009b. Awakening

Sophia wakes up in Kyoko's bedroom, Patches wakes up in the Dreaming.

Sophia wakes up, enveloped in comfortable sheets, and once she uncovers her face, discovers that she is in Kyoko's bedroom. There are three mugs of different tea, she is in her own clothing (but not what she left in last night), and someone is in the shower next to the bathroom. She idly looks through some sewing patterns, then knocks on the bathroom door. Getting no answer, she goes in to find Kenwyn lying in the bathtub, blindfolded and bound. She leaves to see if anyone else is around.

Patches wakes up enveloped in soft sheets, except that when she goes to remove the sheets, they feel like leather… she was asleep under Little One's wing and still wearing her costume from the night before. She rises, standing on argent ground and surrounded by an orchard stretching out over hills. She sees footsteps leading from a cave behind her, but decides to go up the closest hill carrying Little One. It ends in a sharp cliff overlooking the city of Montreal, though from higher than any part of the Mountain. However, the path that she is walking on stretches out into the sky from the cliff edge.

Sophia finds an unattended vat of coffee and Incisor drags herself up from behind the bar, coughing up a bit of cloth. Incisor downs the entirety of the coffee, and Sophia asks for Incisor's help with "a situation." As Incisor emerges from behind the bar, it is revealed that she is wearing a hazmat suit. After verifying that Kenwyn is alive, Incisor lifts Kenwyn out of the tub by the bound wrists, revealing that he is only in his undergarments. Incisor instructs Sophia to take one deep breath, and then starts sorting out what details they can remember or deduce, which turns out to be very little. As Incisor hauls Kenwyn onto her shoulder with the plan being to bring Kenwyn back to his hotel room, Claude shows up asking "What did we do last night?" After ingesting some coffee beans, he announces that he will go get the van, and instructs Sophia to throw some of Talus's clothes onto Kenwyn.

Little One starts to stir, and looks up at the sky. Patches, unable to figure out what the dragon is looking at, heads back down the path towards the cave. Little One attempts to fly, hovers for a moment, then falls into Patches' arms. Inside the cave, there is a swirling portal. Patches asks whether they came from the portal, and gets a cheery squeak in response.

Patches puts her baseball bat through the portal, testing it. When the bat comes back unmarred, she steps through into the Alexis Nihon mall. It is late enough that the Metro station is open along with the coffee shops, but the other stores are not. Knowing that she is only a few blocks away from The Spark, she first heads to mall's Starbucks. Ordering an Americano, she looks around to see if anyone is looking at her shoulders (where the dragon is perched). Only one little girl seems to see Little One, and Patches winks at her before checking her phone. Seeing 20 missed calls from Sophia, she listens to her voicemails which all are nothing other than to the sound of someone carrying something heavy. As Patches goes to leave with her coffee, Little One jumps down to the floor near the drink fridge. Patches 'drops her baseball bat,' scoops it and Little One up, buys a litre of milk, and leaves quickly.

Needing to remove the bonds from Kenwyn, Sophia gets Incisor's help dressing him, then they carry him down to the van. From the front passenger seat, Sophia texts the people she was with last night. Padraic responds, "Doing okay, at me friend's." Patches attempts to respond using text recognition due to her full hands, resulting in "I'm fine, head up the back to Spark."

Sophia calls, and fills Patches in on their "guest," which reminds Patches of having blindfolded him the night before. Sophia arranges a pick-up, and Patches feeds Little One some milk. Patches gets in, to which Sophia responds "I'm so happy to see you. What happened?" Patches fills Sophia in on where she ended up, and they try to figure out how Kenwyn got to the Spark, but those details escape them. Arriving at Kenwyn's hotel, Claude starts to announce a plan to roll Kenwyn into a tarp, but Patches interjects. With the plan set to be 'bringing their drunk friend back to his hotel room,' Sophia and Patches get out of the van with Incisor and Claude waiting in the van.

Patches tries to get the front desk clerk to let him in, but not having any identification to prove his identity, is met with resistance. Sophia steps in and suggests that Kenwyn's is an unforgettable face, but when that doesn't work, claims that Kenwyn is her fiancé, and that they are getting married today. Meanwhile Patches has continued on up the elevator with Kenwyn, and finds his hotel room door ajar. She carefully kicks the door open, and finds the room overturned. This doesn't strike her as what they would have done for their prank, and then she notices someone's feet behind a curtain. Patches draws her rifle and tells the person to come out. Fala whips the curtain aside, one hand pointing a pistol at Patches and the other hand behind her back. Patches drops to one knee behind the bed, training her firearm on Fala. Fala says that she doesn't have to shoot Patches, only him. Patches responds with sarcasm, implying no care for Kenwyn's life, only a desire not to be involved.

Meanwhile Sophia is discussing the theoretical wedding plans, which convinces Leyla (the hotel clerk) to pass Sophia a room key. Sophia heads upstairs. Fala tries to de-escalate the situation, suggesting they both leave, but Patches doesn't believe her and continues to gripe about how much of a "pain in the ass" it would be if Fala came back and killed Kenwyn. Fala then claims to have no wish to kill Kenwyn either, holstering her gun and picking up a pen. Fala draws a circle on the wall, and Sophia arrives. Fala snaps the pen and pours ink into the circle she drew, creating a portal to the exterior and stepping through it. As Sophia questions Patches what was going on, Fala jumps off the edge of the building and lands in a three-point stance below.

Patches kicks the hotel room door closed, then steps through the portal to see where Fala was headed. She calls Incisor, trying to get them to chase Fala in the van, and then returns to Sophia fussing over Kenwyn. Then he starts wake up.

Sophia and Patches quickly step out of the room, hearing him say "Oh no I fucked up my hotel room again. Daddy's going to kill me." as they close the door. Sophia tries to urge Patches to leave, but she stops, writes a note mentioning that Fala was in the room, knocks on the door, and runs down the hall to the elevator.

Incisor calls Patches - Fala melted away into the crowd. They gather in the van, and head back to The Spark.