tushanshu | 10° VIDEO

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10° VIDEO

[There's a pause before Johnny's face appears on the screen, bent over to press the buttons. Once he confirms that the screen is on, he straightens and makes sure he's in frame, wearing very basic clothes.]

Aw, Reed. You shouldn't have! It's a little small, but I admit, I like what you've done with the place.

[He waits a beat, as if Reed might actually respond.]

There are two obvious possibilities for why I'm here. One, the Emperor is a crazed fan who abducted me to find out if The Torch is really as hot as they say he is – I am, by the way – or, two, I'm actually dead, they're lying to me, and I have a motorcycle and a pile of women waiting for me somewhere.

[A split-second pause.] I'll tell you what. If it's the first option? You can come find me. If it's the second, let me know and I'll come find you. Until then? This Fire Sector is like home, sweet home.

Johnny out.

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[He leaves the first remark alone. While there are a million things he could say to it, the rest of her words are more interesting to him and, every once in awhile, Johnny respects the time for serious conversation.]

I could use one. Thanks.

[He smiles and then follows at a short distance, bringing him deeper into the apartment again. His eyes glance around as he walks, trying to learn more about this woman who knows some incarnation of him so well.]

There was this.. silver surfer. I know how that sounds, but he's not from our world. The General just brought in Victor to help us capture him, ignoring our protests. This guy's going around creating giant holes a mile wide and miles deep and, according to Reed, this isn't the first time he's done this. All the other planets he's gone to have ended up completely dead.

It's our first contact with alien life and a threat to the world which, before Reed's brilliant idea, was winning. I was locked in a bunker before I showed up here, with the team, because the General decided we couldn't be trusted while they're busy torturing Silver.

[The more he speaks about it, the more angry he gets. It's clear that all of it bothers him. Being pulled away from his team, not being trusted by the people who hired them, the world being in genuine danger.]

[Nita's a reasonably neat housekeeper, so nothing's dirty or overtly messy, but the apartment is dotted with the kind of unremarkable clutter that accumulates after living somewhere a while. No shoes kicked off by the door, however. Nita prefers not to wear them.]

Something kinda like rum and something kinda like Coke okay? [She's making one for herself as she listens to Johnny's story.]

Wait, Surfer? You captured him? Wasn't Galactus mad you had one of his Heralds? [Even assuming it's Surfer's pre-heroic days in that timeline, he isn't the one to worry about.]

Sure, as long as it has something like alcohol and doesn't taste much like it.

[Johnny leans against some doorway into some other room, roughly facing her and watching casually as she prepares the drinks. His eyes still occasionally glance around at her life, looking into those kinds of clues that can tell a little more about her. Then he tenses with her words and immediately stands upright again.]

Galactus? Who's he? Victor helped the General take us out right after we took out the Surfer. We didn't get a chance to talk to him.

[Nita gives Johnny his drink, frowning.]

Okay, so, where I'm from, there's a...being is the only word for it, I guess, called Galactus. He's existed since before our universe, and he...well, he eats planets. The Silver Surfer is one of his Heralds. [Johnny was one briefly! It went about as well as you'd expect.] The Heralds travel the universe looking for planets that have the right energy signature, and then they call Galactus.

Back before I ever came to the surface, Surfer targeted Earth, but the Fantastic Four drove Galactus off, which apparently doesn't happen very often. Surfer's been around on and off since then, and he's one of the good guys.

[Nita taps her fingers on her glass, thinking.] I'm pretty sure Doom went after him for the Power Cosmic in our universe, too.

[Johnny leans forward to accept it with a quiet 'thanks' as he listens to her speak. What she's saying about Heralds and the worlds makes complete sense with what Reed discovered and the things the Surfer said, but it's still strange to hear all about it from someone not even a part of his own world. Or from his future. Either way.]

I hope, if it is Galactus, that you're right about us driving it off. It doesn't exactly help that I'm here, even if they said time doesn't pass the same between the two. The team needs me.

[He lets out a frustrated noise before taking a long sip of his drink. Johnny doesn't do well being trapped.]

The Power Cosmic.. you mean the surfboard? Reed said it's the source of the Surfer's power.

Edited (lawl wrong button) 2013-04-16 21:41 (UTC)

[Considering Johnny's the one who went and got the Ultimate Nullifier that first time, yeah, he's kind of important to that fight.]

I don't think so? I mean, the board's a manifestation of it, but Galactus imbues all his Heralds with the Power Cosmic directly. I don't think Surfer needs the board.

[She shrugs.] He'd probably answer if you asked him. He doesn't really bother with lying, from what I've seen.

Huh. That's how we captured him, was disabling the surfboard with some kind of pulse. Sue was planning on doing the talking.

[He gives a one-shouldered shrug, because he never understands the real science of it, and then takes another sip of his drink. He pauses mid-sip and swallows quickly as another thought occurs.]

Did you know other Heralds?

Fought Terrax a couple of times. He's a huge jerk. [Nita makes an unimpressed face.]

Let's see, who else...there's Firelord and Red Shift. They helped out the United Front during the Annihilation War. Uh...Stardust. The other Xandarian besides Firelord, whatsisname...Air-Walker. [These all have the aura of people Nita doesn't know, but is dredging up their names from memory. She shrugs.]

There've gotta be more, but those are the ones I remember off the top of my head.

Edited 2013-04-17 04:46 (UTC)

[And Johnny's just.. staring at her and frowning. After a beat, he tilts up his glass and downs the entire thing, squirming at the end from the taste of shoving it all down at once. Then he offers her the glass without comment as to whether he wants a refill or is just returning the thing, wondering just how well she knows him.]

Great. So this is probably going to be a recurring thing.

[Ben's the only one who's much of a drinker back home, and he sticks to beer most of the time, plus Nita noticed how Johnny reacted to finishing the drink like a shooter, so when her gives her the empty glass without asking for another, she just sets it down on an end table to take to the kitchen later.]

If he's even remotely close to our version, Doom is gonna be way more of a pain than the rest put together. [Nita's been fairly circumspect about how little she likes Doom around other people, since Latveria and Atlantis are technically allies, but this is Johnny. She's not going to be unduly prejudicing him against Doom.]

[And there goes his second drink. Damn. Oh well, at least he knows that his fake counterpart wasn't much of a drinker, or had a problem. Either way, another difference. Johnny crosses his arms casually, still watching her.]

He's already a pain. And yet, I know he'll get worse given the chance. [He sighs a little.] Any idea how I get back?

[Hey, pal. You want another drink, you ask for it. Besides, Nita's from when all her comics still had that CCA stamp on the cover, and the Four are the goody-two-shoes of the superhero world.

She makes a disgusted face at his question. It's a sore spot, since she's been here the longest of anyone, as far as she knows.]

If I knew, I wouldn't be here.

Edited (still figuring out email replies) 2013-04-25 14:37 (UTC)

[Johnny gives her a brief 'oops' face, knowing he stumbled into something but completely oblivious to what it is or how to fix it. Instead, he'll just leave that there and move on to other topics.]

Any idea when this rationing will end or how to work around it?

Edited 2013-05-27 21:49 (UTC)

When the turtle stops being sick, or if we get someone with, I don't know, agriculture powers or something.

[She shrugs. She has no idea how to fix it.]

Some of us are working to reduce the effects, but it's just a stopgap.

[In this moment, Johnny misses Reed all over again. And his sister. And even Ben. The pain is visible in his expression as he frowns and looks away, uncrossing his arms. He has no idea how to fix things like this. He's never been the brains of the operation. Struggling to come up with an answer and finding none is a level of fatalism that he still doesn't handle well.]

There has to be something.. [He says quietly, as much to himself as to her.]

There's always something. I'm just not sure we're the right people to find it. Tony Stark's more of an engineer than a scientist.

[As god is my witness, I can't remember if we had a Bruce Banner yet at the time this thread started.

She gives him a wry look.]

No offense, but we could've used your brother-in-law more than you.

We can try.

[He offers lamely, but her latter words have him crossing his arms again. This time, it's an unconscious but defensive gesture at her words. Johnny's more upset with the statement because he knows it's true.]

You're right. [He practically snaps the reply, immaturity never too far.] But I think I'd rather he spend his time trying to get me back instead of coming here to grow crops for some kidnapping aliens.

[Shifting away from his place near the wall, Johnny drops his arms again, a subtle suggestion that he's planning to leave shortly.]

[Whoops. This Johnny is so similar to hers that she keeps forgetting his Fantastic Four is brand new, and that he and she don't go way back.]

Sorry. That was pretty thoughtless of me.

[Unlike practically everyone else in her universe, Nita's perfectly willing to admit when she's wrong.]

[And that completely throws him off guard, to the point where he just stops, stands, and stares at her for a moment.]

If the other Johnny was anything like me, then you know how much I miss them right now.

[A beat. He considers opening up more, adding 'how much I rely on them,' but he can't bring himself to do it. For as well as she claims to know him, he doesn't know her and really there's nothing to say that she's not in on the bigger picture of why he's here.]

We're a team. They need me and I'm letting them down by being here.

I miss my family, too.

[She's about to comment that she's also letting down her team, but then she remembers that the members are all either dead or traumatized, and the New Warriors don't exist anymore.]

It's not the same.

[Because Johnny has to be a special ~~snowflake~~ matchstick. Except that he's not one to be petty in hard and genuinely emotional circumstances, so he relaxes a little with his arms coming to rest at his sides.

A million thoughts dance across his expression in one uncomfortable flash before he gives an exaggeratedly disappointed huff, trying not to think about Reed and Sue retiring or Ben's girlfriend and how alone he really was even before coming here. Then he's smiling again, a smile that Nita might recognize as hiding something quite sad, though few would normally know him so well as to do so.]

I have a kid waiting for me. [He gestures at her door, as if there's someone on the other side of it.] I should get going.

[At that casual dismissal of her own family, her murdered mother and her beloved cousin she hasn't seen in almost a year, and all the people of Atlantis, fled from their ruined capital in a diaspora she doesn't understand, Nita feels a flash of genuine anger--not annoyance or dismay, but the real Sub-Mariner rage. How dare he. How dare this imitation hero accept her hospitality and return it with insults?

However, she's not her cousin, and instead of throwing a drink, or a punch, she fixes Johnny with a cold stare that his smile can't thaw, and the glass in her hand cracks as she doesn't quite manage not to clench her fists.]

Well. Don't keep them waiting.

[Johnny glowers at her, confused why she's suddenly so angry. He's oblivious to all of her family issues and simply takes her response as being overly sensitive about how much more important his problems right now are compared to her own arrival. After all, he just got here.]

I won't! [He grumbles angrily, dropping his arms and strutting over towards the door. Nita still has time to respond if she chooses, but otherwise, Johnny's going to storm out like his name implies and slam the door behind him.]

[Nita makes no effort to stop him, and once he finishes his exit, hurls her already cracked glass with a strangled scream of rage. It explodes against the door where Johnny's head had been a moment before, thrown hard enough that it would have done serious damage to a human. Instead it leaves a dent in the wood, and glass shards sticky with the dregs of a rum and coke scattered on the floor.

So that went well.]

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