milliways_bar | (no subject)

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It should be illegal to be this hot. Wilford's been itching to get back to work lately, because a full month and change doing nothing actually gets pretty boring pretty quickly. But staying in the AC or in the pool all day is the only thing he would have done anyway, whether or not he'd gone back to work by now.

Also boring? Tofu, rice, and fruit smoothies. A real meal would be nice for a change.

Still somewhat dripping from the pool, and eternally too lazy to bother with buttoning up his shirt, Wilford finds an out of the way seat near the window. He places his order with a rat, and pulls a little orange bottle from his inventory. He's barely touched the contents, but since he intends to enjoy his dinner, he slams a couple of pills back. Then there's the kind of gross job of pulling rubber bands out of his mouth — and of course, one snaps. After he wads everything up into a napkin and tosses it aside, he pulls out his phone and waits for his dinner to arrive.

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"No, that's alright, thank you, no, um, no, but..." The increasingly uncomfortable and voluble rattle comes from a table or two away as a waitrat tries to give Cecil a refill on his coffee, and Cecil proceeds to rescue his coffee in the best way he knows how, standing on his chair and perching awkwardly on the back to keep the mug well out of rat-kind reach. Cecil is watching the waitrat with a narrow side-eye that doesn't dare to quite edge into outright glaring, but still manages to convey disapproval of Messing With His Coffee.

"Oh, good god, sit down," Wilford says, rolling his eyes.

The crazy was supposed to stay on his side of the door, he thought.

"It wants to water down my coffee." Cecil complains, the scorn against the very idea heavy in his voice, tugging at the vowels. "Masters of us all you're persistent, no!" He continues as the waitrat offers the carafe again.

Wilford looks at the rat. By this time, another has arrived with his burger and an enormous pile of fries.

"Pretty sure he wants to give you more coffee, but what do I know?"

He watches the rats exchange confused squeaks for a few seconds, before deciding that his fries are more interesting. And much to his delight, they aren't super painful to eat!

"It is not made properly." Cecil declares firmly. The rat finally decides to give up on this particular patron, and wanders off. Cecil huffs, but settles back onto his chair, his mug in a protective grip.

"I could be worse. I could have made it."

The one thing Wilford will admit he is not awesome at: making coffee.

He picks up his burger, but before he even manages to take a bite, he realises that's not going to work. Fine. Ugh. He'll cut it up with a knife like some stuffy hipster snob.

"Alas, a fate worse than death." Cecil replies, humor hiding in the dark roll of words, a smile replacing the glower he'd sent the rat off with. Now that his coffee is safe, he's in a much better mood.

Wilford even snorts. He glances back over his shoulder to see if the rats are off complaining to one another somewhere, but they've disappeared. He assumes they're probably complaining anyway.

"What's your deal then? You only drink it if it comes from one farm in Ethiopia?" A thought occurs to him. "Christ, it's not that cat shit coffee, is it?"

Ew.

Cecil wrinkles his nose, raising an eyebrow at the idea.

He doesn't even know where this... Ethopia? E...topia? Elopia? Is supposed to be. Sounds made up.

"Hand hammered while accompanied by rhythmic cursing, of course. I like my coffee like I like my nights - dark, and impossible to sleep through."

This guy could be joking. He could be serious. Wilford doesn't like when he can't tell, so Cecil gets one of his suspicious little squints.

"Yeah? Who are you supposed to be?"

Some weirdo who hand-hammers his coffee, apparently.

The novelty of not being known is just entirely too much fun, and brings a proper grin to Cecil's face.

"Cecil Palmer. I'm a community radio show host." He introduces himself (hee!) and gets up just a little so he can reach out a hand to shake without making it too incredibly awkward.

Yeah, it took a while for Wilford to get used to that novelty too. Now it's kind of a welcome little break.

And because Wilford is (arguably) a professional, he shakes Cecil's hand. "Wilford Warfstache. TV journalist."

Cecil who is definitely (really!) a professional lights up at the introduction.

"That's two tv professionals in just a few days, and a fellow journalist as well, fantastic! Do you mind if I join you?"

"You met my producer?" Wilford asks.

He slides his glass of Coke out of the way to give more room for Cecil to join him.

"If she said anything about me, she's a lying witch."

"A lovely lady named Nichola? If so, yes, I met her, and I can dutifully defend her honor - she didn't breathe a word about you." Cecil offers as he takes a seat, though he certainly understands the grumbling dislike of producers.

Get him going about Station Management, if you have an hour or five to spare.

Wilford cringes dramatically and eats more fries. "Don't let her catch you saying that. She might have to defend her own honour from you."

He lets that hang for a second. "I think she should bought a new samurai sword too."

Do normal people collect samurai swords for the purpose of threatening friends and colleagues?

Eh. Who cares?

"Oh, that's alright, I always have a bowie knife at least." Cecil waves off the supposed concern as if it were nothing more than a warning that he might need an umbrella later in the evening due to threatened rain. "I wasn't a scout for nothing, after all."

"You say that now, but wait until she guts you for missing a deadline."

He may be speaking from experience. A lot of experience.

Eating a burger with a knife and fork is up there with the most ridiculous things Wilford has ever done. But those pills are starting to kick in, so he tries to take a bite like a Normal Human. It still hurts, but it's preferable to looking like an absolute prick.

"Better than Station Management. At least she's only coming for your life." Cecil likes not being eaten and/or having his soul rended to shreds by creatures from the darkest nightmares created by man.

AKA, his bosses.

No, Wilford would agree with that. Being eaten is the worst.

That said, this conversation is unnervingly normal.

"Where are you from?" It's almost an accusation, as much as a question can be accusatory.

"Night Vale, a friendly little desert community." His words pick up the tenor and pacing of radio personality which... let's be honest.

Really isn't that different from his regular-old-every-day personality.

"Where the days are hot, the moon is beautiful, and mysterious lights pass overhead while we all pretend to sleep."

Somehow all of that sounds ominous. Or none of it does.

...

Somehow both.

"Huh."

Wilford didn't know Desert People left the desert. But this guy isn't from his world, surely.

"You, uh. Pissed off any ancient gods lately?"

You're supposed to be polite to Desert People. But maybe when they're not in the desert, they lose all their power? And Wilford has never been one to not poke something with a stick until it bites him.

"Oh no," Cecil smiles, a 'you must be joking neighbor' smile. "Did my chanting in the bloodstone circle this morning. Why?"

He sighs.

"There's something in my teeth, isn't there?"

Wilford has no idea how to continue. He's sitting here, sharing a table with a fucking Desert Person, and that's not something he ever expected to find himself having to navigate.

"No," he says, stuffing his face with fries. "Just wondering."

Well, this is awkward.

Is it? Nah, that's just the normal background levels of existential dread.

"Oh good, sometimes the interns don't tell me, and our latest one has been... well, I suppose eventually he'll have to move on to other things." Cecil hates to discourage anyone's dream of community radio but... he's not sure Chad has the chops.

Why is it that the first person Wilford meets here who makes sense is a Desert Person? That's just not fair.

"You haven't killed him yet?"

Sometimes he should maybe just shut up.

Cecil rears back a bit, the side-eye he had been giving the rats earlier now making a re-appearance.

"Pardon?"

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