The Perk, Monday Afternoon

[not_a_goddamn_princess]

“I can’t believe that dick Ember actually pulled this crap on me. On me,” Margo said, leaning on the counter. Her head had stopped aching some painkillers and a spell ago, but it still itched, like a phantom headache that put insult to injury. “Actually, scratch that. Zap me from one magical kingdom to another, have a big laugh, screw another naiad, that sounds exactly like that goat-fu–”

The barista cleared her throat. She set Margo’s order down on the counter and gestured with her eyebrows.

Margo shot her a dark look. Her next coffee the barista was absolutely going to spit in? That was tomorrow’s Margo’s problem. “Thanks,” she said, slapping a bill onto the counter. “If this coffee sucks, I’m calling bullshit on today.” That was a lie. She’d called bullshit the second she woke up with a bruise on her head on the floor of a mad scientist’s herb garden.

Wearing yesterday’s clothes, no less.

She sat down at a table near the window and sipped her damn coffee. It didn’t suck. That felt like an insult too, like the universe couldn’t even give her something tangible to be mad at right now.

A black and white bunny fell out of the air behind her. “TESTING OH FU–” it bellowed with the voice of a chain-smoking fifty-year-old man. When Margo turned around, it was gone.

“Jesus christ.”

[open, if slow]

Comments

[designateddadfriend]

Travis had almost entirely handwavily spent the weekend catching up with his dead former mentor, only to be told equally handwavily at the last minute that the reason why Pruitt had showed up for him instead of his dead husband was because Pruitt didn't think Travis was ready to see Michael again.

So he was in his own kind of shit mood as he came in for coffee that morning.

He nodded to the . . . pirate queen? . . . by the window. "Was that a rabbit?"

The fact that he couldn't even quite scrounge up the proper 'that's not how rabbits work' outrage right now was deeply depressing.

[not_a_goddamn_princess]

“That sounded more like an old dude one more bad decision away from the cancer ward,” Margo said. She turned to look at the new guy. Rabbit? “Wait. Did you say rabbit?”

[designateddadfriend]

"I did," Travis said, sounding resigned. He shrugged. "You get used to that kind of shit around here."

He was tempted to ask her if she was new, but that had annoyed the hell out of him when he'd first arrived, and honestly, he hadn't been exactly super social since climbing out of that hole earlier in the summer.

[not_a_goddamn_princess]

“No, I mean did you just see a rabbit that talks,” Margo said. She veered up out of her chair. “You get a lot of talking animals around here?” she asked as she rummaged around the room, peeking under tables and moving chairs.

She’d really taken depth vision for granted before, huh.

[designateddadfriend]

"Define 'a lot'," Travis said dryly. "The squirrels report the local gossip as 'news' on the radio every day, and I got trapped at the bottom of a giant pit by raccoons about a month or so ago."

[not_a_goddamn_princess]

“This might be a long shot, but does the name Fillory mean anything to you?” Margo asked. Wait, did she see movement? “Hey, you! Your High Queen tells you to stop dicking around!”

[designateddadfriend]

Travis shook his head. "Doesn't ring a bell, no."

He put in his order quickly while she was yelling, then turned back.

"High Queen, huh? Fair warning, the castle here is actually a high school, and we have a mayor's office rather than a royal court."

Maybe his 'pirate queen' assessment hadn't been too far off.

[not_a_goddamn_princess]

“So I’m on Earth,” Margo said. She kicked a chair. “Fuck.”

[designateddadfriend]

"So sorry that doesn't meet your approval, highness," Travis said with a faint snort. "I'm Travis, by the way. Welcome to Fandom. Possibly the least Earth-like Earth town on, you know, Earth."

[not_a_goddamn_princess]

“I’m Margo,” she said. She would have rolled her eyes. . . one eye, but Margo could’ve sworn she just saw that bunny run towards the counter. “And what state are we–” She shoved another chair aside. “–in right now– shit, did you see where that bunny went?!”

[designateddadfriend]

"Maryland," Travis said, following her monocular gaze. "Near Baltimore. And, uh. No. If you're worried about it being a health code hazard, you're probably going to be eternally frustrated."

Like, you know, he was.

[not_a_goddamn_princess]

Margo did roll her eyes this time. Eye. Dammit. “My kingdom’s full of talking animals,” she said. “I figure if that fuzzy escape artist can croak, maybe it can cough up something useful.”

She righted herself and looked at Travis. “Maryland, huh? Well, that’s predictably inconveniently far from Canada.”

[designateddadfriend]

"It is," Travis agreed, rolling right past her comment about a rabbit coughing anything up in here. "But I'm sure you can book a portal if you need to. I would suggest asking for somewhere a little more specific than 'Canada' when you do, though. It's kind of a big place."

[begmetwice]

Irene had, blissfully unvisited by anyone haunting her from her past, spent the weekend in front of her television in her pajamas. In the years since she'd been gone, Netflix had apparently developed a drama series about the royal family, and while she wasn't quite caught up to the ones she knew personally, it had been plenty to occupy her for several days.

But now: coffee. And from where she'd been lingering by the door with a latte and checking her messages, Irene caught that whole show.

"Rough day?" she asked the be-eyepatched woman with a sympathetic wince, once it seemed like things had calmed down some.

She had no idea what to make of the rabbit, so she was just going to neatly not comment on that at all. Might not even have to do with Eyepatch, here. Could be a Fandom thing.

[not_a_goddamn_princess]

“Try rough 48 hours,” Margo said, hunched possessively over her drink like an angry (but very fabulous) one-eyed goblin. “Or rough life. I lose track. I just got punted from my kingdom by an inebriated satyr with an impulse control problem, and attacked by a piece of furniture, so yeah, I’m not at my best.”

[begmetwice]

"Shit." Really, that sounded like an awful couple of days, but there was also quite a lot of information there, and now Irene looked not only openly sympathetic but intrigued. "Sorry, did you say your kingdom?"

'Satyr' she might have misheard, sure, but kingdom sure was an interesting word, and told her right there that this was probably a new person, and not just one that Irene herself had not yet met since she'd been back.

[not_a_goddamn_princess]

“Fillory,” Margo said, lifting her head up from her drink just enough to get a load of who was talking.

Huh. She was hot. Not that Margo was in a mood to do anything with that information. “Tell me you’ve heard about it.”

[begmetwice]

That was okay; Irene would remain hot, conveniently!

"Okay," she agreed easily, taking a sip of her coffee. "What should I have heard, then?"

This was a cute way of saying that no, she had absolutely not heard of it.

[not_a_goddamn_princess]

Hey, she wasn’t saying the hot wasn’t good to know. For an emergency or something, like being stuck on Earth for longer than a couple of days while Eliot probably got his gorgeous yet dumb ass killed. “Magical kingdom full of talking animals and soap opera levels of stupid whimsical drama?” Margo said. “Subject of a bunch of admittedly good children’s fantasy books written by the biggest creep in the universe?”

[begmetwice]

"Is that the one that's just a big Christian allegory and one of the kids doesn't get to go to heaven because she liked lipstick?"

Close, Irene. So close.

[not_a_goddamn_princess]

“Close, but less with the Christianity and more with the bacchanals,” Margo said. “The Chatwins? Ember and Umber? No?”

She groaned. “Fuck, why am I even trying,” she said. “That goddamned horny cock probably sent me to a world without Fillory books because he thought it’d be funny.” She should be lucky she still had magic.

Did her unimpressed, annoyed-with-the-universe look still work if she only had one eye to use? Worth a shot. “I’m High Queen Margo,” she said. “The Destroyer. I know. It usually sounds more impressive.”

[begmetwice]

"To be fair, you really are setting the bar quite high with the Destroyer," Irene noted, clearly a little amused even as she ducked her head in an approximation of a curtsy. "Pleasure to meet you, Your Majesty. Irene Adler."

When in doubt of whether to offer a curtsy or a handshake: do both. So Irene was also offering out a manicured hand as she added, "Welcome to Fandom, sorry about the circumstances."

[not_a_goddamn_princess]

“Sorry about the circumstances my goddamn life,” Margo grumbled. She’d remember shit like poise and charm later. But handshakes she could handle. Manicure, meet slightly more practical manicure. “Nice to meet you. I don’t mean to be rude to a local, but you wouldn’t happen to know a way off this faux-French rock, would you?”

[begmetwice]

"Well, yes," Irene hedged carefully. "The rest of the country -- we're in the States -- is just across the causeway, so there's that. But most of us aren't from here, self included. Getting back home can be a touch trickier sometimes, depending. You wouldn't happen to know what year it's supposed to be for you, would you?"

Though, honestly, this Filor-whatever probably had a different calendar, didn't they? But the time-travel had been Irene's biggest shock, and it was where she was inclined to direct any newbie-warnings.

[not_a_goddamn_princess]

“I tried your causeway, it didn’t do shit,” Margo said. The year question, though? That was interesting. In a ‘how fucked by the weird am I about to be’ kind of way. “It was 2017 back on Earth last time I checked a calendar. And. . . something Fillorian time?” When she shrugged, her entire face shrugged with her. “I have people there to keep track of that kind of thing.”