Coffeeshop Scene

Participants:

audrey2_icon.gif lancaster_icon.gif vincent_icon.gif

Scene Title Coffeeshop Scene
Synopsis Interdepartmental deals are sealed at Starbucks.
Date August 31, 2010

Bronx, an unfortunate Starbucks


Things in the government take a long time. The Department of Homeland Security, the Department of Evolved Affairs and the Central Intelligence Agency trying to waltz together is a labourious process. The second time Hanson followed up, Lancaster was in Russia. The third time Hanson followed up, she's been summarily summoned to the Bronx on the 31st of August, where a corner-side Starbucks is taped off from the public, the street dotted with official looking cars, although by the time Audrey is flashing her badge to be permitted onto the scene, the main of this investigation has been winding down.

Inside, the building is empty, midday sunlight coming in through the windows — or struggling through it, as a spatter of some kind of viscous liquid has stained the glass, thick enough not to drip and drain completely, or rather, it's in the process of doing so.

Puddles of the same fluid have to be walked around on the ground where samples haven't already been taken, and Lancaster has manages to get some on herself. Or rather, some on the baggy, Teletubby style biohazard suit with a faceplate as wide as a small television. "Did you get the tall, grande, or vente suit when you came in?" Lancaster is asking Vincent, who is in the same. "Or do none of those apply?"

Man. No one offered Audrey one of these things. The guy out the front said it was okay, so.

Stooped over in the process of prodding a pipette at a particularly greenish lump of mystery snot off an unoccupied table, Vincent straightens himself and turns his upper body enough to give Linky-Winky a look that radiates nearly as much exasperation as it does ewok indifference to his Situation.

His brows are tilted distinctly behind the wide plastic screen of his mask and his shoulders are sloped. Not because they aren't straight, but because the fucking suit's too big. "I was supposed to go home at noon," is what he dictates very clearly instead of answering, CLEVER DEFLECTIONS such as these having earned him his stature within the Department and all. A flick of the pipette scatters greasy slime light across the frame of Lancaster's giant face hole. The plastic one, not the. Mouth one.

She should go back out, ask for a suit. Ask for something more than the little hospital booties that have been slid over her not particularly expensive heels that go with her not particularly expensive skirt and jacket as she makes the potential mistake of walking into the crime scene of…

What is she walking into and why couldn't they just meeting a god damned office. Was this all just to make her see how many hoops she'd jump through to get this file? How badly does Agent Hanson want the file. Will she give it to us on a bus, in a van? In a can, with a fox?

"Where's Mikey?" IS what Audrey ends up saying, standing in the doorway with a file gripped in hand, both hands pressed to her hips and looking around the coffee shop with one raised brow

Bitch did not just throw slime at her. Bitch did, though, and it's dripping off Lancaster's face plate, one eye squinched shut behind the plate enough for lines of eyeshadow to be seen. From the little stand with the sugar and extra milk in silver containers, her bulkily gloved hands get out a few paper napkins with which to clear. "It's a good thing that can't get in my hair," she says, in full range of Audrey in favour of responding to the whereabouts of an illegal alien. "You know what happens when we cross that bridge.

"Hey, look who it is!" Neatly placing slime-packed napkins into disposal with wooden stirring sticks and torn sugar packs— that she'll have to tell someone about— she opens up her arms bad into small tree trunks, gloved hands splayed as if she might hug Audrey, but never does get there. "Come in. You want a latte or something? Most of the employees have been either arrested or hospitalised, but it can't be that hard."

"Too well," says Vincent, whatever that means. Audrey can wonder about it when she's getting ready for bed later.

In any case, Vincent double-dips his pipette to trace a bit of ripped fabric out of mucous and dunks it inelegantly into a paper bag, put upon as only a government agent being asked to personally assist in overseeing an alien spooge-filled crimescene can be.

"Everything's still plugged in," is offered helpfully from his new post behind the counter once he's space-walked over there, sandwich bag held aloft. "There's bound to be a clean cup around here somewhere."

"I think I can do without a grande half caf light foam with the side of gooey green topping. And I'd rather not need to burn the suit Lanny. Keep your hands to yourself. What happened here? Gotta be something special if they got both of you in the suits riding high up your ass and your wading around in… please tell me I'm not wading through the remains of some… evolved vampire who hit daylight and just exploded or is this being written off as a gas main explosion?"

Inquiring Homesec minds wants to know. "Or at least if I am, did they sparkle when the sun hit them." Terrible joke. Watch Lnacaster love twilight. "Nice to see you too Lancaster. Lazzaro. Always finding such interesting places to meet me. What next, a sweat lodge in the mojave desert? I brought my part of the deal, where's yours and if you say it's under that pile of shit, I will…" Something.

There is a necessity to waddle, when it comes to these suits, and despite Lancaster's tall and lankily athletic frame, that appears to be what she does as she moves for the counter and the coffee machines, mostly out of curiousity, or so it would seem. "If you wanna be familiar, my other name is Adrianne," is offered, Lancaster pausing to twist full-bodied to glance at Audrey, seeing as she lacks peripheral vision right now, before poking around the machines with clumsy fingers.

"Oh wow, the guy exploded his crap all over here too. I think someone was making a frap. I got the file if Vincent says you can take a peeksee, by the way," she reports. There's a hiss as burning hot milk jets out from a spout as Lancaster casually flicks something on, flicks it off.

Vincent — who had picked up the half-finished frap in question to peer dubiously down into its contents — lifts his head again to look just as dubiously to Audrey, white dress shirt and dark tie visible through the fog showing light on his window to the world. "Lazzaro's fine for me," probably doesn't need clarifying. AND YET. "She likes to be called 'Addy' for short."

Stuff drifts thickly off the end of his pipette. More stuff squelches under one thickly-treaded plastic boot when he sizes the pair of them up and steps back out away from the counter, lest he somehow wind up cornered back there by the pair of them and jets of boiling milk. "Is that how you lactate?"

Okay, Audrey can't help it, back of palm comes up to cover her mouth and shoulders shake at Vincent's joke, unable to contain herself and tries to look away. Firm grip on the files she's brought and not about to loose them to the exploded individual gracing the underside of their collective shoes. Literally.

Lancaster replies via a steaming jet of milk that almost hits Vincent before he's successfully out of range out of preemptive defense. It instead hits a wall, and dissolves a spatter of green slime as it drips. "Don't question the deadly potential of any of my bodily functions," she says, before the sight of giggling out the edge of her face plate steals her attention, and blonde eyebrows shoot up in a show of genuine surprise. Okay! The Department of Homeland Security can lol, who knew?

Almost is too close. Vincent vanishes great rubbery suit and all in a fold of sooty smoke and reappears opposite Audrey, evidently not above the use of Normal shields where hot jets of unfriendly milk are involved. He isn't laughing either. Nor does he miss that Audrey is, black eyes skirting to give Lancaster a wary look in the process of checking the dials at his wrist to ensure everything's still intact. "If she wants to be in charge of the next failed attempt to bring in the Midtown Man, she has my blessing."

They can laugh. Don't expect her to do it, or smile, for another three months, this is her quota for the quarter. "I'm not going to peeksee at it here. Not where some guy just errupted while getting he caffeine on." She wouldn't put it past Lancaster to demand such. "And i'm not handing this over until the Sylar file from Apollo is in my hands." Audrey's looking between Lancaster and the magical mysterious Lazzaro.

"Okay. That's cool. But I'm not cheating you when I tell you this: you're not taking this documentation out of this building," Lancaster says, suddenly all seriousness with lines drawing through her face to better express it. Tada! Never put it past Lancaster. "It's just not happening, but you don't gotta go make this into a Mexican stand-off. We don't exactly make copies of this stuff at Kinkos, so you're gonna pull up a chair, drink a cup of slime, and read what you asked for in full view of me. Or we can go for a little ride, just us ladies, if your surroundings are making you uncomfortable."

How could that possibly be. A leathery briefcase is taken out from where Lancaster had previously stashed it just for this occasion. "But make a decision fast, they said we're not allowed to pee in these things. Vince asked. And hand over the data, I'm not here to screw you over. You'd know."

"The one day you're not wearing a diaper," intoned lowly, helpfully from afar, Vincent passes his paper bag off to a third space suit that has slow-walked his way in from what must be a more active part of the crime scene, somehow. He's got more shit on his suit than Lancaster and Lazzaro combined. Also, he doesn't stay, slow-motion waddle taking him back out again without so much as a second glance for the conversation at hand.

Kind of like the way Vincent manages not to acknowledge his latest classification as one of the girls. He doesn't say he's not here to screw Audrey over, either. Probably because he isn't necessarily not.

"Somewhere else. I don't want to ruin my cheap suit, or your cheap haircut any further by making you stay in that suit" Audrey offers the file is offered over to Lazzaro since he was the one that had actually asked after the files. "Lets go find a more… cleaner coffeehouse, I think this one just lost it's health inspection certificate or at least, just got donwgraded to a C from a.." Audrey turns, craning her neck just a fraction. "A"

Now that gets a squint, jab deflected mostly with bafflement as opposed to a counter comment, before Lancaster glances over at Vincent. "Hey Vince, two questions," she says, swinging the suitcase by a finger. "How much do you want whatever it is we asked her for, aaaand… do you think this slime stuff is flammable?" This last part is accompanied with a reasonably hopeful and toothy grin, only partially obscured through sunglare. "I figure either answer might allow for a reminder about who's doing who a favour."

"Substance presents a possible threat, as it contains known oxidizing agents. It also irritates the mucous membranes." Which means that it may help set people on fire and nobody's going to be using it for lube. How they know that it irritates mucous membranes is anyone's guess. He doesn't look worried, though. On the contrary, he glances to Audrey's file and then at Audrey, gloved hands held open but away. At a skeptical distance.

"You can probably guess the answer to the first one."

Big. Sigh.

"Come on Lancaster, let the little lackey's do the work. You and me, we got a date somewhere else, maybe even a spa. My treat. Maybe you can give me clothing advice" Not that she'll take it. "You can point out the interesting bits to me while we bond over hers and hers pedicures" Audrey's going to try and make nice, passing over the file to Vincent. It's all fun and games lobbing insults back and forth till someone gets hurt, or someone really really wants to read that classified file.

"The key to a perfect wardrobe are properly fitting undergarments, because it boosts the wearer's confidence and complements their figure. Most women suffer from misshapen bras. That's what Tim Gunn says." Lancaster executes a full-bodied turn to Vincent to better mouth an exaggerated I love him! through the wide face plate, before shuffling to regard Audrey again, waving the suitcase indecisively before moving to vacate the counter with the intention of heading out.

She makes a motion with gloved hand like she's flicking blonde locks over her shoulder, despite the obvious barrier involved. "Don't wait up," she tells Vincent. "You know where to find me if you run into something else awesome."

Vincent's gloves are coated with a thin, stringy sheen of slime, and so is the file as soon as it's passed over into them. The look he gives Audrey through his window is not appreciative.

But he's either too tired or too apathetic to say anything. The file is his. He begins to trudge away with it between his arms, forklift style. "I'll call if I find anyone glued to a ceiling."


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