The Perk: Monday Afternoon

[pieandcoffee.livejournal.com]

Dale sits at his usual table working a crossword and a suduku puzzle while he works on his third cup of coffee since he entered the Perk.

Odds are he'll be looking at a getting a fourth at any moment.

[Open because I'm boooooooooored. Entertain me people!]

Comments

[last-mizrahi.livejournal.com]

After her office hours, Juli needed a coffee. She'd forgotten to bring one and had regretted it the entire time that she'd dealt with paperwork and planned her class for tomorrow.

"Good afternoon," she said mildly, but with a faint smile. This was the one Charlotte was with, wasn't he? Interesting.

[pieandcoffee.livejournal.com]

"Afternon," Dale said looking up from his puzzle and tilted his head at Juli. "Have we met?"

[last-mizrahi.livejournal.com]

"Not formally," she admitted, getting her coffee and stepping over to his table, "but I did see you at the party Mary had a few weeks ago. I am Dr. Juli Mizrahi, a friend of Charlotte."

[pieandcoffee.livejournal.com]

"Ah," Dale said offering his hand in greeting. "Good to meet you, Doctor. And any friend of Charlotte's... Well I think we're familiar with that idiom. You teach at the school or are you a MD at the clinic?"

[last-mizrahi.livejournal.com]

She went to shake it firmly. "I teach," Juli said, smiling, "healing people isn't a speciality of mine. And, please, call me Juli."

[pieandcoffee.livejournal.com]

"Juli it is," he said graciously, "And please call me Dale. What do you teach up at the high school?"

[last-mizrahi.livejournal.com]

"They've put me in the Social Studies department, I believe," she said, though Juli had only read that once. "At the moment I'm leading discussions of the various differences found between worlds. It's quite interesting." To her anyway.

[pieandcoffee.livejournal.com]

Dale tilted his head at that. "Oh really? Then are you from this world or something different?"

[last-mizrahi.livejournal.com]

"All indications point to this being Lost Jerusalem," Juli said, "as we renamed it in my time. From what I can tell, this is six thousand years in the past to me." Give or take a few hundred years.

[pieandcoffee.livejournal.com]

"Lost Jerusalem?" Dale said looking very curious. "Six thousand years? Sounds like you had one hell of a trip to end up here."

[last-mizrahi.livejournal.com]

"It's what we called our origin when we realized that we couldn't find it again. Our beginning." how the ancients had lost a planet Juli still wasn't sure, "to this day our capital planets are named after it. We're on Fifth Jerusalem now." Five planets, and six thousands years.

"My ship took a wrong turn through hyper-space," she said, sipping her coffee, "the trip itself was not so exciting as the destination, I'm afraid."

[pieandcoffee.livejournal.com]

"Six thousand years in the future and Fandom is more exciting?" Dale asked with a grin. "Somehow I find that a little disappointing."

[last-mizrahi.livejournal.com]

That got almost a grin. "I suppose it depends on what you're used to. We don't have near so much nature, and I find it fascinating."

[pieandcoffee.livejournal.com]

"So I'm guessing see the volcano this weekend was also a bit of a thrill for you?" Dale asked. "Not that I'm not happy that the island once again did one of those shifting moves to a new place, but that may have been too much excitement for me."

[last-mizrahi.livejournal.com]

"The volcano was magnificent," Juli said, eyes bright. "Mohinder and I would've gone closer had we had more time to prepare appropriate safety precautions."

[pieandcoffee.livejournal.com]

"Sounds pretty daring," Dale said with a quirky grin. "I preferred the view from my apartment. Especially after we moved. So I guess you can that in hindsight..."

[last-mizrahi.livejournal.com]

"You must be daring, if you wish to make progress in science," she said lightly. "It would be only natural to want to go and see it closer then."

Juli looked rueful at that. "I'm still wishing for icebergs, I'm afraid, concerning the move."

[pieandcoffee.livejournal.com]

"Well there's daring and running into a lava flow," Dale said with good humor. "And I prefer to keep my Florshiems un-melted. "And why are you concerned for the recent move?"

[last-mizrahi.livejournal.com]

"We were considering an air-approach," Juli said very dryly, but with a smile. "And not... concerned, so much as disappointed. Mohinder and I were discussing the possiblity of where the island would move next, and I voted for the cold because we haven't done that yet."

[pieandcoffee.livejournal.com]

"Well I wouldn't object to an glacier or two," Dale said sipping his coffee. "And for some reason I wouldn't say no to seeing a flock of penguins."

[last-mizrahi.livejournal.com]

She laughed softly. "Neither would I," Juli admitted, "as they're extinct in my time. Are you from this timeline?"

[pieandcoffee.livejournal.com]

Dale shook his head. "From almost 20 years in the past," he explained. "I was in the pursuit of a suspect and he went through a portal to another dimension. I followed him and ended up here."

[last-mizrahi.livejournal.com]

"Portals are not simply limited to Fandom then?" Juli asked curiously.

[pieandcoffee.livejournal.com]

"This one was... a little different," Dale replied. "It was an entrance to a place of either evil or good. Instead of sending me to my world I ended up here in the woods."

[last-mizrahi.livejournal.com]

Juli considered that, then, "and where would you place Fandom on the evil or good scale?"

[pieandcoffee.livejournal.com]

"I'm a firm believer that the island itself isn't good nor bad," Dale replied. "I haven't thought about it being sentient or not but I'm fairly sure the secrets it has is something it won't reveal unless it is damn good and ready."

[last-mizrahi.livejournal.com]

"If it ever is," she noted, "which I find myself in doubt of."

[pieandcoffee.livejournal.com]

"There's a part of me that wonders if this traveling island might be some sort of lost city," Dale said leaning back. "Have you ever heard of the myth of Atlantis?"

[last-mizrahi.livejournal.com]

"I haven't," she admitted. "What is it, if you don't mind me asking."

[pieandcoffee.livejournal.com]

"It was a mythical island that was described by one our ancient story tellers," Dale explained. "It was described as being a utopia, where it had advanced ideas in technology and possibly magic. The island itself disappeared in history which of course... just makes me wonder."

[last-mizrahi.livejournal.com]

"It just... disappeared?"

[pieandcoffee.livejournal.com]

Dale nodded as he took a sip of his coffee. "Just disappeared off the face of the Earth. No one knows if it was just a natural disaster or something even more fantastic happened. Does make you wonder, doesn't it?"

[last-mizrahi.livejournal.com]

"That it does," she mused, "that it does. And nothing, no evidence of any theory has been found, I presume?"

[pieandcoffee.livejournal.com]

"Not as far as I know," Dale replied. "Then again I'm hardly an expert on the subject."

[last-mizrahi.livejournal.com]

"I'll have to look into it," she said lightly. "I'm curious now."