cold crescent re-opening [attn.: all]

[mnemosyne]

The lower levels have been open for several weeks. One mustn't interrupt the ordinary business of Business, and below the levels of Cold Crescent accessible only to kin and Garou are acres of office space, glass-enclosed corner offices with views of the front range mountains and the staggered teeth of the downtown skyscrapers. Energy companies and insurance concerns, marketing firms and property management groups, law firms and accounting firms and investment firms. Money and people and things are moved here with the stroke of a pen. That unexpected fire in the elevator bay was enough to send a few tenants scattering. Denver overbuilt during its last energy boom and though those spaces are now filling up, well: there is space, grand space, still available. Who wants to risk fire and flames on the thirty-seventh floor?

The loss of that one elevator changes the complexion of the morning rush, even with the loss of a few tenants. An easy fix: arrive earlier. Leave later than everyone else. Or just take the goddamned stairs.

--

There is a certain hushed, impermanent not-quite-silence that settles over office buildings after hours. There are no windows to be opened and no night-sounds to come crawling in, just the dim glow of monitors left running, the hum of the elevators carrying the janitorial staff between floors. The distant growl of an industrial vacuum and the quiet slither of cord as it whips over the carpet. Now and then, the crack and release of ice from the ice maker in the break room, its dim rumble startling for its inconstancy.

Lights are dim and indirect, just the occasional warm pool shed by the odd table lamp, turned on for ambiance and then forgotten in the daytime rush, lost in the brightness of five or six o'clock, when the sun smears against the west facing windows and - and -

--

Éva prefers silence during the work day. Closes her door often as not against halls and sits with just the quiet hum of her computer and the background music of her own mind. The regular interruptions from her cell and her desk phone handled smoothly and thoughtlessly. After six, though, when the brilliant fluorescents have been killed and the quiet hallways are mostly-dark, she opens the door to the office, and turns on KVOD.

Just a few bars in to Satie's Gnossienne No. 3 when Marta ducks her head in. The younger woman has a redwell tucked between her left arm and her lean body. "Did you hear they reopened upstairs?"

A quiet shake of Éva's head, no.

"Yeah, well." Marta shrugs. She has not been up there. It feels like going to visit a victim in the burn ward. Gratitude in the end for survival, but how can you bear to imagine the scars, the pain and horror, before and after. "They have."

"Is that - "

"Oh, yeah," slipping the file from beneath her arm, Marta crosses the room as the Satie unfolds and hands over the redwell.

"Thank you, Marta. Even though upstairs has reopened, we'll continue to keep the sensitive files off site, I think. You should go home. I know you've been here since six a.m.

"Have someone walk you to your car."

It isn't dark, not yet. But winter is coming and it will be soon.

--

From Satie to a selection from Arvo Pärt's Lamentate. Hardly appropriate for the evening rush. She thinks of: mist rising over empty streets. The subtle nuclear glow banked off the blacktop. She does not think of such things for long.

There are: handwritten notes to consolidate the research. An abstract of a timeline with mark-ups regarding sourcing. Clippings from the depths of newspaper archives about the DIA, Fentriss. The Holy Ghost Catholic Church.

Pictures, historic and contemporary, which are kept in careful, marked order. Another sort of running timeline. She flips through them again, and again, and again. Narrowing her half-mindless survey to two. Before and after the statue of the veteran appears.

The DIA. The missing floors. She glances up at the ceiling, thoughtfully, speculatively. Breathes out, slow and steady, and allows herself to

shiver

just the once, before she makes a call.

"Mr. Cruikshank? This is Éva Illésházy. I have some information for you."

---

[OOC: soo, my Shadow Lord kin has some, uh, important info about Cold Crescent to share and since she exchanged numbers with Afro-Daddy at the sort-of warmoot she is calling him. I'm happy to share what she knows with anyone else whose character would've expressed an interest there too, but I will want to do so via an actual-factual IC scene so hit me up if you are interested.]