Summary:A WAND agent meets a refugee in Central Park. Log Info:Storyteller: None |
Related LogsTheme SongNone |
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Central Park is useful on a number of levels. It's a good place for meetings which is what Agent Koa Turner had been planning on using it for. He'd had an appointement with Keiko to share some progress on the case she'd sent his way and suggest ways she could help.
It's also a useful landing pad for dimensional breachers and while this is FAR from an every day occurance it is part of WANDs remit to deal with interdimensional visitors. Not all of them are horrors from beyond the darkest dreams of men. Some of them really are just visitors. Either lost travellers or… in this case, tourists.
Koa has been talking to to the six winged, angelic looking group of four for the past fifteen minutes after he sealed their portal shut (it startled him). This has garnered a LOT of attention, the odd golden skinned beings with long hair that billows and floats as if in water.
He is just about wrapping up with them but there IS a small crowd.
"Alright just be sure to check in at that building first. There IS a process to these things." He's saying as the group sort of drifts toward departure.
Kori Anderson's spectating with the rest of the crowd. Wide green eyes (which eerily don't blink much) are fixed on the discussion at hand. She doesn't seem to mind that she stands out even in the crowd staring at the six-winged angels. Jean shorts that are borderline indecently brief for her height, cowgirl boots, and a midriff-baring thin pink camisole worn under a sleeveless white lace shirt so fragile it's nearly translucent.
She's got a bucket of caramel corn under her arm like she's at the movies, and stares at the situation with rapt fascination. And big handfuls of caramel corn, entirely messily devoured in a way that's neither feminine nor polite. She wears a bangle around her wrist but no visible jewelry. Weirdly, too— no purse or other accessories.
*chrunchomnfchrunch* she goes, and breaks into applause when Koa dismisses the angelic interlopers.
Keiko is running late to her appointment with Koa. Probably a good thing she is, given the portal, she might have summoned her Dragon to threaten the poor travellers who stepped through.
Ding Ding
The bell on her bike sounds as she weaves through the pedestrian, coming to a stop not far from where Koa, and Kori, are standing. "Oh please, don't applaud him. It will go to his head…" she asides to the woman munching on caramel corn.
"Agent Turner, sorry I'm late… " she calls out, taking a moment to secure her bike.
From where she is, Kori will see the traces of ink that peak out from the collar of Keiko's shirt.
Ding Ding. Ding Ding. Koa knows that sound and waves to Keiko. "No problem. Had an issue here."
The loud popcorn crunching and applause as the angelic visitors depart has him turning even as the crowd is breaking up. It doesn't take him long at all to locate the source, of course.
"I didn't realize that interdimensional customs was quite that entertaining." He calls out to the apparently incredibly entertained woman who is consuming caramel corn at an absolutely prodigous rate.
And dressed, in truth, slightly unseasonably. Not entirely mind, it's starting to get warm and rather humid here but only on some days. Not today thankfully, Koa would be sweatting buckets.
"I hope you had a good view?"
They were unusual, those visitors, to be sure.
"I do not know what that means," Kori tells Koa Turner with a cheery voice. She smiles and nods at Keiko's passing mutter. "I will be careful to keep my hands away from his head," she assures the passing agent.
"I was able to see the proceedings quite clearly, if that's what you meant," she offers to Koa. Her tone helps offset any concerns that she might be snarking at him. She's… weirdly since
"What's a phone book?" Kori asks Koa. "Is that like a Facebook? I wanted to get on the Facebooks but my friend Peter told me it would be unsafe, because then my picture would be everywhere and everyone in the world could 'tag' me with videos and then I would be all over the social medias all over the world and that worries me, because I do not wish to be famous that way," she says, fretting.
She looks from Keiko to Koa. "Are *you* a Handyman?"
Keiko shrugs her shoulder looking rather confused. "I've … no idea, really. Facebook? Is that the thing that pops up on my phone each time I take a photo of my work and asks me to tag the location?" Koa might be rather amused, should he check, to find Keiko's profile rather bereft of information but the albums filled with photo's.
A lot of them clearly mistakes - you know, like when you move and get *part* of the thing you're trying to capture. How on earth she managed to get a profile, is anyone's guess.
Koa is going to have to field that question though.
"But if you find the children, you can call me… " the small asiatic looking woman answers, taking a business card from her jeans pocket. "My numbers on there." And if Kori is lucky, Keiko might even work out how to answer the call!
"And I am, yes. I … fix things."
"Less handy than her for some things. Probably more for others." Koa chuckles. He's not at the moment convinced that Kori is in any way dangerous. A lot of the predators that imitate humans in this fashion wouldn't have the patience for an extended conversation like this. That DOESN'T mean he doens't suspect something is odd here. To the onctrary something seems to be deeply so. But what? Well he's yet to figure that one out.
"But no my job is to do largely what you saw. And then to deal with things when they get dangerous. And what is it that you do, Kori Anderson?"
He'd love to know what Keiko things Kori is. He's betting currently some kind of knowledge-centric being. They tend to be… well, a bit like this.
Kori accepts the business card from Keiko and looks at it, unsure of what to do. She checks her camisole as if checking to see if it'll retain the card successfully. It's too lose, so she lays it against the back of her phone for safekeeping and jams both into her back pocket. "I will tell you if I find the children," she assures Keiko, dutifully.
Koa gets her attention again and she shrugs her athletic shoulders at him. "I go to school, mostly," she tells him. "At Midtown High. I have tried having a job but I have been dismissed from my duties fourteen times now. And then I am sometimes at my apartment where I eat and rest," she tells him.
"Oh! And I went clubbing with a friend last night. Does that count?"
"Annoying is how I would classify you, Agent Turner. But useful right at the moment." Keiko is rather dry and pragmatic when speaking to Koa. Clearly she intends to use the latter to her benefit.
"You're in high school? I thought that was for children." Tactful, Keiko. Oh so tactful. "But that means you're studying, yes? What is it you are studying, Kori?"
Any question about being dismissed are lost as Keiko looks horrified "Who did you Club? Surely the police would have been called, wouldn't they?" She's so confused. "And might I see your weapon? I use a staff to fight."
In truth, Keiko's not sure about the redheaded woman. She's not sure she's of this world though.
Koa lets his palm slide up onto his jaw where he can sort of hide his face. Who did you club indeed. He wonders about Keiko sometimes.
"No. Not to club, Keiko. A club. A place where you listen to music and dance and sometimes drink."
Presumably not drink if Kori is in high school which would put her at most at 18, maybe 19 if her birthday is early in the year.
"She went dancing. With a friend. And I presume to not pull a Jets and Sharks."
There's a reference, Koa can't help himself, that will probably sail right over both their heads.
"You've tried to hold down a job though?" That's interesting. Perhaps he can use that if she'll just tell him…. "May I ask where? And what happened?"
Kori rounds on Keiko, eyes wide. "I thought that word meant the *same thing*!" she gasps. Solidarity! A moment of mutual confusion. "Because they are both verbs, you see! I am learning about grammar," she says, proudly, and sticks a thumb at her chest. She wags a chin at Koa's explanation, looks back to Keiko. "'To club' can mean physical violance with an impact weapon. But 'clubbing' derives from 'night club'," she explains. Kori looks weirdly grateful to be able to help someone in the same way someone helped her. "Is English not the confusing?" she asks wryly, hands planting on her hips.
She looks back at Koa. "With the jobs?" Once prompted, she starts counting her fingers, eyes rolling skywards in thought. "I was told I was operating the register incorrectly, I misplaced $32.20 after a delivery, I provided the pizza two minutes past the 30 minutes or less window, the burrito got stolen by a duck, my bicycle was stolen and I could not make deliveries, I lost my hat, I lost my shoes, I was told I would distract from the girls on stage, I spilled all the drinks on a business dinner, I dipped my lunch in the fryalator, my shirt was too tight, I wrecked the cleaning machine, I didn't understand why I should take my pants off, a dog ate the USB drive, and I confused 'hot sauce' with 'ketchup' too many times."
She counts on her fingers. "That's all of them so far."
"Oh." Keiko looks … disappointed. "So you don't have a weapon?" That seemed to be a high point for the small woman. "Grammar? Is that your mothers mother or your fathers? Oh, no. I know this. That's how words go together right?" Koa may well wonder about her.
"English is one of the most difficult languages I've heard." she nods sagely to Kori, eyes widening as the list of dismissals grow, nodding a bit at most of them.
And then "Why did you have to take your pants off and … what's a USB drive?"
Has she been living under a rock?
A lot of those are pretty mundane, the sort of things that might happen to a careless teenager. Some of them though are indicitive of a lack of understanding of the functioning of the world that Koa usually ascribes to the inhuman. Non human. Parahuman? Something.
Oh, and also Keiko now. Apparently.
"Why would you WANT her to have a weapon?" Koa asks Keiko incredulously. To the list of questions she asks Kori he adds: "A burrito was stolen by a duck?"
Well with a name, her description and an idea of what she was fired for he should be able to track down at least some of her work places and examine them for paranormal influence. If she does NOT turn out to be a creature of magic… well he's still gonna be damn curious.
"Has that been difficult with your parents, your, uh, work issues?"
Still probing. Magical creatures don't really understand familiar relations.
"That's what I said!" Kori tells Keiko, agreeably. "It is a terrible language. I'm … not sure what a USB drive *is*," Kori concedes. "But it is important and has important things stored inside it. I was in a lot of trouble when I lost the one I was supposed to deliver. But not as much as I was when I wouldn't take my pants off." She frowns. "I have been told several times that I must wear clothing of a certain type and should not walk around undressed. Then I started working at the coffee shop and the owner said I should take my pants off in the back office. I was very confused!"
She looks back at Koa. "This is fun! I am enjoying making new friends. And yes, a duck stole it. It was a terrible fight. But— my parents do not care, sir," she tells him, her face suddenly crumpling. "They are dead. I can only try to honor their memory by doing the best that I can to start a new life."
"English …" Keiko shakes her head "… is like it's mugged all the other languages and taken the worst parts to use. So very confusing." She frowns at the explanation though and goes to say something but changes her mind.
Oh right. Koa is trying to do his job.
"Where did you grow up, Kori?" She might as well ask the direct questions and adds "I am not from America, either." develop a common frame of reference, to engender trust. That's right, isn't it?
There's a surprising lack of empathy from the woman with the tattooes in regards to Kori parents.
"No he's not supposed to tell you to do that. It's illegal. He should be arrested for- wait, you have been TOLD several times that you should not walk around undressed?"
Um… this is not getting any less strange.
And then he asks the wrong question. Dead? No that's not the answer a spirit being would give. She still might be supernatural but that fairly cinches the question of her being some kind of poessessing entity.
Probably.
"Oh, I'm sorry Miss Anderson. That has to be difficult. Are you staying with other family then?" A natural question if she is hman or human ish.
"I am from the nation state of Malta, in Europe," Kori tells Keiko with a politely dutiful tone. "But my family travelled extensively in Europe. There was a… terrorist incident and they were killed. It's very difficult to discuss," she says, looking crestfallen.
"I emigrated here and I am an emancipated minor," she tells Koa. All true. "And yes. I am accustomed to wearing very little, if any, clothing, because of the … climate in Europe. But I was told by the Immigration and Naturalization Services agents that I must show my identification to any agent who requests it, /and/ I need to wear pants at all times. I've asked why this is so, and no one has given me a good explanation. And on top of that— people ask me to take my clothes off! It's all very perplexing."
Keiko knows she didn't answer Koa about the weapon. She might be expecting some questions later though. "I have been to Malta. It is very nice there. You're right it is hot but I must have been in a different part, the people there all wore clothes."
There's a prompt there for Koa if he takes it. Kori apparently has identification.
Keiko will agree that Kori is … different … but has Koa seen some of the others in the city? The natives are just as confusing and different. At least to the tattooed woman.
"It's because there are laws against public nudity. And sort of against private nudity depending on where and how private." Privacy can mean different things to different people and Koa doesn't want to get the poor girl in trouble. "Also depending on where you are laws against not wearing enough clothes. Indecency laws, they're called. People here find it variying levels of distracting and disturbing. And no, no one should be asking you to take your clothes off… well." Short pause. "Very few people should be asking you to take your clothes off if you're not in some kind of relationship with them."
Malta eh? That shouldn't be too hard for the foreign desk to run down. Koa nods to Keiko. He saw that glance she gave him. Good spot.
"Mind if I see your ID, Kori? And if you're living on your own, feel free to give either one of us a call if you should run into trouble that you can't sort out."
He does wonder how she PAYS for a place to stay if she has trouble holding down a job.
"Been to Malta have you Keiko? Aren't you well travelled." Under what circumstances, he wonders.
"Oh! You are a government agent? I am required to surrender my ID to any agent on request. May I see your identification as well?" Kori's digging in her pocket for her ID, which is folded up with a few dollar bills and a recepit to Arby's.
Once Koa demonstrates he's indeed government, she hands him her ID. It's a New York State Identification card, featuring Kori with a toothy, beaming grin and the name 'Kori Anderson' with an address in a dodgy part of town. 'Lawful resident', though it makes no claims of citizenship.
An agent of SHIELD, however, might recognize the telltale signs of a holograph disguise on the card designated by SHIELD agents. Manipulating it reveals an extra-terrestrial refugee card, issue to an alien visiting Earth and indicating Kori Anderson is a war refugee.
Keiko watches as the card is handed over, biting her tongue on any comments she might make about Koa. She's dry and glib but he has a job to do and she's asked for his help and she's not going to jeopardise that by upsetting him.
Errr, upsetting him too much.
"He is indeed a government Agent." She says after a moment. "And I have, Agent Turner. I've been many places." Helpful much?
Koa's badge says WAND. Well it also says SHIELD and since she's interacted with agents of SHIELD before she'll recognize some of the iconography. When he sees the symbols denoting the involvement of SHIELDS ET division he makes a silent 'ah'. This explains much. It also means he doesn't have to run down her places of work and check them for paranormal influence.
Though he might do that JUUUUUST to be safe.
After looking at it for a minute or two he hands the card back.
"Thank you. I'm sorry you're arrival to this country was so difficult but hopefully things will get better from here."
Malta. Who knew it was so far away…
"And definitely if you happen to hear anything about htose missing children let us know." Though if she does he's even more reluctant now to throw her into the thick of anything. She's had it hard enough getting here and it's the furthest thing from his mind that she might be a combatant of any kind.
"If you're really staying in that area though I'd keep Keiko on speed dial. I'm sure she can give you a hand if the taps ever break. Or your window gets broken." There's a nod to Keiko. Maybe she can check up on Kori at some point. They seem to have some affinity as people who don't know what clubbing is. Or at least didn't when they first heard the word.
"But I don't have her—" Kori looks at Keiko in confusion, then balks. "Oh! The piece of paper! There was a phone number on it!" She whips phone and card out and starts transferring the number into her phone, then turns in place and angles to get a selfie with her and Keiko in the picture. "The cheese!" she declares.
"I have been muchly enjoying my time on E— America," she tells Koa. "The people have been very kind. I am very confused by things, but people are going to effort to help me so I do not do anything too terrible. I am looking for a job I would be good at, though. If you find something that I would be suited for, please let me know? I have a little stipend and it is just enough for my rent and some food each month."
Of course if Keiko had been your usual young woman, she would have just 'wired' the phone number to Kori. "Yes, it has my phone number on i—- Wait, what are you doing?"
The resulting photo has Keiko grimacing, eyes crossing as she's taken by surprise.
"I uh … don't think you'll like what I do much. It can get pretty dirty and …" well Keiko's not sure her insurance will cover … well, Acts of Kori.
"But I will certainly keep an eye open."
"I'll see if I can think of something, Miss Anderson. I mostly deal in paranormal and interdimensional events but if something comes up that seems like it might suit I'll be sure to send it your way."
He's not at all sure what that would be. Kori is very earnest and very friendly but she clearly has some issues at the moment handling Earth culture. Something that makes the best use of her bubbly personality would be ideal. But it'd have to be a non-service related position so that her, uh, unfamiliarity with local mores and custums can't cause spectacular explosions. Literal or metaphorical.
"Ah but what kind of cheese?" Koa teases slightly when Kori mangles the usual invitation to smile.
"Well, I should be going, but it was nice meeting you Miss Anderson. And like I said, give a call to the offices and ask for Agent Turner if you need to get ahold of me." Though she probably has her own point of contact and Koa isn't necessarily expecting that he'll be taken up on that.
"Keiko shall we grab a bite to eat. Kori's crackerjack is making me hungry."
"Pepperjack," Kori says, seriously.
"I hope you find the missing child," she tells the two agents, fretting. "I wish I could be of more help. I am afraid I do not know how to do of the investigatings," she confesses. "But you two seem very smart and confident! I am sure you will be successful," she adds. "I was very happy to make the acquaintance of you two."
"Crackerjack?" Keiko frowns, dark eyes going to the candy corn in Kori's hand "Oh. Right. Food is good, yes." Does she really not know the colloquial term? It's possible. She didn't know what clubbing was, after all. "Pepperjack, yes."
What *will* she call it the next time?
"It's been a pleasure meeting you too, Kori. I hope you find a job that lets you keep your clothes on." That's right isn't it?
With a look to Koa, Keiko glances to her bike. If they're leaving, she'll collect it. She's going to need it later.
"Good choice." Koa says tapping the side of his nose. Pepperjack is indeed delicious.
"Take care, Miss Anderson. I'm sure we'll be seeing eachother again."
In Koa's world there are very, very few coincidences. Though Keiko might have been one.
"You do know that's most jobs, right?" The Agent says to the handyman as they meander off down the jogging paths leaving Kori to finish her caramel corn and possibly look up at the angelic beings - now small specks in the skies still drifting toward town.