multiversallogs | It's like paradise, spread out with a butter knife

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It's like paradise, spread out with a butter knife :: [OPEN]

Who: EVERYONE
What: Réjean has decided that more people ought to celebrate and help raise a bit of dosh for one of his favourite bars. See: flyer.
Where: The Apache.
When: Misdi night and into the wee hours of the morning.
Warnings: Discussion of Pickman's manky feet.

The Apache is much the same as it always is: dimly lit, with the jukebox playing in the background, and the bartender serving whatever's on tap. Tonight, the bar is packed with people from all across the city, different cantons and cohorts, all out to celebrate surviving the fungal plague. Patrons are encouraged to buy tickets for a door prize with the proceeds going to repair the damage tunnelling ants made to the cellar.

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"Mr. Nigma." And there's Jim, sketching out a salute with two fingers and a good-natured smile. "It's nice to see you out and about. Glad you survived the ants all right."

Eddie lifts his free hand to mimic the salute, and grins. He'd wondered what became of the guy. He seemed to have his act together, but with fungus, who knows? "Hello! Likewise! You're not doing to badly in the aftermath, I see. Enjoying yourself?"

"I'm all right, thanks. I didn't get up to all that much after we talked. Got on a horse, fought off some ants while another guy knocked down an ant hive, dragged him out of the rubble, rode away to a temple." He shrugs, like this is no big thing.

"And yeah. It's nice, getting everyone together. Survival's always a good thing to celebrate."

Eddie laughs. Sounds like an adventure! And he didn't have to go out there and subject himself to it. All the better!

He sips his drink, and cants his head slightly. "Now that it's all settling back to normal... until the next thing, anyway... do you have plans, now?" Eddie suspects what the fellow's just described is business as usual. He'll probably get himself into some interesting trouble or another.

"Plans? Well, my number-one plan is getting back to my ship. I know they tell me that's not possible." He takes a drink of his beer, the unspoken but obvious I don't believe that hanging in the air between them.

"Beyond that, I don't know... Find work and somewhere to live, I guess, in the meantime. So, hey." He smiles. "You said 'until the next thing', like this kind of thing happens a lot here. Does it?"

"Escape is a very good plan, especially when they say it's impossible. As an added bonus, if you let enough people know that's what you're going for, if you get eaten by something and vanish without a trace, they'll think you succeeded." He does not mean this to be discouraging, but he smirks. "A pattern is establishing itself, yes."

"Yeah, well. It wouldn't be the first time I tried something I was told was either impossible or not the best idea." Jim Kirk apparently doesn't know the meaning of the word discouraging.

"So this has happened before?"

"I already told you about last time. Or did you forget, in all the excitement?" He keeps his tone and expression pleasant, but takes another drink to keep from becoming less so. It is important to play nice.

Jim thinks a moment. "Yes," he admits. "I must have. I apologize. It was a busy day and I think I'm still having a hard time wrapping my head around everything that's gone on."

He smirks, and waves his hand, dismissively. "Oh, at least you'll admit it. I suppose I shouldn't fault you for that." But he totally will. Time to talk about things other than escape plans and the state of the city.

"So, you have a ship. How awesome is it?"

"Very," Jim says at once, his pride and admiration clear. "She's the Federation's flagship. I've had her just a few months."

Pause. And maybe his bright smile loses just a hint of its warmth. "I hope I get back to her."

Now that is impressive. Eddie nods, thoughtfully. He can relate to wanting to get back to that sort of accomplishment and source of pride, and it's not anywhere close enough to his own areas of expertise to be threatening to his own ego. So, Jim now has his sympathy.

"I understand," he says. "But, it's a good challenge."

"It is," Jim agrees. The man doesn't know how to back down from a challenge, even if it's one he wishes he wasn't facing. He'll take this one on, too. He'll get back to his ship somehow, back to those challenges.

He nods again, grinning now. "But, since you do have a Federation flag ship, that obligates you to telling a story about the most interesting place you've gone, so far. The most interesting that you are willing to tell, anyway." Pretty please?

Jim hums, thoughtful, turning so he's half-leaning against the bar. "I--" he starts. And stops. And frowns a moment before breaking into a sheepish smile.

"It may not wind up being the most interesting place to anyone but me. I wish I had a lot of amazing stories of amazing places but I've had my ship just a couple of months. Right before I became captain, though, I was briefly marooned on a planet named Delta Vega."

He sips from his beer, warming up to the tale. "I was pitched off the ship for mutiny--which was an unfair charge, by the way. It was maybe insubordination. Ejecting me from the ship was uncalled for. Anyway. It was this cold, frozen, pretty inhospitable place, but there was a Starfleet outpost there. I got chased by a monster, who was eaten by a bigger monster, which then chased me. Into a cave. Where it was run off by the future version of the first office who had kicked me off my ship in the first place."

He shrugs. Crazy story, right? "He did this-- this thing--" Jim gestures at his face-- "I could see into his mind, relive his memories. Turns out he came from the future and altered the past. Oh, and the bastard that threw me off my ship? My lifelong friend, apparently. Who knew? Well, besides the future one.

It's weird, but... I learned a lot about myself, that day. In a frozen cave, with a Vulcan from the future."

Because he's been hauled off here, Eddie's receptive to the story, unusual as it is. He listens, fascinated. "Huh," is his initial reply.

"What I find the most interesting is that you preface telling me a story about going to another planet, getting chased by a space monster and then another space monster, met and psychically shared memories with the alternate-future version of a friend you didn't know you had as only interesting to you." He grins. "That's amazing. Trapping you here is a crime. I am not even joking around."

Jim's learning good grace these days, and he manages to summon enough of it to shake his head and smile, a polite deferral. "I guess I didn't want to assume the personal revelation would... translate well? Or be meaningful to anyone else. But thank you."

Eddie notices the deferral, and thinks that's amusing. He smirks. "Well, you have space monsters in it," he points out, helpfully. "I, personally, have never been attacked by space monsters, and if we conducted a poll of the people in this room..."

"All right," he allows, "I guess that's interesting. I'm still used to home, I forget not everybody gets chased by space monsters or has a chance to on a regular basis."

His easy smile is back, but it's slightly dimmed; he brought up home and now, once again, he can think of nothing but. He wants to get back, his drive as much a reflection as his newfound sense of duty as it is his longing.

Oh god, no, are we going to be homesick now? Is that what's going on? God damn it. "You're fun," he says, encouragingly. So... keep being fun, got it? "If I can be of any assistance with your efforts, please let me know."

Now that helps. He's been worried, you see, about not being fun anymore. Now that he's Captain and has responsibilities sometimes he feels like he has to be careful and not fun.

"Thanks. I appreciate that. I'll let you know."

He seemed like the sort of guy who would appreciate being fun. But then again, Eddie wants to be the sort of guy who seems like fun, and if Eddie wants to be something, that's what makes the most sense for other people, too, obviously.

"Of course! I'm very interested in what skills prove necessary to any hypothetical return to your ship. Hopefully it does not involve fighting eel-monsters, which is about the best lead we've been presented with, thus far."

"There may be some fighting involved," Jim admits. Seems there always is, isn't there? "Eel-monsters, though?"

Why is it always monsters? Why can't it be something cute, fuzzy, and passive?

Eddie mimes an eel monster with his free hand, sock-puppet style. Raaar, see? Eel-monsters!

"This is what I have been told," he says, gravely.

"Oh." Huh.

"I've never fought eel-monsters before. I went up against these, uh, chasing-monsters--" and here he mimics the movement, arms swinging, "--and that one monster with the-- he had--"

Jim raises a hand, his wrist in front of his mouth, and he opens and closes his hand, fingers outstretched, to try to demonstrate a monster with a huge gaping mouth. "--like that."

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