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[hadyougoing]

When Ava stops by the bar for some Friday night raspberry-lemonade-and-vodka, it comes along with a small cardboard box, addressed To: Ava and From: Elle.

Her eyes narrow fractionally, since last time they hadn't exactly parted on the world's greatest terms, and she shakes the box suspiciously before asking Bar for an x-acto knife. One delicate slit in the tape later, and she is prying the thing open to discover a toy London phone booth.

Ava blinks. (The knife disappears.)

And, after a moment, she begins to giggle.

She's not sure she gets the joke, but this thing is kinda cute.

[ooc: open until whenever, y'all. I got a paper to procrastinate on.]

Comments

[stillbecoming]

"...Pencil box?" Just a moment ago Buffy was trying to decide what to order; now she's trying to figure out what Ava is holding. "Dollhouse miniature?"

Bar, understandably confused, produces both.

"Thanks," says Buffy, sighing. "Yes. That's a great dinner. Low-carb."

[hadyougoing]

"Ooh!" Ava says, brightening, and takes herself, her drink, and her phone booth down the Bar to Buffy.

Her face takes on an awww expression.

"Look at the little pillows ..."

[stillbecoming]

Buffy looks at the little pillows. Her face remains unawwwed.

"What's the decoration on the bedspread? Are those --" She lowers her head, squinting. "Are they slices of cheese?"

[hadyougoing]

Ava frowns, eyes widening, and bends to examine the miniature bed.



And, solemnly, takes a swig of her drink.

"Why is it always cheese?"

[stillbecoming]

"Or maybe they're very square apricots."

Buffy is very absorbed in her brainstorming process.

For a few moments more. Then she blinks and looks up. "-- So how've you been?"

[hadyougoing]

"Oh! Uh."

Ava smiles, and hefts her drink. "I am not shabby! I'm kinda bummed the diamonds turned back into nachos, though."

[stillbecoming]

"Oh!" Buffy claps a hand to her mouth. "I forgot to check."

Which reminds her. "I was too busy getting attacked by the paper towel dispenser in the bathroom. Or a -- demon possessing it, I guess. And then --" She's getting more animated. There might be hand waving. "So apparently, exciting news bulletin, there are demons in outer space! Giant slug demons. I'm kind of dreading the third time charm."

"At least we still have nachos?"

[hadyougoing]

Ava doesn't whimper, but she looks as though she might like to.

"There are demons in outer space? They're not just aliens?"

A beat.

"There's a demon in the paper towel dispenser?"

[stillbecoming]

"Oh, not anymore!" Buffy assures her. "It came out."

"And -- I guess they're alien demons. Or demon aliens." She fiddles with the pencil box for a moment, and adds, "But a-apparently they're really rare?" Then, struck by a thought: "Well, I guess I don't know if they're rare. They just don't come to Earth that often. For all I know, once you swing out past Mars you're knee deep in 'em. Or...elbow deep. With the gravity factor being not so much."

It is a disturbing thought. "Maybe I should ask one of the spaceship people around here."

[walking_napalm]

About the time that Ava is shaking that package, Liz is slipping through the Friday night crowd. She's wearing a black skirt, black tights, black flats, and a black sweater with the sleeves pushed up to her elbows; her camera is in one hand, the strap wrapped around her wrist.

She comes up to and leans on the bar, and asks for Polaroid film (she's carrying a digital camera, the heavy black kind with extra lenses and switches and buttons, but there is an old-school Polaroid back through that door that is running out of film).

That's when the giggling starts. Liz glances down a few stools and -- there. The younger woman is familiar, though it takes a moment to place her. Liz internally debates saying anything at all for a long moment, and then she says, "Knock knock joke written on the bottom?"

[hadyougoing]

Ava looks up--

And recognizes her, vaguely, but isn't sure at first whether she's talked to her or just seen her.

Wait ... wait.

Demons!

Ghostlady!

"Hi!" she says.

"Uhhh ..."

She glances to the little toy and starts giggling again.

"No? It's, um-- I think it's an inside joke my friend didn't let me in on."

[walking_napalm]

"It's still funny even though you're not in on the joke?" Liz asks, a little dubiously. She rests her camera on the bar.

[hadyougoing]

Ava smiles wryly.

"Well, she's kind of a weirdo ... I say that with love." A beat. "Mostly."

[walking_napalm]

Liz half-smiles, more with one side of her mouth than the other. "It was Ava, right?"

[hadyougoing]

"Yes!"

Ava looks pleased, and then guilty.

"Uhh ... did it start with R?"

[walking_napalm]

"... Nope," she says, her smile widening a little more. "Liz." She gives a small wave.

[hadyougoing]

Ava gives her an embarrassed grimace.

"Sorry! Hi Liz! I remember I thought you were a cat-burglar but you actually, like. Fight ghosts?"

Go go gadget memory!

[ofthosegoodold]

Applegate is unsure of what could be so amusing about a tiny silence cabinet, but then humans do find their entertainment in the oddest places.

"A bit small to be of much use, isn't it?" he asks, leaning back against the Bar next to Ava.

[hadyougoing]

Ava blinks and looks up.

"--Oh, hey," she says. "Uhh ..."

A small, secretive smile.

"I don't know-- I've got a small plastic friend who could probably make it work."

Despite Mr. Dinosaur's inconveniently long neck and stiff plastic tail.

[ofthosegoodold]

"The wonders of technology." Applegate feels that the industrial revolution has a lot to answer for in terms of the general downswing of creativity in human cruelty, but the phone line to Hell he had installed a while back has proven quite convenient.

Technology has done beautiful things for the waging of mass war, too - it's 1915 and Applegate is loving every second of World War One. (He's decided that's a good name for it. It implies a Two, after all, and Applegate is nothing if not an optimist.) The war has him in a remarkably good mood, which may be why he's currently content to make small talk to no immediately obvious purpose.

Though he still wouldn't have picked just any conversational partner.

"How have you been, Miss Wilson?"

[hadyougoing]

"Oh, you know, I'm hanging out," Ava says cheerfully. "Answering phones in hell, filing in quadruplicate, battling the creepy things that keep crawling into the file room."

She lifts her glass.

"And then home, sweet home. Seriously, I don't know what I'd do without these spiked fruit juice combos." She grins. "How are you?"

[ofthosegoodold]

Applegate reflects briefly on the possibility of putting some damned souls in charge of the paperwork. It does mount up, and demons tend to think that burning it is the way to go, but where are you if you don't keep records? There's certainly no shortage of the ruthlessly efficient in the fiery pits, and the thing about burning for all eternity is that it tends to lose its edge after a millennium or two. Best to shake things up a bit, keep the agony fresh.

"I'm very well indeed," he says. "I've got a war going back home, it's really kicked itself into full gear now. I'm barely having to do a thing these days, mankind has it entirely under control."

[hadyougoing]

"A war?"

That sparks some genuine curiosity. Ava sets the phone booth carefully down on the Bar and glances to him.

"What kind of war?"

[ofthosegoodold]

Applegate's eyes are bright as he answers. The light in them isn't a nice one.

"A world war."

[hadyougoing]

Ava smiles, faintly.

"I used to think those were the worst ones."