milliways_bar | (no subject)

Shannon ~~sans entrance post yay~~ is there, reading over his shoulder. It's rather hard to miss a word underlined thrice.

"Love?"

Christian jumps with shock, nearly knocking over his... glass of milk?? Well, yes.

Turning and seing her, he gets a hold of himself again. "Ah, hallo. Sorry. I've been somwhere else..."

She rolls her eyes. "Obviously."

Since introducing yourself is in vogue, or something: "I'm Shannon, by the way."

"Nice to meet you. I'm Christian."

He looks at her sheepishly, running a hand through his hair.

"And now you're going to tell me that you're a dead shapeshifter from Mars, right?" Hey, it's Milliways. It could happen. And it probably has.

"Neither the one, nor the other, nor the third. I'm simply and boringly human. How about you?"

"Just as boring as you are."

"So where are you from then, back in the real world?"

There is a thoughtful look on his face for a moment, then: "Well, maybe that's not as boring as I thought. If there are so few humans around, that makes us special, doesn't it?"

He smiles a little. "I'm from Paris."

She raises her eyebrows. "If you say so."

"And you're from France? I lived in Saint Tropez for a little while. Sort of."

"How come?"

She shrugs. "A guy.

"I take it you don't have any special reasons for Paris?"

"Oh yes, I had. It was the place to be. Home of the boheme. You know, beauty. Freedom. Truth."... "Love."

"Okay, so you're some kind of artist type, right? Or a hippie. Because no one else takes that kind of stuff seriously."

As far as Shannon's concerned, bohemian means wearing clunky shoes, big necklaces and clothes with weird patterns that don't really match.

Christian has never heard of hippies. But he has heard of artists. And he's proud to be one. In fact, he couldn't imagine anything else to be.

"I'm a writer."

And then, suddenly, he hears what she's been saying. "You don't believe in it, then?"

Well, Shannon definitely believes in beauty, or at least the kind you can achieve with designer clothes and cosmetics. Truth, though? Not so much. And we won't get into love.

"I don't exactly go around campaigning for all that, no."

"So, you have never felt it, have you? You've never been in love?"

[OOC: Mun will go to bed soon. If you don't want to slowtime, you will have to make an exit for Christian has no reason to do so :-)]

"If I have, it really isn't your business. What's with your fixation on love anyway?"

[ooc: I'll slowtime merrily away if you don't mind, because Christian's quite fun to talk to. :)]

Christian has a hard time hiding his frown, being a grown-up and not just go and sulk.

"Well, is thatyour business, then?"

[OOC: That's fine- I enjoy it as well :)]

Lincoln was perfectly fine -- aside from the usual turmoil of anxiety about the possibility of all his friends being cut up and dead while being stuck helpless at the Bat -- until he saw himself talking to a blonde woman he didn't recognize.

Now, Lincoln is staring. The other him-like person isn't dressed the same, and his hair is different, but it's definitely... him-like. He's even doing something with a pen and paper. Lincoln looks down at his own pile of sketches. He's a little bit in shock. Cautiously, he gets up and takes a seat next to the guy. He doesn't say anything yet, though. He's not sure what he can say.

Christian notices someone sitting down next to him, but out of the corner of his eye he glimpses that it's neither a talking parrot nor some blood-sucking fiend and doesn't look closer. He's to busy trying to keep the conversation with blonde woman alive. He's badly out of practice...

Curiosity has killed many things: this time the tragic victim is Lincoln's awkward silence. He peers over at the man's paper and sees the word written on it. LOVE. He clears this throat.

"What's that mean?"

Christian turns but still doesn't really see the man. He seems somehow familiar but he's quite sure he hasn't met him before. But he can see the other looking into his notebook and at least gets the question. "Well, I couldn't think of anything to write about. I thought, love might be a good subject, but it just got in the way. -Excuse me, have we ever met before?"

"No, I mean -- love. I haven't heard that word before." He stops himself. "Well, yes I have. I got told about sex, and there was something about love in there, but sex sounded really awful, so I was wondering if -- love... meant something that I'm not aware of." He points. "You haven't written much else."

He puts his hand out like Sheppard does. "My name is Lincoln Six Echo."

This is a strange night. First this woman tells him, she doesn't believe in his values and then this guy tells him he's never even heard of love... Christian looks at him questioningly. The man looks serious. Christian can't believe it, still. "You haven't heard of love? You're not pulling my leg?" He completely fails to take the hand, but that's just because he's startled, no bad intentions.

"Your leg?" He glances down beneath the table. "What does that have to do with anything?" Metaphors do not abound at the Institute either. "No, I haven't. What is it?"

Lincoln not getting the metaphor calms Christian down. He's not made fun of. And not looked down on. This guy is serious. And innocent, to an unusual vast extent. "I'm sorry, I've been rude. I'm Christian." Now, it's his turn to put his hand out. "Are you... some kind of enchanted animal?"

[OOC: Sorry, bed is calling. Can we slowtime? I'd like to play this!]

There's only so much Lincoln can take of feeling stupid, and he feels stupid when he doesn't know words. "Enchanted" means nothing to him. "Maybe, but I don't think so. Look, does it strike you as funny that we look alike?"

Christian examines his features. Looks. Looks deeper. There's a thoughtful look on his face. It ids not exactly like looking into a mirror. Meeting Lincoln in the streets, he wouldn't have looked twice. The guy's hair is much fairer thean his, he looks older, haggard. Like a fresh mind in a worn body, where Christian is the other way round. Some resemblance, yes. And there is the birthmark on the forehead... That's strange after all. But birthmarks on the forehead are not this special after all... He shrugs. "Must be coincidence. I don'T even have a brother." He smiles in what he hopes to be an understanding way: "Why does it bother you this much?"

He leans close. "Look, where I'm from, nobody looks the same. It just doesn't happen. It's not right, there aren't enough people to look like anybody else. Where did you come from?"

Now, it's Christian's turn to feel stupid. Not enough people...!? Strange.

"I'm from Paris. Well, England, really. But I lived in Paris and mad it my home. -Where are you from?" -He just has to know what kind of place that is...

Lincoln tilts his head. "We sound different." Christian sounds a little bit like Dr. Merrick, but... not. There's something slightly more familiar about his speech, but he can't place it.

"I live in the Institute, which is where you wait to go the Island. But I don't know where it is other than that. You can see cliffs and water from the windows." His expression turns ugly. "The Island is a lie, though."

Christian looks puzzled. The man talks in riddles.

"What is this Island? And if it is a lie, how can this institute be the place where you wait to go there? That make sit a lie, too, doesn't it?"

Brain is still working, at least.

"The Institute exists. I've lived there for the past three years. But the Island doesn't. There's no Island: they kill you instead." Lincoln watches his face. "Paris isn't like that, is it."

Christian has to grin in spite of the serious topic. "No, it is not. It's a wonderful place." The smile fades. "It was."

"Tell me this story, I still don't understand it. Is it... the Earth you are talking abou?"

"It was? What happened to it?" Lincoln straightens, suddenly worried. "There isn't actually a Contamination, is there?

"That's the story. A big awful something wiped out everyone that was alive on the planet, only there were some survivors, and that's us. We get brought back to the Institute where they help us recover and then, if we win the Lottery, we get to go to the Island. But I saw the people who won: they killed them and cut them up." He shakes his head. "I don't know why they would do that if we're supposed to repopulate. They must be lying about something. But if your Paris is gone, that makes things different."

"No, it isn't. It's just... Not the same any more. Not for me, that is. But it's not contaminated. The whole world is not, I would have heard something. Where did it start?"

"Where did it start?" Lincoln never thought about that. "I don't know. We just always knew it had happened." If what he says is true, if there is a living, working world far away from the Institute, then...

Christian's not revealing something, though. "What happened to you?" He had a sneaking suspicion it had to do with that word he'd written down, further cementing Lincoln's intuition that whatever it was, it was something to be avoided.

Christian looks like a deer close to dying from a mortal wound. He feels like this, too, and his attempt not to show it is ridiculous.

"There was this woman. She gave me heaven and hell and then she did the worst thing she could ever do: she died."

He has forgotten that Lincoln doesn't know love and won't understand, probably.

The heaven and hell stuff, Lincoln has no clue about. And if this woman was like McCord's friends on his wall, Christian might be feeling this way just because she had no clothes on. But he can sympathize.

"Jordan might be dead by now," he says quietly. "She won the night before I came here. She's one of my best friends."

Christian doesn't know what to say. The Reaper has affected him only once. He doesn't even want to imagine what it is like to live next door to him...

It's nice of Bar to decide that the time for milk is over now and provides a pitcher of beer and two glasses.

Christian thankfully takes the hint and asks Lincoln: "Would you like a drink?"

Lincoln eyes the beer.

"I didn't too well with that stuff before." And he really doesn't want to face that awful hangover again. Besides, it smells funny. The drinks he had before didn't smell like anything but Stim fruit drinks.

[[OOC: I've got to head out. Slowtime again? I'll be back Sunday night.]]

"Well, go ahead and order what you like. It's on my tab."

He still doesn't know how to pay this stupid tab, but as bar is still patient with him, he doesn't worry too much. But he'd like to write, at least, as she's always coercing him...

[OOC: No problem]