multiversallogs | Apollo [open]

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Apollo [open]

Who: Apollo and mysterious guests
What: Exploring the city
Where: The El Train
When: Veerdi (Friday) afternoon
Note: Multiple threads are great! Apollo can be hitting up multiple locations.

After finding a job, Apollo had decided to celebrate by taking himself out to explore the city. He hadn't really taken much time to use the strange train that was used to get around the city, choosing instead to explore nearby areas on foot.

Now that he was actually using the train, he was realizing just how small a scope he'd been seeing.

He was sitting on the train, fiddling with the CiD and looking through recent posts to the network, though he would glance up occasionally to glance around at the other passengers.

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"Love traveling enough to enjoy your time in a place like this?" he asked, a faint smile tugging at his lips. It was such a typical desire of a young person. Wanting to get out and travel, see the world, sow wild oats.

"And for the record," he added, and his eyes trailed over her, lingering in certain areas--somehow, more to point out the obvious than to ogle her--"I figured out that you were a girl already."

"Well, that makes you much smarter than some people I know." She didn't particularly like the way he looked at her. He had the same hungry look that Rogers had...well...best not to remember that incident. But that was the problem with having lived such a long life. There were so many memories in her head and all of them were constantly jostling, like children demanding attention. It was no wonder older vampires were often insane. And why they so frequently chose to go into torpor to regain some lingering traces of coherence.

"I don't mind Baedal so much," she admitted. "It's the people that unsettle me. I suppose I'm used to being surrounded by others with a similar vocabulary, a similar cultural identity. I feel quite out of my element here. I suppose I would feel better if some more people from my world arrived, although not necessarily friends or even acquaintances. Just people who understood what I was talking about when I spoke of a speakeasy or a gin joint."

She glanced at him. "Does that make any sense at all?"

"The words? None," he said cheerfully, flashing her a charming smile. "But in my defense, I don't understand half of the words that come out of you peoples' mouths."

Future people, he thought, used some very strange words.

"But I understand the sentiment. I wish some people would show up from home. I'd guess most people feel that way. No one really likes to be alone, not even people who pretend to enjoy it."

He managed a sympathetic smile, or at least he hoped it looked that way. He wasn't used to the expression.

"You could explain the terms to me, though. What's a speakeasy or jim joint?"

Mina smirked. "A speakeasy is a tavern, of sorts. Thoroughly illegal, considering the recent prohibition of alcohol. A gin joint is a variation on the same theme. Quite exotic and lively. Everyone is terrified that they'll be caught at any moment. Some people go just for that thrill. That sense of a community behaving badly."

She paused a moment, looking thoughtful. "How is it that you speak the King's English so perfectly anyway? Shouldn't you be speaking Greek or something?"

"Must be unusual to be here, then," Apollo ventured to guess. "Alcohol seems to flow pretty freely around here."

A world in which it was prohibited. How strange. He couldn't see how the people wouldn't have rioted against that.

"I don't know what you're talking about. I'm speaking the same as I always did." He looked at her curiously. "Haven't you noticed that? That everyone is understanding each other?"

"I'm beginning to," she said. "At least, they understand each other's words, if not each other's meanings all the time."

Misunderstandings, however, were a relatively normal part of life for Mina. The only questions was whether or not these misunderstandings were intentional. With Apollo, she perceived him to be the type of person who lived relatively on the surface. Which was not to say that he couldn't have depth. She could. But her conversation with him just struck her as fairly shallow and straightforward.

"Well, we should hurry along to your aquarium. I do want to get all of these packages back to the inn before sunrise. Otherwise, I might die of embarrassment." Or exposure to sunlight.

"Well, if you want to get back, don't let me stop you," he offered, sticking his hands into his pockets. Immediately, he pulled them back out. No, not a confident look. He might have lost his power and his status and his comfort, but if he couldn't put on a show of pride--well then, there just wasn't anything left for him to feel good about.

"Of course, I'm glad you're coming along." And that was true enough. Most people around here were annoying to no end, as far as he could tell. Like those men at the temple who had gaped the moment he'd suggested anything other than complete compliance with the religion of their captors.

Anything other than docile submission to the gods who had probably snatched them away.

"There's time yet," Mina said with a smile. "And far be it for me to turn down a gentleman's invitation to an aquarium."

She lofted an eyebrow slightly. "Shall we?"

He politely offered her his elbow. "For the sake of your balance," he clarified. "I hate to see pretty girl go tumbling down."

On the other hand, he would never turn down a tumble with a pretty girl.

"Have you paid a visit to the temples yet?" he asked curiously as he continued to lead her along. "I was asked to visit one recently and I must say, I was thoroughly unhappy with the concept of having to pay tribute to the gods who probably pulled us into this world."

Mina couldn't help but raise another eyebrow. It wasn't very often that anyone called her a pretty girl. She could count on Doyle for the occasional 'doll face' or 'baby cakes' and ever now and then, she would get the odd 'handsome woman' from a casual acquaintance. Pretty, however? Well, that was a rather rare compliment.

She held onto his elbow, following him along the path. "No," she said, "I haven't been yet. I suppose I ought to." She scowled. As a lapsed Anglican with hedonistic and pagan tendencies, she supposed it would be appropriate to visit a polytheistic temple. Still, there was a nagging doubt in the back of her mind about it.

What if they were Fae?

"What's it like?" she asked.

After a moment of thought, he responded "Minimalistic." Unimpressive, bare, undecorated. He could have gone on and on. He was surprised the gods of this world put up with such a half-hearted attempt at worship.

"One large, somewhat empty room. There are spots in the wall, one for each of the gods from what I understand." He rolled his eyes. "Some of the other travelers I was there with threw a fit when I suggested the temple was anything other than grandly impressive."

"I see. That sounds rather..." she paused to search for the word, "practical, I suppose. Although one rarely hears of a temple devoted to more than one god at a time." Did they have those back in ancient Greece? She wasn't entirely sure. She seemed to remember Dr. M saying that she had once been a priestess of Athena. Athena and no other gods. They must have compartmentalized their worship back in those days.

"So who are these gods we're dealing with?"

"There's twelve of them, and only one or two sounded like they'd be any fun at all. I didn't memorize most of their names."

It was true, it had been strange that the temple was devoted to all the gods at once. "I'm not entirely sure who the head god is," he mused. "But he's the one that I'd like to blame for bringing us all into this world."

"You seek someone to blame?" She rolled her eyes, good-naturedly. "Typical male, I think." Typical Kindred too, for that matter. "Then again, I rather like having someone to blame. It means I have someone to aim at when I get a little hot headed." She patted the bulge in her pocket where her pistol was resting.

She smiled slightly, glancing at him. "You're the first god I've ever met so forgive my questions if they seem sophomoric, but why, precisely, would a god, any god, want us at all? Couldn't he or she just snap his or her fingers and conjure up people, if that was what he or she wanted?"

"I hate to admit it when I don't have an answer," he began, "But I guess I don't have an answer."

He really did hate that.

"The gods of this world seem to function differently than the gods I'm familiar with. Their jurisdictions, powers, interaction with the world. Even their expectations, judging from that temple." He ran his fingers through his hair. An annoyed expression crossed his features and for a moment, he looked more like a put-out schoolboy than a deity.

"I don't know if they created this world or just took over or what they need us for."

"Well," Mina said, putting her free hand on his elbow. "It sounds like we have a mystery on our hands." She gave Apollo a fierce, little smile. "If nothing else, it'll certainly be fun trying to unravel it."

She bumped her hip against his. It wasn't particularly ladylike or authoritative, but it felt appropriate in the moment. "Are you up for the challenge?"

He wasn't sure what the hip thing had meant, but it was sort of cute. Strange. There wasn't much else about this woman that he'd really describe as cute. Maybe the laugh. Somehow, he didn't think that she'd appreciate hearing those thoughts.

"I've never backed down from a challenge," he replied.

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Apollo [open]

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