etrayalogs | December Library Catch-All [ OPEN ]

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December Library Catch-All [ OPEN ]

WHO: John, Harold, and anyone who might find themselves at the Library
WHEN: December
WHERE: The Library!
WHAT: The Library is here and open to all! Come borrow books, find a comfy chair to relax in, or snoop around.
NOTES\WARNINGS: Will be added as they come up

The Library is a five-story neoclassical building of terra cotta, brick, and stone. And the inside is, in fact, a library! And rather clean and organized too. There's no dust, no muddy footprints (apart from your own), and all the shelves are organized by Dewey Decimal, subject, and author. All literature is something you might find in a 2010 New York City library: various forms of fiction, children's and teens' sections, history, science, cooking, gardening, the list goes on. There's even small sections of audiobooks on compact disks and of DVDs ranging from old classics to history shows. The first floor has a reading/study room, a comfortable space with deep armchairs and tables with chairs; the fifth floor has some smaller tables clustered under a skylight. Part of the second floor is abruptly closed off by a door with a biometric scanner that denies entry to anyone who isn't John Reese or Harold Finch; the walls surrounding this section are soundproofed, so even a keen listener won't hear anything from inside. Otherwise, it's a perfectly normal library!

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[ Shock of all shocks, when a blanket is gently laid upon him, Riz doesn't stir a bit. Maybe he needed the sleep more than he thought, lost for once not in the torment of a nightmare, but a peaceful, dreamless slumber, as though he'd simply fallen asleep at his desk or on the couch back home. The sensory memory of it all, of worn furniture and a drafty room, of dim lighting and of quiet, is so strong that once he does return to wakefulness, there's a moment where he forgets himself.

He's not here in Etraya. He's home where he belongs, family photographs hanging on the walls, loved secondhand books perched upon thrifted bookshelves, the familiar creaking of Strongtower Luxury Apartments a blanket of sound around him, and most importantly... ]

Ma...?

[ He's woken up like this a hundred times. Who else would make sure he's warm while he sleeps? Who else wakes him with a warm smile, a kind voice ringing out, hey kiddo, wanna try sleeping in a bed for once?

And then reality sets in as he glances down at the unfamiliar blanket and someone who is absolutely not his mother is seated right across from him. He grimaces, tugging his knees closer to his chest as he colours in embarrassment, most prominent at the tips of those long ears of his where the green of his skin isn't quite so vibrant, tinged with scarlet. ]

Oh, shit, uh --

[ He clears his throat. He's lost all credibility. He's never going to pass as an experienced adventurer if he goes around falling asleep and calling for his Mommy. ]

I didn't mean to fall asleep here, [ he mumbles, rubbing some sleep out of his eye. ]

[ John has seen his fair share of soldiers crash out only to wake up disoriented about where they are, so he doesn't react at all to Riz's sleepy question apart from looking up from his book. That and the embarrassment really drive home the fact that he's just a kid, even if he's learning all sorts of dangerous things at his academy. ]

There's no rule saying you can't sleep at the library. It's a safe place.

[ It's a safe place because John enforces that, but he doesn't need to mention that. ]

That's not...

[ Riz's eyes dart to the side. That's not the biggest problem. The biggest problem was that being caught lacking in public and then calling some guy Mom is deeply, horrendously embarrassing not only on a professional level, but also on a natural, normal teenaged level. It's the sort of thing you do once in fourth grade and then never again.

He grimaces. ]

I think it's kind of a stretch to call any place around here safe, [ he counters. ] But especially not public buildings like this one. This isn't really -- this isn't what I do.

[ Let his guard down. Sleep in public. Sleep in general, actually. He should have at least only fallen asleep around someone else that had his back.

Though in a funny way, he supposes he did; though he doesn't know John well enough to trust him, he certainly has no reason to believe he'd get anything out of attacking some random kid in the library. ]

[ That's a fair counterpoint. He doesn't have any reason to trust John, and John can't blame him considering he only trusts Harold. All he has is John's word that the library is safe, which isn't much. ]

Do you want me to wake you up next time?

[ He really would rather let a kid who needs to sleep, well, sleep, but he also respects the fact that Riz seems shaken up by the whole thing. He's not about to force the kid to do something that makes him so obviously uncomfortable. ]

I -- I mean, yeah, but there won't be a next time. This is not normal for me. Ask anyone.

[ Not that many people here know him well enough to know his predilection for just not sleeping whatsoever. But at the very least, Fabian and Gorgug alike are well acquainted with Riz's tendency to stave off sleep as long as possible. And after everything that happened with the nightmare cat...

Well, sleeping publicly is even stranger for him. ]

So there won't be a next time. This place is just really cozy, I guess. Not like the rest of Etraya.

[ He's not going to press the point. Riz seems very much against the idea of taking a nap, or at least one in the library. John can get the point. ]

That's because it's not from Etraya. [ Normally he wouldn't say more, but this is Riz. They've talked enough that John knows he'll only have more questions, so he pre-emptively answers at least one of them. ] It's from my world, Finch and I know the building.

It's from your world? That makes sense. [ He runs a hand down the worn material of the couch, the fabric having pilled with the number of people who had sat exactly where Riz is seated. Now that he's calming down, a part of him is settling again, sinking back into the atmosphere of a place quite unlike anywhere else in Etraya. ]

It actually feels like people actually lived here. Everything else around here is so... clean. I didn't realize how much I missed that.

[ Which usually isn't an indictment. But to Riz, with his hand-me-down clothes and his thrifted furniture and his creaky old building, he'd missed signs of people, signs of life. ]

Did you and Mr. Finch come here often?

[ Is John actually a big reader? ]

Are you saying I don't do a good job of cleaning this place?

[ John's usually stoic face doesn't change much, maybe a hint of raised eyebrows, but there's a skeptical tone to his voice that makes it clear he's making a joke. Or at least attempting to. But he does understand what Riz is saying, about it feeling lived in, and it's not because they live on the second floor; there's signs of the Library's life from before it was shuttered and Harold put it into limbo.

As for Riz's question, John doesn't address it directly, but he thinks Riz will infer the answer based on what John did say: he comes here often enough that he's in charge of keeping it clean, and it is clean. Shelves are dusted, floors are mopped, chairs at the tables are pushed in, there's no books laying around except what they have out with them. ]

Honestly, I assumed the robots did it. They clean up everything else.

[ Is this a place where they could reasonably bar access from the helper bots? That would be nice. Even if they aren't bad - and Gorgug certainly likes them a lot - they're a symbol of someone or something else, and they feel as though they don't belong in a place like this. ]

But I actually meant -- did you come here often back home? Back when this wasn't, like, a little slice of home and it was just another library. [ He pauses, then amends: ] Well, not just another library. It's huge! [ A longing sigh. ] I'm super jealous. I wish we had one this big in my hometown.

[ Turns out Elmville Public Library pales in comparison to one belonging to a major city. Who'd have thunk it! ]

[ John had shoo'd the robots away when they tried to come in. He would agree with Riz that they don't belong here. This is his home, he doesn't need them invading it. ]

We worked out of here. It was abandoned. We cleaned it up when it arrived here and opened it up for everyone to use. This place could use a large library.

[ It's a personal detail he hasn't told anyone else, but he feels. Soft, towards Riz. He's a good kid. John likes kids like him. ]

You guys used an abandoned library as a home base?! Ugh, that's so cool.

[ Riz and the Bad Kids may have a hollowed out (albeit fully functional) pirate ship as a homebase which is objectively cooler, but in Riz's little mind, an abandoned library is so, so, so much better. It's the sort of shit that any Rogue worth their salt could only dream of. So many hidey holes, so many resources, so many books... ]

It's nice of you guys to share it. I don't know if I would, [ Riz says in absolute earnestness. For all that it was not an active choice on John's part, Riz has begun to see this guy as very mysterious, but very cool -- a paranoid gunslinger on some sort of awesome mission with a mysterious partner (benefactor? Mr. Finch's suits are swanky), with a (secret?) team, working out of a library...

He's living the dream. That's exactly what Riz wants his life to look like. ]

Are you ever gonna tell me what it is that you guys do together? You and the rest of your team, [ he says, swinging for a clue or two. ] It all seems very secret, but you can't give a guy a business card like that and expect him not to be curious.

[ John is not used to being "cool". More often than not their numbers only reluctantly come around in the end, they're busy having their lives turned upside down in some way. John doesn't think he is cool, but Riz is a strange kid. It shouldn't surprise John at all.

And that's right, Harold did give Riz a business card. Well, they have their bonding over suits and Harold likes to encourage people like that. ]

Like I said before, we help people. Maybe they're in a difficult situation and we get them out of it.

[ That's probably not a very satisfying answer for a kid like Riz, who seems endlessly inquisitive, but John will answer (most) questions he has right now. But he's not one for long speeches and he thinks the kid will want to ask his own questions in his own way. ]

You 'help' people - [ it's not that Riz doubts that's exactly what they do, but those quotation marks seem to audibly thud into place at the ambiguity of this help ] - and you've got an entire secret base to do it from? [ He's now seated cross-legged on the chair, but his foot impatiently jiggles at the ankle, as though tapping steadily against some imaginary floor. ] It sounds like there must be more than just you and Mr. Finch working together. And it's obviously clandestine, like...

[ Like what Riz is doing, if he takes them at face value. Which he doesn't (he doesn't take anyone at face value, barely even himself), but the similarities are there. Although he'd never had the chance to get started, this is the same thing he's signed up for: to do tasks that benefit the greater good underneath the cover of spywork, paid in nothing but good wishes and the sensation of being a little bit closer to his Dad. ]

Spies for good? [ He arches a brow at him. ] What's an example of your do-goodery?

[ He doesn't want to give too much about the numbers away, but he thinks it's okay to give Riz a slight hint at what they do. Just a glimpse. ]

There was a man steeling money from veterans and we were able to prove he was doing it and reinvest the money in reputable charities for veterans.

[ Of course, that's not the half of it. There was a lot of breaking and entering, Harold hacking a prosthetic arm, blowing a hole in the bank floor while a train was passing to cover the noise, and a shootout with some goons. Plus John got arrested by the FBI. Still, a good number.

Spies for good is a nice summary, though. ]

[ Riz holds John's attention, John's gaze, unblinking as he focuses on what's being said and what isn't being said. ]

If you did it through legal means, the outcome would be different, [ he says instead, like a light bulb has gone off in his mind. It's not that he'd thought that they were doing things entirely legally in the first place, given that they have a secret hide-out, given that they're secretive, given that government agencies usually don't have any organizations in which they categorize themselves by their willingness to 'help' people.

Probably. Their worlds are very different. It would be wrong for him to assume that their governments would be in any way the same when their worlds clearly aren't. ]

The money, I mean. The investments. That's not really the sort of thing the government does. [ He tilts his head. ] Do you have a partnership with them, or did you just tip them off for the arrest?

[ He assumes that's what John means when he says that they proved it, or else the proof is more or less negligible. ]

[ John can practically see the gears turning in Riz's head. He seems like the kind who likes to work things out, read between the lines. John will have to be careful how much he gives away, but he doesn't mind Riz figuring out that much. ]

No formal partnership. We're independent, though we have some connections. And you're right, we took care of the money ourselves. There one day, gone the next.

[ That's what Harold is good at. ]

Connections...

[ Riz rolls the word around in his mouth. John is ex-something. Ex-military? Ex-espionage? Ex-police? It's clear in the way he speaks, the way he walks, the way that he can be so firm and unforgiving with his words. Not in a bad way, he thinks, in the privacy of his own mind, but in the way of someone so accustomed to bluntness that he rarely tempers his words.

Are they John's connections? Mr. Finch's? Or someone else's entirely? He drums his fingers against the armrest of his chair. ]

I see. Off the book, but you've got official ties that might appreciate a little, um, vigilante work from time to time. [ He tilts his head contemplatively. ] The money stuff -- that's Mr. Finch, right? He's a guy who's used to dealing with money.

[ To clarify, he adds: ]

His suit is very, very well-tailored.

[ It's the first thing he'd noticed. That, and the limp. ]

[ Of course Riz would notice the suit, given his own clothing of choice. John thinks that he and Harold would get along nicely if they talked more. ]

Finch handles the back of house things. He's good at it.

[ Very good at it. John trusts Harold without question. Harold has never let him down, John's various mistakes and missteps are his own. But John doesn't directly address the rest of what Riz says, lets it go uncommented. He's quite right, though Carter sometimes disapproves with their way of doing things, and both she and Fusco grumble about how they cavalierly treat their positions as detectives. ]

So that's money, and... other things that can be handled outside of the hot seat.

[ He shoots an amused grin John's way, realizing that he's being intentionally vague, and also knowing that he's unlikely to get all of the specifics out of the man. He and Mr. Finch are close and while Riz is happy enough to spill his own secrets if need be, he knows he'd never spill the secrets of any of his friends. ]

...I don't think it's a coincidence that the two of you were brought here together.

[ They make a good team. They are a good team. It's going on three years they've been together now and there's been hardly a day when they're not in constant communication, when he doesn't have Harold in his ear, watching his every move.

It was bad when he arrived and hadn't found Harold yet. John is immensely relieved and comforted by Harold being here with him. ]

You think Echo was nice enough to do that?

Nice? No. I don't think nice has anything to do with it. But I think effectiveness might. I've noticed that people seem to come here in groups of people they already know, even if that's kind of -- statistically improbable? [ He looks down at his hands, moving them as though he's pointing things out on a board. Which he is, just only in his mind; he knows his primary clue board by heart now. He's not even aware he's doing it. ]

They're also not choosing the best of the best when it comes to combat or intelligence and stuff. But what they do seem to be gunning for is finding people that work really, really well together. The mutants who trained in that compound together, the superheroes, my group, and... [ He jabs one pointy finger in John's direction. ] The two of you. Not just individuals. Teams.

[ That's good information, and clever thinking. John can tell that Riz has put thought into this, and he knows Riz is a thinker. He might be young but he's shown to have a solid head on his shoulders. ]

If only we knew the criteria we were being judged on. It's one thing to make a connection like that and another thing to know how to use it. Is being a team important somehow? But that would probably defeat the purpose of this whole setup.

[ If he knew, if only he knew, he'd be able to play his role. ]

I don't know. Some people come without having any friends by their side, and others seem to have practically a dozen people or more from their own world, [ Riz says, stroking his chin. ] But the ones who have more people from their own worlds seem to be more... dysfunctional. Like people who need to be taught how to work together, rather than people who naturally work together in the first place.

[ There's the superheroes, who seem to have different philosophies on their homes and jobs. And then there's people from Krouse's world, all of which are sharp as a tack and stronger than they appear, but consistently and constantly at-odds with each other. But if they could learn how to work together, he thinks, they could have been nigh unstoppable.

None of it fits perfectly. All he can do is focus on the things that do fit. ]

...we haven't been given any way to actually, tangibly help our worlds. Do you think that it's down to judgment? Like, which people they think are most worthy? Maybe our ability to get along with each other influences that. Or maybe they want to see how far they can stretch our bonds before they break. Stress testing, you know?

[ It's all just spitballing, really. He wishes he had more. ]

...but they want us to get along with each other too, I think. Or to show that we can, even when circumstances are, um. Sub-optimal?

[ Too many possibilities, not enough information. ]

Being judged on worthiness is a double sided coin. We could be worthy if we learn how to get along and band together, or we could be worthy if we're able to betray each other at a later date. There's no saying which it will be until the moment comes. Given the lack of communication so far, I don't think we'll ever know.

[ Some people will do one, other people will do the other. It'll be a test no matter what. ]

But I agree that for now we're supposed to get along.

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December Library Catch-All [ OPEN ]

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