[SEMI-OPEN]

[acreage]

WHO: Amos Burton, James Holden, Wysteria, Ellis, and YOU
WHAT: Two spacemen fall out of a rift, later explore scenic Kirkwall
WHEN: Nnnnowish? Waves hands
WHERE: The Wounded Coast, then Kirkwall
NOTES: A closed arrival thread, plus open individual threads for meeting Amos and/or Jim after their quarantine period.

Comments

MESS HALL, OPEN.

[innerharbor]

Amos is a large man, minding his own business, until he isn't. It's breakfast, or it's lunch, or whatever the fuck, but Amos looks up from eating his food with a frown, and turns to the nearest person at table. "Wait," he says, "is this real meat?"

[justashotaway]

He's asked exactly the right person. Laura nods, as if this is the most normal question she's ever heard, and then she says, "I think it is nug."

As if to punctuate the statement, she pulls a glimmering lyrium claw to stab a chunk of meat on her plate: nug drenched in gravy, mashed turnip, and something green she still hasn't figured out the name of.

[innerharbor]

Well, that's a bit disappointing. He frowns a little, poking the food with his fork that probably isn't made of an aluminum compound. Looks at the pot, which is probably clay or stone and not some recycled polymer alloy.

"So, some new strand of soy." Like mung beans. "Damn impressive."

[justashotaway]

"What is soy?" Nothing about nugs is strandlike, aside from the way the meat pulls apart when you cut it--but that's true of all meat, as far as she knows. And she's eaten enough different foods in the past year that she knows that the food at the Gallows is not considered "impressive" by most.

[innerharbor]

"S'a bean," Amos says, poking at his 'nug'. "Meat substitute. High in protein."

[justashotaway]

She frowns, trying to piece together how this relates to his plate of meat and vegetables. "But we are not eating beans."

[innerharbor]

Amos isn't going to get caught up in this who's on first bullshit. He pinches the bridge of his nose. "The fuck is a nug, kid?"

[justashotaway]

It's rare that she meets someone whose knowledge contains the same sort of holes as hers. But once she realizes that's the case, she looks at the man a little more carefully: large, with a serious brow and a flat mouth.

"Nugs are small animals that live where people do not." Sometimes they live near people, but she's not sure a clarification regarding villages is necessary. She tries to think of what would have made it easy for her connect that word to the creatures she'd seen in the countryside. "They have large noses and ears, and their skin is pink, and they are easy to kill."

[innerharbor]

"Rats," Amos says, poking at the food. "We're eating pink rats. That's not weirder than everything else, here."

[justashotaway]

"No," she corrects, stabbing another piece of nug with her claw. "Rats are smaller."

[innerharbor]

"So people eat this shit on the regular?" He can't blame them. For everything, it tastes good.

[justashotaway]

"At the Gallows." She's seen nug in marketplaces, too, she thinks. "I do not know what people in other places eat."

[innerharbor]

He gives her a look, trying to suss something out, before deciding he doesn't have enough information to make up his mind. He keeps eating his food. "You have never heard of soy," he says after a fair amount of thought. It's not a question.

have another teen

[windyvoice]

Jenny Lou is a sleepy eyed young woman, trying and failing not to fall asleep over a mug that's probably coffee. She blinks at the question, hauling herself up a little to look at what he's eating.

"Yeah?" She squints at it, "Looks like meat. What's it taste like?" She hasn't run into any weird taste sensations since coming here, but it's not like it's impossible either.

[innerharbor]

Amos stares at the food, then at the girl, and blankly wonders which misstep he made trying to make his question clear. "Meat."

[windyvoice]

"Then it's meat," she says, settling back down into her sleepy slump on the other side of the table, though she keeps her head propped up to look at the guy, "You're new, yeah? Do they not have like meat-meat where you're from?"

[innerharbor]

"Weird," Amos says idly. He keeps eating though; focused mostly on his food, it may seem like he's forgotten the girl's question entirely, but he answers in his own time. "They do not."

[windyvoice]

Big silent type, huh. That's fine, a lack of words from a companion hasn't ever really stopped Jenny Lou before. "Huh. Ya know they had shortages and stuff here when I first showed up, but it was never on stuff like meat. Like if you can grow it locally, you got it. We were shit outta luck with like coffee and sugar and stuff like that. It sucked."

[innerharbor]

Amos stuffs that nugget of intel away for later. Hey, Cap. Guess what they had shortages on. More importantly, Amos doesn't even know where to begin: they grow meat locally? So is this meat grown? How do you even make a cow, where do they live? Does that matter? What the fuck?

None of this shows on his face, which remains impassive as he pokes at his breakfast meat. Actually, something comes to mind as important. He turns to the kid and asks, "so, this is vat grown?"

[windyvoice]

"Nah, definitely from an animal," she says, then adds just in case, "Like a regular animal. Or regular for here? They got these fuck off huge things that are like buffalo with extra horns and I think that's basically what a cow is here. The goats are regular as far as I can tell, though."

[innerharbor]

Amos has never seen a goat, or a cow, and is about two hundred years late on the last buffalo. She is, for all intents and purposes, talking about cartoon animals.

"Tastes like blood." Real meat does. He'd never thought about it, but it makes sense.

[windyvoice]

Uh.

"Like a lot of blood? 'Cus it probably shouldn't be like... super bloody."

[innerharbor]

Now that they're having a proper conversation, Amos turns the lights on, and smiles with empty cheer. "Nah. Just that coppery taste, like after a fight."

[windyvoice]

Welp, that's a big ol' yikes for her.

She wrinkles her nose, "That's weird, my dude. Do you like get hit in the face a lot?"

[innerharbor]

A small shrug. His smile stays in place, not reaching his eyes. "I always win."