Day 50: Cafeteria (Brunch)

[selfrescuer.livejournal.com]

Somehow, after their talk in the chapel, Elaine felt simultaneously more accepting of and more irritated by her future husband. On the one hand, seven years had clearly been good to him. He seemed more sincere and thoughtful than he had been before his disappearance, and he had a more mature (dare she say, handsome?) look to him. On the other hand, there were clearly some things that made even time throw up its hands in vain and say, "To hell with this!" Guybrush was still inexorably prone to disastrous accidents if the story about the Pox of LeChuck was anything to go by, and he was so obviously keeping something important from her that any passing dolt in the Institute would have been able to tell. In the end, that eternal underlying sweetness of his that won out, keeping her from punching him again, at least. That was only by a hairs width, though. Her snugglecakes was going to have to stay on his best behaviour if he knew what was good for him.

She left the Mighty Pirate™ alone for the time being when the announcement of the next shift went off. He would want some time to catch up with Morgan next, presumably. As much as the woman's attitude bothered her, she was a friend of Guybrush's, as she had claimed. Elaine could be strict, but she wasn't the kind of shrewish future wife/past fiancé who would keep her man from seeing his friends. Besides, she needed some more time to catch up on the goings-on of the Institute. Patients filled the building to the brim, now, it seemed; there would be a lot to investigate.

After a few quick trips back and forth to the bulletin and a few new leads to follow up on, the governor gave in to her nurse's persistent nagging and headed to the cafeteria for brunch. After the relatively light fare of the day before, Elaine took advantage of the Institute's admittedly scrumptious offerings and loaded up a full, balanced brunchfast of eggs, sausage links, waffles, and vegetable soup. As expected, the selection of drinks did not offer either root beer or grog. Grog she could live without, at least, she thought while making a face. Eugh. For now, she settled for a tall glass of water.

Elaine settled into a seat in the cafeteria and tucked into her meal. Her eyes didn't stay on her food, though, instead gazing around restlessly; she hadn't seen LeChuck so far this morning, and god forbid he wanted to invite himself to brunch with her if he chose now to show up. A certain horribly unpleasant dinner on Mêlée Island came to mind. She was prepared to either move at the first sign of the dread pirate or signal a random stranger to sit with her before he could.

[For Dean]

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[hes-deadjim.livejournal.com]

McCoy looked up at the voice, a distinct English lilt to it. A female patient was hover nearby, holding a tray and looking down at him, a finger pointed towards the table. The first thing he noticed was her hair, the most vivid red he'd seen in years. She was also quite a handsome woman, he noted next, confident, strong body language and intelligent eyes.

The doctor rose, politely gestured to the empty chair. "'Course not," he said. "I was never one to turn down the company of a beautiful woman."

He waited, then sat down himself. Eating could wait a little longer, and so could keeping an eye out for the others. He could at least rest assured that they hadn't been carried off or vanished like the other patients: he could recognize Jim and Spock anywhere, even in writing, because only Jim could get combine both that flippant air and that command presence and only Spock could be that special brand of unruffled logic on paper. Chekov hadn't checked in, but the ensign could be late. There was still time to check in.

McCoy might have plenty to worry about, namely the whole matter of what this place was and how to get out of here, combined with keeping an eye on the crew, but that didn't mean he had to go completely forgettin' his manners. He'd been raised right, and even being dumped into what could very well be a giant lab experiment wasn't going to make him forget it. He held out his hand across the table.

"Doctor Leonard McCoy."

[mateswithnobody.livejournal.com]

"Oh stop it," Donna chided, waving a hand while looking slightly embarrassed. It was one thing when a kid (who was obviously a kid) complimented her, but for someone who had to be closer to her age, Donna couldn't help but like, yet attempt to brush off anything of the sort.

So she had a seat, possibly blushing and keeping her eyes mostly to her plate while taking looks across at the other man. He was probably a little older than her - few years or more - so she could understand him being better than any "superboy" when it came to compliments. She'd decided that chivalry was dead (at least in this part of the universe), but that the occasional gentleman was flitting about here and there. Nice to know that some could be decent.

Though apparently not decent enough to give her a proper name as they held out a hand.

She stopped her staring contest with her plate long enough to glance over and then grin. "Oh, you're going to have to do better than that one," Donna warned with a chuckle, "Already been 'Kirk and McCoy' before with this friend of mine. Care to be a bit more original?" Of course, that was saying worlds about her and Doctor's own method of taking aliases, but it was usually the Doctor's lack of creativity for that one.

[hes-deadjim.livejournal.com]

The woman was waving off the compliment, but that looked like it might be a blush coming on all the same. She sat down. McCoy thought she might have even looked a little pleased. It was hard to tell for certain, considering that she seemed so interested in her plate suddenly. McCoy caught her shooting glances at him, but unlike Jim, decided not to make a fuss over it.

After a moment, she glanced up and grinned, an expression he thought almost cheeky, then proceeded to tell him he'd have to do better than that. Of all the possible replies he'd expected, being told that his name wasn't all that original, and that he should have tried harder wasn't one of them. His eyebrows shot upwards in surprise.

Kirk's name coming up so easily was also startling. Jim had something of a reputation, and while it wasn't that unusual to find just how far that reputation spread, it was unusual here. No one he'd met so far seemed to recognize them, much less know of the Federation or Starfleet. He'd nearly started to wonder if that was the case, if they were the only ones here from that universe. The five year mission was proving constantly just how large space was and just how little they knew about it in the end. There was nothing so humbling as being shown just how small you were in relation to the rest of the universe. He was just finally settling into the idea (reluctantly) that there were other parallel universes out there. His world, the people he knew and the Federation were either completely different in some places or just didn't exist. It wouldn't be too far off the mark to think that they were only a small part of reality.

Maybe Vulcans had gotten comfortable with that idea long ago, but McCoy was all human and although he was a scientist, he could still feel a moment's awe and uneasiness at the scale of it.

It was one thing to get mistaken for another McCoy. He wasn't the only one out there in the galaxy, much less other realities. Kirk was a rarer name, but it wasn't too hard to believe that there were others out there too. He wasn't so sure that was the case. She seemed to recognize his name. He might have been inclined to believe she was mistaking him for someone else, but mentioning them both together? Jim had already made quite the name for himself as it were, and he'd come up with a few procedures himself. That was on top of numerous research papers and journals. Their names were getting out there, along with the rest of the crew. Running into someone who knew them wasn't out of the question.

So what's all this about her having 'been' us with a friend? he wondered.

The doctor looked at her, puzzled. "Afraid I'm not following you, " McCoy said. "That is my name." He gave a smile as he added. "And here I thought it a mighty fine name too."

The McCoy line went far back as it were. There was some pride to carrying that name and he wasn't too shy to say so.

[mateswithnobody.livejournal.com]

Well really, if you thought about it, it wasn't all that uncommon a name. Donna didn't know by how much, but still... there were probably a few Leonard McCoys in the world. Maybe a handful of those were doctors too. Same could have been said for when she met Bruce Wayne, though he'd been a good enough sport to say that his parents had been uncreative. Here she'd apparently just confused the poor guy.

"Oh..." was all she said at first, but once she realized how rude that was, she attempted a bit more, "I guess a name like that wouldn't be too terribly impossible... sorry for making it sound that way. See, lots of people here use aliases," John Smith, for example, "I have before now, and that's been one of them so yeah... didn't mean to sound rude." Well she had, but only because she'd thought someone was again trying to give her a false name. She only played that game here if it was in teasing. "I'm Donna. Donna Noble."

[hes-deadjim.livejournal.com]

"No harm done," he replied. "Pleasure's all mine." McCoy wasn't too sure what to make of it. She'd brought up his name and Jim's in the same sentence, seemed to think he was joking initially. A mistaken identity seemed like a long shot. The explanation she just gave could make sense. It was reasonable enough on it's own. However, it didn't quite fit with her earlier disbelief either. It had to be one hell of a coincidence for her and her friend to use both "Kirk" and "McCoy".

Miss Noble's reaction regarding his name name was curious enough to get his attention but he also wasn't Spock. He wasn't about to forego a normal conversation to start in with an interrogation. Bad enough he'd embarrassed her already.

"I guess I'm not one of them. I'm too attached to it to go changing it now," The institute had apparently assigned names to everyone, but that didn't mean he planned on going around and using it. As a member of Starfleet and a doctor, he didn't think he had anything to hide, even when the Enterprise wracked up plenty of enemies. Donna on the other hand...

Why had she felt the need to use an alias? Was it habit with her, maybe a necessity, or just something on a whim once or twice? It made him wonder just what her line of work was. For all he knew, Donna wasn't even her real name. Shame if it wasn't, the name had a certain ring to it. "Small world then. Have we met before?"

It was worth asking. He didn't think they had directly, or at least, he'd never heard of her even offhandedly. He didn't remember her face or that hair, and she didn't seem to recognize him.

[mateswithnobody.livejournal.com]

Oh good, he was understanding. Which, Donna suddenly realized, was because she'd either made little sense to him, or had given him a reason to think her suspicious. Really, with how much she might've not trusted a person who said they ran around using different names... better try to undo the damage at least.

"That probably sounded shady, didn't it?" she said sheepishly, "It's not that I like using other names though. Or having them given to me," she grumbled, glancing off at a nurse because that was the closest of the staff, "Just that my friend doesn't like people knowing who he is. Can't say I understand why, but once he's given some name off it'd look stupid not to just go along with it." She waved a hand and sighed. That spaceman...

Small though Donna knew the world (i.e.: Earth) to be, she didn't think she'd have forgotten someone who gave that name. But she did tile her head across at the man, studying him with a quizzical expression. "You know what, you do look a bit familiar," she said with a point of the index finger towards his face, "but I don't have the slightest idea as to why that would be. Not because you're a Doctor, certainly..." with the one she knew, that was enough. And she'd be in trouble if the Doctor ever proved to have some evil twin running about. Or maybe he was the evil one. Mental one, no doubt.

[hes-deadjim.livejournal.com]

"A little," he had to admit. Donna didn't look like the type, but looks could be deceiving. Of course, you didn't go outright admitting that you used
aliases either. It didn't do much for credibility if you were going to be looking to deny anything later. She was (probably) telling the truth about her opinion on the matter. He didn't care for them all that much himself. You tended to use aliases when you something to hide or at least, your identity was dangerous for whatever reason. He'd always found them more trouble than they were worth, preferred sticking with his own unless it really was unavoidable. It sounded like it wasn't necessarily that Miss Noble's name was problematic, just that this companion of hers was.

Donna considered him for a moment, then pointed at him. "Must be one of those faces," McCoy said. He hadn't had people react to him like she had, but for now, it was the only explanation.

The doctor took a bite. The way she'd said 'Doctor', it was almost as if there was something more to it. Being a doctor tended to give you chance to meet all sorts of people, but it didn't sound like that was what she was talking about. It was almost as if there was something especially significant in the way she'd said it.

Well, no use in dwelling on it at the moment. She honestly didn't seem to put a finger on it just yet. It was obvious they hadn't met before, so McCoy moved on. "So I take it this friend of yours gets you in a lot of trouble."