fic: jaan-e-mann, agastya/?, pg-13.
I wrote this like way back and only now managed to squeeze a few words out of me to finish it properly. Shame shame.
space age studies
fandom: jaan-e-mann
pairing: agastya with whoever he is with at the end of the movie ;)
rating: pg-13
word count: 1,072
disclaimer: Er, that dude who directed and wrote Jaan-e-Mann owns. I don't.
notes: All the science mumbojumbo is just that - stuff I totally made up that has no actual basis on absolutely anything. But hey, this is JEM fic. I think I'm allowed.
Agastya was pleased. He had an extended lunch hour, no work worries and some delightfully light reading. So he relaxed in the NASA personnel cafeteria and cracked open page 436 of “Top Ten Most Fascinating Theories in Astrophysics”. By the time he had finished eating, he was on page 612 and he had used up exactly 48% of his leisure time (he found these sort of small calculations very soothing).
He glanced at his watch (okay, make that 48.7% of his leisure time spent) that showed 12:23. It was exactly on that moment that he heard a strongly accented female voice somewhere in his proximity ask, “Excuse me?”.
He looked up and saw Piya, nearly choking on the air he had been breathing quite happily just a moment ago. Piya, who had unbelievably blond curls that framed her face and fell onto her shoulders. Piya, who was holding a food tray and looking at him quizzically.
“Can I sit here?” she asked, again with a heavy accent, and gestured the seat opposite him.
Once he regained his sense of time and space, he nodded. “Y-yes. Please. Sit.” He also gestured at the seat opposite him, unfortunately with such enthusiasm he knocked back his unfinished cup of coffee, nearly all over her lap.
As they mopped the coffee off the floor, Agastya had time to re-evaluate the situation. No, this wasn't Piya. Piya married Suhaan, they live in Mumbai and Suhaan calls him on his birthday and every Diwali (“Hey dude, are they showing the new Don sequel over there in Texas? You have to check it out, I got a small role in it!”). This wasn't Piya. This was someone else entirely. Seven people with the same face in the world.
At least he hadn't ran into a clone of himself.
Then he and the Piya-clone sat opposite each other and when she caught him staring at her (he couldn't help it), he stopped and laughed nervously. To his surprise, she did the same.
“Um, hello,” he said awkwardly and introduced himself.
Shaking his hand enthusiastically, she smiled and answered, “I'm Preity Zintakova.”
That smile, so alike and yet so different from Piya's, he mused, setting off various orchestras in his head. “Russian? How did you end up here in NASA?” he asked her, coming back to reality. Orchestras vanished.
“Cutbacks, they told us. Russia cannot afford too many cosmonauts, the government just doesn't want to send people to space anymore.” She stopped smiling and looked ever-so-slightly blue for a small moment. Then she smiled another radiant (though not nuclear-ly so!) smile. “But I'm glad I got a job here. They said they're launching me soon.”
“That's great,” he said, also smiling and then it hit him. This was a girl. A beautiful, sexy, intelligent female being. He was known to be unable to communicate properly with such. So he knocked over his cup again (thankfully empty this time) and there was a long, dreadfully awkward pause in the conversation as she ate silently and he tried not to stare at her, or his hands, or his empty plate. It was one of the most difficult things he has ever had to do and well, he had been to the moon, twice, so he should be able to handle situations like this. It shouldn't be this difficult.
Then her eyes came upon the book next to his tray.
“You like astrophysics?” she asked him, and the interest in her voice was genuine.
“I like astrophysics? I love astrophysics, astrophysics is in my bl--” he began and then promptly stopped. The voice of Suhaan ringing in his ears again. No. He'd do it differently this time. He'd do it his way. “I'm very interested in astrophysics. Especially this theory I'm reading about right now, the ability to bend the texture of space using mathematical logarithms I find very interesting, though slightly theoretical at this point.”
Preity Zintakova, again to his surprise, was nodding as he talked. Her beauty made him nervous but he felt more relaxed when she spoke again. “I liked that book, 'How We Wish The Universe Was Round' and thought it very revealing on this subject. In Russia we had a professor who had studied this, Mr Zemlja, have you read his works?”
“Mr Zemlja is one of my favourites!” he couldn't help exclaiming. “I also enjoyed his works on cosmometanomics.”
“Cosmometanomiczja!” she nearly squealed in delight. “My thesis was counter-arguing some of his newer opponents' retorts on that subject and the plausibility of his post-revolutionist view of kinetic time limitations. What I basically always liked was that his...” She chattered on and he listened, amazed at her knowledge and perspective, and just watching the enthusiasm in her eyes as she went into detail about some argument, some experiment, some mathematical puzzle she had solved. Once she had begun talking properly, it was difficult to get a word in, but he didn't really mind.
He listened to her talking and commented when she let him and the orchestras went off inside his head again. They continued playing in the background as they talked, and lunch turned to dinner and dinner turned to date at the movies, second date, first kiss, fifth date, sixth, first night. Eventually they found out they'd be working together soon, in space no less, and the rest was cosmometanomics.
He hadn't thought about meeting someone like Piya. Someone better than Piya, someone who he could actually converse with comfortably and someone who could relate to him and who he could relate to, as well. It amazed him that she was really that beautiful, though not as much as it amazed him that she liked him. Loved him. And that he didn't need to act cool or smooth in order for her to do that. Preity also said dumb things every now and then, and giggled afterwards, blushing just the tiniest bit.
The universe seemed to have a magical way of working things out, as everything just fell into place, slowly and perfectly, like a huge puzzle with the pieces just clicking together one after another. Agastya could write a theory on that, go deep into the plan the universe had carved out for him, starting from his meeting with Suhaan and Piya, and ending with this. Or rather, not ending, hopefully never.
He liked the sound of that.
----
Before you say it, plazmah, of course I will crosspost at bolly_fics soon!
space age studies
fandom: jaan-e-mann
pairing: agastya with whoever he is with at the end of the movie ;)
rating: pg-13
word count: 1,072
disclaimer: Er, that dude who directed and wrote Jaan-e-Mann owns. I don't.
notes: All the science mumbojumbo is just that - stuff I totally made up that has no actual basis on absolutely anything. But hey, this is JEM fic. I think I'm allowed.
Agastya was pleased. He had an extended lunch hour, no work worries and some delightfully light reading. So he relaxed in the NASA personnel cafeteria and cracked open page 436 of “Top Ten Most Fascinating Theories in Astrophysics”. By the time he had finished eating, he was on page 612 and he had used up exactly 48% of his leisure time (he found these sort of small calculations very soothing).
He glanced at his watch (okay, make that 48.7% of his leisure time spent) that showed 12:23. It was exactly on that moment that he heard a strongly accented female voice somewhere in his proximity ask, “Excuse me?”.
He looked up and saw Piya, nearly choking on the air he had been breathing quite happily just a moment ago. Piya, who had unbelievably blond curls that framed her face and fell onto her shoulders. Piya, who was holding a food tray and looking at him quizzically.
“Can I sit here?” she asked, again with a heavy accent, and gestured the seat opposite him.
Once he regained his sense of time and space, he nodded. “Y-yes. Please. Sit.” He also gestured at the seat opposite him, unfortunately with such enthusiasm he knocked back his unfinished cup of coffee, nearly all over her lap.
As they mopped the coffee off the floor, Agastya had time to re-evaluate the situation. No, this wasn't Piya. Piya married Suhaan, they live in Mumbai and Suhaan calls him on his birthday and every Diwali (“Hey dude, are they showing the new Don sequel over there in Texas? You have to check it out, I got a small role in it!”). This wasn't Piya. This was someone else entirely. Seven people with the same face in the world.
At least he hadn't ran into a clone of himself.
Then he and the Piya-clone sat opposite each other and when she caught him staring at her (he couldn't help it), he stopped and laughed nervously. To his surprise, she did the same.
“Um, hello,” he said awkwardly and introduced himself.
Shaking his hand enthusiastically, she smiled and answered, “I'm Preity Zintakova.”
That smile, so alike and yet so different from Piya's, he mused, setting off various orchestras in his head. “Russian? How did you end up here in NASA?” he asked her, coming back to reality. Orchestras vanished.
“Cutbacks, they told us. Russia cannot afford too many cosmonauts, the government just doesn't want to send people to space anymore.” She stopped smiling and looked ever-so-slightly blue for a small moment. Then she smiled another radiant (though not nuclear-ly so!) smile. “But I'm glad I got a job here. They said they're launching me soon.”
“That's great,” he said, also smiling and then it hit him. This was a girl. A beautiful, sexy, intelligent female being. He was known to be unable to communicate properly with such. So he knocked over his cup again (thankfully empty this time) and there was a long, dreadfully awkward pause in the conversation as she ate silently and he tried not to stare at her, or his hands, or his empty plate. It was one of the most difficult things he has ever had to do and well, he had been to the moon, twice, so he should be able to handle situations like this. It shouldn't be this difficult.
Then her eyes came upon the book next to his tray.
“You like astrophysics?” she asked him, and the interest in her voice was genuine.
“I like astrophysics? I love astrophysics, astrophysics is in my bl--” he began and then promptly stopped. The voice of Suhaan ringing in his ears again. No. He'd do it differently this time. He'd do it his way. “I'm very interested in astrophysics. Especially this theory I'm reading about right now, the ability to bend the texture of space using mathematical logarithms I find very interesting, though slightly theoretical at this point.”
Preity Zintakova, again to his surprise, was nodding as he talked. Her beauty made him nervous but he felt more relaxed when she spoke again. “I liked that book, 'How We Wish The Universe Was Round' and thought it very revealing on this subject. In Russia we had a professor who had studied this, Mr Zemlja, have you read his works?”
“Mr Zemlja is one of my favourites!” he couldn't help exclaiming. “I also enjoyed his works on cosmometanomics.”
“Cosmometanomiczja!” she nearly squealed in delight. “My thesis was counter-arguing some of his newer opponents' retorts on that subject and the plausibility of his post-revolutionist view of kinetic time limitations. What I basically always liked was that his...” She chattered on and he listened, amazed at her knowledge and perspective, and just watching the enthusiasm in her eyes as she went into detail about some argument, some experiment, some mathematical puzzle she had solved. Once she had begun talking properly, it was difficult to get a word in, but he didn't really mind.
He listened to her talking and commented when she let him and the orchestras went off inside his head again. They continued playing in the background as they talked, and lunch turned to dinner and dinner turned to date at the movies, second date, first kiss, fifth date, sixth, first night. Eventually they found out they'd be working together soon, in space no less, and the rest was cosmometanomics.
He hadn't thought about meeting someone like Piya. Someone better than Piya, someone who he could actually converse with comfortably and someone who could relate to him and who he could relate to, as well. It amazed him that she was really that beautiful, though not as much as it amazed him that she liked him. Loved him. And that he didn't need to act cool or smooth in order for her to do that. Preity also said dumb things every now and then, and giggled afterwards, blushing just the tiniest bit.
The universe seemed to have a magical way of working things out, as everything just fell into place, slowly and perfectly, like a huge puzzle with the pieces just clicking together one after another. Agastya could write a theory on that, go deep into the plan the universe had carved out for him, starting from his meeting with Suhaan and Piya, and ending with this. Or rather, not ending, hopefully never.
He liked the sound of that.
----
Before you say it, plazmah, of course I will crosspost at bolly_fics soon!