Mingle - Emergency Potluck

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WELCOME POTLUCK

Greetings, residents! Those more observant sorts among you may have noticed a large influx of very crowded ferries. In order to welcome our new residents en masse, Town Hall is holding a potluck in Town Square. Please bring a dish if you are able and make a new friend!

All of our newest arrivals need only bring themselves. We look forward to welcoming you all into our community, and may your lanterns always be lit.

This event is open to all! In light of our new influx of prospective players following the Great Sail Migration, we've decided to offer a small public event to tide everyone over until the TDM this weekend.

Comments

[thelatechrisfreeman]

"Economy class?" Chris repeats, confused. It means a certain something in their world... but what does getting the cheap seats on long-term transit have to do with getting a job? "What does that mean, like, a social class that drives the economy?"

[hate_gettin_older]

"It's like this," he starts, and bites into a buttered roll, delaying his further explanation for the space of chewing and swallowing.

"The whole world froze over when I was little. Only people still alive are the ones who got onto this train that goes round the world and never stops. Up in the Front, that's where the rich bastards are, the ones who paid first class. In the middle, there's the people who got economy class tickets, they work for the Front. And in the Tail, there was us. The ones who got on by lottery."

[thelatechrisfreeman]

Chris thinks that over.

"But how can the train never stop? Surely there has to be some form of maintenance being done, entropy being what it is. And if the whole world is frozen over, wouldn't that include the tracks that the train runs on?"

They give themself a shake -- don't get sidetracked (ha) by questions that probably can't be answered.

"And you grew up in that situation? The train's been running that long? Damn." They poke at their food for a little while, though they don't take another bite -- instead looking up to say, "I'm not surprised that rich bastards preserved the old order with them on top, even in the face of the world ending."

[hate_gettin_older]

Edgar shrugs at the first question; nobody ever told him, or anyone he knows, how it's possible that it never stops. The one about the tracks he could answer, but Chris brushes past it.

"Eighteen years, yeah," he says. "And yeah, they called it the natural order of things." Deeply, deeply sardonic on the last words; he isn't miming air quotes, but he might as well be.

[thelatechrisfreeman]

"There's nothing natural about working most people to death so a select few can sit on top of a fat pile of money." Chris sighs.

"But... where I'm from, Americans especially see themselves as 'rich people in waiting'. All... 'if I do everything right, if I work hard, I will see success and then I'll be rich and it's easy street from then on'. They don't realize they have way more in common with poor folks, how close they are to being poor folks themselves."

[hate_gettin_older]

Edgar shakes his head. "No one ever tried selling us that bullshit. Only ever 'this is where you belong, know your place, keep your place.'" His voice goes thin and stilted on those words, mimicking an accent that isn't his. "Like everything'd fuckin fall apart if any of us ever even set eyes on the Front."

[thelatechrisfreeman]

"Gross," Chris says. "Fucking hate snotty, arrogant people like that."

Beat.

"So how's the... train travelling the world thing work? Are the oceans frozen over, too?" They look a little sheepish to admit, "The only frame of reference I have is Amtrak, in my time, and U.S. rail is pathetic when it comes to passenger trains. I keep picturing little compartments and uncomfortable seats."

[hate_gettin_older]

"I dunno about the oceans. They just told us, the track goes around the world and the train goes on the track. Never even saw the outside, in the Tail. No windows."

He shakes his head. "No little compartments either, that I ever saw. Just our bunks."

[thelatechrisfreeman]

"Eh, I'm imagining short term commute trains, really. Sleeper cars are only on certain routes, and even then it's First Class... if I'm remembering correctly." Chris shrugs. "Anyway, I'm not really trying to find parallels with your world, just kind of thinking aloud."

They lapse into silence at eat some more. Might be a good time to pick up with questions of your own, so Chris doesn't feel like this is some one way, very bad interrogation.

[hate_gettin_older]

Edgar's happy to take a few moments to just eat, now or pretty much anytime.

But after a few bites, he asks "So what's it like where you come from, then?"

[thelatechrisfreeman]

[[ OOC: Dear God, can I get through one month without being taken out by sickness? ]]

"Mm..." Chris thinks about how to answer for a while, picking at their food and eating small bites. "Climate is more or less like this place, though I live on the Eastern Seaboard of the Atlantic, so it gets pretty dreary and rainy... especially in the autumn. I live in the big city... lots of asphalt and concrete, tall buildings... and since it's the U.S. the place is built for cars more than anything. Loud, crowded... but I live in my own little apartment, and it's not hard to get some quiet if I need it."

Another moment of silence. "Oh, and we have superheroes."

[hate_gettin_older]

He's nodding, following along as best he can. Most of it makes sense to him, even if a few of the descriptions are things he's only ever heard of.

Until the last words, on which he twists his head to give Chris the sort of look that usually gets accompanied by a record-scratch noise on a certain kind of soundtrack.

"Sorry, you've got what? Like Superman and that?"

[thelatechrisfreeman]

"Oh," Chris says, casual as you please, "you must come from another of those worlds where I am fictional."

After taking a sip of their drink, Chris elaborates, "Yes, exactly like Superman. He's in Metropolis, so I've never seen him in person. I spent most of my life in New York, and recently moved to Gotham City before I was transported here. But I haven't met Batman either. I'm not an active superhero, even if I have metahuman powers."

[hate_gettin_older]

The look on his face doesn't change.

"Superman," he says slowly, "and Batman, they ... people always told me they were just made-up stories. Imaginary."

The difference between imaginary and extinct is one that some of the adults tried hard to drum into the oldest train babies, though in later years very few of them still bothered.

[thelatechrisfreeman]

"They probably are made-up stories in your world," Chris replies. "First Aid says that a member of his team back home collects all the Batman comic books. First Aid is a Cybertronian, a type of inorganic alien, and I'm pretty sure Sam Porter knows them from fictional works in his world."

[hate_gettin_older]

"Huh." Blinking. "So it's the same as like, fairies and wizards and that? Made-up in one world, real somewhere else? Din't know that could happen with, I dunno, actual people."

(The word he's grasping for is individuals.)

[thelatechrisfreeman]

"That's the multiverse for you," Chris replies, with all the world-weariness of someone who has dealt with a lot of alternate dimension, past universe, time bending multiverse weirdness.