sunburned | (no subject)

Entry tags:

cities

(no subject)

The city hasn't changed very much, in the time since he was last there. The market still heaves with bodies, the air heavy with spice and incense. He finds himself remembering the scraps of Hindi that he learned when he was here last. He doesn't know the others well, but he tries to keep them in the corner of his eye - particularly Kivrin, who he knows matters to Julie.

"There has to be some way back," he says, to nobody in particular. "To the island, I mean? We cannot be stranded here?"

ooc: gathering post! This is where they get separated, so choose the groups you will, darling ones! :D

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

The further they walk, the more frustrated he becomes. He cannot imagine a life without Julie, in a foreign country, without even a dragon in sight. All of this is so completely without reason, without purpose.

In the crowd, someone's shoulder catches his and John raises his hand in apology.

"Sorry," Kivrin says, instinctively. The man striding through the bazaar hadn't really seen her, and when she ducked out of the way he bumped into John, but it's an easy enough thing to happen--the streets are narrow, crowded, bustling with people and noise. The last is made enough worse by the translator buzzing back to life; recognising the roots of an Indo-European language it seems to be trying desperately to adjust and only succeeds in overlaying utter gibberish in her ears.

(deleted comment)

"I would have liked to do a little more preparation," Kivrin admits, glancing up at him. Preparation like learn something more about Old Delhi than the basics she learned back in school, and program her translator with Hindi. But she's a time traveller, she can fake it, right?

"I have a tendency to stick out everywhere, friend," says Granby, with a wry smile, lifting his left arm, missing his hand. "But I do know what you mean - I think I've rarely felt so goddamned conspicuous, even when I was in uniform."

Instinctively, John wraps his arm around her shoulder, protective in the way that he might be with Julie or Maddie, or even his own sister.

"I speak a little of the native tongue," he says. "Not fluent, but I do."

Kivrin leans into him, almost unconsciously grateful for the reassurance. "My implant will pick it up," she says hesitantly, leaving unspoken the if we're here for very long. None of them know how long this is likely to be.

"Hopefully, we won't be here long enough for it to need to," he says, valiantly fighting to put Julie and Laurence both out of his mind. "the island's capricious at best; it whipped us here, it may well whip us home again."

"Yes," Kivrin says, not at all surprised he'd all but read her thoughts. "Honestly, I don't think at all that it's going to be permanent. Longer than we'd like, maybe, but that's mostly because we didn't have time to pack or leave a note. I expect Pangur will find someone to feed him."

"Julie's pregnant." He says it absently, not entirely sure that it's his news to tell, but it's all that he can think about. It fills his mind entirely. "I refuse to think that I am stuck here without her and Laurence both."

"I know." She'd figured it out, once she stopped being so distracted by the mist and her Oxford and her time lab and started paying attention to her friends' actual lives. "But it seems unlikely somehow, that we're stuck here forever. It's a bit like back home. The drop is stuck, or off-timed, but we'll find it and we'll get back. Or someone else will come for us."

"I dread to think what Laurence'll get up to while I'm not there," says Granby, because thinking about that means he doesn't have to linger on the thought that he might get stuck here. "He's already brought up marriage and she's only been with child for five minutes."

"Mischief. But nothing they can't solve," Kivrin promises. "And we'll have a story to tell them, when we get back. More likely they've missed you already and are trying to rush in to fetch you back."

"If Laurence has done anything other than locked Julie in a room, I'll kill him," says Granby, grimly. "He can come himself, if he likes, but he'd best have taken measures to stop her."

"I'm staying out of it," Kivrin says, quickly and firmly, not feeling entirely qualified to offer suggestions on other people's impending babies. "With any luck we can bring them back a souvenir."

"Souvenirs," says Granby, trying to nod, trying not to take everything so far to heart. "You're right. I must find her something she'll really like. Lauence is far easier to please."

"That's the trouble with contented people," Kivrin laughs. "It's so hard to find things they like more than what they already have. But look, does that look like a bazaar to you, over there? We could go see."

He nodded and then, almost as an after thought, offered her his arm.

"Excuse my manners," he says, giving her a crooked smile. "Laurence would reprimand me for the most horrific sort of scrub."

Kivrin laughs, and takes his arm. "It's all right, I won't tell on you."

"Good," he says, smiling, a faint flush starting under his ever present sunburn. "Because I think that having both of them angry at me would be something like between trapped between a devil and the deep blue sea. They've both got a temper, though Laurence is far more difficult to find."

"I wouldn't wish it on you," Kivrin laughs. "See, it's convenient to have nobody to get upset with me but a greedy cat." It has its downsides, too, but at least guilt isn't one of them.

"I'm used to a dragon who holds me to account," he says, pausing to examine a stall full of jewelled rings far too big for Julie's fingers, far too flashy for Laurence's. "You'd think I'd be used to it by now."

Kivrin leans over to inspect an amber ring, but more out of curiosity than interest. "You would, really. I admit I'm still not used to the idea I don't have to report to anyone. I keep thinking my tutor's going to want udpates on everything."

"My mother sent me to the Corps when I was eight years old," he says, pausing as she looks at the ring. "I've been trying to remember that I do not have to snap to constantly, but training is hell on a man. Though, I imagine, Laurence would have something to say about the quality of my discipline from time to time."

"Eight!" Kivrin looks startled, though it probably isn't that different from being sent off to school like she was. "That seems awfully young."

"My father died and she couldn't afford to keep all of us," he says, no emotion - just a fact to be stated. "It was that or let my sister starve, I suppose."

The longer they're stuck in this horrible, crowded place, the more frustrated Aphrodite becomes. Sure, it's bitchin' to have her godhood back, but what good is it if she can't use it to get home to her Luke? She's got half a mind to make herself invisible to mortals and start causing some trouble just to blow off steam, but Thor would still be able to see her, and strangely, that's enough to give her pause. For the time being, at least.

"What is this, like, some test?" she asks the group at large. "Some stupid task or whatever the island powers want us to figure out and then they'll send us back?"

"Perhaps," says Thor. None of their number blend in with the crowds around them, but Thor, particularly, sticks out like a sore thumb, at least a half head taller than anyone they encounter, if not more. "The island is fond of its tricks."

"Yeah, well, I'd like to send a nice big energy ball right in the face of the island's stupid tricks," Aphrodite huffs in reply, hands going to her hips. "Or at least I would if I knew which direction to throw it." She and Thor are definitely standing out, a couple of blonde deities side by side, but she doesn't particularly care if they're especially noticed. She just wants to find the way home.

Thor laughs, a low rumble in his throat as he takes in the strange sights and sounds. It is a conscious effort to not continue to make it rain, so eager is he to use all the powers once left to him. In the end, he cannot help himself the indulgence. Clouds roll in above the city and rain pours down on the busy streets, leaving a suspiciously dry circle around himself and Aphrodite as they walk. Their path clears a little as people find shelter from the rain, and he shoots Aphrodite a wry smile.

"And I would bring the thunder," he replies in agreement. "But our keepers are a treacherous lot, and I do not trust them to fight fair. Our powers would sooner be turned against us than them."

She knows the rain is Thor's doing, and the fact that they stay untouched by it while everyone around them gets drenched gives Aphrodite a bit of a long-missed thrill, of being in the company of a fellow god, both of them untouchable. She's kind of missed stuff like that, even if she's gotten used to living as a mortal.

"They never fight fair," Aphrodite says, throwing up a hand in a vague gesture at their surroundings. "Look what they're doing to us now. We're stuck in this place with no way of knowing how to get back. It's so not fair."

"Are you truly so eager to return, Aphrodite?" asks Thor, turning to face her with a curious look. He worries about Loki, alone on the Island, but he cannot claim a fondness for Tabula Rasa beyond that reserved for his few friends that have remained over the years.

"To the island? Not really," Aphrodite replies. "I like having my godhood back. But my boyfriend is back there, and he needs me. I have to get back to him." The truth is that she needs him too, just as much as he needs her, but that's not as easily admitted.

"Luke?" says Thor. He has heard Aphrodite speak of him before, but has never met the man himself. He wonders who could have snared the heart of a love goddess. He must be formidable indeed. "That is his name, right?"

"That's him," Aphrodite confirms, her expression softening automatically at the mention of his name. "He's a demigod. Son of Hermes. He hasn't had the easiest life, and the island's been pretty jerky to him lately."

She puts on a flippant little smile, adding in the kind of vain statement anyone she knew back home would expect of her. "Except for how he's got me, of course."

"Hermes," Thor echoes, thoughtful. "I do not know him." He shakes his head, then, stricken with sudden ruefulness. "But I hope he finds peace, soon. The island is not always the most comfortable of prisons."

"Maybe," Wanda said vaguely, trying to tuck her hair under an ornate scarf in an effort to make herself stick out just a bit less. "Though to tell the truth, I'm not seeing a whole lot of island in all of this, aside from the bunch of us being here in the first place. We're not usually left so... adrift when stuff like this happens."

"Why does the island do any of the stuff to us it does?" Aphrodite says with a shrug. "Stranding us here in this city with no explanation seems as likely as anything else. It would be nice if we could get some kind of hint as to what we're supposed to be doing, though."

"No dice, looks like," Wanda conceded with a frown, absently playing with a stray lock of white hair that refused to stay in place. "Maybe there's nothing to be done. All of the disappearances lately... maybe we're just the latest, and this is what comes next."

That idea rang a little hollow to her own ears, admittedly, but it still seemed likely. "Either way, I think priority numero uno should be figuring out a way past those walls that stopped you," she went on, scoffing in annoyance when a small child shoved his way past her in the general bustle.

"For sure," Aphrodite agrees with a nod. "It's harder for me to teleport if I don't know where I'm going, but nothing I tried could get me past them. There's got to be some way out, though."

"It does seem to imply that someone's not done playing with us," Wanda reluctantly admitted, crossing her arms. "We could try going through it? I or the big guy shouldn't have too much trouble, but the locals probably wouldn't be so keen on it."

"Hey, if it gets us out of this place I don't really give a crap what the locals think," Aphrodite says. "Whatever works."

Wanda may not have had a whole lot in common with the love goddess, but at least in this they were of a mind.

"Subtlety be damned, huh? I couldn't agree more. Something to run by the group, maybe?"

"For sure," Aphrodite replies. "Unless someone else has a better idea, I figure we might as well try everything, you know?"

"And try to enjoy the surprise vacation in the process, I guess," Wanda added with a nod, doing her best to swallow both her distaste for the crowded locale and the slow, unnerving realization that she actually wanted to get back to the island.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only