Day 38: Lunch

[beloved-less.livejournal.com]

Soubi was beginning to feel the effects of a busy morning on a tired body. To make things worse, they were serving Tacos and Burritos. He could really do some with something a bit softer today. Blander. But it was hardly his biggest concern right now.

Having picked out his lunch, he looked for Ritsuka. He had to apologise, but these things usually ended up in bigger arguments, so, as could be expected, Soubi was a little nervous. Maybe they wouldn't find each other this shift. Maybe he had a little more time?

Soubi sat alone, being sure that his face was set in the expression that sent the girls at College the other way.

[He gots a Sheeny Beeny]

Comments

[bullygeneraleva.livejournal.com]

Oh. Evangeline's face fell. That was kind of anticlimactic. No big showdown, in fact or in the potential future... well, if this robot thing was telling the truth. She kind of hoped it wasn't, even though she'd almost certainly never know either way. An end without a struggle was always boring.

"So what's a Digger?" she asked, now that the potentially more interesting line of questioning had apparently been exhausted. "Professional ruin looters?"

It was a common enough profession in the Old World and she'd already guessed correctly once referring back to the place. Made a better story than if their rivalry had started over drainage ditches or something.

[no-barbarian.livejournal.com]

He ignored her look of disappointment. This wasn't story time, for crying out loud.

That question still made him feel off-kilter, even now that he'd figured out where he was (and wasn't). "Looting is kind of a strong word," he said, looking appropriately hurt. "I mean, it's not like the ancients are using any of the stuff we take, right? Besides, we're performing an essential service to society." It was true enough, and if that essential service wasn't provided for free, well...that was only fair, considering what dangerous work digging was.

[bullygeneraleva.livejournal.com]

"What?" she asked incredulously. "You're a pirate, right? Don't you already take living people's stuff?"

Well, some people had their little lines they didn't want to cross. Maybe he was some history buff and considered messing with the present acceptable but taking relics a necessary evil, or something. People were weird like that.

[no-barbarian.livejournal.com]

"Oh, that's something altogether different," Teisel said with a dismissive wave of the hand. "Robbery's just common sense. They shouldn't show off what they can't defend, am I right? I mean, what do they expect to happen? My family's gotta eat, too." Just a touch of defensiveness came through. It wasn't like Teisel robbed people just for kicks. He enjoyed it, sure, but not in a particularly malicious way.

And, thinking practically, every ruin was a gamble. There might be something valuable inside, or there might be nothing. There was almost always money to be made in a city.

[bullygeneraleva.livejournal.com]

"What, they expect," Evangeline said, "Is that each day will be mostly like the last, with the same pleasures and the same pains. That's how humans live. The common sense of an outcast doesn't apply to them."

She smiled as she spoke; she wasn't admonishing him. Just explaining something she got a lot of misanthropic satisfaction out of explaining.

[no-barbarian.livejournal.com]

Teisel grimaced. The only honest year of his life had been by far the longest. "It is all the same, and it's a lot more pain than anything else, as far as I can tell. I don't know how they can stand it." At least on the outside he hadn't felt trapped.

He grinned back; he was slowly warming up to the little blister. "Huh. All things considered, they really should be thanking us. They're not losing anything they can't get back in a few years, and they get something interesting to tell their grandchildren." One adventure for the price of a bank account and maybe one lousy house plus contents--the bargain of a lifetime.