milliways_bar | (no subject)

Entry tags:

autor,
clint barton

(no subject)

The Bells of Saint John are ringing...

A girl with a laptop a somewhat lost expression stumbles into the bar as she searches her pockets, trading the computer from hand to hand as she does. See, the problem with hitching a ride with a 900-year-old alien with two hearts and a time machine is you forget to bring your purse, and there's a definite risk of not having your metro card.

And then her feet hit the uneven wood of the barroom floor.

And then she looks up.

And promptly backs up against the closed door with an expression that's definitely closer to panic.

"No, not again..."

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"Oh, I hope not," Autor rasps, after choking on his tea. "It was instituted after... an incident involving--ulp--some p-people who, um... on top of..."

In the time it takes him to process this, a blush has destroyed his face. "Let's just say that the sentient bar was very, very unhappy."

"... Oh my stars." She replies, blinking, scooping her mug off of the bartop.

Autor drains his tea, pours another cup, and drains that as well.

"The other rules should be fairly obvious," he says, sufficiently steadied. The boy peeks at her. "Did you want to see the Window? Or maybe the library? We have a greenhouse here, too. Oh, and a lake."

"Sounds less like a bar and more like a city." She points out, still slightly skeptical about the whole 'magically appearing bar' thing.

"It's not like any city I've ever seen," the boy says. It would help if he'd seen a city, much less left his home town. "If Milliways is a city, it's one which, if I recall correctly, evolves."

Holding up a finger, he hops off his stool. He gestures to his door. "This is where your cafe should be, right?" he asks, and then crosses to open the door to the grounds. "Is this the outside you left?"

Blink.

Blink.

She raises a hand to object, but can'tn find anything to say about it.

So she buries her face back in her mug, very similarly to when she was dragged into an alien's snogbox. Time machine. Space machine. Whatever.

Autor shuts the door and pads back to the bar. "Bit to take in, huh?" he says softly, cradling his cup in his hands.

She sighs into her mug.

"Fits into my day, actually. At this point, I'm not sure why I'm bothering to be surprised."

Mostly because this is only the second place she's run into where a different place appears every time the door opens.

"No, not again..."

"Oh?" he says, and pours himself some more tea. And orders some chocolate croissants--which he nudges towards her--because why not. "Why's that? From the sound of it, I don't envy you your day."

"Oooh." She takes a croissant because, honestly, if you're offered chocolate croissants, you eat them. It's logical.

"My brain was hacked twice, flew a plane, ended up in an alien snog box, and now I'm stuck in London without my oyster card. And I'm still not sure what is the weirdest part."

Autor blinks at her, and then draws a breath through his nose. "Start from the beginning, again?" he says, and there may be a 'please' in the tone. But probably not. "When you say your brain was 'hacked', what does that mean, exactly? And what's an alien snog box?"

He doesn't even know what snog means.

"Hacked? Hoovered? I don't know, I wasn't... where I was supposed to be. I don't really remember, I just... didn't know where I was." She never saw it happen to other people, just saw the effects of it afterwards - all those people, apparently dead but evidently not on the crashing plane, that was plenty terrifying all by itself.

The kid blinks. "Hoovered?" he says. "If you weren't where you were supposed to be, then where were you? If you don't remember how you got there, how did you get out of it?"

"He said it was a data cloud, that... it was uploading peoples' souls." She replies, musingly, quietly. "He reversed it. Don't know how."

Autor sips his tea. "So he's the alien?"

He logs away 'uploading' to look up later, though he's pretty sure he's not going to find the context she using it in.

"Yeah. Just... showed up at the house. As a monk." No, we're sorry Autor, there's just no way to make that less weird. An alien showed up at her door in a monk's habit. A... very authentic monk's habit. A very authentic, turn-of-the-last-millenia monk's habit.

"Huh," Autor says, blinking, because yes, that's pretty darn weird. "Was he looking for anything in specific or just seeking sanctuary?"

He may or may not be joking.

"He was looking for me." She can't make it less weird, but she really can make it more weird.

Autor was worried about that. 'Anything in specific' was vague enough that it could not have been her, it could have just been something else--but no, of course it's her. Why else would he have hacked her brain and had her view a mass soul-uploading?

His Oswin never mentioned an alien, and nor did turn-of-the-century Oswin--but that means nothing.

The boy picks up a croissant, but doesn't take a bite. "Did he perchance say why?"

"Well, he said it was because I called him first. Only I didn't mean to, I was calling about the wi-fi, and a lady at the shops gave me a number and said it was the best help line ever, so of course I'm going to call it. And instead I end up with an alien monk. ... Though, he stopped being a monk, at some point, more absent-minded professor."

It... really never stops getting more weird.

Autor has to resist the urge to facepalm, and he's not quite sure why. It's a strong urge.

"If you ever manage to find her, I'd recommend a stern talking to," he says dryly. "So you 'called' this monk cum absent-minded professor alien on a... help line?"

Yeah, he has no idea what that last bit is, either.

"Why'd he need you?"

"Dunno. I sent him away, but... then I got lost, the first time. When I knew where I was again, I was in my own bed, and he was outside next to his... he calls it a ship, I call it a snog box, either way, he was sitting out there, guarding me." She firmly believes that she can put in for an award for weirdest day ever. Little does she know, this doesn't even rate top ten.

Autor sets his pastry down. "Guarding you?" he asks slowly. "From what?"

Are you afraid now?
...No.
Well then. You should go sleep! You're alright now, it's safe.

"Getting lost again, I suppose." And, sure enough - as soon as he'd left, she'd been attacked again. At least, she's pretty sure that's what happened. It felt the same afterwards.

Autor shakes his head. "That... makes very little sense," he says. "No wonder you were confused when you arrived here. Well. More so than I normally see, anyway."