Where to now?

Who: Daniel and Olivia
When: Mid-afternoon
Where: Mya's Diner, eventually

Daniel McAllister arrived in Marquette at mid-afternoon, a week after he'd first determined that he needed to go there. He'd spent the time gathering things he might need before starting on the journey, which had been a drive because he hated relying on rentals. Hunting could be difficult enough without having to drive a vehicle he wasn't familiar with, and he had a feeling that he would need as few distractions as possible in Marquette.

The town looked ordinary enough as he drove through it, though he hadn't really expected to see anything that was blatantly unusual. Towns suffering from supernatural problems didn't generally have any convenient tell-tale clues like "Help! This place is weird" written across the sky in fire, and even though Marquette was a hotspot - maybe because it was a hotspot - there was no reason to expect anything different here. He made a few passes through town anyway, just in case, before making his way to the hotel he had booked a room in, Beacon House Hotel. He went to the room and brought a few things in, but he would have to wait until dark to take some of the more interesting items inside, so it didn't take long.

Daniel was hungry after his long journey, and he'd spotted a diner during one of his rounds through Marquette that he'd liked the looks of, with an angel on the sign. In a place like this, it could very well be owned and run by a real angel, and where better or more auspicious a place to have his first meal? He was encouraged by the idea of there being an angel in this town; it meant that, perhaps, the evil here was at least partly balanced by good, and no one could appreciate such a rarity better than a hunter. He parked and went inside, taking a seat at the counter where he could discreetly watch the customers while he ate.

It was getting close to the end of her shift, for which Olivia was beyond thankful. It was the second day in a row she'd had far too much on her mind to concentrate properly and it was beginning to show in her work. She wouldn't have cared, had she not had things to pay for now. She was finishing up her last table when she spotted the man sit at the counter. Deciding to try for a few more bucks before she left, Olivia wandered behind the counter and gave him a small smile before placing a clean, empty coffee cup in front of him.

"Hi." The greeting came with a smile and she leaned against the counter casually. "You need a few minutes?"

Daniel had found a menu while he was waiting, set in the usual place in such diners, with more or less the usual array of options. He tended not to vary his choices if a place had something he liked, since just having something familiar in a new place could be change enough. He looked up from the menu and gave the young waitress a smile. "No, I'm all set, thank you," he replied. "I'd like the turkey club on rye and a side of pasta salad, please." He set the menu back where he'd found it, then gestured at the mug. "And some coffee."

"Sure." She wrote down the order and slid it to the back to be taken care of before she fetched the coffee pot. "I haven't seen you in here before," Olivia stated, content with idle chit chat. "Are you new to town? Or just passing through?" And ugh she sounded like a local. Which wasn't a bad thing - as she had nothing against the locals - but still...

"A bit of both," Daniel answered. "I just got here this afternoon, and I'm not here permanently, but I'm not sure yet how long I'll be staying either. And," he added with a wry smile, "I don't cook, so you'll probably be seeing quite a bit of me. Daniel McAllister." He offered his hand to shake. He wasn't generally quite so free with his real name, but if there were other hunters in town, it was the name they'd know him by. It was a bit risky to spread it around, but the more he did, the more likely it was that a hunter might recognize it and possibly seek him out. Especially if they were in Marquette for the same reason he was.

"That sounds familiar," Olivia told him, taking his hand with her own. "The not quite staying but not yet going thing, not the cooking thing. Though I don't really cook either. Or well, not often." She shook her head and gave him a smile. "Olivia Ferreira. Nice to meet you. Do you have family here?"

The last name rang a distant bell in the back of Daniel's mind, though he wasn't sure why. It could be any number of things, for any number of reasons, and it wasn't so singularly unique a name that whatever he was recognizing it from necessarily had to have anything to do with Olivia. He made a note to check on it later, just in case, saying, "Good to meet you as well. No, it's just me. My family's a bit scattered." It was true, overall - there was a core of McAllisters always at home, but plenty of them with Chosens whose movements took them far away from the family residence.

She nodded along as he spoke, resting her arms on the counter top in a casual stance. "Marquette seems to draw people in. It's hard to leave," Olivia admitted with a small, sheepish smile, "Not sure why, though. It's definitely not the crazy night life, I'll tell you that much."

Daniel made a note of that too, because it could very well be more literal than - perhaps - Olivia suspected. If there was something about Marquette, or something in Marquette, that drew people to it, perhaps supernatural beings were more susceptible?

He chuckled and said, "It does seem like a quiet little town. Some people like that. What brings you here? Are you a student?" He'd driven past the college on his circuit around town, and she seemed about the right age.

Olivia shook her head, straightening off of the counter and searching for...well, she wasn't quite sure what. Something to keep her hands busy. "No. I was just passing through. That was a couple weeks ago, and...well, I'm still here. For reason I'm not really sure of." Olivia paused and smiled again. "Sort of trying to save up for the next big adventure, you know. It's hard to go from a place like Chicago to Marquette." Not that she missed the big city. Everything seemed more chaotic there. She'd barely made it out with her sanity.

Daniel's eyebrows went up slightly in acknowledgement. "Really. That must be quite an adjustment for you. It was smart thinking to come here, though. It's much cheaper to live in a small town. Easier to save money." She seemed restless, subtly so, as though she weren't accustomed to staying still for long. Or maybe something else - he'd seen people antsy in countless situations, benign or otherwise, and given the reason why he was here, he couldn't help but notice it more than he might have otherwise.

"Not so much. I like to move around a lot, it all depends on where I end up stopping. Though you're right, it's easier to save money in a smaller town. Things are less expensive, and really, not a lot here to blow it on." Olivia's restlessness was barely noticeable to her anymore, though there was the occasional moment when she wanted to shoot herself just to find some calm waters. "Is that what you're doing?" she asked, once again not quite finding the line between appropriate and none of your business questions. "Saving up for your next stop?"

So it wasn't just momentary. Moving around frequently had to be symptomatic. Daniel's curiosity was definitely piqued.

"Not exactly," he answered. "I'm a writer, freelance work, mostly. It might sound a tad clichéd, but small towns like Marquette can be inspiring. You see more of the smaller picture than you do in bigger cities. I don't think I've ever just had a chat with a waitress in New York or Boston, but in smaller places it happens all the time. There's less stress in the air, less of a need to just go go go."

"I believe that," Olivia said, turning to grab his plate of food that had just been called behind her. Setting the plate in front of him, she went to fill up a glass of water. "I think time moves a bit more slowly in places like these? More time to think. And I'd say, if you're a writer, more time to find the right words? Unless they just come naturally to you, I guess. Some writer's are like that, right? Prolific and everything."

Daniel smiled his thanks. "I find I'm most prolific right before deadline," he quipped, a line he'd used a thousand times that fit right into people's usually vague ideas of what a writer's life was like. "I do need someplace quiet to clear my head every now and then, though. I suppose you could call this a vacation, though I'm not about to turn down a job if one comes up." He paused to take a bite of the sandwich. It was good. One would think that a turkey club on rye would be difficult to get wrong, but Daniel could provide a laundry list of how many ways in which one would be mistaken about that. Random, inexplicable vegetables, enough mayonnaise to fill half a jar, overcooked bacon . . . Mya's had gotten is right, though. This would definitely be a regular stop.

She knew she should let him eat his food in peace, but her curiosity was piqued again, so she leaned against the counter, clasping her hands together on the top of it once more. "I know you said freelance work, but what kind of writing do you do? Like, hard hitting, cut throat journalism? Or short stories for magazines? Or do you do freelance work while you're working on your soon to be best selling novel on the side?"

Daniel swallowed and gave a light, self-conscious laugh. "Magazines, mostly. And, yes, the novel, which of course will change the face of American literature as we know it." He gave her a wry look. "Just like every other half-finished novel taking up space on someone's hard drive." He didn't mind the conversation while he ate; apparently he wasn't keeping her from anything she needed to be doing, since she was lingering on her own, and he did want to learn more about her and about Marquette. Even if she was just a normal human, her impression of the town could still offer valuable insight.

"Ha, I don't haven a half finished novel," Olivia pointed out, and then paused. "Then again, I don't have a hard drive either." But Judiel did. He had a lot of them apparently. She wondered if he had a half finished novel on one of them. "What's it about? Your novel. You don't have to give me details, just a brief overview to quell my curiosity."

Usually, Daniel answered this question with something banal about a young man's coming-of-age story, which had a tendency to bore other people instantly so that they were glad of a but you don't want to hear all the details and quick subject change.

This time, though, he had an opportunity. Appearing to be more occupied with keeping his sandwich from falling apart than with watching Olivia, he said, "It's a fantasy novel. It's based on the premise of angels and demons being mortal beings that live in Earth." He picked up a stray piece of lettuce, watching Olivia out of the corner of his eye.

Olivia lifted her eyebrow at that, more at the fantasy part than the actual plot. It could have been non-fiction, though she wasn't sure he knew that. "The tried and true good versus evil theme?" Olivia asked finally, shifting from one foot to the other. "What's going to set your novel apart from the rest?"

The understatedness of her reaction could speak volumes, but then it could just be mild interest. Daniel decided to press a bit further. "Most of the novels I've read," he explained, "treat the two as just two groups. You have your angels, all with halos and harps, and you have your demons, with pitchforks and hellfire. All the individuals within each group are the same." He paused deliberately for a sip of water before continuing. "I'm taking more of a taxonomer's approach, if you will. Treating each group as a genus, and creating species within it. I have very distinct types of angels and demons, all with their own characteristics and behaviors, just like it works in nature." He glanced up at her. "Unusual enough to get some attention, I hope."

Tapping her fingertips on the counter, she considered that, thinking he was much closer to the actual truth of things that he thought. Or maybe he knew more about what he was writing than she thought. "I'd say so. Not many people stop to consider that maybe angels and demons are as individualistic as we are." Olivia paused, realizing she was speaking in terms that made it sound like such things were real, so she sent a bright smile his way. "In a fictional sort of way, of course. It sounds interesting though. I think Marquette is a good place to get some peace and insight."

Daniel's lips quirked slightly. Bingo. The telling remark and awkward pause, complete with hasty and clumsy subject change, gave him exactly what he was looking for. The lack of hostility or suspicion in her reaction was something of a relief, as well; that sort of fumbling response was extraordinarily difficult to fake convincingly, so if she had anything unsavory to hide, that would have come across as well. At the very least, though, she knew what he was talking about, and wasn't savvy enough to realize that he'd been fishing. She might just be an ordinary human with an unusual frame of reference.

It was also an interesting, and worrying, coincidence that the first person he had had any sort of real conversation with in Marquette knew about the supernatural. He would have to watch himself carefully in the future. Olivia clearly didn't pose any kind of threat, though, so he looked at her and said deliberately, "Yes. I thought it might be a good place to do some research."

"Research," she said before she could help herself. And it wasn't really a question, either. Olivia eyed him closely, the volume of her voice dropping just a notch. "Are there a lot of angel and demon sightings here, in Marquette, then?" Because she wasn't about to come out and assume that he was aware of the same things that she was. Every writer had their own forms of research after all.

Daniel lowered his own voice in kind, now that they weren't following quite so closely with the charade of the aspiring novelist. The place was pretty quiet, but it was best to be careful while he was still unsure of how likely it was that they might be overheard by the wrong being.

"Angel sightings are a bit tricky," he told her, "but demons and other things, yes. Marquette blazes off the map like a neon sign, if you know know what to look for. But then, you already knew that."

Olivia was proud of herself that she showed no outward reaction to what he'd just said. It really told her all she needed to know about him, though she was reluctant to reveal anything about herself that he hadn't already apparently picked up on. "I don't generally look for any of it," Olivia said, choosing her words carefully. "Unless you think I might be one or the other?"

Daniel laughed a little. It was probably a bit rude, but social niceties were very rarely on Daniel's list of things to look out for when he wasn't trying to get someone to help him with information for a case.

"I doubt it. You'd be much better at covering your reactions, if you were. You would be used to having to do so." And she would have an idea of when a completely blank expression was the biggest giveaway of them all.

Her lips quirked into a small smile at that, lowering her head briefly to chuckle a bit under her breath. Looking back up at him, she shook her head. "I've perfected my reactions over the years. I must be losing my touch. Or you're just smarter than most people I meet."

Daniel gave her a slight smile. "Thank you for the flattery, but that's hardly the case. It's just that most people don't pay attention. They don't see what's in front of them because they're not looking at it. If I really was just an innocent novelist, I wouldn't have even noticed your slip." That simple truth had both helped Daniel and tripped him up more times than he could count. It was amazing, how often an eye witness in his line of work was next to useless because they flat-out refused to believe what their eyes had shown them.

"Well, I'm a firm believer of seeing is believing," she stated, tapping her palms against the edge of the counter. Olivia grabbed the coffee to refill his mug before she shot him a curious look. "If you're not an innocent novelist, then what are you?"

"A researcher," Daniel stated matter-of-factly. No need to tell Olivia everything at once. It was enough, for now, that they both knew they were on the same page. Further relevations could come later, when he knew her a little better. Or if she needed help with something. "I just call it a novel for obvious reasons."

She made a little sound in her throat at that and replaced the coffee pot. "A researcher. So you research demons and angels. What is it that you do with your research, exactly? I doubt there some kind of scientific magazine to submit your findings too."

"Not exactly," Daniel agreed. "But it still finds its way to those who can use it."

"I'm sure it does." Olivia wanted to ask exactly how that worked, but she felt maybe she was digging deeper than she should. It was strange, meeting people who knew about the same things she did. All in one small town too. "Do you need anything else?" she asked, sliding his bill over to him. "Dessert, maybe?"

"No, thank you," Daniel smiled. The bacon on his sandwich was enough of an indulgence for one day. The older he got, the more care he had to take to stay fit. It wouldn't do to lose a kill because he'd let himself get out of shape. "Lunch and conversation were all I needed. You've been very helpful."

"Excellent. Then I'll expect a generous tip," Olivia told him with a small smile and a wink. And maybe he'd come in again and she can ask him exactly what he'd found out about Marquette in the angels and demons department thus far.

Daniel chuckled. "I make it a policy to tip well when I wish to return to a restaurant." Daniel used tipping the old-fashioned way, the way it had originally been used when the practice had begun - to insure proper service. Waitstaff who were happy to see him and knew good service would be rewarded made his life easier, even more so than it did for those people for whom eating out was a luxury. Daniel appreciated anything that eased the more mundane inconveniences of the family curse.