| From Courtship to Stuffed Bunnies |
| Summary: | Surprise presents and interrupted Awkward Moments and all points inbetween. |
| Date: | 2041.03.11 |
| Related Logs: | Aftershock |
| Players: |
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--[ Recreation Room ]-----------------------[ Deck 9 - Battlestar Cerberus ]--
Post Holocaust Day: #13
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This huge room spans quite a lot of floor space, the support beams crisscrossing at even points throughout the room. The two sides are divided fairly between the Enlisted and Officers with an unseen line more or less running down the center of the room. A couple pool and card tables sit in no-man's land with a series of regular mess tables at the rear of the room, nearest a counter full of minor refreshments like coffee and bags of chips. Magazines and reading material are spread out over the couched seating areas and a few televisions are set-up with a couple of video game systems made available.
-=[ Condition Level: 2 - Danger Close ]=--------------------------------------
<Enter Evandreus to Tisiphone and Marcion sitting on a couch, with a LEGO model of a three-spinner variant of an FTL drive on the back of the couch between them, having some manner of Awkward Conversation.>
"But you do." Tisiphone suddenly skewers Marcion with a very direct look. "And- and there's what's making this all so- so frakked up." The stare suddenly crumbles away, squirming back down to her lumpenmug. "It's like you said. Universe just got a lot smaller. Bedamned if I'm gonna avoid you until the Cylons finish blowing me out of the sky."
"Mess around' implies joking, cavalier attitude." Marcion takes a very deep breath, then takes her hand again, holding it with both of his. "Not interested in joking, or pretending, or kissing just for fun. Want…" he looks down. "Want something that means something." His eyes cannot find hers, this time, and his shoulders seem to be hunching a bit. He's bracing himself for a blow.
What a situation to walk in on. Witness Tisiphone floundering out of an awkward and potentially painful situation with all the grace necessary to make it even more awkward and painful. "I- it- frak, Alex." It won't help anything, but she's looking wretchedly unhappy. "I'm- it's not me that you're looking for, then. I can't. I can/not/. I- frak." She gives up trying to find more spins on the concept of 'no', and pushes up from the couch, sliding her lumpenmug on to the nearby coffee-table with a sharp enough effort that it splashes over the lopsided rim.
Marcion's eyes close, and for a moment his body tenses… blow taken. He stands up, taking the FTL drive in his hands. "Do not understand, but do not have too. I understand that." His eyes search around, and finding no other reason to stick around, he nods and starts towards the door. "Sorry for confrontation. Did not mean to make you uncomfortable."
What a situation, indeed. Legos laying un-played with! The blocks of color attract the Bunnypilot close enough to the point where he realizes that Tisiphone's upset, and any remark along the lines of, 'Hey, legos!' dies on open lips as his eyes slip from Tisiphone to Marcion and back again, "Hey, dudes. What's wrong?" he wonders. "I mean. What -else- is wrong?" he amends. 'Cause, y'know, the world's already ended.
"I'll-" Tisiphone's unhappy gaze follows Marcion's route toward the door. "Frak, I'll- see you around. Whatever." The last defeated bit aimed at herself, rather than the engineer making his escape from the man-wrecking party over yonder. She picks up her lumpenmug and starts carrying it to the sinks with a quick, agitated pace. "Bunny. Hey," is mumbled along the route. It would be nice if she didn't alienate /everyone/ today.
Marcion does not look around, does not even acknowledge Bunny. He just walks out, lost in his thoughts. And when Marcion gets lost in his thoughts, he might not be seen for awhile…
Marcion has left.
Oberlin arrives from the Deck 9.
Oberlin has arrived.
Evandreus gets walked straight past twice, only once with any comment, and he turns to watch the pair of them move off in their various directions, not saying anything for a moment, then, settling on the arm of the sofa. "What happened, Cubits?" he wonders. "I mean… if you want to say. If not, just tell me to shut up," he offers.
Stavrian arrives from the Deck 9.
Stavrian has arrived.
"Frakking witchbitch of a-" Tisiphone is muttering terrible things at her lumpen teamug as she rinsed it out in the sinks at the bevvy counter. She overturns it on a teatowel and turns around, parking her butt against the counter as she stares glumly over at Evandreus. "He's sweet on me, that's all," she mutters. It's fair to guess that's a gross simplification.
Off-duty. As off-duty as one can really get in his situation, Oberlin spins the wheel on the hatch with a lazy motion of his arm to open the door with a jerk, clutching yet another bundle of paperwork and admitting himself along with a puff of smoke. Said puff is emitted from the tip of the lit cigarette propped in his lips. "Ugh." He mutters to himself as he walks inside, for no discernable reason.
Fresh off shift but at least showered and not smelling of his workplace, Stavrian threw on off-duties before coming down to the rec room to seek out tea. With his own mug. Of course. His expression's a bit drawn today, tension wiring its way across his dark brows. At least the voices coming from here are ones he recognizes.
".. Oh!" is the reaction from Evan, after a moment, looking toward the hatch as if he could still find the signs of lovesickness lingering there if he tried. "Well, that's… I mean," he lifts a hand as if gesturing would make the words come faster, his other hand reaching behind him to prop him up there. "He's not a bad-looking fellow," he points out, "But I dunno about his timing. Courtship should probably best take place when we're not facing the exctinction of the species, eh?" He tries to inject a little levity, there. He lifts his gesticulating hand to Stavrian in a wave hello, the levity fading from his features as he sees yet another person with a cloud overhead, one beginning to form over his own, as if the bad humor were contagious.
"He made a model of an FTL drive out of /LEGOs/ to show me," Tisiphone says, despairingly, to Evandreus. "Dude is pooched. Flowers and candlelight when the whole frakking battlestar just needs to get drunk and shag." She picks up the lumpenmug and the quartermaster-issue teatowel and pads back over Evan-wards, trying to muster a crooked smile of her own before his gives up the ghost entirely. "Sorry you had to see it. Frakdamn, what a mess."
"Huh. There's a statement on humanity." Oberlin says half to himself as he takes the cigarette out of his mouth and clamps down on it with his thumb and forefinger. Shameless eavesdropper, this guy. If one looks, an ever-so-slight roll of his eyes back up in his head and a slight smirk indicate cynical amusement more than out-and-out distaste. This done, he keeps walking on in with a slight glance towards Stavrian as Evan's attention indicates his presence.
"I don't know, Evan. Isn't courtship at its core meant to combat the extinction of a species?" Stavrian asks unbidden into the conversation. The fact that he's got no idea who he's talking about hardly seems to bother him. "'Scuse me," to Tisiphone, as he inches past her to the hot water urn on the table. Priorities and all. Only after it's full does he glance over his shoulder to see who the fourth voice is.
Evandreus actually smiles a little at the explanation of the model. "He made that for you? It must have taken days… that's…" a further twitch of a smile at the corner of his mouth, "That's actually kind of sweet, in my book," he lets her know. "And I suspect drunken shagging would just lead to poor feelings, in the end. But— then again— you can call me old-fashioned, but I've always thought that two people ought to be in love before they go to bed with one another." A little pause, a tip of his head to one side, "Or, not to discriminate against polyamorous relationships, groups of three or more people should also be in love before they go to bed with one another," he amends, for fairness' sake. Then, to Jess, lifting his chin to cast his voice over yonder without going so far as to yell out, "Heh. Maybe. But I don't think this is the time or the place to start considering repopulating the species, guy. Who knows whether or not -we're- even going to survive much longer, ya know?"
A faint and not-unpleasant flicker of recognition is given to Oberlin when he speaks, sleet-blue gaze travelling along with him for several steps. Tisiphone's attention moves next to Stavrian. She's seen his tea ritual enough times now that she calls to him, "Y'know, if you-" Hesitation. She bullies onward: "Ever want cardamom tea, I brought a bag of pods aboard with me. Could swap some for something." No wonder she's got no non-regulation-issue clothing except her socks; seems all she brought aboard was yarn and spices. Last and not least, to Evan, with a slightly lowered voice: "It's heartbreakingly sweet. It is. Just- not for me." She pitches her voice for broader conversation, after those words. "Depends what you're going in for, I think. Sacred marriage, Aphrodite crying tears of joy on your matrimonial bed, or a roll in the hay? The problem's when one person's expecting the former, and the other the latter."
The smirk that emerges on Oberlin's face in response is uneven, even rueful. He steps aside to allow Stavrian some space as prepares his tea, taking another puff of his smoke and dragging his feet towards the coffee station, preparing his own drink. He looks about and grabs an ashtray and stubs out the cigarette after setting up the cup and pours himself a serving, lolling his head back over his shoulder at Tisiphone and Evandreus, directing a narrow-eyed nod at both in turn. "This all feels almost normal, somehow."
Stavrian picks up a spoon, drifting it through the hot water until it swirls. "I was just being a smartass." The widower in the room has, whether for better or for worse, nothing to say on the subject of matrimony. His tin's dug out of his pocket, eyes down as he listens to the two of them shuffle through this topic, and his eyes then lift again when Tisiphone mentions other tea. "Yeah, I'll take you up on that. I've got…" He shakes the tin of loose leaves. "Couple of things. Some other things. We can find something to trade."
If there was a vague flaring of his nostrils in a kind of scornful scoff when Aphrodite's tears are mentioned, it's a mild thing. "That's why the Lords gave us mouths, Cubits," Evan begins. "They're not just for oral sex anymore. We can talk to one another ahead of time to make sure these things don't happen. It, well… obviously sucks," he here tosses a flash of dark green eyebeams after the hatch where Marcion disappeared to, "but it sucks a lot less than finding out afterward, doesn't it? He'll be okay, Cubits. Don't worry too much about it. At least you were honest with him. That's always the best course." He looks back to the drinks station, only to let his eyes settle on Oberlin rather than Jess, brows furrowing a little in thought. "You know… I kinda know what you mean," he offers back. "It's like… some days I just want to take a long walk out a short airlock and get things over with… and some days it feels like… yeah… this is just how things are, now."
"We roll with whatever shit's flung our way," Tisiphone says, looking toward Oberlin as she settles on the couch near Evandreus. She doesn't even seem discomfited by the Raptor pilot's proximity, which is passing odd for those who have seen her personal space unexpectedly invaded. "It's what we do- one of the only things we do we should be proud of, at least." She starts drying her lumpen teamug off with meticulous care, fussing with it the way her bunkmate fusses over lint. "What kind of history book will we make if it ends, 'And then they all gave up and shot themselves in the mouth', you know? That's- it's what I tell myself when the airlock starts looking good."
Having put out his smoke, Oberlin firmly affixes his attention upon the steaming cup of coffee, scooping it up in his hand and shrugging in the laziest way he possibly can. "Hm. This already tastes stale." He notes, half to himself before walking away from the drink station, cup in hand. "That's the thing about history books. People have a bad habit of writing whatever they want in them. Personally, I hope someone talks about me owning an assault rifle that was blessed by Zeus himself, that fires lightning bolts and melts Cylons with its very touch." He smiles thinly. "I could stand to be a little taller and a little more buff, too. You're all taking notes here, right? Right?" To Evandreus, in particular, the man gets one word as the smile fades a little. "Yeah. Some days are like that."
Stavrian inches backwards out of the group at the urns, retreating to one of the nearby tables as they talk. He sets down his tea and sits, finger tapping against the side of his tin and shaking loose tea leaves into his water.
Evandreus has a tendency toward melting into peoples' personal space bubbles. Usually people who have personal space issues are just grateful he's not lying on top of them at any given moment. As it stands, he spreads his fingers into a sort of odd formation and, in a turn of fortunes from the other day, uses his altitude on the arm of the sofa to place his fingertips at intervals on Tisiphone's scalp, pressing into the fuzz. "I'm not sure we're going to be writing -any- history books if it ends like that," he points out. "But yah. We can't put on the final act of humankind and not give the play a proper ending," he agrees. "Besides. Cap'n Juggles would kill me if I tried anything like that. She needs me, yo. And I owe her my ass in that seat when she needs it there. I owe her at least that much." Knuckles move, but fingertips don't, as he squidges against Cubits' scalp. "Hah!" he gives one short laugh to Oberlin's scriptura account of himself. "What's your epithet going to be?" he wonders.
Tisiphone's face squirms through a series of odd expressions before settling on something fairly placid and content. Hey. Scalprubs. "I'd like to be tall," she murmurs, volunteering her own. "And I'd like to make Erebus choke on me when it decides to swallow." Her expression goes from placid to heavy-lidded, then suddenly to a wince — there's a fading goose-egg in amongst the dandelion fuzz. She shifts slightly, and the problem is averted. "Then busting out the crown of his head in my ejector seat." Athena would be proud. Or maybe cry.
Rojas arrives from the Deck 9.
Rojas has arrived.
"Oh. Stick with the basics." Oberlin considers Evan's question, first and foremost as he inches towards Evandreus and Tisphone, guzzling his coffee. "Mind you, the Cylons might be the ones writing the books. So I'd just be happy being known as the Demon Oberlin, riding out from the Underworld on the back of the great hound Cerberus, burning Toasters into some kind of nasty, molten component sludge." He squints a bit as he smiles, his teeth flashing. "Being a bedtime story bogeyman would satisfy any delusions of grandeur I could possibly harbor." He pauses a bit, pensively as he glances towards Tisiphone now, his lips pursing. "Actually, yours sounds good. Sounds sufficiently heroic." He turns on a foot to eye Stavrian, taking note of the other man's trajectory and destination for some nefarious purpose.
Stavrian stirs his tea slowly, mantaining the motion of the small whirlpool forming. His eyes come up once, watching the trio for a while in silence. Lips move without actually opening for a second and then stop, courage gathered and then lost to find a place in the dynamic. He looks back at the table, reaching across it to pick up a pen that someone had abandoned earlier, the ball rubbed against his thumb to test for ink. Luck left him a sheet of half-crumpled paper, which he drags closer with his fingertips. When blue eyes go back to the three it's something like the way a person would watch a television progam on mute, his attention focused for a lingering couple moments on the tattoo on Tisiphone's head, highlighted by Evan's noogieing. His foot pulled up onto his ankle to make a shelf for the paper and pen, he looks down at the paper and starts making a few softly curved lines on the crinkled surface. It's not until he looks up a second time to refresh his memory that he notices Oberlin looking at him, and his chin lifts in a reverse nod.
Via means of the hatch, A Wild Rojas Appears! Thick burlap bag hanging on one shoulder while a black cigarette tucks in neatly at the corner of his mouth. The Old Ensign gives a couple of furtive glances at those gathered within, lingering with a slightly raised brow at the sight of scalp rubbery while standing in place like some kind of seasonal gift-giving figure in off duties. "Heads up, Jerks!" Goes the warning call. A hand goes in the bag. Stuff flies. The Ensign grins. To Tisiphone? A stuffed, cuddly llama, with inset button eyes. To Evandreus? Another stuffed toy. A bright white rabbit, all furry and with nylon whiskers. Oberlin and Stavrian get different gifts, although possibly more dangerous when flying through the air. Tightly wrapped packets of Aerilon biscuits, simple wheat concoctions with light smatterings of sugar. Someone's been down in storage!
Evandreus shifts a pinkyfinger away from the lump with a brief murmur of apology for not spotting it earlier, then seems content to listen to the others' tales of glory with a little smile. "I wasn't built for that sort of thing. If Thetis came out of the ocean to offer me the choice, I'd sell off all my glory and my name to go home again and live unsung to the age of Nestor." And then— the daemon appears with his gifts, and the Bunny is assaulted with a bunny, hand distracted from Tisiphone's head in order to catch it with both hands. "Did we win a contest?" he wonders.
"No dying, or the friends we leave behind will kill us," Tisiphone murmurs, returning to the irony of previous sentiment. She tips her head to the side, giving Evandreus's fingers a sort of light bat. "Maybe-" Her attention is snagged away by Rojas's entry as well. Eyes glimmering with puzzled curiousity, she dutiful sits up, leaning forward to catch her Mystery Pressie. "What the-" she mutters, puzzlement narrowing to bemused suspicion. "Who in frak told you I like llamas?" She can't help bark a laugh as she demands answers. Rumours that she's a hairless transsexual? That's one thing. Word getting out that she's fond of llamas? That's just not cool.
"Oh, I wasn't either. But that goes back to what I said. Whoever writes this shit down for posterity doesn't have to know that." Swilling more coffee, he himself finally strolls his way down to an adjacent table, setting it down, along with his paperwork and hooking a chair with his boot which he promptly settles into a few seconds later. He shoots Rojas a smirk as well and proceeds to bust open the paperwork with a vengeance while gifts be a-given.
And that was Oberlin. By the way. RLY.
Shit, there's something flyingathishead. Stavrian's left hand snaps up, catching the package of biscuits before it smacks him in the face. /That/ is self-preservation instinct. He eyes the back of the stranger's head, then Oberlin and his identical 'gift', then back to Rojas. "I could get used to this. Who are you?"
Noooo, pay no attention to the man behind the gifts! That means he has to explain things. He sighs, a roll of the shoulders shuddering their way over as he flops down onto his own, seperate couch. A lighter emerges from a pocket just in time to send grey wisps of smoke upwards. Funny how that works. "No contest. Needed to get stuff out of storage. Like those biscuits. They expire soon. Best eat 'em quick or learn to share." Puff. A single smoke ring attracts his attention as he continues. "You like Llamas?" Ok, that gets his eye to glance Tis-wards for a second. "Frakin' lucky guess on my part. It was that or a dolphin. You don't seem dolphiny." Another smoke ring. And another, then he finally looks at Stavrian with a little fix of the eyes and a smile. "Rojas, Nathan. Spanner, if you want. Ensign if you must. Spend most of my time on the deck with one shoulder engine-deep in a viper and the other arm flailin' wildly at the chief." Aerilon twangs to his voice fade in and out like a child playing with the volume control on a stereo.
Evandreus looks the other bunny in the eye for a moment, as if engaged in some private sort of discussion with the creature, before he hugs it to his chest, evidently having become smitten enough with the beast to do so. Or because it's soft. "There were stuffed animals in storage?" he does wonder, even if his grip on the white fluffy beast indicates he's not displeased with the dispensation.
A llama. Tisiphone turns the small stuffed animal over and over in pale, skinny fingers, her bemusement slowly giving way to faint but genuine smile. It won't occur to her until much later to try and make like she's too cool for stuffed toys. Certain of Nefarious Plans(tm) behind this gift-giving, she says to Rojas, "Daphne told you, didn't she?" Ensign Kolettis, her bunkmate. "She did. I know it." He doesn't even have to answer. She's figured it all out for herself. She slouches back into the cushions, bootheels hooked on the edge of the couch, knees up toward her chest. The llama — /her/ llama — gets perched between her knees.
"I don't think," Stavrian tells Rojas, as he sets the biscuits down on his knee, "That I could imagine you giving a Viper a prostate exam and call you by rank at the same time, Rojas. And I'm shitty at callsigns, so forgive me if I forget 'Spanner' in the next five minutes." The wrapping around the biscuits is poked at. "Thanks, though. These are meant to be /eaten/, right?" Just checking, raising an eyebrow. Aerilonians, man, you never know.
Oberlin's fast but not that fast. He reached forward and the biscuit package bounces off his fingertips and lands flat in his coffee cup with a tiny 'sploosh'. He grins ruefully and picks it out, popping the package open and says, flatly but earnestly, "Thanks." Smirking a bit, he glances over to Rojas as he starts to dip one of them in the coffee. Without the wrapper, this time. "This isn't some sort of hideous violation of custom, is it?"
"Eat 'em, shove 'em up your ass, I couldn't give a damn so long as they get used before they go stale." Rojas waves a dismissive hand towards the biscuits, disrupting a particularly good smoke ring with a grumble as a result. He peers over the side of the couch towards Evan and Tis, raising a brow once more at them both as his chin rests in the crook of an arm. "I keep 'em around the repair yard back home. Well, Picon. Second home. Stuff 'em in a suitcase when I get called up-" Ah, A reservist. "then drop 'em off back on the continent on Aerilon for some of the kids. Considering their ain't much place for them anymore, someone may as well enjoy 'em." He's very matter of fact about the entire thing, really. "And No, Tisiphone. Daphne din't tell me squat. You just got lucky." The sploosh? The sploosh noise just gets a grin. "Shitno. They're good in coffee or tea. Great for dunkin', but don't let 'em linger." He's… incredibly at ease. He was a nervous wreck yesterday. What the balls?
"Aerilonians drink tea. I bet they're tea biscuits," Tisiphone says, all self-assured knowledge. It could just as easily been 'Aquarians eat fish for dessert,' or 'Sagittarans gnaw roots for sustenance.' Rojas's protestations on behalf of Daphne's innocence are considered. Dubiously. She's still not sure she's buying it. But- whatever. Llama! She actually starts to pet it with her fingertips before realizing what she's doing. She clears her throat, and starts rummaging out her own pack of cigarettes instead.
Stavrian obliges. By taking a bite out of a biscuit, not by following Rojas' other suggestion. He tilts the treat back, studying his own teethmarks in it, and then reaches over to dunk it in the tea. Why not. He sticks it back in his mouth, holding it there with his teeth as he picks his pen back up. Table manners, right there.
"Oh, yeah. The list. I heard Gemenese eat their young, and Capricans drink the blood of Gemenese too." Oberlin says, with a slight flippancy, wrinkling his nose rather faintly in Tisiphone's direction. "Virgons, man, we just eat. We were a planet of utter fatasses. Hence my lack of table manners here." He says, taking another dunked bite of the biscuits, as he takes Rojas' advice to heart. Minus the shoving them up his ass bit.
Somewhere in there, lingering over the word 'were,' Oberlin's eyelids flicker a bit, as if he's adjusting to past-tense with some hesitation.
Stavrian lifts his head, squinting at Oberlin. Over the top of the biscuit he's got still stuffed between his teeth. Mainly at the Virgon part; the Gemenon/Caprica interaction didn't seem to faze him one bit. He pulls the biscuit from his mouth, tearing off a bit in the process that's already been nicely pre-softened by tea and saliva, and picks up the other biscuit that was in his gifted pack, tossing it across the table at the intelligence officer. "Here, sir. Consider it a sacrifice to uphold cultural identity."
Oberlin gets a faintly cross look from Tisiphone, as she's called on her blatant stereotype. It's only faintly cross because first, it's a fair criticism and second, well. LLAMA. She lights her own cigarette and lets her head loll back against the couch, blowing smoke out at the ceiling, listening to the conversation and the sound of teabiscuits giving their lives in the name of deliciousness. Stavrian's sacrifice is noted from under drooped lids, and accompanied with a smoky snort.
Rojas' cigarette hops along to the other side of his mouth with the movement of his tongue, mouth breaking into a little grin to let smoke escape from one side. Gifts did the job they were meant to, apparently, so he folds back on the couch, but only after taking a good long look at the two air-wing folks cuddling their respetive toys. "Second weirdest thing I've seen this week." he mutters.
Evandreus has become distracted somewhere along the line, rubbing his cheek against the fluffy white bunnyfur. "That was really sweet. I mean… taking back toys for the kids. We'll take good care of them," he promises with a quiet smile, then, brows rising, he just cuddles on the bunny all the more, waiting for the other shoe to drop.
"You think we're going to be at Condition Two for the rest of our lives?" Tisiphone asks the ceiling, between long, contemplative drags at her cigarette.
"I am not my father's son." Oberlin protests suddenly as he again botches the biscuit catch and it splits in two. One of them falls onto the table's surface and the other 'plops' into his coffee again. SPLOOSH. He says this dryly and with a stranged, detached humor. There's just something about it. It just looks utterly practiced. And hollow. "But what the Hell. Cheers." He lifts the coffee cup, half drunk, in a toast towards Stavrian and chows down before turning his head to one side and giving Tisiphone a completely innocent look. "What?"
Stavrian glances at Evan for some reason after Tisiphone's question. It's just a flicker of blue eyes, that then moves on to the Ensign. "No," he says, drily. "There's always Condition One." He eats the last of his biscuit and brushes off his hands, picking up his tea to wash down the baked bits in his throat. "But as for downshifting, I really don't know. I keep dreading that command's going to go overboard and try to build an amusement park in the fourth hangar bay to 'take people's minds off it'."
"Yes." Nathan's voice hovers over the couch, a thin trail of smoke wisping it's way along in tow. "We will stay at condition two for ever and ever and ever until condition two becomes the new condition three and condition one becomes the new 'HOLYSHIT!'" He yells the last bit just to make sure people are awake, then snickers. "We'll eventually start drinking, anyway."
"Oh, yeah. That'd do it. Totally." Tisiphone aims this sarcasm at Stavrian, a wry grin twisting her mouth around her cigarette. "We can spend money that's not worth the paper it's on, to throw deactivated grenades at milk-powder cans and win…frak, what would we win, anyway? Mother of the gods, I'd shag the XO myself if it meant we could all get drunk."
Evandreus buries nose and mouth against the rabbit, but peeks up over it long enough to catch the tail end of Jess' glance, giving a little chuckle as he twists her question around. "I'd prefer the hottub," he notes, as to the amusement park offer, then tenses up at Nathan's hollering, only laughing a little after the fact. "At some point they're going to have to re-evaluate the threat levels. I don't think we'll ever be as secure as we were before the attacks, but— soon we'll get used to it enough that living in fear for our lives will be par for the course, and they'll stop using it as a reason to keep us at Condition Two. If we're not all dead by then."
"Totally," Stavrian echoes Tisiphone in the same wry tone. As to the amusement park. Or to shagging the XO for a drink, maybe. Who knows. He looks over at Rojas, then Evan, letting his shoulders slouch a bit. "Wouldn't that be something. You know…if you smell something awful, in about five minutes your nerves will adapt to the stench." He sniffs, as if subconsciously supporting this idea. Sorry, Oberlin. "That'll be us. So used to it eventually that Condition Two won't even interrupt someone jerking off anymore."
"GO GIRL. GO." Tis gets a response. Nathan can't really be seen thanks to the angle of his couch, but the finger pointing towards the hatch is pretty obvious. After his snickering has subsided, her whole mention of money draws a sigh. Quite a long one, actually. "Y'know, I've got a card on this boat that accesses an account that has…" He figures out in his head, allowing for interest rates since he left home and the like. "Fourteen point seven million cubits. That's not including net worth in the company." The next thing he says is even quieter, and happens to rhyme with 'Motherquacker'
"Mmm." Munch, crunch, crunch, swill. Oberlin makes short work of his cookie and chases it with the remainder of his coffee, leaning over to steal a napkin from an adjacent table as he rises out of his seat and mops up the slight spillage from the tabletop before flipping open his paperwork. Oh, the irony of bringing work to the playroom. Some people are just /like/ that, though. "There's always condition /zero/." He says, playfully echoing Stavrian. "You don't want to ever see that. Neither do I." The talk of loosening threat levels doesn't really earn any further comment from him. "If I were Command, I'd be on the floor of my cabin drunk, in my socks with a sidearm in my mouth." Well, just that one comment. What /does/ the Admiral do when nobody's around, anyway?
"A card that accesses an account recorded on a fragged server in a charred data-center-" Tisiphone pauses there for another drag on her cigarette. "-in the bottom of a crater." She sounds almost droll. A few seconds later, she straightens her head up, looks at Rojas and asks, "Wait. You're serious? Fifteen million cubits?"
"That's why they've got to re-evaluate the use of it from the top," Evan notes to Jess, leaning back and resting one foot on the arm of the sofa as he slumps against the wall. "Keep the alert levels pertinent, so that people actually pay attention when it's condition two." He rubs the bunny's belly. Scritch-a-scritch-a. "Fourteen point seven— what in the hells and waters were you doing up here?" he has to ask Nathan. Oberlin's vision of command makes his brows quirk upward. "Yikes."
"You try flyin' what we get to fly without a drop of military in you." Rojas explains, as if it's the most obvious thing in the world. "When you're contracted to repair Vipers, you eventually wanna fly one. S'why I happen to be an Ensign at 34. Gods bless the reserves." Rojas Repairs happens to be a big-ass company. Well, was. "Jus' don't ask me too much about the business side of it all. I jus' fixed shit for a living."
Stavrian tilts his head slightly at the mention of all the money that once was, raising an eyebrow. He folds up the paper he'd been idly sketching on, pushing the stolen pen behind his ear.
Marko arrives from the Deck 9.
Marko has arrived.
"Y'know, I can think of a couple people who knew me very well that told me I lived in a horrible world." Oberlin says smoothly as he looks on up at Evandreus. "Everyone else's world just caught up." With a single blink of his eyes, he starts to look down at a piece of paper, already covered with notes as he reaches into his pocket and produces a pen. "Ah. The call of the private sector." He adds with another aside to Rojas. "That's some beer money. That's the problem with it. It was tempting, but never tempting enough. "Also, the Fleet was probably better for me. Aside from that whole 'not dying' thing, when you call your boss a 'useless asshole' in the private sector you don't tend to get thrown in a cell. I like to think being an officer taught me a little bit of humility." He smiles one of those thin smiles.
Tisiphone raises her hand, cigarette held aloft like a cancer-causing torch, at Rojas's comment. "Hey. Me too. I sure as shit didn't come from a military family." A smoky snort at the very though, mouth twisting in wry amusement over it all. She spins her cigarette around in her fingers before bringing it down for a drag, exhaling it over Oberlin's words.
"I've known my fair share of mechanics in this life, dude," Evan peers at Nathan, "And not a one of them had fourteen mil in any account," he points out, just a little suspicious. He turns his head, then, pressing his face into the short sleeve of his N A V Y t-shirt and coughing into it.
Stavrian had scratched something idly on the paper a long time ago, that he now notices again as he starts to stand up. It makes him pause a moment on his feet, thumb pressed into the page's crinkles. His eyes lift and then his head, watching the chatter and stepping around Oberlin's chair. Just after Tisiphone's spoken, he turns his head so his words don't carry far beyond her. "Ensign? I need to…speak with you about something." It's never good when someone wearing scrubs tells you that. "When you're done." A nod to her tea.
"I know, I know." Rojas peers over the couch to grin at Tisiphone. "No room in the military for hermaphrodite albino bloodsuckers, right?" He grins. He's joking. Honest. The cigarette dances on his lips, getting precariously close to burning down to the filter as he turns to shrug at Oberlin. "Quite a lot of it WAS beer money." The accent once more slips away. "I'll probably share once I can get the damn stuff from storage without raising a few brows. S'long as I don't hate you all by then." Aaaaaaand finally, Evan. Spanner just grins, ear to ear with the cigarette clinging on to his bottom lip. "Then they weren't as good as me." He actually winks. "And I am very, very good."
Marko ducks into the rec room with a bottle of water in one hand and a sheaf of notes and folders tucked underneath his arm. "Hey Buns, Money, Spanner." he says, nodding to the other Raptor and Viper jocks. "Lieuteant." he adds for Oberlin's benefit as he finds a place to sit near the others. "How's thing's going?"
Hermaphrodite albino bloodsucker? Tisiphone likes the sound of that, if the wolfish grin suddenly splitting her face is any indication. She bites at the empty air between herself and Rojas, teeth meeting with a sharp click. "Didn't you get the memo?" she says to him. "I had to give up blood-drinking for Flight School." Mock-disdainful snort. The wide grin falters a bit when Stavrian addresses her — first gentling to a curious expression, then cooling further to concern. "Uh, what?" she asks. A glance to Evandreus, sidelong, as if he has answers for her. "Sure? Yeah. What is it?" She grabs her long-dried lumpenmug, sets her stuffed llama into it, then pushes up from the couch to move toward Stavrian.
Evandreus' cheeks are just a little rosy when he comes up from his coughing fit, and his brows rise, both, at Rojas' assertion, paired with the wink as it is. "You weren't the kind of mechanic with the tear-away coveralls and leather banana hammock, were you?" he wonders, looking the guy over speculatively. Tisiphone's sidelong glance is returned in kind, though his reads less, 'do you know why the medic wants to see me' and more 'hermaphrodite, what?'
Stavrian slides his hands into his pockets. His expression's hard to read, as are his blue eyes, as is the not-really-smile he attempts to offer her. His head makes a motion towards the hatch and he turns to head that way himself, passing by the newly-arrived Marko with a nod. "Flasher." Hey, he remembered /that/ callsign.
"Mmm-hmm." Oberlin says, towards nobody in particular. It could be in response to Rojas' statement, or Marko's greeting, although the latter receives a nod. For now, he is engrossed in his paperwork, although peer pressure looks like it's going to start hitting him as the trail of smoke reaches his nostrils. He fumbles in his pocket and produces one of his own, leaning over to the adjacent table again to snag an ashtray, setting it square on his tabletop as he lights on up. His head darts on over to study Stavrian a moment. Just a moment. Finally, he speaks up. "Y'know who moves more cubits than anyone imagines?" He inquires, to no one in particular. "Plumbers. Or so they say." He's using the present tense again. That line of work has probably been supplanted by undertakers. Who knew?
"And I had to give up drinking." Comes Rojas reply to the news that Tis had to stop the bloodsucking. "Period. 'Blah blah blah bourbon is not constructive to level flight' my ass." There's.. probably a call-sign worth story in there somewhere, but alas it's overshadowed by an entirely different one. Lucky him. "No Banana hammock." 'Spanner' almost looks apologetic. "Fixed my first engine before I could write properly. Colonial One? Worked on that, too." He blinks. A thought occurs. "Wonder if it still even exists. I'll be pissed if it doesn't 'cause that was some damn fine work if I say so myself."
"Hemopradites and banana hammocks?" Marko says, taking his eyes off his notes and peering at Tisiphone as if she'd just sprouted a new head. "What kind of conversation did I just wander into?" he asks with a chuckle. "Oh, heya, Doc, my apologies, didn't see you." he adds, nodding to Stavrian.
"I'll- catch up with you guys in a bit." Tisiphone sounds precariously balanced between 'I'm sure he just wants to discuss Pyramid scores' and 'help the medics are coming for my pristine Sagittaran organs'. She stabs out the last of her cigarette as she passes by Oberlin's table, appropriating his ashtray to do so, before following Stavrian out the hatch. "What is it?" can be heard as she rounds the corner, before their voices trail away.
<Here endeth Tisiphone's log. Now recruiting further logs from the Rec Room survivors.>