"My schedule is pretty open most of the time, so whenever works for you."

And then Matt came in. Ozzy grinned and said, "Hey! Haven't seen you in a long while! How's tricks?"

  Meg chuckled, and waved to Matt as she said "Now works, unless you want to do some brain picking first with Matt.  How are you, Matt?"

  "Oh, you know.  Boring space stuff.  Though Azrith isn't exiled anymore, and I picked up more Science™ than I probably would have off my cheap scholarship before I died.  So I'm back for round two of feeling out my place in things."

 He produces a couple tiny boxes "I've also got a scoop that refreezes ice cream equivalents, and a customizable fake flower for whoever wants cheap souvenirs.  I meant my opening statement."
This message was lightly edited by the player at 08:47, Sat 01 July 2017.

Ozzy thought for a moment and said, "The customizable flower sounds interesting. I can re-freeze ice cream with magic if need be, but I wouldn't mind seeing alien art or whatever."

He then grinned and says, "So Azrith can go back home again? That's good. He was the lion-y guy, right? Or was that someone else?"

  Meg smiled, and said "Halkor was the liony guy.  Azrith was the exiled prince, and Archeirae was the one who looked like a cat-lady but had the boneless ability like an octopus.  Which is really interesting, when you consider that it means she, and anyone else boneless, could squeeze themselves through ridiculously tiny spaces that way that others wouldn't expect.  That might be how she managed to escape where she'd been imprisoned.  Matt, would you like to see the stuff I've been working on for a Plan B for humanity?"

  Matt nods as he hands over the souvenir to Ozzy, "Meg has it right.  As for Plan B, as nice as it would be to not need one it sounds worth a look."  Meg has proooobably not gone mad with power while he was out.  So that just leaves hoping it's a good idea in the first place.

"Better to have one and never need it, right?", said Ozzy. If he was honest with himself, he was kind of proud of Meg for thinking about something like this.

"I kinda miss Archeirae. I liked having another painter around, and she had an interesting perspective on Art."

  Meg chuckled, and said "The basic idea is to build what amounts to an Ark.  Something we can put a viable genetic sampling of the human species on, and put it out there in space,
 so that if something happens here, and we don't manage to save the world, there will still be some humanity left.  I don't plan to be on it.  The last thing an Ark would need, is an ageless, unkillable person in charge.  I don't want to be in charge of the lives of all those people, I'm not wiser than they are just because I can plan on a centuries-spanning timescale.
 But I think it would be a good idea to put an Ark out there, and make sure it has a viable
 genetic population on it."  She indicated that they could follow her, if they were done eating, adding "Mom has shown me the knack of opening portals magically from point A to point B as long as they're in the same dimension.  Makes getting to the lab a lot safer if I bring guests."

  "I would imagine security being a lot easier to handle when you don't need to unlock your doors personally, yeah.  I'm more curious about the living conditions and speed involved with your Arc.  Usually the 'Arc ship' concept is to accommodate for the fact that by time it gets anywhere, the people who built it will have invented three new methods of faster than light travel and awkwardly skirt around their old sub light or near it ships."
This message was last edited by the player at 08:12, Sun 02 July 2017.

Ozzy nodded and said, "True. Then again, this *is* an apocalypse-prep ship, so I think we're assuming that if this ship is being used, then we're not planning on having people capable of building new tech. Unless you were planning on sending it out before any disaster happened, Megs?"

   That got a chuckle, and Meg admitted "The engines are capable of going FTL, I just have a couple kinks to work out on the inertial compensation.  I use myself as an experimental  tester, just because I can survive a lot more than most.  The biggest thing, is getting a group of psychologically stable individuals who will be able to tolerate what essentially makes for never going 'outside' again unless they're wearing a heavy duty spacesuit.  Unless they pick a planet to colonize, but that isn't the main idea for the Ark I'm building.
 Shouldn't take me too long to put the majority of it together either once I get the kinks flattened."  In answer to Ozzy, she nodded, and said "The idea is to get our 'fallback' up and running before an apocalypse happens.  I want to get it into commission BEFORE some BBEG destroys the majority of humanity.  That way, we can save the best of science today, as well as the best of modern medicine, and hopefully people continue to improve as time passes.  I've designed units to help with asteroid mining, and programmable fabrication units that can handle most basic ideas, but the more complicated stuff will take more programming.  But they can build state of the normal human art computers and medical equipment right now."

Ozzy shrugs and says, "I don't see why not. Hasn't the international space research community found, like, a TON of planets that could be either just straight-up lived on, or terraformed into livable conditions pretty easily? Plus, the Fermi Paradox has been resolved. We KNOW that there are aliens out there. Maybe we can get some of them to be willing to accept refugees, just in case?"

  "Well, just as long as there is still a good majority of talent left back home.  The way things seem to go, loading up all your 'best and brightest' in a single ship seems to make it that much more likely for it to blow up shortly after launch due to unforeseen circumstances beyond it's design."

  He turns towards Ozzy, and comments "Unfortunately despite a... mostly positive reputation up there, my diplomacy cred still had years pass before a single guy had their wrongful exile rescinded."

  Meg waved both of them toward the employee door, which let her open a portal to her lab without the general public watching it happen.  As they went, she said simply "I want to send the best of current technology, not necessarily the best and brightest minds.  To be blunt, the best and brightest minds are usually highly eccentric and do not play well with others in close quarters for the rest of their lives."

===============>> Lab

Had it really only been two weeks?  His stay in Weston had seemed longer than that, maybe because it had taken him so long to get himself situated.  It was actually an invigorating challenge.  Hacking into a system that was outside any network he was familiar with.  Thankfully the computer language was close enough.  He had spent his whole life looking for his family.  Two days in this world and he accomplished what hadn't lead anywhere back home.

His car was parked a short distance away, he had a customer to pick up here in a bit, figured it would be better to make contact and then go get the car instead of sitting out front with the car running.  He had been running errands and passengers around for the better part of the day, so a chance to just sit down and relax for a little bit was nice.

Approaching the café, he has to smile a bit at the street performer standing outside the front door.

"Well, I don't think I can handle this
A cloudy day in Metropolis
I think I'll talk to my analyst
I got it so bad for this little journalist
It drives me up the wall and through the roof
Lois and Clark in a telephone booth
I think I'm going out of my brain
I got it so bad for little Miss Lois Lane."

Kevin tosses a few dollars into the open guitar case as he heads into the building.  The singer bowing his head just a little in thanks as he continues with his song.  For a second, less than a second, Kevin's smile falters ever so slightly as he enters the café.  A fleeting memory brushed aside as his smile returns and he heads for the counter to place his order.

Apokryphos, something treasured; hidden.  Part of him just had to wonder what was treasured and hidden here.  Though at the same time, maybe someone really just liked the name.

  The first thing he noticed was that the aroma of the food was delicious.  The second thing was, all of the staff were neatly garbed in jeans and t-shirts that matched.  The patrons were a mix of people, young and old, families and single people.  It did appear to be a very popular cafe, and the aroma was a good explanation there, but the decor was different, mixing Greek and Chinese.  There were enough people to make it look pretty busy.

The aroma was exceptionally pleasant, and he just enjoys it for a bit as he takes in everything.  He had to order though, he'd look odd if he just stood around for an extended period of time.

"I'll take an order of Lo Mein with lamb."

He liked the sound of that fusion of Chinese and Greek, it was something he figured he'd give a try.  Still it was a little odd, but he doesn't comment on it.  The owner likely had a reason for the mix.  Family.  Personal reasons.  The smell, staff and number of people in the area showed that it was a successful combination.

"I'll take a large tea as well."

  The dish came in short order, and the flavors were an amazing mix of Greek and Chinese.  The waitress looked no more than sixteen at the oldest, and she was in her uniform, but something told him she liked her job here.  Taking a good look at all of the staff, they looked either very young, or their eyes were older than their bodies.  Something here was not the norm, but not in a bad way.  All the happy smiles of the staff were a clear indicator of that.  He heard someone speaking Greek in the back, a deep, masculine voice that was pleasant enough, and carried well.

Magic.  It was something that just screamed in the back of his mind.  Though he could just be over thinking the situation.  In either case, it wasn't the malicious feel.  It was just part of the warm, welcoming ambiance of the setting.  Most wouldn't know this was going through the gears of his mind of course.  He gladly accepts the order and finds a seat.

He is casual about it, but it is something to the trained eye he can't hide.  He sits where he has a clear field of vision of most if not all of the place.  Back to the wall, entrances and exits from the room clearly visible as well as a decent view of the street.  Not that it looks like he's focused on any one spot.

A few bites are taken and he prods his smart phone a few times to bring up the latest news, listening quietly to the newest updates.  Sports, weather, metahuman activity, current events.  The eyes are the most noted, but the male speaking in Greek is noted, too.  He is but he shouldn't be surprised.  It was fluent, conversational.

The taste of the meal isn't lost on him either and he eats steadily.  He wasn't on a time constraint, but he should eat quickly.

Ultimately his curiosity was tickled enough that he realized he would likely start looking into this place.  It would be placed on a far back burner to be certain, there wasn't anything nefarious about this place after all.

As the staff and his waitress make their rounds, he does make polite small talk with them as well.

  The wait staff, as he watched, all were what might typically fall into the 'too young' or 'hard lives so far' category.  The deep voice seemed to emanate from the employees only area, a little surprisingly, but the surprising part was when it switched from conversational Greek to fluent Mandarin, and a female voice answered in return, sounding slightly exasperated.  Moments later, a tiny woman, only five foot two, appeared out of the kitchen, wearing jeans and a silk shirt in jade green with hand embroidered Imperial dragons on it as she headed for the door, adding over her shoulder, her ebony hair done in a complicated pile that kept it up and neatly confined "Don't catch the kitchen on fire with anything too wild until I get back from the Chinese Market.  You knew the stock of that was low, and the regular suppliers do not carry that."

No.  I will not operate like that here.

As he continues to watch, he sees those signs.  He hid them well, but he knew that look.  He carried that look for at least a year or two until his mentor taught him how to hide it.  As well as how to hide the fact he was observing people, for the most part.  He was no expert at it, but over the years he had become well practiced at hiding his attention to detail.

The voice changing naturally from one language to another was certainly impressive.  He does not stare, though his attention to the woman walking through the café and out the door is rather obvious.  The shirt and the dragon design catches his eye the most and he gives it a look to appreciate the detail that went into the shirt.  After a quick look he goes back to eating and his casual observation of the area.

Still, it can't be helped.  The taste, the care of the owners for their employees.  The atmosphere.  He could feel it, the mask was starting to falter.

Finishing he pays for his meal and leaves a generous tip.  He still had a little time before his customer should show up.  And he needed a little air.  He heads off to the side where he wouldn't be seen from most of the people inside.

Breathing exercises, a quiet mantra going through his mind.  Back at his apartment he would go through some katas but right now, he needed to focus.  Center himself.

Put the mask back on.

Kevin could hear a mild fanfare out front, and could see the front end of a limo from where he was standing. A moment later a well built man looking to be in his mid-to late fifties with grey hair and beard walked around the corner, a ciggarette in one hand and a lighter in the other. With his plain black suit he looked like a biker at a funeral.

The man takes up position next to the wall, eyeing Kevin as he lit his cigarette. "Ya seem awful angry bout somethin son, am I gonna have to worry about you?"

'Son', it was almost like a physical strike against him.  There is the faintest of winces, though his ready smile eases over his lips.  Warm, friendly and honest.  He does sidestep a little away from the man, just to put a little more distance between them due to the cigarette.

"Just having a bit of a bad day, nothing that I'm going to cause trouble over with others though."

Honest curiosity gets a bit of the best of him.

"Any idea who's limo that is?  Apokryphos seems like a pretty nice place but limo stopping out front?  Guess it's more popular than I thought."

Private security, maybe.  He didn't have anything that made it clear he was security.  Still he wasn't thinking it was any major celebrity, wasn't enough pomp and circumstance for that.  Someone local probably.  That or just some high school kids having a good time.  He didn't think high school kids would have someone that gave off the vibe this guy was as a driver though.

The man shot Kevin a curious look. "My son Don, aka Senator Donald Derring, aka the Hunter. Making me David, aka Mr. Hurt." The man smiled as he held out his hand for a shake. "Am I that unrecongizable? I know I'm not current, but they released the files on us ww2 parahumans YEARS ago, and theres been eight books and a movie on it since. One of which I co-wrote."

Kevin gives a little chuckle, but he casually accepts the offered hand with a pretty relaxed grip of his own.

"Good to meet you, sir.  And I wouldn't be too worried.  The last two weeks have been a bit of a blur for me.  Name's Greg.  Apparently.  Took me a few hours just to figure out where I was.  Woke up in an alley on the other side of the city.  Or maybe I just blinked.  Really not sure.  Dealing with a bit of amnesia and just been putting my life together.  Haven't had a whole lot of time to deal with current events outside of what makes for a good decent job without too much paperwork and previous work history."

He'd have to make a note of starting to put together a list of heroes and what not on this world.  Mentally he kicks himself for not doing it already, but he did need to put a lot onto just getting an identity, job and everything else here.  He hadn't even had a chance to go over the diagnostics for his suit or the Osprey.  Something he should probably start looking at, but Uber and Lyft had been keeping him busy lately too.