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[shootsharp]

MASK OR MENACE, HEROPA; floating in a most peculiar way.

[ The mood of the street changes when it begins to rain with a cheerful summery patter that is nevertheless relentless enough to cause a stir. Umbrellas bloom and raise. Footsteps quicken, and the open-sky mall clears of people as they change their trajectory for cover.

Except for Teddy Flood.

It's been some minutes. Water gathers between the crevices of the bricked ground he stands on, boots fixed in place, and rain strikes off the wide brim of his hat, finding a path to run and coming down at a intermittent trickle down his back. The flare of his jacket only barely protects where his conspicuous revolver hangs at his hip, because he's making no effort to do so. He's making no effort at all, still as a statue. Not even breathing.

His blue eyes seem both blank and focused on some mysterious point in the air, raised up, roughly towards where the city skyline looms up into the patchwork clouds above. He is midstep, one hand raised, his expression relaxed into inscrutable.

Some pause to take in the sight of him, as if judging whether or not this is some kind of street performance. Someone's shoved a five dollar note into his breast pocket. Others snap pictures.

Teddy doesn't notice, watching the sky. ]

MASK OR MENACE, NETWORK; the stars look very different today.

excuse me i seem to have fallen
off the beaten trail you wouldn't
happen to know which direction
lies sweetwater would you

MASK OR MENACE, HEROPA; planet earth is blue and there's nothing i can do.

[ Metal-shod hooves click and plod on wooden planks as Teddy slowly steers his horse across the boardwalk. He cuts a distinct figure amongst the beach-going Floridians, boots dusty, hat unironic, good form in his saddle and an openly carried gun at his hip. The novelty drags some glances his way, and he tips a nod to those nearer without too much in the way of conviction.

Because he is distracted.

A subtle redistribution of his weight in the saddle is enough to stop his horse from his slow meander to a halt as Teddy looks out over glittering blue ocean. After a moment, he swings his way out of his saddle, touching down with the subtle thump of boots on plank, the jingle-jangle of horse tack. Keeping leather reins wrapped over his knuckles, he moves closer to where wooden railing bars off the drop onto the yellow sand that stretches off into the frothy waves. ]

Comments

heropa.

[indocile]

( oh, no.

oh, no, no, no, no-- )

Teddy, ( with a worried sort of exasperation, conscious of how absolutely nothing she says now he's going to register in any useful way, ) not again.

( what does she even do with this. how did he come right the last time? where is catherine, catherine would probably know exactly what to do with a computer box person, there is probably - maybe it's like that time she saw someone jumpstart a car with another car??

margaux slowly types how does computer turn on again into her phone's search engine, jerking abruptly when she realises she's started leaning against teddy like he's a post to do it. )

[shootsharp]

[ Rain continues to patter and soak dusty grey suit even darker, and Margaux's lean only does not tip him over for virtue of the fact she's small, and while he doesn't tower over anyone, he's solidly built. Despite his preternatural stillness, when she leans, there's no robotic inflexibility. He is warm where he should be warm. Flesh and bone.

Seemingly. He doesn't blink, but maybe Margaux will when her phone suddenly stops working in her hand, shutting down, but rebooting when she hits the on switch.

In that moment-- ]

Margaux, [ Teddy says, angling aside from her. He squints, faint calibration, a flicking glance upwards. ] You'll catch a death out in this.

[indocile]

( blink, yes; she also makes a small noise of frustration and smacks it against her hand a couple of times before thinking to hit on, and - )

Oh, for the - you will catch something else, Mssr. Flood.

( catch these tiny hands, giving him a little shove that will probably not impact him any more than her leaning did, actually. )

How long have you been out here? What happened?

[shootsharp]

[ He obliges her in just a slight step backwards beneath her mock-assault, giving her what is very nearly a smile. It fixes in place at her questions, wheels turning behind his eyes, before he tips a look backwards, the way he came. ]

Not long, [ he says. If he's in any way disturbed by how she's found him, you couldn't tell from the way he speaks now. ] I came up from that tunnel [ he means the subway ] not a minute ago, and stopped to get my bearings.

[ He moves, then, to gently, contactlessly herd her out of the rain, the continual patter of which puts his teeth on edge. ]

[indocile]

( not so keen on standing in the rain too long, either, margaux allows herself to be herded towards somewhere drier, saying, )

I hope you got them to your satisfaction,

( a bit tartly, piqued by the entire experience and at least 75% of that pique on his behalf. 25% conceptually outraged by his characteristically stoic response to the entire affair. at least he's moving and making expressions and being exasperating again, though, she much prefers that -

sometimes she still wonders. did humans have people like this, at home? did they die? can they die? are they just still like teddy was, somewhere, waiting-- )

Where are you going? We. I am coming too!

( in case. in case of what?? in case. )

[shootsharp]

I was fixing for a drink.

[ Once under cover, he resumes an easy wander, and catches sight of the little fold of money in his jacket pocket. He pulls it out, smoothing it with his thumb.

Patient enough to have wandered this far from the Porter in search of a nice bar as a point of reference, he is patient still, and offers her the note. (She didn't even have to forcibly loot him!) ]

Where I was before, you can't swing a cat without hitting a saloon. Here, I'd be surprised if anywhere carries a decent whiskey.

[indocile]

( margaux's very automatic reaction to being handed money is to tuck it into her bra-strap; more to the point it is to accept it, rather than consider whether or not she should refuse. teddy knows his own business and how much money he can go handing out to pretty girls, probably, especially when the next purchase either of them is likely to make is apparently 'liquor'. )

They're all sort of new to me, ( conversationally, falling comfortably in step with him - albeit a quicker step, to keep up with the pace of his longer legs. ) The arrangements at home are very different.

( he would adapt there, too, she thinks. he is patient with the world in a way she is not, even if someone else decided he would be. )

I bet you another five dollars I can find you a decent whiskey.

[shootsharp]

Town saw a lot've newcomers too, [ Teddy says as they go, looking over storefronts, traffic, people. He has, necessarily, adapted to existing in this world too, but there's always some part of him that niggles. If he focuses on it for too long, well--

Margaux's already had to deal with that once. How much he absorbs is debateable, eyes ever so slightly glassy, sliding off some things in search of others. ]

And I'll take that bet, if you're buyin'.

[indocile]

If I'm buying, I want to ride on your shoulders if I win,

( immediately. how long has margaux been looking for an opening for this precise thing? possibly since they've met. it's not an impulse unique to teddy, to be fair, sort of the same impulse people who like climbing mountains have when they see a big one. )

[shootsharp]

[ To his credit, he's fairly sure that five whole dollars could buy the whole bar a round.

(No.)

Teddy looks askance at her proposal, a ripple of amusement in his own calm, quiet demeanour. ] They ride cowboys in place've horses where you're from too?

[ That didn't sound like refusal. More than one woman's probably made the same request of him in the past, even if he doesn't remember. ]

[indocile]

Save a horse, ( she says, glibly. whether she picked that up here, where she might've heard the actual song, or if the saying lingered at home - it absolutely does not matter nearly as much as her palpable glee at having that exchange with a real live (sort of) actual cowboy. )

Go on. It'll be fun. Also, you might be drunk and agreeable.

[shootsharp]

[ Whatever fault in his coding -- or whatever upgrade, depending on your perspective -- gives way to reverie and imaginings of lives lived, hen parties in which he carried many a small drunk and agreeable woman on his bare shoulders somehow do not take such a hold as to interfere with the moment now. His smile is modest and sharp at the corners. ]

Then you best ask me when I'm drunk and agreeable, [ he counters. ]

[indocile]

All right, then, ( all loose-limbed insouciance, bouncing ahead and walking backwards in front of him, thumbs in the belt-loops of plum coloured trousers, ) I will.

Saying yes to things makes life interesting, you know, Teddy.

( saying yes to margaux will probably do it, for sure. )

[shootsharp]

I suppose so. But I reckon boring's got its charms.

[ What other people might class as boring, anyway. Silences before sunset, drinking alone, the wild west rolling out its golden carpet out the window of his train into Sweetwater. ]

Not that I expect a lively young woman such as yourself to agree on that score.