fandomtownies | The Devil's Nest, Friday Evening

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The Devil's Nest, Friday Evening

After settling in next to the bar, Allie was poking through news sites on her phone. Most of it still didn't make a lot of sense, but one bit of news caught her attention. She set an alarm on her phone to make sure she headed to the beach in time to see it.

Tiny decided the night's specials would be space themed drinks while the DJ went for the space themed music. Which wasn't bad, until the fifth version of Sky Rockets in Flight.

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Bruce walked into the bar and surveyed his surroundings as he took a seat. "I feel like there's a theme at play here."

"And it's my own fault," Allie replied with a sigh. "I told them about the launch tonight."

"Ah, now it makes sense. So everyone here is a fan of NASA?" Bruce asked.

"I don't know that I'm a fan, so much as I'm just intrigued," she admitted. Sending rockets to the moon isn't something that happens where I'm from. I never thought it was possible till I came here."

"And here I was hoping to score some points with a bartender by mentioning that I've been on the International Space Station," Bruce said. "But since you're just intrigued, you might want to read up on the Mars rover missions. Sending a rocket to the moon is something this world mastered decades ago. Now we're sending things to other planets, too."

"The Space Station? Really?" Forget scoring points with the bartender Bruce, you scored points with the bouncer. "Kaidan took me to the Citadel once, unfortunately we got too caught up in this alien mafia thing to do much sight seeing."

"I'll definitely read up on the Rovers. It sounds interesting."

"I was a little bit younger and had a friend who really knew how to party," Bruce said. "It was a little humbling. I thought I had connections, but this guy somehow got me onto a shuttle."

That, plus the whole 'seeing Earth from space' thing. That was kind of humbling, too.

"Impressive," Allie nodded. "I can't imagine what that must have been like. You're lucky."

"Well, if Wayne Aerospace can get a station up in orbit soon like I'm hoping, you're more than welcome to check it out," Bruce said. "And I swear I don't make a habit of making promises like that to every woman I just met."

"I should hope not, especially when you don't even know my name," Allie pointed out. "That could get awkward."

"Then we'd better introduce ourselves before the awkwardness sets in," Bruce noted. "Bruce Wayne."

"Allison Sekemoto," she replied. "But most of my friends call me Allie. It's nice to meet you. Can Tiny get you a drink?" He was in the bar after all.

"Since I'm talking about space stations, I should probably go with a Mir," Bruce noted before turning to the bartender. "Tiny, if you please?"

Tiny mixed up the drink and slid it across the bar. "So what do you do on the island? Teach or are you just here for the random weirdness?"

"I lean toward the latter," Bruce said, taking the drink. "I'm a donor to the school, and I'm theoretically here to get a handle on how my donations are making a difference. But mostly I'm vacationing in a crazy place."

"But why?" Allie asked, honestly confused. "The random weirdness is fun and all. Up until the point it tries to kill you. Why stick around for that if you don't have to?"

"A lot more things try to kill you in my hometown of Gotham City," Bruce said. "Trust me, this is a respite. And it doesn't hurt that I used to go to school at Fandom and still have friends here."

"Same for me. Where I call home, most everything wants you dead. This place is remarkably calm." When it wasn't trying to kill them. "I only know one of the students, but I have some friends here in town."

"Since you've helped introduce me to space drinks, you can officially count me as a friend," Bruce said, lifting his glass in a toast. "But that's another thing that sets Fandom apart. The people here really are extremely friendly. I figure that makes up for the odd gender change or monster attack."

Allie nodded in recognition of the toast. "They are. Kind of ridiculously so. It's not a bad thing. It Just took a while to get used to when I first got here."

"But you're used to it now?" Bruce checked.

"Sort of. I'll probably always be surprised by it, but it's nice." And way less cut-throat then it had been a home.

What were the odds that Éponine knew a song by a one-hit wonder band from the 1970s? Long to nonexistent, but on the other hand this song was going to end up as part of her repertoire of constant humming after tonight.

"Well then!" She breezed in, with a quick glance at Tiny just to see if he was sulking about something tonight, and flung herself haphazardly onto her usual barstool with one foot swinging back and forth. "Anything interesting on that phone of yours tonight that you're poking at?"

"A rocket launch to the moon," Allie replied. "It seems they can do that now."

"To the moon!" echoed Éponine, with an incredulous laugh that quickly turned into a curious one. "Do you know, I believe you? It's funny, really, I'd only have thought you'd gone mad for saying it not so long ago, but lordy, the things people can do now, even if I'm damned if I know how. What d'you think it's like up there? I used to imagine it, some nights, what it'd be like to pay a visit there. Not when it's full, that'd be much too bright, but I think I'd like to be able to hide in the dark parts when I felt like it, and look down at this place from all the way up there. How tiny you'd all be!"

She trailed off, distracted by her own thoughts about what a trip to the moon would be like, then sighed, her shoulders slumping. "But of course, that sort of thing's far too fancy for the likes of me."

She was just talking to the wrong people. Allie had only just been offered a trip to a space station in the other thread.

"Cold maybe. Dark. I don't know," she admitted. "It's strange to think we probably used to be able to do that where from," Allie considered. "Back before Red Lung and the rabids. Before everything became about survival."

Éponine's expression turned somber, and she nodded in understanding. "No point in thinking about it much after that, was there?" she asked, and never mind that she'd been very good at thinking about the life she used to have when she was little. (Or the one she thought she'd had, anyway. Memory could be deceiving.)

"No, I guess not. But maybe it'll change someday." Kanin had seemed to think so. Allie could only hope.

"So what have you been up to this week? Anything interesting?"

Éponine huffed in exaggerated indignation. "Hardly not, no. I don't like it when things are too busy, but I don't like having nothing to do, either. Got something in mind, by any chance?"

"Maybe," Allie replied. "It's nothing much. Just helping me help a friend for a little while if you'd be willing to spare the time."

"And what do I --" Éponine caught herself and shook her head; friends were supposed to do things for each other without anyone owing the other anything, weren't they? "What d'you need me to do?"

The thing was Allie caught that unspoken question and didn't blame Eponine for it. It was a fact of life when you grew up struggling to survive. You couldn't waste the effort or energy on something without a worthwhile reward. "Nothing much. Just be there. In case something goes wrong."

Which was sort of vague, yes. "How much have you realized about the people on the island?"

It was a habit that would take her a very long time to break, if she ever successfully managed it.

"I s'pose I can do that," she allowed cautiously. "But what could go wrong? God knows it could be anything with the people here. What d'you mean, about the people?"

"Personally as long as we're careful, I don't think anything will go wrong." From what Nick had described, Allie figured the worse that would happen was she'd wind up knocked out for a minute or two. "But he wants to be careful and I can understand that."

"What I meant about the people...well, some of them are more then just your ordinary person. Like me, because of being a vampire, I've got a few extra skills."

"And Jack," Éponine added with a resigned sort of air. "In a different way, of course. But what's it have to do with helping someone out? Another one with those extra skills?"

"Exactly," Allie nodded. "Except his only came about recently and he's still trying to get a handle on them. I offered to help him out because well, it's not like he can hurt me all that badly if anything went wrong."

"And if anything does go wrong," asked Éponine practically, "what would it be?"

Not that she was opposed to helping, but the self-preservation instinct was still pretty strong.

"I'd probably pass out for a moment or two." It's not like Allie could die or anything. "In that case you'd need to poke Nick and tell him to put his sunglasses back on."

[You saw nothing!]

"Oh, is that all?" It wasn't as if she understood exactly what Nick could do, so it sounded fairly trivial to Éponine. "Good lord, that's nothing so difficult, of course I can do that."

"Good, thanks," Allie smiled. "I think it'll be easier on him if he can get a handle on things. It's never good not knowing how to control things."

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The Devil's Nest, Friday Evening

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