newcomb | mingle log | the quad and elsewhere | we were young and drinking (coffee) in the park

Characters: Gansey and whoever shows up
What: Interpersonal interaction! Meet each other face-to-face while nothing is on fire
Where: the quad, unless elsewhere seems cool to you
When: loop 1, day 10 (6/10 irl)
Content Warnings: nothing yet. please use and check thread subjects

It's a pleasant day outside. There's a nice breeze and the sun is doing its best. At very least, it's not raining and warmer than it was yesterday. This is, statistically, likely to bring college denizens out of their dorms and offices since rain seems to often be on Newcomb's horizon. Fall in not-at-all-New England is lovely that way.

Gansey, for his part, can be found throughout the day in several places! He likes hanging out near the clocktower to study, since he's found time works best there (at least for him). It's nice to have a watch that's doing something vaguely akin to timekeeping for once.

But he's an explorer at heart, so he can probably also be found in the library, the computer lab, and wandering the grounds. Gansey isn't sure he's interacted with anyone outside a classroom or on Fermii since the train crash, so he's more likely than usual to strike up conversation instead of waiting for it to come to him.

The real question is this: where's everyone else hanging out today?

[ i'll be throwing gansey at anyone who doesn't note that their tag is closed. please mingle! ]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Iggy makes a face. "We're in some sort of interdimensional nexus. I'm so not going to worry about a damage deposit."

He grins.

"And I'm gonna paint the walls! Make it look really cool. I haven't decided on a colour palette yet.

"You really aren't too stoked to be here, huh?"

"I was kinda in the middle of something back home. I really want to get back there."

"What was it?" Because he's imagining something terribly mundane. Gardening, maybe.

"See, that's the problem. I can't really remember the details. But I'm sure I will, and anyway, it's not like there's plenty to fix about this place to make it so we can burst the bubble and get out." She has priorities, all right?

The concept of bursting the bubble and leaving has not occurred to Iggy as being an option. So he stares for a minute.

"Whoa. Hardcore."

"What, you want to stay in endless October knowing if the clock doesn't reset we all die horribly as a giant meteorite comes crashing down on our heads? Although the death part won't actually be that horrible because we'd be vaporized before we could feel it."

Iggy absorbs this, then shrugs.

"I mean, I'm not stoked about it," he says. "But we're all gonna go someday. And being dead's not so bad!" Said with a genuine cheerfulness.

"How can you be sure? Are you dead or something?" Her own reaction is like there's this gut-punch of loss, but she can't remember who that was.

Iggy smiles, but for the first time it rings false.

"I mean, you go on to a better place," he says. "So how can that be bad?"

Quickly, he moves on: "But I don't want to die. Obviously. I guess I'm just not really confident that we can find a way out?"

"I'm not sure I can believe that unequivocally being true. Not everyone goes on, or ghosts wouldn't be a thing, right?" She doesn't really know what she believes. That elements of personality and the like continue after death is definitely a real thing because that's how artifacts work.

"Well, I want to get out of here, so I will keep working on it. I mean, they wouldn't have created this space if there wasn't a belief in a solution to the problem at hand."

Iggy looks at her much more carefully than he has thus far. "You know about ghosts?" he asks, trying to sound only mildly interested.

"Huh. Okay, point."

"Had to put together a soul bottle to handle a body-jumping spirit once," Claudia said, shuddering a little. "I'd almost pity Alice if she weren't a total psychopath."

She didn't like anyone who went after her people, though. And she doesn't really regret locking her away for hopefully all eternity.

"I know that the psyche can exist independently of a physical body, and under certain circumstances even after death, and interact with us on certain levels, so if that's what you mean by ghosts, I guess."

"...what?" He's never heard of anyone doing something like that before. He's starting to realise that he might actually be the most normal person here.

He nods.

"Yeah, that's what I meant."

"My life hasn't been normal since my brother blew up his lab when I was seven." She's well aware of that.

"Ah, yeah. Ghosts, I can't help believing in, but an actual place beyond this one? I'm still a skeptic. Too many religions telling too many stories. Can't all be right"

"What? he asks again. "Why did your brother have a lab?"

He shrugs at that. To Iggy, the afterlife is just a fact. "That's fair," he says mildly. He's still more hung up on the lab thing anyway.

"He was a post-grad in applied physics, why wouldn't he have a lab?" Claudia asks in response, unable to stop from going immediately on the defensive.

"Oh. Well. How was I supposed to know that's a normal thing?" Iggy has never set for in a post-secondary science class in his life.

He frowns. "You weren't there at the time, were you? That sounds super traumatic."

"Researchers need labs. They minimize the damage when brothers blow themselves out of space-time with hubris," Claudia said, and no, she isn't backing down yet. "And yes, I was there. He was my guardian after our parents died. I didn't really have anywhere else to be. Well, not there, there, he left me with the professor after lying about what he was doing, and when we figured it out, it was too late."

"Took me twelve years to get him back."

Iggy listens. His eyebrows stay lifted and, armed with this new information he simply says, "Okay, you had a weird life, huh?"

Space-time? Hubris? He has no idea!

"Pretty sure normal is relative. You won't find them on my family tree," Claudia says, grinning a little at the horrible joke.

"What about you?"

He shrugs. "Me? No science labs or anything like that, no. I think I must be from the boring dimension."

He looks around the quad. "So you gonna just chill out here the rest of the day?"

"So, what, no family, no history, you just sprung fully formed from the ashes of that freaky train?"

She shrugs at his question. "At least as long as I'm feeling the music."

"Wouldn't you just shit if I did?" he asks with a grin. "My family isn't very exciting. Uhm. We're religious, I guess that's kinda weird - I was homeschooled until I was a teenager." A fact he blames his social awkwardness on.

"But no requests for overused songs, right."

"I'm not sure I wouldn't put it past this place," she says, honestly. "I can't really call religious weird, I mean, roughly a third or so of all Americans are."

She doesn't know what else to say. "I have a GED, so I can't exactly throw stones about schooling."

But as far as songs. "Any idiot can learn one song like that. As I said, I like the ones with meat."

Iggy shrugs. "Depends on the religion."

He grins again. "You're still a snob, but I respect that. I'll leave you to it, then. But I'll see you around."

mingle log | the quad and elsewhere | we were young and drinking (coffee) in the park

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