Home Sweet Home (Aryana)

[Gleam]

"Got it!" Jagd howls jubilantly, as cool water flushes out the pipe and smacks him in the face, turning his sentence into garbled gibberish. Showers don't sound like much until you lose it and build it back with your bare hands, after all.

Giggling, he rolls out of the spray and clambers up the iron ladder to check the water supply, a large tank with a pulley and bucket nearby to dump water in, making the entire contraption a sort of reverse well. It has to be manually refilled, but that's a small price to pay for not smelling like old dog.

Jagd mentally apologizes to Magnus. The husky, below at the base of the tower, barks as some of the water touches his coat, and the great dog dances away, tail pointed straight up.

Swinging back down on the pulley, the scarred man lands on his feet and gazes about his home, a repurposed water tower that had survived the cataclysm fairly well. Set high up off the ground, it was safe from ground predators and people that annoyed him. He had made the ladder retractable just in case too. Magnus couldn't quite manage ladders, but he made do all the same.

"D'ya want a bath, boy?" Jagd calls down to the dog, who responds by hiding in the nearest bush, provoking another laugh.

[Aryana Flinn]

CLOSER THAN YOU THINK
A couple of block down the road Aryana was trying to find her way around. She hadn't been in this part of town since she was a little girl, back when her parents were still alive. Looking around at her surrounding, Aryana could see that part of the park hadn't been touched. She looked over to the tennis court and could remember herself back then playing with her father, but that was before he began drinking and being abusive.

Turning to a corner and making her way past all sorts of courts both broken and untouched, she made her way down to the water tower. Minding her own business she hadn't realized someone else was there, but as she turned her gaze to the side she saw an image. It looked like a canine but she wasn't so sure. Moving closer she confirmed that it was a dog, in fact. Standing there she observed the dog not realizing that the owner was there too.

[Gleam]

Magnus barks and Jagd's head twitches upward, looking around curiously for what has his companion's attention. Just past the broken-down, half-torn fence around the base of the tower (a victim of the storm-strength winds that had ravaged the city), a woman was standing, eyes fixed uncertainly on the husky.

Magnus barks again, and Jagd whistles in response, the trained command setting the dog to heel, native guard instinct receding. His scarred master leans against the railing around the main level of the watertower, beaming down. "Ho, stranger!" Jagd calls, waving enthusiastically. "Don't mind Magnus, he's gruff and irritable and deprived of his bacon lately."

He leans back, grips a hand railing he'd stripped from a park walkway nearby, and slides down it to the ground, spinning down around it like a fireman's pole. The action unfortunately leaves streaks of mechanical oil on his hands and cargo pants, which Jagd doesn't really appear to notice. "Welcome to the hinterlands."he adds with a smile, hooking his thumbs into his pockets.

[Aryana Flinn]

CLOSER THAN YOU THINK
Aryana jerks her head to the attention of the man. Blind as a bat with only one eye uncovered, jumped a little. Aryana was never this blunt, she was always alarmed of her surroundings. However, today just wasn't her day. She'd been walking around for hours just seeing how bad New York City had come to be.

"H-hi" She said with a little uneasiness in her voice. Aryana was never the type of person to speak to people she had just met, but as polite as she was she was never reluctant to politely respond back if she was being spoken to.

[Gleam]

Jagd flaps a hand in a dismissive, casual gesture, and plops down on his butt at the base of the tower. He's a little intimidating to look at, he knows, and the huge dog doesn't help, so putting himself on his can goes a long way to not looking like a crazed madman. Magnus trots up and seats himself beside his master, as the man reaches out to scrub at the dog's right ear.

"Haven't seen you before." Jagd says cheerfully, leaning back against the water tower base. "You just out wandering and seeing the sights, collecting the souvenirs? I have event mugs! They don't really match, but, eh, I say this gives them character."

He blinks once, and switches train of thought abruptly. "I just finished hooking up plumbing!" he cheers.

[Aryana Flinn]

CLOSER THAN YOU THINK
Placing a hand to her patch she scratched a bit. She did this when she felt like it was okay to move on. The man had cause her no harm, so she thought it was alright for her to be a little bit herself, just a bit. As she placed her hand back to her side, she slowly paced closer to the tower, man, and canine. He was the first man she encountered after the event, well at least exchanged words with. The rest she just happened to pass by.

"I'm new around these parts yes, and I as for pluming congratulations," she says letting out a sigh. It wasn't a sigh of displeasure, but a sigh that was more like a satisfaction. Unlike the man she still had her apartment which was barely untouched by the catastrophe.

"So what's the name of your dog?" She pressed out which was something she never did.

[Gleam]

"It's a blessing." Jagd agrees readily. "I was getting tired of having to skinnydip every time I wanted to be sanitary. That water is cold. "

He pats his husky on the flank and sends the dog forward a couple paces to sit before the girl with ears perked, panting slightly in the heat of the afternoon. Robin-blue eyes peer curiously up at her. "Magnus." his master calls over the dog's head. "He's a friendly sort. Shake, Magnus!"

The dog responds automatically to the command, offering a paw up to the woman along with a big wet tongue that lolls out.

[Aryana Flinn]

CLOSER THAN YOU THINK
As the dog trotted over to her she tilted her head to the side. She watched as the canine walked over to her, sat down, and with his masters command to shake he raised his paw for her to take. Chuckling a bit, she extended her hand and took the canine's paw, shaking it lightly and releasing it after two pumps.

"What a nice name. What's its breed?" She asked him not realizing she was being a little too open for her taste. She wasn't very much of the type to ask too many questions to those she just met, but being he was the first she had spoken to before the event, she didn't seem to mind. It would be nice to have a little company being all alone in this now broken world.

"Sorry, I don't really speak to people much." She explained to him as she bent down to pet the canine behind its left ear.

[Gleam]

Magnus pants up at the woman, butts his head against her leg hard, and then trots back to his master, sitting beside the scarred man, where the dog sets his head on his paws, and evidently goes back to sleep. "Malamute." Jagd replies affectionately, ruffling the husky's head again. "Big, loyal dogs. Best companions you could ask for when trouble comes. I think all this counts, eh?"

Jagd indicates the entirety of New York with an outstretched arm.

"Anyways, there's no need to apologize." Jagd continues, smiling up at the woman. "You're doing just fine. If you start shooting sign language at me I'll be totally lost, no question, but this I can cope with."

He shoots a cheery salute, two fingers touching his brow in the old Boy Scout tradition. "I'm Jagd. Asimov Metschulin, but since nobody ever pronounces any part of it right, you can call me pretty much whatever you want. This -" he reaches back and knocks on the water tower, " - is my home. A fixer-upper, I do admit."

[Aryana Flinn]

CLOSER THAN YOU THINK
Aryana finishes off scratching the dog behind its ear and releases her hand placing it back to her side as she stood up. Watching the dog turn around and walked away, she closed her eyes briefly and reopened them as the man began to speak. Malamute was what he had said, but for Aryana she didn't really care what kind of breed she just thought it was a cute dog, but all dogs are cute. Although the hairless and the dogs with faces that seemed to have layers of skin on their face weren't so much.

Moving on with her thoughts her facial expression straightened. "I don't trust you quiet yet." She said under her breath before she looked past the man and the canine, staring at what seemed to be the water tower she had saw just a minute ago from a block away. She scanned the area looking for nothing in particular, then she fixed her sight back to the man.

"Ary-Aryana Flinn" She said back in a hushed tone, she wasn't very comfortable telling her name to a stranger. She was just never used to being with anybody other than a couple of people. However, most of her so called friends had lost their lives, so there wasn't really anyone. She looked back up at the water tower, and although it did looked run down being hit from the event and all, it was still somewhat sturdy. She wasn't going to take a chance though.

"There are many abandoned buildings now, so why don't you crash in one of those places?" She asked him with a questionable tone.

[Gleam]

"Honestly?" Jagd replies, raising an eyebrow. "I like the view. You can keep your apartment complexes and highrises and tenements. I want me some trees, dammit, and here, in the middle of the park?"

He indicates the luxurious green surroundings of Hudson Park. "I have all the greenery I could want." the man continues, satisfied. "I can have apples for breakfast if I want them - provided that it's the proper season. And I don't have to deal with looters or the rabble, because no one tries to rob a water tower, and in any case it's got a pretty commanding field of fire."

Jagd tilts his head and smiles, a little abashed. "'Sides, I'm not fond of people telling me what to do. Tried that for awhile, but after the sky fell down, well, kind of got stranded. Figured if I'm going to be stuck, I might as well be stuck in a highly visible and comfortable place."

[Aryana Flinn]

CLOSER THAN YOU THINK
Aryana ruffled her brows and crossed her arms. She hadn't meant to say it in a harsh way if it was how her words had came out to be. "I was merely suggesting." She replied as she looked past the man. She sighed feeling as if things had suddenly turned upside down. Walking over to a boulder, she took a seat and placed her elbows on her knees with her chin gently placed on the palm of her hand. She glanced over to the man, unsure if she should speak. It seemed as if she had hurt him in someway, or at least that was how he had approached it in her opinion.

Keeping silent she picked up a pebble and began tossing it in the air, but suddenly she found herself becoming bored with it so with her fifth toss she didn't bother to catch it, but let it drop on the ground with a silent cling as it hit the surface of the pavement.

"I don't particularly know how to speak well with people I just met, so if my words seem to sound harsh in any way shape or form, I do apologize." She proclaimed as she gazed over to the water tower above.

[Gleam]

Jagd blinks and his mouth quirks in a smile. "You didn't." he says cheerily. "I tend towards harsh language. Army habit. So if you feel the need to apologize for offense you believe you've caused me -"

He rolls away from the support of the water tower base and quite bluntly prostrates himself before the girl, arms laid flat in the dirt. "Please forgive this one for his mercurial ways and fickle moods - he does not intend offense or distress by any, merely that he listens to the weather of his heart with a keener ear than most."

A beat, and he rolls over on his side and props his head up with a hand, one eyebrow cocked at his momentary company. "Besides, honestly, if you try to take me serious all the time you . . . well, you'll probably stroke and die." Jagd grimaces. "Morbid. But entirely true."

[Aryana Flinn]

CLOSER THAN YOU THINK
She was surprised by his actions, rolling to the ground, and it seemed as if he was bowing, bowing for forgiveness. Now, Aryana wasn't the sort to let her emotions expel out in the open unless she knew who they were, as in a close companion, but with what he had done, Aryana couldn't help but to burst out in laughter. Quickly; however, she covered her mouth and bit her tongue to refrain herself from laughing any further.

She glanced over to his dog Magnus and watched his reaction, but it seemed all he did was rise up for a split second then went on to what he had been doing the whole time.

"Well, if that were to happen, then Death would surly come and take my soul." She replied forming a smile as she spoke. "However, I do hope it doesn't happen."

[Gleam]

Jagd smiles in return and rolls onto his back, linking his hands behind his head. "He might be a busy guy." the scarred man comments, eyes closing as he enjoys the bright sunlight. "I'd say not to bother him with it, I'm sure he's got pigeons to count or something. Dead ones, I mean."

He frowns. "What a depressing job that would be. Dead pigeon counter."

A pause, and then Jagd's back arches, leaving him stood partially on his head and peering back at the woman. "Sounded vaguely poetic, that. You attached to what's left of the Uni or are you just a Thoreau fan?"

He grins and spins over, balancing on his elbows and toes, hands still folded behind his head. "I can definitely see you in front of a chalkboard pelting miscreant students with erasers, at least."