Conditioning had made the sight of woman and camera intensely interesting in Lionel's eyes, and he paused with a teacup poised at his lips as he sat perched on the edge of the trampoline set up beside the aptly named Compound.
When she drew nearer, brushing an impressive assortment of leaves out of her hair, he set the cup aside and rolled the mask back down over his lightly furred face.
"Hello," he said, his voice low and clear despite the impediment of the knitted mask, and for the moment it seemed that's all there was to it.
Sarah turned when she heard a voice, trying not to be startled by the man and his...mask? It almost reminded her of a scarecrow, really, and she stopped to offer a polite and friendly smile to him (or maybe it was a her?) and a nod. "I must look a fright," she admitted ruefully. "Hello."
Unsurprisingly, that absurd way of framing her tousled state tickled Lionel, and it earned the stranger an invisible grin. "I take it photography...isn't a profession for the faint of heart, in a place like this."
"Not when it's dinosaurs that you're photographing," Sarah agreed with a brusque and brave tone in her voice, as if she was both worried and proud that she was probably about to be reprimanded for her actions. "At least, the herbivores. I was considering writing an article about the types so we know more about what's lurking over there."
She approached, extending her hand. "Sarah Jane Smith, at your service."
Lionel responded with a curious tilt of his head and one gloved hand of his own, which he pressed to hers with an almost delicate touch. "Lionel," he said simply. "Just Lionel. And what did you find out, Sarah?"
Apparently Lionel wasn't one to be judgmental of those who liked to flirt with death.
"Mostly the same as I already knew. We happen to be living in a situation that is uniformly impossible, utterly, by the laws of linear time and space. Although, for those of us who are acquainted with more...creative methods of living, it's still odd. There's no explanation! No rift, no evil plan afoot. Nothing," she said in a tone of wonder.
Sarah Jane was hinting at wanting an explanation for the mask, but she figured something would come in time and at least he didn't seem hell-bent on sacrificing her to some unknown god. "So you don't seek out the truth?" she teased with a heavy amount of joy. "Not one of those?"
"Oh, the true's swell," said Lionel slyly, as he popped back up onto the very edge of the trampoline, folding his legs up beneath him like some overgrown feline. "But where's the fun in knowing everything there is to know? Where's the magic, hmm?"
"Because!" she retorted even if she was laughing and enjoying herself, wandering closer to make her case, "Because you're never going to find out everything! It's about the pursuit and you'll never know all the information in the world!"
"Mmmhmn. But it's the not knowing that inspires the pursuit." Curious conversation, it seemed, was easier to ferret out in a place like this than he'd been accustomed to at home. Normal people were reluctant to talk to a man in a mask about anything other than the fact he was a man in a mask.
She took a long look at the mask and her eyes narrowed in critical wonderment and judgment of what might be lurking behind that. "I've met many people who don't have faces like mine. I don't mind, really. That you haven't attempted to kill me really makes it all fine by me, whatever you are. Alien or human or otherwise."
When she drew nearer, brushing an impressive assortment of leaves out of her hair, he set the cup aside and rolled the mask back down over his lightly furred face.
"Hello," he said, his voice low and clear despite the impediment of the knitted mask, and for the moment it seemed that's all there was to it.
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She approached, extending her hand. "Sarah Jane Smith, at your service."
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Apparently Lionel wasn't one to be judgmental of those who liked to flirt with death.
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