Justric

The Last Kings of Orion

Glad you liked it!

The Last Kings of Orion

Hob took the plate with a surprised but pleased expression on his face, eyes lighting up at the sight of the cookies. The plump but pretty redhead was apologetic about the grill being closed, but sounded more than legitimate in her sincerity to make him a sandwich of some kind if he wanted. He could only grin at her, and shake his head.

Lifting one of the cookies off the pile and to his mouth, he took a bite and instantly closed his eyes and leaned as his head back as he groaned in appreciation. When was the last time he'd had cookies of any kind at all? Or any sweets of any sort, for that matter. True, he had occasionally been able to snag the odd candy bar from a vending machine at the Mountain, and the military cooked meals were perfunctory at best even if they did include some sort of desert. But this cookie? It was... it was...

Words were abandoned as the rest of the cookie quickly followed the first bite, then regained as he cried, "Oh, GOD, these are fucking amazing! Chocolate chips. Honest to goodness, fucking, chocolate chips! Screw sandwiches, these are my dinner! Thank you!"

Swiftly, Hob carried the plate as though it were made of the finest porcelain and weighted with gold, and he sat at the nearest table at hand. A second cookie began to vanish in his hunger. It was like eating home, a pit of nostalgia he hadn't realized he had been slowly filled with each moist morsel as it danced on his tongue, caressed his teeth, and slipped down his throat. After everything else since waking, he needed this! It was something wonderful, unlike the horribleness of Harris and the restrictions the NI-techs were forced to labor under. It was something simple, as opposed to his being in love with a computer. It was something joyful, in contrast to the sorrow they carried with them from the Earth.

Mid-way through his second cookie, crumbs on his chin and chocolate on his lips, he looked up at the woman in a pleading desperation. Did she have any idea of what an angel she was to him right now? "Sorry, sorry. I know I'm rude, and I'm sorry, and I hate to ask this but..."

Hob bit his lips as he tried to figure out how best to ask her without offending her. Demands and requests being ignored time after time had taught him to be wary of asking for too much, even when providence provided unexpectedly as it just had. The last thing he wanted to do was to piss off this chipper young woman!

"D-do you have any milk? Please?"

The Last Kings of Orion

A little under the weather today, but will try to post later tonight.

The Last Kings of Orion

Yay Penny!

The Last Kings of Orion

Hob going to play hooky for a bit. I wonder which doctor will find him first?

(Edit: Those of you I owe posts outside of Last Kings, I should be replying tomorrow morning/afternoon. This boy needs to get his head down for a bit!)

The Last Kings of Orion

Hob knocked, one-two, against the bulkhead door. A motion caught his eye, and he espied a man roughly his own age who gave him a nod and a grin. Hob returned the nod, at least. Smiles? His smiles were in short supply these days. Dismissing the encounter, he turned back to the door to knock again when his fist froze.

Why was he doing this?

The though struck him out of nowhere, paralyzing him fast as more thoughts followed quickly. No one had specifically ordered him to do see the doctor. It was simply expected. He had been told to, sure, but being told to was... well, it was more of a suggestion, wasn't it? Hob had never seen it in writing that he had to have his skull and nervous system scanned again and again and again, and it wasn't as though Dr. Brock had sent him any sort of reminder. It stood to reason that it must not be all that important if the doctor didn't bother to make a courtesy call! So why should he subject himself to further humiliation? This was something that could be done later, surely! After he had eaten and rested and felt calm! OLGA would understand and Gavin had built her; surely if she would understand Hob's reasoning then he had to as well! All of this only took the faintest few nanoseconds to rationalize in his head.

The handheld communicator in his other hand buzzed with urgency. Frowning, he glanced at it to see it was from Dr. Park. There was a reminder he could have done without! Worse still, the shrink had called him 'Robert', which if anyone had been taking any notes on him whatsoever they would know he didn't like his actual name. 'Robert', 'Bob', 'Rob', 'Robin', or (worse) the dreaded 'Bobby'... None of them sat as well on his tongue and mind as the archaic 'Hob". It was Park's none too subtle reminder that finally settled Hob's doubts and lead him to the only decision that would make him happy at that moment.

Fuck 'em all to hell. I'm hungry, damn it!

Dr. Brock had yet to acknowledge the first knock, and instead of knocking a second time the NI-tech stepped away from the door and hurried towards a side passage. He suppressed a giggle. Part of him at that moment very much wished he had a flaming bag of crap to leave in front of the door. Given his light-hearted and mischievous mood, doing the whole proverbial 'ring the door bell and run away' was good enough for the moment. Hurrying down the side corridor without running, Hob made for a cross passage that would lead him to the cafeteria. Park's message was ignored and Brock would be left to confusion. More importantly, Hob would get something to eat before going back on duty!

Communicator still in hand, he tapped out a quick message to OLGA. Much as he hated conversing with her through devices instead of face to face, Hob felt she should know that he was aiming to misbehave. "Playing hooky. Don't tell Dad!" He kept it short and sweet, resorting to texting just in case anyone passing by might overhear him and get curious as to what he was about. Pocketing the communicator then, Hob stuck his hands in the jumpsuit's hip pockets and made for the dining hall with a bit of a swagger he hadn't felt in some time. Sweetly he began to whistle up one of his favorites, 'When I Get Low, I Get High'. The professional notes within the bouncy melody hung in the air about him as smirked.

He'd pay for this little act of rebellion later, probably. But for right now? The freedom was sweeter than the music.

The Last Kings of Orion

Her question caught him a tad off guard. Glancing down, Jack was surprised to see the top of his overall's zipper had slipped just a bit to expose the t-shirt and the necklace beneath. There was a bit of a chagrined look on his face as Jack realized it had slipped out from beneath his shirt; as a working man, he knew the dangers of wearing such things around power tools and the like. Only pushing a mop as was his lot in life now, Jack really didn't see much threat in wearing it. He fished it out for her to see, dangling it at the end of its worn gold-ish chain. "Oh, dis t'ting here?"

Nearly a century and a half old, the silver coin still held its definition sharp and clear. A young Queen Victoria was profiled on the face side, the words about her head proclaiming her the sovereign of Newfoundland. The opposite side boldly declared '20 CENTS 1885'; a simple but elegant filigree pattern enclosed it. The coin itself was set securely in a plain bracket of what looked to be burnished steel. Fingering it as he did, it was clear that Jack held the curio in near as much esteem as Pauline did her crucifix.

"S'pose ya could be saying it's... Newfoundland. Still our own dominion, back there. Pot auger days, like I says, 'fore we cotched on to the Maple Leaf." The coin twinkled ever so slightly beneath the bay lights. "Silver were mined in Newfoundland. Coin struck there. Common currency for a whiles. Twenty cents, well, lot of money back den. Them what knit me put it in my hand day I were born, see? Means I'll never be on Long Tom's account. So I keeps it wit me, duck, and when we gets from wherever we're to now and comes to New Canaan, there'll be a bit of Newfoundland still with me."

He looked up and gave her a sheepish grin. "Makes me a bit of a mawk, I knows. No better den dem what were born on a raft, not a block of common sense with me head full a' stunned notions. But the worse t'ing ya can have in yar head is nar' t'th, an' between the jigs and the reels, its' tanks to this here coin that some part of Newfoundland's still wit me. Not a bad bit of it, b'y.'

Jack gestured to Pauline's necklace, and his self-conscious smirk became a wide smile. "So ya see, Miss Pauline, you brought God an' Jaysus, an I brings Newfoundland, an' when we hove to come New Canaan, yes-sir-ee b'y, folks'll be all the better for 'em both!"

His handheld beeped at him from his breast pocket, and he frowned as he pulled it free to take a glance. What he saw made his smile a huge, encompassing thing that declared that not only was all right with the universe but that all was about to get better! "Laird-de-thumpin' Jaysys," he murmured in awe. That so much time had passed...

"You'll pardon me, Miss Pauline," he apologized, "I needs to get this baggage down to Recycling. Der's a lady waiting for me, an' as ya knows yar own self, you should ne'er keep a lady tappin' her foot!"

The Last Kings of Orion

Great posts all around, folks!!

The Last Kings of Orion

"S'pose you could say dat, b'y," Jack grinned as he hedged his bets a little. Letting too many people know about his plans to build a still, however small, was not the greatest of ideas. "Second Shift in our crew did the proper thing, left us wit little enough to set our hands to. So I came down to where yar at to lend a bit of a hand. Dis place is in a right floption, it is, so I says ta meself, 'Jack', I says, and I tell the truth to shame the Devil now, I says, 'Dis place is rake for run, an' wouldn't ya be a better sort to put yar face an' eyes into it than go off and play the Devil at cards?'"

His eyes flickered to her crucifix as he chattered on amenably, a small smile twisting in the corner of his lips. Jack couldn't really recall the last time he'd been to Mass or taken confession. Sometime back before the family had left The Rock, he was sure. He still carried the rosary his grandmother had gotten for him in the pocket of his overalls, right besides the jackknife his father had given him. But the crucifix? That was packed away somewhere, he thought. Around his neck hung a Newfoundland twenty-cent piece from 1885, the very same coin his great-grandfather had placed in his palm just after he was born to make sure that Jack would never be in want or need. That silver coin carried a great deal more meaning to Jack, especially now, and it humbled him to think on it.

The gay laughter burst brightly from his lips when she asked where he was from, the bay ringing with the sound of it. "No harm in asking', duck! I'm an Islander! Talamh an Eisc! Newfoundland! Near Petty Cove Harbour by way of St. John's, which t'ain't the same Petty Harbour, that being a different place in the altogether. You'd need to right squint to find Petty Cove Harbour on any map, nuttin' surer den dat! Family's been there since, oh, pot auger days at the least. Long time. Only things got hard, so we tanned off to Wyoming few years back 'fore everyt'ting went arse over kettle an' ended up on dis boat. An' der it is. Dat's it, b'y."

Still grinning, he gestured up to the silver at her throat. "Bless your cotton socks, glad to see ya still have faith. Some nice piece o' stuff, b'y. Named for St. John's myself, an' dat being named for Saint John the Baptist, you see. But here's me, talkin' the cat off da fish truck! What 'bout yarself? You from Wyoming yarself?"

The Last Kings of Orion

Heroes: Heads up! Hob just came a'knocking at Gavin's door.