exsiliumlogs | Just how far would you like to run

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Just how far would you like to run

Date & Time: 9/10 + 1:30pm. Hottest time of the day in the desert. Enjoy.
Location: Cairo, Egypt
Characters: Chloe Frazer, Charlie Cutter
Summary: Get in, steal some ancient, sacred artifacts pertaining to the Book of the Dead and a couple of spare canopic jars, party hard and start some trouble.
Warnings: Extreme stupidity

When the swirl of dust from displacement settles along with the slight nausea rolling around at the lowest point of her stomach-- when Chloe shakes off the memory of exsilium under the heat of midday sun on her skin-- making the leap from future to past is routine enough these days that she skips the shock and awe, moving to give both herself and her surroundings a quick, efficient evaluation. They're not far off from the city (Cairo, according to the briefing) but the distance serves as a decent enough buffer as the pair get their bearings.

Better than being shoved feet-first into over crowded streets, in her opinion.

"Jesus, Charlie." She's halfway through patting down the almost too-taut fabric of her Initiative-donated linen dress by the time he finally grabs her attention. "You've got hair."

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Charlie makes a low noise, taps Initiative-issued wristwatch (currently disguised as a heavy bangle). "Handy to have a translator on hand as well." Means it'll be easier to get a solid meal at any rate. Cons he can run without the common denominator of language. Clarifying what sort of meat something's made with? Harder to gauge without it.

There are men at the gates, but getting into the city isn't an issue. The press of bodies is immediate though and Charlie falls back: a half step behind her. He's a big man and people get out of his way, but he'd much rather have her walking in front of him until-- "There." Charlie taps her shoulder, motioning to a narrow side street crowded with merchants.

As if Chloe's about to get picky with her meals.

The turn off's immediate and sharp once he taps her; Chloe breaks away from the din to duck down into that narrow passageway, sheltered from the searing sun by buildings and strung fabric. "You're really planning on doing the talking, are you?"

"Well if you'd rather do it yourself--" Charlie ducks his way through the side street market, feeling painfully conspicuous as they go until finally ducking in under an awning smelling strongly of some kind of roasted meat.

From there he doesn't give her much of a choice, shouldering his way through to secure them some form of lunch. By the time he gets back to her, passing off a small loaf of dense bread and a very small piece of what was probably chicken, he seems well enough in his element. One foreign market place is much like another, radical timeline difference or no.

"Pretty sure I just got ripped off."

"Looking like that, I'm sure you did." Which is a light dig, but it's also true: the man is quite literally the 1300s definition of 'tourist'. Chloe slips over to lean under the shade of a nearby wall while she picks at her meal. "You know we're practically senior citizens here. Going to make it bloody impossibly to charm my way into landing us a place to stay."

"Old, unmarried, hanging about with a bloody Roman?" He cocks an eyebrow at her, taking a bite from his own bit of bread. "Pretty sure that first one's the last of your problems, m'dear."

It's crowded, loud, but strangely familiar. Hell of a lot more like normal than a bombed out cityscape. "We'll work something out. It's only a few days - we can make a few promises we've no intention of keeping."

And she laughs at that-- grins wide enough to flash teeth as she chews. "I love it when you talk dirty."

Even tucked away in a narrow offshoot of the main road, the streets are alive with an all too familiar sort of energy: travelers and merchants, locals chatting over a bite and a beer, swapping stories or playing games. Some trips feel like time travel, others (like this one) just don't beyond fashion.

"Hard to believe, isn't it?" Chloe asks without context, fingernails picking at the tattered bread crust.

Edited (boo double icons!!!111) 2013-10-03 08:53 (UTC)

If he wasn't feeling smug before, that's enough to do it. Charlie settles in the shadow of the wall, all easy angles and a gratuitous self-satisfied grin.

And the meat in his fingers is greasy, but pairs wells with the bread. They're working a job, as close to running their own gig as they've been in-- well, a year come to think of it. Out of the sun with a proper sort of lunch, the bustle of people and the possibility of something exciting around the corner... Well, sure. Hard to believe, but hard not to be a little satisfied with it all too.

"I know," he says. "I haven't tasted bread this good in ages either."

She'll buy them a proper sign once they get back.

"Mm. Almost forgot." It's an absent remark, spat out as her fingers are licked clean. "Your anniversary's next month, yeah?"

"End of this one actually," he says breezily, faux or otherwise, though he'll be damned if he knows the date. Those first few days hadn't exactly been a smooth transition. The nearest way to pinpoint it would be to go digging back through the network archives, sort out when the bombings had been-- but to be honest, he hadn't been keen to look. Hasn't seen the point in numbering his days.

"I take it you haven't been planning a extravagant party for me then?"

She takes the correction well (if she takes it at all) slipping a freshly cleaned finger beneath the inside of his cuff and using it as a lead to tug him away from the alley wall. Once Chloe's certain he'll follow along behind, he's set loose. "If I ever do, you have my permission to shoot me."

"Noted."

From here, Charlie's content to let her lead. They'd been given the bare bones information before setting out for Cairo - the location of the scrolls they'd been sent to destroy, some rudimentary overview of culture and customs (very little of it new) but apparently no map had survived the thousands of years between here and the lonely prison island clawing for its foothold in the future. And Christ if it wasn't a big city. If they're going to get lost in it, he might as well be able to swear that he isn't responsible.

Which is usually what it all boils down to: one or the other steering the both of them off into trouble. Swapping liability just means the pair of them only look partially incompetent in equal amounts when things go sour versus wholly incompetent on the regular.

And finding a tavern worth flashing metal for takes practically no time at all, but finding one willing to do business with a pair as out of place as they are without the addition of a few less than welcoming stares costs them the better part of their day; Chloe doesn't feel the cool press of carefully woven mats against her skin till evening, or the smell of incense and sweet wine. (Also overwhelming perfume with a hint of body odor, but she's smelled worse.) They've a room near the main hall, first-- and only-- floor, where the low, rumbling din of regular patrons going about their business could match the angry rattling of a busted AC unit.

Sprawled out across bedding, pitcher of beer within reach, she supposes it's pretty damn comfortable. Aside from the ache in her heels, of course. Nothing a long rest can't cure.

On the plus side, the long day on their feet has meant learning at least a few of the major thoroughfares - making some mental notes about landmarks and talking to enough of the local color to know that getting information out of anyone with a face like his is going to be like pulling teeth. Still, they'd at least gotten an idea of which district the temple they were after might be found in, if not an exact location. It was as good a place to start as any, though a slow one. Tomorrow would mean more leg work, literally and figuratively, if they wanted to run the Initiative-assigned mission in the early hours of their third day on the ground and still have time leftover for their own work.

Sitting near her feet, one leg pulled up and chin hovering near his knee, Charlie carefully skims through the offline data stored on his tablet. It's not something he can flash about during the day, but in the confines of the room where no one might see it, he finds himself gravitating back to it - paging through the information he's stored and making note of the things that aren't there yet. It's a poor substitute for a proper journal, but as close as he's likely to get to one for the time being.

"Oi." Her foot finds his hand, nudging at his wrist with her toes as a way of interrupting his work. Planning a job's fine. Knowing the details? Undeniably important. But there's a point where things turn more habit than necessity, (something she's all too familiar with)and nothing on that softly glowing screen could possibly offer him more insight than the city surrounding them both.

Besides, it sucks competing with a screen.

"Read your porn later."

It earns her a low noise, a gentle swatting at her ankles, but he gives over after a minute or two: shuts the tablet down, folds it over and smuggles it back into his satchel before leaning over. He pats her high on the thigh, good natured enough, on the way to reaching for the pitcher of beer.

"Probably ought to see if we can get a lift tomorrow - save us an hour or two of walking there and back."

"Uh-huh." That Chloe lazily slides the pitcher back (she is, after all, closer in proximity) as he moves to take it is less malicious than it might seem despite having interrupted him once before already. They're off to a good start: better if he doesn't ruin it with overthinking or a tightly wound schedule.

Christ, the people here don't even have alarm systems-- they could easily laugh their way to those scrolls and be perfectly safe. Probably.

"What? Devil's in the details, bright eyes." He leans farther, managing to avoid tangling with her as he plucks up the pitcher. If they're running a job, they might as well pretend to work. He likes the details, the planning, the minutiae. "Now be a dear and pass me that cup, would you?"

There's only a brief pause as she feigns at mulling over his request, telling grin fixed firmly in place before the brass cup's pressed hard against his palm. "The devil's in this bedroom, darling, and she doesn't mind so long as you're planning on paying attention to her at some point."

Ah. There's a knowing quirk to his eyebrow as he accepts the cup and pours some of the thick, frothy beer from the pitcher. "Well--" A brief sip and it tastes better than any lager he's had for months; makes the home brew on the island taste even more like piss. "--suppose there's no harm in being thorough."

After a long pull from the brass cup, he sets it and the pitcher on the floor.

"Not much." Mild correction snuck in as she steals a few sips from her own cup. There's no segue at all when Chloe asks, settling back on her forearm for leverage, "Good, isn't it?"

"Well it's not the worst thing I've tasted, that's for damned sure. Now make some space."

With a gentle slap to her calves so she'll draw her legs up for a moment, he slides back across the bedding so he can sit against the wall - can feel the low vibration of noise from the main hall through it. Settled, he pulls her legs easily into his lap. Pinches her just above the knee. "Suppose we couldn't make it a rule to only fetch things for people from time periods with a certain level of hedonism to them, could we?"

She curls her legs across the top of his, angling her calves down against his side. What she intends is to tug him closer; what she gets is a quick reminder of just how much the bastard weighs when she winds up pulling herself in on him instead.

Oh well. Same outcome, why bother complaining.

"You mean that wasn't one of our rules already? I must be slipping."

"I'll add it to the employee handbook once we've made it back then." He's grinning, easy and pleased as punch as she reels herself in against him. Running his hand lazily up from her knee, he adds: "Come to think of it, I wouldn't say no to modifying the dress code either."

And it's all silliness, but daft in the same vein that Morocco or Vienna or San Salvador had been. Same low light, only here it's not because the shades of the lamps are all dirty or the fluorescent light in the washroom's gone out. The same murmur of strangers a few walls away, the taste of beer still on his tongue, the gritty feeling to his own skin from a day spent in the sun.

Could be worse.

"No, no." One more solid break in the conversation hits as Chloe downs the last of her cup, pauses to catch the nostalgia of it all that's swallowed alongside a dose of choice lager. It's a casual pause, and it's intended to be-- fingertips settling on the cloth wrapped round his waist. "This I could get used to."

"--minus the sunburn."

He makes a low noise, grumbling as he catches her wrist in a grip that isn't rough, but is nowhere near gentle. "I'll show you a bloody sunburn," he says, as if it's a collection of words that have any meaning outside their intonation, while he leans down to her. Bumps foreheads and noses before kissing her plainly.

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