⚘ [ fringe event #2 ] || sleepless (video)

[entangles]

[ In the abandoned lab of a former mad scientist, Olivia sits at a table covered with manila folders, dusty beakers and containers of who-knows-what. She looks exhausted, stressed--fingers rubbing circles into her temples. Hours she's been at this, going through Walter's lab, his files, staring at words and numbers that make no sense to the agent. Given the time he was here, Walter couldn't have left much, but what he did leave apparently leads to no answers, no answers she can comprehend at least. ]

If anyone found a way out, it had to be you, Walter.

[ Without looking up, she reaches for the cup of coffee next to her, misjudging the distance in a moment of tired absentmindedness. The half-full coffee cup tumbles, spilling the contents across the table. ]

Shit--

[ooc: Anyone from Fringe would be much-loved! No doubles, except her canon double, please. ]

Comments

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[call_me_spooky]

Yeah, I know.

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[entangles]

I can accept alternative universes, even doppelgangers. Pocket dimensions, sure. But a fictional character who exists as reality in another universe?

[ Or she just doesn't want to accept the fact that she, too, could also be a form of entertainment. ]

Technically, if you are from another universe, I should exist in yours.

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[call_me_spooky]

Not necessarily, if we're considering the possibility of multiple universes, and not only parallel but divergent universes. If it's not as simple as considering whether a coin comes up heads here and tails there, why should there be a limit to the complexity or the variance of planes of existence that don't touch upon our own?

It takes some getting used to, I know. But I promise you'll have an easier time if you keep an open mind.

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[entangles]

Then you're suggesting that someone's-- imagination could somehow convey an entire reality? [ Unfortunately, Walter would probably have a theory for this. ] And that fictionalized reality could be performed by actors who are, coincidentally, the alternate versions of their fictionalized characters?

I have an open mind.

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[call_me_spooky]

I'm suggesting that to reject the possibility outright based on nothing more solid than the assumption that your frame of reference on reality is more valid than mine is to willfully reject the opportunity to explore the infinite weirdness of the universe. To deny the possibility of a greater truth that lies beyond perception but not out of reach.

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[entangles]

And to accept the possibility without any scientific explanation, without anything to back it up except mere assumption? Trust me, Agent Mulder, I've come to accept a lot of things-- absurd circumstances that I wouldn't have even been able to comprehend a few years ago.

[ Woah, did she actually just call you by your 'real' name? That sure says something that her words hide. ]

But I can't help but be skeptical right now.

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[call_me_spooky]

As the Doc, I'm sure he's got a theory.

[Gosh he's tickled by that. But we digress, don't we? He noticed you're warming up to him, too.]

There's a difference between skepticism and blind, willful ignorance.

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[entangles]

Who?

[ the verb 'Warming up' may be giving Mulder too much credit. ]

I assure you it's skepticism.

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[call_me_spooky]

Doc Brown.

[There's a trace of a smile.]

Then there's hope for you yet, Agent...? Sorry, couldn't quite make it out on the screen.

[The picture wavers a little bit as he shakes the device for emphasis.]

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[entangles]

Olivia Dunham.

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[call_me_spooky]

Agent Dunham.

[There's a twitch of his lip that might be a smile if he were not Fox Mulder, man-droid extraordinaire.]

I'll get your badge number later.

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[entangles]

You're assuming there will be a later, Agent Mulder.

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[call_me_spooky]

I'm guessing. Usually visitors get a day or two.

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[entangles]

You seem pretty confident about that.

[ Wait for it, wait for it- ]

How about we make a bet. If you're here tomorrow, I'll buy you coffee.

video;

[call_me_spooky]

Why not. If I'm not here, you'll... well, there are those who'd argue that's its own reward.

I think I'll win the worst A.D. contest when we chat, though.

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[entangles]

Not a popular character?

[ Did you see that pun? ]

You're right. You will win.

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[call_me_spooky]

Cute.

[Very flatly, though really he's amused that she's at least entertaining the possibility.]

See you, Agent Dunham.

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[entangles]

[ At twelve 'o clock sharp, Olivia arrives at Cafe Juliet dressed for work. Black suit. White dress shirt. Hands folded in front of her. The more she can frame this meeting in terms of work, the easier it is for her to rationalize a justification. In a way, Olivia's amazed that she's let herself ask a stranger, no less a supposed fictional stranger to coffee. Within a week, she's made more of a social life for herself in that past three years. Maybe the next strange will get a dinner.

However, Olivia doesn't consider this invitation to be a "social gathering." Reconnaissance. An investigation. Whatever you want to call it that doesn't suggest she's doing this for her own morbid curiosity. You see, science fiction, television in general, has never really been Olivia's thing. Hasn't had the time, or the interest. Yet, who hasn't lived through the 90s in America without hearing about X-Files? Who hasn't seen glimpses of an episode while late-night channel flipping?

In fact, Peter's probably already made a joke about the Fringe division and its fictional cousin. ]

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[call_me_spooky]

[The thing about Mulder is, overall, he loved the City, and for him it hasn't been so long since he was a regular around here. Mulder thrives on the unexplained, and a place that let him live with characters from Star Trek was a phenomenon he was all too pleased to study. So in some ways he has her at a disadvantage; he knows it's an inevitability to accept the impossible as probable, here.

He doesn't have any idea that she's anything but a plain old fed, one from a world, probably, that doesn't have a basement full of shelved files on aliens and demons and the Jersey Devil. That's all right. If she hadn't offered to buy him a drink so sarcastically, he probably wouldn't have showed. But she's funny enough that here he is too, wearing a slightly rumpled black suit to match hers, with a bandaid high on his cheek.

Fox smiles at a waitress who looks familiar, continues on to slip into the seat opposite Olivia's, like it's no big deal.]

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[entangles]

[ When Mulder finally arrives, Olivia doesn't move to greet him, content to initially observe the character as her mind tries to grasp the reality of this obviously real Fox Mulder. To this, she gives him a look that's probably familiar to the deadpan fed: reticent, without the slightest suggestion of an expression, not even a twitch that might hint to how she's really feeling about this.]

Agent Mulder.

[ Her voice is deep, firm and even, with every word enunciated clearly. Maybe she's just fulfilling the FBI stereotype a little too well, or maybe Olivia Dunham is just always this intense.

Finally, she raises her hand to shake his. ]

I almost thought you wouldn't come.

[call_me_spooky]

[There's no reason for him to doubt her story, she's got all the earmarks of a bona fide g-woman: the suit, the monotone, the lack of any apparent sense of humor. It's kind of charming, in a weird way; maybe just because it reminds him of home, though he hasn't been here long enough to feel the least bit homesick. Maybe he just feels like the feds need to stick together. Or maybe he's just hungry.]

It takes a lot to make me stand someone up.

[entangles]

[ Olivia presses her lips together in that way of having something to say, of wanting to say something, that necessarily can't be said. Or articulated. In this case, it's the latter: revealing government secrets is and will always be felony. As an agent, Olivia has always lived by the law, yet these strange circumstances she finds herself in, whether in this or that world, often require one to bypass the requisite behavior in favor of results. She highly doubts the government had ever prepared itself for wormholes and alternate universes.

What to tell Mulder, what to ask, how to ask? One word to break a law, another to talk circles around it. ]

I'll be honest. I've never watched your show. No time, no interest. That kind of stuff-- it just wasn't real to me.

[ She wrings her hand together and finally that tight-lipped expression shifts into a tepid smile, evincing the slightest discomfort. ]

And then--

[ She pauses. ]

You wouldn't happen to have been involved in any cases that involved... alternate universes?

[call_me_spooky]

[Her admission gets nothing more from him than a slight shrug. Truth be told, he prefers talking to people who don't know every intimate aspect of his life (and his time in the City showed him that intimate details were, unfortunately, not excluded from the mix.) Accepting the existence of a reality in which his reality is unreal doesn't negate the validity of his own existence, as far as Fox Mulder is concerned-- but it can be a headache when people can't see past it.

But she cuts to the chase, which he likes, and the chase sounds like it has potential.]

For reasons that should be obvious I can't say I disbelieve the existence of alternate universes. But, no. Aside from my experiences with the City, I haven't been personally involved in cases involving other universes. There are such cases in the files-- I'm having a hard time bringing the specifics to mind-- but none that we've reopened. Yet.

[There's a bit of a gleam in his eye, though.]

Why do you ask?

[entangles]

[ Suspension of disbelief seems to be the general tactic of the city's people. Moreover, without her trusty scientist to confirm, at least theoretically, the possibility of fictional and real versions of a character coexisting, Olivia finds it hard to comprehend Mulder's existence.

But here it--he is. Agent Mulder, rumpled suit and all. ]

So you reopen cases. That's to say, they aren't- [ How to phrase these without sounding insulting... ] immediately pertinent.

[ Olivia leans in closer, as if she's about to reveal a secret. Softly, she answers-- ]

It'd be a felony if I told you.

[call_me_spooky]

I investigate the cases that can't be solved, the ones they don't want solved. Ones that come up that no one will touch and ones they've buried. When I have time there are decades upon decades of such stories in the files-- X for unexplained. Because they ran out of space in U.

[It's an explanation, not a justification. Agent Mulder believes many things, but above all else he believes his work needs no outside validation, that his pursuit of the truth is in and of itself a validation of the work he does. It's why he's never minded working alone, working against, working without support. Opposition strengthens his conviction. It doesn't matter if she believes him, if she believes in him, at all.

He doesn't lean in to mirror her, trusting in his convictions to trump the false air of intimacy. It's a sharp move, though. Shame she isn't real in his Bureau.]

You know we're not in Kansas anymore.