Power || Jessie & Madison
TIMING: Current. LOCATION: The UMWR library. PARTIES: Jessie @goryglam13 and Madison @madisonnotmaddie SUMMARY: Jessie wants to research demons. So she goes to the UMWR library. Madison is there, and she likes to help. ( @ Daniel and Daiyu look! She's not in the woods!) WARNINGS: None!
Nightmares had come way too easily and way too frequent now, and that’s something that Jessie just couldn’t stand. Lack of sleep was not fun, especially when you had to deal with the public on a regular basis. And besides, she had taken a long enough break on her hunt for more information regarding the hellish beast that was playing cat and mouse with her. Luckily, though, Wicked’s Rest had seemed like the perfect place to get information on things that went bump in the night, and one place she had yet to try was UMWR’s campus library, despite not being a student. Of course, when you were a master at charming people, nothing stood in your way.
Now, standing in the entry way to the library, she had so slyly managed to sweet talk her way into, Jessie let her eyes scan the vast building. There had been multiple floors towering over her, but without a campus ID, there was no way she was going to be able to use a computer to find what she was looking for. Unless, she could borrow someone else’s or at least get them to log into the computer for her.
—
Madison wouldn’t exactly call herself a library enthusiast, but she enjoyed it well enough, and sometimes if she was really lucky the librarians let her look at the really old mathematics books. Unfortunately, that wasn’t the most common of occurrences, but even if it only happened once in a while, she was grateful for it. Sadly this library wasn’t like the ones in Buffy, and there weren’t answers to all the questions she had about what she was (there were plenty of people who liked to wear beige and looked like they knew all sorts of things, but most of them did seem to be missing the British accent that the guy who helped Buffy out had).
There was a woman standing by the entrance and she looked confused. Madison wasn’t sure of it, but she figured she could at least offer to help (and not ask the woman if she was a hunter – which she didn’t do all the time, despite whatever Daniel and Daiyu liked to imply). “Hi.” She said, voice tentative. “Did – I mean, I’m not assuming you’re lost, but if – well, I can help you maybe find something if you want. Or I can go away and we can pretend this never happened. Sorry.”
—
The voice came out of nowhere, but it was welcomed. Maybe Jessie wouldn’t have to use her charm after all. Real confusion had seemed to work just fine. But the question was if this other woman would still help her, when Jessie revealed she wasn’t a student. Honestly was the best policy though, and she wasn’t going to lie. She just didn’t have it in her. And Jenna’s judgy eyes being cast down on her didn’t seem to help matters either. Most importantly though, she didn’t want to see anyone get hurt by this thing anymore than she already had been.
“Uh, hey, yeah. You honestly came along at the right time. I needed to do some research on a topic, and I heard this was the best place in town for really old books.” She chewed on her bottom lip, before just getting to the point, “So…I need to do research on demons. I know that sounds completely out of the blue, but it’s really important. Can you maybe help? Either pointing me in the right direction or logging into the computer, so I can at least see what books are available.” Jessie knew she probably sounded insane, but she didn’t know what else to do and searching on her own would be nearly impossible without some kind of assistance, be it via human or a digital card catalog.
—
“This might be the best place in town for that.” She shrugged. “Or there might be somewhere else in town that’s better – but usually in stories or movies where people need to do research, a library is a good place to start.” That much Madison was fairly positive about. Though this woman might have been better off at the town library, but maybe the university library had other sorts of things that were more research-y (academic. Right…) – she couldn’t claim to be sure about either of these things one way or the other, but if this woman needed help, then she could help!
Except she was asking about demons and Madison had to fight with her face to not look completely and totally gobsmacked about it all. Because demons weren’t real, were they? But if this woman thought they were, Madison wasn’t going to step in and squash her ideas. Plus, if stuff like werewolves and vampires were real, then maybe demons could be real, too. They were in television shows and they were pretty powerful (or at least, that was what she thought in her mind – were there hunters who went after demons?). “I don’t know where there’s books on that, but yeah, we can go and look at a computer if you’d like?” She began walking toward where a few of the computers were. Old ones, ones that looked like they’d existed years before she was even born. But that was a good sign, right? Old meant they knew more things! (Or was that just people?)
—
Jessie was desperate for any help she could get, and while she hadn’t actually checked the library in town yet. She figured a college library would be geared more towards research, and maybe even hold the key to life. It was impressive what could be found on college campuses around the world. Jessie had read many articles over the years on the different artifacts that places like Harvard and other well known universities had held. If this place was known for things that went bump in the night, then maybe someone at the library had thought to start collecting material on anything that matched the town’s m.o.
“I know it’s a stretch, but I had the exact same thought you did. Let the movies guide the way. They have most of my life anyways.” She laughed, before offering up her name as she followed the other woman towards the computers, “I’m Jessie, by the way. And you’re a lifesaver for doing this.” Literally. If these dinosaur computers held the key to taking down this thing that was haunting her, then Jessie was game.
—
“Movies have guided your life?!” Madison exclaimed, just loud enough to earn a hush by one of the librarians and she felt her cheeks flush with embarrassment. Right. Monitoring her voice was something that she had to work on. Not usually, she didn’t think, but right now, apparently. Which was far from ideal and far from what she wanted to be, but she’d just have to make sure she only whispered for the rest of her time in the library today. “I’m Madison, and please, I don’t think that this makes me a lifesaver.” She was one, technically, sort of, unofficially, but not like this.
She sat down in front of one of the computers. “Wait, do you go here? I don’t – well, I am not assuming, but I figure you might go here, but if you did then you’d –” Madison cut herself off. “Sorry. How can I help?” She bounced her legs against the chair and the ground. “Do you wanna log on first or should I?”
—
Jessie laughed, but quickly caught herself when Madison was shushed, “Yeah. Sorta. My parents make movies. And I do special fx makeup. It’s kind of a family affair.” She smiled at Madison. And then thought about kicking herself for not just running with that. If you told people you were working on a movie or tv show or even a novel, they never gave you that look, because you were creating something of fiction. And Jessie decided that next time she was trying to research stuff, she would lead with that. I’m making a movie. I need ideas. Not I have a demon trying to kill me. I need to know how to stop it.
“It’s nice to meet you, Madison.” And no, you are quite literally saving my life. “Um…I don’t go here. I just kind of charmed my way in here. I thought it would be a good place to look for information, so logging in isn’t really going to happen. That’s kind of why I needed your help.” She shot Madison an uneasy grin hoping this wouldn’t change the other woman’s mind.
—
“Woah.” She could feel her mouth falling wide open, and she knew it probably wasn’t a great look, but she hoped that she at least looked impressed; she was. It wasn’t the time to ask too much more about that, but Madison filed that fact away for another time. If she impressed Jessie enough now, maybe the two of them would be able to hang out together again and then she could ask about the special make up and what it was like to make movies and stuff. She knew nothing about that, she only knew a bit about movies (and she liked movies, but that didn’t mean she knew things about them), but maybe she could impress Rory with her extra movie knowledge. It would be nice to know more things about what her friend was interested in.
So Jessie didn’t go here. Which Madison had sort of already figured out, though she hadn’t wanted to entirely jump to conclusions, because assuming things about others wasn’t polite or correct. Most of the time. “Oh, okay. It’s no problem.” She just hoped that she wouldn’t get in trouble with the university for this. She couldn’t afford to get kicked out or to get booted off the soccer team. But she was logging in as herself and she wouldn’t search up anything too weird. Besides, if people like her lived in this town then the library computers probably had gotten all sorts of supposedly strange things searched on them. Madison typed in her username and password, “uh, do you wanna click and search or should I?”
—
Jessie had caught onto Madison’s reaction, but it hadn’t phased her. She had gotten used to it over the years, especially when she was in middle school and high school. Some people thought it was the coolest thing in the world and others would tease her and bully her for it for various reasons. And mostly now, because she was a nepo baby according to some content creators and media outlets. It had taken awhile to adjust to and shrug off, but she had gotten there with Jenna’s help.
Watching as Madison logged in, Jessie realized that even the searches probably needed to be discreet. She didn’t want to get her new friend in trouble for looking up things that could be considered occult type stuff. This girl had been nice enough to do a complete stranger a favor, and Jessie knew she would owe her something. Rory had a lock on pizza. So maybe they could go get coffee or dessert? She’d ask later, when it didn’t feel like a spy mission taking place, “Maybe you should search? I don’t want to type anything in that’s going to get your account flagged.” Jessie tried to think of how they could word the search, “Maybe something about religion or angels and demons both. I don’t know. What do you think?”
—
Jessie was kind and caring. Madison had assumed as much already, but the fact that the woman didn’t want Madison’s account to get flagged was proof enough. Though she supposed that it was basic decency, it was still nice and she chose to believe that Jessie was just good. Even if she was looking up demons, which was more than a little weird in Madison’s book, but she supposed (once again) that she needed to not judge that sort of thing, mostly because she herself was pretty weird (at least from the perspective of a lot of people) (probably).
“That sounds good.” This was sort of like some episodes of Buffy, and that was very cool. She didn’t know which episodes it was like (maybe she needed to watch more of those – maybe Jessie would want to do that, if the research turned out well and all that), but it sounded like something that important people did. “I’ll start with the Bible and Demonology?” Then it could be like I’m poking around for some sort of religion class. Which she wasn’t taking, but that was beside the point. “I’m open to any suggestions you have, though.” If this was Jessie’s investigation, Madison didn’t want to take charge.
—
She had been surprised by the kindness that a lot of people in this town had bestowed upon her. From Izzy to Rory to Regan and now Madison. Big city life had always been different. All walks of life, but filled with people who mostly kept to themselves. It could feel very lonely at times, unless you had your own solid friend group. Wicked’s Rest had started out like that, but it had also been because Jessie was afraid to give people a chance at first for fear of them getting hurt. But the more she made herself available, the more she felt supported.
“That’s perfect. Not too sus.” Jessie honestly didn’t know what to look for. Sure, she had the book at home that had summoned the demon. The ultimate source, but she hadn’t wanted to touch that thing for fear of what else it could do. She had written down some phrases on her phone though, the last time she had been brave enough to open the book. Things that stood out, including some things written in Latin, “Oh! Um, and maybe if there’s any Latin dictionaries?” That had to help. It was like the most basic part of researching ancient text right? Language translation?
—
She nodded. So far, at least, she didn’t seem to be making too much of a fool of herself which was a big relief. Or if she was making a fool of herself, then Jessie was even kinder than Madison had figured and was doing a very nice job at not pointing that out. Or maybe it was somewhere in between, which she was also fine with. Or she’d be able to be fine with that, because that was how she worked. If things needed to be fine, then they would be. The idea of that made her feel a bit uneasy but she attributed that to the fact that she was pretty much always some level of anxious, so it wasn’t like it was hard to make her feel uneasy.
She just needed to stop thinking that way. Which, of course, was far easier said than done.
“I think there’s some Latin books somewhere around here. What do you say we poke around and see what we can find on the internet, and then maybe we can go searching for books? I – well, I don’t have any plans, so I’m chill with however long this takes. You can do more research on my account another time, too. I don’t want you to feel all rushed today.” Plus, maybe that would mean they could hang out together again, and Daniel and Daiyu should be proud of her for not talking about being a hunter and also not hanging out in the woods.
—
It was like music to her ears. Books that would be of use, but even more so, someone who was willing to help her, “I think that would be a great start, and you’re a Godsend. Seriously. This is something I’ve been trying to figure out how to research for a while now, and I would be so screwed, if you hadn’t come along.” Jessie meant every word of it. Knowing there was someone who could help her on her random little quest to find out more information made the loneliness of chasing this thing along disappear for a little while.
“Have you eaten? Maybe we can order delivery? My treat for you helping me and letting me use your account.” Jessie would be mindful of what she looked up and searched when using Madison’s info, because right now, it was a lifeline and all she really had to go on. She had come in thinking it would be an uphill battle, but with a new friend by her side, Jessie was sure to find something useful in their research, even if it was Madison’s phone number, so they could hang out again.
