Word Count: 849

The silver-furred werewolf had quite a lot of experience in the area of alcohol. He'd been drinking practically since birth, his stomach growing steadily stronger with each sip of liquor, beer, or wine he took. Of the three, he preferred the first one most of all, since it generally tasted better than wine and did not require copious amounts to become drunk like beer. Given the choice between nothing or either wine or beer, however, Rurik would've taken either in absence of the good stuff. Aside from that, the werewolf flirted often with marijuana, enjoying the hazy happiness of it swirling about his head. He had developed quite a tolerance for these two substances thanks to lifelong use, but at least he kept himself under control. Rurik was not an addict—he had seen one or two in his time, and they were not a pretty sort of people. Beyond the two basic substances which Rurik used, he'd dabbled in other chemicals. Mushrooms were fun, but though Rurik enjoyed their hallucinogenic properties, he rather thought they took a lot out of the user. It was difficult to be productive and more difficult to talk to others for him—his imagination was not so strong, so when chemicals altered his brain and dazzled him with faint hallucinations of images, shapes, and colors, he preferred to turn inward and simply enjoy these things rather than socialize. He'd dabbled with opium before, and while he appreciated that feeling—it was really, really nice, to be truthful—that was the chemical he'd seen ruin others most often. It was about the most addictive thing that was common use for the canines. Even their tobacco was far cleaner than the humans, free of the chemicals and additives that turned them to poison.

As the silver-furred werewolf placed the packets down, he noticed Anselm was doing something with paper. For all his love of language, Rurik had not been able to completely master writing all of them. His lingual prowess was verbal-based, and he could write only in his mother tongue. Reading, however, was a different matter entirely, and though he'd once struggled with English, he did not find it nearly so difficult to digest now. The silver-furred werewolf grinned, and nodded his head to show he would certainly understand it. It might take sounding the words out like a child and reading it over three times, but Rurik would get the picture sooner or later, perhaps even copying the words down in the Russian language so he could refer to them more easily. "Sure can, unless you're writin' something other than English," the Russian joked, his pale yellow canines showing in a broad grin. It was a joke—from the tawny-furred man's accent and his general demeanor, Rurik had surmised he was not a foreigner, and it was unlikely he knew how to speak or write any languages other than English. The silver-furred werewolf couldn't hold anyone's preferences or interests against them, however; perhaps it was just not Anselm's way to engage in that sort of learning.

The Russo reached out for the bowl, flicking the lighter with his large, awkward paw and drawing it to the green. It flared up and burned brilliant orange and then black as it began to char, and the werewolf drew in a large cloud of smoke, passing the still-smoking bowlpiece over to the other canine. Rurik held this large cloud of smoke until his lungs burned and his eyes watered, exhaling a great cloud of smoke that billowed outward. "This is some very good travka. This is what will come out if I follow your instructions?" the werewolf asked, excited. It was one thing to take bud from the earth; it would be a different thing entirely to grow his own. Perhaps if he ever went back to the other side of the world he could bring it back; no doubt this strain was something entirely exotic from what they had on the far continent. "Samogon is not so hard to brew, but you gotta be careful, too," the silver-furred Russian added with a mischievous smile. True, if one was not very careful brewing any kind of liquor had the potential to go wrong, whether it was from an explosion or over-fermentation or even just a bad batch, but people had been brewing the same kind of moonshine that Rurik spoke of for many, many years. It was quite simple, really, and the recipe could be altered for virtually any flavor and any type of liquor. "Ready to write?" the Russian asked, that playful grin still stuck on his face. He had to emphasize to Anselm not to brew anything with bits and pieces of the fruit or whatever he chose to make his alcohol with—anything containing cellulose might produce methanol, or whatever that meant. In truth, Rurik had no idea what that statement really meant, but it had been in just about every samogon recipe book he'd ever read. Obviously, it meant something, otherwise so many authors would not have made a precaution against it.

Word Count: 1222

Language was something that Rurik took great pride and love in; he had grown up speaking Russian, and over the years he had picked up several other languages and several fragments of languages. He knew how to say hello and goodbye in many of them, and he was especially interested in the origins and families of languages. He was not surprised to have learned that the Romance languages had a common root; they shared so many traits with one another. French and Spanish had many similarities, and when he'd been learning a few Italian words from Cambria, he had picked up some of those same similarities. Italian was the closest descendant of the original language, or so he'd learned—the silver-furred werewolf knew nothing of Latin, and he assumed there were few left who did. It had been a dead language long before the humans were extinguished, though it survived through its children and the many words and roots it had imparted on other languages.

The werewolf watched the other canine write with interest, his bright blue eyes focused on the other canine's sloppy, sloping writing. It certainly was readable, but Rurik was paying more attention to the way he shaped his letters, which loops went before which shapes, and so forth. It was quite interesting for him to watch, though he doubted it would help him learn to write English any better, as he was unlikely to even attempt that. It was kind of nice, anyway—so far as he knew, there were only three other canines on the whole of this land who were possibly capable of comprehending his handwriting. Two were his children, and the third was the odd wolf he'd met on the beach shortly after getting here, pretty and clearly dangerous Marishka. He didn't have to worry much about his children; he doubted Silas and Liliya would be interested in what he had to say in notes or journal entries. As for the other one, the silver-furred werewolf hadn't even approached his home in Halifax with her.

The notes that Anselm scribbled would be tucked carefully in one of the Russian wolf's journals and studied, for sure—if it was at all possible to grow plants on a ship, Rurik would have to try it. The other wolf began to respond to the wolf's question, and Rurik nodded. It was a matter of his own skill, of course—it was doubtful that anything of his own would come out very much like Anselm's bud the first time around. Disappointing as that was, Rurik knew with time he might become very good at raising these plants. The idea that these plants were distinctly male and distinctly female—and that they exhibited differing characteristics—clearly fascinated Rurik, and he looked to Anselm with his brilliant husky eyes. "Male and female plants, huh? Never heard that before. Are other plants like this?" the Russian asked, more curious than anything. He didn't have a general interest in gardening, but he'd never actually seen any difference between different trees or flowers.

Anselm took a break from writing for a moment, heading back after a second. The werewolf reached for the pipe and poked the bud around with one nail, stirring it a bit before lighting it once more and sucking on the far end of the pipe. It wasn't too often he got to smoke out of one of these; though he generally preferred to roll joints the Russian wolf certainly wasn't above imbibing his travka this way. Anselm finished his writing and the werewolf perked up a bit, shaking his head as he placed the smoking implement back down on the table by Anselm, clearing his throat and shaking his head as if to straighten it out. "You need something like an old washing machine, a dryer—maybe even a bucket or a tub," the werewolf mused. He'd seen many different things used as the primary implement for brewing this simplistic recipes. Anselm would figure something out; he had the room for it in this very garage with a small one.

"You need something sugary—fruit, honey. If you can find real sugar that has not spoiled, or someone who can make it, the measurement for this raw sugar is ten kilograms, but you may have to change if you use fruit or honey. There are some in Europe who do refine sugar, but I do not think many refiners would live around here," he said carefully, not wishing to insult Anselm or his culture. Rurik revered the more feral way of life that was dominant on this continent; to live among these simpler canines was almost paradisiacal. They were no less intelligent and resourceful than their European counterparts, they just preferred a way of life that was closer to the ancestors' lifestyle. "After this you need three liters of milk, and roundabout thirty or forty liters of water," the Russian continued, pausing between each bit of speech to allow Anselm to catch up writing. He didn't want to tax the man's hand too much; after all, it was a rather unnatural motion for a Luperci's hand. "You stir this around for two hours in your tub, and then you need to distill it."

Rurik took no chances—it wasn't very likely that Anselm knew how to do this process, so he cleared his throat again. "You have to get a pot, and its lid must have a hole in it. Then you need another two pots, one with two holes on either side and one with no holes. You need pipe, too. Copper, something like that, you know?" the Russian asked. Anselm appeared to be a pretty smart guy; he wasn't sure his explanation was the best but he would understand. "You stick the pipe into the one-hole pot, and pass it clear through the two-hole pot, with the end of it held over the third pot," he said, wincing at his poor description. The werewolf motioned for the other canine's writing implement and pen, hoping to sketch it out for the other canine. "The one-hole pot, put the brew in there, put it over fire, and heat it up. The two-hole pot, you put cold water—as cold as you can make it—in there, and then your final product drips into the last pot," he said, a sheepish grin displayed on his face. "Do you understand?" he asked, hoping the other wolf might pose his questions if he had any.

Recalling the other canine's warnings, the silvery werewolf jumped, smacking his hand against his own knee. "Damn. You write this down, too—make sure! If you use fruit to make your sugar product, you cut out all skin and innards part. Use only pulpy fruit parts, otherwise you make methanol and kill yourself," the werewolf added, far too brightly for talking about potentially brewing a deadly chemical. "I have no idea what that means, methanol, but all of the books say it is deadly," the wolf said, growing slightly more solemn at this. He sincerely hoped the tawny-furred canine would take this advice quite seriously; Rurik had never seen the effects of bad moonshine, and he never hoped to. "Maybe if you look in a library you will find more on these processes, yeah?" he suggested, smiling brightly.

Archive whenever you read this. Word Count: 506

Rurik was fascinated by the notion of plants having entirely different sexes; the silver-furred werewolf boggled at this idea. He tried to imagine what it was like for a plant to have a dick—and he almost snorted aloud with laughter at that thought. It was impossible to picture plants with anything like canine genitalia; the silver-furred werewolf's loopy-high mind was simply trying to conjure the impossible. Rurik was also totally useless with the names of these plants—a tree was a tree was a tree to Rurik, and there was no differentiating by name. Tilting his head to the side, the Russian wondered at this—they had both parts? Such a concept was foreign and almost gross to the Russian, who wrinkled this nose at this.

In describing the brewing processes of samogon, Rurik had forgotten one vital thing: he was no longer in Russia. Things like milk and sugar were exceptionally difficult to find in these parts; whatever milk that was leftover from humans had spoiled rotten and dried to dust years ago, and it was highly unlikely sugar was still viable after so many years. The werewolf had not considered that these things would be extremely had for Anselm to find, but he continued to babble about it happily until he'd come to the conclusion, interjecting one final piece of advice as he pulled out a tiny bottle of what appeared to be human-salvaged stuff. He set this on the table. "This is yeast—throw a few pinches in before you let it ferment. You can grow this stuff, too. I think, anyway," the werewolf admitted with a laugh.

"Aye, this would be the best we can hope for," he said in response to the Infernian's suggestion of experimentation. They would both do their best despite having little foreknowledge of the tasks they were undertaking—though the silver-furred werewolf was certainly appreciative of this meeting. They'd traded in far more ways than one—a swap of knowledge, a swap of product, a swap of friendship. The other canine continued speaking for a moment, his next statement eliciting an outright guffaw from the silvery Russian. "The plants have balls?" he repeated, still chuckling beneath his breath and shaking his head from side to side, disbelief on his face were it not for the myriad of useful stuff Anselm had already provided him with.

"No worries, my friend. I'll kill the ones with balls," he said, still snorting under his breath at this thought. "Thank you," he added brightly as an afterthought. Anselm's suggestion seemed most doable to Rurik, and he grinned broadly, and nodded, packing a little bit more of the bud into the pipe. He took his first hit as was custom—not thinking, for the moment, that perhaps Anselm's customs were different—and passed the thing back over to Anselm, reclining on the couch, quite happy with this meeting here today. It had proven most useful, and he'd met Gabriel's cousin and befriended another of the Inferni clan. A good day, indeed.