Matt Jamison - OC - Milliways or a reasonable facsimile thereof

[mm_merky]

You'd think, what with all the amazing people and all the amazing sex and all the amazing opportunities in Matt's life right now, that he'd be able to avoid wrecking it by picking fights with powerful sorcerers and subsequently getting his spirit friends prohibited from talking to himBut if you thought that, you clearly do not know Matt Jamison

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[leftistbeanpole]

Oh look, it is a scruffy doctor with a giant book under his arm.

Jordie's slid into the seat opposite. The book makes a resounding thunk on the table. "This is heavy," he says by way of greeting, "so I'm gonna sit down for a minute. But then I'll go away."

He also has a lowball of something amber. It does not make such a loud thunk as the book.

[leftistbeanpole]

"Is she?"

[tantric_slacker]

"I can't tell," Matt says flatly.

"Ariel's been forbidden to talk to me."

[leftistbeanpole]

"By..."

Jordie blinks.

"Is, uh." He points toward the hall containing the Security office. "Is that legal here?"

[tantric_slacker]

"I don't know."

Matt shrugs, picking up the knight and moving it aimlessly around the table in front of him, as if it were about to launch a military campaign against his plate.

"Their-- their contract is from outside Milliways. Ariel is technically his servant. And as far as I can tell he didn't actually do any forbidding, he was just ominous and hinty about how maybe he and I would talk again, but maybe, hypothetically, Ariel and I wouldn't, so unless Security likes reading through the lines--"

Why does he never think to involve Security?

[leftistbeanpole]

A servant named Ariel?

A powerful sorcerer?

Isn't that --

Jordie shakes his head a little, as though shaking off the thought. "Can Ariel read?"

[tantric_slacker]

Isn't is just.

"... I don't know," Matt admits.

"But actually, I could probably cast a spell to imbue something with ... a meaning, or a memory, or a sense of me, anyway, and she'd probably dig it more."

Spirits are not always super literary, and Ariel kind of doesn't dig the mortal intellectual pursuits.

[leftistbeanpole]

"As long as you're not directly talking to her..." Jordie spreads his hands. "Would that work?"

[tantric_slacker]

"It would," Matt admits.

"If she wanted to get the message. And if Prospero is just capricious and not actually in full-on nuclear mode, because in that case I'm not sure what to bet on."

He sighs.

"I'm just ... worried that she'll get hurt. And that if she does, I will know that it was entirely because I couldn't keep my damn mouth shut. Both of which are things I should have thought of before."

[leftistbeanpole]

"Yep," Jordie says, merciless. "I mean. She's bound to this guy who can fuck her up. Putting on the white knight persona doesn't do her any good."

[tantric_slacker]

Matt frowns, miserably.

"I guess I thought he might listen to me ..."

Because he knows some people don't take people seriously at all if they're spirits.

But.

That was kind of a long shot. Matt shakes his head.

"So it's done, and ... I realize now that everything I say he will ... tie to her. Probably partially because I did that."

[leftistbeanpole]

"Probably."

Pause.

He drinks again. "Okay, so, stop me if this is one of those things I'm not supposed to mention, but, uh, isn't it a play? That they're from?"

[tantric_slacker]

"It's a play in your world, too?"

Matt's interest is piqued, but not enough to elevate him from his current self-loathing jag.

"Uh. Yeah. I told Ariel that one time. She didn't take it well."

[leftistbeanpole]

"I probably wouldn't have, either. Anyway -- the point is, if Prospero hasn't read it? Can't you figure out some kind of weakness from it and go from there? If you're wanting to get her out from under it."

Beat.

"And doesn't he set Ariel free and give it all up anyhow?"

[tantric_slacker]

"Assuming the version I ... we know is the same," Matt admits, "it's not a bad idea."

He frowns.

"Does he? Because my impression is that right now it's ... before. I mean. Triangulating from how many years Ariel's got left and how old his daughter is when the play happens."

[leftistbeanpole]

It seems like there's always a point when talking to this kid that Jordie finds himself with the urge to pat him on the hed.

"If you fuck up a thousand years of Shakespeare scholarship, you know how hard I'm going to laugh?" Jordie shakes his head and drains his glass. "Triangulating. Jesus Christ. When was the last time you read the play?"