Sunday Bloody Sunday

[Carthrat]

And by all standards, it's a fairly flash office building. The walls in reception features a blend of polished marble and enameled wood, and it's all very shiny, and perfectly maintained. Interestingly, there were no signs or anything indicating who owns the building, or what it's used for.

The elevator itself is big on mirrors. Cadfael can see his own reflection from every direction, and it's not hard to conclude that he could probably use that shower. Later, maybe.

The front part of the elevator is made of glass, to give one a view of the rest of the tower, and as it shoots up and up and up, Cadfael is treated to
the site of several sprawling floors. The elevator rises through a glass tube in the middle of these floors, and there's a large, open area that can be seen on each one. More worryingly, that open area looks much larger than the building itself.

"Pretty impressive, huh?" says Barry, not sounding impressed in the least.

[Bjorn]

"Showy," Cadfael murmurs.  "Not hidden."

[Carthrat]

Barry cocks an eyebrow. "You think so? Well. Maybe it is. I guess."

He sounds dubious, even as the elevator leaves the long tube and starts ascending through a more typical shaft, covered up on all sides.

A short while later, the elevator stops, and the doors opening, revealing a spartan corridor with a door at the end. It's not dressed up like the rest of the building, but left very bare. Barry steps out and heads towards the door, and opening it, reveals a small, office, likewise in a spartan fashion. There's really just a desk, a filing cabinet, and some chairs. A door is in the back of the room.

[Bjorn]

After a quick glance around, Cadfael casually walks up to the filing cabinet and opens it, taking a peek at its contents.

[Carthrat]

"Don't do that," warns Barry, as Cadfael's hand drifts towards the cabinet. There's a dangerous undertone to his voice.

[Bjorn]

"Why are we here?" Cadfael asks, letting his hand drop back to his side.

It occurs to him, at this point, that there's a problem with office buildings that he'd never considered before: a lack of escape routes.  Once again, his hand goes to his pocket, to rest on his woefully inadequate store of prepared runes.

[Carthrat]

Barry pauses.

"You want to get back at the Cabal, hmm? This is the office of the person who'll help you do it. You're a very lucky man, Bowan," he says, leaning against a wall. "There's something you can do for her, and apparently, nobody else can. I can't imagine what, but I'm sure you know better than me."

[Bjorn]

The error in that notwithstanding, Cadfael doesn't bother to argue with Barry.  The man is a servant of someone else, and only as important as that warrants.

However, that doesn't mean that Barry doesn't merit any interest whatsoever.  Looking over Barry carefully, for the first time in full light, Cadfael observes, "Not a mage."

[Carthrat]

"Nope," replies Barry, shrugging. "I'm just a guy."

[Bjorn]

That seems unlikely, but Cadfael doesn't pursue it any further -- partly out of consideration for Barry's privacy, but mostly because he doesn't really know how.  Today has had more conversation than the past three weeks already.

"How long?" Cadfael inquires instead.

[Carthrat]

Barry shrugs. "A couple of minutes. She's not of-"

The side door to the office opens, revealing a perky-looking young woman, dressed in a business suit. Flipping her long, auburn hair over her shoulder, she walks straight up to Cadfael with a disarming smile, and extends her hand.

"I'm Shizue Kinomoto, and you're Cadfael Bowan. It's a pleasure to meet you," she says, and Cadfael notices- with perhaps some trepidation- that's she's really quite attractive, and would probably be described as 'Buxom' in polite company.

[Bjorn]

The undisputable beauty of Miss Kinomoto stirs feelings in Cadfael with which he has little experience or grasp on, and so in his time-honoured fashion of dealing with such things, he utterly ignores them as irrelevant.

Nor does he reach out to take her hand, instead choosing to study her carefully with Mystic Sight -- utterly unaware that it likely makes him seem as if he's ogling her.  "Bargain?" he says, with a faint hint of curiousity in his voice.

[Carthrat]

Shizue doesn't pay much attention to Cadfaels strange look dropping her hand and shrugging, slightly. "Straight down to business, eh? I like that in a man," she comments. "Well, take a seat."

There's no hint of magic about her. The business suit she's wearing doesn't lend itself to concealing weaponary or anything like that, either, and she has a relaxed, open manner. Doesn't seem like someone with much to hide, on the surface, at least.

[Bjorn]

Cadfael looks around for a seat, being careful out of instinctive paranoia not to move in such a way that either Barry or Kinomoto lose track of his facial glyphs.

[Carthrat]

Shizue is taking a seat behind her desk, and Barry is leaving through the main door. There's a pair of seats on the other side of the desk, however- comfy looking, high-backed chairs.