audrey main // ramona flowers (dyingatherfeet) wrote in musingslogs, @ 2011-01-12 16:04:00 |
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Entry tags: | ramona flowers, superman |
Who: Johnny and Audrey
What: Audrey shows up at the safehouse to flee zombies, and Johnny makes Audrey think her sister has been invaded by the bodysnatchers.
Where: Warehouse
When: During Reaver!Plot
Warnings: None
Johnny was doing his best to keep everyone on the calm side of crazy, he’d brought as many as he could and was periodically checking for more. Jack, Bly, Tessa, and Jess were all settled in as best as they could be. The warehouse the Bat had let him borrow was well fortified, and had running water, which was about the long and short of it. He’d brought food, but there wasn’t a ton. If they were trapped here much longer than a few days the food would run out and he’d go back out again.
The place itself was huge, but sparse, he was trying not to make too much of a presence there, he’d be sure and clean up before they left. His group was pretty well occupied with hot dogs, so getting away to chat with Max had been fairly easy. Of course that put him on duty for the arrival of her sister, apparently a genetic pain in the ass as well, but he didn’t mind. He would do his best to look after her, because with the shaky ground he and Max were on it wouldn’t do well to get her sister killed.
Audrey had only done this once.
Earlier in the week she'd asked a clerk at her job to describe the back room she'd never been in in detail. He'd been puzzled by the question, but had been excited enough to have the new girl talk to him that he'd provided a pretty good layout. That night, she'd opened a door into her side world, the sub-space place beneath everything else, and managed to come out in the back room even though she'd never seen it. She came out the wrong door and almost killed herself tripping on packages, but it was a small triumph.
Now, in the middle of an unbelievably real zombie apocalypse, she was all the more glad she'd tested her theory. It took her about five minutes to walk the intervening sub-space path to reach the door to the warehouse, and when she opened it she only opened it a crack at first, making sure the coast was clear before she swung it all the way open and walked out.
Audrey had no idea what sort of man her sister might be friends with, so she didn't really know what to expect from Johnny, or what he expected of her. Choppy blue hair, goggles worn on the head, a leather jacket over a bright blue winter sweater, jeans and a pair of black and pink roller skates, however, were likely not what someone pictured Max's sister in, but there she was, colorful and serious and out of place as always.
She skated out a few paces, looking across the room at several other people. None of them really fit what she pictured for Max's 'friend.' She rolled sideways, skates at an even angle, and found herself face to face with someone who did. "Oh. Hey. ...Johnny?" She asked, pointing at him as she waited for confirmation or denial.
Johnny didn’t know what he was expecting when he heard that Max’s kid sister was coming to the warehouse. One thing he did know is that when he was presented with Audrey, it wasn’t what he was expecting. Still, ever polite, ever sweet, ever endearing Johnny just smiled widely at her, “That’s me, you’re Audrey? I’m glad you made it. Do you need to phone your sister or anything?” he asked offering his phone just in case.
A small, slow, surprised smirk. “I’ll call her later,” she assured him. Max could stew as far as she was concerned, and Johnny’s sincere, forthright sweetness was funny. Was he trying to ingratiate himself because he was banging her sister or because he hoped it might get him in good enough to get that far? Then again, maybe he was just nice. That would be like Max, ending up with the good guy, coming up aces even in another dimension. She braked on her skates. She looked past him, and gestured with a jut of her chin to the other people in the shelter. “Who’re they?”
Johnny nodded, making a note to send Max a quick text to let her know that Audrey had arrived safely. Just in case it slipped her sister’s mind. “A few of my neighbors,” he said pointing them out, “That’s Tessa, and Bly, and Jack-” he wasn’t sure Jack wanted him going around claiming him as his son, but it was painfully obvious when they were in the same room together, “And Jess is not feeling well.”
He looked back at Audrey and smiled politely, “So you just got here?” he didn’t add on a comment about her poor timing, that much was obvious.
She catalogued the people and their names before looking back over to Johnny. “Couple weeks ago,” she said. “I didn’t really feel like bothering with the boards just yet. Then there was an epidemic of the T-Virus and I didn’t have much of a choice.” She reached down and began to unlace her skates. “So what’s Max up to lately?” She pretended she wasn’t as curious as she was, didn’t feel a need to know what her sister had done after disappearing through the portal and throwing their father into a fit.
What was Max up to lately? Well there was a loaded question he didn’t particularly want to answer. At all. But he didn’t let that show. He was the world’s greatest liar after all, even in the middle of a zombie apocalypse. He just shrugged a bit and smiled, “Working, we work together at the Seattle Times. We’re also neighbors, she’s my best friend’s roommate. So we see a bit of each other socially, but mostly we share a cubicle at work and she tries to steamroll over my career,” he said it all pleasantly, clear there was no malice at the very least. Things with Max were as complicated as ever, but he wasn’t about to spread that around.
She looked up, almost losing balance on her skates. “Max is working at a paper?” She vaguely remembered that the few times Max had been home for stretches of time beyond a day or two when they were kids, Max would sometimes go shut herself away and writer for hours on end. But she’d never equated that with anything serious. The fact that she hadn’t gone straight back into the military boggled her. There had to be a catch somewhere. Johnny’s description of their relationship was normal to the point of nearly being creepy. Where were the near miss stories and the tales of hero Max the military woman? “That’s it? Nothing else?”
“Yep, she’s doing well too. She doesn’t understand my messy filing system but she’s made herself a niche.”
Johnny chuckled a typical nerdy Johnny Copeland chuckle and pushed his glasses up on the bridge of his nose just a bit as she looked confused. “Unless she’s moonlighting as a Professional Bull Rider or at the Monster Truck Derby then I’m pretty sure that’s it.” He had his orders after all, he’d been walking a line between Johnny and Sentinel since he’d gotten everybody to safety, but this was a situation where the nice nerd schtick would have to come out full force. He’d promised after all.
Yeah, there definitely had to be a catch someplace. No way Max was satisfied with sitting around in an office cubicle. Maybe this guy didn’t know it, but there had to be something - secret agent jobs, or maybe she was working there as a mole for the FBI. “If you say so,” she said, clearly still dubious, and unlaced her other skate. “She seeing anyone?” She watched to see if he choked, or obviously lied. One of the only complaints she ever heard about her sister was that she seemed to have trouble settling down with a man, and if she had finally hooked up with someone long term Audrey was going to have to start investigating whether or not an invasion of the body snatchers type situation was going on. Maybe the portal and flipped her brain upside down.
Johnny half shook his head and half shrugged, “I couldn’t begin to tell you,” he answered. And that was mostly true. He really couldn’t begin to tell her because no matter how hard he tried he’d never wrap his head around her personal life. He supposed once Audrey saw Max, found out about her condition, and whatever else she decided to tell her, she’d have the information she wanted. But the last thing he was going to do was let that cat out of the bag. Ever.
“What do you do, Audrey?” he asked curiously.
She raised an eyebrow but didn’t call him on that. Sure, maybe they were just friends and Max didn’t talk about her love life. That would fit the bill - all business, no pleasure. “Delivery girl,” she said, and sat down to pull her skates off as she finished unlacing them. There was the aspiring artist aspect as well, but she’d only just met Johnny, and didn’t know what might get back to Max. She was used to keeping pieces of personal information back, however small they might seem, and she held herself coolly enough to strike most people as mysterious and unapproachable, which lately suited her just fine. “I appreciate the place to stay, Johnny,” she said, after a moment. If nothing else, she had to admit the guy seemed nice. “Mind if I steal some food from you? I had some dry stuff at the Chinese grocery I was hiding out in, not super appetizing.”
He nodded and leaned against a table that was set up as she took off her skates and he smiled, he wondered if she liked being a delivery girl, but he didn’t want to be too nosy. He waved his hand off, “It’s no trouble at all, I’m glad you were able to get here,” he answered smiling genuinely. “Food? Yeah definitely, we’ve got hot dogs, they’re probably not much better than the dry stuff, we also have some cans of soup, but nothing to eat it with, so we’ve just been heating the can up on the hot plate and drinking it. There are a few burned lips,” he said smiling a bit sheepishly. “If we’re here for a long period I’ll go for more food soon. Any of that sound appealing?”
“Hot dogs on a hot plate sounds like a classy apocalypse dinner,” she mused. She opened her purse, a round bag with a star sewn into the side, and dropped her skates in. She pulled out a pair of scuffed blue slip-on shoes and stepped into them, zipping the bag shut without any obvious bulges on the sides from the skates. It was like there was nothing in the bag at all. “I’ll give Max a good review,” she said, smile wry. “You might have gotten a better score if you denied me hot dogs and kicked me to the curb, actually.” There was no point in hiding what her relationship with her sister was like, he’d find that out from Max if he didn’t know already. On that note, she set to making food, and left Johnny to entertain his other safe house guests.