With Great Moxie (Ace)

[Gleam]

Jacob set his luggage down outside the dorm door and sighed with satisfaction, as he leaned against the wall and searched through his pockets for his room key. He hadn't brought much, truly, since he was confident he could rebuild his gardening collection from the native flora.

He found his key, nodded in satisfaction, and then knocked out of long habit on Dorm 05 and waited to see if anyone would answer.

['Ace' Julia Dale]

Ace had been inside the room, the hardwood floor littered with her things: candy wrappers, cigarette butts, playing cards, bullet casings, dirty clothing and a children's learn-and-draw colouring book. The TV was turned to an infomercial channel just to put some noise into the room. Her side of the room had a futon with a cheap green blanket, holes had been poked through various parts of it, which she had been sleeping beneath. The place was sparcely furnished, because Ace didn't like a lot of the stuff the place came with. It smelt like smoke, drink, take-out, and dust.

Then, there was a knock, which partially woke Ace from her afternoon slumber. "Great. People." She said to herself as she brought herself to a stand and wandered over to the door. She called as she approached it in her jammy shorts and the tank top she slept in, not seeming to care that her arms were visible. "If you're selling anything, I'm not interested." She said in a brash tone, pulling the door open the crack that the chain allowed to glare at whatever stood on the other side.

[Gleam]

Jacob stared at Ace, nonplussed. Then he raised a hand and massaged his brow. "Dorm 05." he said. "Right, Jane Doe?"

He held up the key in his other hand and let Ace get a good look at his room key and the keychain it came on, demarking what room it belonged to. "I think I am assigned to be your dorm-mate, presuming I am not found dead and stuffed with my own dough in the morning."

['Ace' Julia Dale]

Ace glared at him for a moment, blinked, then started laughing. She continued to laugh as she unhooked the chain and let the door swing open.

"Mother fucker, if it isn't Mr. Muffin Jack... or Jake or something..." She shook her head and reached towards the floor to pick up her pack of cigarettes, feeling the timing was appropriate. She grimaced to notice there only being 2 left. Oh well, she wanted one.

She lit it up, only once doing so did she notice her arms with their faded needle tracks, and went to grab a jacket. "So, okay, right..." She took a drag, "You're gonna live over there." She pointed to the distant bed which was put into the corner of the space. "If you snore though, I swear I'll be making a complaint and relocating you." She said simply.

The infomercials blared about how much of a bargain this speaker system was, and that if you bought this, they would throw in cooking mitts free. She went over to the futon to find the remote under her pillow. She switched it off.

"Never had a roommate before, so, cross your fingers." He could guess what she was talking about. Ace wasn't even sure herself but it sounded right to her. She kicked the children's learning book under the coach smoothly, pushing a chocolate wrapper with it to be lost forever.

[Gleam]

"Sure, that works." Jacob said with a crooked grin. He took a step back and grabbed his luggage, then hefted it into the room. He weaved a way between the litter, plopped the case down on the stripped bed, and cracked it open, then started feeding clothes into the tiny closet nearby. "I do not snore, so I cannot see that being a problem."

He barely even notices the clutter, apparently, as he finishes the closet stocking. "Now, I have had roommates before, and it is rather useful to set ground rules." Jacob leaned back against his bed and stretched. "As you have the oldest claim, I believe you should dictate what you think is reasonable. Then we can argue about them."

['Ace' Julia Dale]

Ace was glad that he went with this plan easily. She was even more relieved to hear that he didn't snore. "Fantastic." She responded sincerely. Taking another drag, she watched him unload his things.

"Ground rules?" She raised her eyebrow. "What I think is reasonable? Alright, I take my stuff, you take your stuff, you live over there, I live over here. Don't mess with what's mine, and I'll try to respect what's yours. Like that?" She said, with a half-grin.

"I really hope you don't actually intend to argue with me..." She added afterwards. Ace then went to walk to the kitchenette and open the mini-fridge, pulling out a beer and cracking it open. "Want one?" She offered.

[Gleam]

Jacob huffed a laugh. "I mean like if you bring a guy here, letting me know so I can give you some privacy. Or who stocks the kitchen - ah, my thanks." He took the beer, popped the top with his teeth, and took a drink. " Or do they give out free alcohol on a schoolground?"

He pauses and considers that. "Actually if they do, all my reservations about this campus vanish."

Jacob shakes his head and resumes talking. "I am a relatively private individual so I will not be doing that myself, though."

['Ace' Julia Dale]

Ace withheld laughter as much as she could, but of course her ladylike ways made it end up a snort. "Guys. Nah, I don't think you need to worry, buster." She said, "It may surprise you, but I scare people." She said with a half-grin.

"As for the alcohol? Nah, I brought it myself. If I need more I order online. I got this credit card on the way to Solstice that says I'm like some 43 year old dude." She shrugged, feeling that now he was her dorm mate, he was in some sort of pact with her not to report her. Although, obviously this pact was not a two way agreement. Regardless, he could probably see the gun on the floor.

"It would be fantastic if that was the case though right? I'm with you there." She said about the beer.

"You're a private individual so you won't be doing what? Filling the fridge or bringing back guys?" She asked, grinning out the side of her mouth.

[Gleam]

"Oh, shit." Jacob said, straightfaced. "Really? I better start running." Another drink punctuates this statement, although he chokes and starts to laugh at her credit card comment. "Ah, internet truth averages hold to their standard."

He peers at the door to the hallway. "It would be great, I agree, but can you imagine the eleven and twelve year olds buying their first lager and drinking it before class? Chemistry, as it was originally done." He raises his bottle in mock salute. "In pursuit of intoxication."

"I'll fill the fridge if only because I do not think you are the tea sort of person, and once I am buying one beverage I may as well stock the rest." Jacob replies with a smile. "This said, if anyone falls for my dashing good looks, there is a whole pair of islands out there to explore - why waste all that virgin territory?"

['Ace' Julia Dale]

Ace grabbed one for herself from the fridge. "Ha Ha." She said sarcastically with a half-grin. She notices him looking off towards the hallway, "That leads to the bathroom, closet, and den." She explained, waving it off with her cigarette hand before taking another smoke.

"Ah I remember the days." She said with a small laugh. "And no, I'm not really a tea person, sorry. It's too bland." She said. It is a well known fact that smoking reduces one's taste buds, and Ace's weren't ever very good at their job anyway. "Stock away." She said to him saying he'd stock the fridge.

She laughed when he came to his comment about the current state of the territory. "I see what you did there." She said, pointing at him with her pinky finger before taking a drink.

[Gleam]

Jacob snickered and took a drink as he set out the last of his stuff, his laptop and several spiral notebooks's worth of notes, which he stored in a set of cheap plastic shelves soon enough. "That is because you have, most likely, drunk only the English versions, and the quality of tea is dependent on the herbs available to blend for it. And England is a miserable little island to grow anything on."

He bows deeply in answer to Ace's comment. "I live to entertain, Jane. To our continued coexistence, or at least not mutual extinction."

Jacob lifts his bottle in a toast to his flatmate. "Not that I could really toast anything else while drinking YOUR beer, though. That would be rude."

['Ace' Julia Dale]

Ace eyed the laptop for a moment and then returned her gaze to Jacob. "Dude, I don't even remember." She said simply, "Ah and that's right isn't it, you're from there..." She smirked a little at that. "Never been there myself." She stated, as a prompt for him to tell her about it. Why not, the infomercials were turned off, and Ace enjoyed sound.

Ace raised her beer, "Dude, don't care, you can do whatever. To existance, seems as good a thing to toast as any." She said, clinking bottles with his and throwing back a swig. "Okay I think it's a British thing or something, but being rude is okay," She told him. "I don't give a fuck."

[Gleam]

"England is rainy." Jacob said, acknowledging the prompt. "That is the first thing you realize, and it is constant, and cold, and fairly miserable. The city streets are cramped and the pollution is old."

He leans back against the wall behind his bed. "But the people are all proud. I would guess it's a nation that defines itself most by its ability to weather anything, and pure stubbornness. So there is a certain . . . dry humor that comes of the assurance of survival." Jacob takes a sip of beer. "So yes, they're all arrogant pricks. But they're likable, and decent folk to share a beer with."

He eyes Ace dubiously. "I am certain you would not take offense, as you seem thick-skinned, but just because I can get away with insulting you does not mean I want to."

['Ace' Julia Dale]

Ace listened to his story about his home while drinking her beer. "I don't know about all of them being likeable," She joked, "But sharing a beer seems alright." She gave a half grin and took another drag of her cigarette, flicking off some of the built up ash from the tip. The flavour was sharp and tarrish on her tongue, and there was a sharp pleasant sensation in the back of her throat as she drew the nicotine in. Half a second later and she blew it out in a grateful steady stream of grey.

"That's nice of you, I guess..." She said with a shrug. After a moment of pause she turned back to the fridge and pulled out a bottle of salsa, and pulled a half-eaten bag of tortilla chips from a cabinet, and began to munch, "Hungry?"

[Gleam]

Jacob gave the tortillas a Look.

"Alright, budge over." he said. "You can have those if you want, but I am making proper food and you are as welcome to it as I am." He searched through a minicooler he had brought with him, and examines a package briefly. "How does broiled salmon with honey glaze sound? Can't do anything for a side, I'd need to raid the kitchen for that."

A pause.

"Yes I feed people." he said. "It's a thing."

['Ace' Julia Dale]

Ace raised her eyebrows in surprise, continuing to chew on her chip. She moved aside easy enough, not wanting to cause unnecessary hassle with the mad one. She looked over to his minicooler, listening as he said he was bringing out broiled salmon. With honey glaze. "Sounds fancy..." She admitted.

"You can raid the kitchen sure..." Her expression changed from confusion and shock to amusement, a classic half-grin forming. "You can raid the kitchen all you'd like. You're officially the chef, dude. No question." She laughed a little at the situation while she went over to grab some proper pants and flip on the TV again to watch the infomercials. It was one of the best channels she'd seen so far.

"I don't suppose you brought a DVD player and some flicks, no? Because," She called, "I can pretty much tell you the number and cost of a waffle-iron with a bacon-fryer of the top of my head. I don't think that's healthy."

[Gleam]

"Takes maybe ten minutes, nothing big." Jacob said, distracted, as he set out the salmon (being in the cooler, it had thawed well enough already) and began to run cool water over them to finish the process. "I'd need herbs and spices to do anything complex, this is just a bit of glaze and a cracked oven."

He adds the glaze after he's finished rinsing the salmon, sets them on a waxed baking sheet, and sets the oven to warm. "You bet your ass I am the cook." he said, voice definite. "It's my lineolium-tiled kingdom."

Jacob peeks out into the living room. "And by the by, I have the first six seasons of Doctor Who saved to my laptop, so if you wish to go ahead and plug that in and start it up - well, cheers."

['Ace' Julia Dale]

Ace went over to the laptop as he said that's where the entertainment was and grabbed it easily, unplugging the cables at the back and bringing it to the couch, looking down at the keyboard hesitantly.

She clicked a few icons randomly on the main screen, squinting to make out the words. "Okay I'm where I need to be with this..." She said it as a definite, but she actually had no idea. She looked at him with some strange combination of ignorance and assurance. She would pretend to understand. "Here, you find it. Do I need to poke the fish with one of those stick things or do you just throw it in the oven and wait?" She asked, "Or hell, should I just bring it to you?"

She immediately took the second option, bringing the laptop to him unplugged in the kitchen, "Here." She said, opening the log-in screen towards him.

[Gleam]

"Give the salmon ten minutes to broil and it will done, no worries." Jacob replied, and glanced at the laptop. His fingers tapped a rapid sequence into the keyboard, somewhere between twelve and fifteen characters, and it logged in. Then he moved the cursor over a large file marked DR. WHO.

"I have a relatively inadequate sense of direction. Particularly in cyberspace." Jacob explains aside, then doubleclicks it and starts up the first episode, full-screen. "Required viewing for English audiences. They have it in their elementary schools during recess, in fact. That's if you were lame enough to stay inside during it. I was."

He putters over to the fridge, leaving Ace with the laptop. He glances through it and gnaws on his lip. "How are you with hard liquor?" he calls. "Like Amaretto, for example."

['Ace' Julia Dale]

Ace nodded, "Sure thing, sounds good." She said, watching him easily tap in words to the screen, as though it were effortless, and identify a folder. A part of her felt a strange sense of envy, but she disregarded it.

"I'm sure." She said about the english watching it in recess. "Haven't seen it myself. I didn't watch too much television when I was younger." She shrugged, still holding the laptop. She turned it around to face her finding the play button easy enough. However, she decided to bring it to the couch and wait until dinner was ready.

"Sure, I can handle it." She said easily, not even thinking about the liquor in question. After placing it down on the couch she glanced back over to Jacob. "... Need anything? Help maybe?" She offered, somewhat straining at the attempt to do so. She winced to herself, wondering how this might hit her in the ass later. How might she regret this...

[Gleam]

Jacob raised an eyebrow at Ace. "I am handling it tonight. But if you want to call it fair, you can wash the dishes any night that you eat what I cook. Fair exchange?"

The oven timer dings and he extracts the salmon, adding a light spread of honey on top of the glaze and setting them onto plates, which he carried out to Ace. "Here you go. Basic, not high-class fare, but quick and easy. I'll have better material to work with once I find where the faculty stores the stocks for the Terminator kitchen."

He plopped himself on the other side of the couch and nodded at the laptop. "Go ahead and start it up."

['Ace' Julia Dale]

Ace could tell by his raised brow that her offer had surprised him. Yeah, yeah, she thought to herself, I know. She paused for a moment after he offered her to do the dishes. "...Dishes?..." She remembered paying for the muffin. There was no such thing, she repeated inwardly, as a free meal. "Yeah sure. Fine." She said simply, and left it at that.

The timer dinging nearly made Ace jump. She hadn't heard that noise in this place before. Actually, now that she thought of it, she didn't remember using the oven at all this last year. The microwave, sure, and maybe the skillet once or twice and some pots, but not the oven.

She took the plate out of his hands hungrily, smelling the cooked salmon in the air. She didn't see a fork, so she just carefully slid the meat to the edge of the place and held it level to her face to nibble at it, though it was still very hot. She made due with what she had, and didn't bother asking for cutlery.

After her first bite she took another larger one. Then she stopped to wipe her face against her sleeve, "Damn this took 10 minutes? This ain't basic, dude, this is pretty ritzy." She said, moving her greasy hands to press the click button below the mousepad on the laptop for play. She devoured another bit of it like some sort of starving animal.

The eerie first 3 notes of the Dr. Who theme made Ace raise her eyebrow and give Jacob a look. She obviously was a bit cynical.

[Gleam]

Jacob didn't stare or watch Ace eat, though he completely failed at curbing the smile that grew on his face. He ate peaceably (at a far slower rate, mind you), and bowed at the compliment. "Then I will endeavor to expand your culinary horizons." he replied. "Despite how much I love tortillas and and all."

As the theme music played, Jacob ducked his head a bit. "It's good. Even if the theme is a bit . . . old. By now. And the Daleks are always pretty silly."

['Ace' Julia Dale]

Ace shrugged from the other end of the couch, "Sure, whatever." She casually responded. She didn't seem to particularly care. She enjoyed tortillas as much as the next guy, but this... well, if he planned on cooking more food like that, she didn't care what crazy shit he brought into the dorm.

She listened to his explanation of the music. "Yeah sounds it..." She gave him a curious expression, "... Daleks?" The nerd talk went way over her head, and her face showed as much. She didn't try to pretend to understand this time. She gestured for an explanation, but snapped her head around when the episode began. Ace dragged more of the fish towards the end and into her mouth, until it was gone. It didn't take very long.

[Gleam]

Jacob waved a hand, almost embarassed. "Don't want to spoil anything, and they show up some time later in the show. Disregard my accidental spoiler."

When the episode finished, Jacob hummed to himself and nodded. "So there's your first episode of the national series of English broadcasting. Any opinions, Jane? And should I try to make seconds? An empty plate is such a depressing thing, after all."