084. Monopoly

The motley get to know the Spark's new neighbors.

***"One of my best friends in the world, sitting across the table, agree on many things. But we can't agree on whether Monopoly should be played with house rules… a more personal Monopoly."***

Before a bright and early start Monday morning, Patches and Braum spend their weekend ravaging and musing, respectively. Sophia, for her part, is anxious to find out what she can about Jigg Grifter's operation, but she is still very conspicuous as a dragon.

Patches arrives at Riverside Design to find her architecture firm dramatically changed: Grifter's company, Gierz, has infused a lot of money into the firm, upgrading equipment, modernizing the design, improving the technology, and even adding a LEGO break room! The opulence is not lost on the employees, or on Patches, who pays a visit to Grifter's office to check in with him. She officially accepts the terms of her renewed employment at double her current salary, noting that Zistor's information about Grifter pans out: adorning his walls are framed patents, no doubt those he bought from other nocker inventors. While Patches is curious about his end game, she is friendly enough with Grifter.

Back at The Spark, Braum calls a meeting to get everyone up to speed on Grifter and Gierz' arrival in Westmount Square. With various degrees of grumbling, he manages to get Kyoko, Zistor Flexx, Sir Xaeron, Claude, Talus, and Incisor out to the garden alongside Sophia. Sir Xaeron and Claude aren't convinced that there's anything suspicious about Grifter at all; Braum and Sophia want to know where he gets his millions of dollars, and why he's made a habit of buying patents, sight unseen. Zistor is adamant that, even if it isn't sinister, it's unnatural to not want inventions to be actually *made*.

Zistor may not know what the nocker's end game is, but he was approached by Grifter twice: once for the archives, and once for the rocket. Sophia and Braum notice that Kyoko is trying to avoid the subject of Grifter, and she eventually comes clean: she was investigating him on behalf of the Red Branch. "Anyone with access to proscribed technology automatically draws some attention." Kyoko acted as an online confidante for Jigg, and though she doesn't know everything about him, does share that she felt lots of pain from him, and felt something was "off" about him. She also mentions that he has a certain skin condition, which explains why he wears the dragonskin gloves. "Kay would have been able to do this," Kyoko mutters to herself. Sir Xaeron, hearing this testimony, offers a different suggestion: perhaps they could break into Grifter's apartment?

Back at Riverside Designs, Patches is called into a meeting with Millicent Paige. The sluagh demands to know why the residents of the Spark are keeping a dragon in captivity. Patches is forced to admit that there is a dragon up in the garden, but that "she chose us", and that she means no one any harm. The sluagh insists on knowing what colour the dragon is: when pressed, she admits that dragons "make her nervous". As it turns out, her freehold was destroyed by a white dragon, and Jigg Grifter was the one who rescued her.

At the same moment, Sophia flies up into the sky and spots a large, dangerous-looking white dragon on the rooftop of a nearby highrise. She flies over to it, hoping to parley, but the white dragon asks her to join him in hunting treasure… specifically the nearby Glamour-filled workshop of the Spark! As the white dragon dives towards the Spark, Sophia tries to block it, and ends up taking a blast of cold to her body. As Sophia lands heavily in the garden, the white dragon flies off over the mountain. The members of the Golden Braid look to each other, acknowledging a new enemy; Patches, meanwhile, having witnessed the attack, quickly decides to take the rest of the day off….