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Just for how long *can* you feasibly put something off? As it turns out, for quite a bit. It has almost been an entire season since Keith showed up.
Better late than never, right? Deciding for an understated entrance, the Cheshire cat has chosen to use his human illusion, so as not to attract too many stares. He still does anyways, though- mostly because his human appearance is rather striking all of its own.
It wasn't that Keith was a looker when he was a human. He was moderately attractive, by some standards, but since it has been a very long time since the redhead has seen his human self with his own eyes, his looks rely solely on memory. And memory is… a tricky thing.
He steps into the restaurant wearing his usual greaser outfit, the tee and the leather jacket, ands boots, but his hair for once is not slicked back, framing his face with coppery red hair. As far as his face goes, memory has emphasized some things and softened others, with the result that the illusion that Keith projects, without really realizing it, is close to grade-A Hollywood hunk material by way of James Dean with a touch of Beatty.
But, he would be the first to point out, there was nothing but fur and fleas underneath the smoke and mirrors.
(He didnn't actually have fleas.)
For a moment he hesitates at the entrance, thnking to hiself that perhaps he should turn back and head out again. It was an awkward time to drop by…
For his part, Billy's having a drink at the bar. Its not much of a bar, more a bar-in-a-restaurant, but you can sit there, have french fries, and drink alcohol. "I… want…" Billy considers, chatting up the bartender, "I need to try some new stuff, you know? I don't like drinks that are too harsh, I like sweet things?" He takes a french fry and pops it into his mouth. The bartender considers, remarks, "Manhatten." and moves off to make one. Billy is wearing a pair of jeans and a red t-shirt, both of which are rather on the fitted side.
"Manhattan's overrated," Keith says once he has quietly made his way towards the bar. He barely makes any noise at all when he moves- his illusion may have boots, but the real thing doesn't. "You should try Singapore Sling."
He slips onto a seat and rests his elbows on the bar and his chin on his hands. "I'll have a Brandy Alexander, myself," he tells the bartender, and gives Billy one of his megawatt grins, with a wiggle of the fingers to indicate a salute.
"Do they even have those outside of, well, singapore? I'll try it next time if he knows how to make it." Billy gestures to the bartender, "I got him." Then he turns a dimpled grin on Keith, "Long time no see— again." He chuckles softly. Pushing the fries over a bit in a wordless offering, he nods to Keith again. "So, what's up, dude?" His manhatten arrives and he lifts it up to sip it, and… doesn't immediately hate it.
Keith takes the friendly overture to signifyy he isn't getting lectured for being awol for so long. He slides a couple of seats over until he is sitting next to Billy and grabs a fry.
"What's up? Nothing much. Bike's in the shop and I'm out of bread-" he rubs his index and thumb together "So she's gonna stay there for a while until I can put enough together. Back in London." He gestures over his shoulder with his head, as if it were around the block. For him, in a way, it is. "So I decided to come around and visit. I got kinda bored of running away from people, I figured I'd run away somewhere where I was close enough to say hi."
He chuckles and munches on a chip. "So how are you doing?"
"Do you need a job? I could put in a good word for you here. I live upstairs, after all." Billy nods his head slowly, "Running away is not especially life-affirming, but hey, this is me, I ran across time and space only to settle into Stupid Time. But then I found a family, and I've been growing it." He lowers his voice a bit, "I even have a secret base now." He flashes a grin, "But you should try not to run away so much." He flashes his dimples again, "Me, well, besides the most horrible thing ever happening to me a couple days ago, I'm great."
Keith's eyes go wide for a second. He had a quip for every part of Billy's answer, except the end. Looking serious all of a sudden, he looks at the time-traveling mage and asks quietly, "What happened?"
"Someone mind controlled me and made me cast a spell against my friends." Billy's tone is grave and serious, and grim. "I don't know if you really understand what it is my power does, but I'll let that sink in for a minute." And he tosses back a big swallow of his Manhatten.
He stares for a few seconds, and then nods. "You're like Wonderland." He's using his best frame of refernece for that, since no other experience that he remembers comes close.
He reaches out and gingerly puts a hand on Billy's shoulder. "Is everyone better now?"
"They're fine, fortunately." Billy nods his head slowly, looking relieved about that. Though he isn't sure how to interpret that he's like Wonderland, "My power is okay… because I use it within an ethical and moral framework. Otherwise, its… a power I don't think should be _allowed_. And someone else used mine against my will. He froze us all so he could escape and his minions could kill us. Fortunately, it wore off early." He shrugs, goes for a fry. "Teddy's fine, the rest are fine. Its just worrisome. Anyways. Its not the Poor Billy Show." He grins weakly.
Picking up the cue, Keith follows Billy's lead. "Right, not poor Billy at all. A nice place to live, a drop-dead gorgeous boyfriend, friends and family. Oh, and not bad looking at all." He crosses his arms on the bar and rests his chin on them, giving Billy a smirk.
He raises an eyebrow and reches out for his Alexander when it comes. "Maybe I've made all the wrong decisions, y'know?"
The compliment makes Billy blush a little bit, but he can't help but grin at the mention of the drop dead gorgeous boyfriend. That's so true no one can deny it at all. "Yeah, well, that's my life. Let's just home no one tells me to say 'the nazis won' five times in a row, just saying." He gives a half a shrug and a grin, then tilts back some of his Manhatten again, "Or maybe you just haven't made all the right decisions— yet. There's still time. That's the cool thing about decisions. Until you're dead you can make new ones."
"That's where you're wrong, Billy Boy." He leans in and bops a fry on Billy's nose. "I'm already dead, remember?"
He leans back on his chair. "You're one of the lucky ones, Bee. Someone would have to be a saint to love me, and there haven't been any new saints since they smoked Joan."
He makes a toast and sips on his drink. "So tell me about this base," he says, quieter.
Billy eyes Keith a moment, and reaches over to poke him in the arm, "Don't seem dead to me. Alterlifed perhaps, I'll concede that much, but not dead." See? He can poke. He looks to the bartender, "Singapore Sling." is his order before he turns in his seat to lean on the bar and peer at Keith, "Bah, there's someone for everyone. I did get lucky, yeah, but that might have been because I think maybe I pulled him from the future too." There's a pause, and he hesitates, "If I tell you its not really a secret base, is it?"
"That's fairly good reasoning. Even if it is only a semi-secret base because you have told me of it if not about it." He takes another sip and hmms, enjoying the creamy taste. "It's ok, you gotta keep your secrets. Everybody's got an attic."
He seems to find something amusing. "You know where you said there's someone for everyone? Last guy I fell for? Interesting guy. Had an accent. He also happened to have a thing for a friend, and she had a thing for him."
He trails a fingertip across the border of his cocktail glass. "You know, I probably haven't seen either in a year, or so."
He turns to Billy and says, "Funny fact. I've actually run into your father more than I have you in recent times. We hung out at the park, one night." And fought eldritch abominations, but that goes without saying.
"Yeah, well, the base is hidden and accessible only by magic portal so its not like you could ever find it if you wanted to, so knowing it _exists_ doesn't help knowing where it _is_. It could very well be on mars." Billy chuckles and then peers, "Hey, those things happen. You fall for someone who doesn't fit. Its the fitting that's hard. Its the fitting that takes work and luck and practice." But then he blinks, "Yeah, well, Dad and I don't go in quite the same circles. Both Magi of the First Order, I'm kinda a technomage while he's the traditional pointy hat sorcerer type. But you know where to find me. If you _wanted_, I could see if the Planners and you were a good fit."
Keith actually thinks about this seriously for a couple of seconds. He looks into his drink and swishes the remaining contents around in his glass, and hmms.
"I've been gadding about long enough, I guess. Maybe I can make myself useful." He down the contents of the glass, and nods. "If they'll have me…"
"It's not quite so much an If They'll Have Me, its… do we fit. I mean, our powers are… uneven. We have me, we have a shapeshifter, we have a guy who duplicates himself, a speedster, a sound-manipulator, a …. mote of pure consciousness that's possessing an unused body." Billy shrugs, "The Planners are not quite some super exclusive group. Oh yeah, we also have a Kree now, which is weird only because he's frankly annoyingly pretty and won't stop mentioning how superior Kree are to all other races."
Keith listens to this and takes a few seconds to absorb it all in. "I… see. So." He toys with his glass, passing it from hand to hand. "Annoyingly pretty? I don't think I've seen that *yet*. Pretty and annoying? Yes, back at the mansion…" he hmms.
"So… how do you do this? Do you do an interview? Schedule a friendly chess game? Go out for booze? I'm not quite caught up in my social graces. Living under an open sky for a year will erode most of your manners down to bare." He chuckles.
"He's an alien who is so intensely sure of the utter superiority, in every way, of his people, and who is slightly less attractive then Teddy, and has a giant tup of arrogance he just spreads around him." Billy snorts softly and gives a little shrug, "He also won't stop calling me an engine, which I'm trying really hard not to find insulting." He half shrugs, "You come over to my apartment, I invite the K-Twins, my brother, and said alien over, you… explain your situation. No one understands reasonably because your explanation is the only weirder explanation then mine, I expect, but hey, since when did understanding matter? Maybe next time we go out we invite you to come along."
Keith gives Billy a look. "My explanation is weirder than the time-traveling wizard from the future? I beg to differ." He shrugs, "I'm just this alleycat."
He slides off his seat and stretches, "Hate to cut this short but I need to find somewhere to crash. Sure, just let me know when you'd want me to come around and I will. You can leave me a messge at the bar and I'll check in every day or so. How's that?"
Billy eyes Keith a long moment, half-shrugs, "I don't even know what wonderland is." he notes, but he quirks a thumb up, "Or, you can crash on my couch for a couple days. Noh-Varr now has a door to his spaceship so doesn't need to sleep on it, and why not? Teddy and I seem to draw strays. Easier, and its actually a seriously comfy couch. We make bank at our day jobs, man."
The eyetwitch is barely visible. Blink it, and you'll miss it.
Keitheith puts an arm around Billy's shoulder. "Okay… your couch invitation is tempting. I will gladly accept your hospitality. But I have only one request…"
"Just to be clear because this was a thing with NOh-Varr but this is temporary, man." Billy adds his own condition first, and there's an arm around his shoulder, and requests, so Billy squints. "Okay, your request iiiiis? Note our dietary schedule is more then a little weird because I regularly go to spain for paella for dinner, and…such."
A very small Rabbit Hole opens, for just a fraction of a second. It is enough time for Keith to stick his hand in and take something out, which he then presses against Billy's chest. A well-worn copy of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. "Please, read this sometime. Every time you say you don't know what Wonderland is, a Mad Hatter drops dead on the spot."
At the condition, he smirks, "I don't overstay my welcome, Billy." It was hard enough for him to stay when he was welcomed in the first place. "Just give me some towels you don't care about so I don't shed on the couch, and I'll be gone come Friday."
Billy handwaves idly, "Shed, whatever." He takes up the copy of the book and blinks at it a moment, "Cleaning spells I'm an expert at. Gosh, you don't think I sweep and vacuum and do dishes myself do you? What is the point of magic if you still have to do chores? Though there's going to be a movie about that going super duper wrong, but don't worry about it. I'm not a mouse magician." Billy rises, and cocks his head, even as he pulls bills out of his pocket and lays them down for their drinks and fries. "Just be careful. Don't do that.." He gestures to the spot in the air the rabbit hole, "..directly in the apartment. Its got Grade-A Sorcerer Supreme Wards laid throughout, because, well, like.. Obvious reasons. Dad worries. No telling what would happen. Only his and my magic is in the rules of exception for the wards."
"Well, as long as the wards don't cancel out the magi that's keeping our souls bound together, causing me to unravel and dissolve into nothingness, we should be fine!" Keith smiles. "Lead the wy."
"The Wards should object to new, active effects, but not standing spells." Billy says confidently, and he turns, and leads the way up, "They aren't quite so.. personal.. as the wards on Dad's place. Those, frankly, have boundary issues, its like, you want to think about filing charges. Bad touch. These are mild in comparison, though they react to active magic badly."
"Then that means…" the redhead stops for a second before going up, and sighs. He dismisses the illusion that makes him look like a regular human, leaving the Cheshire Cat in his place.
"Just in case they object." He follows after Billy, silent for a few seconds before he says:
"Hey. Thanks again for the crash. I'll owe you one."
He pauses, and adds, "I know. I'll make tiramisu for dessert tomorrow, to make it up to you."
He hadn't quite figured out how not to shed while baking. But maybe this time he'd find the right workaround.
Billy lifts a hand and shakes his head, "Oh, illusion is fine. The wards aren't focused on that. Its the.. portals… I'm worried about. They might not like those." But he leads into the apartment, adding, "Hey, I like tiramisu."
