open ♪ little shine

[chosenfake]

Date & Time: June 1st, late afternoon.
Location: An unnamed bakery in the main part of town.
Characters: Luke (chosenfake) and maybe you!
Summary: Luke is shopping for sweet things. Nothing life-changing. Luke will not be getting sick or transferring it to others if you're worried.
Warnings: None, unless you're diabetic.


[Luke spends some time studying the window outside the bakery. He's not sure what he has in mind. Despite his noble upbringing, he never really paid much attention to what kind of sweets were what, and that's coming back to haunt him now. He remembers Tear's cake, though, and it makes him a little nostalgic. He folds up his umbrella and goes inside.

For anyone with a similar amount of self-control, he can be found browsing the cases and shelves, torn between fruit tarts or chocolate-covered confections. There's normal bread, too, but that's not why he's here.]

That one would probably go good with tea...

[Man, it all looks delicious. Maybe he'll grab that layered coffee and chocolate cake for Asch. He seems like that kind of person.]

Comments

where there are cookies there is this dude. hello.

[curatesecrets]

[Artie, meanwhile, is all about the cookies. he's squinting at the racks, however. as delicious as everything looks, he can't help but be mildly dismayed.]

No oatmeal scotchies?

OOOoooh

[chosenfake]

[Luke blinks and looks at the older man.]

What's a scotchie?

[curatesecrets]

[Artie glances over and smiles a little] Oatmeal scotchies? They're oatmeal cookies with butterscotch chips in them instead of chocolate - and, incidentally, my favorite. Maybe they just don't have all the ingredients, here, though.

[he frowns, thoughtfully] I know a lot of things are hard to come by.

[chosenfake]

Huh, that sounds really good. There's more kinds of chips over there. [He points to the other side of the shop, where there's chocolate drops and things like that.] I bet we could make something with them.

[curatesecrets]

They are, they're phenomenal. That's not the only thing we'd need, though. We need sugar and brown sugar and butter -- [he sighs] Not the kind of things that you can find easy around here. Unless you know where we can find some...

[he stops] Annnnd I'm rambling. I should probably at least introduce myself. [holding out a hand, he offers a sheepish smile] Artie Nielsen. Been here about a month.

[chosenfake]

We have more of that than you'd think. The last time I was sent on a mission, there were food stores everywhere, so... I grabbed some stuff. The Initiative doesn't seem to have any trouble getting things, but... that's different.

[And strange. Luke is rambling too, though, and the introduction snaps him out of it. He takes the offered hand and shakes it with a grin of his own.]

I'm Luke. It's nice to meet you, Artie. I've been here... twelve weeks. That's two months on my world, but I think it's longer here.

[curatesecrets]

Thanks, Luke. [he smiles, looking around the bakery with slightly fresher eyes] So - wait, lemme get this straight - we can bring things back from the places they send us?

[chosenfake]

Yep! As long as you're not trying to take a piece of history or something. No one's gonna miss a bag of sugar.

... At least, no one's approached me about it yet.

[A little nervous laugh.]

[curatesecrets]

Well, for both our sakes, I hope you're right, because that is an excellent idea. Hopefully next time they send us somewhere with a Hy-Vee or something.

In the meantime ... [his eyes rove over the baked goods again, and he smiles] What would you recommend?

[chosenfake]

Hy-Vee? What's that?

[The way Artie's eyes sparkle makes Luke grin.] The little ca-rollies or whatever they're called-- those are really good. But nothing beats a cake.

[curatesecrets]

It's a chain of grocery stores, in my world. They sell just about everything you'd need to cook food.

They have cannoli? Oh, I'll definitely need at least two of those. Claudia would love one.

[chosenfake]

Is your world... Earth? This is supposed to be Earth, too. So maybe there's Hy-Vees in the past somewhere, or something similar.

[He should buy more. They're delicious. Luke grins a bit.]

Cannoli! That's it.

[curatesecrets]

Something similar, at the least. In the United States, there are different store chains depending upon which part of the country you're in.

... What flavor are the best? You're the expert, here. [he hovers over the case of cannoli, deliberating]

[chosenfake]

All the towns I've been in have maybe one or two places that sell the same thing. I can't imagine sticking a whole bunch of them next to each other. [Haha, he's thinking literal chaining.]

Hmm... [Luke leans in from the side, considering.] I think the strawberry ones are my favorite. They don't taste like they're fake, unlike a lot of the food I've had while living here.

[curatesecrets]

Oh - [Artie chuckles as he tries to catch a clerk's attention, so they can buy some cannons]. Not that sort of chain, it.... It's a word that means there are a series of stores in different locations, all owned by the same company. Chains were invented so that no matter where people were, they could get the same products at the same level of quality and price.

[chosenfake]

Oh... that makes sense. So it's like if stores were ran by the same family.

[Luke is a bit more established than Artie, and he's good conversation, so he jumps in and offers to pay with a tiny smile.]

I'll have the vanilla and chocolate cake in the corner, too.

[curatesecrets]

That's how a lot of them actually started, yes. [he smiles, then blinks in surprise as Luke pays]

You - you don't have to do that, you know. I - I have money...!

[chosenfake]

[Luke flashes Artie a grin.]

Don't worry about it. I've been here longer, so I have money saved up. [He hands Artie the little bag of cannoli, then takes the cake box underneath his arm.]

[curatesecrets]

Thank you, that's very generous of you. I'll have to return the favor someday soon. [he takes the bag and allows himself a brief moment of "omg pastry", sniffing the contents with relish]. Where do you live? In the apartments?

[chosenfake]

[Luke shakes his head.]

I did, but then some kind of airship crashed into the apartments so I kinda had to move out. Me and Asch live above an empty restaurant now. It's south of here.

[curatesecrets]

Oh! I heard about that - the rocket. [he's suddenly even more animated, nodding rapidly] I actually arrived right before they opened the apartments up again - spent my first night here in a tent, it was all pretty disorienting.