This sort of thing must happen every day.

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

It's not the first time Bossuet has wandered into a bar after getting hit on the head. And it's probably not the first time someone has wandered into this bar after getting hit on the head. But here we are.

He had been walking towards the sound of gunfire. The unfamiliarity of that particular experience--or perhaps the still-tender lump on the back of his head--had given everything a dizzy dreamlike feel. Terribly exciting, but a bit nauseating as well. The sort of sensation that can get a person lost in a half-familiar set of streets and alleys, and make a person think it might be wise to step indoors just for a minute. Just to ask directions, just to get out of the July evening heat. Of course most doors were shut. There was a riot on, possibly even a revolution. But this particular door had opened and--right, here we are.

The new arrival is a dusty young man with a dented hat in his hand and a green-and-gold cravat wound around his head. His coat might have been fashionable in Europe of the early 1820s, back when it had its full set of matching buttons. His tricolor cockade, at least, is new and clean: a festive splash of blue-white-red pinned over his heart. Vive la République. And hello?

((OOC - new player, new character! Bossuet/Lesgle is coming in from the beginning of France's July Revolution in 1830; his friends might remember that he fell to friendly fire (...someone dropped something on him from a second-story window, good work) and went missing for a bit at the time.))

((--and I'm out for the night, will try to get back to the threads tomorrow. Back for slow-times but I don't think I can juggle any new threads unless we've talked about it already? Thank you all!))

Comments

[is_the_motion]

"Are you lost?" Bonnie asks, looking up from her marking.

By marking, that means a giant crate of jigsaw puzzles, which she is grading on skill and design.

[ooc: Welcome to the comm :) ]

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

My, what an unconventional costume this person is wearing. But Bossuet isn't exactly a fashion-plate himself.

"Ah...surely not. I can't have gotten far on foot. But I have misplaced a barricade. About so high, paving-stones and barrels? Last seen in the environs of Rue de Richelieu?" He smiles hopefully.

[is_the_motion]

Bonnie considers this for a moment.

"If I was ter tell you that yer in a different world, what would you say?"

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

"...That I've long hoped for it? Has the king been put down, then?" There's not much point in pretending not to be an insurgent, not with the tricolor and the dust of barricades on him. Today it would be the greatest shame in the world to hide one's convictions.

[is_the_motion]

"Ain't quite what I meant." the woman says, wondering if her American accent might be any clue to the gentleman - which even counting the bar's ability to translate should still be audible.

She'd say he wasn't in Kansas any more, but she thinks that may be after his time.

"You ain't in France."

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

His hopeful smile is starting to feel a bit fixed, but he resists the impulse to glance out a window. Playing along with a joke is one thing but he'd rather not look like an utter fool. Not today, not in front of...strangely-dressed possibly-foreign people. "Oh, no? What are we calling it now?"

Kansas is definitely after his time.

[is_the_motion]

"France it out there." Bonnie says. "And will still be when you leave, just as you left it. Here, you are at the end of the universe. If you don't believe me, look out that window."

Beat.

"It's a lot to take in."

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

Fine, then. He looks, a casual glance over his shoulder. He keeps looking.

He think he might be sick. But that's probably the head injury. Joly did say, once, that nausea was a common symptom. And what about hallucination? That was a symptom of head injuries too, wasn't it? Or prolonged unconsciousness, coma, strange dreams...?

"That is...a remarkable sight. Probably best appreciated with a bottle of wine between me and it."

[is_the_motion]

"The first drink is on the house, welcome to Milliways." Bonnie says.

She's more of a beer connoisseur than wine, but she heads over to the bar, leaving her box of jigsaws, and beckoning him to join her.

"What sort of wine?"

[cook_the_rude]

There is a gentleman, wearing fine cloth and a strange cravat in a style Lesgle will never have seen, sitting in a comfortable chair near the fireplace, drinking red wine from a long-stemmed glass that looks elegant, if plain.

"Bonjour, monsieur," he says, politely.

This seems to be a rather up-market bar, as things stand.

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

That's quite the novel take on cravat styling, yes. And quite the nonchalance, considering what's been going on in Paris the last few days. Impressive!

"Monsieur," says Bossuet with a slight bow. "Is the café still serving, or in these revolutionary times are we helping ourselves to the wine cellar?"

((Heh. Do people mostly handwave language-barrier stuff here, I assume?))

[cook_the_rude]

"This café is serving," the gentleman with the strange cravat says. "There's no revolution here. Bizarre though it may sound, this isn't Paris any more."

Pause.

"Which year is it for you? 1832?"


[[OOC: It's generally assumed that the magic of the bar translates for those who don't speak English; but Hannibal Lecter spent part of his youth in France and speaks it like a native.]]

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

"1830." And yes, it does sound bizarre to say that this isn't Paris any more. "Why, has Paris changed its name recently? Even the men of '93 didn't do that."

((Ah, cool, thanks!))

[cook_the_rude]

"No, this is a different place, and a different time," the gentleman says. "This is Milliways, the bar at the end of the universe. Please refer to the serving rats and that observation window showing the end of the world for proof."

The window that the man indicates shows some completely nonsensical display that seems like fireworks dissipating slowly like ink in water, with stars, clouds, rising phoenixes and shattering church windows thrown in.


[[OOC: Find other Milliways muns online on AIM at chatroom 'crackinthewall' for more answers or general socialising.]]

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

Ah. Yes. The observation window, the one that looks like an opium dream. Lesgle swallows down a wave of headachey nausea and tries to keep smiling. "Everyone complains that Parisians think the world ends beyond the faubourgs. I didn't think anyone meant it literally."

Speaking of opium dreams, he wonders whether his medical student friends had dosed him with anything when they were wrapping up his head. It would explain so much.

((Thank you!))

[cook_the_rude]

"The world ends here," the gentleman says. "I do understand that it's hard to grasp on your first visit. Everything will seem rather unreal. Coming back a second time usually convinces people it's real."

Pause.

"Would you like some wine?"

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

"Always. The most reliable support in uncertain times." Or at least, a good start for sorting out the impossible.

[street_sparrow]

Gavroche glances up at the sound of the door, then pauses, taking in the new arrival.

It's Bossuet, all right, but... something's not quite right.

"Welcome to Milliways", he ventures after a moment. "First drink's free."

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

Bossuet doesn't recognize him, not really, but he recognizes the accent without even realizing it. That's the sound of ordinary people. The sort of people who belong in cabarets telling you about free drinks. Real people. "A beautiful policy, that. And I can stretch a first drink very far. But just one for now--you know, really I'm looking for the fighting. I misplaced my barricade."

((Yay for handwavey simultaneous conversations. :D ))

[street_sparrow]

(OOC: grins We call it Millitime and it happens more often than not. :D)

Gavroche isn't expecting instant recognition, in the circumstances. He nods. "The fighting's just outside your door. This is going to sound like a strange question, but what year is it?"

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

Just outside your door sounds ominous. Bossuet freezes for a moment: but as no gendarmes burst into the place to shoot him on the spot or drag everyone to prison, he takes the boy to mean just around the corner. Which is still nearer than he'd thought, since he can't hear any shouts or gunshots or horses--

"Ah. 1830...? Thermidor, of the year thirty-eight?"

[street_sparrow]

"...that explains so much." He smiles ruefully. "My name is Gavroche. You may know an eight-year-old gamin of that name, who hangs around and runs errands...?"

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

He narrows his eyes. Children change considerably from eight to their teens, but Lesgle can make out a resemblance. "Gavroche and I owe one another ten sous. But..."

[street_sparrow]

"Yes, and we never paid each other back", he remembers. "That was me, ten years ago. This place... is special. There are people here from far in the past, and the future, and other worlds altogether."

[tire_moi_mes_bottes]

"You can keep my ten sous a little longer, as I don't have yours." Whatever the boy's joke is, it's surely very clever, but Lesgle's head is pounding and he can't quite catch the humor. "Ah...have you seen Monsieur Joly? The one with the curly hair, usually staring at his tongue in a mirror?"