Happy Hour!

[isaysimplewords]

When Cal finally, finally remembers to ask Bar for instructions on making raktajino so he can have it at home - the coffee shop across the street is good, far better than Cal's own attempts at brewing coffee for himself, but it's just not the same - a note pops up along with the answer

Comments

[cutting_edgex23]

X slips onto a barstool, head tilting fractionally as she studies Cal.

Then --

"Hello. I would like a root beer float."

Beat.

"Please."

[isaysimplewords]

Cal grins. He hasn't seen X since before he left for his new world.

"Hi, X," he says. "Coming right up."

He opens the freezer to find the ice cream, saying,

"How've you been?"

[cutting_edgex23]

"I have been okay. Busy. Here and at home."

She pauses for a moment, searching for the right words.

"Bela knows you are back?"

[isaysimplewords]

Cal emerges with the ice cream and sets it onto the counter, repeating the search in the fridge for root beer.

He looks up at X's question.

"Yeah. She told me about the demon. She seemed pretty shook up." Not that he blames her for that.

[52_dropoff]

"Hey, Cal. What's a raktajino?" He's seen it on the menu before, but never asked.

[isaysimplewords]

"Klingon coffee," Cal answers. "It's a lot like Earth coffee, but - better."

Gaze in awe at Cal's mighty descriptive powers.

[52_dropoff]

"Klingon? That's an alien race?" His timeline didn't have Star Trek. It had Space Trek 2020, with Beast Boy after the Doom Patrol and before the Teen Titans. It wasn't very good.

[isaysimplewords]

"Yup," Cal says. "From the Star Trek universe. It's a TV show. Well, shows. Four of them." (Cal died long before Enterprise started airing in his old world.) "And some movies.

". . . anyway. You don't drink caffeine, right? There's a decaf version too, if you're interested."

Which raktajino devotees from its home universe would no doubt consider an abomination, but when Cal started drinking it, Bar was mindful of roughly how many cups a day he would be consuming. She prefers not to let patrons die of caffeine poisoning.

[a1enzo]

"Hey, Cal! What is raktajino?"

[isaysimplewords]

"Hi, Enzo!" Cal says. "It's Klingon coffee."

He's about to add, with appropriate sternness, that Enzo can only have decaf, when he remembers:

"But I don't know if there's a digital version." Or how to make it if there was.

[a1enzo]

"That's okay, I couldn't have it if there was." Cal's stern thought processes do not lie. Do not tempt the Wrath of Dot. "I'll have a root dir float."

[isaysimplewords]

There is a pause.

"You're gonna have to talk me through that one," Cal says.

Starting with where the digital ingredients might be stored.

[living_vamp]

Aww, poor Cal. You get a very, very hung over living vampire at your Happy Hour.

She looks awful...and in need of coffee. In fact, she croaks out, "Something coffeeish that's strong."

[isaysimplewords]

Cal looks sympathetic. That sounds like a pretty solid description of raktajino, which is Klingon coffee, but she does not look like a good subject for experimenting on. It wouldn't be very nice.

Bar kindly provided some prebrewed coffee before going to sleep, so Cal pours a mug of that and puts it in front of her.

"Here you go," he says. "Cream and sugar?"

[living_vamp]

She nods slowly, propping her head on an arm. She's sitting in the same spot she passed out the night before.

"Any hangover remedies you'd recommend? Atlantean...kicked ass."

[isaysimplewords]

"Yeah, hang on."

Cal gets out the all-purpose recipe book and flips through, brightening when he finds the recipe for the hangover cure Ianto showed him. Or at least something that looks pretty similar.

"I think I can make this. It's got fruit and honey and stuff in it, and I know how that sounds right now, but it goes down a lot easier than food, and it really does help. Something about the nutrients, I think."

[gorgonfondness]

"Dark chocolate and peanut butter milkshake," Mia rattles off as she takes a seat. "And I'll love you forever if you can make me a grog loaf sandwich as well."

She's in a half and half sort of mood right now. Most of it is visible happiness, but there is a hint of frustration at not knowing what she's going to do with her husband.

[isaysimplewords]

Cal laughs.

"I don't know what that is," he says, "but I can ask in the kitchen."

The shake sounds easy enough. Cal's not so good with anything more complicated than tea (heat water; add teabag; serve), but he's found that the ingredients he needs have a funny way of being right in front when he goes to look for them.

[gorgonfondness]

"The waitrats know what I like; as far as I know, I'm the only patron who orders it."

[isaysimplewords]

"Okay," Cal says. "I'll just be a minute."

His request in the kitchen is received easily enough, and he returns to say,

"They'll have that out for you soon."

It will probably get there before Cal finishes making the shake that he's now looking up in the book.