multiversallogs | Fare thee well / Trade in all our words for tea and sympathy

Who: Rachel Conway and THE ENTIRE CITY, if they so choose :|
What: Hanging out at the tea house for tea, conversation, and CR.
Where: The Shrove's Wing.
When: Today, from midday until well into the evening.
Notes: Note the time of day or where your character is sitting if it makes a difference to your thread.
Warnings:Potential for people Rachel knows to get mashed together like Barbies IT'S FUN SHE ENJOYS IT OKAY.

Working the middle shift is a mixed bag. On the one hand, Rachel's day is pretty much shot for anything else; not long enough before her shift for much in the way of adventures, and while her later evening is free it's not like she has a circle of friends or dates or anyone to go out on the town with after.

But the trade-off in being there for this shift is seeing the customer base turn over, from the people doing lunch to the leisurely afternoon lollygaggers, from those arriving for midafternoon tea to the evening dates. A wide range of people, alone or with company, comes and goes over the course of her shift, and she's happy to wait on or hang out with them all.

She can be found manning the tea bar, or sometimes carrying pots, cups, and food to and from tables. Sometimes she even gets to crash at a table or in a booth for a few, or she gets to go upstairs to wait on someone in one of the private rooms. It's a busy day and there are a lot of people to see.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

This is why she's glad she has Raylan as a sounding board; she sensed something was off about all these so-called initiatives but she didn't see what he did, how it could be used for distraction, or for cover. "I hadn't even thought of that. I wonder how we'd find out. If there's even a way to find out. I'm sure they're not making anything obvious, if they are in fact going to all this trouble to divert attention."

"I'm sure they'll expect at least one or two people to do some digging. Just wish I knew where to dig, myself." There was too much going on, and Raylan isn't sure how much it's connected, if at all. Disappearances, anti-crurovore sentiment, the plague and the ants... he hates all this uncertainty, and he hates that there doesn't seem to be anything he can do about it.

"I wish I did too," Rachel replied, thoughtful. She was in the same boat as Raylan, unsure where to start with so many things that needed explaining.

"Did you go to that rally they had recently? I didn't. I didn't want to take part but maybe I should've at least taken a look."

"No, I stayed away too. Seemed like a fast way to get bitten in the neck or arrested, frankly." Neither of which are very appealing prospects. "Didn't go as sour as I was expecting, though."

Rachel raises her eyebrows. "Were you expecting violence? Or things, like, getting out of hand in some other way?"

"Frankly? Yeah. City's current climate, a bunch of people protesting they should be allowed to eat people - didn't think that's go over too well."

Rachel nods, thinking.

"So it could boil over at any time, basically."

"Right. Loaded the gun, now I'm just waiting to see where they point it before they pull the trigger." It could go a variety of ways.

Rachel studies him, wrapping both hands around her cup as it sits on the table. "What are the likely targets?" she asks. "Where do we look--how do we even know what to look for?"

"All good questions," he says, with a sigh. "Don't know enough yet. Point of a diversion is to get us to look away from it, not toward it."

She nods, falling quiet for a few long moments.

"...I feel so lost here, sometimes. Like I don't have even half a clue what's going on around me, or what to do about it. I hate that feeling."

Raylan leans back in his chair. "Know what you mean. I think part of me kept expecting to just get snapped back home again, same way I got snapped here. But it hasn't happened yet." And he's begun to stop expecting it.

She opens her mouth like she's about to say something, but she thinks better of it. She's just not sure saying I don't think it's gonna happen anymore is really going to make anything better.

"Guess it's time I started trying to fix that. If I can."

He smiles, a bit ruefully. "Well, we gotta do something, don't we?" Keep moving or despair.

"Yeah. Yeah, we do." She'll be damned if she lets this place make her despair too much, or give up. "We'll figure it out. Though it'd be nice if we could have five quiet minutes in which to do that."

"Never. Can't go making it too easy, can we?"

"Yeah, no, okay, I guess all the challenge and fun in life would be gone if everything was easy."

There's a pause, and she makes a protesting little face. "But once in a while woukdn't hurt."

He laughs. "No, it surely wouldn't. Guess I'm just done expecting that, these days."

"Yeah," Rachel relented. "I guess that's the difference between being hopeful and being... I dunno. Willfully ridiculous. It'd be nice but you can't go expecting it."

"Seems like. Best we can do is try to get home ourselves." And stick together in the meantime.

"Yeah. And survive in the meantime. Speaking of--remind me. Have you found steady work yet?"

"Yeah - I mean, kind of had to. I got deputized, though." No one was capable of looking at Raylan and making him anything but law enforcement, evidently. "Working for the sheriff of Mog Hill."

Fare thee well / Trade in all our words for tea and sympathy

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I am unsure of the timing, but I think he would have by then. We'll go with it?