I don't know what to do and I'm always in the dark, living in a powderkeg and giving off sparks.

[hesourhostage]

In a Main Gauche sunroom, Andrew Wells is sitting upside down in a chair with his camera, rewatching old footage and snickering to himself. One of these days he's going to find some way to invest in a laptop and some video editing software and actually get this documentary off the ground

Comments

[savesomelight]

"Oh fun!" Piper beams, clapping her hands together a little. "God, I haven't been to a movie in ages, and I haven't even been to the city yet." To be honest, she's a little bit freaked out by that, being a small town girl and all, and she's not exactly a social person, but she likes Aubrey and if Andrew goes... Well, she can convince Andrew to come along, even if he didn't want to, which he probably will.

As if on cue, Andrew actually puts down his camera and looks over at him, suddenly very interested. "I haven't been out of this building since I got here." A pause. "Okay, sometimes I follow Buffy and Tay when they go hunting, but that doesn't really count."

Piper smiles at him over Aubrey's shoulder and then turns back to Aubrey and whispers, "I'll make him leave the camera at home. He's not so bad when you get used to him, really." She's well aware that the two of them seem to make each other uncomfortable- empath and all-but she's a natural born peacekeeper and if someone like Tay can actually like Andrew (whether she'll admit it or not), then anything's possible.

[thecellsiam]

"Great!" Aubrey was actually a little worried about the whole thing xemself; xe's not great in large groups, especially when xe only knows one of the people going. (Well, xe's met another, but xe doesn't really count that as knowing him, and given that Aubrey gets attached to people ridiculously fast, this says something.) "I mean, I don't know exactly when this is even happening, sometime soon, but I'll poke at Doc -- er, my friend, the one who's organizing this -- over the journals, tell 'em there's a few more coming."

Xe eyes Andrew skeptically, though, when Piper promises to make him leave the camera behind. "I'm not sure that's possible," xe whispers back, mostly serious, though there's a hint of a joke in xes voice. Xe means the camera, probably.

After that xe actually looks at Andrew, now that Covert Whispering is done with. Seems impolite and all to just completely ignore the kid (right, like he's that much younger than Aubrey) after having invited him along. "You haven't?" xe asks. Hypocrite. The only times xe's left the building is the two times xe went to visit the Skid. In the parking lot. "Hunting?" xe adds, belatedly. "For what?"

[savesomelight]

She giggles. "Oh, it's possible." If you're a Glaysa, that is. She doesn't feel comfortable poking her friends, but if she just toys with Andrew's emotions a little to let him know that he tends to make people a bit uncomfortable with that camera, he'll leave it alone... Not that she'd ever say that was what she was doing. Too sketchy.

Somewhere during the covert whispering, Andrew has righted himself on the chair and is fast-forwarding through something on the camera in a very determined way. "Nope," he says, popping the 'p' a little bit. "They hunt things that come through the Rift mostly. There might be some footage on here of something... Maybe it's on another tape."

He gives up on the camera and sets it aside. "Buffy's the Slayer, you know." Said in such a way that suggests that this is both something Aubrey should know and that Andrew is very proud to be associated with Buffy because of it.

[thecellsiam]

Aubrey gives her another skeptical look, but doesn't say anything else, distracted by Andrew. Xe makes a slightly annoyed face at the camera almost unconsciously (xe's used to emoting at them when there's nobody around to see xem doing so).

"That's okay, you don't really have to show me," xe says. The entire idea of being on the recording side of the camera squicks xem almost as much as the idea of being on the recorded side.

Xe raises an eyebrow at Andrew's seemingly-random declaration. "Is she?" xe asks, in a tone that obviously says 'I have no idea what you're talking about but I'll humor you.' Xe's doing xes best to like Andrew, partially because xe tries to like everybody and partially for Piper's sake.

[hesourhostage]

Oh... Kids. Piper's never actually had Aubrey explain that xe's not exactly male or female before, but she has the feeling that's the case, whether by emotional disonnance or something else. She just shakes her head and leaves them to it.

"Yeah. We're from the same world. I used to be one of her arch-nemesis..es, but then I reformed. Buffy just doesn't know this, because there's some sort of problem with timelines being weird."

That made sense. Really.

"She used to kill vampires, but there don't seem to be an overabundance and vampires to kill." It should be noted that he still says vampires with a certain lilt to it. Vampyres. It's a thing.

[thecellsiam]

Xe catches Piper's little head-shake and gives her a small 'what?' look, as if xe's not, what, eight years older than her and is thoroughly chastised.

Ah, timelines. "Better than her coming from an alternate universe and knowing a different version of you," Aubrey points out, ignoring the sad twinge that still accompanies any mention of Litta.

"So, what, if you were her arch-nemesis, are you a vampire?" xe continues, raising an eyebrow. Not that xe actually thinks Andrew is, and xes tone clearly says so, but xe's not going to rule out the possibility of vampires here. There's angels and xe's sitting in a room with a demon right now, so it only follows. Mostly xe can't take Andrew seriously on account of the way he's talking -- vampyres indeed.

But now that Andrew's talking and not fiddling around with the camera, he's not so bad. Really.

[hesourhostage]

Piper has decided she just isn't going to say anything, and is just going to smile and read her book.

Meanwhile, Andrew seriously considers this. "Yeah, that would be kinda weird."

He gives Aubrey a rather indignant and look and practically whines, "She fought other things too." He doesn't mention that he was technically the lackey of her actual self-proclaimed archnemesis and not him, nor Warren, nor Jonathan were ever really taken seriously, but, hey, in Andrew's little Delusion World, none of that is true. "She fought... Demons and stuff."

Piper looks up abruptly from her book and Andrew waves a hand. "Not you." A pause. "And humans too. Less them though, because she's kind of a-a protector of the people."

[thecellsiam]

Aubrey mutters, "Yeah, it kinda was," at Andrew's observation. As if that wasn't the entire reason xe brought it up.

"So you were a demon," Aubrey says. At this point xe's pretty much teasing Andrew. Then again, xe's also mildly interested in Andrew's world, too, so xe follows this up with a more serious question: "So what, your world was more like this one? What with Vampyres and demons and suchlike?" Xe can't help but mock Andrew's pronunciation -- it's a thing. Xe imitates people sometimes, and Andrew's just so damn mockable.

[hesourhostage]

Piper snorts from behind her book, but tries to cover it up with a cough. Meanwhile, Andrew seems to be incapable of realizing when he's being teased unless someone waves their hand in front of his face and says, 'OI, I'M TEASING YOU, YOU LITTLE PONCE.'

"No, but I summoned them. That was kinda my thing. I had a pan flute and everything." A pause. "Demons don't really respond to pan flutes here... Or being summoned." He waves that off and moves onto the next question, still smiling wistfully. "Yeah, not really so much different. I mean, we didn't have a Rift. We had a Hellmouth, but I think if people daily came through the Hellmouth it would be even more unpleasant than people coming through the Rift here."

Another pause.

"Because they'd probably get eaten by something."