milliways_bar | (no subject)

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Today was one long string of busts from a little before sunrise to just before the close of the financial markets, then a breather, then two more busts. Ray would say October is starting early except that October already started early, given some of the seismic readings coming out of the Pacific and the number of tourists in Caribbean hotels reporting nightmares and worse. It's really not Ray's day and won't be for some time.

Especially since the last bust was in Chinatown and left a more lingering residue than he would have liked.

"[[Bar, if you would please be so kind, give me anything you can think of that'll distract me from the fact I currently appear to be unable to speak anything but Cantonese,]]" he says. "[[Thank you.]]"

[tinytag: Alyx Vance]

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"[[Sure thing,]]" says Ray, and blinks. "[[I don't even want to know how the Bar's translation field is handling this. I can hear myself speaking the Cantonese, but I'm understanding it in English... anyway. You were saying?]]"

...Alyx has seen and heard some pretty weird things since she got to Milliways, but this'll definitely make her Top 5.

"Um. Maybe I should come back later?"

"[[No, go ahead,]]" Ray says with a sigh. "[[I've had stranger things happen before. It'll pass in a day or so if Egon's brain activity readings are correct. I can answer the questions in writing if you'd rather.]]"

"I'll manage," says Alyx. "Um..."

Ray just tilts his head, eyebrows up in what's meant to be an 'I'm listening- go on' expression. This is, however, Ray. There's more than a little Labrador retriever to the look instead.

What was she going to ask him again? Oh, right.

"Remember those photos you took while we were up on the Observation Deck? When I showed them to Gordon, he said there was a set of buildings missing, and we were wondering if they just never got built in your world or what."

Ray scratches his head a moment, then says, "[[What year is he from? We lost a couple of major buildings in 2001.]]"

Good Lord that's weird to listen to.

"Huh. Well, he came to my time from 2001, so maybe... what time of year did it happen?"

"[[September,]]" Ray says. "[[Dimensional incident. An airplane that had taken off in 1963 and disappeared flew back into normal space on September the eleventh, 2001. Trans-Ocean Flight 66's flight path took it over the southern end of Manhattan, but there were buildings there that hadn't even existed in 1963, and it hit one of them. The instrument disruption it caused knocked air traffic off course for a twenty-five mile radius, and an Eastern Airlines jet on autopilot spun out of control and crashed shortly thereafter, taking out the first building's twin.]]"

"How big of a plane are we talking about?"

Alyx doesn't have a lot of experience with aircraft that isn't alive, trying to kill her, or both.

"[[Trans-Ocean 66 had seating for a hundred and sixty people, but to my knowledge there were only about eighty on board at the time. The Eastern flight was carrying sixty people, but had capacity for close to two hundred.]]"

Alyx lets out a low whistle. "Yeah, that'd do a lot of damage if it hit something."

"[[Hasn't happened since, fortunately,]]" Ray says. "[[Although it sort of reminds me. I picked up a collection of pictures of the city for you, if you're interested.]]"

Edited 2008-09-20 00:06 (UTC)

Her eyes light up. "I'm very interested, thank you."

"[[Here you go.]]" He digs out the data solid from one of his pockets; the advantage to having those plans in the holocomputer is that he can produce similar designs on a recurring basis if need be. "[[There should be explanatory notes with each.]]"

Alyx beams. "Sweet." A beat. "Um, the notes are in English, right?"

"[[Yes, with options for four other languages. New York makes a lot of money selling pictures of itself to people from all over the world.]]"

"Huh. And there's really money in that?"

"[[Quite a bit, if you're a city that's known the world over as a place people want to visit. If they can't get there themselves, pictures and books and postcards are the next best thing. Or if they've visited and want better pictures to remember the place by, they buy these and take 'em home.]]"

Alyx nods. This makes sense; it's what she's doing right now, after all.

"So what do I owe you?"

"[[Nothing. It's a gift,]]" Ray says. "[[I do this kind of thing all the time for people, although usually it's books rather than just pictures.]]"

"Really?" She looks pleasantly surprised. "Well, thank you!"

"[[You're welcome,]]" Ray says with a smile. "[[Any time.]]"

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