ataraxionlogs | Well, let's make this official.

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Well, let's make this official.

CHARACTERS: Clive Dove and hopefully various other people, otherwise this log is a lonely log.
LOCATION: One of the lounges in the Passenger Quarters.
WARNINGS: Probable puzzles at some point. Canon hazard plus owning a big book of puzzles.
SUMMARY: It's the probable prelude to a Poker/Go Fish/Blackjack/War/etc night with some tacos.
NOTES: I'm just gonna put it up here 'stead of at the bottom. Brackets and prose are both awesome, and you know what else I'm fond of? Threadjacking and three person threads. (Though ask the other person before cutting in, but assume this is my cart blanche way of saying I'm good with it.)

He knew, from experience, that he tended to think best while multitasking, that his greatest bursts of inspiration tended to come while he was preoccupied musing about clockwork and gears, brooding over the wording of an article, or just contemplating a silly riddle.

The Tranquility lacked pretty much every last one of Clive's usual distractions. (It had a number of different distractions to make up for it, he supposed, but that didn't help if the 'distractions' were what he wanted to be distracted from.) What he had to work with: matches and a deck of cards.

The former was of little use in this regard. And so it was that Clive Dove was sitting in one of the lounges and attempting to shuffle with one hand. It beat trying to build a card castle. He knew the fundamentals, it was just proving to be more difficult than he-...

Ah. Clive made a slight noise of surprise and annoyance (not a scream or anything, but reasonably audible), an 'ah' or 'oh' as the cards spilled forth, probably around the same time someone was passing by, as the cards (again) slipped out of his hand and he had a round of 52 pick-up to play.

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Asato was passing at the time the cards slipped from Clive's hand. He stopped and turned, looking from the pile of cards to their owner, then down again. At the time, he'd been foraging for some food to bring back to his own room, but he was beginning to think it might be time to try and find people he could rely on, too. The whole 'being in space' thing didn't sit well at all with a creature as terrestrial as a ribika like himself.

He stopped and gathered up the cards, handing them back to Clive in a stack that, overall, could've been neater. While doing so, he chanced a glance at what was actually on them, but the symbols were foreign to him, or at least their purpose was.

"Are you casting spells?"

He took the cards with gratitude: picking them up once more didn't exactly appeal to him, and so the stranger's help was very much appreciated. "Nothing of the sort," he said reflexively with a bit of a laugh...which stilled as he thought about what was actually said, took a long look at the other man, and realized... "You're serious, aren't you. You come from a world with actual magic?"

It seemed nonsensical, impossible, but up until recently so did space travel and spaceships.

He nodded a few times because yes, that's exactly right. "Actual magic, yeah. But you weren't doing that?" He looked back down to the cards with that same curiously puzzled expression. What they could be for otherwise was beyond him.

"Magic isn't real; don't be ridic, dudes!" And the familiar, yet irritating voice of America is heard. It's apt to just appear like this and be all loud and whatever cause he's motherfucking America and he does what he wants, no shits given.

He adjusts his glasses, grinning ear to ear as he approaches the two, his little alien sidekick thing following close behind. Standing next to Asato, he grins broadly, curling his fingers for a brofist.

"SUP SIDE-KICK DUDE. How's it hanging? Knock me some skin, soul brother," he insists, keeping his fingers curled as he awaits for Asato to slide him some skin or something. He glances at Clive, brows arching.

"Hey, were you that puzzle dude that had the deck of the cards? From Britain, right?"

"Magic is--" But he stopped, recognizing that voice. America! His ears perked up and his tail began to swish back and forth eagerly.

The extended fist...confused him, though. Knock some skin? He patted and lightly slapped over America's fist a few times, looking to him for some kind of confirmation that that had been the proper response. Eventually he thought to copy the act too and see what that did, so he bumped his own fist against America's. He couldn't think of any other response that could be appropriate in any way.

"America, what's he doing?" Talking about Clive while the other was right there. Etiquette, how does that work?

Edited 2011-12-19 03:44 (UTC)

America watched Asato pat his hand, hit it, whatever. He sort of gave Asato a flat stare, and then he finally got it. Good job. You passed brofist orientation; let him show you something else.

"Hahaha! You got it, man. Check it, if you do this--" He pounds the side of his fist against his hand, "--it makes a turkey! Gobblegobblegobble! It's like if a brofist and a high five had a baby."

He then puts his attention on Clive. America had no idea what etiquette was or social skills for that matter. His lips purse.

"Easy! He's playing 52 pick up and being British, duh! I always hated that game; but I always make England play it whenever we have a deck of cards. It drives him shitty insane, haha."

Asato just gave an excited little "Ah!" at that. Easily entertained? Definitely. He was still a child at heart, after all.

"52 pick up? British?" Keeping his eyes on the cards, he leaned down a little, then cast his glance back up to Clive. It sounded less threatening than magic, so that was a start. Maybe it was just another one of those human things he needed to learn to help him integrate.

"Is that true?"

His lips pursed right back at America. Purse-off!

He turned back towards Asato. "Not by choice, but yes," he said with a bit of a (forced) smile, though the American annoyed him...no sense of etiquette or social skills. "You could say that I am."

"That you're...British, right?" Asato appeared to be pretty interested regardless, and with America around to help him out he felt bolder than he usually would. This way, he could ask more, and that was the entire point of branching out to speak with the humans--to ask, and to learn. To improve himself with little tidbits of knowledge whenever possible.

"So what kind of things do you do with those cards?"

"Hello! What is it you're playing?"

"At the moment, 52 pickup," he replied with a bit of a grumble as he stooped and gathered up the cards. Fortunately they weren't scattered far: Clive found that he didn't relish the thought of diving under a couch for a stray ace or wayward diamond.

"I was attempting to busy myself with doing, well...something," he added as he picked up cards. Two of clubs, jack of spades, queen of diamonds... "But one-handed shuffling, as it turns out, is a great deal harder than it looks. I've lost track of the number of times I've spilled the cards by accident." He paused, deck in hand, messy but more or less gathered. "Has anyone found a proper library yet? Assuming that in the future they have anything resembling books."

"I've heard of a library, but I haven't found it yet."Stats hasn't been too far and he hasn't found everything.

"Could you explain how you play this game?"

"Pity. I'd be curious to see if they carried any histories of the owners. It would be nice to know who they are."

He turned his attention to the cards. Finding the nearest flat surface (for the sake of conversation, let's say a table) Clive spread them out wide. "It's really quite simple. All you need to do is accidentally drop the cards and you have a game of 52 pickup."

"That would be useful, indeed."

Stats laughs at the description of the 'game'.
"I'll teach it to my sons."

"Sons?" This was surprising, in its own way. He seemed of age and so it seemed plausible, likely, even. But it was just...in a sense, it felt as though everyone aboard the ship were brave adventurers without any particular lingering responsibilities from where they came from such as family, and so vaguely odd to encounter someone who was...well, not.

"So you're a father? It must be difficult being separated from your family."

"Yes, it is. Even though my sons are grown up now. We're still very close, and I miss them."

"I see. My apologies for bringing them up."

Clive gathered the cards briskly into a stack and started to shuffle them...two handed, of course. "Do you play any games? I know a few. Most of them are more interesting with more players, but...oh, forgive me, my name is Clive."

Edited 2011-12-28 17:44 (UTC)

"Oh, it's all right. I like talking about them. I'm Stats, nice to meet you.
We race, we play jokes, and we share riddles."

There were probably better things for him to be doing than wandering the decks of the passenger quarters, but Wheatley had already convinced himself that walking practice was incredibly productive and also that he was not lost. Nope. Not lost at all. Knew exactly where he was, thanks.

Besides, he was really getting the hang of this mobility thing, pacing up and down the corridors, concentrating on one foot in front of the other, trying his very hardest to minimize stumbling (with only marginal success).

As a rule, however, he was generally easy to distract, and the sound of shuffling caught his attention, enough to make him forget the current fight he was having with his legs, backtracking towards the lounge and peering inside.

"Cards! Are you playing cards?"

Number one on the "things I would do if I had fingers" list: learn to play cards.

Clive glanced up, mildly embarrassed and...yes, mildly suspicious if but for a moment (it passed almost quickly enough to be imagined), and yet oddly grateful that he wasn't caught dropping the cards again.

"I was thinking about it, yes, but I'm not entirely sure I feel up to playing a round of solitaire." There was an implied invitation to be had in his statement.

Even if there hadn't been an implied invitation, Wheatley was already through the door and attempting to arrange himself on one of the chairs. The maneuver itself was stilted and awkward, as if he didn't quite know where to put his legs, but once settled, he wasted no time in continuing his card-based inquiries.

"Can't imagine that's fun at all, playing by yourself. What other games do you know?"

"Oh, the usual." He picked up the deck of cards and started idly shuffling them...two handed this time, they didn't need to deal with another spill. "Blackjack, War, Poker, Go Fish..." Clive considered the options, amending the selection with a, "If we go with most of those games, we'd be better off finding a third person."

Wheatley nodded fervently, with a wide-eyed and hyper-attentive countenance that perhaps resembled the expression of someone pretending to know everything about what they were being told. The hints of bewilderment, however, were difficult to mask, and eventually he caved.

"Never actually played cards. Always wanted to learn, though. What's a good one to start with?"

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Well, let's make this official.

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hi.

OSHIT also I hope replying is ok, if not just lemme know and I'll wait :X

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Hastily half-assed, so please accept my apologies in advance.

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What I wrote above applies here too. Apologies, but you'd be waiting until next year otherwise.

Re: What I wrote above applies here too. Apologies, but you'd be waiting until next year otherwise.

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And again, apologies, you'd be waiting FOREVER if I fully assed it.

No worries at all! Sorry for the wait on my end.

LJ fucked up in a glorious fashion, so.

lj and holidays yaaay 8,I