Garrick family

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   <default>Garrick family</default>
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<image source="Image"></image> <image source="image"></image> <header>Information</header> <label>Organization Type</label> <label>Leader(s)</label> <label>Leader(s)</label> <label>Allies</label> <label>Allies</label> <label>Status</label> <label>Location</label> <label>First Appearance</label> <header>First Appearance</header> <label>Debut</label> </infobox> The Garrick family are a family of Finders active in Ontario.

Modus operandi

They are well-known Finders, tend to have a family uniform including aviator hats, goggles, and headphones that makes them identifiable to both Others<ref name=":0">“Wonderkand?”

“Yes.”

“Do you know them?”

“No, I don’t think I’ve ever crossed paths with them. A good thing, it seems. But it was mentioned that they have a uniform. The Garricks do as well.”

“Ear flap hat?”

“Yes. I recognized the look by what Jude was wearing. There might be a power in that, in being recognizable as a presence greater than one person, when traversing the Paths, or being able to ask if a Lost has seen someone with an outfit resembling yours. A cost, too. I should let you know, before any incident arises, I do believe I’ve crossed paths with a Garrick. Between when you were rescued from the Forest Ribbon Trail and when I returned nearly a month ago.” - Excerpt from Summer Break 13.9</ref> and practitioners.<ref name="Wonderkand">“A Garrick,” the old man said. “Large family, smaller impact. We’ve seen them around.”

“Yes. I knew your grandfather,” the boy said.

“Yes,” Jude replied. “I think I’ve heard of you, sir. Nice to meet you.” - Excerpt from Gone and Done It 17.10</ref> This may have costs and benefits as the actions of one affects the reputation of all.<ref name=":0"/>

In addition to the Paths, they also work in the Abyss<ref>Avery wanted to walk the Paths, and Zed knew a city mage named Edward, who knew finders who walked the Paths, as well as delving into the Abyss.
[...]
“Working all summer. I’m going to spend more time on the Paths and in the Abyss than I do in reality.” - Excerpt from Leaving a Mark 4.1</ref> and may consult on projects outside either realm.<ref name="4.1e1"/> Family members are expected to put in a certain amount of time on the Paths.<ref>The company head has everyone, regardless of status, run a certain number of paths each quarter.”

“My family does the same,” Jude replied. - Excerpt from Gone and Done It 17.10</ref>

Work with Edward, a proficient City Mage, who connects them to groups and individuals in other fields like the Belanger Circle and the Blue Heron Institute.

The family equips each individual Finder well, with both mundane items like their trademark aviator gear, climbing equipment, and oxygen tanks,<ref name="4.1e1"/> and a few magical items. Members who need extra help are given more items suited to their needs.<ref>“Blowdryer with a cut cord, set it to on, it’ll pin down whatever you’re pointing it at. Blow it around a bit, but won’t blow it away. Has to be a certain size, certain amount of strength or raw power can rip it away, but… handy. Stapler, does the opposite, crack that baby open and give it a squeeze, catches ’em and flings ’em back, can even staple something or someone to a wall if you catch the edge of them and throw ’em back enough. Eyeliner keeps your vision clear of dust and sand, but makes you colorblind while you’re wearing it. Yo-yo string, tie it around something, throw that something away, it’ll come back to you within twenty-four hours. Glass crowbar, lighter than a regular crowbar, more effective too, but it breaks on use, or breaks if you break it, fixes itself the next day.”
[...]
“You equip all your newbies like that?” Nicolette asked.

“Poppy was sick. We thought we’d make it easy on her. She was weak, we thought if she had a good day and she could run the path, she’d need stuff that didn’t need her to be strong,” the Aunt said. - Excerpt from Summer Break 13.9</ref> They extensively employ Escape Ropes.

The Garricks try to keep new Paths they discover fairly exclusive, only selling access to Bound to the Party to a few people,<ref name="BttP">“It’s a pretty exclusive Path. Found by colleagues of mine, sold only to me and two others.” - Excerpt from Left in the Dust 16.8</ref> and altering the entry ritual to The Station Promenade to keep out uninvited Finders.<ref>“We’re talking about a lot of things,” Jude said. He double checked with family again, then said, “We’ve already got a bit of a lock on it, just so you know. Adding conditions and things to the ritual for entry. That deal you agreed to before we brought you in? It’s to protect you. Don’t go for a visit without us, or the landing on arrival might be rough. Or lethal. Us finding the Promenade secures us against them, more than anything.” - Excerpt from Summer Break 13.9</ref> Like most families, they also had private texts and practices.<ref>“Some of that’s going to be family practices. There’s a value in putting a text out there, making it part of a greater pattern, but there’s something to be said for having it in-house. The releases, the shorter practices, that’s stuff we’d have to have family meetings over. That’s harder to do.” - Excerpt from Summer Break 13.9</ref>

Members

• Cliff Garrick - Jude's father<ref>Jude’s dad.  Cliff Garrick. - Excerpt from Wild Abandon 18.3</ref>
• Esme Garrick - Jude's mother<ref>“Esme Garrick,” Jude’s mom said. - Excerpt from Wild Abandon 18.3</ref>
  • Jude Garrick - Cliff's youngest son<ref name="4.1e1">“Yes. Yes. I remember. My hands are a little bit full with a god parasite. Can I get back to you? I’ll see who I can send.”
    
    “Okay. Thank you.”
    
    “Set up. Be ready. I keep my sons and daughters busy.”
    [...]
    “I’m sending my youngest. They’re building the entrance now. Enter, if they aren’t there when you arrive, they’ll be there shortly after, or I’ll take a break to ensure it works.”
    
    “Okay. Good luck with your parasite god.”
    
    “God parasite, not parasite god. But thank you.”
    [...]
    It was a guy, fifteen or so, with a wispy mustache, goggles, and a bunch of gear. He had a tank at his hip, a bag, some rope, some climbing stuff, and what looked like headphones.
    
    It was the headphones that he pulled up away from his ears. “Jude.”
    [...]
    “It’s good to have certain things. Oxygen, protection for the eyes and ears. Spare clothes you can pull on to cover every bit of your skin.” - Excerpt from Leaving a Mark 4.1</ref>
  • Tess Garrick - Jude's sister<ref>Tess can look into the connection block.  And… you okay with assisting?”
    
    His voice had faded, like he’d stepped away from the phone.  Jude’s sister or mother replied, inaudible. - Excerpt from Gone and Done It 17.6</ref>
  • Jude's unnamed oldest brother<ref>“We have one that just finished. Jude’s oldest brother. We pay him to draft texts we sell to the practitioner community, he’s putting the money toward a home, allegedly.” - Excerpt from Wild Abandon 18.3</ref>
• Peter Garrick - Lance and Adorea's father, Jude's great-uncle, led the exploration of The Station Promenade. Meant to be the next head of the family.<ref>Jude’s Uncle Peter was the big one.  White scarf.  He had been the guy who was meant to be next head of the family.  At least, until Jude’s dad had started making nice with Avery.  He was also the one who had sent Jude’s cousin Adorea on the trip to the Stuck-In-Place. - Excerpt from Wild Abandon 18.3</ref>
• Leona - Peter's wife<ref>“My wife, Leona.  She wasn’t aware or awakened for the first while. - Excerpt from Let Slip 20.9</ref>
  • Lance Prescott - Jude's first cousin, once removed
  • Adorea Prescott-Garrick - Jude's first cousin, once removed
• Clay Garrick
• Walt Garrick
• Reece Garrick<ref>“Reece Garrick.”
  
  Finn and Luca’s dad. - Excerpt from Wild Abandon 18.3</ref>
  • Luca Garrick - Jude's cousin
  • Finn Garrick - Jude's cousin, youngest<ref>And from there, partners, then by declining age.
    
    Finn was the last. - Excerpt from Wild Abandon 18.3</ref>
• Nell<ref>“Fifteen seconds. Nell is coordinating with her brother on the mapping. Using the gate of horn to get the shops. Writing labels and… good. Go! Clock!” - Excerpt from One After Another 10.1</ref>
• Rod<ref>“We dropped two more at the alley. Rod came within an inch of his life as he pulled on the rope.”
  
  “Yeah, but that’s Rod,” Adorea said, not into the walkie-talkie.
  
  “Be nice,” the great uncle told her.
  
  “Rod sucks,” Adorea told Avery, smiling. - Excerpt from One After Another 10.1</ref>
• Shane - Father to Poppy<ref name=":1">“Shane and Kimber,” Peter said. - Excerpt from Crossed with Silver 19.13</ref>
• Kimber Garrick - Mother to Poppy<ref name=":1"/>
  • Poppy - died from leukaemia before walking her first path
• Max - killed by Miss<ref>“Max, maybe?  But Max disappeared at the end of Winter.” - Excerpt from Gone and Done It 17.11</ref>
• Dex - disappeared on the paths<ref>“Okay.  Because Dex didn’t come back from a path a few weeks back.  I liked Dex a lot.” - Excerpt from Gone and Done It 17.11</ref>
• An unnamed Garrick that left due to being homosexual, Walt's brother<ref>“My uncle,” Cliff said. “Brother of Walt and my dad. He was gay. Might still be, I don’t know.” - Excerpt from Let Slip 20.1</ref>
• Ronald Garrick II - ancestor who bound Ratko the Wrongdoer<ref>“Ratko the Wrongdoer. Lost denizen of paths, a long time bound. I hereby release you from a binding set by Ronald Garrick the Second. I bid you be summoned and-” - Excerpt from Playing a Part 15.5</ref>
• Chester Garrick - ancestor who bound Queen Sootsleeves<ref>“Sootsleeves, who emerged from the womb with her kingdom, castle and citizen all!”
  [...]
  “I break the binding set by Chester Garrick, and bring you into a binding set by us!” Avery called out. “Bought fairly by Avery Kelly. I call you here!” - Excerpt from Playing a Part 15.5</ref>

Associates

• Edward - City Mage, point of contact between the family and the Blue Heron Institute
• Avery Kelly

History

The Garricks were considered a large but minor family by Wonderkand, and had been a practitioner family specializing in the Paths for at least several generations.<ref name="Wonderkand"/> The Garricks were involved in binding Queen Sootsleeves and her kingdom, and possibly also in the preceding Founding. Earlier generations of Garricks had a policy of binding every Lost they encountered to try to clear out the Paths and make them safer to traverse.<ref>“Bound Lost?”

“We have a fair few. There was a time, my great grandfather and grandfather’s day, back when we called ourselves Dreamers or Dream-walkers, we thought if we bound enough we could depopulate the Paths, less dangerous Others to run into.” - Excerpt from Summer Break 13.9</ref> They also discovered and kept mostly secret the Path Bound to the Party<ref name="BttP"/>, likely well prior to the start of the story, as its boons had been weakened with frequent running, despite the limited access.

When Avery first made contact with the Garrick family, they were involved in dealing with a god parasite and working on brute forcing Zoomtown, likely among other projects, and dealt regularly with Alexander Belanger for augury advice on Paths and Lost items.<ref>“Unhatched egg screams randomly. We don’t know what it does yet but Alexander Belanger said it was strong, so we keep troubleshooting it. The bingo card makes noises and circles numbers when those numbers crop up randomly in real life and when you get a bingo it dumps you onto a random point on a Path you’ve been to before.” - Excerpt from One After Another 10.1</ref><ref name="9.3e1" /> Jude mentions to Avery that the Garricks were involved in evacuating Nicolette Belanger from the Forest Ribbon Trail after she stranded, and then switched places with, Avery,<ref>“Snowdrop got taken off the Path by a rival, leaving me there with… her.”

“He gives me the occasional bad dream and I spent a few minutes with him. What do you even do? Sneak around to the detour?”

“She got that too. An acquaintance came and gave me some emotional support, my friends negotiated and got my attacker to step in and replace me, and her boss kind of arranged a way out for her after that.”

“Oh… I think I remember that. I wasn’t part of it though.” - Excerpt from One After Another 10.1</ref> which Nicolette says was her first time interacting with the Garricks.<ref>“What do you think they’ll say?” Zed asked Nicolette.

“No idea. I’ve barely dealt with them. My first interaction with them was this spring. Using the dollhouse to snatch up Snowdrop.” - Excerpt from Summer Break 13.9</ref>

After Alexander's death, the Garricks' main project was solving the newly discovered Station Promenade. They gave Avery and allies access to the Promenade so she and Snowdrop could perform the Familiar ritual with witnesses, in exchange for contributing to a group run of the Path, which The Wolf ultimately crashed. The Garricks were likely also considering trying to marry Avery into the family at this point.<ref>“Heard. I hope you and Jude work well together. We have high hopes,” a man’s voice came through.

Jude put his hand to his face with an audible slap. - Excerpt from One After Another 10.1</ref><ref>The older man who had been guiding people through turned, looking. “She’s doing fine. The table note is interesting. That’s something to explore on a future expedition.”

“Will she be invited?” Verona called down.

“I suppose, if she wants. We’d like to maintain some form of contact. Pair her and Jude up more, teach her the family secrets as they go.”

Verona smirked, while Lucy nodded, maintaining a poker face. Between them and John, Zed and Brie exchanged glances. - Excerpt from One After Another 10.a</ref> Some of the Garricks were initially skeptical of Avery, but her handling of the situation impressed them enough to invite her to the next Promenade attempt and offer her input.<ref>The Garricks were organizing for another visit to the Promenade, and were sending out messages to ask for thoughts and if anyone had ideas that they hadn’t included in the debrief surveys and things. Wonderfully dorky. She bookmarked that. - Excerpt from Dash to Pieces 11.8</ref> The Garricks later negotiated with Avery for a key piece of information about the Station Promenade, in exchange for money, items, access to Garrick texts and practices, and freeing bound Lost. Despite her high asking price, and some initial suspicion and attempted manipulation on their part, they were impressed with her and pleased with the outcome of the deal, and eager to continue to work with her and have her marry into the family.<ref>The Aunt asked, “How would you like everything? Full access to Garrick records, dip into funds as if you were a family member, free access to our knowledge about practices?”

Avery folded her arms.

“Uh, Avery?” Zed asked.

“This is a prelude to you guys proposing marriage?” Avery asked.

“Ah, you got there already,” Zed said.

Jude sagged, head hanging.

“It doesn’t have to happen now, it doesn’t have to happen soon, even. We could set the date for when you’re twenty or twenty-five. We’d need a promise, or a staggered series of commitments, do you understand what I’m saying by that?”

“I… hmm…” Avery paused. “I find it odd you think I’m equipped to get this offer, but not smart enough to understand staggered commitments or whatever.”

“We’d want to talk to your guardians. Or do Zed and Nicolette qualify?”

“Don’t steamroll her,” Nicolette said. “She hasn’t expressed interest.”

“Of course,” the Aunt said. “It wouldn’t have to be Jude. We have a number of young bachelors of an appropriate age. You’re thirteen?”
...
“Is there a chance something could happen in that direction later?” Walt asked.

If you have a Finder cousin of Jude’s who’s a girl or woman? Avery thought. “Slim, if I’m being honest. Very slim.”

“Right,” Walt said. His tone of voice had changed, and somehow not for the worse.
...
“Fuck me,” Walt said. “A solve?”

“Near solve,” Clay said. “Some finer details to be worked out. Like the Wolf.”

“Fuck me,” Walt said. He paced a little, nodding. As he passed Clay he clapped a hand on Clay’s back. “Good.”
...
“It’s good, Clay. Okay. You’ve been fair, Avery Kelly,” Walt said. He seemed happy. “We’ll get you set up.”

“She said she might have some tips on the Cakewalk.”

“I said I’d make it cheap,” Avery said.

“Fuck,” Walt said. “What the fuck are we going to give you, kid? We’ve gotta bring you into the family. Polish up our eligibles. Who or what are you looking for in a partner?”
...
“This is how Paths get discovered,” Walt said. “Gotta find it, figure out a reliable means of getting in, fling yourself at it a few times, scared as hell, maybe you unravel it, usually you don’t. Then you get the right information from the right Other, or a clue, put two pieces of information together, find the tool that gives you a clear idea of what’s up. Then you got it. Still got a lot to figure out, but this? This is good.” - Excerpt from Summer Break 13.9</ref> This deal, in which items belonging to the deceased Poppy were traded to Avery, played a large part in alienating Shane and Kimber Garrick.

The Garricks advised Kennet about their planned Founding ritual, helping fix some flaws and gaps in Verona's original plan, though the Garricks remained pessimistic about the town's odds of success. When the ritual did succeed, and Kennet needed help transporting dozens of hostile practitioners safely out of their town, they hired the Garricks to take them on the Paths in order to avoid the hostile forces in the surrounding regions and realms.<ref>“I guess I wanted to call to sound you out. Something like eighty practitioners crashed our town, to support a big Musser Lordship claim.”

“Holy shit,” Jude’s dad said.

“Sixty-something still around. I don’t know if we’re in bad shape and I shouldn’t even be calling to ask for information and advice-”
...
“-I don’t know if I shouldn’t be calling, if I’m okay to call for the advice, if I’m taking these people onto a Path, which Path might be best and safest for one-time travelers, maybe. Except I’d have to run it a bunch of times, to take different people to different destinations. If I didn’t take them all to the Blue Heron. Or…”

“Or?”

“Or if I’m okay to offer a business opportunity.”

“What opportunity?” Jude asked.

“Maybe you guys want to do it? I owe you guys. I owe you a lot-”

“Not to gainsay you, but I don’t see how you do,” Jude’s dad said.

“I do,” she said. Jude said I had to repay some of what I got. “If there’s a cost involved, let me shoulder some of it, and then some. If that means I’m in your debt, okay. I’ll work on it over the next while. But we’d be looking at getting sixty people in… I think we counted thirty cars. Possibly thirty different destinations. You’d come, pick them up, take them, and go. And I’d cover some of the costs, taking it on as debt, plus some extra.” - Excerpt from Wild Abandon 18.3</ref> Avery also used this opportunity to try and mend the rift forming from her favoring Jude's immediate family over the other Garricks, and to make up for her and Miss' complicity in the death of Max Garrick, though none of the Garricks besides Jude were aware of this. The Carmine Exile threatened the Garricks with gainsaying to prevent the evacuation,<ref>“Then shall we go first?” Jude’s Uncle Peter asked. “Taking one small group? And we can call the Kennet group and they can pass on the message?”

There were nods.

“Peter Rhys Garrick, I gainsay you, for fifty-three days, for fifty-three falsehoods made.”

The group parted.

He was at the back. Charles. - Excerpt from Wild Abandon 18.3</ref> but ultimately they were allowed to carry it out, with the understanding that the Garricks wouldn't do business in the region afterwards.<ref>“I’ve offered the girls a compromise that will let them get the Garricks out. But the Garricks can’t be doing business here over the long term. Not as couriers.” - Excerpt from Wild Abandon 18.5</ref>

References

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