Pizza Planet, Friday Afternoon

[bitten_notshy]

Jack had never made time to get any good at video games since he jumped forward in time. They seemed loud, and childish, and he didn't see the point of them -- and anyhow, being publicly bad at common things was embarrassing. Easier to avoid the subject entirely.

But at 13, he loved loud, childish, pointless things, and didn't especially care if people he'd never met before thought he was good at them or not. Which was why after he devoured some pizza for lunch, he spent some serious time trying to conquer the ancient meta Mortal Kombat game in the corner of the restaurant. Someday he'd make it past the first two opponents; for now, he was having fun trying.

[OOC: Open like a restaurant!]

Comments

[not_a_whiner]

So-- who knew-- you could eventually run out of food in a house. Pizza seemed like the safe option to quell the biotic-sized gnawing in Kaidan's stomach.

He hadn't known the kid from his house would be there.

"Just hit all the buttons at once," he said, after debating for a while on the matter of whether he wanted to deal with the kid at all.

[bitten_notshy]

"And what will that do?" Jack asked, barely glancing away from the screen. He seemed mildly surprised to realize who was addressing him; Kaidan hadn't been going out of his way to be friendly.

He did it anyhow, and was rewarded by a complicated kick-backflip-punch combo that made his opponent's head fly off.

[not_a_whiner]

"That," Kaidan said.

He had a remarkable straight-face when it quite came down to it. "These games are all the same."

[bitten_notshy]

"Hitting everything always works?" Jack asked, glancing over while the game loaded the next level. "I've never played."

[not_a_whiner]

"Yeah," Kaidan said. He took a glance at the machine itself and added, "That one's old."

[bitten_notshy]

A pause, then: "I think I'm old. So that matches."

He'd seen the current year in passing when he picked up his phone, and again when he passed a newspaper stand. It was just another brick in his current great wall of strangeness.

[not_a_whiner]

Kaidan snorted. "You're still a kid," he said, "Even if you don't know what a television is-- doesn't make you old. Just displaced."

[bitten_notshy]

"I'd rather be old."

At least old people got some extra respect. Displaced people just got confused.

"Are you -- displaced? Or old, either one."

[not_a_whiner]

"I'm a century ahead of the island," Kaidan said, leaning against the wall (and managing to look spectacularly broody while doing so). "So yeah. I guess you could say that."

[bitten_notshy]

"Which do you think is easier?" Jack wondered, abandoning his game for the moment. (There was something compelling about broody people, all right?) "A century behind, or a century ahead?"

He tried to imagine finding himself in 1795. Couldn't, and decided he'd gotten the better end of the deal.

[not_a_whiner]

"A century behind, I think," Kaidan said, watching the kid. "You get to see progress in action."

[bitten_notshy]

Jack nodded slightly in agreement. "Everything's loud and confusing," he noted. "But -- it's not horrible. I can't imagine how much more we change before we get where you're from."

[not_a_whiner]

"A lot, and not enough," Kaidan said vaguely. "But isn't that always the case?"

Prejudice, for one. Fear. That stuff didn't go away so quickly. And Kaidan was well aware he hadn't exactly made it better.

[bitten_notshy]

"If you're going to tell me you're secretly a thousand years old, I can hear that at home," Jack warned, with a distinct side-eye.

[not_a_whiner]

"Wait, what?"

Sure, break his excellent lurk-and-brood here.

"No. I'm seventeen."

[bitten_notshy]

"You sounded like someone I know who is," Jack explained. "Just checking. Anyhow, I suppose that proves your point."

[not_a_whiner]

"You know someone who's a thousand years old?" Kaidan asked skeptically. "Somehow I'm not buying that."

[bitten_notshy]

"You also didn't believe me about the man hunting squirrels in the park," Jack pointed out. "Or about not knowing what a television was. You need to learn faith."

[not_a_whiner]

Kaidan's gaze cooled. "I'll show you faith if you earn it," he said.

[bitten_notshy]

"And I don't care enough about what you think of me to earn it," Jack said, equally cool. "But thank you for the game tip."

[not_a_whiner]

"You're welcome," Kaidan said, pulling away from the wall. "And by the way, that shirt makes you look ridiculous."

Maturity.

[bitten_notshy]

"Well, I didn't exactly have a trunk with me when I woke up here," Jack grumbled, pulling the shirt away from his body to look at it.

If it hadn't been cut for someone five inches taller and 40 pounds heavier, it might have been fine on him.

"Anyhow, at least my hair isn't trying to eat my face."

[not_a_whiner]

Congratulations, Jack. It was comments like that that would eventually move Kaidan to start jelling his large quantities of broody hair up into a pompadour.

"Wow," he said. "You must be fourteen."

[bitten_notshy]

"How is that an insult?" Jack asked. "You're older than I am, and you picked at me first."

Maturity ALL OVER THE PLACE.

[not_a_whiner]

"You know what, never mind," Kaidan said. He'd get... sushi, or something. "Clearly I'm in the presence of someone who experienced it all, so I might as well go home."

Be careful.