Weird-looking, half blind, spook wrangling world-walkers that smoke.

[goldeneyeball]

THREAD DIRECTORY

One Fine Day
A Taste of the Future
Pumpkins
Aches
Trauma 50% Off!
I Got a Disease and You're the Cure
Taco Night
Buck Eyes
The Turns Have Tabled
JW and Ginko's Fancy Dinner Date
You Know What They Say When You ASSume...
Sit, Stay, Beg

Comments

[onegreeneye]

"Uh-- yes? It takes a few minutes for them to work, I think. I take it the process is faster in the future?"

[goldeneyeball]

"Oh, hell yes. They've got somethin' called a Polaroid." He pantomimed holding a camera to his eye. "Snap the picture, it spits it out the front and in a few minutes it's developed. They're expensive though, I don't have the cash to for ten pictures just because they're faster. I spend five bucks on disposable cameras like God and everybody else...only downside is the people that develop them always give you this look when you go to pick 'em up. Like they're judging you. Fuck you, lady, you work at the Walmart photo center you can't judge me."

JW momentarily left Ginko in favor of his own little world.

[onegreeneye]

Ginko sat in silence, the still holding the magazine open in front of him as JW ranted.

Finally, he closed it and set it back down, shifting his attention to the dark red can on the ground. Might as well try and distract him from this particular topic. "What's in here?"

[goldeneyeball]

"They have the--hm?"

Oh, right. Reality. He wasn't at Walmart. He was in Nowhere, Japan. He put his showboat face back on and picked up the can. God only knew how much the thing had been shaken during the hike and he did not want this conversation to end with Ginko getting blasted in his remaining eye. So he opened it facing away from them both before handing it over. It only fizzed a little bit.

"A drink!"

[onegreeneye]

He stared at it for another moment, quietly wondering if it was alcoholic or what. Only explanation he could think of for the fizzing.

He took a gulp of soda - and then jumped slightly, spluttering and lifting his free hand to cover his mouth so he wouldn't end up spraying soda all over JW. The texture was totally different from beer or sake, and he turned to James with a look of disbelief. "Is it supposed to do that?!"

[goldeneyeball]

For a single horrifying moment, JW was afraid that Ginko might have been allergic to it. He didn't know what all they put in soda these days, just that they'd changed it. Why else would Mountain Dew Throwback exist?

"It's carbonated...it shouldn't hurt you." Shouldn't. "How's it taste?"

[onegreeneye]

"It doesn't hurt, exactly, it was just... kind of unexpected." He stared at the drink suspiciously for a moment, then took another sip. He still looked a little uncertain about the carbonation, but now that he was expecting it, he could actually notice the taste better. "...it does taste pretty good. It's really sweet, though."

[goldeneyeball]

JW's grin returned. "It's better on a hot day. Has caffeine in it like coffee, so it keeps you going."

He couldn't honestly remember the last time he had fun talking to someone in another world. Sure showing off was always fun, but the small sounds of approval Ginko made were really the icing on the cake.

[onegreeneye]

Ginko hummed thoughtfully, looking into the can for a moment before setting it down between them again. With all this stuff set out, it was a little difficult to stay focused on one thing at a time for long.

He glanced at some of the smaller things first, reaching out after a moment to pick up a paperclip. "...This doesn't do anything... really strange, does it?"

He didn't know how he would process it if this little bit of metal turned out to be some kind of futuristic audio recorder or something.

[goldeneyeball]

The antlered man did not laugh at him because that question was legit as fuck.

"Nah, just holds sheets of paper together...or picks a lock if you know what you're doing."

He picked up one of them and started to unbend it.

"The neat thing about them is that they're made by a machine. Millions of them in a day."

[onegreeneye]

He looked back to the paperclip in his hand, bending and unbending a bit of it experimentally.

"Your time is all about quantity, huh... fifty of those bags at once, millions of these in a day." It's not a judgement so much as an observation. Goodness knows there are times when Ginko would appreciate having so much of something so readily available.

[goldeneyeball]

James nodded slowly. Even in the 60's buying in bulk had been a thing. "We're figuring out how to do more and more faster and faster. It's a little scary. One day we'll have too much."

Another thing he was starting to value: perspective. Ginko was providing him with plenty of that. He dared to scoot closer.

"There's still places where people live just like they do in that village back there. They don't want it. Some days I can see why."

[onegreeneye]

"Guess that would make sense. There are bigger places with more technology than this village now, but nothing to this degree."

...He said, holding a twisted bit of wire. He figured JW got the idea.

"So... what all else have you got here?"

[goldeneyeball]

He was thankful for the change in topic. James offered the wrapped twinkie next.

"Now here's some fantastic engineering for you. This thing will never go stale so long as it stays in that little wrapper. You can have it by the way."

[onegreeneye]

It took some fiddling for him to figure out the wrapper, but once he had gotten that removed (and stared at it for a couple seconds before handing it to JW, because hell if he knew what to do with it now) he took to examining the twinkie. It didn't look too suspicious, anyway, but after his recent discovery of carbonated beverages he couldn't be sure what to expect.

He took a bite, and immediately looked somewhat alarmed. "--what is in this?" He would ask how much sugar was involved, but that wasn't even quite it.

[goldeneyeball]

"Deliciousness." JW couldn't help it. He had to laugh at that. His mind was already racing. He wanted to bring this guy every far-out tasting thing he could think of. Gum, Jolly Ranchers, pizza, brownies. Oh, man brownies! He knew exactly what he was going to do next. "But other than that, beats me! Magic maybe."

[onegreeneye]

"Must be, because I'm not sure anything in nature was meant to be this sweet." He shook his head, giving a half-amused huff. "You want the rest of this? Since you seem to like them so much."

[goldeneyeball]

JW held his hand out. "Oh, they aint natural at all, trust me."

The only things left in the pile were the rubber bands, bread ties, and the die-cut key.

[onegreeneye]

Ginko passed him the twinkie and returned his attention to the few objects left. He examined them for a moment, then picked up a bread tie and a rubber band. They were both small enough, he might as well.

"These?"

[goldeneyeball]

The antlered man promptly shoved it into his mouth. He thought the rubber band might be self-explanitory...but he took a lot of things like that for granted.

"You use 'em to hold stuff together. Bags, pencils, your hair, your friends..."

[onegreeneye]

He nodded, stretching the rubber band experimentally. That made sense; he just wasn't quite willing to guess at this point.

Then he paused and looked up, slightly bewildered. "You're joking about holding people together with these, aren't you?"

[goldeneyeball]

"Well I'm sure you could if you had enough." He grinned.

[onegreeneye]

He snorted and went back to playing with the rubber band, twisting it up and looping it around his wrist. "There's still the question of what they would think of it, of course."

[goldeneyeball]

"That's the folly of man in my time." JW sighed dramatically and leaned back, brushing the twinkie crumbs off his hands. "They all think about how we could do things. Not whether or not we should. I still don't know what we got out of landing on the moon."

[onegreeneye]

"You did what?"

Unfortunately, that little revelation distracted him enough that he let go of the rubber band, letting it snap back into shape against his wrist. He flinched. "--Ow. Dammit."