Steps from the shadows, all trenchcoat &amp; cigarette &amp; arrogance

"Island-wide, I bet," John said, raising his half-glass to Peter and gesturing for him to come in. "Once it was fucking eggnog, and wasn't that a shit to discover in the shower?"

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Peter made a face. "Luckily I noticed this one when I went to brush my teeth."

He glanced at the wards he could feel around John's door. "What are those against? I don't want to break them or get myself fried."

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"Unless you mean me malicious harm, you're safe," John quipped, though he didn't deactivate any of the wards. "The rest are mostly alarms, for when weird magical shite is happening, or if someone tries to trespass into Special Collections."

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Peter nodded and stepped in. "I've set up similar ones at my place and the flower shop, but I thought I'd make sure. No harm to you or yours," he promised, "though I'm not going to stop you getting shit-faced if you want to."

He set his jug of beer down. "Are the walls part of the weird, too? Mine aren't doing that."

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"Nah, that's a hundred percent MCA being MCA," he laughed, motioning for Peter to grab a seat. "Was like that when I moved in-- the place is a damn mood ring. Walls changed colors based on how you feel...it's like half the fun of LSD, and none of the bad shite."

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"Never had the dubious pleasure," Peter said, sitting. "I'll take your word for it."

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"Seriously? Psychedelics and magic have gone hand-in-hand for eons, I'm surprised you didn't play around a bit," he said, sipping at his drink. "I've come up with some brilliant shite while out of my mind."

Also some utterly terrible ideas, but, well, Constantine.

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Peter gave him a wry grin. "Drugs don't affect me. And where I learned my magic, I never would have touched them if they did."

Somehow, psychedelics and Hell seemed like a really bad combination.

Then, because he couldn't remember what John might or might not know, "I spent a thousand years in Hell."

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"Which hell?" Because yes, that was a question you had to ask around here. "If it's run by three mad bastards...I wasn't here, you never saw me, and whatever they might have said about me-- is probably true."

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"I don't think anyone can agree on who's in charge," Peter said. "There are more than three that try to claim it, though." He smiled grimly. "And if they hate you, it just means you're doing something right."

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"Different Hell, then," John decided. "Mine's ruled by a triumvirate since Lucifer decided to piss off and not be God's fall-boy anymore. I've managed to fuck over all three fairly recently, so they're not my biggest fans."

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"I'm not sure about this one's version of Lucifer," Peter said. "We took down Beelzebub just before I ended up here; he was the most powerful I met."

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John shook his head. "You couldn't pay me to throw down with those boys if I didn't have a solid con in my pocket ready to be played. That's the kind of work for the do-gooders of the spandex brigade, though there'd be some fucker, just as bad as the last, filling the void soon enough."

Pessimist? John? Never.

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"We didn't have much of a choice," Peter said. "He was walking around on Earth. And yeah, I'm sure there's some demon just as bad waiting in the wings. Hopefully they'll stay where they belong."

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Once Kanan got himself settled down, he turned toward Peter and raised his glass with a grin.

"All the taps in the building, huh? Whatever the frak is coming from mine is way less fun than this stuff."

Absinthe was definitely crawling up Kanan's list of Earth favorites.

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"Mine is beer," Peter said, pointing at the jug he'd brought. "And no, Earth beer isn't usually green. It's a holiday thing."

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"... Holiday thing? Does this have anything to do with the way Earth messed up the time by an hour, or is that something different?"

Kanan, you had no idea just how many holidays this stupid planet had.

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"...You mean Daylight Saving Time? No, that's different. This is St. Patrick's Day," Peter answered. "It commemorates a saint that..." He shrugged. "Most people nowadays couldn't tell you, so it's really not important to the holiday. The traditions around here are wearing green, eating and drinking green things, and getting really drunk."

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"... Ah." Kanan squinted at his drink, and then shrugged his shoulders. "Well, I'm on my way there, then, at least."

And he wore green... basically all the time. It looked good on him, okay?

"What's up with the daylight savings thing, then? It isn't like the days actually get shorter or longer, here."

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"It's been around a century or so now," Peter said. "I think it's supposed to save energy, having people awake and doing things when it's more light out. It changes back in Fall."

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"Okaaaay." Kanan frowned a little. "Does an hour in either direction actually make all that much difference?"

Because it still sounded stupid to him.

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Peter laughed. "You're asking the wrong person. I have no idea."

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"I mean, I just came from a planet that never sees daylight," Kanan noted, smirking faintly. "And we keep Galactic time. Sure, you work shifts according to the time or the daylight hours depending on what they need, but going and changing it right across the map? That seems so ridiculous to me."

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"It's not everywhere," Peter said. "Some places don't observe it. And some do, but change on different days."

Earth really was odd in a few ways, he supposed.

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"... Your planet makes no sense."

Just in case Peter wasn't aware.

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"I'm pretty sure that no-one anywhere has ever claimed otherwise." Peter shrugged. "No-one sane, anyway."

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"Well, I never claimed to have known a sane person from here, either," Kanan pointed out, grinning faintly. "I'm not sure if Earth is crazy because of the people, the people are crazy because of Earth, or something somewhere in the middle, but it's got to be at least one of those."

And he'd come back. So.

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"Probably in the middle," Peter said. "We pretty much all grew up crazy together."

He eyed Kanan. "You can't tell me you've got a whole galaxy with no weird customs, though."

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"Oh, no, it's all weird," Kanan agreed easily. "But it's a weird I understand, and that makes all the difference. And if it's a weird I don't understand, then hey, it's a big galaxy. I probably just missed something somewhere, and the odds that I'll encounter it again are pretty slim anyway."

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"This is a big galaxy, too," Peter pointed out, grinning. "If you travel around, you won't see our weird again, either."

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"Big, but backrocket," Kanan snorted. "If there is other life out there, in this same galaxy, they clearly haven't gone out of their way to say hello. I mean, I could go looking, but where the hell would I re-fuel?"

But even that was weird, for the record. A whole galaxy with only one sentient species in it? Didn't seem possible.

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Excuse you, Kanan, but Peter wasn't human. Just because there was only one planet, didn't mean only one sentient species.

He shrugged. "You'd have to find a place. Maybe there are some. It's not like Earth's gotten very far out yet."

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... Eh, he started human, anyway.

"True enough," Kanan allowed, "but from the sound of it, nothing's gotten very far in, either. And even if I find a place with fuel, there's no guarantee it's compatible with Escape, either."

He wasn't going to go experimenting with his baby!

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"So you just have to put up with the weird around here, then," Peter said, grinning.

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"How often do you suppose the weird around here will involve free alcohol?"

Priorities.

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"You're always welcome to mine," Peter said with a shrug. "Not like it does anything for me, after all."

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"Hey, more for me?" Kanan grinned. "I can live with that. Just so long as you don't mind dealing with me when I'm acting like a drunken idiot."

In fairness, he often acted like a drunken idiot even while sober.

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"I reserve the right to dump you in the snow," Peter said, grinning.

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Kanan seriously contemplated that one for a moment.

"Still worth it," he decided. "I'm game."

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"There's green sludge in my sink and I need a damn drink," Kanan announced as he peered in the door. "The open door is promising, though. What's going on in here?"

Kanan really needed to get himself an Earth phone. Then he could just start off with 'what the hell is absinthe and how drunk will it get me?'

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"Drinking the stuff from the sink properly," John said, giving Kanan a salute. "Mine's pumping out absinthe, and sounds like Peter's got beer. What nonsense is pouring from your taps, then?"

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"Hell if I know, but I think it has milk in it," Kanan shared. "Yours sounds more fun. What's absinthe?"

Teach him the ways of the green fairies, John.

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"Milk?" John made a face. "Fuck, no, that just isn't right."

He gestured for Kanan to get his ass inside and sit down. "Absinthe is a very, very alcoholic beverage. She's a little green fairy with a hell of a kick, you can't drink her without diluting it a bit unless you want your brains on the floor of a morgue."

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"Try me," Kanan replied, smirking faintly. "I was drinking the ryncol straight when the island was going for its wander."

Because Kanan was an idiot. He'd vomited a lot of purple during that little romp across the multiverse.

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"You can keep with the macho bullshit, or you can actually enjoy her, but you don't get both," John said cheerfully, getting up to grab Kanan a glass and heading to the kitchen to pour a quarter into it. "You can't treat a lady like that, you know. She's better with a little sugar."

JOHN. NO.

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Well, that seemed to amuse Kanan, at least. He gave his shoulders an easy shrug to go with his little snort of amusement.

"I'll drink her however you're drinking her," he decided. "I'll defer to the professional, at least to start."

There was something in there about how he liked them sweet, wet, and green, but he decided to behave himself at least until he was a little more drunk.

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"She's a fancy one, but worth the wait," he promised, giving Kanan a wink as he wandered back over and set the glass in front of him before putting the spoon and sugar-cube on top.

"Now, we can do this one of two ways. The classic, which gives more flavor, or with fire, which just looks cool."

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Kanan rolled his eyes a little and grinned as he followed along.

"Let's go with the flavor, then. Fire's great if you need to cook something, but I'm just looking for a drink, here."

Or many. Probably many drinks.

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"Give her a second, then," he said, grabbing some bottled water and pouring it over the sugar cube as slowly as he could manage. "I don't have any of the fancy shite, but I can get her drinkable."

A moment later and he was handing it over to Kanan after the last of the sugar had melted away. "There you go. Give her a stir, and try not to slam her like some frat boy at prom."

GODSDAMMIT JOHN

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"I understood roughly half of that," Kanan laughed, shaking his head and reaching for the drink. He gave it a stir, just like John had instructed, and then... miraculously, he actually paced himself on that first sip.

Look, he drank like a fish, but he also enjoyed new experiences and just... enjoying things. He could behave himself with his first absinthe experience, too.

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"Most people only understand a third of what comes out of my mouth, so you're fine," John laughed, reaching for his own drink. "Absinthe is considered a rather decadent, salacious drink. Historically, that is. Tales of hallucinations and depraved artists and that sort of thing."

He grinned. "Hence why I like it so much."

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"I don't think even hallucinations could make me all that artistic," Kanan snorted.

Really, he had experience enough with Force visions. He probably didn't need absinthe's help, there. That wasn't stopping him from drinking it.

"Enough to get a person drunk, though? That's good enough for me."

Kanan really had simple needs.

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"It'll get you drunk. And if we decide you still need help after a few of these, we've got Peter's beer."

John, no, you'll make the poor boy sick.

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As if that was the worst that could possibly happen, here. Kanan had plenty of experience with time spent face-down on cantina floors, after all.

"Sounds like a plan," he laughed, grinning and raising the rest of his drink toward John in a kind of toast-shaped salute. "Hey, I was looking for something to do tonight. This works out nicely."

Kanan, you moron.

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There was a knock on Constantine's open door and a blonde with a pixie cut stick her head inside. "Excuse me?"

Verity's taps were running green and smelling like gin of all things, and she hadn't been on the island anywhere near long enough to figure out the connection.

"I was wondering if there was something wrong with your pipes, too?"

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"Nah, there's something right with 'em for once," John laughed. "Absinthe, of all things, which is far better than the eggnog incident. Though with it being Saint Pat's, you'd think I'd have beer like Peter over there. Come on in and pull one up, love."

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"Eggnog incident?" Verity asked, though she did accept the invitation to come inside. "Wait, are you saying your pipes are filled with absinthe?"

Which made the 'eggnog incident' even worse to contemplate. It was bad enough she smelled like a gin distillery mixed with lime. The idea of smelling like eggnog was a hundred times worse.

"...How the hell did that much absinthe get into the plumbing?"

Poor, precious lamb. So new!

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"It's green, it's Saint Pat's, and the island has decided to try and be funny again. This time, it actually succeeded," he said dryly. "Not bad, for a sentient bit of rock."

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"...Please explain the part about the island trying to be funny," Verity said, blinking several times as her brain segfaulted. "Sentient rock?"

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"Fandom is, in and of itself, a sentient nexus of realities. Sometimes it gets bored, once it had a baby, and it tries desperately to understand 'humor' but tends to fall flat," he said with a shrug. "How? No fucking clue. How does my library manage to have every book ever written? Or have its own pocket universe for Special Collections? It just does."

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"So I got the speech about it being a reality nexus," Verity said, "but I missed the--did you say every book ever written?"

Oh lord, you were in for it now, Constantine. That? That was the look of a woman who'd just been offered the location of the holy grail.

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"As far as I can tell. One of the reasons they hired a mage-- someone has to know if the magic theory holds up, or if it's a bit of fiction that tried sneaking over to pretend to be one of the big kids." He gave a long-suffering sigh. "The books tend to be sentient, too. Or at least animated inside the bounds of the library. 'Genre War' isn't just a way of talking about the NYT's Best Seller list."

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"Magic?" Verity groaned and covered her face. "Oh god. My grandma's gonna get wind of this place and then you'll have a problem."

What was Constantine's opinion on grenades in the library? Just asking. For reasons.

"A mage, you said? Like, not a routewitch or someone with a penchant for accidentally setting things on fire or whatever, but an actual, like, wielder of the arcane arts or whatever?"

If he was a snake cultist, Verity was burning this place around her ears.

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"Only thing I light on fire are my smokes, and I tend to use my lighter," he said, giving her a weird look. "Unless it's for effect, then I'm not above a finger-snap."

"Magus. Mage. Bastard. Humanist. Whichever descriptor floats your boat, though 'librarian' is what they pay me for."

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"Verity, cryptozoologist and semi-professional tango dancer," Verity said, used to the weird looks. Magic and her family didn't always play well together. Look at what had happened to Grandpa Thomas. "Neither of which pay me at all."

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"Lucky for you there's this thing called a school right up the hill," John said dryly. "Come summer-time, they even make me teach sometimes. If I can teach the art of the con, I'm pretty sure they'd let an actual cryptozoologist in there."

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"They're not going to let me teach," Verity sputtered. "I just graduated college myself less than a year ago!"

She really had no idea how this island worked, poor lamb.

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"I dropped out of high school and graduated from the school of 'didn't get myself killed fucking with magic,' what's your point?" he laughed. "Hell, you might be the only college graduate in the room."

Was there college in space? Fuck if he knew.

"Fandom tends to value practical experience over a paper degree. In fact, I'd bet good money that most the staff doesn't have any official diplomas, except Jon's husband. He went and shacked himself up with a doctor."

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Yeah, Verity was coming to question all sorts of things about the island today. Like who was in charge of the hiring practices here.

"I, uh, haven't met Jon," she said. "Or any doctors. I guess they're not ones for stopping by bars?"

She really needed to get out to more places than just work, clearly.

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"But there is something wrong with mine," Kanan offered up. "They seem to be running sludge."

He really should have sampled it, though. Shamrock shakes were awesome.

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That was lying propaganda and Kanan had made the right choice!

"That's one way to make me feel better about my gin-and-lime-juice shower," Verity said, sitting down with a drink in hand. "On the plus side, that's a hell of a cocktail to wake up to. I guess I should just be glad I didn't try to take a bath."

A sip of her drink and then she was offering her hand. "Hi, I'm Verity. I'm new, as everyone keeps pointing out."

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Kanan grinned and reached over for the handshake.

"And I'm Kanan. I wasn't going to ask if you were new, but yeah, I haven't seen you around."

Which could just as easily have been a testimony to how often he didn't get out, these days. Clearly he needed to start doing more of his drinking in bars.

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But drinking at a bar cost money! Drinking at home (or in Constantine's house) was free!

"It's okay, pretty much everyone does," Verity asked. "I moved here about a month or so. Thought I was settling in okay, but this was pretty unexpected."

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True enough! And Kanan preferred to drink other people's alcohol over his own whenever he could help it.

"That's this place all over," he chuckled, shaking his head and lifting his glass. "Pretty unexpected. What brings you here, Verity?"

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Verity's instincts were to lie, but there was a green woman hanging out here with no one seeming the warier and alcohol was coming out of the taps. If this place wasn't safe to be open about cryptozoology, nowhere was.

"My job," she admitted. "I'm a cryptozoologist and my family heard about the teal dear and the alots on the island. I'm here learning more about those species and keeping an eye on the cryptids in Baltimore for the next year."

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"I have no idea what half of that means," Kanan shared, leaning forward and smiling apologetically. "You're here to study the local wildlife?"

He paused, and then decided to clarify, "I'm not exactly from around here. If there's something special about the deer and the alots, I really wouldn't know."

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Uh-oh, Kanan. You'd released the nerd.

"They're both species that are unknown to most human scientists," Verity explained, animated with enthusiasm. "The specific coloration of the deer--and at least some of their behaviors--set them apart from their various cousin and I haven't even figured out what phyla they belong to, never mind narrowed it down further."

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"I mean, I'd guess they'd be animals," Kanan noted, raising an eyebrow and shrugging. "Hell, I'd even go out on a limb and narrow them down to mammals, unless they're some kind of reptile species and an example of convergent evolution. We see that sort of thing all the time where I'm from, though I'm not exactly a zoologist, and anything that comes out of my mouth at this point is speculation. Well on the way to being drunken speculation, at that."

Look, he wasn't an animal nerd, exactly, but his lessons as a kid had included all kinds of fun tidbits, like basic biological science. It helped for things like, oh, occasionally communicating with them.

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"I would agree with you on most of those, except I have seen an alot that seemed to be sentient fire, an alot of made of what I think were dishtowels, and an alot of bugs." Verity shook her head. "I can't make proper sense of what the classification should be when they don't even obey the normal rules of what's possible. Not to mention that when it comes to cryptids, even rules like 'what makes a mammal' and 'what makes a reptile' get fluid?"

And people thought the platypus was weird.

"Where's 'not from around here'?" she added, taking another long sip of her drink. "Not a lot of people can bring up the concept of 'convergent evolution' in casual conversation."

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"Not from around here is not exactly this planet. Or star system. Or galaxy," Kanan replied, shrugging. "Even if I didn't already know about that sort of thing when I left home, the fact that there are humans here, too, kind of threw me for a loop. Never mind that we all speak the same language and for some reason I'll never figure out, your planet has some of the same produce as we do, too."

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"We have what?" Verity asked. "Look there's convergent evolution and then there's that."

This made no sense on any scientific level. Verity was going to finish her drink just to stop thinking about it.

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"You have potatoes," Kanan shared. "Why the hell does Earth have potatoes? I don't even know. But here we are, on Earth, and you have potatoes."

And humans, but Kanan was well on his way to drunk, as he'd said, and even while sober he had to harp on the potato thing whenever possible.

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"You don't have bananas, right?" THIS WAS VERY IMPORTANT TO VERITY. Especially since she was also now on her way to being tipsy. Look, she was pretty tiny and absinthe didn't mess around. "Not the kind of bananas that you buy in an Earth grocery store."

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"Yellow-green? Crescent-shaped?" Kanan shrugged. "We've got something close, anyway. Uses the same name and everything. But then you guys go and do something ridiculous like have furry dogs, and Earth goes right back to making no karking sense."

He had one such furry dog. It... wasn't really a typical Earth furry dog anyway.

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"Except our bananas are the result of generations of selective breeding, so even if you were going to have something like a banana, it shouldn't be the monoculture that is the modern Cavendish."

Still not the weirdest conversation she'd ever had, but up there.

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"And this," Kanan shared, "is where you start to lose me. I know you don't have meilooruns or jogan fruit here, but the finer points in the differences between your bananas and ours are lost on me."

A pause.

"Ours taste better."

Not that he was at all biased.

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"Yours probably haven't been inbred to hell and back, either," Verity said. Sorry, Kanan, no argument here. "But you're ignoring the most important thing. Is the alcohol similar?"

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"Rum, whiskey, wine, beer," Kanan recited, ticking them off on his fingers. "Stop me if I name anything you aren't familiar with, here. Brandy, ale, cognac, wine..."

So, basically.

"The basic ingredients are probably different," he added, "but for the most part, absinthe is one of the first drinks around here I've never heard of before."

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"That is so weird," Verity said with the solemnity of someone well past sober. "Like, cognac is named after the town in France it was invented in. Do you have a town called Cognac somewhere? Do you have a France?"

Edited Date: 2017-03-19 01:52 am (UTC)

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"We... do not have a France," Kanan shared. "We have accents that sound French. And British. And, I mean, I'm sure people around here would tell me that I sound American. But," Kanan waved his drink around vaguely. "No France. No America. Well. Maybe there is. It's a whole galaxy of inhabited planets, there's bound to be something..."

He was thinking about this too hard.

"Now next time I go back there I'm going to have to ask around and see if anybody knows about France."

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"No France, but you have a cognac," Verity mumbled into her drink, shaking her head. "That's--this place is weird. And I know weird! I'm from weird! But this place is extra weird."

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"This place is extra weird," Kanan agreed cheerfully. "There's something we can both agree on, right there."

Not that that had stopped him from coming back here after that whole thing on Gorse. But he was going to maintain that he'd come back entirely because he needed to get his dog.

Yeah.

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Verity hadn't gone away yet, but she had a year-long agreement keeping her here, in case she needed a handy 'how the hell do I justify my life choices' excuse when she did.

"When a cryptozoologist and a spaceman agree a place is weird, then there's just no hope for it," she declared, getting herself another tall glass of absinthe.

Because that was exactly what she needed, yes.

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Kanan contemplated pointing out that he wasn't technically a spaceman. He was a man who happened to own a spaceship who occasionally spent a lot of time in space, but that was, like, commuting. Except for when it was his job. Which it often was...

By the time he'd circled around that far, he'd forgotten what it is he was going to protest, so he just shrugged, raised his glass, and said, "I'll drink to that."

To whatever it was. Good job, Kanan.

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"Everybody's seem to have something different," Hera said. "What's in yours?" Then, realizing this was a strange face, "Hi, I'm Hera. Do you live in the building, too?"

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For a moment, all Verity saw were Hera's lekku and hastily averted her eyes, thinking the other woman was a Gorgos medusa, or, more colloquially, a greater gorgon. Verity had never met a greater gorgon before, but that was in no small part deliberate on both sides. Most greater gorgons avoided humans out of fear of another attempt at extermination and Verity didn't want to chance being turned to stone with a glance.

"Hi," she said, a little awkwardly, carefully not making eye contact. "No, I live in the other apartment building in town, but I didn't know what apartments were inhabited and didn't feel like knocking on a bunch of empty doors, you know?"

And it was about then that Verity realized Hera's...hair-tentacles?...were not actually snakes at all. And if they weren't snakes, then it meant Hera was not a gorgon and--okay, now Verity was making eye contact and offering more than just a polite smile. "Hi," she said again. "I'm Verity and the pleasure is mine."

Much easier to be personable when the other person wasn't a giant snake-woman ability--and possibly the inclination--to petrify you!

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Well, that was a weird greeting. Hera wasn't really sure if it was good or bad.

"Nice to meet you. You don't see a lot of twi'leks, then?"

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"I believe you're my first!" Verity said cheerfully. "I thought you were a greater gorgon for a moment because of your...uhh...cranial appendages?" Hopefully that was a non-offensive way of saying 'head tentacles'. "And to make eye-contact with a greater gorgon if neither of you are taking precautions leads to a very painful death, so I was being cautious."

It wasn't like cockatrice and basilisk petrifaction that was reversible if treated in time. While it was possible there was a cure for greater gorgon petrification, Verity hadn't heard about it.

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Hera blinked. "Huh. I don't know that species. The only thing too much eye contact does with twi'leks is get awkward, just like humans. And they're lekku," she said, gesturing at them. "I keep forgetting twi'lek aren't usual on this planet."

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"Not at all," Verity said, noting the word lekku. Her fingers itched for a pen and paper so she could ask Hera all about twi'leks, both biologically and culturally, but she refrained. Because she was a grown adult who knew how to carry on a polite conversation, even with a species she'd never encountered before.

Which brought the total up to five or so since she arrived.

"I also just learned that Kanan isn't from this planet, either," she said, nodding in his direction. "Have you had a chance to talk with him yet?"

She wasn't going to assume the aliens knew one another just because they were aliens.

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Well, it would be better than refusing to look at her, anyway, though Hera wasn't exactly a biologist.

And that assumption was probably a good thing, but in this case... Hera glanced over at Kanan - who seemed determined to get cheerfully drunk - and rolled her eyes at him. "I came here with him, actually. Or technically he came with me. He lived here first, I flew us back," she explained.

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Even so, she probably knew a lot more about how she and the rest of her people worked than Verity did!

"Are you new, too?" she asked. "I've been here a over a month and people are still commenting on that."

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"I've been here about that long myself," Hera said. "But mostly people just keep commenting on my not being human." She sighed. "Next time we head home, I'm taking Kanan to Ryloth for a month in revenge. See how he likes being the only human surrounded by twi'lek."

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"I do apologize for assuming you were a gorgon," Verity said. "If it helps any, a major aspect of my, well, job is basically being a kind of ambassador to sapient non-humans."

In a very secret, 'let's not let the other humans know you exist' kind of way.

"I promise not to spend a great deal of time pointing out how human you're not in future conversations."

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Hera shrugged. "At least you had a reason. And you know about other species. It seems like a lot of people here just haven't ever seen anyone but humans. I'm used to living in a mix of species and just being normal; it's really strange."

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Verity nodded. "In my, uhh, version of reality, I guess, we spend a great deal of time keeping other humans ignorant of most species, both sapient and non. But that's because humanity's response to something new is either 'poke it with a stick for science' or 'kill it with fire.' And since most other species aren't real fond of either option, it's better for everyone if most humans stay ignorant of what's really out there."

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Hera would've liked to say that wasn't true in her galaxy, but after seeing how the Empire handled aliens, she couldn't anymore.

"That seems sad," she offered instead. "Most of my best friends have been non-twi'lek; I can't imagine never knowing they existed."

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"Sad for humans, sure, but the alternative is usually lethal for the cryptids involved, so..." Verity spread her hands. "My life would be emptier without them, but most people don't know what they're missing."

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"Doesn't make it any less sad," Hera said, shrugging.

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Hera followed Kanan down, then turned around and went back up for a glass pulled from their pipes. She came in holding it out. "Is this absinthe? Or can you tell me what it is?"

They didn't have shamrock shakes in her galaxy.

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"Not absinthe, I can tell you that," he said, squinting at it. "Give it here, love, I'll give her a go and see if I can figure it out."

Oh, woe, the the risks he took for pretty ladies.

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"Thanks." Hera handed it to him. "Does this sort of thing usually last very long? We'll need water sooner or later."

They couldn't all go to the mainland, and she was not sleeping next to Kanan if he tried bathing in this stuff.

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"Eh, I stocked up on some of the bottled stuff on a run to the mainland this morning. There's a ton in the fridge, help yourself if you need to take some back with you later," he said with a shrug. Fuck if he knew how often other species needed to hydrate, and far be it for him to deny a pretty girl what she wanted.

He took a sip of her glass, then broke out in a grin. "'S a milkshake. They're... like ice cream drinks. So long as you're not lactose intolerant, they're safe to drink."

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"Thanks," Hera said. "I may take you up on that."

She eyed the glass quizzically. "But your milk here is white; is this just colored green, or what else is in it?"

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"Food coloring, sugar, whipped cream, little bit of mint or vanilla or both, and that's really about it," he said, offering it back to her. "Call 'em 'Shamrock Shakes' around this time of year, they're popular for the holiday."

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"Holiday?"

They didn't have Saint Patrick in Hera's galaxy, either.

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"Supposedly some saint of one of the major religions drove all the snakes out of a country, so they gave him his own holiday after he died. Started out as a religious feast day to try and seduce the locals into the religion, now the Americans have turned it into an excuse to wear green and get wasted and it doesn't actually have anything to do with anything."

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"Oh." Hera thought about it and shrugged, grinning. "Well, Kanan's well on his way to drunk, and I think I've got the green handled."

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"And the loveliest shade of green in the room, no doubt," he said, giving her a little half-bow. "Don't worry, I won't make you drag him back up the stairs if he passes out, that's what my couch is for."

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