Out For A Jog
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Date: 10/17/2018 |
Downtown - International Riverfront
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Cast: | |
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Jogging is good exercise, but jogging in a city like Detroit takes extra precautions... or perhaps Aster is just paranoid. To avoid catching attention, she wears full-length jeans and a light sweater under her usual coat. It's unlikely to be comfortable to carry that much extra heat and weight during such exercise, but Aster's almost never seen without it. One earphone hooks around and into her ear, while the other hangs free, keeping an ear on the environment rather than purely her music. An the environment in question: the Riverfront in the afternoon. A couple of months ago, this would have been a definite daylight hour, but the sky already burns orange with sunset. Arthur is getting pizza for the interns again. But they got his order wrong, so he sits in the park, across from Belle Isle pizza, with a personal Detroit style pizza in his lap. Aster's well bundled up outfit saves him from undue stress when he sees her jogging. As a greeting, he lifts an arm and waves in an exaggerated way, to make him more likely to be seen. Aster's gaze at first slides off Arthur without recognition, but when he waves, the sunset shines off his head to get her attention. She blinks, but it turns into a smile. She waves an arm and slows her steps, until she comes to a halt in front of him. "Arthur! Hey." She glances up and down him and across to the pizza place. "Stocking up for the interns again?" Arthur takes a bite, setting down his slice, and nods. "Right. Only two months to go to exams, so pressure is starting t mount on them. I'm treating them. Getting in some exercise?" Aster sits down on the bench, keeping a comfortable but companionable blend of distance. "Don't miss that... though I maybe should get back into that myself. No offence to Wayne State, but I'd probably try for some distance-ed back at MIT if they'd have me." She bobs her head, pulling her one earphone out. "My survival skills are 'run' and 'hide', and I need to keep 'em sharp." Arthur laughs. "Caltech and MIT are overpriced," he says without a moment's hesitation. "I did undergrad at Harvey Mudd, and then my Master's and PhD at Claremont Graduate. Education just as good, and everyone in the field knows it." The survival skills comment makes him wince. "The bad part is Iknow you're not joking." Aster's breath still comes heavily for another moment or two, but her heart rate steadily gets back to normal. Eh, she can just run for another few minutes after her usual end. "Overpriced if you don't get scholarships like mine," she says. "Though, uh. I may have deferred a bit too long by now, given what they'd probably call a psychotic break. Harvey Mudd and Claremont, huh? A California boy?" She shakes her head. "Not joking even a little. Should probably work on having at least some DPS too, since I can't dodgetank forever." Arthur finishes off a slice. "Scholarships, nice. Some of my graduate work was funded by the firm. Y ou know, after I read the Book of AEther." Nodding. "Spent half my life in California, Living in Detroit, and my phone has a DC area code. Isn't it the way?" Another pause. "I'd think MIT of all schools would be pretty understanding of mental health issues." Aster hmms, looking away. Both hands fidget, which she justifies as fixing her ponytail. "Special circumstances, I'd think. Since the psychotic break in question was of the 'ignore all course work for the sake of trying to break free of the illusion that is the world'. We call it Awakening; they call it obsessive delusion, you know? And that's nice of the firm. Your guys would be the most invested in members' regular education, huh?" Arthur shakes his head. "I think I know what you're talking about. More or less. Fortunately I was able to channel my newly awakened talents into my work. And got a good job in the deal. And yeah. I'd say a large majority of our members have advanced degrees. Though we call the ones who don't Doctor anyway." Aster aws. "I'm surprised. I'd have thought the title would be too much a point of pride for them to share it out with people who don't have doctorates, you know?" She rubs her chin. "You know, I mostly hear about your people in physics and engineering, with a bit of chemistry. Do you have many people in softer sciences like psychology, sociology, statistics?" Arthur smiles, and shrugs. "It is, Some people look down on the ones who haven't.. earned it." He emphasizes the word earned. "We have all sorts. Biologists. Geologists. Psychologists. How varied is your gang?" Aster nods. "That's more what I'd expect, yeah. Like, among the adepts, if you don't show you can walk the walk, then you won't fit. You can't call yourself elite without showing you've put in the work and got the skills." She does, at least, pronounce both syllables of 'elite' and keep 'skills' pronounced with S on both sides. "Pretty varied. Software types like me, exploiters, hardware engineers -- even /wet/ware engineers, with those who get in on cybernetics." Arthur chuckles. "Nice mix. IT's about the philosophy, not the specifics of what you're studying. Only sensible way to run things. While you're here. Anything you need. "I know we do have problems here and while I'm researching one mission, I'd like to start thinking about the next." Aster nods firmly. "Exactly. Mag-- er, 'people like us' are unique. There are as many perspectives on that as there are people to hold them. Trying to force people to unify would just be an exercise in frustration. And, you know, make us no better than the union." Careful talking shit about unions while you're in Detroit, Aster. They don't know you're talking about a global hypertechnological metascientific conspiracy. "Mm. You know those ritual killings? Maya had me look into something, and I have a minor lead on the culprit." Arthur hums. "Alma was talking about some killings, but I don't know anything about them, honestly. Is this er... union related, is it turning out?" Aster shakes her head. "Not from anything I've heard. More likely, it's about..." Hm. What euphemism can she use here? "...someone who's had too much whiskey and brandy." 'Dark spirits' huh. Arthur is going to miss what she means, and just assume it's some wino. He sighs. "Detroit. Figures. Well, if I ccan help, let me know. I've been in a support role my whole career. I want to support the front line people here, too." Aster nods her head firmly. "Mm. Crap like that sure loves to come up in Detroit, doesn't it? Like the city doesn't have enough troubles already. And of course, there's the chance that this, uh, brandy-ite could have been brought about by one of the Big Assholes." That's one way to describe Nephandi, sure. Arthur smiles weakly, and digs into his pizza some more. "On one hand it'd be much easier just to hand it off to the cops, but we can handle things so much better than they can. And you never know when the cops are infiltrated anyway." Aster blinks, then squints slowly at Arthur, and slowly draws in closer. Close enough that she can lower her voice. "...you know I'm talking about dark spirits and nephandi, right? Or, well, 'extradimensional entities' and nephandi, if you prefer." Arthur looks at her casually, but then she says what she really means, and he pauses. Freezes mid-bite. Only then does he swallow, and cough. "Oh yes, of course. Very dangerous. Don't hand those to the police." Aster sits back again, returning to the comfortable personal-space distance. She purses her lips. "Mm. We should standardise these euphemisms. And here I thought 'too much brandy' was clever." Arthur shrugs. "Just call them aliens? I mean,t hey're coming from space. Might as well call them what they are." Aster wrinkles her nose. "Yes, but then we go from a perfectly euphemistic and undercover conversation about 'unions' into suddenly talking about aliens. It loses the subtlety." Arthur chuckles. "Fair enough. But honestly, if you feel the need to speak in code, shouldn't that really be the clue tot ake the conversation elsewhere? Though I should let you jog. You do have my card, right?" Aster mms. "Fair. But it's not always viable to just drag away into private. And your students would probably look at you askance if they saw me grab you by the tie and yank you behind a closed door." She nods to both, and pushes herself back up to her feet. "I should. Going to have to work to get my heart rate back up. Though, how are you with tracking people down? Since that's the next phase with this ritual murderer. Have a name, know where he was living ten years ago, now to follow the trail." Arthur laughs. "Max would blush, but I think all in all he'd be impressed." Rubbing his head once, then grabbing his card from his coat to hold out. "Contact me if I can help with the thing." Aster takes the card, grinning. "That's what I'm asking right now. Are you good at finding people?" She pauses, head tilted. "...though I should probably start off bugging my, you know, /bounty hunter/ friend." Arthur smiles. "Finding people? I'm good at research. I can try that. People tend to leave records. Send me what you have." Aster nods. "Sure. Got your email here--" She flashes the card before tucking it into a jeans pocket. It manages to just barely fit. "--so I'll shoot that through to you when I'm done with this. For now, though?" She slips her one earphone back into place. "Catch you later, Doc." | |
