faderift | all of nature wild & free

"It is," she agrees, very easily, before gladly breezing right on past that. She might save that particular gem for a second talk, or at least... further into this one. Children and memories and so on were potentially sensitive topic areas in the context of their being bartering chips, after all.

"Sure they are." Just because she believes her doesn't mean she has to make it sound like she believes her. "And you don't own any mason jars because you just got here. Give yourself time to restock."

With a smile, so very helpful.

It makes Cosima laugh. "You want to try them on and see?" It's more a measure of trust here than it would be at home - she has no idea where she'd replace them if she had to - but it seems so natural in the moment that the glasses are already in her hand.

"Sure." With a laugh and a shake of her head, before she nods to the hood. "You can try on the hood, if you want."

Although, she peers at the glasses suspiciously, before her gaze flickers back to Cosima. "Just how much are these going to blind me?"

"Ah, see how the skepticism vanishes," Cosima says with a grin. "I'm pretty nearsighted, so. Some?"

She'd look at the hood but, well, it's sort of blurry for now.

"Well, wolves and their eyes. All the better to see you with, that whole schtick." A moment of further consideration, before she pops the glasses on, and--

"Jesus." Removes, very quickly removed, before holding them very carefully towards Cosima. "You'll get your certificate of authentication in the mail. Doesn't mean you aren't a hipster."

"Okay, okay." She takes them back with a grin. "Noted. Though I've always thought nerds make bad hipsters; we're too enthusiastic about our area of interest to be any good at detached cool."

A hum, somewhere between sympathetic and musing. "True, I guess. There weren't enough hipsters in Storybrooke for me to really compare notes with."

Ruby shrugs, sips her beer, and attempts to be reassuring. "Although I don't think any hipster is detached cool when it comes to coffee. They are an enigma of inconsistencies."

Her look is mischievous. "What if I don't drink coffee?"

Ruby looks incredulous.

"You're bullshitting."

Surely. Surely nobody actually doesn't drink coffee. What a terrible concept.

"I'm not," she says, laughing. "Tea. I mean, I've tried coffee, I'm not an alien, but I'm not a regular drinker."

A pause, then, "Man, I don't envy you trying to kick a heavy caffeine habit as soon as you arrived, though."

"Tea has its moments," she agrees, and it is the tone of someone who loves tea, really, but whose blood runs closer to espresso. She groans a little, laughing, and rests her head in her hand.

"You can get it here but it's not the same." A singularly tragic moment, and her smile is self mocking, again. "The world is in turmoil, but what about my coffee?"

Her life is hard, and doesn't she know it.

"Given every coffee drinker I know, I'd say the priorities sound about right. But hey, at least there's alcohol?"

Subpar coffee, no weed, but there's always getting drunk on reasonably potable ale if the new reality gets to be too much!

Ruby laughs, raising her stein to knock it against Cosima's. "Here's to long term liver damage, no matter the poison."

Annnnd a pause. "So, I've done the inter-world rodeo before, at least. You seem extremely chill about... all this."

"Oh."

That's... completely a fair observation.

"...I think I'm kind of in shock, to be totally honest? Not to downplay - everything. But I guess my world's been rocked a few times in the last year," understatement, "and I don't know what to do except move forward."

Cosima pauses, then says frankly, "I want to get home. But I'm in no position to know how to make that happen. I don't know what now."

"Shock is... it's more than fair," Ruby replies, leaning forward and resting against the table. "I mean, it shouldn't be possible. Or real. Ideally this is just a really, really intense tequila delusion." Her smile a shade self deprecating, and she reached out to lightly touch Cosima's wrist.

"We'll get you home. I don't know how, but we will. And there's good people here. It... isn't going to give you a roadmap for what to do next, but knowing you're around decent people is a good start?"

A little apologetic, because this all sounds cliche as well. "You'll be okay, Cosima."

"I thought about the delusion thing," she says, because of course she did, "but it's so internally consistent that it can't be unless I've had a total psychotic break. Those are rare. And even if I have, there's nothing I can do about it from inside if it's this acute, so it sort of comes out the same either way."

A pause, then:

"Not that I'm accusing you of being a hallucination. That's rude."

It's halfway a joke.

"Well," she says, sipping her beer, "I've been called worse."

With a wry smile, tilting her head just a little. "I don't think me assuring you that you're not having a psychotic break is going to mean a whole bunch," Ruby starts, "but if I'm a figment of your hallucination, or whatever, then you need to hallucinate someplace with tequila and Madonna records, stat."

So deadpan, for all of half a second before she smiles - an easy, sympathetic thing.

It makes Cosima laugh, quiet but genuine. "Tequila's not usually my poison, but I wouldn't be picky."

She sits back. "How did you cope? When you first came."

"Figures," Ruby laments, overly dramatic as she falls back in her seat, arms hanging woefully by her side. "Finally someone from a world like mine, and they don't appreciate margaritas."

This, Cosima, this is true tragedy.

Her expression sobers a little, then, softens, and Ruby chews the inside of her cheek. "I actually arrived the same time as a friend, so that helped. I was kind of focused on trying to get involved so I could help Emma, and... make a good impression while she was sorting some personal stuff out." The effort to smile doesn't make it too far. "She disappeared, though. I, um. I actually went on a bunch of trips and expeditions looking for her or for clues but came up with exactly nothing, so... it was really hard, after that. Working helped."

"Oh shit, I"m sorry. That sucks." Cosima tilts her head. "Is the consensus that there's any way she could have gone back, or...?" Given total disappearance, that seems like the best case scenario, at least.

Cosima's idly thought about having one of her sisters here, but having one and losing her might almost be worse.

"Yeah. But—"

How to try and lay this out in an optimistic way? "But yeah, that makes the most sense, I think. I looked for ages and couldn't find a sign of her or of struggle or if anything bad happening to her anywhere. So... I think she went home? I mean, I hope so."

Not to be all doom and gloom, though, Ruby conjures up another smile. "Plus side, though, the more rifters turn up the more chance there is that someone who knows how to make a blooming onion'll be here, too."

Cosima smiles, letting Ruby change the subject. It's clearly painful, and she's not going to push.

"Dude, or mozzarella sticks. Can you imagine how popular that guy would be?" Fried appetizers, clearly the innovation Thedas has been waiting for.

"I wonder if that's something we can reverse engineer. Do they have soft white cheeses?"

"Oh my God. You could be rich. And yeah, this place is wicked into cheese, it's... kind of weird, actually. I think one time I saw a guy using a cheese wheel as a shield? That's not an exaggeration, I mean seriously. Cheese wheel shield."

She shakes her head.

"It's all gouda, I guess."

"...that's awful," Cosima says, after a second. "Truly, exquisitely awful."

It does seem to work as far as distracting both of them, though. After a moment, Cosima laughs, briefly, shaking her head. "I can't imagine cheese is a super-effective shield material, though maybe it's a good distraction?"

"Un-brie-lievable." A moment of consideration, "I'm going to go with the exquisitely and filter out the awful. I think you added that by mistake, anyway."

Someone stop her. Someone stop this problem child.

Just.

Just slowly smiling. She's not going to pun. She's not.

She's definitely not.

"Where there's a wheel, there's a way?"

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