The Universe's Mixer

After spending the full day in the garage attached to the Sherwood Florist, Dinah was tired, covered in grease, and she just wanted to take a hot shower and go to sleep. She’d thrown herself into upgrading her motorcycle. There was a desire to just build a new one from scratch. She’d done it before and she had a lot more time on her hands and a need to be distracted. However, the man claiming to be the embodiment of the City had said something about how she didn’t appreciate what she’d been given and there was a part of her that was afraid that Jake had been taken away because of that. Even if he’d said that he wasn’t responsible for people leaving the City, he had threatened to take away everyone and everything she loved because she hadn’t been grateful.

If she’d known that she would lose people-that she’d lose Jake, she would have stuck with whatever the City had given her. From the apartment above the shop-she could have slept on the couch and let Jake have the bedroom-to the bike the City had given her to... anything, really. She would have done anything if it would have meant that Jake wasn’t sent home to die.

The City was back to normal and in fine form as the streets shifted around her. Due to the shifting streets, Dinah had driven around for about three hours looking for her townhouse. She still wasn’t sure if the City was just being particularly cruel, but she couldn’t find it anywhere. She was sure she’d been through every inch of the City and hadn’t found it.

Instead, she kept finding herself back on the street with the Sherwood Florist. She supposed it was reassuring that at least that was still there. She sighed and directed her bike into the garage for lack of anywhere else to go. She looked at the keyring in her hand after she turned off the ignition. It had felt lighter somehow, and now she knew why. She still had the key to the apartment above the shop (she was the landlady, after all) but she was missing the key to her townhouse. That... didn’t bode well for her.

She debated calling Jensen to see if he could locate her house with the computer at the Clock Tower. She was pretty sure that was a selfish use of the computers, especially since she wasn’t even a member of the League anymore.

( The Will of the City? )

Ted had gotten Jo's message about the ghost, and had been about to run over to the house and buy it up when the streets and everything else had begun to move again. Which was also about the time when the coffers had filled themselves back up, and his efforts of looking for investments to tide the City over were nullified.

Partly glad for it, and partly annoyed because of the amount of work, Ted hadn't known quite what to do. He sat at his desk for a while, staring at the top of it. Jo's number was scribbled on the front of his planner, right under his nose. When his eyes floated over it, he made a decision.

He dialed her number before he could talk himself out of it. Listened to it ring, making sure he didn't overthink things as he waited. There was a click that told him either she'd picked up, or her voicemail had, and he just started talking.

"Jo. This is Ted, from the haunted house. Haunted house. That sounds really stupid said out loud. Do you call it something different? Probably. Anyway. I was thinking I'd like to take you to dinner as a thanks, if you'd want to do that. Maybe drinks after? There's this Italian place that everyone in the office keeps talking about. We could go there. Or anywhere you'd like."

Realizing that he'd just spit out a whole lot of words and hadn't any idea if there was somebody actually on the other end of the line, he paused, waiting to see if there would be an answer, or the telltale beep of a message run too long.