues her...hobby.

But getting the larger male awake and up onto his feet and then across the street to her truck took priority. Sid doesn't hold the delay in research and study and tests against him, though, just puts her arm around his waist and her shoulder under his. Unfortunately she doesn't have anything to help with his headache, but maybe there'll be something where they're going.

And where they go first is to the science labs of the Auraria campus colleges. Sid has a key, and if necessary an excuse to use one of them should some other late night researcher happen along. They don't stay long enough for someone to find them out, though, just long enough for Sid to grab a few bottles and some small machine or other to temporarily supplement her makeshift homemade laboratory. Then it's off to the closest Taco Bell because Sid at least is still hungry, and then finally to the DU area and her home, which is dark and quiet when Sid pulls up to the curb. Her roommate is out because Reasons™.

Sid's house, or rather the house she shares with her roommate, is smallish, what some might call quaint. She leads the others through the living room, past the large flat panel television screen attached to the wall and the bookshelves full of movies and the cozy spacious L-shaped couch. Then it's down the stairs to her cool (temperature-wise) living area. Where the upstairs was comfortably furnished, the downstairs area is incredibly sparse. The wide open common area is completely wide open, the only "furniture" a couple of large bean bags on a big stupid area rug with birds embroidered on it.

There are two doors down here. One is ajar, and through the open space the others can tell that it's the bathroom. The other door is closed. Sid, a box of things balanced against one hip, pulls a keyring with only one key out. This is for the deadbolt - yes, deadbolt - that keeps her bedroom door securely closed. The door itself, when it opens, is a little more heavy duty than your standard interior door might be. Inside it's about as sparse and mismatched and threadbare as might be expected. Sid sets her box down on her bed, which is full sized and covered in the sort of cheap blanket one might get at Target (so, nice-ish but not fancy). There are a couple of mismatched bookshelves sparsely populated by books. On the top of one are a series of potted plants, each one a little healthier looking than the last. The desk against the wall is covered in papers, with a stack of boxes that contain various newer computer parts piled up in the corner. The others may notice that there's a complete lack of personal effects. No photographs, no old teddy bears, nothing that tells the story of Sid Rhodes' personal life beyond the things they already know about her. Everything looks like it was purchased at a garage sale or in a thrift store.

Except, of course, the slick looking compound microscope taking up a corner of the desk. That looks new, fancy, and expensive, because it is.

While the others take in the surroundings, Sid shuffles the papers on her desk into a stack and moves that stack to the top of the boxes. Then, perhaps with Jim's assistance, she turns her bedroom into a makeshift laboratory. The bean bags get dragged in for seating beyond the rickety old desk chair or Sid's bed, tacos get distributed, caffeine is consumed, Jim and Sid take turns at the microscope or looking over little pieces of paper or whatever the hell other science-y things they would know how to do but this player does not.

Hours pass. When at last they have their answer, Jim isn't the only one able to translate it to street names.

Sid removes her glasses and rubs at the bridge of her nose. "Why would someone have this?" she asks, and adds quickly. "Someone Awakened, I mean."

[Joey]

Jim eventually comes to. A deep and telltale inhale, then a long sigh as his eyes flutter, and you can tell that he is the type that sleeps like a baby. Even when the universe has put hammer to nail (the second being his head) and soundly knocked him into oblivion.

Of course, as the system begins to boot, what comes next is the groan of a headache. The butts of his palms come up to his eyes to rub them. Thumbs find pressure points near the bridge of his nose while multiplying figures in his vision are finally unified and brought into focus.

He's regained consciousness. Coherency comes later, the concussion finally fading, the drugs finally giving up their hold, and his jaw flexes. His tongue roots around along roof of his mouth, and his fingers touch the contours of his skull, like he thinks he can feel for and identify a subdermal hematoma with their prehensile tips.

He's in a truck. He can smell Taco Bell. He can hear the crackle of the drive through. “Baja Blast,” he utters from wherever his knocked out self has been stashed in the vehicle. It's better than the incoherency about dancing with the rain and the Wizard of Oz he'd been babbling about earlier.

Eventually they are at Sid's place. He spends some time examining it. Exploring what he is allowed to explore. It might make it seem the concussion has returned, the way he fixates on points, objects, expressions of a life he hasn't fully considered her having.

Baja Blast is the oil that finally gets those gears whirring inside his head. It's plain on his face his full mental faculties are on the case.

And they go to work. Looking through the microscope, examining the unknown substance, checking for its reactivity to other substances – is it a salt, alkaline base, acid – and all that bad stuff. And finally...

It's that smell of ammonia that gives it away for Jim, once the substance is sterilized, brought to the right temperature, and isolated from everything that hides it. Once they are through discussing its makeup, piecing together a chemical profile and proper scientific name...

Eureka.

"PCP. That explains the dissociation. And... It's like schizophrenia. Not just in the short term. This can cause lesions on the brain," he recounts, eyes squinting at the little bit of dried powder that remains. Really, with another science nerd, another Cultist, and Jim's focus on pharmaceuticals, organic chemistry and neuroscience, along with less academic proclivities, it doesn't seem like an accident they would stumble on this.

"She might've dropped it on purpose. A more conscious and lucid part of her. Might've wanted to let us know," he continues. "There was someone else. In the alley. Someone wrapped up in junked time."

He leans over the microscope again, and begins analyzing it for color and contaminants, now that they have a base for comparison, all of which might end up telling them how well (and how professionally) it was synthesized.

"Who made you," just as much his tone as the wording showing he is anthropomorphizing the clue.

Next, he looks at the vial. "Depending on who bought this and from where, how common vials like this are in head shops or medical suppliers, we might be able to figure out where they bought this. If I ask around, we might even be able to figure out what dealer uses this kind of packaging."

Again he is in motion, questing headlong and forward, full steam ahead, his mind jumping from one possibility to the other. Like if he stopped, he might realize all that has happened in the last 24 hours and keel over under the rogue waves that are bombarding him.

[Samael]

Lena is not a scientist. She's really not. Her intellectual and creative juices lie somewhere entirely different, and so when it comes to chemical analysis she's not much help. Instead she goes into support mode, making sure that Sid and Jim have everything they need. The DJ doesn't snoop or pry around Sid's place; instead she runs out to grab some energy drinks and/or coffee (whatever they might want) and watches from a respectful distance. If it takes long enough, she heads to the bathroom for a couple minutes to take her meds and then returns.

As much as she's not a chemist, then they name the substance by its chemical elements she recognizes it immediately. Her nose wrinkles; she doesn't know chemistry but she knows her drug scenes. She used to be into it much harder (that was BEFORE she was Awakened, for the record) and she did learn a fair amount during that time.

"Jesus, dustheads?" She sighs and steps forward then, looking between the two. "PCP is a nasty one among the hard drugs. Like Jim said, that would explain potential mental issues. It's old-school, too. You don't see this shit on the street much these days. What's next, Ludes?"

A wry joke, meant to lighten her own mood more than anything else. She doesn't look pleased at the revelation of the drug. "PCP is a mood alterant; it's incredibly unpredictable. It would also explain why she thought Sid was someone named Chastity; you can hallucinate on it."

She chews on her lower lip a bit, staring at the vial and their results. "It could be magickally enhanced. Think about it; PCP destroys any ego boundaries and pretty unhinges you, pretty much short-circuits your pain receptors. If it's Awakened, then it could do worse. I mean, even if it's not an Awakened person using it is like a walking tactical nuke, but..." She shrugs. "It's worth checking."

[errin]

Lena may not be a scientist, but her presence is appreciated regardless. The caffeine becomes a much needed stimulant as the night wears on and on. Once they all know what that blue powder is Sid tilts her head from side to side, stretching out the muscles of her neck and massaging her shoulder.

"I never understood why people did it," she says in her usual quiet way, except not really. The longer they spent in her room, door closed against the world, the smells of chemicals and SCIENCE permeating their senses, the more relaxed she became. She may be quiet, but her sentences, when she strings them together, are less halting. There are fewer stops and restarts. "The rush isn't worth the effect roulette."

Jim's mention of the other person, the one wrapped in junked time, causes her head to snap up to look at him. Her brows are furrowed into the usual lines of worry. "I felt them. There was someone right behind us but...hidden." Behind them, which became in front of them when she turned around. In front of her. "You don't think...could that maybe've been Chastity?" she asks, looking from one Mage to the other.

Lena's suggestion that the dust might be magical is met with a momentarily blank expression from Sid. Despite her status as one of the Awakened, her default is mundane and rooted in scientific theories and facts. Her brows lift toward Jim, who she then nudges aside so she can review one of the slides under the microscope. Except this time, when she adjusts the dials, when she zooms in for a closer look, she's not looking for chemical compounds. She's looking for fragments of a Weaving. She doesn't rush it, not wanting to miss anything, if indeed there is anything to be found.

=====
Sam Evans @ 8:30PM
Private Message to Alexis Theron Lambros
[Sid: Watch the Weaving: Prime 1 +3 (coincidental) -1 (takin' my sweet ass time)]
Roll: 2 d10 TN3 (8, 9) ( success x 2 ) VALID

Alexis Theron Lambros @ 8:30PM
Private Message to Sam Evans
[[Witnessed!]]

[jamie]

[FPM sent to niko!]

[errin]

"It's," she says, peering through the eye pieces, "it is magical, Lena. It's...it was a Charm. I can feel the resonance. It's not like that woman's." She describes it as best she can, like freedom and shattered things. Liberating and Destructive.

"I can't tell what it was used for now that it's used," she says at the end of her analysis, pulling away from the microscope and pushing up her glasses to rub the bridge of her nose. "Whoever made it isn't close now, and they weren't there last night."