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The Deck; Sunday Afternoon

Travis had survived his first night on the island. It actually hadn't been that bad. His roommate seemed like a pretty decent guy and he'd only been outright asked about his scar once so he was counting that as a win. After getting a ton of sleep last night, Travis rolled out of bed around the noon hour and made his way outside.

He'd called Lawrence on the way downstairs, giving his friend an update of the situation. Lawrence seemed pleased by the choice Travis had made and wished him the best. After hanging up with Lawrence, Travis flopped down in one of the deck chairs (and he'd never thought he'd be in a place where the dorms had a freaking deck) and thought about calling Cate.

They hadn't talked much since he'd proposed and then punched Turner. Probably for the best. He knew she knew that he wasn't in Kansas City anymore but they were both keeping their distance. Sighing, Travis sent a few messages to Hatton instead and leaned back in the chair, feeling warm and fairly comfortable.

Amazing what some new surroundings could do. Even if those surroundings could presumably turn him into a mongoose, Travis felt pretty good about his decision so far.

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Did Travis mind some company? Because here came one of his classmates to lounge outside, along with a very large pink bird. "Hi!" Cecil waved. "You're new, right?"

"Yep," Travis said, nodding at Cecil and tucking his phone back into his pocket. "How could you tell? I'm not wearing my nametag still, am I?"

Cecil looked him over, checking. "I don't see one. I just don't recognize you, and I'm pretty good with faces. Plus I do radio, so I know pretty much everyone. Hi, I'm Cecil! This is Foucault." He reached up to scritch the osmingo's head.

"Travis," he said, nodding and squinting at Foucault. "Hey. Yeah, I just got in yesterday so I guess I'm brand spanking new. Still probably have the new kid smell and everything."

He gave Foucault another look, not really recognizing the type of bird he was. Maybe paying attention in school would have been helpful.

Edited 2014-08-24 16:35 (UTC)

"Oh, don't worry," Cecil answered cheerfully. "There aren't any new-kid predators around here that I've seen, so you should be pretty safe. Well, other than just the regular danger of being alive, of course."

That was reassuring, wasn't it?

"Reassuring," Travis said dryly. He'd done the dead thing already and he kind of preferred being alive even if his life was in disarray right now. "I've heard a little about the dangers of being alive here. Possibilities of turning into a mongoose or running up against magic or something like that. Feels like I'm in some weird role playing video game."

"Oo, I haven't seen any mongeese," Cecil answered. "I had tentacles and another eye once, and really cool tattoos. And Barry was a dog last week."

Travis furrowed his brow and blinked quickly several times. "...okay. But, why do people turn into things? Is there something in the water? Algae or something?"

"Oh, for me it was part of a whole 'different worlds are all sort of melting together' thing." Cecil thought about it for a moment. "I don't know why Barry changed. He might, though; he's pretty smart. People don't change into anything where you're from?"

"No." Travis shook his head. "Not unless you count puberty and that's more getting zits and hair in places where you didn't previously have it. No tentacles or third eyes. Not even in the extreme cases."

"Well, maybe you'll get to try it here, then," Cecil said. "You can see if you like it."

"Uh honestly, I'm not sure if I really wanna change into something different."

He had enough issues with his current body. Or Jeremy Pratt's body. Whatever.

"Puberty was tough enough," he continued. "Voice changing, pimples, growing pains. I think I'd rather avoid having tentacles and a beak or whatever."

"Tell me about it." Cecil sighed and rolled his eyes. "Ugh. Once was bad enough, but here I am again." He shrugged. "It'd be worth it for the tentacles, though. It was so much easier to reach things high up!"

Travis snickered. That was one good thing about Jeremy Pratt's body. He was taller so reaching for things on high shelves wasn't a problem anymore.

"Ever tried a stool? Heard those can add some needed extra height."

"Oh, sure," Cecil agreed. "But not needing one was better! Plus they just looked really cool. Though the extra taxes back home would've been pretty awful." But still, tentacles!

"...extra taxes for tentacles?" Where did this guy live? "Do you live in Atlantis or something?"

"Oh, nowhere so exciting!" Cecil laughed. "I'm from a little town called Night Vale. And the extra taxes thing depends. I mean, if I could show them being more of a liability, I could actually get some grants. But they're pretty obviously an advantage, I think, and they definitely count as 'extra limbs or bodily extrusions', so." He shrugged.

"Right."

Yeah, because Travis totally understood all that.

"Liability for extra...limbs. Something you run into all the time around the United States. Darn them strange taxes."

"I know, right?" Cecil rolled his eyes again. "Still, it's better than other places! Europe's fun, but I wouldn't want to live there."

"And what's wrong with Europe?" Travis couldn't stop himself from asking. "Always seemed like a pretty nice place in pictures."

"It's okay. I suppose it depends on where you're at," Cecil answered. "Svitz was kind of fun when I was there, but I wouldn't want to go back to Franchia."

Yep. Those parts of Europe everybody knew about, right?

Travis blinked a few times. "Are those new countries? Did France and Switzerland break into civil war and have portions of their countries secede or something?"

"Not that I know of?" Cecil answered doubtfully. "I was never really great at geography, though," he admitted.

"Neither was I but I'm pretty sure I've never seen those two countries you just mentioned on any maps."

Granted, things could have happened while he'd been dead but still. "So, I'm guessing this is another one of the things that are different from place to place. Still trying to catch up to how that could be."

"Maybe," Cecil agreed. "Do you have a Luftknarp in your Europe?"

"Never been to Europe but I don't recognize the word," Travis admitted. "Could be something that's native to the continent but I honestly don't know. What is that?"

"Oh, it's another country. I went there in college. So maybe you are from a different place! That's pretty neat."

"Yeah. Neat." It was a more head spinning for Travis. "Guessing this sort of thing happens often around here? People being from different places that other people have never heard of? And it's all acceptable and okay?"

"Well, sure! I mean, it's not like we can do anything about it anyway, right? Unless you're really good at denial, I suppose."

Travis scratched his cheek and shrugged his shoulders. "I know a few people who are really good at denial."

Kyle.

"It's a lot to take though when you come from a place where none of this exists."

"You don't have schools and things?" Cecil asked curiously.

"No, we've got school," Travis clarified, shaking his head. "I meant we don't have magic and people turning into animals and tentacles on people. None of that is commonplace. It's all fictional where I'm from."

"Oh! Okay." Cecil nodded. "We don't have the turning into animals much back home, either. And we tend to do more of the growing extra body parts - you know, extra eyes, extra heads, that sort of thing - instead of tentacles. But at least we keep our librarians properly controlled! Or are you from one of those weird places where they're not deadly?"

"Librarians?" Travis raised his eyebrows and shook his head. "The only way they're deadly is that they try to ruin the fun of being loud in a library. They're fun ruiners."

Cecil shuddered theatrically. "Not in Night Vale. We've got a fairly high death rate due to librarians."

"Death due to librarian?" Travis repeated dubiously. "Are they killing people with boredom?"

"They're deadly!" Cecil flailed a bit. "With their teeth and their claws, and - well, here they seem to be mostly just people, and I even had one for a roommate, if you can believe that! But it took a bit of getting used to."

"Is your hometown just like permanently set in Halloween mode?" Travis asked since he had no other word for it. "Is it all goblins and ghouls and scary things?"

"Of course not!" Cecil laughed. "We don't have any goblins or ghouls, I don't think. The scariest thing I know is Station Management, and luckily they don't come out of their office too often. But librarians are dangerous; I can't believe all the people from places where they're not!"

"Yeah, sorry to disappoint you but librarians are just...rulers of the library where I'm from," Travis told him, shrugging. "Nothing scary about that. It's what puts their food on the table."

"I don't want to think about what ours eat," Cecil vowed, wide-eyed.

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The Deck; Sunday Afternoon

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