The Empire Club/Session 16

*Kingsley briefly tricks us into actually talking about windows. They probably have a rose-gold tint to them. We hear about the view.
*Cassie sends out invitations to a brunch divorce party (on the last day her hotel will let her stay on credit). Bottomless mimosas for everyone!
**She still introduces herself as Cassie Sorothin.
*Cassie invites a lot of people, even Carl.
**Marie comes, and very sincerely tells her she deserves better
**No one else is very sincere
**Heidegger and Maggie Dawes attend ("the biggest social fiasco of the decade!"), along with some other Livethan friends, including her erstwhile crush
**Some press is here, though it's the dregs; she's last week's news. High Society Magazine attends to put her in their Falling Stars section across from their Best Strip Clubs in Aeldrum page
**Kingsley attends, leaving Margaret to listen to her son (along with a crowd) echoing last week's SNP talking points
***Kingsley goes on the prowl, encountering plenty of interested young women (in their 70s!) – too young for him; he returns to Margaret, who gives him some mentholated candies, just like he likes them. He puts them in his pocket for later
***Margaret lectures Lucian about being more like Kingsley: "women don't want to hear about politics all the time! yes, we all think that Aeldrum should be an elvish ethnic state, but it's not going to be happen!"
*The Ladies Who Brunch watch with fascination, perhaps thinking this is the kind of thing they'd like to do, if only they had the nerve
*The party
**Pastel color scheme picked built around Cassie's fav dress, which she has told the Ladies Who Brunch she'd like to be buried in someday
**Custom cocktail: extra-fancy mimosa with rare & exotic fruit juices and fruits
**Sit-down brunch service after ~1.5h
**Cassie interrupts the meal (which she has not touched) in the middle to make a speech
***Cassie downs her mimosa and says each of her friends have abandoned her in her hour of need, instead medicating herself with alcohol and also actual psychiatric medications
***"You've each abandoned me – even you, Marie! May each of you remember this betrayal. Fuck all of you bitches." ..and she falls off the platform
***Marie screams; Hortense curses uncontrollably; other Ladies Who Brunch yell at each other to give her air but don't do so themselves. A hotel staff finally calls a doctor, and an ambulance comes. 
***Marie yells out that she's sorry, and wants to know what she could have done better
***Kingsley stays to watch; Buddha escorts Maggie and Heidegger out the back
*Cassie's body is taken, and a different body arrives at the hospital
*…Cassie does not wake up, but delicacies she did not know were possible are placed into her mouth: her last meal, the Butcher ensuring it was nothing short of spectacular
*The Butcher sends an invoice to the Empire Club, noting this was a demonstration of his skills and expects that we hire him. He lists his requirements for the kitchen. 
*The Butcher hosts a special memorial dinner for the Board members
**Kingsley, Farandole, Gauthier, and Magda attend (Farandole masked)
**Amani pretends she does not know what is going on, and makes other plans.
**Dawes stays behind to look at the window
**He rents the dining car of a train, to represent the transience of existence and to give everyone an alibi.
**Gauthier thinks, "better luck next time," as she consumes a bite of tongue, and considers the marbling the Butcher might accomplish on someone as large as the Whip
**For Farandole, the Butcher invites him to a repetition of Bugs and Drugs night using his special tools, with the brain steamed and presented in its original packaging. Farandole tries to re-enact the ritual he has studied in history books, and begins to see from Cassie's point of view, perceiving her memories and her feelings… and keeps going, becoming somewhat catatonic. 
**Kingsley, especially perceptive, notes the train slowing down 4 hours outside the Spires and some official-looking people at the upcoming stop. Kingsley takes the skull into the bathroom to try to send it up an air vent.
**Several police officers board the train and enter the dining car
***Gauthier and Farandole observe they are not police, but men with kevlar vests beneath their sweaters – the Shantine Mafia
***They tell onlookers outside that it's a "routine police investigation", with an orderly richly bribed to go the other way
***The Mafia guys ask where Cassie Sorothin is, given that she sent a beggar's body to the hospital in her place
***Magda persuades them to instead hit up Carl Sorothin
*Farandole takes the skull home to add to his bone collection.
*Cassie wills her entire estate to anti-conservation charities
*Life insurance Kingsley arranged on all board members clears 2.2 million ducats for the club
*Gauthier's agent makes the legal case that Carl Sorothin was always the owner of that seat
**They buy him out of his original investment for a million ducats – the Aeldrum Finance Minister convinced him to lowball it in exchange for an affidavit that he was ignorant of Cassie's dealings
On windows
*Dawes visits the professor and agrees to a proposal for mirroring effect on windows for another half-million ducats
**"You get the sense that however much this guy is screwing you, the university's screwing him more."
*The Most Excellentacious Amani joins Dawes in visiting Frank, who is pleased his bribery of the postman finally paid off in getting a letter delivered
**Frank is shorter and wirier than he was before, as if compressed.
**Shows an excellent proof of concept, and wants funding for a machine and on-site installation. He'll stay at the club and sleep in the closet; machine can rest on a gantry outside the Spire
*Frank says the Empire Club basalt sings, like an opera – not snooty, like some basalt – like his old workshop basalt, that others thought was too flaky
**He's had some apprentices, but they went mad or on drugs or didn't get it
**Amani suggests botany students for the next try
*We converge on a 3-month contract with Frank, to grow basalt frames for the seven main windows and full basalt glass for the two side panels
Category:Session Summaries