Leonardo da Vinci // Leonardo // Bar!

[innermuses]

So the door opens, as doors are wont to do, and through that door comes hurtling a device the likes of which you've never seen!

...unless you've seen bicycles before.

Riding the bicycle (it appears to have a wooden frame. It's painted garishly yellow) is a young man of about 16 years of age, in bright earth tones of cotton and linen that might be

Comments

[scots_wolf]

Somebody sticks his head out from a sofa, looking at the source of the crashing noise.

[scots_wolf]

"You're in Milliways, the bar at the end of the universe," Urquhart says. "And you came here through a door, of course. Which connected here by what appears to be random magic."

[innermuses]

"Magic?"

Leonardo is now at the door, examining the door frame by running his hands along and up it. "Magic is just somehting we don't understand yet."

[scots_wolf]

"Probably," Urquhart says. "Try asking the bar for a drink. Go on!"

[innermuses]

Leonardo gives him a look that suggests he may be considering the blond man to be mad. But he does cross back to the bar, albeit warily.

"Ask... the bar?"

[scots_wolf]

"Go on," Urquhart grins. "Go ahead and ask, even if you feel silly."

[innermuses]

Leo's not backing down from the that challenge.

"OK," he says, turning his attention to the bar. "Then I'll have a goblet of wine."

When it appears, he jumps back in delighted surprise.

"Fantastico!" he declares, and even tries the wine. "It's even good wine!"

[scots_wolf]

Urquhart laughs.

"See?" he says. "Magic! And if it's just technology from the future after all, it's from a far enough away future to look like magic to us. Are you from earth, or somewhere else?"

[innermuses]

"Oh, I'm from Earth," Leonardo says, his attention divided again because he's crouching by the bar, running his hands along the wood and looking for the trapdoor.

"Florence, to be...

"Wait, there are people here who aren't from Earth?"

[scots_wolf]

"Florence," Urquhart says. "I've been there."

But there was too much competition working there.

"What year? And yes, there's people from other places than earth here. Actually, I wonder why there aren't more blue women and metal men, and the like. There are a lot of vampires and werewolves. Quite a number of deities. And a mermaid."

[innermuses]

"1467," he replies. "Vampires and mermaids, really?"

He'd love to meet them.

[scots_wolf]

"A good two hundred years after I'd been there," Urquhart says. "There's a lot of earth people here from the latter part of the 20th and the early 21st century; no idea why. They have interesting science and technology that's not too advanced to understand. As a rule, I'd say there weren't any bikes yet in your time. But they haven them."

He points at the vehicle Leo's crashed in on.

[innermuses]

"My bicycle."

Of course, Leo had forgotten. With the same youthful exuberance that's carried him aroun dthe bar, he returns to it, piclking it up and wheeling it back to the bar and hs wine.

"I designed it. You mean it becomes popular?"

[scots_wolf]

"Did you?" Urquhart says. "Yes, it becomes popular. Very popular. You should invest in yourself, it will probably pay off for your twenty-times-great-grandchildren."

Beat.

"What's your name."

[innermuses]

Leonardo has no ideas what 'invest in himself' means. He doesn't realise, howver, that he's gone a long way without introducing himself.

"Sorry," he says impulsively. "Leonardo da Vinci."

[scots_wolf]

Urquhart might have read that name in some history book from the future. Or he might not. He gives no indication to either.

"Nice to meet you, Leonardo," he says. "I'm Urquhart. I came in from Cologne in 1260, and I'm dead."