Just Cappie is fine (downandirty) wrote in saveatlantisic, @ 2017-05-08 18:42:00 |
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Entry tags: | !log, *hannahgrace, *lena, cappie, emilia spinnet |
Cappie had thought about the girl he'd kissed at the St Patrick's Day party a few times since that night. He knew it had just been the Harp talking, or acting, but that didn't mean he hadn't enjoyed the experience all the same. When Aria had told him that her name was Emilia and that the delicious, anonymous brownies they'd all received were most probably from her, he'd taken it as a sign that he should probably stop procrastinating and actually ask the damn girl out for coffee, rather than just daydreaming in class about the way her lips had felt on his. Luckily for him, it hadn't taken too much convincing to get her to agree to meet him. He even got the distinct impression that she appreciated his sense of humour, which was remarkably refreshing in this place. He'd noticed a disturbing lack of ability to relax and have a good time among the residents of Atlantis so far, except Alexander Hamilton. That guy was a hoot. He hoped that maybe Emilia would be on his wavelength too. Anyway, he thought she might be able to use a bit of friendly company, after some of the comments he’d seen on the network about the brownies. Seriously, when was free, magically delivered, delicious food ever a bad thing? Still, it wasn't his place to wade in and preach at people and, quite honestly, he couldn't be bothered to deal with the fallout but cheering up the chef, he could do. Cappie took up a seat on one of the bar stools at the centre of Tower One, waving away the bartender who asked him if he wanted to order something and watching the entrance to the elevators, as he waited for Emilia to show up. Aria had told him which block she lived in and he figured, if he waited for her here, she wouldn't be able to miss him. Emilia had been thinking about their kiss, too, but she wanted to think it was for a different reason. She’d been in Atlantis for almost two months, but she still missed Luke. Telling herself this kiss had only been one of those weird party magic things assuaged her guilt. What was it Sydney had called it in Breck? Accidental Infidelity? If she stopped to consider that Cappie was cute and fun to be around, that would make things a lot more complicated. She’d have to really consider how to deal with the fact that she was in a relationship with someone who wasn’t here. Thinking about that would be figuring out how long she was supposed to wait for him. Did the fact that her boyfriend was in a totally different reality mean she was technically single? It wasn’t something she was ready to think about yet. Coffee and a friendly face were always welcome, though, so she agreed easily when he suggested getting together. He seemed nice and Emilia was always happy to make a new friend. She had a few here from home, but they were more Alicia’s people than hers. Em adored them all the same, but she thought it would be nice to have a friend who hadn’t known her sister first. Finding him easily, she walked up and held out a small box filled with some snickerdoodles. “I didn’t have any brownies left, so I hope these will do as well,” she said, offering him a grin. It was rare for her to not have some kind of fresh baked goods around her apartment, even here where she didn’t have quite as nice a kitchen. Cappie jumped down from his stool when he saw Emilia coming, a wide smile spreading across his face. She was even more attractive than he remembered from through the beer haze, with big, brown, almond shaped eyes, a cute, little, button nose and a big, bright smile that made her lower cheeks dimple. He cleared his throat, reminding himself to stay cool. He had this. He was good at this. Talking to girls came naturally to him. It was all a matter of evolution. “Oo, goodies,” Cappie said gleefully, taking the proffered box and peeking inside. He had been joking when he’d asked her to bring more brownies but he was never one to turn down sweet treats. Snickerdoodles. Nice. “They’re no brownies,” he said, with an exaggerated sigh. “But I suppose they’ll do.” He tossed Emilia a cheeky grin before closing the box and tucking it under his arm. “So, coffee?” he suggested, gesturing towards the coffee cart which stood in the large entrance atrium. He’d been planning to go to Coffee Me Better but now, with the addition of snickerdoodles into the equation, he had a better idea and it involved coffee to go. He was glad to see she’d brought a coat. “What can I get you?” he asked. “A Cappie-cino?” he added, hopefully. It was an old joke and one he used often but he still liked it. It made him smile to himself. Laughing at his joke, Emilia nodded. This coffee cart was one of the places in Atlantis she frequented. “I’m usually more of a mocha girl, but maybe I will try the Cappie-cino today,” she teased back with a grin. Most of her more serious considerations fell to the wayside, at least for now as she found it easy to relax around him. She didn’t know Cappie well, but from what she did know, he seemed like fun. She liked the quick, easy banter between them. Pushing a little of her hair behind her ear as they walked, she looked over at her companion and smiled again. “You know,” she said, “I’ve realized I know almost nothing about you. What did you do before you came to Atlantis?” For that matter, she didn’t actually know what he did here, either. Grinning a little more playfully, she added, “aside from organ harvesting, of course. I know that’s your favorite hobby, but you must have others.” Cappie’s smile spread even wider. Emilia’s laid back attitude and openness to his crappy jokes immediately put him at ease. She was exactly the sort of girl he enjoyed being around - the kind that made it him want to work hard to impress her. He have to be careful about that. He thought she was the kind of girl he could get very used to being around very quickly. There was no queue at the coffee cart when they got there so Cappie stepped up and ordered one cappuccino and one mocha. “I’ll let you try mine if you let me taste yours,” he told her, leaning against the side of the cart to wait for the coffees. Cappie sighed, looking up into the tall atrium ceiling, as he tried to think of what to tell her. Talking about himself certainly wasn’t among his favourite hobbies. Luckily for her, though, neither was organ harvesting. “Your organs are safe,” he reassured her, holding up his one free hand in surrender. “Well, I’m a student, a Cancerian and I enjoy long walks on the beach,” he recited, teasingly. “At least,” he added, “I’m sure I would if I were motivated enough to leave the couch once in awhile.” “What about you?” he asked, flipping the conversation back to her at the earliest available opportunity. “I mean, it’s clear you like making half of Atlantis worry that someone’s anonymously trying to poison them, but is the baking just a happy side effect of your nefarious nature or do you actually enjoy it too?” Knowing the Weasley twins for so long made it impossible to not be able to take a joke. She’d learned over the years to keep up with a good joke. She could have her more serious moments, especially when it came to the things she was passionate about, but this was different. She could easily keep things light here. She laughed softly when he gave an answer reminiscent of a personal advert and shook her head. “At home I was a Pastry Chef,” she answered him a little more seriously. “Then I ended up in Colorado, in this place called Breckenridge. Alicia and I ran a wine bar and a tapas restaurant there. It’s been kind of an adjustment here, with being assigned to a team and everything, so I guess baking things for others is my way of having a piece of familiarity. It’s something I’ve done ever since I was old enough to use a kitchen.” Realizing she was kind of gushing a little about cooking, she stopped there and hoped the burning in her cheeks wasn’t really obvious. “Ah, now it all makes sense,” he exclaimed, lifting the lid of the snickerdoodle box and inspecting the contents again, narrowing his eyes for dramatic effect. “You know, I’m going to have to be a tougher judge, now I know you’re a professional,” he warned her, teasingly. “I might even need to demand more samples, just to make sure I’m being fair,” he added, sounding entirely reasonable. Still, he couldn’t help but think it was cute how excited she sounded about baking. He hadn’t met many people that were that passionate about their day job. Even Lasker Parkes, the most prestigious KT alumni… the only prestigious KT alum, was more enthusiastic about how he and where worked than what he actually did. In a strange way, she gave him hope. “You’re cute when you blush,” he noted offhandedly, noticing the slight pink tinge to her cheeks. Behind him, the barista placed their two freshly made coffees on the cart counter. Cappie was distracted for a moment while he paid for them before handing the cappuccino to Emilia and grabbed the mocha for himself. “Cute-er,” he corrected himself. “So baking all these tasty treats for other people is entirely selfishly motivated?” he questioned her, raising his eyebrows as a little smirk twitched the corners of his lips. “Good to know. There was I, under the impression you were some kind of do gooder.” He turned, starting towards the doors. He had a place in mind to take her, if he could only remember how to get there. “Oh, of course, that makes complete sense.” She nodded solemnly, but there was a smile on her lips at his teasing. She knew he was mostly just fishing for more goodies, but she didn’t mind. Emilia did bake because she loved it. She’d always loved being in the kitchen. Baking was her passion, but she enjoyed cooking non-sweets, too. All of it was fun for her and the best part was being able to make someone happy with the fruits of her labor. It was why she made enough to share with others. It was why she’d felt so badly when some people seemed to be offended by the gifts. The coffee was warm, but in a way that warmed her hands and felt nice. Thanks to the coffee collars, it wasn’t enough to burn, although she knew she should let hers cool before she tried a sip if she didn’t want to burn her mouth. “Completely selfish,” she assured him with a smile that said it wasn’t really. She had wanted to make others smile. Maybe she baked because she loved it, but she shared it with others because sometimes it was the only way she knew how to help when bad things happened. She knew it didn’t make everything better, but if her food could cheer someone up, even a little, it made her feel a little less helpless, whether it was sending care packages to her sister’s team after a loss or sending them to people in Breck after a mass exit. She hadn’t expected to be met with such resistance to continuing the practice here. Cappie found Emilia easy to be around. As they walked, they carried on talking and Cappie found out more about Breckenridge and the tapas bar Emilia had run there with her sister. He already knew a little about the town in Colorado from Aria - he explained that his roommate was the one who’d tipped him off to the fact that it was Emilia who had most likely baked the brownies for everyone - but he was still getting to grips with the concept of world hopping. His own world, CRU, his life, was so normal compared to all of this. It was an adjustment for him and, every now and then, things were still catching him off guard. However, no one could say that Cappie wasn’t laid back, about most things actually, and, true to form, he had been taking the whole kidnapped-to-another-world thing in his stride. “So why haven’t they got you running a super awesome bakery here?” he asked, sounding indignant at the powers that be on her behalf. “Surely that would be good for troop morale or something like that.” He figured that morale was the only reason they’d decided to keep him around - to keep everyone in a happy state of potential intoxication so that they would forget the fact that they were risking their lives in someone else’s war. So far, he’d been happy to do his bit. Partying in Atlantis wasn’t too different to partying at home, although he was beginning to miss his friends a lot more than he imagined he would. He was kinda hoping Emilia would prove to be a wonderful distraction from the loneliness. They came to a corner in the road and Cappie paused for a moment, looking both ways up the street before motioning to the left and nodding for Emilia to follow him. “I do know where I’m going,” he added, realising that it might look slightly shady, him leading her off in some random direction without explanation. “I found this really cool place a couple of weeks ago. You’re gonna love it.” He paused, stopping to consider something that could potentially derail his plan. “You don’t mind a little bit of innocent trespassing, right?” “I guess they need more magic users?” Emilia didn’t really know why she’d been assigned as a field agent. She’d done alright with defense in school, but baking had always been her thing and she honestly didn’t know how much good she’d be in the field. She was anxious to prove herself there and had been training hard with Dimitri since her arrival to get stronger, tougher, but there were times that she’d wondered, herself, why they hadn’t given her the bakery to manage. Shrugging, she offered him a smile. “I don’t mind it, really,” she said. “Sometimes it’s good to try something new, go outside your comfort zone and the people on my team are pretty great.” She’d known Damon and Taisia both in Breck, at least, and having Becker as her CO was nice, too. She knew who to go to if she needed advice or help. “Innocent trespassing?” Emilia managed to lift her brow and laugh all at once. “You’d have definitely been a Gryffindor,” she decided, shaking her head. “You can do magic?” he asked, slightly taken aback by the revelation. Of course she could do magic. It seemed like every other person here was a witch or a vampire of a freaking Jedi. In fact, it was the run of the mill, boring humans like him that were in short supply here. Still, the fact didn't do anything to make her seem less appealing to him. If anything, it heightened his intrigue still higher. It also made her comment about Gryffindor make a lot more sense than it would have done only a few moments earlier. “Hold on, so that chick wasn't kidding when she said her friend used to be in Gryffindor?” he reasoned, realising belatedly that he’d been playing along with a joke that wasn't even a joke. “I thought she was just really into Harry Potter or something,” he admitted, feeling ever so slightly foolish. “I'd only want to be a Gryffindor if you were one too,” he told her, with a cheeky, sidewards smile. In reality, he'd never really given it much thought. He knew about Harry Potter, obviously - he didn't live under a rock - but he’d never read the books and he hadn't gotten around to seeing the last couple of movies that had come out. In his time, the series hadn't finished, although he guessed Atlantis would have the full collection if he ever felt the need to catch up. He wondered if Emilia was in them. That would be weird but very, very cool. Emilia nodded. It didn’t seem that unusual to her, but she’d grown up with it. She’d also gotten so used to it being common knowledge in Breck, that she didn’t even think about concealing her abilities here. Luckily, her time in Breck meant she was also used to the fact that there was a series of books about her world, about Harry. “Probably not kidding,” she laughed and shook her head. “Alicia was, but I was a Hufflepuff and Leo was in Ravenclaw. We’re kind of a varied bunch.” If this was home, her involvement with Cappie would be discouraged. Her even telling him what she was would have been against the law. She’d been away for so long, it wasn’t even really a consideration for her now, but there was a part of her that still missed home. “This place is so weird,” Cappie commented, although there was a childlike sense of wonder in his voice. Cappie may have had an alternative upbringing but he’d never really been encouraged to believe in magic. When he was a child, his parents had been of the opinion that Santa, the Tooth Fairy, the Easter Bunny and their ilk were just an invention of the conglomerates to force downtrodden parents to become slaves to the capitalist institution. Astrology, on the other hand, had been consulted frequently, in their family, as a highly regarded and accurate science. To be confronted now with people, like Emilia and Zelda, who could really do magic, real magic, made a small part of him, the residual five year old that still lived inside, feel thoroughly vindicated for his childhood longing to believe. Turning the final corner at the end of the street, the pair of them stepped onto the coast road, opposite the building which housed the spa. “Follow me,” Cappie told Emilia, warning her to be quiet with a finger to the lips before crossing the street and leading her down the side of the building, under the cover of the encroaching night’s darkness. The spa was still and quiet, closed to business for the day, which was exactly how he’d hoped to find it - it meant that no one was around to hear when he reached up and pulled down the metal ladder which led up to the fire escape. “Ladies first,” Cappie said, turning to Emilia with a grin and motioning for her to precede him up the ladder. It wouldn’t be the easiest climb, with their drinks and the box of snickerdoodles, but the ladder turned into a metal staircase about four feet above their heads and Cappie knew the place they’d find at the top would be worth the effort of the climb. “You didn’t tell me coffee was going to come with an illicit pedicure,” Emilia teased as she stepped forward and reached for the ladder. It was a balancing act, holding her coffee and she considered it for a moment before concentrating a second, murmuring a soft wingardium leviosa as she focused on the coffees and the box of biscuits. She wanted to keep an eye on them, so she floated them up higher, above them. That could be disastrous if she lost her hold, but she wouldn’t. This was a spell that had always come easily to her. Keeping enough of her focus on the magic, she looked over her shoulder as she started to climb. “See, magic has it’s uses,” she told him, winking before she turned back to the ladder and made everything float a little higher. Cappie’s eyebrows rose in surprise as his coffee and the box of biscuits suddenly levitated out of his hands. His look of surprise turned into a grin, however, at her words and that wink and he used the opportunity of having free hands to climb the ladder after her. If she’d looked down at him again, she would have noticed that he was absolutely checking out her ass and making no secret about it but, after a few moments, the pair of them were on the fire escape together and Cappie took back his coffee and the cookies from where they were floating in mid-air. “As much as I would love to get you undressed, even if it is just your socks that come off,” he started, with a cheeky yet (he hoped) adorable smile. “We’re not here for pedicures,” he told her, leading her up the fire escape, their footsteps echoing on the metal steps. When they reached the top, Cappie expertly balanced his coffee cup on top of the box of cookies and reached up and over the tall, wooden gate that barred their progress. Like before, he found that it was padlocked shut but that the padlock itself wasn’t locked, just hanging there to make sure that the gate didn’t blow open in the wind. Shooting Emilia a triumphant look, he pulled the padlock away and pushed the gate open so that she could walk through. Beyond, the rooftop patio of the spa was deserted but no less lovely for it, with its views out over the ocean, its deck chairs, patio heaters and the soft, underwater lighting of the open air infinity pool, which cast ripples of light and shadow bouncing in every direction. It gave the whole rooftop an enchanted, underwater look. Cappie surveyed the scene proudly, hoping he’d done good. “Don’t say I never bring you anywhere nice,” he told Emilia as he shut the gate behind them, shutting out the world below and barring them from the prying eyes of anyone who might have a mind to spoil their fun. The view from the top was breathtaking and Emilia smiled as she looked over at Cappie. “I have to admit, this was a pretty good idea,” she agreed as they made their way towards the deck chairs. This was absolutely better than a pedicure, even if she didn’t mind a little pampering now and then. She made a mental note to drag Alicia here for a sisters day soon, when the place was actually open, but for the moment, her attention focused on Cappie. “You’re lucky that grate wasn’t locked,” she teased him, even though she could have easily taken care of that with her magic. Muggle locks were easy - they didn’t use the kind of complicated locking spells some wizards chose for theirs. “It’s gorgeous up here,” she added, taking another look around. Definitely worth a little breaking and entry, she decided, at least as long as they didn’t get caught. Dyson and Cat liked her, but she wasn’t sure that would be enough to keep them out of jail. Cappie followed Emilia across the patio towards the deck chairs, laughing at her comment. “I know,” he agreed. He would have looked like a right idiot if the gate had been locked - if someone had just forgotten to secure the padlock the other day, when he’d found it open, and had since corrected their mistake - but it seemed like fortune was smiling on him tonight. “It’s not the only thing,” Cappie muttered under his breath, watching Emilia as she looked around at the patio and out across the ocean. The comment wasn’t meant to be heard but, if it was, Cappie wasn’t too bothered. Emilia had to realize he was interested. He didn’t bring just anyone along on his illegal breaking and entry jaunts, after all. There were two deck chairs positioned close together overlooking the pool and, beyond that, the ocean. Putting down his coffee and box of cookies on a low, round rattan, table next to them, he pulled one of the patio heaters over and turned it on before slumping down into one of the chairs. Picking up his coffee cup, he turned to Emilia with a smile. “So,” he said, grinning. “Tell me more about you?” He was getting the distinct feeling that she was going to be his new favorite subject. |