Regulation and Control

Who: Bas Capper, Tonks, Harry Potter (Matt is there as well if Cass is about to have him on screen, otherwise we'll just assume he's there)
What: Fetching a newly revived Harry
Where: Bas' property on the shore of Loch Gairloch, Scotland
When: Wednesday night, 9th July
Rating: Pg-13 for language likely
Status: Open;Incomplete

Crazy birds. Charlie had to send the crazy one who was going on about what an idiot he was up here to fetch his coffin? He liked Tonks, always had, but he'd never really liked what he knew of Tonks and Charlie together. The fact that her owls made her sound partially like a possessive girlfriend and partially like Molly Weasley put him off on the whole idea of dealing with her face to face to be honest. But he would because Charlie was his mate and it was for him. Hell, he'd even remember to be nice so he hopefully didn't get Charlie more yelled at than he was likely already getting.

He sat on his porch steps, bottle of beer in one hand and the other petting Cooper, who was laying on the step below him. Tonks' last owl sat in his lap. He was still in greens from having spent the day at the base. The green tee and the trousers could have made him blend into all the trees surrounding the house easily enough. He even could have blended into the porch easily enough so he'd taken the moment to think of putting the light on so Tonks would spot him when she showed.

Who: Harry Potter, Matt Cavanaugh
What: The body wakes up.
When: Tuesday July 08, following the death of Not-Harry.
Where: Sebastian Capper's property
Rating: PG-13, for language. I think this is my standard rating.
Closed; Incomplete

There were stars. They shone vivid yellows and oranges against an incredible blackness, trees springing up, shooting from the bottom of Harry's field of vision and then withering away, spent fireworks of matter and form. There really was no explanation for where they had come from, for a moment or several hours before he had been standing in the darkness somewhere, over the corpse of a woman who was missing her wand. She, some form of her, had stood next to him briefly, though he had not seen her, but then she had passed him by after the dark thing had left the old house. What he wanted to know, suddenly, was how it was possible to watch a body drop, to kill it, and then walk away without knowing whether the person had gone. Harry hadn't gone.

The first sensation was incredible, indescribable cold and the feeling of freezing fire everywhere. After an incredible personal lightness, a feeling of being Other, the sudden feeling of matter and being was incredibly vague and foreign. When he tried to move his arm, it felt unbearably heavy.

The body had sat at the temperature of its surroundings for so long, several degrees below body temperature, and the first thing that happened was all the smooth muscles in his hair fibers contracted, and Harry got goosebumps. The lips that had been waxy and white contorted, the flesh of his lips a deep purplish blue, as were his fingers and toes. His body, wrapped only in the sheet from the morgue, began trembling violently and Harry's frosted over eyes closed with the first breath that felt as cold and as harsh as the first breath of life, when the lungs learn in a split second how to take in air for themselves.

Harry turned on his side, curling into a fetal position and pressing his shivering hands to his chest and his knees beneath them. The blood beat like syrup at this temperature, and he felt slow, stupid, and incredibly, incredibly cold.

Who: Matt Cavanaugh and Charlie Weasley
What: So Matt took this job, you see.
When: Tuesday, June 24
Where: Scamander Park
Rating: PG for possible content
Status: Closed, incomplete

He...well, in hindsight, Matt wasn't really sure how he'd gotten to where he was. That wasn't so unusual for him, but usually he was drunk when it happened, and this time he was most definitely sober. For one thing, he could feel his face without using his hands.

On the negative side, he was three floors up, or two depending on how British you felt like being, standing outside an office, and he still wasn't putting together how he'd gone from showing up at the door to standing here. It was starting to become more than a little scary, actually, that he had no memory of the last few minutes, not since he'd knocked on the door. Presumably, someone had opened it and things had gone from there, but he couldn't be specific.

If that hadn't happened, though, if he'd been magicked up from the front door to here somehow, then really - he glanced at his watch to confirm it - magic wasn't exactly the best thing to ever happen. They were, in that case, slower than the average elevator.

He raised his hand to knock on this door, behind which was presumably Charlie, but hesitated in case whatever it had been happened again. And this time, he supposed, he could wind up wearing his underwear on his head. In Antarctica. Facing a vicious, man-eating penguin. And if his underwear was on his head, what that penguin could potentially eat first didn't bear thinking about. Though it would be so cold that he wouldn't really care.

Instead of knocking, he leaned on the wall across from the door and lit a cigarette. If nothing else, he could escape in the confusion when the fire alarm went off.

"Mom wanted me to be a rockstar," he muttered to himself. "I could call her up right now and apologise for all the shitty, shitty things I did to her when I was growing up. Like ignoring her advice."

Who: Matt Cavanaugh, Harry Potter
What: This is the drugged out, cracked out version of the Haunting, except Harry is a much friendlier ghost (we hope.) Harry finds Matt because Matt is in possession, currently, of his wand.
When: Early morning, June 21, BACKDATED
Where: London
Rating: PG for ghosts and scary content
Closed; Incomplete

It was difficult to tell how much time had passed since the house had ceased to serve as a place of confinement. Grimmauld Place was empty now except for the moving of mice and rats in the cellar and bats in the attic. The streets of London were different, the man found, in this condition, less substantial and profound. They felt grey to him, and he felt that he moved of his own accord, wandering, but really there was a destination in mind, but he did not know it.

Water moved not at his touch, dust and debris passed through him when he walked. Hours passed, it seemed, though the buildings blended together and gave him the impression that he had gotten nowhere. He waited for the familiar feeling of being wrenched through space, but it did not come. He was both hopeful and terrified that the thing had extinguished and had left him in this in between state until he drew so far into himself that he was no longer aware of his existence.

Finally, he felt the pull that was drawing him on, not just as a faint notion, but as something almost tangible. Whatever it was, he was terribly near. Though he could not tell if he sped up, he increased his efforts to arrive, wherever it was.

Who: Harry Potter, Matt Cavanaugh and [Open]
What: Yet to be determined- there will be conversation and possibly mind-blowing self-discovery and revelatory content, but something dressing itself up as Harry will likely move in ways to prevent the aforementioned.
Where: Putney, London
When: A little after nine, June 19, 2008
Rating: PG-13 to R range
Status: Open;Incomplete

The pub was a little fancier than the normal haunts the pair had frequented together, though Harry had no way of knowing that fact. He crawled in the establishment a few minutes after the hour, walking with relish of movement after a recent kill. His hands coursed with magic, and the wand in his pocket responded to him in a way it had not after his encounter with Baddock in the mortuary, his display draining his reserves even as the wizard escaped from between his fingers.

Just outside the door, Harry sniffed and paused, noticing a small dark stain on his jacket. He'd have to be rid of it before he walked inside. First, he thought of discarding it in a dumpster, but then- why not?- he removed his wand and charmed it off, a slow, uncharacteristic smile crossing his features. He entered the Bricklayer's Arm and looked for Matt.

( Letter for Harry )

Who: Matt Cavanaugh and Charlie Weasley
What: Matt returns from Australia to find his house a crime scene, his roommate missing, and some weird dude with red hair intent on killing him.
When: 6 June
Where: Grimmauld Place
Rating: Unknown as yet.

The house looked like it had a secret, but Matt assumed that Harry just wasn't home - it had that sort of abandoned look. But he was too tired to really care in any event, and unless demons waited inside, he didn't really care so long as there was a bed there, and it was relatively clean. Say, made this year some time.

The key clicked in the lock and he swung the door open without incident - apparently no flesh-eating creatures had moved in, which he was counting as a win. The last cup of coffee hadn't helped at all, nor had the trip from the airport; he was running on nothing at all. He was just going to rest for a minute in the living room, just a minute before he hauled everything upstairs and collapsed into bed.

Which probably explained why it took him several minutes to register the condition of the room; he stood in the doorway, blinking at it, trying to clear his head enough to make the hallucinations go away, but they didn't change.

So he sat on his suitcase and lit a cigarette, trying hard to think about this, but the conversation with Fred had taken the last out of him, and he had nothing left that he could use on the task.

It looked like a war zone.

Who: Matt Cavanaugh and Harry Potter.
What: The weirdest pair ever to share a house hang out in their underwear, drink beer, and shout "FWOAR" at passing college girls. Really. I would never lie to you.
When: 16 April
Where: London
Rating: Unknown as yet.

Matt wandered into the kitchen of the very weird house his only slightly less strange housemate had, apparently, inherited from someone very wealthy (and probably mad, he always added, but that was the architecture of London for you) and stuck his head into the fridge, debating whether to commit suicide by frighteningly-decayed lettuce - it was starting to stay green at the middle, and he had a private bet on that he could keep it there until it turned into goo - or, you know, figure out something to eat.

The lettuce, he reflected, looking at it, was really a good diet aid. Also, it smelled.

But embracing the skank as a lifestyle was something Matt had done a long, long time ago, and he merely grinned at the lettuce before pulling out a Camembert cheese and a bottle of beer. A sandwich, he thought, would be very nice, particularly if it was just bread and cheese, but there might be other things around to put on it.

"Harry!" The shout made something rattle in the cupboard and he swore, turning to find out what it was - the last time, it'd been someone's antique candy dish, and it had been less than awesome when it fell out, nearly onto Matt's head, the next time he opened the cupboard. "Want lunch?"

Who: Mila Macnair, her dog Willoughby, and Matt Cavanaugh.
What: It's raining in London, so Mila goes to Scotland to knit magic.
When: Evening, 14 April
Where: Hogsmeade

Like most days in London, it was raining. And like most days in Mila’s life, she wasn’t content being cooped up indoors. So where most people would have been content to curl up and read a book where it was warm, she took the rain as an opportunity to leave the city. In the year or so she had been in England, she had only ever explored the areas near London and a small town in Wales once – just to see where it was that her husband had been born. She decided immediately that it was too nice for him and left before her opinion of the man could taint the beauty of it.

Still, it was his stories that drew him to this place now – and instead of being turned away by the beauty of it, she was drawn nearer.

It was suspended in time, she thought. The houses, shops, and even people were living at a different pace than those in London – a better pace, maybe, but certainly one that was more reminiscent of a time past. Slow. Quiet. It was on a hill in a park that she sat down, the lake glittering below her and Hogwarts Castle looming protectively across the water. Willoughby went bounding off after a wood nymph and she was left alone while he chased, weaving glittering strands of her own magic carefully into a net.

Who: Harry Potter, Matt Cavanaugh
What: Harry is playing the role of an expatriot in Salt Lake City. Matt makes to greet the end of the world totally under the table. The two meet in a taxi cab on the eve of the 'Apocalypse' and discover the meaning of life is liquor and fast cars.
Where: SLC
When: December 31st, 1999
Note: Sorry, I WILL fix the formatting.

( Read more... )

Who: Isaac Kettering & Matt Cavanaugh
What: Some saving, some shooting, some explaining
When: January-ish, 2007
Where: London, England - an alley near a club, Matt's flat, then Isaac's flat
Rating: R - violence, someone gets shot, cauterising the wound, and a whole hell of a lot of cursing
Status: Closed, complete.



( ...and I never thought it could come down to this/bullet in my head, sweetest kiss, it’s in my head... )

Who: Zacharias Smith and Matt Cavanaugh
What: They are inadvertent murderers and men who refused to play god, but the role wasn't one either of them wanted. Now it's time to figure out what happens next.
When: April 1, 2008, early morning, immediately post this rp.
Where: Docklands, on the beach
Rating: Hard R for language, death, description of decomposition and what could be considered either mercy killing or murder
Status: Closed; incomplete

Matt wanted a cigarette and a drink and a place to get warm and stay warm, and he could do none of those things, take none of them, as he finally stood on the beach that wasn't - it was just an ugly hem to the land, where they stood. His shoulders hunched in, and shook a little, and he could not - could not - make himself move to get any of the things he wanted, let alone the things he needed.

A tiny part of him wondered why he should even bother. He'd just let someone die, and somehow that was the end of everything he'd ever been. Shooting people was one thing. He didn't shoot to kill, didn't think he could.

This was giving up. Admitting defeat.

His face wasn't any less pale than it had been when he'd set the dock back into the water gently when he turned to face the other man, his shoulders un-turtleing a little, but he couldn't ask the questions that burned in him any more than he could go get his jacket, put it on, get warm, anything, and he felt nothing but shame for that, tried to tell himself that people died every day and that there was nothing to do in this case.

He called himself a liar and looked at the other man as evenly as he could.

Who: Zacharias Smith and Matt Cavanaugh
What: An artist with a broken wand begins to unintentionally embed magic into his art, channeling the thoughts of those who have disappeared, expressed through whispers in the glass itself. Zach struggles to search for one of the figures that he heard in his art, screaming through mirror glass.
When: April 1, 2008, early morning (5 am, maybe) after comments made in Zach's journal.
Where: Docklands, near the river Thames
Rating: Hard R for language, death, description of decomposition and what could be considered either mercy killing or murder
Status: Closed; complete

His feet slammed through the mud as he stumbled across the pilings, falling against broken bits of bottle washed up on the shoreline. Zach could barely see - the sun hadn't yet risen and all that washed against his pale flesh was moonlight and the artificial whispering of the lamps hanging from ships in the distance. The ferries were calling, a low, rumbling horn that broke the howling of the wind. He tripped and fell, his frantic limbs sprawling into the mire of the Thames, black, sticky mud caking to ripped jeans as he pulled himself up, palms scraping rock as he stood there for a moment, shaking from the fear and the cold. But he forced himself forward, the screams from the mirror pounding in his eardrums, the only thing louder than his heartbeat.

"Anyone out there?" He screamed into the wind. It didn't even echo back.

A desperate face stared at the rocking waves. They were rolling, so close to the shore that all he could see of the piers was the wood gently bobbing on the surface. And she was beneath them. Or so he believed. Leaning down, he rolled his jeans up, took a deep breath, and dove in.

Who: Matt Cavanaugh and Elodie Desmarais
Where: Leicester Square. The one with the theatres.
When: 31st March, afternoon
What: Elodie wants to beat the shit out of Matt. Matt is opposed but armed. Standoff ensues, and maybe it'll mean they can actually talk. Oh, who am I kidding?
Rating: PG-13, let's say.
Status: Closed, incomplete
Notes: I don't know if it snowed today, but it has snowed in London recently, so...let's have some snow.


The best part of the Tube was leaving it, always, hands down. Matt had no idea how these people had managed an empire when they couldn't manage a multi-line train journey; he preferred New York's subway. Or even the Paris Metro, though it would be nice if he could ride that without that song by that one very annoying band going through his head.

Great, he'd blanked out the name of the band, it was so annoying.

But into the fresh air, almost like the shot of whiskey he'd had that morning, or the several he'd had, just enough for a nice buzz, no more, and into the unseasonable weather.

Specifically, it was fucking snowing.

"This is ridiculous," he muttered, getting some looks as he stuck his hands into his armpits; it felt like his hands had instantly frozen, since he, oddly enough, hadn't worn gloves. His jacket wasn't exactly sufficient protection from the cold; it sort of gave up and died at temperatures below forty, which was whatever-the-fuck-it-was in Celsius.

"This is fucking ridiculous!" he shouted suddenly, directly at the woman who'd given him the worst look, a woman who, one was almost forcibly aware, looked a lot like a younger, possibly more female, Margaret Thatcher. One who'd stolen the Queen's clothing. She snorted, and he had to admit he was impressed with her failure to move away in the face of his fucked-up-hobo impression.

"This is a fucked up country," he added, but this time quietly, as he glanced around the crowd, and realised he couldn't see shit. He leaped up onto a park bench - why was it there, there was no park, fucking English - watching to see who waited and who was watching and where this insane person who wanted to punch him might be. Spotting a likely candidate - based on nothing other than the fact that she was staring at him angrily - he stomped up to her and said, irritation as plain on his face as in his words, "I'm freezing my fucking nuts off, and this was a bad plan. You Desmarais?"

Who: Matt Cavanaugh and Susan Bones
What: Celtic and Rangers fans have a showdown and then Sue suggests she and Matt go feed the ducks.
Where: Hackney, London
When: October 2007
Rating: R
Status: Closed; complete

It was oddly silent in the crowded pub when she pushed open the door and slid inside, elbows knocking against the sides of the mostly male crowd inside as she tried to make her way to the counter. Everyone around her seemed to be holding their breath, their eyes wide and round as they stared straight ahead and Susan's head turned to try and figure out what was proving so fascinating to them. When she found it she almost kicked herself. A twenty four inch plasma television showing a football match was kind of hard to miss.

Head shaking, she squeezed in between two stocky figures and nearly tripped over her own feet. Thankfully, her hands grabbed at the bar and hoisted her body up. "Smart, Sue," she murmured under her breath.

Someone beside her hissed something in her ear, which she couldn't make out as at that precise moment the whole pub seemed to have decided to erupt into cheers, voices loud and jubilant as the ball sank into the back of the net. She'd never understood the appeal of watching football in a pub filled with overweight middle-aged men, most of whom smelled worse than the dump around the corner from her flat, and when a number of them raised their arms in unison she had to suck in a breath. God, that was awful.

( Sometimes we run... )

Who: Matt Cavanaugh and Mila Macnair
What: When lost, Mila decides to kick ass. Natch.
When: Late December 2006
Where: London, near Charing Cross Road
Rating: PG
Status: Closed, complete.

This was a bad idea. A very, very bad idea. It was one thing to go into the muggle world with someone she knew – someone she knew who understood how their lives worked, but alone? Mila had never felt like such an idiot in her life, nor had she ever felt more out of place, and it had been ages since she had been so frightened. Her clothes, the jeans and t-shirt she owned but only wore around the house, felt so revealing that she was sure someone was going to say something about how exposed she was with every curve of her body outlined. It was like walking into the street in only her underwear, and Mila wondered if the muggles rushing by her would have been wearing nothing at all if it wasn't so cold out. It was so crowded, too, and every few seconds someone would brush by her causing Mila to startle slightly and resist the urge to turn around and slap them for invading her personal space.

She was lost, she realized with a sinking feeling as she looked up and down the street with no sign of the pub she had left from in sight. She had no idea what to do now – there had to be another entrance back to wizarding London, and she could only hope that she would recognize the aura of magic when she passed it. If she passed it.

"Fuck," she muttered to herself, standing in the middle of the afternoon rush before deciding to go forward in hopes of finding another entrance or a deserted alley she could disapparate from. With quick, long strides she moved off the cement and onto the darker colored pavement, where at least no one was walking. She managed to get a few steps further before she heard someone scream, "look out!" She turned, and had just enough time to see one of the fast, metal machines coming at her, roaring in a way that was entirely unnatural. But before she had the chance to do more than scream in reaction her body was slamming to the ground, the force of someone pushing her out of the way causing her to fall to the ground as the car sped through the place she had been standing not even a second before.

"Close," Matt said quietly, maybe quietly enough that she couldn't hear him over the sound of the traffic, and held out a hand to help her up. "Were you trying to do that, or just didn't see the car?"

He hadn't been the one to get her out of the way - that person was gone, maybe Superman or something, given how quickly he'd moved, as if it was totally normal to save women from getting hit by cars, but he'd been the closest on the sidewalk when she'd screamed.

Since he'd, you know, been standing there paralysed by the thought that someone was about to die in front of him and he couldn't move quickly enough to save her.

( You're the only people who automatically assume everything is related to either crime or sex. Maybe I am just lost, and that is all. )