fandomhighdorms | Computer Lab, Thursday Afternoon

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Computer Lab, Thursday Afternoon

The dorm hallways seemed a little quieter than they had been before. Worried that something might have happened without his knowledge, Dolf had gone to the computer lab to look up last night's radio broadcast. He had a tendency to miss them, but he also knew they liked to report on every detail.

He listened to it, but was none the wiser. Maybe he had just become paranoid without knowing it. He resolved to take yesterday's advice to Raven to heart, and pushed the slight, uneasy feeling away from himself - or at least as far away as he could manage it.

To distract himself, he started to google, and to check old websites he used to look at when... well, when he was back home. He wound up watching the new Dutch prime minister's first grilling in the chamber of representatives with some befuddlement. The last thing he remembered of Mark Rutte, he was still being contested by Rita Verdonk for the leadership of the Liberal Party... and he hadn't even been into politics at the time.

Sufficient to say, he was busy reading up after that.

[[ open lab, open post ]]

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Curious about the upcoming holiday, Cally had planned to go up to her room after work to retrieve her datapad, but ducked into the lab on impulse instead. There was a proper terminal up in her room as well, but this one had printing capabilities, and scanners, and oh -- company.

"Dolf," she said quietly, in case he didn't wish to be disturbed, giving him a wave as she headed for the nearest open seat.

Dolf's head jerked up and away from an article detailing the epic meltdown of Rita Verdonk. "Cally?" he asked (mostly because he hadn't seen enough of her to fully determine so yet), then turned his head towards her, and ascertained it was, indeed, Cally. "Hi."

At least she was still here.

"Hello." She felt silly calling it across a large, empty room, so she abandoned her first choice of seat and carried her things over to one of the terminals near him. "I'm sorry, did I startle you?"

"No, it's okay," he said, smiling quietly (and with only a little embarrassment). "I was just catching up. I've missed-- a lot."

"While you were in the past?" Cally twisted in her chair to look at him. "But you're from this time in the first place, aren't you?"

"I'm from four years ago," Dolf corrected, shutting off the browser. "A lot can happen in four years."

Or so he was finding out.

"I...suppose it can." Cally hadn't given any thought to missing time at home before. "I've been so concerned with the issue of getting home at all that I hadn't considered how much time might have passed for my world when I do. Have things changed a great deal while you were gone?"

"Politics have," Dolf said, rubbing at the back of his head. "Banks have. It's like the country went crazy a little." He paused and thought that over, then shot her an apologetic look. "But not as weird as what is happening to you," he added. Her problems were worse.

"It seems fairly similar to me." Cally leaned an elbow on the computer desk. "You were trapped in the past once as well. It must have been just as strange for you as this time is to me, yes?"

He shrugged a little. "I think I felt what you are feeling," Dolf said, finally. "But right now my problems are not as bad as yours."

Cally appreciated the sympathy, but felt awkward about it at the same time. She bobbed her head in a noncommittal nod, then smiled lightly. "Right now, my immediate problem is just that I have no idea why you people carve up gourds and place candles inside them. So I thought I'd fine out about this upcoming holiday."

There was a short pause. "My people don't," Dolf said, half-confused, half-feeling like he should know this one. "Uh. What?"

Language barriers weren't helping, here.

"Halloween," Cally clarified. "I meant Earth people - though I know so little about the tradition. It's only local, not where you're from?"

"Oh!" he said, realisation dawning. "Uh... I've seen it in movies?" Helpful. "It's American. Mostly."

He was from western Europe. People were always trying to be Americans-from-the-movies.

"Ah. That might explain why it isn't part of my knowledge of Earth," Cally said. "If the accent most humans speak with in my time is any indication, the culture that spread to the stars was influenced most strongly by the British. It's what people keep mistaking my accent for, anyway."

"You do sound British," Dolf said.

Apologetically.

(Though really, European snobbery dictated that he had to think at least it's not the Americans for at least two seconds before feeling guilty about it.)

"Maybe Wikipedia can tell us about Halloween?" he suggested, a beat later.

"It seems to be able to tell us about everything," Cally said with a nod.

And it would never, ever lie, right?

Lies on Wikipedia? Well I never.

"Right," Dolf said, flashing her a tentative grin, and turned around to input the word 'Halloween' on the Wiki page he'd been looking at. "Let's see what there is."

"That's rather sinister," Cally said of the jack-o-lantern at the top of the page.

"Is it?" Dolf leaned closer to the screen to get a good look at it. "Just looks like a cut pumpkin like in the movies," he announced. "A little silly."

"It's the glowing face in the darkness, I think, that makes it feel eerie." Cally scanned the opening text of the page. "A religious holiday turned secular. That concept I'm well familiar with, at least."

"Secular?" Dolf repeated, and turned his attention away from the computer as he shot her a questioning look. He could kind of make it out from the context, but he wasn't sure.

"Non-religious. They kept the tradition but don't believe in the gods anymore."

"Like Easter," Dolf said, nodding along. Right. He got that bit. "I didn't know Halloween used to be religious," he offered, "But it makes sense. Witches." He frowned deeply.

Yeeee-es. Cally's lips knew that frown well, from personal experience.

...Not like that. Like she was also wearing it.

"Of everything that's been demonstrated to me about this island, witches are the thing that I have the hardest time believing in," she admitted. "Clearly there are people here with all sorts of psionic gifts, but... magic?"

"I've seen it," Dolf said, shaking his head. "But I'm still not sure I believe it." Even though he was pretty sure that must have been how people back in 1212 had felt about his iPod.

"I believe things are happening that people call magic because they can't explain how it works, but that doesn't mean there isn't a scientific explanation."

"Some people think their time at home goes faster than here," he said, thinking back to his conversation with Karla. "I said I thought it more likely the time machine jumps them to a different point. But they keep saying, it's magic, it only makes sense like that."

"I'm no expert in physics, but even if time were moving at a different rate between dimensions, that's still a scientific phenomenon. One far past any level of science my people have achieved, but we don't have time travel, either. It's still possible - demonstratively." Cally traced a finger through the air back and forth between the two of them.

Edited 2010-10-30 13:54 (UTC)

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Computer Lab, Thursday Afternoon

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