milliways_bar | (no subject)

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They found another one of the Cortexiphan kids this week: Simon Phillips. He wasn't in Olivia's "class"; he took part in the Wooster trials several states over, and was kicked out after his primary skill turned toward mind reading.

Olivia was the first person he'd met in twenty years who could enter his house and not start a cacophony. Two decades of uncontrolled telepathy, with the Cortexiphan in Olivia's body -- how it triggered a barrier to her thoughts, one Simon couldn't cross for whatever reason -- offering him the only relief.

Two decades of living in a cabin in the middle of nowhere, because otherwise, he'd go completely insane from the noise.

Now, she's at a table with a glass of whiskey, studying it with more care than strictly necessary. Her problem, she thinks, has always been finding the so-called "on" switch -- never in turning it off again. Maybe it's time to explore the benefits of both.

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[ooc: I don't mind at all! :D]

The muted whff-whff-whff of said sniffing gets her attention. Olivia looks down -- and smiles, small but warm, at the sight.

"Hey," she murmurs. Making sure not to intrude too much on the dog's space, she offers a hand for investigation. "How're you doing there?"

The dog moves to sniff at her fingers, and then presses his nose up to her palm.

A few moments later, distinctly human footsteps approach, and a weary voice calls out, "Winston."

The dog looks back, but doesn't leave Olivia's side. His apparent companion, holding a mug of coffee and looking just as weary as he sounds, flashes a glance up to her from behind his glasses.

"Sorry."

Olivia gives the dog a brief scratch behind the ears, then removes her hand. "Winston," she says, in the faintly sing-song voice so many people adopt when talking to animals. "Go back to your owner, okay?"

And, dropping back to a normal tone as she addresses the man, "It's all right. He didn't do any harm."

Winston sniffs at her hand for another moment, but then turns back, and treads back over to the man. His companion kneels slightly to meet him, patting his head once with his free hand before reaching into his jacket pocket.

"Didn't mean to let him wander off."

The man pulls his hand out of his pocket again, in a closed fist, and holds it out to the dog. His palm opens to a small, bone-shaped treat, which Winston eats out of his hand.

Apparently, the coffee wasn't his only reason for stopping at the Bar.

Something in the way the man carries himself reminds her of Simon. Not wounded, exactly; overwhelmed, either by external or internal forces. Olivia watches him for a beat as he tends to Winston.

"Does he do that a lot?" she asks.

"Not usually, anymore."

Graham's still watching Winston as he speaks. He scratches the dog behind the ear a couple times, and then stands again.

"Must be more distractions in here."

"I wouldn't be surprised," she murmurs.

After another beat: "I'm Olivia, by the way."

He looks up to her again, though his eyes settle on her glass of whiskey.

"I'm, um - Will Graham."

Automatically, she notes where his gaze lands -- or, rather, doesn't land. Interesting.

(Not wholly unsurprising, either.)

"It's nice to meet you, Mr. Graham," she says, more gentle than not. Indicating the chair across from her, "Would you like somewhere to sit?"

There's no expectation in her tone: just an offer to accept or reject however he likes.

Graham glances down to Winston, who only offers a yawn, and an expectant tail wag.

"Sure," he murmurs. The dog follows him as he walks over to her table, and settles down on the floor next to his chair when he sits.

He chooses his own mug to watch now, but tells her, "You can call me Will."

"Will," she repeats. The slight smile returns. "All right."

Olivia takes a sip of her own drink, glancing back down to Winston.

"I don't think I've seen you around before. Though..." Olivia's expression slants toward wry. "Apparently, I've been away for a while."

Graham also glances down to Winston.

"I don't think I'd stand out much."

"You'd be surprised." Deadpan. "''Regular' seems to get outnumbered by 'strange' a lot here."

"It's... a different palette than I'm used too," he agrees.

"What um, makes you think you've been away for a while?"

"The seasons," she says, lifting her chin to indicate the back door. "I know the outside's meant to be Scotland, and unless it's gone from summer to spring in the span of a few weeks..."

Graham.

"I - don't think enough time passed for me to see that."

"It's possible it hasn't," she agrees. "Even if you've been coming here for a long time by your own world's calendar."

A slight smile.

"If this weren't a fairly stable environment, the time fluctuations would bother me a lot more than they do."

He nods, but stays quiet for a moment.

Then, "Do you have trouble with time... in other environments?"

"Not usually. There are...they're called 'soft spots,' in my world. They're a little bit like here, except when two universes overlap or start to merge back home, they don't form a bar."

(The last is quite dry.)

"They screw with time, space, and physics instead."

Graham watches the edge of the table as she speaks, with no particular reaction to her explanation.

With a small nod, "A bar might be better."

"Less messy, for sure," she says, the dryness persisting.

And then: "Why do you ask?"

"My world doesn't have places where, um - universes merge."

He glances up to her, then back down to the table. "And you sounded like you knew what you were talking about. With time."

Olivia nods.

"I do," she says. "Only in that specific context, though. And I'm sure I don't know everything it's possible to know even within that context."

"One more context than I'd have," he points out, as he lifts his mug.

"One more than a lot of people have," she agrees, wry. "It's probably good you don't have to deal with that."