fandomtownies | Stark Industries, Wednesday, 03/19

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Stark Industries, Wednesday, 03/19

There wasn't much to repair at the shop today, for which Victor was grateful. It gave him more time to try to find a common thread between all the people who weird things were happening to. (Not that he had much to go on at the moment, besides that they all walked on two legs and breathed oxygen -- and actually, he wasn't sure about Professor Starsmore on that last point.)

To go by today's radio, he had to add Professor Bond, Professor Hale, and -- wait, Jamie Madrox was on the island? And Johnny Storm? Maybe this strangeness wasn't all bad.

[OOC: Open post! And if anyone wants to let Vic know he's gotten AU'd too, you would have my undying gratitude.]

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"So... It's pretty safe to say by now that something weird is going on, right?"

Some people said hey when they came in, and usually Karolina was one of those people. But sometimes things were so weird that cutting to the chase seemed like the thing to do.

"Yeah, it's bizarre. Professor Hale was even smiling at us in class today," Victor said, flashing a quick smile for Karolina. As far as he knew, he'd met her in Fandom. "I mean, I knew he could, but it still looked way wrong on him."

Edited 2014-03-19 16:31 (UTC)

"And I think I heard Johnny Storm is on the island." Along with a bunch of other people, it seemed. "Also, Jim's girlfriend is a guy."

"Johnny Storm and Jamie Madrox, too," Victor offered, sounding a tiny bit excited about that aspect. "Maybe they're trying to get some awesome team-up together. Radio said one of the new people is called Super-Grover -- that sounds like another hero."

Karolina looked a lot more hesitant than she did excited.

"I don't know, why would they all come here to do that?"

"Maybe they can somehow fix the island?" Victor offered. "Maybe there's some sorcerer behind it and they're just getting ready to strike."

Because that happened, right? Even Victor knew it sounded faintly ridiculous.

"That might be wishful thinking," he admitted. "God knows I can't help, so I'm hoping somebody else can."

Edited 2014-03-19 17:46 (UTC)

Karolina shrugged. "Maybe there'll be room for, you know, maybe zapping things later?" she offered. "I mean, not that I want things to go in that direction. But, it's Fandom, so it might happen."

"If it turns into an all hands on deck thing?" Victor said, thinking about it. "Yeah, I guess. Maybe they'll need a computer guy."

He wasn't sure why she'd called it zapping, but the word didn't catch his ear enough to ask about it.

"But you're right, probably it's better if we can solve this without a giant fight. Even if it would be cool, I hear the clean-up's a bitch."

Karolina had caught how he'd called himself just a computer guy, though, and that meant she was giving him a slightly quizzical look right now.

"Well, I think the troopers handle that for the most part," she said, slowly. A little distracted.

"But I still don't want to make work for them," Victor countered, frowning. "Everything okay? You're looking at me funny."

"Um..."

Well. Might as well be a little direct about it.

"Hey Vic, how did we meet?"

"At BWI on the way to Fandom," Victor answered. "We were the only people coming from L.A., right?"

His stomach was twisting. "I know you aren't asking that to reminisce, but I can't tell if you think I'm off, or you think you're off. I still feel like me."

"I realize now that I should have maybe specified that question a bit," Karolina admitted. Since technically they'd met twice. "But I think maybe the fact that you didn't ask me which time means that... one of us is probably off."

"Great," Victor muttered. "Far as I know, we only met once. Any idea on how we could tell which one of us is wrong?"

This time, Karolina's shrug was a little more helpless.

"I don't know if we can, without consulting a third person."

"And then if they didn't agree with either of us, we'd have to bring in a fourth person, and maybe a fifth, and... " Victor ran his hands through his hair. "Ay dios mio, it'd get ridiculous. It is ridiculous."

He looked over at her. "What made you think something was wrong with one of us? You noticed first."

That, at least, was easier to answer. Even if Karolina had to wonder what was behind it.

"You implied you'd be just... a 'computer guy'."

Yes, there were air quotes.

"Well, yeah." There was an implied 'duh.' Victor had a healthy self-image, and he'd been in Fandom long enough to know he wasn't totally useless, but he definitely wasn't a heavy hitter. "What, where you're from did I slip and fall in a vat of radioactive goo?"

Not that he'd totally given up hope something like that would happen, truth be told.

"Not exactly." And here was Karolina frowning and chewing on her lip and generally looking confused and uncomfortable. "You really don't –– you're not just messing with me, right?"

She had to check. It wasn't really Victor's style to joke around about something like this, but she had to check, just in case.

"No," Victor said, folding his arms across his chest as if to protect himself. "I promise. No messing. I have no idea what you're talking about."

He briefly wondered if she was messing with him, but the idea was too far out of character for Karolina to take seriously. Besides, if she was joking, she wouldn't looks so freaked out.

"Victor, you're a cyborg," Karolina said, after a long pause. Awkwardly long. "I mean, in my memories."

She had no idea if that still stood.

"So, um, a lot more than just a guy who pokes at computers."

"Okay, that's even less funny than when kids back home called me an alien," Victor told her defensively. "No offense, but I think I'd know if I was The Vision 2.0. Like, he doesn't even have hair."

Because that was the obvious proof of Victor's humanity. His hair. He was fairly deep in denial at the moment.

"I think you have to be the one from the messed-up world."

"It's not messed up," Karolina replied, although her tone was almost apologetic. "You're a hero. Or, you know, we do our best."

At least he hadn't zapped her across a field this time, though.

"No way." Victor looked even more skeptical, but also like he wanted to believe her. "How did that one happen?"

His mom was still working on letting him stay out past 9 on a school night. Heroing was not happening.

"Uh, it's kind of a long story."

Also, depressing. So she wasn't sure getting too far into it was a good idea.

"Maybe I don't want to know the answer," Victor decided. "Not like there are a bunch of happy origin stories."

And for once, being genre savvy did him some good.

"I still think the whole thing is weird," he added. "Like ... what cyborg stuff should I even be able to do? Last time I checked, arguing with people on Reddit wasn't a superpower."

Edited 2014-03-20 00:47 (UTC)

"Well, like zap things with electricity, and kinda communicate with machines, and there's this thing with magnetism?"

She'd never had to describe someone else's powers for them before. This was weird.

"Yeah, that all sounds very robot-y of me," Victor said, and experimentally wiggled his fingers away from where Karolina stood.

Nothing happened.

"But I still think you have the wrong guy."

"Or you just... don't know how."

She wasn't going to press the issue, though. There wasn't a reason to, and there was no quick way to figure out who here wasn't right.

(Assuming either of them were.)

"But it's okay. Things are just weird."

"Okay, but it doesn't seem there should be a whole lot of technique to being a magnet, either," Victor said, but with no heat behind it. Maybe she was right: He couldn't disprove the concept. "And yeah. Things just keep getting weirder."

"And yet not quite weird enough to do anything with," Karolina replied with a sigh, wrapping her arms around herself. "It' getting a little worrisome."

"Or a lot worrisome," Victor nodded glumly. "And yet there's absolutely nothing for us to do about it. Except pay attention."

Joker walked into the store, supported by his robotic exoskeleton. "Hey, Vic! Awesome. Okay. So... this looks like the most high-tech place on the island. You got anything in here that can measure phase... quantum... harmonic... blah-blah-blah?"

"Probably," Victor said hopefully. "Maybe if you tell me what one would look like, I can find it in Tony Stark's old stuff." A pause. "Also, that exoskeleton thing is incredibly cool. What's it made of?"

"What? No, I'm not... I don't know what one would look like, or how it would work, or even if it would help. I was kind of hoping whoever was here might." He frowned, looking around the store. "This Tony Stark -- he left the island? Maybe if we wait long enough, we'll overlap with a universe where he stayed."

Joker sighed at that, and then looked down at himself. "And, the robopants? Seriously, haven't we had this conversation before? It's just the usual sort of stuff -- mostly carbon fiber, some steel, maybe some aluminum. I dunno. Motors in the joints, a little mass effect generator so it doesn't weigh a ton... uh... I think the straps are nylon?"

"'Phase quantum harmonic blah-blah-blah' isn't a technical term," Victor pointed out. "And yeah, Tony's gone. Actually, two Tonys. Old one who owned the shop and young one who ran it until he graduated."

He added, "Probably I would have asked you about the robopants if I'd seen you in them before today. But I hadn't, so..."

"...Before today," Joker repeated. "Ooooookay. So... you hadn't noticed anything weird about me... before today. Skywalker mentioned a monkey, yesterday. Did you see me with a monkey?"

"Your helper alien chimp, or whatever," Victor nodded. "Yeah, you had him for a couple weeks."

He frowned. "Didn't you?"

"Okaaay, so that's settled: I've switched universes twice so far. This me has absolutely zero monkeys." Joker considered the point. "What do you think it means that both this one and the last one were nearly indistinguishable from my own?"

Victor chewed a thumbnail, considering this. "Dunno. I mean, theoretically there could be billions of tiny differences that you just didn't notice. Like, maybe the guy with the monkey had a shellfish allergy and you don't. Might just be chance that the big stuff all lined up."

"Me," he added, in a can-you-believe-this tone, "I had somebody in here telling me that where she's from I'm a cyborg. So somewhere, I'm awesome."

Edited 2014-03-20 01:14 (UTC)

Joker raised an eyebrow. "You're... not a cyborg? Made from nanites and your mom's DNA by an evil AI? That's not ringing a bell?"

"I ... what?" Victor answered. "No, man. I don't think my mom knows what a nanite is, and my dad was a Marine. He died serving his country. Pretty sure that's not an evil AI thing."

(He was wrong. He hadn't figured that out yet.)

"Guess I got all the weird you're missing out on."

"Yeeeeah. Wow. Talk about weird. You, the now-you, and cyborg-you are just about the same, from where I'm standing. Just think about all the tiny little things that would have had to happen in order for that to be the case. Freaky."

Joker gave Victor a shrug. "So, in your reality, we never had the conversation where I talked about how creepy my cyborg kid was and you glared at me for being rude?"

"I glared at you for being rude because you were being a jackass about your kid, not because the kid was a cyborg," Victor remembered. "But I can see why hypothetical cyborg me would have been even more annoyed."

The thing Joker said about all the tiny little things that would have had to happen was ticking away in his brain. He wasn't sure if it was mathematically impossible, but it had to be getting up there.

He remembered that Fandom was mathematically impossible, right? Was his cyborg brain factoring that into the calculation?

"Victor, the Hypothetical Cyborg," Joker chuckled. "So, does that make you a three-plus-or-minus-three million dollar man?" ~~Metaed... somehow.~~

Well, Marvel. The world Victor's brain was programed in was almost as impossible as Fandom.

"It makes me Schroedinger's Victor," he decided. "I am both worth $3 million and not worth $3 million, depending on how you look at it.

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Stark Industries, Wednesday, 03/19

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