Dinosaurs - [Veronica]

[plantfood]

Three weeks on the island now and Mathias thinks he's ready to leave the Compound without assistance from alcohol. He stands near the front steps, watching the trees with a faintly wary gaze and waiting for Veronica. He'd asked her a few days ago to show him the dinosaurs, thinking that he'd need those few days to prepare mentally, but even with that time he's not sure just how prepared he really is. Maybe the only thing that can prepare him for going back into the jungle is actually going into the jungle. It's not ideal, but it is what it is and Mathias can no more change the island than he can change what happened to him before this place.

The weather is warm, hot and humid, and already he can feel sweat prickling his scalp, but it's a comfort to know that no matter where he goes on the island, the Compound is never far away. Despite this, despite knowing he's in no danger here, he's learned his lesson from last time and is carrying a small pack with enough water to last two weeks and several bags of nuts he's found in the kitchen. It isn't enough to survive on for longer than a few weeks, but it's more than he'd had in Mexico. Just in case anything should happen.

Around him, there's constant movement. People coming to the Compound from their homes elsewhere on the island, people leaving, fresh from showers or breakfast, clean, warm laundry piled high in baskets. There are children in the playground nearby and he watches them for a moment, watches their parents, wonders which of them came to the island on their own and which were born here. It's still strange to him, how this place exists, but it's preferable to whatever might have happened back in Mexico.

He's early, he thinks, but it gives him time to think and to watch, two things he's very good at. So he waits, his thumbs hooked tentatively in the straps of his pack, making sure not to aggravate his healing burns.

Comments

[plantfood]

"I wanted to make things that worked," he answers, thinking back to his school and everything he's done, everything he's learned. "At first I was thinking about aerospace engineering. Building aircrafts and space shuttles, but I decided to become a mechanical engineer. It's more about building things, making things right, making them run smoothly."

He's not quite an engineer yet, he has another year of school to finish, but it isn't going to happen now. "I guess I wasted four years of school I won't finish."

[neptune-sleuth.livejournal.com]

The answer seemed to meet her approval. "Maybe not," she said, shrugging. "I don't think anyone else here is an engineer, and we could always use help making things run a little more smoothly." That was a big part of what she was doing on the Council, after all, just in a far less technical sense. After seeing the corruption of Neptune, she couldn't help wanting to make sure that never came to Tabula Rasa. The best way she knew to keep their government honest was to be a part of it herself. "Besides, I never even made it out of high school."

[plantfood]

"And I'm sure someone out there would be pleased if I could build a cooling system for the huts, yeah?" Mathias adds with a small smile, although he's actually sort of serious about this. Not only will it give him something to do, but it's something that could benefit people should he be able to make it work.

"I guess this place is different," he says after thinking about it. "High school diplomas and university degrees don't mean as much."

[neptune-sleuth.livejournal.com]

"At the risk of sounding like a cartoon animal in a Disney cartoon," Veronica said wryly, "it's less about pieces of paper and more about being willing to play a part." Their system worked for precisely that reason. People gave the best they could and they got what they needed in return. "And I can tell you I, for one, would definitely be pleased by a cooling system. I'm moving into my own hut soon and not dying of the heat would be nice."

[plantfood]

"I could use your new place as my experiment," Mathias suggests with a little grin, not entirely serious, of course. He's not going to experiment on anyone's hut if they don't want him to, but if he's serious about creating a cooling system, he's going to need a place to test it out. "You could be the first island resident with an air conditioned hut."

[neptune-sleuth.livejournal.com]

Veronica laughed. "As long as you don't blow the place up," she said, head tilting to the side, "I think that could be arranged." She wouldn't say no to someone just trying to help out the community, after all - or to being first in line. Besides, the fact that her place was so close to the Compound could only help him. Mathias had been doing really well so far, and she didn't think they had all that much further to go, but that didn't mean it wasn't still something to take into account.

[plantfood]

"I may only be good at a few things, but building things is one of them," Mathias promises, because he's fairly sure he won't be blowing anything up. "This whole plan hinges on whether or not I can find the materials needed for something like this, of course. The plans themselves might take a few months."

But it's something. He isn't sure how well his hands will work once the burns are healed, but he won't think of that now. When the time comes, he'll do what he needs to and if he can't work, he'll find someone to do the building for him.

[neptune-sleuth.livejournal.com]

"Chances are, I'll still be here," Veronica said, smile grim as she rolled her eyes. These days, she was more and more certain she was on the island for the long haul. For the most part, that suited her just fine. Besides, if it took all that time, it would give Mathias something to do with himself. Around here, he'd need it. "Someone has to make sure you don't start coming out to see these things alone."

[plantfood]

"Is this the royal 'you' or are you really that worried about me?" Mathias asks teasingly and he almost laughs, a soft, hoarse noise in the back of his throat. It feels sort of strange and he wonders if he really hasn't laughed at all since coming to the island.

"I don't think you will need to worry about me," he adds in a reassuringly voice, although he's still smiling that same smile. "I can barely manage to go outside alone without getting drunk first."

[neptune-sleuth.livejournal.com]

"Oh, charming," Veronica said, rather than actually answering. It had come differently than she'd meant it, but there was that in there, too, that spark of worry. God only knew why, because she sure as hell didn't, anymore than she wanted to think about her mom or Logan. Of course they'd be the first thing to pop to mind, she thought. She'd thought it all so bad in Neptune. She hadn't figured Logan could get even worse. Probably she should have known better - everyone could. "I'll stop right away, in that case. Aside from my profound concern, however... this place is home now."

[plantfood]

"I am not drunk now," Mathias points out, feeling that this is necessary. He'd been drunk the first time he'd left the Compound, but only because of the party going on and it's strange, but he finds himself wanting to make a good impression on Veronica.

"There are worse places to think of as home, I expect," he adds softly, looking up at the trees again. "It seems not so bad here. Quiet for the most part."

[neptune-sleuth.livejournal.com]

Sometimes she had to take a moment to remind herself that it was okay - that one drink didn't mean anything, that not everyone was at risk to turn into her mother. That she wasn't her mother. The older she got, the harder it became.

"For the most part," she agreed, nodding. "I mean, not that we've been entirely without our share of murders and psychopaths, but hey, what's society without those? And they're a lot rarer than back where we were before." She would have said the real world, but there were some levels of irony even she didn't want to mess with. This one was realer than Neptune had ever been. "Plus we have an overabundance of cops, detectives, secret agents, soldiers, vigilantes and superheroes, so we're doing pretty good on that end."

[plantfood]

As they walk, Mathias remains silent, taking in everything Veronica is saying and trying to see how he fits into this world. He's a German mechanical engineer with someone else's face, he should be dead, and he's yet to really deal with anything that happened back in Mexico. There doesn't seem to be a niche for someone like that, but Mathias isn't prone to self-pity and so he just nods. He'll find his place in time.

"And the population seems to remain relatively small," he adds. "Even with a thousand people this place would be safer than what we came from." There's nowhere near that many people on the island from what he can tell, although he isn't sure just how large the population really is.

[neptune-sleuth.livejournal.com]

As far as Veronica could tell, most places were safer than Neptune. She wasn't about to spin the sorry tale of her life for him, though, no matter how nice he was, so she refrained from mentioning that. "People actually work together, not against each other," she said, "and the killer always gets caught. I'm still not entirely sure this is real."

[plantfood]

"Everything was done for us before this place," Mathias answers, mostly just thinking out loud. "Services and government, it all existed whether we participated or not, but here... what is the saying? You reap what you sow?"

Although he's been supported by his parents for much of his life and had to work for little, he's never been lazy. He likes to work, loves to travel and be involved and he expects his life here will be no different.

[neptune-sleuth.livejournal.com]

Whatever people said at home, it had never been true back there. In the world beyond Tabula Rasa, enough money could meaning getting away with murder - literally. Here, people actually seemed to have hearts and a willingness to help. It never ceased to amaze her, but she had, for the most part, stopped expecting the other shoe to drop. "Just so," she said, smiling a little.

[plantfood]

Considering this, Mathias smiles as well, watching his shoes as they walk. He brushes past a vine and barely even flinches, letting the tapered end trail over his fingers as he pushes it aside.

"It's good to find a place where such a mentality works," he says, reaching up to scratch his stubble thoughtfully. "Unexpected, really, but not unwelcome. I don't know that I've ever met so many people so willing to help each other out."

[neptune-sleuth.livejournal.com]

"I know I never have," Veronica said wryly. Before she could crack a joke or say more, though, she spotted the IPD outpost off through the trees and smiled, triumphant. "Nearly to Jurassic Park. It's just past that building there." The trek was about the only reason she didn't come out this way even more often. There were times when she just had to remind herself these things were actually there.

[plantfood]

Mathias pauses, looking through the trees to the building Veronica is referring to and he smiles, unable to stop himself. There's still a part of him that believes this isn't going to happen, that dinosaurs don't actually exist and maybe Veronica really has brought him all this way just to kill him, but he wants it to be true. All his life, he's been pursuing the next adventure and this is it. This is the biggest one yet.

"You said there is a fence, yeah?" he asks, scanning for it. "Something to keep them away from the other side of the island?"

[neptune-sleuth.livejournal.com]

Veronica couldn't entirely help herself. The way he lit up when she pointed out the outpost made her grin right back, some of the smugness of her usual smile leached away. "Yes," she said. "No. Not a fence like you're thinking of. An electric fence. It's - I'm not actually entirely sure how it works, something to do with a field of electricity that reacts when the dinosaurs get near it. Whoever was here before all of us got collars on all those things. I try not to question for fear my brain will explode if I think about it too hard."

[plantfood]

"I think I'll follow your lead," Mathias decides after a moment spent wondering how in the world anyone could get collars onto dinosaurs. There's no answer, not one he can come up with, and he knows he'll just drive himself crazy trying to find a solution that may not exist.

"Have they ever gotten out?" he asks as they come closer to the outpost. He lifts his hand again, trailing it over leaves and branches as he passes them by, half-hoping to find or feel the electric fence in some way.

[neptune-sleuth.livejournal.com]

In truth, Veronica didn't actually know just where the fence began. No one had, to her knowledge, actually mapped the thing out yet, and probably the only people who knew for certain the exact lay of the thing were those who had put it in place and were long since disappeared. She hated not knowing the answers, having to leave things up to chance, but as far as not knowing how something worked went, she could let this one slide. At least it kept them safe. Mostly, anyway.

Walking forward, she nodded. "There was an earthquake a while back - not that bad," she said, "but enough to knock out the power temporarily. The fence went down for a while." There were other times, though, when people had simply woken up in the middle of it all. She wasn't sure Mathias needed to know about that just yet. "That was a pretty epic round up."

[plantfood]

"Jesus," Mathias murmurs, trying to think of the widespread panic that must have caused. He's glad it's something he's missed out on, if only because he thinks he's had more than enough panic and fear to last him a lifetime.

As he follows Veronica, he keeps his gaze on the jungle in front of them, looking for any kind of movement. In truth, he isn't sure what he expects to see here, but he's open to anything at all. "Was anyone hurt?" he asks, although he isn't sure he wants to know the answer to that question while he walks toward the dinosaurs themselves.

[neptune-sleuth.livejournal.com]

"Oh, no," Veronica replied, waving a hand dismissively, "when the giant lizards spotted us, they just wanted to have a nice chat over a cup of tea." She shrugged her shoulders, coming to a stop for just a moment before turning, walking the line she was fairly certain was the fence or close to it. "There were a few injuries, some more serious than others. No fatalities, though." Not that time, at least. As ever, it was the humans who had proved more dangerous in the end.

[plantfood]

As excited as he is to see real dinosaurs, Mathias is grateful they're behind a fence here, because he's begun to imagine the kinds of injuries that are possible during a dinosaur attack. He's seen Jurassic Park more than a few times and he's using that as a template for what he's imagining. It isn't pleasant.

"I never thought of the carnivores as tea drinkers," he says, following along behind her, his gaze still on the jungle. "They have always struck me as coffee addicts myself."