Cooling Off [Open] [R for profanity]

[ravaged-rose.livejournal.com]

She's wandered through a few others' creations by now so at this point Rose is ready to try something of her own in the Sensoriums. She goes for the familiar, albeit with a few tweaks. She'd always thought the Titan's Tower would have been better without that pesky roof over the top-floor pool.

It's nighttime because that's what makes the most sense. The idea of her former teammates wandering the place as AI's is creepy, but the Tower dead-quiet in daytime is even creepier and makes her feel twice as alone.

There's a bottle of rum (take that Tim!) and her pack of cigs on the pool edge, the San Francisco skyline lit up across the bay, just enough breeze, and a clear dark sky with a smattering of stars that seem close enough to touch.

She's also naked, because what's a pool all to yourself if you have to be dressed?

Rose dives down and just lays still at the bottom for a few moments, looking up at the starry sky distorted through the water for as long as she can before she needs to surface for air. She's missed swimming more than she thought.

Comments

[foursleeves.livejournal.com]

Something black and viscous ziplines down through the tower's convertible roof.

"And now! For tonight's entertainment!" Apparently it's a person too, "He's outrageous, contagious and laugh out loud funny! That's right folks, and he'll be here all week!"

When he realises it's vacant, or at least surmises that it is, he rubs the back of his neck, "Aw shucks, I always get the ghost shifts."

[ravaged-rose.livejournal.com]

Rose pops up to the surface of the water, slicking her wet hair back from her face with both hands and taking in a deep breath. It takes her about three seconds to them notice her guest hanging from the ceiling.

"Gah! Shit, I didn't even see you up there!"

She tilts her head at him then, a faint smile on her face.

"You coming in or something?"

[foursleeves.livejournal.com]

Oh dear, Peter certainly wasn't expecting an extremely naked, extremely intimidating woman to emerge from the pool. He hurriedly covers his eyes with his free hand.

"Excuse me, lady," Pete, when shielding your gaze there aren't supposed to be gaps between the fingers, "I didn't realize this was, uh, occupied."

[ravaged-rose.livejournal.com]

Rose smirks. Aww, trying to pretend he's not peeking. That's cute. She turns and floats partly on her back to look up at him.

"Well yeah it's occupied but I learned to share in junior kindergarten."

[foursleeves.livejournal.com]

His fingers snap shut at the sign of movement. He's not looking he's not looking oh dead God he's not looking.

"Is that where you picked up your concept of modesty, too?"

[ravaged-rose.livejournal.com]

She rolls her eyes and let's herself sink into the water again, paddling to the edge of the pool and hooking her arms over the side.

"I was here first, sweetie. You don't have to stay if you don't like the dress code."

She reaches for her rum and takes a quick drink from the bottle.

[foursleeves.livejournal.com]

He drops from his webline and crouches poolside.

"I'm just saying that if we happened to get ambushed by space gribblies, that'd be a pretty unfortunate state to be caught in."

[ravaged-rose.livejournal.com]

She raises a brow at him.

"Space gribblies? What are those?"

If they're something she can kill barehanded she won't worry about it.

[foursleeves.livejournal.com]

"Y' ever see Alien?" he'd gesticulate to the surroundings if they looked more like the usual green and pulsing and not like the inside of Don Henley's brain, "For all we know this could be the freaking mothership."

[ravaged-rose.livejournal.com]

She laughs a little.

"Well lucky for us I could take Sigourney Weaver in a fight with both hands tied behind my back. If SHE can handle aliens I'll be FINE."

[foursleeves.livejournal.com]

"Well that's reassuring. If the Stay Puft marshmallow man turns up, I'll know who to call."

He holds out his hand, "Spider-Man."

[ravaged-rose.livejournal.com]

She takes his hand and shakes it. Good hard grip but not hand crushing.

"Ravager. I assume your name is self-explanatory on your powers?"

[foursleeves.livejournal.com]

"If we're playing the 'assume everybody has powers' game I'd dread to guess at what yours might be."

This might've been more believable if he didn't tailend it by whistling his own theme tune.

[ravaged-rose.livejournal.com]

She raises an eyebrow at this whistling, but just shrugs and picks up her cigarette pack now that her hands are partly dry, tapping one out and lighting it, though she at least does her best not to breathe the smoke into his face or anything.

"Actually if you just wanna go look up 'ravage' in the dictionary I'll wait. It's pretty accurate." It all just boils down to 'ruinous damage' in verb and noun formations. She likes it.

[thexanwhosees.livejournal.com]

Xander was going to do some training when he stepped in. They briefly stopped in San Francisco before heading overseas. Just to get away from Sunnydale as far as possible, and Buffy was dealing with major mocha jonesing.

He paused to glance at the skyline with his eye and his own limited eyesight kept him from noticing the very naked woman in the pool.

...Wait a second.


"Whoa, hi, uh nice boobs... view! Nice view!" Yeah he's just going to turn around now.

Any time now.

[ravaged-rose.livejournal.com]

Rose just LAUGHS at him, loudly, swimming over closer to the edge of the pool that he's standing by and grinning because that frantic stammer is the funniest thing she's heard since she got here (short of that story Leela told her about the time she drank Cyclops under the table).

"Thanks, I made them both myself." She hooks her arms up on the edge of the pool and leans a little. Less outright exposure, WAY more cleavage.

"You coming swimming too?"

[thexanwhosees.livejournal.com]

Yay cleavage! Cleavage is of the good.

He just hoped she wasn't secretly a demon since he's had mixed luck with that.

"I am coming... Uh swimming. Yeah, uh you know I was once on my school's swim team?" Not that it was that hard to sign on by the time they lost a few players to a case of turning Black Lagoony.

He started to turn, but then well a touch of suave Xander showed up. At least enough to do a little show with the stripping.

Thank you the Fabulous Ladies Nights in Oxnard.

[foursleeves.livejournal.com]

"Actually, mine's a rhyming dictionary, so I'm betting all I'll find is savage, cabbage, bofabbage."

He watches her take a drag, "You know, those things'll kill ya."

[ravaged-rose.livejournal.com]

A demon? Rose? Well, not in the supernatural sense...

"Swim team? Sounds charming." Swim team? Seriously?

Rose is a little thrown if she's honest. He looks like the normalest dude that ever normalled and he can barely look her in the eye just because she's not dressed... but he's HERE which means he's probably got something crazy under his belt. Everyone she's encountered seems to have history even if they don't have powers.

And, well, his body language isn't adjusted. He still moves like he's not quite used to having only one eye. (It took her months to really compensate properly so it's not like she can hold it against him or something.)

She pushes off the wall and strokes back into the water a few feet, waiting on him to climb in, smiling just a little at the flare which which he tosses his shirt aside.

"Before we end up naked together maybe I should know your name?"

[ravaged-rose.livejournal.com]

She laughs a little at that first part. Bofabbage? What the hell? But it's just weird enough to be really funny.

When he makes that second comment she taps some ash off the cig and tilts her head back to breathe out the smoke.

"I'll worry about cigarettes killing me when people stop trying. Everybody needs a bad habit."

[foursleeves.livejournal.com]

"I'm just saying, my nailbiting fixation isn't going to cause others to break out in melanomas." he scritches the back of his head, "Unless, you know, the nail clippings run off and develop their own nicotine addictions. And I have spotted some of them hanging around outside the Marlboro factory."

[ravaged-rose.livejournal.com]

"What the hell drugs are in the food in your universe?"

But she's snickering anyway. She takes a final drag off the cig then stubs it out half finished. Maybe she's feeling a little courteous.

"Is that wit all practice or all experience?"

[foursleeves.livejournal.com]

"As far as I know, high levels of caffeination are consistent with all dimensional variations of New York." Strange, most women would have stopped laughing and started pulverizing by now. She must be from another universe, "Even the unpopulated ones."

[ravaged-rose.livejournal.com]

If he'd caught her in a worse mood she would have probably pulverized him but good, but he was funny and she was bored. And he was right about New York.

"Always knew there was something in the water in that city."

She points across the bay at the glittering skyline of her mindscape San Francisco. She's not sure if it seems so pretty now because she misses it, or because the sensorium built it from her kind remembrances, or both.

"Have you ever been?"

[foursleeves.livejournal.com]

"Nah," he finally gets off his haunches and sits on the edge of the pool. The suit retracts as his feet dangle in the water, proving there really is something pink and boyish underneath the goop, "The West Coast climate doesn't agree with me. Nevermind how terrible I look with my shirt off."

He's already had his own reacquaintance with home courtesy of the Sensoriums. It had not exactly gone too well.

"So, where exactly are we? What building are we supposed to be in?"