fandomtownies | Magic Box, Thursday, May 24

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Magic Box, Thursday, May 24

Tara had just opened the shop when a goat wandered in through the open doors, looked at Tara with baleful eyes, and began deliberately munching on some jewelry and poultices on a sale table.

"Excuse me," Tara said uncertainly. "If you're a student trying to cure yourself, that's ... not gonna help, sorry."

The goat didn't answer, other than by moving along to graze on some dreamcatchers.

"Hey," Tara said indignantly. "Those kind of cost a lot of money? So, uh ... m-maybe don't eat them?"

The goat's only response was to look even sadder at being reprimanded as it continued to eat. And then a second goat joined it. This one seemed to like the taste of spellbooks.

Tara sighed and did her best to move the really valuable stuff out of the reach of goats while she attempted to persuade her guests to leave. Unless she figured out they needed to be punched -- which was unlikely, because Tara -- this was going to be a long day.

[OOC: Open magic shop with minor goat problem!]

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From just outside the door, some indignant yelling was pretty audible. "Hey. Hey hey hey hey hey! Not the boots! Do you know how hard it is to find those?"

After a moment: "Argh!" And then a muffled thump, so apparently not.

And then Gabrielle came through the door, sai in her hands and teeth marks on her boots, looking irritated and slightly out of breath. "If this is some kind of punishment for not wanting to stick with the village farmer life, it's really not funny."

"It's really not funny no matter what," Tara sighed from her perch on the counter. She'd given up on trying to shoo the goats and was now just watching the beasts warily. "Hey, Gabrielle. Are your shoes going to be okay?"

"They'll be fine," Gabrielle said resignedly. "At least they'll make a good conversation starter: 'What happened to your boots?' 'Oh, it's a long story. Let me tell you all about the time I got mad enough to punch a goat in the face.' Or more than one, if they keep this up," she added in a loud and pointed tone to the goats in the shop.

"You punched them?" Tara sounded impressed. "I've just been trying to ... kind of stay out of their way and let them be goats. Besides, I don't want to get too close."

Seriously. They smelled evil.

When even Gabrielle -- who was used to long treks without a chance for a bath for days on end -- noticed the evil smell, that was saying something. Of course, that also meant she was somewhat inured to it.

"They disappear if you punch them," she said, shrugging; by Fandom standards that wasn't even weird. "Kicking them doesn't work, though, and for the love of the gods, don't try to hit them with a weapon, because then they start to cry."

That part was horrifying even by Fandom standards.

"... huh," Tara said, and climbed down off the counter to go over to the smaller goat, who was placidly chomping her way through what had once been a rather nice display of vintage brooms.

"I'm sorry?" she said softly, then punched a very girly punch toward the goat's muzzle. It was more of a tap with a fist, really.

But it worked; the goat vanished. "Okay, that was kind of fun," Tara admitted. "And now I feel a little bad for thinking that."

That was a lot like some of Gabrielle's early attempts at fighting, only without the same kind of acerbic commentary Ephiny had provided at the time.

"Sometimes it's just a little satisfying," she agreed. No judging from the girl who'd snapped and gone postal on a Roman legion, and was currently sizing up the other goat. "Especially with the messthey're making."

No chance she was going to revert to her pacifist phase, given the punch she aimed at the other goat.

"Did you know goats were this messy?" Tara wondered. "I ... kind of didn't. I wish I could just punch the mess" -- and the smell -- "away, too."

"I came from a farming village," Gabrielle pointed out lightly, waving a small cloud of goat hair away. In ancient Greece, where for once there actually were goats by any normal world's standards. Go figure. "But even the meanest goats I ever saw weren't quite as bad as these."

She looked around and took stock of the shop, and frowned. "This is . . . bad."

"I think it looks worse than it is?" Tara said, pushing her hair back. "I got most of the valuable stuff up or shielded, so mostly they were eating ... junk, really."

Edited 2012-05-24 21:03 (UTC)

Gabrielle looked relieved at that, at least. "Well, good. One of them ate part of a scroll I was working on earlier -- a blank part, thank the gods." Unlike some people in the land before Charmin who used her scrolls for other reasons, Xena. "I think there are going to be a lot of unhappy people on the island before this blows over."

"It'll only be a day or so?" Tara offered, hope in her voice. "I'm already unhappy, though."

She tapped a fingertip against her lips. "Um. Where were you when it got your scroll? I should have somebody check on Moxy if they're in the dorms."

"Out in the park," Gabrielle replied in her I-am-trying-to-be-reassuring tone. "And I'm not happy about it, either. Do you need a hand with this?"

Tara shook her head, waved a hand dismissively. "If you really want to? But ... I've been working here three years now. This is not the first time I've had to clean up."

"Trying to enjoy it while you can?" Gabrielle asked, lightly but with a serious undertone.

"Kind of," Tara said, equally lightly. "I probably won't get to clean the shop up after random invasions more than ... two, three more times."

"Tell me about it," Gabrielle agreed, looking wistful for a moment. ". . . I'm really going to miss modern plumbing."

That one time had been nice, but they weren't going to run across a random ~~off-screen~~ flushable toilet in every cave.

"I don't suppose you could take it with you," Tara mused. "I feel lucky I'm going to a place ... kind of like this."

"I'll just have to adjust to living without it again. If I really missed running water that much, I'd go to Rome, and I'd rather not do that again," Gabrielle said, grimacing slightly. "I got along without it for fifteen years before I got here, anyway."

She tilted her head, curious. "There are other places like this, really?"

"Sorry, I didn't say that very well," Tara apologized. "I just meant in the broad ... Earth, speaking English, 2012, indoor toilets, Internet sense."

The Hellmouth was supposed to be a bit more like Fandom than that, of course, but it seemed like a lot to get into and hadn't been what Tara was thinking of anyhow..

"Oh. Right." Gabrielle gave an abashed shrug. "I got a little distracted making up a speech in my head about why this place is so special, so that's where my train of thought went. Home's interesting, but not quite like this."

Just wait until she found out that Xena's childhood home was built over a portal straight to hell. Yes, hell. Not the Greek Underworld. It was a special place.

"I won't even be able to call people after a while, too," she realized.

"Oh, right, your phone will die?" Tara guessed. "I could ... try a magical energy source, but I don't even know if that would work. Let alone across dimensions."

"It's okay," Gabrielle assured her. "Even if it did work at home, one of the last things I need is it unexpectedly going off while I'm . . . trying to sneak up on some gang of bandits or avoiding trackers."

She brushed some stray hair back from her forehead and smiled. "Besides, someone has to keep the art of the written letter alive."

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Magic Box, Thursday, May 24

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