damned_institute | Day 28: Bus 2

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Day 28: Bus 2

The group hadn't made it to the Twin Pines before the nurses started ushering them back to the buses. Sanji didn't believe the small sack dinner he was handed would make up for the meal they would have had at the restaurant, and aside from that he'd still wanted to check the place out. Now he had no way of comparing it to what they served at the asylum and he couldn't help but wonder if the staff had planned it that way.

Somehow in the large crowd of patients and nurses he lost track of his crewmates, something that seemed to be occurring just as often as Usopp warned it would. He had their room numbers now, though. He would find them tonight if not before.

His dinner was eaten quickly and he found it lacking, but he wouldn't complain. What he really needed was a cigarette. Bringing it up on the walk down Main Street earlier had only made him think about it more, and now he was just irritable. He tapped a light broken rhythm on the plastic pane of his window, staring out at the other patients as they were loaded into the buses also.

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"Javert," offered Javert, with a wry twist of his mouth, as he began to unwrap his own meal. Best not to say more than his name; there was no telling who'd recognize it, even without his former title, and he felt inexplicably uncomfortable with the idea that someone would.

"I don't believe any of us knows precisely where we are," he continued, "though general consensus seems to be America." So this fellow was new, then? Or close to it? Hard to tell. "I've no idea where in America, though; I'd never left Europe before I arrived here, so it's all rather unfamiliar to me."

Javert? Javert... the name was familiar. From his bulletin board notes? He couldn't recall immediately, so it probably was not anything too startling--such as, say, being a sword in a human's body. Possibly just one of the many French names he'd taken down, noting how many people of French or Japanese descent seemed to be in this place.

"Europe, hm? I spent a few years living in London," Mark commented, glancing out the window briefly. "I couldn't place our location either, although it would be nice if we were on Earth." The right Earth. Right dimension, right time. All of that business was a headache; first figuring out how they got to this place would probably explain where they actually were. Not that he had any way of determining that either.

Another one like Reynolds, then, judging from the "on Earth" comment. This time, instead of disbelief, Javert only felt a mild curiosity.

"I'm quite certain this is Earth," he responded, smirking slightly despite himself; it felt decidedly odd saying that. "The patients who've been here longer seem to be of the opinion that it is twentieth-century America, and I suppose they know better than I. I take it you aren't from Earth, then? There seem to be a few of you about."

"I'm not so certain," Mark answered frankly. From the sounds of it, this fellow was also displaced in time here, although (if it were really Earth) not by world. "I've been places that looked a lot like this on other worlds. I suppose you could say I'm not from Earth, in the sense that I'm not a native, and I don't live there now. But I spent a good chunk of my life on Earth.

"I picked up a little history while I was there. I'll admit it seems like 20th century Earth to me. Maybe a little earlier or later. I'm not an expert." He glanced up, to the ceiling of the bus. "It's too bad I never took much of an interest in visual astronomy, or I might be able to tell from the position of the stars where we are, Earth or not. Assuming that isn't an illusion too. Considering the circumstances, we can't really be sure of anything based on the environment our captors show us."

Javert's eyebrows drew together. "I must admit the possibility of this not being Earth had never even occurred to me. Has technology truly advanced that much in the past century and a half?"

The idea itself was disturbing in the extreme. Still, he couldn't help but feel more curious than ever before. If such things were possible in the future - now - he'd do well to learn as much about them as he could.

[Not a problem! :D]

"Century and a half?" Mark repeated. He glanced out the window again, at the rustic little town. More advanced than some of the hidey-holes in Vorkosigan District, yet centuries behind the rest of the galaxy or the growing Barrayaran metropolises. "I don't know about your situation, but I'm from well beyond a century and a half after the time period this appears to be. And yes, where I'm from, faking all this wouldn't be difficult at all."

A dome set to simulate daytime and nighttime with the stars all in the right place for an Earth evening in some rural mountainous region, perhaps in America as some had guessed. People brainwashed into odd behaviors. Even the descriptions he'd read of the monsters could be duplicated with enough genetic tinkering...

There was a point. "Say, have you actually seen any of the monsters they say are around at night?"

Not as far ahead as Reynolds and his crew, then - though chances were Mark and Reynolds might not even be from the same universe. Wonderful.

"I'm from 1832; this is all rather new to me." Javert glanced around at the inside of the bus, grimacing slightly. "Though, frankly, I could do without some of these inventions.

"I have seen some monsters - undead cats, a ghost that can summon fire with her bare hands and cuts whatever she touches, a creature with a metal pyramid for a head and a massive sword. There are others; I would show you a list, but I left my journal in my room. I take it you haven't seen any yet?"

A ghost that summons fire and cuts anything she touches? Lasers, maybe? But even placing aside the stories from other patients about their own worlds, it was stretching to say that this place was a creation of technology from his home. That might be possible, yes, but unfortunately he had the feeling that this place was not so primitive as it seemed by quite a degree. Alternate dimensions remained the stuff of holovids back home, yet this place dragged people from such strange times and places...

"1832, hm?" Mark smiled, trying not to seem overly interested. He had a bad habit of intimidating or repelling others when he took on an air of too much interest; he could be a little overly intense. "Did you ever have the chance to travel on a steamship, by chance?"

[Now my turn to apologize @_@; Sorry for wait...]

Javert only smiled briefly at Mark's apparent interest. He didn't particularly mind; answering the question allowed him to take his mind off the bus. Besides, he found the idea that someone could possibly think life in his time intriguing in any way rather amusing.

"Afraid not - they're not particularly prevalent in my time. I have no plans to travel on one when I get back, either; I've no desire to ride something that could blow up under my feet at any second."

Like this bus, he thought, but didn't say that out loud. Mlle. Callahan hadn't thought anything of riding it, and she was - what - twelve, if that? No doubt M. Mark would find it laughable if he expressed his concern.

"That's a pity," Mark answered honestly, "I took an interest in them when I learned about them in a museum in London. They were rather fascinating devices."

Meeting someone from that time was odd, at best. And from France. A man who had arrived from interesting times. "I can't blame you for not wanting to risk unwanted explosions during your travel. They do have a way of ruining a trip." He wondered how well the time-displaced man was taking the rumbling machine they rode on now. Mark knew the risk of explosion was minimal, but to someone who was from Javert's time, the sounds and smells must be intimidating or at least worrisome. Javert's calm expression was a credit to his nerves.

So steamships were in museums by his time? Javert supposed it was only to be expected, but it was somewhat disconcerting all the same.

He chuckled briefly at the other man's comment. "Indeed they do. Frankly, I've no idea how all of you can stand to travel like this on a daily basis. Everyone in the future must be half-deaf or worse."

"By my time, things have been quieted down quite a bit. Most of these engines are noiseless. And scentless, as well." Talking to Javert was fascinating, especially based on his own interest in Earth's nineteenth century. "If you don't mind a personal question... what did you do, back home?"

Considering the timing, it could be any number of interesting things... or perfectly normal things, disrupted by circumstances. He privately thought he'd rather prefer hearing about the latter. Javert might not care to talk about it, of course.

Well. That was an interesting question, and one which brought up all sorts of memories he'd rather not dwell on at the moment. Still, he supposed M. Mark had a right to know.

"I was an inspector," he said at last. "First class." He couldn't help but add the 'first class'; he'd worked his way up to the position and, in his own unpresumptuous way, he was proud of it. "Part of the police force - plainclothes, but police nevertheless. You still have those in the future, I should hope.

"And you?" he added. "What do you do? Or will you do, as the case may be?"

"Right now, I'm a student of economics at a university." The idea of a 'Betan education' wouldn't mean much to his seatmate. "I've also got some investments active on the side. I suppose you'd say I'm a businessman, simply put."

The comment about hoping police still existed brought a nod from Mark, although not exactly a smile. He could appreciate Javert's high rank as an accomplishment, but his own encounters with official law authorities had never been pleasant. At the very best, they tended to show up with the right intentions but too late, and at worst, they were shooting at him. "Yes, we've police as well. They differ from planet to planet, but the Earth police tend to be rather reliably dedicated to their cause of keeping the peace and defending the law." It hadn't been their fault Mark had been on the wrong side of the law most of his time on Earth. At least they weren't like the police on Jackson's Whole...

"Ah." said Javert, who had never received a formal education, nor saw any pressing need to obtain one. "I'm afraid my experience with students is somewhat limited." Presumably, he added mentally, they did some studying in between staging insurrections and getting themselves shot, but if they did, he didn't know about it.

"Reliably dedicated, eh? An improvement from my time, then." He smirked. "Any idea how they manage it? Any advice would be more than welcome."

Well, the university was a fairly new construction at the time, wasn't it? Or at least not so wide-spread as it was in Mark's time, or even a few centuries later on Earth.

"I can only imagine it is due to the time to refine the role, since other worlds in my experience don't do so well," Mark answered, raising his eyebrows. "On the world where I was born, the police essentially function as a way of gathering income through bribes or through bail payments. The law consists of whatever is dictated by those with the most money and assets."

"A good portion of the policemen in my time live in much the same manner," said Javert, a slight edge creeping into his voice for the briefest of moments. "Still, we get along well enough. There are always men willing to turn in their partners in crime in hopes of a softer sentence; I'm sure the same is true in your world.

"Speaking of worlds," he added curiously, "how many are there in your time? I should think quite a few, based on what you've said thus far."

Mark smiled, although not pleasantly. "You misunderstand--their behavior isn't illegal there. There, if someone chose to accuse me of a crime and the police caught me, I would be arrested without question and my actual guilt would not be so much an issue as the amount of credits I carried with me. If I could afford the bail, or could bribe the individual who caught me, I would go free. There's a reason I don't intend to go back to that world." Though he would change it from the outside, slowly...

He took a deep breath. Ranting about injustices on Jackson's Whole would be enough to take up an entire bus trip. "But there are many other worlds. I've only been on a handful; some people never even leave their homeworld. Plenty of planets, but only a few dozen major inhabited ones. All are different, have their own way of living." He paused. "You haven't talked much about where you came from. I know from history that it wasn't a very peaceful time, especially in France, but I'm not an expert. I wouldn't mind knowing more."

Javert frowned at that. "I've heard it said that the police's practice of taking bribes might as well be legal, but I can't imagine a world like that."

He shook his head. "It isn't - wasn't particularly peaceful. It was, of course, infinitely preferable to the revolution some thirty years previous, but the last few weeks have been - were - somewhat difficult for us. Student uprisings, general unrest - the streets weren't safe. A general by the name of Lamarque had just died of tuberculosis - he was a member of the parliament; the poor thought him their champion. Naturally the students chose the days following his funeral to revolt; the last of the barricades fell mere hours before I arrived here." Before he killed himself. No - don't think about that.

"M. Mark, I'm afraid I'm not entirely certain what sort of information you're interested in; if it's to do with politics, you'd be better off reading one of your history books. I'm out on the streets more often than I am inside reading the papers. Was, rather."

On Barrayar, it wouldn't be considered strange for him to be mortally offended at being addressed as "Monsieur" or any other variation that wasn't his proper title; of course, he hadn't introduced himself with his title, and judging from the time Javert came from, introducing himself with a title might have added an uncomfortable extra edge to the conversation. Enough guessing at how to introduce himself in this strange place, he resolved; he was Mark, and the rest of his hard-won name and his title were details that weren't absolutely vital for every person he met to know. Particularly when it seemed more likely to alienate people around here than win them over. Mark had to admit he was a bit of a hard sell based on looks alone, he didn't need to make things harder on himself.

"I suppose I was wondering what your daily life was like. I don't mean to pry into your personal life, but I'm interested in the details that tend to be left out of history books. The individual experience that ordinary people..." Well, maybe he was asking a lot of Javert. Anyone asking Mark for a summary of the daily experience of the average person from any of the worlds where he had lived might have gotten a blank stare or a brief, sarcastic comment. These things weren't recorded well because they were hard to capture. "Never mind, if you don't care to; it's just my personal curiosity."

Javert laughed shortly. "A former inspector is hardly the right man to ask for information about 'ordinary life.' You're likely to get the idea that everyone in Paris is depraved and corrupt and that it's dangerous to even look at someone the wrong way."

He had the impression that his own life had been more varied than most, but to describe it...that was difficult. At the moment, he couldn't come up with anything more descriptive than 'interesting,' and he doubted that would satisfy Mark.

"In a way, I'd imagine life in my time isn't terribly different from anyone's now. People are people, no matter the year - I expect I'd need a more specific question." He smiled slightly. "You must realize it's rather difficult to describe what's normal for me."

Mark smiled back wryly. "Yes, I suppose it's too vague a question. I apologize; if I had known I'd be interviewing someone from that time period, I might have more coherent questions for you."

Though he didn't think an inspector was a poor choice for learning about life. Even if it was the criminal life, he knew from personal experience that criminality was not always the result of depravity or corruption, and that the economic and social climate of a place could sometimes be divined simply by the types of crimes committed there.

"I imagine you're right--human nature in my time, in your time and in this place is probably generally all the same at heart." A few monsters, a few saints, and mostly people somewhere between trying to muddle along.

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Day 28: Bus 2

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