IC CONTACT

[waxwings]

[action/audio/text/video/voicemail]

username: ICARUS

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"This is Ed. Leave a message."

[He absolutely has vocally advertised his services repairing/creating things for people. Drop him an inquiry.]

Comments

[defaulthawke]

I didn't like your choice of carpet.

[text → video]

[waxwings]

There wasn't any carpet!

[He knows bullshit when he sees it.]

[video]

[defaulthawke]

[God, winding up Ed was always so much fun. He's missed it.]

Too bad I never got to see it. How'd you finish it without your favorite beast of burden?

[waxwings]

Piece of cake, I built an inn when I was 12.

[Don't give him opportunities to gloat, Garrett.]

It didn't last long before they kicked us all out anyway, you didn't really miss much.

[defaulthawke]

Where'd you go since then?

[waxwings]

Since the Zenith program ended..?

[Was that a trick question. He means Zhautas right? Where the fuck else would be be Garrett, he doesn't know about any off planet pre-Hell adventures!]

Here, why?

[defaulthawke]

So it's only been, what, a month for you?

[waxwings]

In Zhautas terms, maybe.

[it's been longer than a month but not yet two months, by his calculations. He's not sure Garrett's calendar works the same as any he'd know, anyway.]

[defaulthawke]

I haven't seen you in almost a year.

[waxwings]

Welcome to the multiverse. You know how many birthdays I've missed? I don't even know how old I am.

Time just... does that, it doesn't always line up.

[defaulthawke]

How many years do you remember? How many has your body lived?

[Those are probably four different answers. He's cool with it.]

[waxwings]

I remember 20 years that didn't happen.

[Dryly, almost as if he doesn't expect Garrett to believe that.]

My best guess is around 24. I've missed six months enough times... that I'm probably aging a little faster than I should but I can't be any younger than 21.

When I left Zhautas it was June but now it's January, that sort of thing.

[defaulthawke]

Just go with the middle. Try... 23. 23 is a good age.

[waxwings]

I spent five months being 23 in the company of that purple bastard, it wasn't exactly a good age for me.

I'm not interested in reliving a whole year of that, the sooner it's behind me the better.

[defaulthawke]

Just to be clear, we're talking about the purple tentacled bastard, right? It's a big multiverse, I imagine there's a lot of purple bastards.

[waxwings]

Yeah, he had the network rigged to alert him if anyone used that word, I learned to avoid it. It'll take some getting used to, not having the chip anymore.

[Shocking he got away with 'purple' considering Quin's methods, but he didn't question it. More importantly, though, it was really weird being the one on this end of the conversation.]

You been here that whole year you were gone?

[defaulthawke]

No, I went to this weird jungle full of dinosaurs, then there was a fairy fuckland.

[He said that last part almost dreamily. God, he misses it.]

We lived in a castle. I had jobs.

[waxwings]

[All right, he's got nothing for that but it's not any weirder than the shit he's lived.]

I'm starting to think half the multiverse is sex-themed, I'm just glad to be away from it again.

[Hopefully for good this time.]

How long have you been here then? It's pretty weird, what are the chances we always keep bumping into the same people? Every place I've been someone I knew was there at some point, either from another world or back home.

[defaulthawke]

Stephen thought it was The Force. Binding everyone together, keeping us looping back to each other.

[It's made more sense than anything else he's ever heard.]

It's been about four months, ish. Three and a half.

[waxwings]

[Okay, Ed's experience with the term 'The Force' is from Star Wars talk and he's not entirely sure these two things are related.]

I can only hope. There's someone I've found a few times over the years, she's not here- thankfully, but we'll find each other again, we always do.

[More importantly though, sweeping that emotional shit under the rug.]

You had a job? What kind of work were you doing?

[It's a little hard to wrap his mind around after the context of no one being able to work in Zhautas. The place was enough to make him stir crazy.]

[defaulthawke]

I was a bartender and did jobs gathering magical ingredients in the forest for gold.

[They were dangerous woods, okay.]

I only got pollened a few... handfuls of times.

[waxwings]

Pollened?

[Just going to quirk an eyebrow over that one.]

That anything like what was going on in Nevrione?