Open RP: Please, don't hesitate to interrupt...

[we-shall-see.livejournal.com]

What would you do if you were an intelligence agent who had suddenly  been sent into the not-too-distant future, and been told that your country was going to get into some pretty hairy political situations?

That's right, newspapers are a good place to start.

Gust is in the Great Hall, with several of said papers, doing the usual juggling act that is flipping pages, smoking a cigarette, and drinking coffee.  Oh, sorry, 'americano,' at Mello's suggestion.  The spy looks nothing other than distinctly bored, when in fact, he's reading very closely.  You learn not to appear too interested, you know? 

Comments

[otakukonata.livejournal.com]

Konata was scheming. If Near and Mello were together, then it made perfect sense for L and Matt to be together. And she wanted dirt on that so her pictures could match.

But how? Especially since she almost got caught last time.

She was reading a manga (pick one, I don't care) while thinking about this. Out loud, not really paying attention to her surroundings, she asked, "how does one spy on a couple?"

[we-shall-see.livejournal.com]

"Easy."

He glances up.

"Elementary, even. You'll need a camera, of some sort, infrared if you're going to be doing night time chase. Then you figure out rendez-vous points; you're talking the way they contact each other, either phone or meeting up. I'd suggest tailing a car, but you look too short to drive."

[otakukonata.livejournal.com]

She glowered at him for the 'short' comment.

"They're all here. So I have the camera, but what about a way of hiding myself?"

[we-shall-see.livejournal.com]

"First, establish the scenario you'd be trying to capture footage of. Inside? Back seat of a car? Hotel?"

There are options for these sorts of things.

"Every one needs a seperate treatment."

[otakukonata.livejournal.com]

"Inside. And I'd have to sneak into their house, since it's not mine."

[we-shall-see.livejournal.com]

"Don't try the 'hiding in the closet' deal, above all else. It doesn't work."

Even for short people.

"Think of a way to see into the room. Outside window access, or position yourself to see through the door as they close it."

[otakukonata.livejournal.com]

"Hmm...I wonder if there's a spell that can work as a peephole...Or something to make me invisible! And quiet."

[we-shall-see.livejournal.com]

"Second, if the pictures are going to be for a court situation, you need legal work. Otherwise a judge'll throw them out."

You have to be careful with spying, nowadays.

[otakukonata.livejournal.com]

"Oh, no, this is for personal use. Maybe blackmail."

And she says this with a straight face.

[mello-n-choco.livejournal.com]

"So, old man, you finally get some decent coffee?" I ask, siding into the seat across from Gust. He's amusing. "And, if you're looking for leads, they're all skewed. It doesn't match up with the timeline I lived, and my timeline doesn't match with yours." So, I finally got around to researching who he was. I tell the passing house elf to get me some hot milk and cream. I haven't found a supply of the xocolatl I had with Mr. Wednesday. Maybe if I actually mentioned it to Near, he'd get me some, but I can't rely on him for everything.

[we-shall-see.livejournal.com]

"So saying means that you've researched my timeline."

Gust arches an eyebrow.

"You're from the same screwed up world as Matt, where they decide teenagers should have access to the records of American foreign ops?"

[mello-n-choco.livejournal.com]

I smile. "It's not so much a matter of they decided we should. It's a matter of we needed it and we got it."

I think a moment, trying to decide how much I should tell him. A house elf brings me my milk and cream and I pull out a chocolate bar and pocket knife to shave the chocolate with.

"Let's say that the one we were training to replace was the top three detectives in the world. And, as such, he had a lot of access and we, as his successors, had that access as well."

[we-shall-see.livejournal.com]

"The top three detectives were all one 'he'?" Matt told him something about that, but Gust isn't going to let on. Maybe they'll both tell him different points, and he can connect the dots on his own.

Never hurts to know a little bit more, after all.

[mello-n-choco.livejournal.com]

I shrug. "Well, they were three, but there was a battle between them. Ryuzaki, the one we were training to replace, won and took their names to simplify things." I thought a moment more. "He even used that to his advantage at times. Investigated himself through the use of proxies." Or patsies, whichever. "I'm sure you're familiar with the process?" I take a sip of my hot chocolate. They actually managed to leave out the sugar this time. Finally.

[we-shall-see.livejournal.com]

"Of course."

Information gathering equivalent of a slight of hand. You never know who's spying for who, or, in this case, who is who.

"This is all post cold war?"

Although from his point of view, that's a historical misnomer; he sees all the hot parts. But then, when have history textbooks ever told the truth? It makes sense that they're no different in the future.

[mello-n-choco.livejournal.com]

"Both. Though, the detective battle was after. Though, for the most part, Ryuzaki was more after. He started at the very end of the cold war." I shrug. "There is a lot of overlap in our timelines, but a lot of discrepancies as well. According to my timeline, the cold war 'officially' ended in 1991, when Ryuzaki was 12. He'd only started fully operating under his pseudonym then. He'd already developed his reputation, though."

I take another sip of chocolate before I ask. "What would you have done, faced with the sudden and inexplicable death of multitudes of criminals due to heart attack?" Just curious to see what he'd do with our last case. Wondering what else I could have done with it.

[we-shall-see.livejournal.com]

"What connects them? Never mind, they're criminals. Vigilante, probably, but look into it to see if there's more going on. Autopsies, looking for drugs in their systems. If you've found something, you've got a conspiracy of the staff within the penal systems."

He drums his fingers on the table.

"Assuming magic exists? Look at how the person slash people controlling the stuff, I assume there was a person or a group, would know who to off. Set up a test or two. Narrow in on them by what information they're getting, how, etc. Make sure they couldn't get to me."

[chance-silvey.livejournal.com]

Chance has come to the Great Hall to grab a bite to eat. She's got a currant scone in one hand and a cup of coffee in the other.

"You've got newspapers?" She's got to come over to see this. She would have said hello anyway, but ... real newspapers, non-wizarding? "Tell me it's not just the Daily Prophet. What passes for wizarding journalism makes me cringe."

[we-shall-see.livejournal.com]

"Real, non magic newspapers. I had to give a man in a wizarding pub three packs of 'muggle' cigarettes and a blow dryer to get him to deliver them to me by owl, of all things, every once in a while. It's like prison, but better coiffed."

He shakes his head, bemusedly.

"But it's more than worth it. Even though he'll only send the saturday one, and probably patchily at best. But it's something."

[chance-silvey.livejournal.com]

"The cigarettes I can understand. The blow dryer is beyond me. Maybe it's exotic to wizards." Chance sets down her napkin-wrapped scone and sits down to peer at the paper. "... I don't know who these politicians are," she confesses after a brief glance at the headlines. The front page isn't really the part of a newspaper she reads anyway. Current events have never been a great interest of hers. It's the science news she would want, recent archaeological and biological and geological discoveries. Geopolitical coverage, maybe: summits on global warming and the like. Stuff about the space program.

"Speaking of exotic, I saw that purple monster you were talking about, finally. Can't believe I never ran into him before. I guess my luck finally ran out?"

[we-shall-see.livejournal.com]

"You came out unscathed? Did it yell 'fwiend' at you?" Good God. "Frankly, I'm surprised you're not cowering in terror. It reaffirmed my tentative atheism."

Actually, Gust pendulums back and forth on that one, depending on his mood and the time of day.

"I think there's a story about a science museum near the back. Funding cuts, though, nothing unexpected or unusual, except that intellectuals are engaged in a clawing battle with the corporate and the burocratic, as usual. The more things change..."

[chance-silvey.livejournal.com]

Chance sighs, a quick rough exhalation of breath. "Same story everywhere, exactly. There was this wonderful little museum in Birmingham, I remember, the Red Mountain Museum. The mayor basically killed it. He wanted a children's 'discovery center' downtown instead. The building's shut down now. God, when I think about the work they used to do there ... a whole new species of trilobite discovered." She could probably say a lot more, but mercifully opts to sip her coffee instead.

"The purple thing didn't yell anything at me, per se. It was yelling, though. Something about 'Mikaw' and 'fwowah.' I really don't know what it meant. There was this hideous little pop-eyed dog following behind it, too, and at one point it picked up the dog and put the dog in its purse." Trendy, that Tinky Winky. "It did say 'Tinky Winky' a few times, too. I guess I ought to be grateful it left me alone. How'd you get labeled 'fwiend'?"

[we-shall-see.livejournal.com]

"Those are the things that look like beetles, in rock, and no one knows how they breathe. And that's the extent of my knowledge in the field." No, really. Land before time hadn't even come out yet, and he wasn't precisely looking at history, geology, or any of that sort of science in school. Physics and math, through and through, and engineering without any regrets, except that he didn't try to skip a year when he was younger and move out of the house sooner.

"I took a chocolate. Big mistake, huge. Someone gave that thing a pet?" Good God. He hopes it can't reproduce.

[chance-silvey.livejournal.com]

"Well, not much is known about the internal anatomy of trilobites, period. That includes their respiratory system if they had one. The general tendency is simply to extrapolate from what we know of present-day arthropods. But you're thinking of the right creature, yes. To be honest, I was kind of hoping your purple monster would turn out to be some kind of a dinosaur. The application goes on about Barney, so ... why not?" Chance looks a little embarrassed to admit it.

She unwraps her scone and breaks off a piece. "It's definitely not a dinosaur, whatever it is. Interesting cranial crest on it. I wonder if anyone's ever studied it. With dinosaurs, they're all dead, or ought to be -- Alan Grant would take exception to saying they're all dead -- so there's never that problem of having to deal with the danger posed by the living being in order to study it. I don't think I'd want to touch Tinky Winky with a ten-foot pole."

[we-shall-see.livejournal.com]

He catches on the 'if they had one.' It's interesting to think of how different it is possible for life forms to be. It's not often something one stops to consider. Heck, he doesn't even know if insects do breathe in the usual way, or not.

"Another dinosaur?" One for her to get to before the tabloids did, he supposed, but to be fair, that must have been extremely frustrating. "If you were ever likely to find one, it would be here. We've got a giant squid, so I'm told, out in the pond out there."