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OPEN!!

WHO: Rodimus and OPEN
WHERE: Heropa; Arcade and foodcourt
WHEN: July 18th or therabouts
WHAT: Trying to figure out human culture, getting excessively into cheap arcade games
WARNINGS: None ATM!

Rodimus is immediately regretting how little attention he paid to humans and their culture in general during his last stint on Earth. He'd never really bothered to pick up on any of the subtleties of their interactions...never really needed to. Okay, honestly, he'd never really picked up on the broad strokes either. Same excuse.

Now, holomatter avatar all fired up and ready to go*, he's ready to do some ""research"". Get the lay of the land; pick up some basic Earth culture....stuff.

*Rodimus' holomatter avatar is of a young, colourfully dressed woman, who appears to be in her early twenties.

A. ARCADE

This seems like a reasonably popular place for people to gather and do things that look enjoyable. Rodimus spends a good long while lurking around the outskirts of the arcade before actually going in. He's figured out that the humans come here to play games, and that to play those games they use currency. The games in question definitely look interesting, although he's not yet sure how they all work or what the object of some of them is. On paper, he's here to just do some observation, and sticks to that, spending some time milling between people playing skeeball, air hockey and some miscellaneous computer-screen based games, occasionally asking painfully blunt questions about what they are doing or how it works. They all seem fairly simple, but the humans in general seem entertained. Many of the games seem to be competitive in nature, and pit two or more individuals against one another.

The longer he spends watching people, the more the urge to actually try these games out begins to grow on him though...

B. FOOD COURT NEAR ARCADE

Although his holomatter avatar neither needs or is able to eat, Rodimus figures this is a good place to try and get some cues about human behaviours. Food seems pretty integral to the culture here, so why not? There's a small food court right near the arcade that's filled with several small stalls and kiosks selling both meals and snack food of a wide variety. He spends an indefinite period of time watching hot dogs rolling in a small, self-contained ecosystem.

The sheer volume and variety of food and drinks available for purchase here is overwhelming to Rodimus...and he can't he even eat any of it. How humans even manage to decide on a daily basis is beyond him. He watches in rapt interest as the people at the juice bar make smoothies, and abject horror as others consume some fleshy nuggets from cardboard containers. There's a lot to learn here, and he's got no idea where to start. In the process, he's generally making himself a nuisance, hanging around too closely to people while they order, watching them eat, asking the employees prying questions about their food preparation processes that if his holomatter avatar were less charmingly disarming they might mistake otherwise her for a health inspector.

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Rodimus barely has time to react at all, and suddenly the puck is neatly in the goal box and the little electronic counter on the edge of the table has given his opponent a '1'. Okay, maybe this game was a little more complex than he'd initially thought. Nothing a little time to get used to it wouldn't solve though.

"Hey, hey I wasn't even ready!" He insists indignantly. He's going to pay better attention this time for certain. He drops the puck back on the table and hits it into play. There's not really a lot of rules it seems....just...hit the little plastic thing into the goal box. Simple.

"That's the first lesson." She grins. "Always be ready."

And true to the lesson she's already dropped a little lower, hand light on her paddle and ready to swing it out. Which she does, as soon as Rodimus hits the puck toward her. Arcade games: totally her thing. So she knocks it, again, in a swift beeline straight for the lefthand corner of the goal.

Rodimus makes a quick attempt at blocking the puck, and nearly does, but it skates off the corner of the paddle and into the goal nonetheless.

"Scrap!" He slams a fist down on the corner of the table. Okay, this game was definitely a bit harder than he'd anticipated. The rules were simple, yes, but there did seem to be a considerable amount of skill involved that his opponent had....more of.

"I - I just haven't had a chance to get used to it yet," he says, more to himself than to Carrie. When he retrieves the puck and hits it toward her goal, it's a lot more aggressively, and maybe not very well aimed, either.

"Uh huh." She grins, mostly to herself, and twitches the paddle to the side in time to deflect a score. It bounces over to Rodimus's side of the table again, and Carrie keeps her eyes locked on it even as she goes for a carefully casual tone when she asks, "So, name?"

Casual, while everything is super easy: the secret of being a true Cool Kid.

Damn. She's skilled, he'll give her that. And she makes it look so infuriatingly easy.

"Rodimus." He says absently, focusing intently as he hits the puck back toward her. He's pleased she at least didn't score another point, but doesn't let his guard drop...not anymore. "You?"

Rodimus? That's not a this-planet name she's ever heard. So... nonhuman? Does she have any evidence to refute that? This time her paddle lands squarely on top of the puck, and she glances up just long enough to flash a smile.

"Carrie."

Then the puck is flying forward again, driving for another point. Hopefully Rodimus hasn't caught on to this game quite yet, and Carrie can slide in one more easy point.

Rodimus decidedly hasn't gotten the hang of it, and if truth be told, might be getting less the hang of it. This human's breezy confidence is throwing him off. Enough so that another point slips past him and he swears.

"Okay, okay, this time I'm ready," Rodimus says determinedly, leaning forward as he sends the puck back in her direction as aggressively as possible, mumbling to himself about the unfairness of feedback delays.

Wait a second. Did she just hear something about feedback delays? Because that would really eliminate all possibilities that weren't 'futuristic' or 'not-from-Earth'. She darts a glance up from the table to Rodimus, thoughtful — and it's just thoughtful enough that she nearly misses her cue to knock the puck away from her goal. Almost. It's a little bit more of a scramble than a Cool Kid should be seen doing.

But she'll make up for it with a gamble. She knocks the puck back toward Rodimus again, asking offhandedly as she does, "So, what's your usual species?"

At first, Rodimus is surprised by the question; surprised enough that he blocks the puck from the goal but only barely. It goes ricocheting back to Carrie's side without any clear direction. He then realises that because of imports, non-humans probably aren't all that uncommon around here; although he's still wary. Cybertronians pretty much operate on the DL by default on alien planets...it's a hard habit to shake. Even planets comfortable with aliens have their...reservations about his species.

More importantly, it tells him he's not succeeding very well at passing as a human...that or there's something unusual about this girl. Did she know about holomatter avatars? The hair was usually how people figured it out if they were familiar. Maybe heightened senses? Was she not human?

"What...what makes you say that?" Rodimus decides to ask, non-committally.

Bingo. She doesn't quite have confirmation, but she's sure there would have been a whole lot more confusion there if her guess had been totally off. That goes a long way towards confirming her suspicion.

"Few things," she says, noncommittal, as she easily hits back the puck to Rodimus's side. "Starting with the name. Not exactly a Betty or Teresa, spud."

Slag. He always forgets to come up with a fake name. Not that it matters...he doesn't really know any human names anyhow. Betty? What kind of name is Betty? Where do they get these?

Lost in thought, he nearly lets the puck slip by, recovering just in time to knock it back to the other side of the table.

So she knows he's not human. He's still not about to volunteer his home planet without knowing more. In the reality he's from, Earth and it's humans didn't exactly have the best relationship with Cybertronians. He's not yet sure how much of that is true here. It might be best to ask a few more questions.

"Maybe I'm not human, then," he acknowledges. "Do you...have you had a lot of aliens on Earth? This Earth, I mean."

She's an alien? Carrie was right? Yes! There's a second or two where her face completely lights up, but she reins it in pretty quick, and her expression subsides back into the 'cool and collected' look. (But, man, this is so cool.)

"Sure, we got plenty." Quick, think of an alien! She has to have met a few by now, right? "Like, uh... Thundercracker!" She's far too happy to remember that name, and snaps her fingers with it. "Yeah. Sure, there's one."

The puck, meanwhile, slips into her goal, and Carrie doesn't even notice.

This would be a really good moment for a spit take if there was a drink involved. Instead Rodimus nearly drops the paddle, shock plain on his face.

"Thu...Thundercracker!?"

Well, if he wanted confirmation about Cybertronians on Earth, he got it. Or he assumes so..."Thundercracker" can't be that common of name. Was Thundercracker still on Earth? That guy really needed to get his scrap together.

"I uh. Was this "Thundercracker"...was he, perhaps. Large. Maybe not so...organic. Maybe made of metal? Sometimes a...a jet?"

Whoa, now there's a reaction. She straightens from her ready lean over the table, watching Rodimus with open curiosity that she forgets to mask.

"Can't say on the jet part, but the rest... yep." She cocks her head, thoughtful over the latest news. "Take it you know the spud. Yeah?"

"You could...uh...say that," Rodimus says, pausing to tap fingers on the corner of the game table. He shakes his head. If Thundercracker is on Earth, and openly, at that, there really isn't much point in secrecy any more is there? "Literally. You could actually say that because...yeah. I know the guy."

Rodimus thinks back, trying to remember the last time he'd seen the Decepticon. It was on Earth, come to think of it. It was....it was not Rodimus' finest hour, actually. Oh, yes, he remembers it all very clearly.

"I don't want to invite any rash comparisons, given our...er...political differences," Rodimus starts slowly, still treading carefully until he knows the full-extent of current Cybertron-Earth relations. "So, don't jump to conclusions when I say we're both from Cybertron, will you?"

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OPEN!!

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