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Post by Pee-Dee on Jan 27, 2012 21:57:04 GMT -5
Month 6, Week 3, Day 4. Semi-private.
"-so I figure we buy them some coffee and ask about the local beat," Petunia says as she wanders around to the passenger side of their assigned car.
She's been out of the hospital for a week and still doesn't really remember who she was. Despite her hopes, no one's put in a Missing Persons report matching her description. She hopes her family isn't tearing themselves up over this.
She hopes she has a family.
But until she remembers, Petunia has arranged for the basics of life. Motorcycle, apartment, job, teevee. She'll be all right.
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Post by Spinister on Jan 27, 2012 22:12:51 GMT -5
Esprit nods, because Det. Dahlia is making good sense there. Of course they should ask the more experienced detectives here about the local beat.
However, she is also heading for the passenger side of the car. She pauses awkwardly and suggests, "Don't you want to drive?"
Esprit is given to understand that being the driver is the more preferred-role, so surely, Det. Dahlia should want it. If Esprit has to, she can drive... very slowly and cautiously, to the extent that Det. Dahlia is probably going to get annoyed. So she wants to avoid that.
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Post by Pee-Dee on Jan 27, 2012 22:16:42 GMT -5
They're both on the passenger side. Um. Well, crap. Driving cars is a skill she didn't retain. If she ever had it in the first place, and she's not too sure about that.
"Don't you?" Petunia asks hopefully, despite all evidence suggesting Det. Hunt doesn't.
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Post by Spinister on Jan 27, 2012 22:25:07 GMT -5
"I like shotgun," Esprit says simply, and it does not seem like she is joking on that matter.
Shotguns and rifles and pistols and flamethrowers and fusion bombs and Needlenose's photon missiles...
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Post by Pee-Dee on Jan 27, 2012 22:33:45 GMT -5
"Right. Well, this is going to be an adventure." Petunia walks around to the other side and slides in behind the wheel. She looks at the dashboard. She looks at the side mirrors. She looks at the dashboard again.
"... Hand me the manual."
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Post by Spinister on Jan 27, 2012 22:38:08 GMT -5
Esprit sits herself down in the passenger seat and locks the doors, because that is always the first thing that should be done when entering a vehicle. That way, a ninja can't open the door from the outside and get in the car with them. Then she does up her seat belt. Then she opens up the glove compartment and looks for the manual.
After some searching, Esprit finds the manual and tries to hand it over to Det. Dahlia. She is watching Det. Dahlia like a hawk. Surely, Det. Dahlia knows how to drive, like a normal, sane human being? And Esprit can pick up some pointers from watching her?
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Post by Pee-Dee on Jan 27, 2012 22:48:39 GMT -5
Det. Hunt expects a lot from the amnesiac.
Petunia flips through the manual, making sure she's got a good grip on what the different gauges are for. And which pedal is which.
Then she notices Det. Hunt has buckled her seatbelt. She should... probably do that, too.
Petunia drops the manual in her lap, turns on the ignition, reaches over and tries to move the shift stick into R. It jostles a little bit, but ultimately does not move. She frowns- oh, hey, button. With her thumb pressing the button in, the stick slides back from P to R.
The car rocks back on its wheels- and goes no further.
Petunia sighs. "Right, parking brake."
Looks like it's time for the manual again, because she has no idea what all these levers on the steering wheel are for.
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Post by Spinister on Jan 27, 2012 23:01:52 GMT -5
Somewhat hesitantly, Esprit reaches into one of her pockets and pulls out a folded piece of paper, which she then tentatively offers to Det. Dahlia. The paper has on it what basically amounts to a 'pre-flight' checklist for driving a car and then an 'in-flight' checklist for the actual driving and then a 'landing' checklist for parking the car.
She does not want to explain why she has this.
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Post by Pee-Dee on Jan 27, 2012 23:11:41 GMT -5
Petunia takes the paper, looking a bit confused until she begins to read. Then her face brightens with understanding. Oh! Handy!
"Thank you." She smiles at Det. Hunt. "I'll give it back when we get there."
And apparently the parking brake is not one of the levers on the steering wheel. It is a thing over here. Petunia releases it, and the car rolls back. Her foot slips to the brake pedal, slowing them, and she twists to look behind her as she backs out of their space.
"I ride a motorcycle," she says by way of explanation. "Cars are..." She waves a hand vaguely. "Not the same."
Fortunately, the instincts for how to drive in traffic are mostly the same.
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Post by Spinister on Jan 27, 2012 23:19:17 GMT -5
Esprit does not yet venture an explanation for why she is letting Det. Dahlia drive, though she has one. Actually, she has several. The reason why she isn't explaining is that Det. Dahlia has not asked for an explanation yet, and giving an explanation for no reason looks suspicious and guilty.
If Esprit just continues on like this is normal, hopefully Det. Dahlia will just accept this as normal, and they can avoid awkward questions.
If not, she does have those excuses.
For now, Esprit just smiles back at Det. Dahlia - it is a conscious thing, this smiling business, trying to remember which muscle tightens when - and she lets her gaze rove over the surroundings outside.
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Post by Pee-Dee on Jan 28, 2012 23:43:17 GMT -5
Petunia drives like she means it. She does not, however, appear to believe in either turn signals or the rearview mirror.
Soon enough and with minimal encounters of the "stomp on the non-existent passenger side brake" variety, Petunia gets them to the Secret Bakery. Intact, even.
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Post by Spinister on Jan 29, 2012 0:25:02 GMT -5
The Hairsplitter that lurks coiled in the back of Esprit's head is screaming bloody murder the whole time. Esprit raises her fingers to pinch the bridge of her nose and seriously considers spending her nights learning how to drive. She can fly a helicopter. Why are cars so hard?
As she unbuckles her seat belt, she stretches and accidentally-on-purpose hits the wiper control for the car. Then she thinks very hard, There are levers and buttons on the wheel. Use them. Mostly the turn signals.
Esprit gives the parking lot a look-over from the inside of the car and then piles out. She starts to walk around the car, seemingly inspecting it. This is something one would do with an aircraft. This is not really a thing people do with cars.
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Post by Pee-Dee on Jan 29, 2012 12:14:33 GMT -5
"Ack, what'd you hit?" Petunia flicks various buttons and levers, discovering the turn signal, the emergency lights, the headlights, the high-beams, the speed-setting for the windshield wipers, and the windshield-wash mode. Then she manages to get the wipers off.
Sadly for Det. Hunt, even knowing where the turn signals are does not convince Petunia she wants to use them. One of her driving instincts is "people don't need more warning than absolutely necessary for what you're about to do".
... Det. Hunt is walking around the car. Petunia watches and shrugs, before climbing out and locking up. "What are you looking for?"
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Post by Spinister on Jan 29, 2012 14:12:12 GMT -5
"Foreign object debris," Esprit says confidently, like this is perfectly normal and also like foreign object debris is of the devil. She even ends up crouching down, picking up a very soggy and trampled coffee cup, and then throwing it away in a nearby garbage can because Hairsplitter is raging about what litter does to the environment. She notices that no one else who is leaving a car does anything remotely like this and she makes a mental note to just... get out of the car and go the next time.
So, the litter thrown away, she moves to enter the Secret Bakery, which is actually a coffee shop with baked goods. She looks at all the exits, moving her eyes more than her head. She looks at everyone in the shop briefly, gauging threat levels. She considers what could be used as an improvised weapon in a fight.
Esprit puts no thought into what she might actually order.
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Post by Kup on Jan 29, 2012 19:47:10 GMT -5
Seated at one of the corner tables, not because being at a corner table makes you less noticeable but because it makes it easier to watch the whole room, is a grumpy woman who looks to be in her forties, perhaps lower fifties, wearing a somewhat too large suit of desaturated gray-greens on her wiry frame. She's got a cup of coffee in her hands, black, as she keeps watch over the room, in the middle of telling some sort of story to her partner or another. She raises an eyebrow when someone she recognizes enters.
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