Quicklog: Vesper, Doug
May. 18th, 2003 05:47 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
evilbeejVesper gets picked up by Doug while she's picking up Doug. Also, scooters, mods, Colin Mochrie, techno-ogling, music, and way too much information.
Logfile from Project Infinity.
Doug Ramsey
Doug Ramsey's boyish features often present others with the momentary impression of a twelve year-old who's grown to startling dimensions. Nevertheless his face, upon closer inspection, bears tell-tale marks of his twenty-eight years of life. The shades have been drawn on the windows to his soul, lightly tinted sunglasses with trendy black frames neatly reducing the cool blue of his right eye and metallic silver of his left to equally imperceptible shades of gray. Even through the dusky lenses it's easy to tell that Doug is blind; though his eyes are always open, they never focus on anything with the clarity of sight. His wheat-blonde hair has been clippered short enough that no bangs obscure his soft, handsome face.
Dressed in the style that moguls like to call 'designer casual', Doug has found a personal balance of comfort and style that fits well on his tall, slender frame. A simple ash-hued cotton v-neck with sleeves that end just past his elbows complements the pair of matching socks that peek out between the cuffs of his conservative black slacks and the tops of his black suede loafer-esque shoes. Over the v-neck is a stylish beige suede jacket that doubtless originated somewhere in Italy, bearing that simplicity of appearance which results only from very complicated, very expensive tailoring.
Clipped to his belt are the twin raven-black informants of pager and cellular telephone, each sitting snugly within its own compact leather holster. Over Doug's shoulder is usually slung the strap of a black leather bag that looks like the illegitimate love-child of Giorgio Armani and a team of NASA engineers. It manages to have admirable carrying capacity, including a laptop compartment, without sacrificing its elegantly manageable shape. In the side is a specialized pocket for the collapsible white cane which Doug can often be seen using.
Vesper Antagonist
She's gotta be six feet tall. More than that at the moment; her hair's not helping make her any shorter. Vesper's obscenely long black hair is piled on her head in a sleekly complicated braid-thing, pinned up and stuck through with what looks like a fancy knitting needle and a mechanical pencil. Apparently she lost one. The deep blue and brilliant green locks she religiously keeps dyed sweep back from her temples into the architecture her hair has become, and a few recalcitrant wisps stray down the back of her neck. This is neat because the rarely-seen tattoo at the nape of her neck is now visible: a combination chaostar/Mod target. Her green eyes are outlined rather dramatically, behind silver wire-rim glasses, in kohl; the lip gloss she's wearing is a dark wine color - it and the eyeliner are both in sharp contrast to the basementlike paleness of her skin.
The young woman's wearing a cropped black tank top with 'ADAM ANT' (D and N backwards, naturally) printed on it in red, fitting flatteringly tightly around health-conscious but not necessarily athletic curves; o! shocking, her belly and the piercing she's got there, as well as a good lot of her lower back and the Stratocaster-playing Kokopelli tattoo *there*, they're exposed; she's unabashedly wearing a pair of vintage embroidered bellbottoms and rather blocky-looking girly sneakers. Vans, they say on the sides. Her arms are burn-scarred from fingertips up past her elbows.
Covered Bridge Lane
The sprawling campus of Beacon Harbor University runs up along the west side of the street as it winds it's way southward. Named for the covered bridge that once spanned the Harbor River, a river that forms the southern boundary of most of the city's urban sprawl. That bridge was replaced in the mid fifties to accommodate the heavy trucks that pass along Route 96, but retains its name in tribute to an old landmark. The eastern side of the street is a collective mixture of student housing, small stores, apartments and other buildings commonly found in college towns across the country.
The Babelbox is gone. Everything's gone, really, but as Doug was in something of a transitory stage, that doesn't really matter. The only thing that was going to be a constant was his 'box. And it's gone. The hour is late, coming up on midnight, and Doug is walking alone toward the all-night Deli. He's taking advantage of a traffickless moment and walking more or less down the middle of the street, at a slight perpendicular that'll get him to the Deli eventually. He likes walking in the street; it puts most of the sidewalk-level text out of range. Of course, the cane and glasses probably don't make this look very safe to the casual observer.
No, no they don't. Actually, it wouldn't look safe in the first place. But no, now the impression is 'drugged-up blind dude' instead of just 'drugged-up dude'. Vesper, on her way home from the University and driving her vroomy vroomy scooter, slows down and squints through her goggles. "Hey!" she calls. "Hey, are you all right? You're gonna get hit by a car if you keep that shit up..."
At the sound of the scooter's approach, Doug picks up the pace and skips up onto the curb with more confidence than a man who can't see lampposts ought to have. Real bright, Ramsey. Just silk-screen yourself an 'It's a mutant thing. You wouldn't understand.' t-shirt while you're at it. Pathos is no excuse for carelessness. "Uh, nah. Woulda heard 'em coming. Thanks, though." He stares straight ahead, but aims his babel field toward the scooter and voice, to see what he can see.
It's a Lambretta motorscooter, model LI-65, and there're a bunch of numbers on various parts of it, designating what size they are and shit like that. There're band stickers on the scooter in different places: the Jam, Radiohead, Astroburger, Blur, Gorillaz, the Kingpins, Mephiskapheles, the Planet Smashers -- there's also a sticker says 'If it's too loud, turn it down (weezer rock music). The girl herself, there's a nicely rounded 'ADAM ANT' across her chest, her sneakers say 'Vans' on the sides, her jeans have got 'Levi's' on one back pocket, there's a big 'ROAG YOAD' sticker across one side of her helmet, there's a mechanical pencil stuck in her hair that says 'Bic #2', and her underwear's got the Super Skrull themesong printed on it. I shit you not. There're several rather arcane user's manuals and a copy of Neal Stephenson's 'Cryptonomicon' in the back compartment of the scooter, as well as a bag that says Dunkin' Donuts. Oh, and there's a laptop in her otherwise-empty shoulderbag, says 'Powerbook' and the standard keyboard. Also says 'Property of Vesper Antagonist - touch and die, proles' on it, handwritten. "...I can see that," she says, all Canadian-accented, with a tone like her eyebrows are up out of dubious awe. "Still not a good idea, though." The scooter wheels around, stopping by the curb, idling. "Though you're perfectly welcome to tell me to fuck off."
Oh, wow. Doug pauses, not even bothering to mask the smile that the collection of texts brings to his lips. Now this person has potential. He reaches up to lean one hand on a handy 'No Parking' sign, remembering to sway his cane far enough to tap it first. "Not at all. I wouldn't miss the chance to bask in the dulcett purr of a Lambretta." He grins and gestures with his cane, enjoying the intimation that he can recognize the make by the sound. "What colour is it?"
The girl goes totally bigeyed. "You can tell the difference between a Lambretta and a Vespa just by listening? Holy fucking /shit/ you're good. It's -- it's green, seafoam green..." And she sits up straighter, turning the scooter off so she can converse better. This does fascinating things to the ADAM ANT. "You don't *look* like a Mod, but I guess I don't really, either, so nevermind."
Doug Ramsey says "Mod? :)"
Vesper says "In general, the sort of person who obsesses over scooters. They listen to a certain type of music exemplified by early British Invasion and American 'Garage Rock' bands, as well as early 80s Mod Revival bands like the Jam and the Go-Gos. They tend to dress cleanly, the girls wearing miniskirts and doing the bobbed hair thing; the guys wear silk suits and skinny ties and great big army parkas; the 'Mod Target' is the red dot, white circle, blue circle thing that appears on RAF planes from WWI and WWII. Motto, 'clean living'."
Doug Ramsey says "I am in awe of you. :)"
Vesper, geek.
Grinning with guilty smugness, Doug waves a hand humbly and declines to correct the misconception. "Friend of Mods. Never owned one myself." His mouth fails utterly to quirk wryly. It's not inconceivable that he might once have had a scooter, after all. "I'm more of a general studies geek, with double majors in hacking and conlangs." Expression gliding into a pleased smile, the he-geek leans forward to extend his hand to the she-geek. "Doug."
Vesper also notes -- what's on her underwear? http://www.otmfan.com/ssclub/html/skrull.htm
Doug Ramsey says "That is the coolest thing I have ever seen."
"Wow," says Vesper, still bigeyed. And she reaches out unhesitatingly and clasps Doug's hand, suddenly grinning a lot. "Vesper. Vesper Antagonist. Hacking, huh? Ever hear of a Holly, mostly traceable to a concordia.ca site? And /conlangs/ - have you got any past alpha stage? Oh - Christ du plotte, sorry! Me, I'm a ridiculously eclectic geek. Geek code's a kilometer long. But - oh, listen," and this is all while she's leaned forward, taking his hand, and she's finally sitting up again, letting go, "I'm just on my way home, was going to get coffee. Come with?"
Doug's smile becomes a grin as his hand is taken, letting it stay taken for as long as Vesper likes. "A few, yeah." He has to find out if this world has Star Trek before he mentions his most famous language. "And I haven't, actually. Heard of Holly, that is. I'm.. new to the area." Yeah, because the net is so much about geography. Fast thinking, Doug. He stands with one hand anchoring him to the street sign, the other still warm from Vesper's touch, and smiles. "I can't think of anything I'd rather do right now."
Aw! He should just mention, fish for it. If it's by name and there's no Star Trek, no harm no foul. If it's by name and there /is/, woo instant fangirl. "Ace!" exclaims Vesper, getting off the scooter, pocketing the keys, taking her helmet off and wrenching her goggles off her face so they hang around her neck. Time for the glasses, which she takes out of her pocket and puts on. "Deli's right here. New to the area, huh? So what made you decide to move here? I came 'cause BHU was paying an obscene amount of money for a new sysadmin - no one'll tell me what happened to the last one, except I heard he got merged with the system or something and is all Ghost in the Shell." Eh, he hasn't heard of her handle. Either she's not as famous as she thought she was or he's lying about the hacking business. Who cares, he's hot and can tell the difference between the sound of a Lammie and the sound of a Vespa. And knows about conlangs, and has apparently come up with a few.
But if this place /has/ Star Trek, and some /other/ guy invented the language, he'll look like a lying schmuck. Better to hold off on big stupid show-off stunts like that, and stick to little stupid show-off stunts like pretending he knows anything about scooters. Brandishing his cane at the sidewalk, Doug meanders toward the deli's entrance. "Seriously?" With some of the stuff he saw in Solace's files, he'd definitely believe it. "Um, I'm kinda on an unexpected layover. Just this morning I was on the London red-eye out of Toronto." It's all technically true. Best to avoid lying outright, in case he has to come clean later.
"Seriously," says Vesper in all seriousness, glancing back at Doug, swinging open the door with her free hand. "I keep jumping at the slightest sound whenever I'm in the lab alone. Which is often enough. It's so spooky, being in his old office. I keep expecting weird data-tentacles to come out of the network and snag me in like Tron or something. But with tentacles instead of the Star Trek kinda replicator/transporter beam thing. Here, I've got the door. Toronto and London, eh? I've always wanted to go to London. Most of my favorite bands -- well, all right not most, but a lot -- were from there. Or are. Or whatever."
"Damn. Scariest assimilation I ever saw was in Superman III. Topped Locutus hands down. Thanks." Doug's cane raps the frame of the deli's front door, lending sufficient bearing for him to walk through it without any trouble. He hates to go first, as old habits die hard and none are older than the chivalrous manners he was taught as a boy, but he supposes he's allowed, what with being legally blind and all. "Yeah? My latest crush is Shang Yang and the Legalists. Vancouver guys, kinda TMBG meets Throat Culture." Once inside the deli, Doug purses his lips. "Ah, I've gotta warn you, I haven't got any cash on me."
"Superman III. The one with Richard Pryor and Colin Mochrie, right? I swear, Superman is the /best villain ever/. I wish Mochrie'd make more of them, I don't care if he's Prime Minister now," replies the girl, letting the door shut behind her, coming up behind Doug. "Shang Yang and the Legalists -- I'll have to KaZaA them, see if I can't find anything. They sound like they're right up my alley. And hey, don't worry about it, I'm the one did the inviting. Logically, therefore, I pay." Wait. No money? And wait. He was just on a plane to London? Wait. What? Vesper does a little blinking, then shakes her head to herself and wanders up to the counter. "Heya, Charlie." She holds up a hand to forestall the guy saying anything, then grins. "Not my usual. Just a regular, and whatever Bright Eyes here wants."
"Mochrie was in that? You're kidding." Doug shakes his head, looking faintly amazed. "I haven't seen it in forever." Of course, there's the possibility that Colin Mochrie /wasn't/ in it in his world, but /was/ in this world. A line of thought which leads him to reconsider how serious Vesper was with that 'Prime Minister' thing. "Good logic," he says approvingly to the analysis of the burden of capitalist responsibility. Doug can't help but grin at the nickname, reaching up to adjust his glasses. "Uh, gimme whatever you've got that's hot, thick, and sweet. Preferably with caramel and mocha."
"Dude," says Vesper, blinking back at Doug. "Mochrie was /Superman/. And Christopher Reeve was Lex Luthor -- he had the right look for it and everything. It really sucks with the accident and everything, but he's all heroic about it and shit, so he's keeping up the whole Good Guy mythos. Regular guy, taking down the Ubermensch. It's like sticking it to the Man, but cosmically. Or something." Charlie gives Vesper and Doug a /look/ - the one he gives Vesper, thankfully, would be lost on Doug - it translates to 'what, ANOTHER guy, scootergirl? Dayamn.' The girl leans against the counter, crossing her arms, helmet dangling from one hand. "But I heard that the latest Superman to come through Beacon Harbor's actually /nice/. Probably because he's not American." Oh, the tone - so innocent. Then she cracks up.
"..." That's about the most Doug can manage to say to all of that. He's weighing the odds that Vesper is fucking with him against the odds of Colin Mochrie, human pidgeon, playing Superman. Sliding his hand across the countertop, Doug takes the coffee Charlie sets before him and turns to find a seat, making sure his back is to the deli guy. "Okay, so you got me. What gave it away? I don't look like I'm from another dimension, do I? If everyone I've met since I arrived has been an anthropomorphic animal of some sort or another, I'm biting down on the cyanide capsule in my hollow tooth." He says all of this as he slides into a booth, collapsing his cane and getting comfortable.
Vesper pays for the coffees and takes hers, then blinks at Doug, almost entirely surprised. Sliding into the booth across from him, she sips the coffee and puts it down, then leans forward a little, chin in hand. "You're what...?" Pause. "Oh! THAT kind of new in town." Now her voice is decidedly sheepish. "I, uh. Didn't. Guess, I mean. I figured like ten million other things, but I guess I haven't been in town long enough myself to pick up on stuff. Don't bite down on your cyanide capsule! I'm not a furry in disguise, I'm just your friendly neighborhood sysadmin." Another brief pause, the length of a heartbeat. "Wait, /how/ new in town? Do you have someplace to stay?" No cash.
Doug Ramsey suddenly rolls giggling at that mental image. Doug, walking around among anthro animal people, the only human anywhere, with no fucking clue, playing it cool and froody as he pretends he's just a regular guy.
"Oh, jeez!" Doug Ramsey, super-spy. Kept the secret for a whole hour. "And I thought maybe this world didn't have a Vancouver or something." His tone is dead serious, expression fearfully grim. "Just how much of that stuff about Superman was true?" Doug's very strongly in the habit of stringing together conversational fragments into one long oratory, so he has no qualms about answering different statements and questions in turn. A handy skill around these parts. "Very new. As in, hours. But I got lucky and landed in that Solace place, so I've kinda got somewhere to crash." He endeavors to sound as if he has minor misgivings about staying there. While he's too honest to lie about having a place to stay, he's not about to miss the chance at an invitation to bed down at Vesper's place.
"...there was a guy at Solace who was, like, completely convinced they were implanting subcutaneous bugs and homing devices and shit in him, and after that the place has kinda spooked me out. How 'bout you come stay at my place for now? About the only dangerous thing there is the tub of experimental cheese in the back of the fridge, and the only illegal thing there is the maryjane, and if you don't approve of that I don't smoke around you," suggests Vesper casually. Because Doug is hot. And Doug knows shit about shit. And that's a PERFECTLY good reason he wouldn't've heard of Holly. So maybe he really /is/ a hacker. And maybe he can give her a hand sorting out the really insanely good hacker that keeps poking around in her systems. And maybe he's not opposed to random nookie. "And, uh, the stuff about Superman was all true. Even the not American thing. This one's supposedly Canadian. Which is why I was cracking up."
"In my senior year at NYU I had a pet mold named Harold that was, in a former life, a container of fudge my grandma sent me in my freshman year." If Vesper can guess why he named it Harold, Doug will have sex with her right here on the table while smoking some of her maryjane and tracing her problematic hacker simultaneously. "Thanks. That sounds great." W00t! Invitation! Doug, you scoundrel. "And the jane's not a problem." If not for the whole 'losing everything he's ever known' thing, Doug would consider this a very good day. As it is, it's definitely looking up. "But I don't know if I want to live in a world in which Colin Mochrie regularly wears spandex."
"Oh, not regularly! He /is/ Prime Minister of Canada now, see. You don't tend to wear a lot of spandex when you're PM. I mean, at least not in public. At least not in this universe," grins Vesper, sitting back, drinking a huge whack of coffee because it's cooling off. A moment later she sets it down and puts both her hands on the table, squinting. "Wait. A mold named Harold. If that's a Harold and Maude joke, I'm going to pause to be in immense pain. If not, I'll be fine. Oh hey, do you mind scooter-driven transport? I /have/ got a spare helmet, 'cause I seem to keep picking up hitchhikers in the snow..."
Doug shakes his head, grinning, as Vesper sabotages any hope of a clever comeback about his world's PMs wearing spandex as the garb of office. "Sorry, no. Though it was rather resistant to dying." Sipping his own coffee, Doug licks his lips and says, in a very flat and deliberate tone, "I collect spores, molds, and fungus." Realizing that he's trying to win a girl over with an Egon impression, Doug quickly attempts to move the conversation along. "Don't mind it at all. Do you drive like a lunatic?"
"..." is what Vesper can get out, staring at Doug, before cracking up helplessly. "Oh my GOD. I didn't get to grow up watching - we didn't have a television - but whenever Ghostbusters was on I went to my best friend's house, oh my /god/, I can't believe I didn't catch that. I had the world's BIGGEST CRUSH on Egon. You /bastard/!" Dead. Laughing. It takes her a good minute to calm herself somewhat, while still giggling here and there, and it takes the rest of her coffee, too. "No no, not a lunatic - no, I'm a good driver. Here, finish your coffee and I'll take you home." Heh, heh. Take you hooome with me. Heh heh heh.
"Yeah, well, it wouldn't have been esoteric enough if I'd just named it Egon." Doug sits and grins, listening to Vesper laugh as he sips his own coffee. At the profession of good driving skills, he looks smilingly disappointed. "And here I was hoping for an excuse to really hang on." The instant blush that hits his cheeks indicates that that was one of those things you think of saying but don't actually mean to let out in any kind of audible form. Doug practically dives into his coffee and drinks deeply. Smooth move, ex-lax.
"Well then!" says Vesper cheerfully, crumpling up her cup and gathering her helmet. "I'll have to drive crazy just for you. Maybe just knowing I'm taking a hot hot guy home with me and he's hanging on while I drive'll be enough to make me swerve wildly." She slides out of the booth and stands, stretching. "You ready to go?"
The flattery makes Doug grin, rosy cheeks complemented by his fogged-up glasses. "I'll have to hang on extra carefully so I know what to compliment about you. What else, that is, as I can't very well take hold of your strange and fascinating brain." He rises from the booth and finishes the syrupy dregs of his coffee, placing it directly into a nearby bin marked 'Trash'. "As I'll ever be."
-------
Once they're settled on the scooter, both helmeted, Doug told exactly where to put his feet and to use his imagination concerning where his hands go, the pair of them are vrooming off through the streets - the sound of the vehicle echoes off the buildings, filling the avenues with a gleeful roaring; the wind tugs at them, pointing out the good fortune of Vesper's hair being in braids - it pulls away words, only leaving the faintest sound of the girl singing /something/, something melodic about San Francisco. She drives expertly, but *fast*, and Doug's hanging on is indeed a good idea.
Having tucked his glasses away for safekeeping, Doug grins like a kid as the scooter starts up. His mismatched eyes remain closed against the wind of speed, mutant sense expanding and contracting curiously as he feels the city whipping by. His hands remain respectfully at Vesper's waist for the entirety of the journey, though the occasional bit of turbulence in the road makes him hold a little tighter. He catches snippets of the melody that whips past him, but when he fails to put a title to it, Doug grabs a song out of the air and begins singing his own, something Spanish that fits the pace of the speeding Lambretta.
Unfortunately, Vesper doesn't know Spanish - on the other hand, the wind works against it anyway, and it's only when the scooter stops for traffic lights that she can hear him, and that's when she quiets down to listen, grinning. Glance over her shoulder: "What's that? Like the melody."
"El Matador, Los Fabulosos Cadillacs, Grosse Point Blank soundtrack." There's a movie Doug could see again. He smiles and returns the glance, silver iris glittering in the streetlight. "How 'bout yours?" His hands remain carefully stationary, though his thumbs brush up and down minutely on Vesper's lower back.
No reaction to the silver eye - though it could be she doesn't see it, as she's wearing goggles again. The tiny little brushings of her lower back, on the other hand, they get an equally tiny but involuntary straightening of her back. "I /love/ that movie. John Cusack is teh roxxor. And the soundtrack is the best ever for driving. Mine? Shadows of San Francisco by the Push Kings. Off their album Far Places."
Thumbs stilling as Vesper's back straightens, Doug decides to play it safe since he isn't sure how to interpret the reaction. He barely realized he was doing it. Taking solace in geeky enthusiasm, he grins. "Definitely. I mean, I wouldn't know for the driving, but I love it when I'm.." deathmatching? Shit. "..uh, gardening." Yeah, that's a smooth recovery. He raises his voice over the traffic as the light changes. "I could be a Cusack character, but I'm too happy." He grins demonstratively.
That was definitely an 'I like that but damn is it a bad idea because I'm so driving' reaction. But yeah, hard to interpret. Her voice is /very/ wry as the idling scooter starts up again at the changing light, her gaze going back to the road. "Gardening? You garden. For some reason I wasn't taking you for the earth-loving tree-hugging back-to-nature neo-hippie type. And hey, there're happy Cusack characters! Lloyd Dobbler, for one. Mm, Lloyd. Hey, we're almost there." Her voice is a lot louder, since they're underway.
"I'll have to do more research on the subject of Lloyd Dobbler." Doug grins and leans just slightly, feeling the wind on his face and putting his mouth in more audible range of Vesper's ear. "Well, I can't say I've ever hugged a tree, but gardening's a nice escape from.. everything. The world." Except in rare instances, carrots don't come with text. Nice and quiet for Doug's head. "But I'm definitely some kind of hippie. Post-neo, maybe."
"...postmodern...?" asks Vesper after a second. His mouth is near her ear. For perfectly normal reasons. But it's near her ear; she can feel his breath. Goddamn but he's distracting. "The techno-elite. Tekhnari, they call 'em in Russia. Digerati. Meditating in the sun with your cellphone and your PDA, listening to the birds and the wind and a Velvet Underground mp3 playing on your iPod." The scooter slows down in front of a low-rise apartment block, putt-putting around the side of a building.
"Postmodern's so used. It's been built up to this huge iconic thing. The next era, like they're to neo-whatever what neo- was to whatever. I'm more like neo-whatever 1.02. A new release, but I wouldn't go so far as to say sequel." Way to ramble, Doug. "But you've got the techno-elite thing right, though I'm kinda at a disadvantage. Lost my 'box." Oh yeah. The impetus of this little outing.
"*Suck*," says Vesper, vehemently sympathetically, parking the scooter. "What were you running? I can see what I can do about finding you a replacement, and there're some people I can talk to about getting you papers and shit, and once you've got 'em I can get you a job, too. But if you had a mega-super-beautiful-to-behold box, it's gonna be a little outta my league." She turns it off and pockets the keys again, tugging off her goggles, putting her glasses on; as soon as she's getting up off it, she goes around to the back and opens up the compartment there. Time to switch helmet for books.
"Um.." Doug grins and dismounts the scooter with careful grace, pulling off his helmet and running a hand through his hair. "Yeah, it was pretty good." Pretty good! He had to file a restraining order to keep the Microsoft Slugworths away from his baby. "Deus en machina. But thanks, though. I'd appreciate the help." He holds the helmet out toward Vesper. "You'll hafta show me your box." His expression is as blank as his mismatched eyes.
That earns a doubletake from Vesper, who's in the process of readjusting the mechanical pencil in her hair so it holds the braids up better. She grins widely and takes the helmet, putting it in the back of the scooter, then snags her manuals and her Cryptonomicon and shuts the hatch. "Yes. Yes, I will," she replies, perfectly innocently. "Come on, I'm up on the second floor. Outside steps." There's a big sign on the building says GREENWOOD APARTMENTS, and numbers on all the doors - it's almost like a motel in layout, almost. On the outside, anyway. She puts a lock on the vehicle and starts up the stairs.
Doug grins at the innocent reply and sticks his hands in his pockets, cheeks pinkening just slightly. "What kinda place is this?" A casual question to give him some idea of his surroundings. Good neighbourhood? Skeevy? Can't tell. He hasn't noticed an overabundance of graffiti, but he's been rather distracted. As Vesper starts up the stairs, Doug raises his hand half-way, about to ask her to guide him, but he pauses. You know what? No. He likes this girl, she's very cool, and he's not going to lie to her. Thus he follows the collection of text that represents Vesper, approaching the steps slowly and then ascending them with confidence.
Yay not lying! "Eh, it's mid-grade," comes Vesper's voice from a few steps up; it's only a flight, so she levels off fairly soon. "Apartment complex, close to Chinatown. Chinatown's a little creepy sometimes, I hear, but I've never had any issues, so whatever." She stops in front of a door whose number I don't recall at the moment, taking her keys out again, one handed, and opens it up - waits by it for Doug to catch up. "No one cares much if I play music, and no one cares at all if I grow certain plants, so it agrees with me."
"Sounds comfortable." Chinatown, hm? Must be a good takeout locale. "I'll have to see if there are any vacancies once I settle in." Though considering Doug's unique needs, he'll probably be going penthouse rebuild. Once he gets himself back into sufficient cash to back the lifestyle to which he's accustomed. Jogging up the steps, Doug reaches out and catches the door with only a bit of guesswork based on the location of the brand name on the inside of the lock. "Wired for broadband?"
"Naturally. What do you take me for, some kind of Luddite?" grins Vesper, moving out of the way so Doug can get in, then shutting the door behind him. "It's only 192k SDSL, but I'm fighting with the telco. Should get an upgrade soon." She flicks on the lights so /she/ can see, anyways, and drops her books on the counter between the kitchen and the living room. The place is full to brimming with cool shit: scads of books taking up a wall-to-ceiling set of shelves on one wall - science fiction, urban fantasy, mythology, pulp mysteries, Pratchett, beat poetry, Qabbalah, scads of manuals on a variety of systems and subjects, Star Trek technical manuals, historical fiction, offbeat erotica, children's fantasy, reference books for really odd things, graphic novels, directories, biographies, classics, English mysteries, Joseph Heller, Abbie Hoffman, a bunch of choice manga, psychology, sociology, cyberpunk, Bradbury, Kesey, Leary, classic horror novels, Gibran, CS Lewis, Ellis, and ten tons of books on radio and music and bands and production and technique. And more. There're scads of CDs and record albums on another set of shelves, a shelf of technical journals and fan magazines for things like Dr Who and Sherlock Holmes and Vampirella, and a bunch of loosely-organized boxes of software documentation and floppy disks; there's a Fender Stratocaster plugged into a matching vintage tube amp in the corner; the walls have several signed art prints on them as well as a bunch of print-outs of various amusing comic book pages and posters of different bands. The floor's hardwood, easily-movable rice mats scattered about; the furniture's comfortably worn and mismatched, all of it bearing labels of some sort somewhere on them. Refrigerator's humming in the kitchen, and there're those cheesy kids' brightly-colored alphabet letters and magnetic poetry all over it. Standard appliances, most notably a blender. The place is remarkable for a computertype in that it's disorganized but /clean/ - no trash or empty food containers lying around; nice, vaguely peachy-melony scent in the air. "As far as vacancies and settling in, I'm not gonna be in a rush to kick you out or anything, unless it turns out you eat babies or something. Come on in. Oh, which reminds me, in general, don't invite people in unless they're already over the threshold. City's got vampires."
Speaking of. Doug stops short in the doorway and braces his hands against the frame of the door, eyes closing. Whoops. Walked into that one, Dougie. Should have asked her which was hers and checked ahead. Now he's got the blare of a lot of books hitting him right in the head. If Vesper hadn't already invited him in, his pained expression might give her the wrong idea. He knows she's saying something about eating babies, but she's a quiet voice behind a lot of other voices. With concentration he withdraws his field and lingers in the doorway, taking a deep breath, face flushed. "That's quite a collection you've got over there," he finally says, nodding toward Vesper's private little library.
"...eh?" Vesper may be really bright, but she's not exactly the most perceptive girl in the world when it comes to putting causes together with results. She's looking up at Doug, then, and her eyes widen. "Christ d'ostie du ciborie..! Are you all right?" This she's asking as she's already moving over, quickly, taking his arm in a steadying gesture. "Look like you're going to fall over --" Pause. Collection? Glance over at the shelves, then back at Doug uncomprehendingly. "What?"
"Help me find the couch and I'll level with you." Doug smiles to show that he's all right, and that everything's all right, and there's no need to panic. But the smile's just a little tight because he's keeping his babel field completely withdrawn. He begins to head in the general direction of the couch, comforted yet distracted by the touch at his arm. Despite his promise, he begins to level en route. "I haven't been completely honest with you. I mean, I don't normally tell people because they freak out. But I want to be honest with you because.. well.. you're great." Not quite how he intended the revelation of his powers to go.
"Sure," says Vesper, bigeyed. Her arm wraps around his, and she goes in the general direction of the couch, guiding at whatever pace he wants to set. Luckily, it /is/ a clean flat - nothing to step over. Low coffee table to navigate around, but that's about all that's in the way. And it's a /comfy/ couch. "And - and thanks. And if it's /not/ baby-eating, I'm sure I won't freak." The last guy I actually considered dating for longer than a couple of one-night stands and/or some random fooling around was blue. But this, at least, she doesn't say out loud.
Finding the couch by means of Vesper's guidance and a little blind groping, Doug sinks into the seat and exhales. He slowly lets his babel field out, finding that the couch puts him almost entirely out of range of the bookshelf. Exerting much less concentration to keep the mass of text out of his brain, Doug relaxes a little, smile coming more easily. "No, it's nothing like that. In fact, most people familiar with mutants usually find it kind of dull." Doug shrugs and laces his fingers together to keep from fidgeting. "I can see writing. I am blind," he notes quickly, "but I can sort of.. sense text. And when I run into a lot of it, it kind of catches me off my guard." He gestures toward the bookshelf, half-smiling.
"Oh - oh /cool/," is Vesper's immediate response. She sits down too, not letting go his arm. She forgot, see. Yes. Her secondary reaction follows almost as quickly, and involves what's definitely amused embarrassment in her tone. "Uh. Super Skrull?"
"Geechy as Nietzsche," Doug replies with a straight face. Then he grins, thumbs twiddling nervously. He noticed that she forgot. He's not about to remind her. "Um, so I didn't know it was a Lambretta by the sound. Sorry." Doug doesn't mind telling those harmless lies that might as well be true, like 'I like your shoes,' but stuff beyond that gnaws at his conscience. Thus the quick dodge away from guilt. "Oh, and I can understand any language." He said in casual tones.
"...sokay. Neat factor in other areas infinitely makes up for that - I don't know /anyone/ who can do this stuff, but I've met people before could tell the difference by the sound, and--" Pause. VERY big eyes, accompanied by Vesper sort of edging closer and shamelessly wrapping her other arm around the one of his she's already got. "Holy hot damn," she blinks. "That has to be the single coolest power /ever/. And the most goddamn useful. /Any/ language. Any?"
"Um, oui?" Doug grins, wondering if Vesper's going to pull a Wanda on him. His Russian accent is flawless, after all. "Any language. I mean," he tilts his head in a slight shrug, "it takes time to assimilate new ones, but I've got every terran language down, and most programming languages, and a good many codes the military thinks are still unbroken.." Showing off? Hell yes. He fancies this girl, and he's not gonna pull any punches if he can impress her further.
Nah, she only has the two. "That is so fucking cool." Vesper, awed. "Oh damn, your box must have been the shit. I'm so sorry you lost it. I really /will/ give you a hand getting things together, no worries. So every language on Earth, eh? Sign language count? ...body language?" she asks, coming even closer. Yeah all right, most ridiculous come-on ever, even as she's practically leaning on him by now. He /did/ say she was great. And he /did/ come home with her. And there's very little propriety involved when it comes to the way her brain works. But she's not about to just outright, well, jump him. Yet. "Jesus, you can read /anything/. Closed books, I guess from that bit before - hee, locked filing cabinets..."
"No, sign language doesn't work. Only written and spoken.. languages." Doug's grin becomes a smile, quietly happy, politely interested. "Well, I can read body language, but only by touch." He reaches up with his free hand and lightly touches his fingertips to Vesper's forearm. "And I've already been privy to one very secret filing cabinet, which is why it's important my 'sight' stays on the down-low." He feels it's important to get this disclaimer out of the way before Vesper makes him forget.
"/Not/ a problem," says Vesper softly, now actually leaning. It's a progression, see. "Unless you think me going out and getting gel pens and investing an afternoon in body graffiti's not subtle enough for the keeping on the down-low." Oh god that was such a grin in her voice. "By touch, eh? There's a series of absolutely wretched pick-up lines running through my head having something to do with that - better stop me before I make a fool of myself and try and use any."
"Well, you'd need an accomplice to help you wash up afterwards, but I'm sure I could find someone willing.." Doug grins and begins to lean as well, though much more slowly. Vesper isn't covered in head-to-toe erotic poetry yet, and he doesn't want to knock heads. "Actually morbid curiosity compels me to let you share a few." His lips curl into a sideways smile.
Oh, no. And no getting impaled on her glasses, either - she takes them off and reaches up over her head, putting them up between the top of the couch and the wall, grinning. That hand comes to rest on his chest; the other stays wrapped around his arm. "Well. There's the one says that could only mean we should keep in touch. And then there's 'oh, your story's very touching, but /we're/ not touching quite enough' which is /awful/, but it's almost made up for with the idea of the Bloodhound Gang covering the Rocky Horror Picture show - Janet and Rocky on the Discovery Channel - but that's not a line, it's just weird."
Laughing, Doug groans and shakes his head. "You frighten me, Vesper." He smiles and trails his fingertips up her arm to the top of her shoulder, turning slightly to accommodate the motion. "But in that really good way." The hand at her shoulder lifts and very gently touches the edge of her jaw, sliding up to caress her cheek. Face location confirmed, kissing is a go.
"Oh good," says she, very quietly, head inclining slightly at his touch. And, well. Kissing blindly is a lot easier when the other involved party is looking. And then after a certain point, no one actually needs to be looking - that's when Vesper also lets *her* fingers do the walking. Or the talking, depending. /Nice/ kiss.
Vesper says "And then they have TEH HOTT HOTT SEXX0RZ!!!11!"
Logfile from Project Infinity.
Doug Ramsey
Doug Ramsey's boyish features often present others with the momentary impression of a twelve year-old who's grown to startling dimensions. Nevertheless his face, upon closer inspection, bears tell-tale marks of his twenty-eight years of life. The shades have been drawn on the windows to his soul, lightly tinted sunglasses with trendy black frames neatly reducing the cool blue of his right eye and metallic silver of his left to equally imperceptible shades of gray. Even through the dusky lenses it's easy to tell that Doug is blind; though his eyes are always open, they never focus on anything with the clarity of sight. His wheat-blonde hair has been clippered short enough that no bangs obscure his soft, handsome face.
Dressed in the style that moguls like to call 'designer casual', Doug has found a personal balance of comfort and style that fits well on his tall, slender frame. A simple ash-hued cotton v-neck with sleeves that end just past his elbows complements the pair of matching socks that peek out between the cuffs of his conservative black slacks and the tops of his black suede loafer-esque shoes. Over the v-neck is a stylish beige suede jacket that doubtless originated somewhere in Italy, bearing that simplicity of appearance which results only from very complicated, very expensive tailoring.
Clipped to his belt are the twin raven-black informants of pager and cellular telephone, each sitting snugly within its own compact leather holster. Over Doug's shoulder is usually slung the strap of a black leather bag that looks like the illegitimate love-child of Giorgio Armani and a team of NASA engineers. It manages to have admirable carrying capacity, including a laptop compartment, without sacrificing its elegantly manageable shape. In the side is a specialized pocket for the collapsible white cane which Doug can often be seen using.
Vesper Antagonist
She's gotta be six feet tall. More than that at the moment; her hair's not helping make her any shorter. Vesper's obscenely long black hair is piled on her head in a sleekly complicated braid-thing, pinned up and stuck through with what looks like a fancy knitting needle and a mechanical pencil. Apparently she lost one. The deep blue and brilliant green locks she religiously keeps dyed sweep back from her temples into the architecture her hair has become, and a few recalcitrant wisps stray down the back of her neck. This is neat because the rarely-seen tattoo at the nape of her neck is now visible: a combination chaostar/Mod target. Her green eyes are outlined rather dramatically, behind silver wire-rim glasses, in kohl; the lip gloss she's wearing is a dark wine color - it and the eyeliner are both in sharp contrast to the basementlike paleness of her skin.
The young woman's wearing a cropped black tank top with 'ADAM ANT' (D and N backwards, naturally) printed on it in red, fitting flatteringly tightly around health-conscious but not necessarily athletic curves; o! shocking, her belly and the piercing she's got there, as well as a good lot of her lower back and the Stratocaster-playing Kokopelli tattoo *there*, they're exposed; she's unabashedly wearing a pair of vintage embroidered bellbottoms and rather blocky-looking girly sneakers. Vans, they say on the sides. Her arms are burn-scarred from fingertips up past her elbows.
Covered Bridge Lane
The sprawling campus of Beacon Harbor University runs up along the west side of the street as it winds it's way southward. Named for the covered bridge that once spanned the Harbor River, a river that forms the southern boundary of most of the city's urban sprawl. That bridge was replaced in the mid fifties to accommodate the heavy trucks that pass along Route 96, but retains its name in tribute to an old landmark. The eastern side of the street is a collective mixture of student housing, small stores, apartments and other buildings commonly found in college towns across the country.
The Babelbox is gone. Everything's gone, really, but as Doug was in something of a transitory stage, that doesn't really matter. The only thing that was going to be a constant was his 'box. And it's gone. The hour is late, coming up on midnight, and Doug is walking alone toward the all-night Deli. He's taking advantage of a traffickless moment and walking more or less down the middle of the street, at a slight perpendicular that'll get him to the Deli eventually. He likes walking in the street; it puts most of the sidewalk-level text out of range. Of course, the cane and glasses probably don't make this look very safe to the casual observer.
No, no they don't. Actually, it wouldn't look safe in the first place. But no, now the impression is 'drugged-up blind dude' instead of just 'drugged-up dude'. Vesper, on her way home from the University and driving her vroomy vroomy scooter, slows down and squints through her goggles. "Hey!" she calls. "Hey, are you all right? You're gonna get hit by a car if you keep that shit up..."
At the sound of the scooter's approach, Doug picks up the pace and skips up onto the curb with more confidence than a man who can't see lampposts ought to have. Real bright, Ramsey. Just silk-screen yourself an 'It's a mutant thing. You wouldn't understand.' t-shirt while you're at it. Pathos is no excuse for carelessness. "Uh, nah. Woulda heard 'em coming. Thanks, though." He stares straight ahead, but aims his babel field toward the scooter and voice, to see what he can see.
It's a Lambretta motorscooter, model LI-65, and there're a bunch of numbers on various parts of it, designating what size they are and shit like that. There're band stickers on the scooter in different places: the Jam, Radiohead, Astroburger, Blur, Gorillaz, the Kingpins, Mephiskapheles, the Planet Smashers -- there's also a sticker says 'If it's too loud, turn it down (weezer rock music). The girl herself, there's a nicely rounded 'ADAM ANT' across her chest, her sneakers say 'Vans' on the sides, her jeans have got 'Levi's' on one back pocket, there's a big 'ROAG YOAD' sticker across one side of her helmet, there's a mechanical pencil stuck in her hair that says 'Bic #2', and her underwear's got the Super Skrull themesong printed on it. I shit you not. There're several rather arcane user's manuals and a copy of Neal Stephenson's 'Cryptonomicon' in the back compartment of the scooter, as well as a bag that says Dunkin' Donuts. Oh, and there's a laptop in her otherwise-empty shoulderbag, says 'Powerbook' and the standard keyboard. Also says 'Property of Vesper Antagonist - touch and die, proles' on it, handwritten. "...I can see that," she says, all Canadian-accented, with a tone like her eyebrows are up out of dubious awe. "Still not a good idea, though." The scooter wheels around, stopping by the curb, idling. "Though you're perfectly welcome to tell me to fuck off."
Oh, wow. Doug pauses, not even bothering to mask the smile that the collection of texts brings to his lips. Now this person has potential. He reaches up to lean one hand on a handy 'No Parking' sign, remembering to sway his cane far enough to tap it first. "Not at all. I wouldn't miss the chance to bask in the dulcett purr of a Lambretta." He grins and gestures with his cane, enjoying the intimation that he can recognize the make by the sound. "What colour is it?"
The girl goes totally bigeyed. "You can tell the difference between a Lambretta and a Vespa just by listening? Holy fucking /shit/ you're good. It's -- it's green, seafoam green..." And she sits up straighter, turning the scooter off so she can converse better. This does fascinating things to the ADAM ANT. "You don't *look* like a Mod, but I guess I don't really, either, so nevermind."
Grinning with guilty smugness, Doug waves a hand humbly and declines to correct the misconception. "Friend of Mods. Never owned one myself." His mouth fails utterly to quirk wryly. It's not inconceivable that he might once have had a scooter, after all. "I'm more of a general studies geek, with double majors in hacking and conlangs." Expression gliding into a pleased smile, the he-geek leans forward to extend his hand to the she-geek. "Doug."
"Wow," says Vesper, still bigeyed. And she reaches out unhesitatingly and clasps Doug's hand, suddenly grinning a lot. "Vesper. Vesper Antagonist. Hacking, huh? Ever hear of a Holly, mostly traceable to a concordia.ca site? And /conlangs/ - have you got any past alpha stage? Oh - Christ du plotte, sorry! Me, I'm a ridiculously eclectic geek. Geek code's a kilometer long. But - oh, listen," and this is all while she's leaned forward, taking his hand, and she's finally sitting up again, letting go, "I'm just on my way home, was going to get coffee. Come with?"
Doug's smile becomes a grin as his hand is taken, letting it stay taken for as long as Vesper likes. "A few, yeah." He has to find out if this world has Star Trek before he mentions his most famous language. "And I haven't, actually. Heard of Holly, that is. I'm.. new to the area." Yeah, because the net is so much about geography. Fast thinking, Doug. He stands with one hand anchoring him to the street sign, the other still warm from Vesper's touch, and smiles. "I can't think of anything I'd rather do right now."
Aw! He should just mention, fish for it. If it's by name and there's no Star Trek, no harm no foul. If it's by name and there /is/, woo instant fangirl. "Ace!" exclaims Vesper, getting off the scooter, pocketing the keys, taking her helmet off and wrenching her goggles off her face so they hang around her neck. Time for the glasses, which she takes out of her pocket and puts on. "Deli's right here. New to the area, huh? So what made you decide to move here? I came 'cause BHU was paying an obscene amount of money for a new sysadmin - no one'll tell me what happened to the last one, except I heard he got merged with the system or something and is all Ghost in the Shell." Eh, he hasn't heard of her handle. Either she's not as famous as she thought she was or he's lying about the hacking business. Who cares, he's hot and can tell the difference between the sound of a Lammie and the sound of a Vespa. And knows about conlangs, and has apparently come up with a few.
But if this place /has/ Star Trek, and some /other/ guy invented the language, he'll look like a lying schmuck. Better to hold off on big stupid show-off stunts like that, and stick to little stupid show-off stunts like pretending he knows anything about scooters. Brandishing his cane at the sidewalk, Doug meanders toward the deli's entrance. "Seriously?" With some of the stuff he saw in Solace's files, he'd definitely believe it. "Um, I'm kinda on an unexpected layover. Just this morning I was on the London red-eye out of Toronto." It's all technically true. Best to avoid lying outright, in case he has to come clean later.
"Seriously," says Vesper in all seriousness, glancing back at Doug, swinging open the door with her free hand. "I keep jumping at the slightest sound whenever I'm in the lab alone. Which is often enough. It's so spooky, being in his old office. I keep expecting weird data-tentacles to come out of the network and snag me in like Tron or something. But with tentacles instead of the Star Trek kinda replicator/transporter beam thing. Here, I've got the door. Toronto and London, eh? I've always wanted to go to London. Most of my favorite bands -- well, all right not most, but a lot -- were from there. Or are. Or whatever."
"Damn. Scariest assimilation I ever saw was in Superman III. Topped Locutus hands down. Thanks." Doug's cane raps the frame of the deli's front door, lending sufficient bearing for him to walk through it without any trouble. He hates to go first, as old habits die hard and none are older than the chivalrous manners he was taught as a boy, but he supposes he's allowed, what with being legally blind and all. "Yeah? My latest crush is Shang Yang and the Legalists. Vancouver guys, kinda TMBG meets Throat Culture." Once inside the deli, Doug purses his lips. "Ah, I've gotta warn you, I haven't got any cash on me."
"Superman III. The one with Richard Pryor and Colin Mochrie, right? I swear, Superman is the /best villain ever/. I wish Mochrie'd make more of them, I don't care if he's Prime Minister now," replies the girl, letting the door shut behind her, coming up behind Doug. "Shang Yang and the Legalists -- I'll have to KaZaA them, see if I can't find anything. They sound like they're right up my alley. And hey, don't worry about it, I'm the one did the inviting. Logically, therefore, I pay." Wait. No money? And wait. He was just on a plane to London? Wait. What? Vesper does a little blinking, then shakes her head to herself and wanders up to the counter. "Heya, Charlie." She holds up a hand to forestall the guy saying anything, then grins. "Not my usual. Just a regular, and whatever Bright Eyes here wants."
"Mochrie was in that? You're kidding." Doug shakes his head, looking faintly amazed. "I haven't seen it in forever." Of course, there's the possibility that Colin Mochrie /wasn't/ in it in his world, but /was/ in this world. A line of thought which leads him to reconsider how serious Vesper was with that 'Prime Minister' thing. "Good logic," he says approvingly to the analysis of the burden of capitalist responsibility. Doug can't help but grin at the nickname, reaching up to adjust his glasses. "Uh, gimme whatever you've got that's hot, thick, and sweet. Preferably with caramel and mocha."
"Dude," says Vesper, blinking back at Doug. "Mochrie was /Superman/. And Christopher Reeve was Lex Luthor -- he had the right look for it and everything. It really sucks with the accident and everything, but he's all heroic about it and shit, so he's keeping up the whole Good Guy mythos. Regular guy, taking down the Ubermensch. It's like sticking it to the Man, but cosmically. Or something." Charlie gives Vesper and Doug a /look/ - the one he gives Vesper, thankfully, would be lost on Doug - it translates to 'what, ANOTHER guy, scootergirl? Dayamn.' The girl leans against the counter, crossing her arms, helmet dangling from one hand. "But I heard that the latest Superman to come through Beacon Harbor's actually /nice/. Probably because he's not American." Oh, the tone - so innocent. Then she cracks up.
"..." That's about the most Doug can manage to say to all of that. He's weighing the odds that Vesper is fucking with him against the odds of Colin Mochrie, human pidgeon, playing Superman. Sliding his hand across the countertop, Doug takes the coffee Charlie sets before him and turns to find a seat, making sure his back is to the deli guy. "Okay, so you got me. What gave it away? I don't look like I'm from another dimension, do I? If everyone I've met since I arrived has been an anthropomorphic animal of some sort or another, I'm biting down on the cyanide capsule in my hollow tooth." He says all of this as he slides into a booth, collapsing his cane and getting comfortable.
Vesper pays for the coffees and takes hers, then blinks at Doug, almost entirely surprised. Sliding into the booth across from him, she sips the coffee and puts it down, then leans forward a little, chin in hand. "You're what...?" Pause. "Oh! THAT kind of new in town." Now her voice is decidedly sheepish. "I, uh. Didn't. Guess, I mean. I figured like ten million other things, but I guess I haven't been in town long enough myself to pick up on stuff. Don't bite down on your cyanide capsule! I'm not a furry in disguise, I'm just your friendly neighborhood sysadmin." Another brief pause, the length of a heartbeat. "Wait, /how/ new in town? Do you have someplace to stay?" No cash.
"Oh, jeez!" Doug Ramsey, super-spy. Kept the secret for a whole hour. "And I thought maybe this world didn't have a Vancouver or something." His tone is dead serious, expression fearfully grim. "Just how much of that stuff about Superman was true?" Doug's very strongly in the habit of stringing together conversational fragments into one long oratory, so he has no qualms about answering different statements and questions in turn. A handy skill around these parts. "Very new. As in, hours. But I got lucky and landed in that Solace place, so I've kinda got somewhere to crash." He endeavors to sound as if he has minor misgivings about staying there. While he's too honest to lie about having a place to stay, he's not about to miss the chance at an invitation to bed down at Vesper's place.
"...there was a guy at Solace who was, like, completely convinced they were implanting subcutaneous bugs and homing devices and shit in him, and after that the place has kinda spooked me out. How 'bout you come stay at my place for now? About the only dangerous thing there is the tub of experimental cheese in the back of the fridge, and the only illegal thing there is the maryjane, and if you don't approve of that I don't smoke around you," suggests Vesper casually. Because Doug is hot. And Doug knows shit about shit. And that's a PERFECTLY good reason he wouldn't've heard of Holly. So maybe he really /is/ a hacker. And maybe he can give her a hand sorting out the really insanely good hacker that keeps poking around in her systems. And maybe he's not opposed to random nookie. "And, uh, the stuff about Superman was all true. Even the not American thing. This one's supposedly Canadian. Which is why I was cracking up."
"In my senior year at NYU I had a pet mold named Harold that was, in a former life, a container of fudge my grandma sent me in my freshman year." If Vesper can guess why he named it Harold, Doug will have sex with her right here on the table while smoking some of her maryjane and tracing her problematic hacker simultaneously. "Thanks. That sounds great." W00t! Invitation! Doug, you scoundrel. "And the jane's not a problem." If not for the whole 'losing everything he's ever known' thing, Doug would consider this a very good day. As it is, it's definitely looking up. "But I don't know if I want to live in a world in which Colin Mochrie regularly wears spandex."
"Oh, not regularly! He /is/ Prime Minister of Canada now, see. You don't tend to wear a lot of spandex when you're PM. I mean, at least not in public. At least not in this universe," grins Vesper, sitting back, drinking a huge whack of coffee because it's cooling off. A moment later she sets it down and puts both her hands on the table, squinting. "Wait. A mold named Harold. If that's a Harold and Maude joke, I'm going to pause to be in immense pain. If not, I'll be fine. Oh hey, do you mind scooter-driven transport? I /have/ got a spare helmet, 'cause I seem to keep picking up hitchhikers in the snow..."
Doug shakes his head, grinning, as Vesper sabotages any hope of a clever comeback about his world's PMs wearing spandex as the garb of office. "Sorry, no. Though it was rather resistant to dying." Sipping his own coffee, Doug licks his lips and says, in a very flat and deliberate tone, "I collect spores, molds, and fungus." Realizing that he's trying to win a girl over with an Egon impression, Doug quickly attempts to move the conversation along. "Don't mind it at all. Do you drive like a lunatic?"
"..." is what Vesper can get out, staring at Doug, before cracking up helplessly. "Oh my GOD. I didn't get to grow up watching - we didn't have a television - but whenever Ghostbusters was on I went to my best friend's house, oh my /god/, I can't believe I didn't catch that. I had the world's BIGGEST CRUSH on Egon. You /bastard/!" Dead. Laughing. It takes her a good minute to calm herself somewhat, while still giggling here and there, and it takes the rest of her coffee, too. "No no, not a lunatic - no, I'm a good driver. Here, finish your coffee and I'll take you home." Heh, heh. Take you hooome with me. Heh heh heh.
"Yeah, well, it wouldn't have been esoteric enough if I'd just named it Egon." Doug sits and grins, listening to Vesper laugh as he sips his own coffee. At the profession of good driving skills, he looks smilingly disappointed. "And here I was hoping for an excuse to really hang on." The instant blush that hits his cheeks indicates that that was one of those things you think of saying but don't actually mean to let out in any kind of audible form. Doug practically dives into his coffee and drinks deeply. Smooth move, ex-lax.
"Well then!" says Vesper cheerfully, crumpling up her cup and gathering her helmet. "I'll have to drive crazy just for you. Maybe just knowing I'm taking a hot hot guy home with me and he's hanging on while I drive'll be enough to make me swerve wildly." She slides out of the booth and stands, stretching. "You ready to go?"
The flattery makes Doug grin, rosy cheeks complemented by his fogged-up glasses. "I'll have to hang on extra carefully so I know what to compliment about you. What else, that is, as I can't very well take hold of your strange and fascinating brain." He rises from the booth and finishes the syrupy dregs of his coffee, placing it directly into a nearby bin marked 'Trash'. "As I'll ever be."
-------
Once they're settled on the scooter, both helmeted, Doug told exactly where to put his feet and to use his imagination concerning where his hands go, the pair of them are vrooming off through the streets - the sound of the vehicle echoes off the buildings, filling the avenues with a gleeful roaring; the wind tugs at them, pointing out the good fortune of Vesper's hair being in braids - it pulls away words, only leaving the faintest sound of the girl singing /something/, something melodic about San Francisco. She drives expertly, but *fast*, and Doug's hanging on is indeed a good idea.
Having tucked his glasses away for safekeeping, Doug grins like a kid as the scooter starts up. His mismatched eyes remain closed against the wind of speed, mutant sense expanding and contracting curiously as he feels the city whipping by. His hands remain respectfully at Vesper's waist for the entirety of the journey, though the occasional bit of turbulence in the road makes him hold a little tighter. He catches snippets of the melody that whips past him, but when he fails to put a title to it, Doug grabs a song out of the air and begins singing his own, something Spanish that fits the pace of the speeding Lambretta.
Unfortunately, Vesper doesn't know Spanish - on the other hand, the wind works against it anyway, and it's only when the scooter stops for traffic lights that she can hear him, and that's when she quiets down to listen, grinning. Glance over her shoulder: "What's that? Like the melody."
"El Matador, Los Fabulosos Cadillacs, Grosse Point Blank soundtrack." There's a movie Doug could see again. He smiles and returns the glance, silver iris glittering in the streetlight. "How 'bout yours?" His hands remain carefully stationary, though his thumbs brush up and down minutely on Vesper's lower back.
No reaction to the silver eye - though it could be she doesn't see it, as she's wearing goggles again. The tiny little brushings of her lower back, on the other hand, they get an equally tiny but involuntary straightening of her back. "I /love/ that movie. John Cusack is teh roxxor. And the soundtrack is the best ever for driving. Mine? Shadows of San Francisco by the Push Kings. Off their album Far Places."
Thumbs stilling as Vesper's back straightens, Doug decides to play it safe since he isn't sure how to interpret the reaction. He barely realized he was doing it. Taking solace in geeky enthusiasm, he grins. "Definitely. I mean, I wouldn't know for the driving, but I love it when I'm.." deathmatching? Shit. "..uh, gardening." Yeah, that's a smooth recovery. He raises his voice over the traffic as the light changes. "I could be a Cusack character, but I'm too happy." He grins demonstratively.
That was definitely an 'I like that but damn is it a bad idea because I'm so driving' reaction. But yeah, hard to interpret. Her voice is /very/ wry as the idling scooter starts up again at the changing light, her gaze going back to the road. "Gardening? You garden. For some reason I wasn't taking you for the earth-loving tree-hugging back-to-nature neo-hippie type. And hey, there're happy Cusack characters! Lloyd Dobbler, for one. Mm, Lloyd. Hey, we're almost there." Her voice is a lot louder, since they're underway.
"I'll have to do more research on the subject of Lloyd Dobbler." Doug grins and leans just slightly, feeling the wind on his face and putting his mouth in more audible range of Vesper's ear. "Well, I can't say I've ever hugged a tree, but gardening's a nice escape from.. everything. The world." Except in rare instances, carrots don't come with text. Nice and quiet for Doug's head. "But I'm definitely some kind of hippie. Post-neo, maybe."
"...postmodern...?" asks Vesper after a second. His mouth is near her ear. For perfectly normal reasons. But it's near her ear; she can feel his breath. Goddamn but he's distracting. "The techno-elite. Tekhnari, they call 'em in Russia. Digerati. Meditating in the sun with your cellphone and your PDA, listening to the birds and the wind and a Velvet Underground mp3 playing on your iPod." The scooter slows down in front of a low-rise apartment block, putt-putting around the side of a building.
"Postmodern's so used. It's been built up to this huge iconic thing. The next era, like they're to neo-whatever what neo- was to whatever. I'm more like neo-whatever 1.02. A new release, but I wouldn't go so far as to say sequel." Way to ramble, Doug. "But you've got the techno-elite thing right, though I'm kinda at a disadvantage. Lost my 'box." Oh yeah. The impetus of this little outing.
"*Suck*," says Vesper, vehemently sympathetically, parking the scooter. "What were you running? I can see what I can do about finding you a replacement, and there're some people I can talk to about getting you papers and shit, and once you've got 'em I can get you a job, too. But if you had a mega-super-beautiful-to-behold box, it's gonna be a little outta my league." She turns it off and pockets the keys again, tugging off her goggles, putting her glasses on; as soon as she's getting up off it, she goes around to the back and opens up the compartment there. Time to switch helmet for books.
"Um.." Doug grins and dismounts the scooter with careful grace, pulling off his helmet and running a hand through his hair. "Yeah, it was pretty good." Pretty good! He had to file a restraining order to keep the Microsoft Slugworths away from his baby. "Deus en machina. But thanks, though. I'd appreciate the help." He holds the helmet out toward Vesper. "You'll hafta show me your box." His expression is as blank as his mismatched eyes.
That earns a doubletake from Vesper, who's in the process of readjusting the mechanical pencil in her hair so it holds the braids up better. She grins widely and takes the helmet, putting it in the back of the scooter, then snags her manuals and her Cryptonomicon and shuts the hatch. "Yes. Yes, I will," she replies, perfectly innocently. "Come on, I'm up on the second floor. Outside steps." There's a big sign on the building says GREENWOOD APARTMENTS, and numbers on all the doors - it's almost like a motel in layout, almost. On the outside, anyway. She puts a lock on the vehicle and starts up the stairs.
Doug grins at the innocent reply and sticks his hands in his pockets, cheeks pinkening just slightly. "What kinda place is this?" A casual question to give him some idea of his surroundings. Good neighbourhood? Skeevy? Can't tell. He hasn't noticed an overabundance of graffiti, but he's been rather distracted. As Vesper starts up the stairs, Doug raises his hand half-way, about to ask her to guide him, but he pauses. You know what? No. He likes this girl, she's very cool, and he's not going to lie to her. Thus he follows the collection of text that represents Vesper, approaching the steps slowly and then ascending them with confidence.
Yay not lying! "Eh, it's mid-grade," comes Vesper's voice from a few steps up; it's only a flight, so she levels off fairly soon. "Apartment complex, close to Chinatown. Chinatown's a little creepy sometimes, I hear, but I've never had any issues, so whatever." She stops in front of a door whose number I don't recall at the moment, taking her keys out again, one handed, and opens it up - waits by it for Doug to catch up. "No one cares much if I play music, and no one cares at all if I grow certain plants, so it agrees with me."
"Sounds comfortable." Chinatown, hm? Must be a good takeout locale. "I'll have to see if there are any vacancies once I settle in." Though considering Doug's unique needs, he'll probably be going penthouse rebuild. Once he gets himself back into sufficient cash to back the lifestyle to which he's accustomed. Jogging up the steps, Doug reaches out and catches the door with only a bit of guesswork based on the location of the brand name on the inside of the lock. "Wired for broadband?"
"Naturally. What do you take me for, some kind of Luddite?" grins Vesper, moving out of the way so Doug can get in, then shutting the door behind him. "It's only 192k SDSL, but I'm fighting with the telco. Should get an upgrade soon." She flicks on the lights so /she/ can see, anyways, and drops her books on the counter between the kitchen and the living room. The place is full to brimming with cool shit: scads of books taking up a wall-to-ceiling set of shelves on one wall - science fiction, urban fantasy, mythology, pulp mysteries, Pratchett, beat poetry, Qabbalah, scads of manuals on a variety of systems and subjects, Star Trek technical manuals, historical fiction, offbeat erotica, children's fantasy, reference books for really odd things, graphic novels, directories, biographies, classics, English mysteries, Joseph Heller, Abbie Hoffman, a bunch of choice manga, psychology, sociology, cyberpunk, Bradbury, Kesey, Leary, classic horror novels, Gibran, CS Lewis, Ellis, and ten tons of books on radio and music and bands and production and technique. And more. There're scads of CDs and record albums on another set of shelves, a shelf of technical journals and fan magazines for things like Dr Who and Sherlock Holmes and Vampirella, and a bunch of loosely-organized boxes of software documentation and floppy disks; there's a Fender Stratocaster plugged into a matching vintage tube amp in the corner; the walls have several signed art prints on them as well as a bunch of print-outs of various amusing comic book pages and posters of different bands. The floor's hardwood, easily-movable rice mats scattered about; the furniture's comfortably worn and mismatched, all of it bearing labels of some sort somewhere on them. Refrigerator's humming in the kitchen, and there're those cheesy kids' brightly-colored alphabet letters and magnetic poetry all over it. Standard appliances, most notably a blender. The place is remarkable for a computertype in that it's disorganized but /clean/ - no trash or empty food containers lying around; nice, vaguely peachy-melony scent in the air. "As far as vacancies and settling in, I'm not gonna be in a rush to kick you out or anything, unless it turns out you eat babies or something. Come on in. Oh, which reminds me, in general, don't invite people in unless they're already over the threshold. City's got vampires."
Speaking of. Doug stops short in the doorway and braces his hands against the frame of the door, eyes closing. Whoops. Walked into that one, Dougie. Should have asked her which was hers and checked ahead. Now he's got the blare of a lot of books hitting him right in the head. If Vesper hadn't already invited him in, his pained expression might give her the wrong idea. He knows she's saying something about eating babies, but she's a quiet voice behind a lot of other voices. With concentration he withdraws his field and lingers in the doorway, taking a deep breath, face flushed. "That's quite a collection you've got over there," he finally says, nodding toward Vesper's private little library.
"...eh?" Vesper may be really bright, but she's not exactly the most perceptive girl in the world when it comes to putting causes together with results. She's looking up at Doug, then, and her eyes widen. "Christ d'ostie du ciborie..! Are you all right?" This she's asking as she's already moving over, quickly, taking his arm in a steadying gesture. "Look like you're going to fall over --" Pause. Collection? Glance over at the shelves, then back at Doug uncomprehendingly. "What?"
"Help me find the couch and I'll level with you." Doug smiles to show that he's all right, and that everything's all right, and there's no need to panic. But the smile's just a little tight because he's keeping his babel field completely withdrawn. He begins to head in the general direction of the couch, comforted yet distracted by the touch at his arm. Despite his promise, he begins to level en route. "I haven't been completely honest with you. I mean, I don't normally tell people because they freak out. But I want to be honest with you because.. well.. you're great." Not quite how he intended the revelation of his powers to go.
"Sure," says Vesper, bigeyed. Her arm wraps around his, and she goes in the general direction of the couch, guiding at whatever pace he wants to set. Luckily, it /is/ a clean flat - nothing to step over. Low coffee table to navigate around, but that's about all that's in the way. And it's a /comfy/ couch. "And - and thanks. And if it's /not/ baby-eating, I'm sure I won't freak." The last guy I actually considered dating for longer than a couple of one-night stands and/or some random fooling around was blue. But this, at least, she doesn't say out loud.
Finding the couch by means of Vesper's guidance and a little blind groping, Doug sinks into the seat and exhales. He slowly lets his babel field out, finding that the couch puts him almost entirely out of range of the bookshelf. Exerting much less concentration to keep the mass of text out of his brain, Doug relaxes a little, smile coming more easily. "No, it's nothing like that. In fact, most people familiar with mutants usually find it kind of dull." Doug shrugs and laces his fingers together to keep from fidgeting. "I can see writing. I am blind," he notes quickly, "but I can sort of.. sense text. And when I run into a lot of it, it kind of catches me off my guard." He gestures toward the bookshelf, half-smiling.
"Oh - oh /cool/," is Vesper's immediate response. She sits down too, not letting go his arm. She forgot, see. Yes. Her secondary reaction follows almost as quickly, and involves what's definitely amused embarrassment in her tone. "Uh. Super Skrull?"
"Geechy as Nietzsche," Doug replies with a straight face. Then he grins, thumbs twiddling nervously. He noticed that she forgot. He's not about to remind her. "Um, so I didn't know it was a Lambretta by the sound. Sorry." Doug doesn't mind telling those harmless lies that might as well be true, like 'I like your shoes,' but stuff beyond that gnaws at his conscience. Thus the quick dodge away from guilt. "Oh, and I can understand any language." He said in casual tones.
"...sokay. Neat factor in other areas infinitely makes up for that - I don't know /anyone/ who can do this stuff, but I've met people before could tell the difference by the sound, and--" Pause. VERY big eyes, accompanied by Vesper sort of edging closer and shamelessly wrapping her other arm around the one of his she's already got. "Holy hot damn," she blinks. "That has to be the single coolest power /ever/. And the most goddamn useful. /Any/ language. Any?"
"Um, oui?" Doug grins, wondering if Vesper's going to pull a Wanda on him. His Russian accent is flawless, after all. "Any language. I mean," he tilts his head in a slight shrug, "it takes time to assimilate new ones, but I've got every terran language down, and most programming languages, and a good many codes the military thinks are still unbroken.." Showing off? Hell yes. He fancies this girl, and he's not gonna pull any punches if he can impress her further.
Nah, she only has the two. "That is so fucking cool." Vesper, awed. "Oh damn, your box must have been the shit. I'm so sorry you lost it. I really /will/ give you a hand getting things together, no worries. So every language on Earth, eh? Sign language count? ...body language?" she asks, coming even closer. Yeah all right, most ridiculous come-on ever, even as she's practically leaning on him by now. He /did/ say she was great. And he /did/ come home with her. And there's very little propriety involved when it comes to the way her brain works. But she's not about to just outright, well, jump him. Yet. "Jesus, you can read /anything/. Closed books, I guess from that bit before - hee, locked filing cabinets..."
"No, sign language doesn't work. Only written and spoken.. languages." Doug's grin becomes a smile, quietly happy, politely interested. "Well, I can read body language, but only by touch." He reaches up with his free hand and lightly touches his fingertips to Vesper's forearm. "And I've already been privy to one very secret filing cabinet, which is why it's important my 'sight' stays on the down-low." He feels it's important to get this disclaimer out of the way before Vesper makes him forget.
"/Not/ a problem," says Vesper softly, now actually leaning. It's a progression, see. "Unless you think me going out and getting gel pens and investing an afternoon in body graffiti's not subtle enough for the keeping on the down-low." Oh god that was such a grin in her voice. "By touch, eh? There's a series of absolutely wretched pick-up lines running through my head having something to do with that - better stop me before I make a fool of myself and try and use any."
"Well, you'd need an accomplice to help you wash up afterwards, but I'm sure I could find someone willing.." Doug grins and begins to lean as well, though much more slowly. Vesper isn't covered in head-to-toe erotic poetry yet, and he doesn't want to knock heads. "Actually morbid curiosity compels me to let you share a few." His lips curl into a sideways smile.
Oh, no. And no getting impaled on her glasses, either - she takes them off and reaches up over her head, putting them up between the top of the couch and the wall, grinning. That hand comes to rest on his chest; the other stays wrapped around his arm. "Well. There's the one says that could only mean we should keep in touch. And then there's 'oh, your story's very touching, but /we're/ not touching quite enough' which is /awful/, but it's almost made up for with the idea of the Bloodhound Gang covering the Rocky Horror Picture show - Janet and Rocky on the Discovery Channel - but that's not a line, it's just weird."
Laughing, Doug groans and shakes his head. "You frighten me, Vesper." He smiles and trails his fingertips up her arm to the top of her shoulder, turning slightly to accommodate the motion. "But in that really good way." The hand at her shoulder lifts and very gently touches the edge of her jaw, sliding up to caress her cheek. Face location confirmed, kissing is a go.
"Oh good," says she, very quietly, head inclining slightly at his touch. And, well. Kissing blindly is a lot easier when the other involved party is looking. And then after a certain point, no one actually needs to be looking - that's when Vesper also lets *her* fingers do the walking. Or the talking, depending. /Nice/ kiss.
