01<@Ardweden> [Day: Thursday, September 16.  Time: 3:50.]
 01<@Ardweden> [After a really rough day, Tiffany convinced Christina to go to 
the mall with her.  *That* was difficult!  They were just walking through the 
parking lot to one of the main entrances when Tiffany spotted Tony exiting the 
mall, hands shoved in his pockets and a dark look on his face.  And he's heading 
right for them!]
 01<@Ardweden> [What's a Tiffany to do?  Besides hide ineffectually behind her 
best friend?  Let's find out.]
 01<@Ardweden> [Session Start!]
 06* Tiffany keeps hiding for a second, with Christina looking back at her and 
gestures with her head towards Tony. "Over there." She sighs. "That's one of the 
last people I wanna run into today..."
 01<@Ardweden> [Christina glances back at Tiffany, then looks at Tony, then back 
at Tiffany.  "Why?"]
 06* Tiffany sighs again and looks up at her, emphasizing pointedly. "Because I 
*already* ran into him today...you know, early today..."
 01<@Ardweden> [Christina blinks, or probably does - it's hard to tell with 
those glasses.  "Oh... okay, um."  She looks around for a way to escape.  
Meanwhile Tony looks over at them and starts walking faster.  Uh oh.]
 06* Tiffany sighs. "Probably too late now anyway." She stands back up. "Come 
on. If we just start walking, maybe we can act like we didn't see him." She 
takes her hand and starts walking towards the mall
 01<@Ardweden> [Christina nods, and she walks, falling in step with Tiffany.  As 
they approach him, Tony stops and says, "Didn't know you were into girls, Tiff."  
Christina turns bright red, but she just clings to Tiffany's hand more tightly.]
 06* Tiffany stops for a moment and turns to Tony, giving him a fake smile and 
brushing her hair. "Tony. Didn't see you there."
 01<@Ardweden> ["Bet you didn't."  The strange, dark look isn't gone from his 
eye, as he looks from Christina to Tiffany, probably trying to decide if he 
wants to say something.  Christina, meanwhile, looks like she might want to hide 
behind *Tiffany* now.  She's clearly better at this sort of thing.  Whatever 
that thing is.]
 06* Tiffany sighs for a moment, still playing with her hair. "What do you 
*want*, Tony?"
 01<@Ardweden> [Tony looks like he wants to say something, then glances at 
Christina and thinks better of it.  "Tyler's in there," he says instead, going 
back to walking.  "You might wanna talk to him."]
 06* Tiffany looks at him for a moment, losing her discomfort with the situation 
for confusion. "Huh? Why me?"
 01<@Ardweden> [He really doesn't seem interested in answering as he walks away.  
Christina turns to watch him go, and once he's reasonably out of hearing 
distance says, "What was *that* all about?"]
 06* Tiffany sighs. "Not a fucking clue. Wanna go in and find out?"
 01<@Ardweden> [Christina nods and goes back to heading in, now kind of pulling 
Tiffany along.]
 06* Tiffany goes along willingly so she doesn't get as pulled. She's as eager 
to find out what's going on as Christina is.
01<@Ardweden> [They head into the mall and before long spot Tyler in the 
Gamestop.  Steve stands nearby, sipping something from Orange Julius.]
 06* Tyler is staring at the violent beat them up games, cause that's what he 
does.
 06* Tiffany glances in the Gamestop and hesitates for a moment. Not really her 
kind of thing. But eventually walks in, either with Christina dragging or of her 
own volution. She taps Tyler on the shoulder. "Hey, we need to talk."
 01<@Ardweden> [Christina does, in fact, tag along!  A little distance behind, 
as she's dropped Tiffany's hand.  She looks around the store.]
 06* Tyler JUMPS. "er. hey..."
 06* Tiffany puts her hands on her hips. "Don't hey me. Why did Tony tell me 
that we need to talk?"
 01<@Ardweden> [Steve blinks, slurping his Julius.]
 06* Tyler goes pale.
<Tyler> er.. umm...
 06* Tyler shifts looking at tony and christiana. "No reason" he's lying badly.
 01<@Ardweden> [Christina looks at Tyler and then Tiffany.  She gives her an 
eyebrow raise.]
 06* Tiffany stares at Tyler. "Right." She grabs him by the arm and hauls him 
out of there. Or at least tries to!
 06* Tyler doesn't resists. "HEY! I need to pay for these." He holds up two 
games.
 06* Tiffany takes the games out of Tyler's hands and hands them to Steve. 
"Here. Pay for these and meet up with him later. He'll pay you back." She goes 
back to dragging.
 06* Tyler sighs and shoots steve an apology glance as he's dragged out of 
there.
 01<@Ardweden> ["Huh?" Steve asks intelligently as they're shoved into his free 
hand, and Christina walks up, removing her sunglasses and looking down at said 
games.  "Are those good?  I was sort of thinking about getting a 360."  Which 
just makes Steve gape at her.  Girl.  Games.  Talking to him.  What.]
 06* Tiffany turns back to Christina. "You gonna wait here or coming with?"
 01<@Ardweden> [Christina waves and smiles brightly at Tiffany.  "You got it.  
Text or call if you need me," she says while Steve still tries to come up with 
something relatively intelligent to say.]
 06* Tiffany nods and smiles back to her. Then yanks on Tyler's arm. "Come on." 
She yanks him towards Orange Julius herself because man that sounds good about 
now.
 06* Tyler sighs, and starts to move forward, trying to drag Tiffany out with 
him now.
 06* Tiffany lets go before he can do that, but she's frowning. She's clearly 
not going to let him get out of there easily
 01<@Ardweden> [They fight over who drags whom!  Well, anyway, they head out 
into mall proper and towards the Orange Julius.]
<Tyler> Come on, let's get a shake at least. I fucked up.
 06* Tiffany frowns and keeps her voice relatively low as she waits in line. 
"Just what the hell is going on, Tyler?"
 01<@Ardweden> [Holy crap.  Was that Tyler saying something like "I'm sorry?"  
And also kind of like a friend?]
 01<@Ardweden> [That was so holy crap it's in brackets.]
<Tyler> I fucked up. I did something I knew was fucking bad. Right after Tony 
put his neck on the line.
 06* Tiffany scowls. "Stop beating around the fucking bush, Tyler. What the hell 
happened?"
<Tyler> What do you want at Orange Julius?
 06* Tiffany frowns at Tyler, but pauses and then calms down a little bit as she 
realizes that he's actually being friendly for once, and she wouldn't want to 
waste this opportunity. "Strawberry banana."
 06* Tyler nods and goes through the line ordering a large one for Tiffany and a 
large blueberry. He brought it back, handing Tiffany' hers and taking a drink of 
his own. Clearly, stalling for time.
 06* Tiffany sits down and raps her nails on the table, looking off to the side 
with her other elbow on the table. She still looks a bit annoyed.
 06* Tyler sighs. "I said something. He was pushing for why I was being nice to 
you. I ran out of excuses and fucked up."
 06* Tiffany sighs too and takes the julius. "Why *are* you being nice to me, 
Tyler?"
 06* Tyler frowns and looks away from Tiffany. "Truce for now till I can make it 
up to Tony."
 06* Tiffany frowns. "Is truce the reason you're being nice or are you calling a 
truce right now?"
<Tyler> Both, I don't know. Look, I don't want kicked out. Okay? I don't think 
it's a good idea and I'm going to help folks no matter what.
 06* Tiffany sighs. "Why do you want to help, Tyler?"
<Tyler> Out of the kindness of my heart.
 06* Tiffany stares at Tyler. Hard. "You know. That line would work soooo much 
better on someone whose life you haven't made miserable for the last year."
 06* Tyler shrugs. "Every one wants to be something important. I am."
 06* Tiffany shakes her head. "I'm not the one you need to make peace with, you 
know. I couldn't give a rat's ass."
 06* Tiffany brushes her hair and looks at Tyler. "You're a fuck up with an 
attitude who thinks he knows it all and you *don't*, Tyler. You're gonna end up 
getting us killed one of these days."
 06* Tyler looks away sipping his drink, not really responding to that.
 06* Tiffany sighs and sips her own drink. "And you're avoiding the question. 
You still haven't told me why Tony said I should talk to you. Is that what this 
is about?" She then narrows her eyes. "Oh god, please don't tell me that's what 
this is about..."
 06* Tyler shrugs a bit staring at his drink. "I fucked up."
 06* Tiffany stares at Tyler. "What did you *do*, Tyler?"
<Tyler> I told you. He kept asking; I ran out of excuses.
 06* Tiffany blinks at Tyler. "You..." She blinks again. "You *told* him?" She 
just looks at him incredulously. "What the fuck, Tyler?"
 06* Tyler looks at his drink. "Look, I don't like lying to my friends. More so 
one that just risked his neck for me and is risking it for you too."
 06* Tiffany sighs. "Yeah Tyler but..." She frowns. "Couldn't you think to 
*talk* to us about it first?"
 06* Tyler turns and looks Tiffany in the eye if he can. "What makes you think 
I'd have wanted to do that? What makes you think I would want to talk to Hank 
about this? Or you? Or the ditz? or mumblefuck?"
 06* Tiffany looks at Tyler. Hard. "Look, do you want to work with us or not?"
<Tyler> Unlike the rest of you I don't think breaking a team up is smart. I 
would have picked different people, but you got chosen. You can blame this all 
on me or you can ask why Tyler wouldn't want to go to a group of people that 
aways assumes the worse of him, believes he's wrong even when he's right, and 
have threatened to beat him to a bloody pulp instead. I wonder why it might be I 
didn't think of asking that group of people what they thought about me telling 
my concerned friend the truth when he knew I was lying.
 06* Tiffany frowns and holds up her hand. "Okay, first of all, it's not "all of 
us." It's Hank. Second of all, if you do this crap yourself, you're gonna get 
killed, you know."
 06* Tiffany looks aside and brushes her hair. "And before you go all "poor me" 
on me, can it. I had this same conversation with Javy too."
<Tyler> Oh, I'm not going poor me. I fucked up. I said that from the get go. I 
don't care if I get killed; I'm doing this.
 06* Tyler looks so earnest. It's hard to tell if he's just putting on a brave 
front or not.
 06* Tiffany glances back at Tyler. "You want us to work as a team? Fine. Fuck 
Tyler, has it *seemed* like I'm not going to work with you if I have to? But if 
that's gonna work, we're gonna have to *work* as a goddamned team."
<Tiffany> And that means you and Hank are gonna have to stop this pissing 
contest over me. Hank's gotta realize I can take care of myself. And you're 
gonna have to realize I'm not the goddamned easy target you think I am.
 06* Tyler looks like he's going to fight that, and then exhales taking a drink. 
He is clearly using it to get some control. "So. Truce?"
 06* Tiffany sighs and sips from her drink too. "Truce. But I'm still not the 
one you have to convince..."
 06* Tyler laughs. "You haven't realized it? All of them will fall over 
themselves to make you happy. You ask nicely and they'd do it."
 06* Tiffany stares at Tyler and sighs. "It's not as easy as you think. Every 
time I try to even remotely stick up for you, Hank thinks I want to fuck you."
<Tiffany> You and I *both* know I wouldn't touch your greasy ass with a twelve-
foot pole.
 06* Tyler stares at Tiffany, jaw dropping, and then face contorting in 
disgust...
 06* Tiffany snorts. "Yeah. I know. Right?" She frowns. "You're gonna have to 
talk to him. Show him that you're actually willing to listen to the team."
 06* Tyler takes a deeper breath and looks away. "I tried to get them to talk to 
me with Tony. You knew I had no clue. I begged for suggestions. Hard to listen 
when no one talks." He wants to say something else, you can feel it, but he's 
doing a good job holding back his tylerness.
 06* Tiffany sighs. "You were trying as Imp. Try as Tyler first." She stands up. 
"I gotta go. I wouldn't want to leave Christina in the clutches of the 
Tremendous Maw back there."
 06* Tyler laughs at that last bit. "Sure, no problem. He's harmless though. 
I'll wait a few minutes before heading back."
 06* Tiffany frowns. Then sighs and shakes his head. "Fine. Look, let's...I 
don't like working with you either, Tyler. But I'm willing to if you're willing 
to work with me. And I bet the others would be too if you actually give them a 
chance and don't immediately piss 'em off."
<Tiffany> Good luck with Tony.
 06* Tiffany waves and heads off back to Gamestop.
 06* Tyler will sit there drinking his blueberry smoothie for a few minutes 
before heading off that way himself.
 01<@Ardweden> [Tiffany walks into Gamestop to see Steve standing by Christina, 
holding a bag with a few purchases while she looks a DSi over.  "It has a 
camera, really?" she asks, and Steve nods.]
 06* Tiffany pulls out her phone as she walks and sends Javy a quick text. She 
then looks up and blinks at Christina and Steve. It's acutally kind of cute.
 01<@Ardweden> ["Yeah," Steve says, "And um, see, it has internet, too..."  "Oh, 
like my phone!  But it plays better games, right?" "Er... yeah," Steve says, 
nodding enthusiastically.  "Lots of really good games."]
 01<@Ardweden> ["Good, because my phone doesn't have one of those..."  Christina 
sort of gestures.  "With the arrows..."  "D-pad?" Steve offers helpfully.  
"Yeah, that.  What does that mean, anyway?"]
 06* Tiffany waves over to Christina from outside the Gamestop. She doesn't want 
to get in the way of their "quality" time.
 01<@Ardweden> ["Directional pad.  Because it moves sprites in certain 
directions, see?"  Christina nods, then looks up and spots Tiffany.  She smiles, 
waving back.  "Hey, Tiffany," she calls, and Steve looks up, too, blinking.]
 06* Tiffany looks at her phone and Javy's message, then smiles at Christina. 
"All good. Ready to go?"
 06* Tiffany texts Javy back quickly on her phone.
 01<@Ardweden> ["Sure!" Christina calls, and she turns to Steve.  "Thanks for 
the help.  Maybe I'll get one of these... I mean, it's pretty cute."  She puts 
it back on the rack.  "See you at school!" she calls with a wave, heading out of 
the Gamestop.]
 01<@Ardweden> [Steve waves.  "Uh, yeah.  Bye?"  He still doesn't seem quite 
sure what happened.]
 06* Tiffany snickers at that and then heads off, glancing back at Steve when 
he's out of earshot. "Oh god. You *so* deserve a freebie on me for that..."
 01<@Ardweden> [Christina shrugs, still smiling.  "He was pretty nice, 
especially for one of *those* guys."  Pause.  "Besides, that little pink game 
thing was cute."]
 06* Tiffany answers Javy's text, then looks at her and snickers. Then pauses 
and looks at her again. "Wait, you're serious..."
 01<@Ardweden> ["It was!"]
 06* Tiffany grins. "So you're going to be hanging out with Steve more now?"
 01<@Ardweden> [Christina rolls her eyes.  "You mean, like, at all?  I dunno.  
He is in with Tyler and stuff."]
 06* Tiffany nudges her. "I'm teasing." She sighs. "That didn't go as horrible 
as I thought it was going to." She sips her julius, then holds it out for 
Christina. "Wanna sip?"
 01<@Ardweden> ["Sure, thanks."  Christina sips, then hands it back.  "So, what 
happened?"]
 06* Tiffany shakes her head. "Long story. Some personal stuff..." She frowns. 
"Though I think Tyler's going to be nicer to me from now on. It's...weird."
 01<@Ardweden> ["Really?  Nicer's good, right?"]
 06* Tiffany rubs her head. "Yeah. It's just...weird, you know? I swore Tony was 
gonna slug me or shove me down with him coming at me like that..."
 01<@Ardweden> [Christina nods.  "Yeah... it was pretty scary.  I... I'm sorry.  
If that happens a lot, I mean."]
 06* Tiffany shrugs and cracks a small smile. "It's cool. I'm used to it, 
y'know? And hey, things might be getting better." She sips her Orange Julius 
some more, then sighs. "Though things are more complicated too."
 01<@Ardweden> ["Why?  Is this about the, um, Hank thing?"]
 06* Tiffany sighs. "Yeah." She looks off to the side for a moment and pauses, 
thinking.
 01<@Ardweden> [Christina looks at Tiffany curiously.]
 06* Tiffany smiles. "It's nothing. Hey, you wanna shop for purses?"
 01<@Ardweden> ["That's rhetorical, right?" Christina grins, as she leads the 
way to Hot Topic.]
 06* Tiffany snickers. Then looks at Christina. "Hey, I wonder if Susanna'd want 
out on these little outings with us."
 01<@Ardweden> ["Hank's sister?  Maybe.  She's got an... interesting style."  
Christina is clearly trying to find a nice way to put it.]
 06* Tiffany gestures to herself vaguely. "Apparently she likes mine. Go fig, 
right?"
 01<@Ardweden> [She laughs.  "Yeah.  Anyway, sure, if she wants to come."]
<Tiffany> And if nothing else, she could use your...special touch.
 06* Tiffany grins and nudges. Then thinks. "Hey. It might actually be a way for 
Hank to get to know you if things blow over..."
 01<@Ardweden> [At that, Christina blinks.  And blushes.  "Um, well... yeah, I 
guess so..."  She hurries to the Hot Topic.  Time to hide behind fashion!]
 06* Tiffany frowns a bit. "Ah, sorry....I didn't mean to...I mean...Stina, wait 
up!"
 06* Tiffany runs after!
 01<@Ardweden> [Session End!]