Smithsonian Museum of Natural History, Sunday

[sharp_as_knives]

It was a lovely day out, and the ride to the national mall had been breezy and warm. Now, with their bikes parked nearby, Hannibal stowed his helmet in a locker and spent a few minutes setting his hair to order again. Not everybody preferred to rock the electrical socket look, Jono.

"Where shall we start? Fossils, gemstones, plants?"



[OOC: For the one mentioned! NFB due to distance, but if anyone else is at the museum or wants to call - why not?]

Comments

[furnaceface]

//I've got a bit of an affinity for fossils,// Jono admitted. //What came before is sort of a big deal in the Starsmore family.//

[sharp_as_knives]

"I would think you'd go out of your way to avoid them, then," Hannibal noted. "But fossils it is," he agreed. He headed for the main desk to pick up a map. "This way, it looks like."

[furnaceface]

//I don't hate every other Starsmore to have ever lived,// Jono offered, ambling along behind him. //I've got all the respect in th'world for my great granddad. Hell, if it wasn't for him, I wouldn't have known what I was in for with the whole... Akkaba thing.//

... Granted, he never would have had that stupid tattoo until that whole Akkaba thing, either. But that was mostly water under the bridge, anyway. Maybe he'd be more bitter about it if he'd kept that chest?

[sharp_as_knives]

"Tell me about him," Hannibal said. He strolled toward the plant fossils in the first room, glancing at the cards next to them. "Your great granddad, what was he like?"

[furnaceface]

//He was a brave man,// Jono offered, following along and perusing the displays. //An Inspector, actually, for the police. Had a hard time of it - Starsmore was always a lesser house within the clan and they mostly used him to cover up their - er - activities. Blood sacrifices, generally, charming lot that they were. Told me a bit about the opium habit he managed to kick right around the same time the clan disbanded for good, and threatened to light my bloody arse on fire if I developed a drug habit myself.//

A beat.

//Threw down against Dracula once, actually,// he noted, //though I don't doubt he embellished that story when he told it to me, I can't doubt he actually did so like I used to. Not considering the same bloody vampire came after me once, with a grudge against my family and a taste for Starsmore.//

[sharp_as_knives]

"Your Dracula sounds quite a bit nastier than the one on the island," Hannibal noted. He glanced at Jono as he stepped up to the same display, standing next to him. "Why did the clan disband?"

[furnaceface]

//... Vampires ate most of them.//

As good a reason as any, right there. Jono leaned forward, pretending to be very interested in a plaque he wasn't actually going to read all the way through as he spoke.

//Far as I'm aware, it was a bloody massacre. But Akkaba's got their claws dug in almost everywhere, London was just one corner of it all. They weren't as disbanded as Granddad had thought. They were just... elsewhere.//

[sharp_as_knives]

Hannibal squeezed Jono's shoulder in silent reassurance. "And now?"

[furnaceface]

//They're not here, and that's good enough for me,// Jono replied, leaning his way. //I'd have to be insane to go seeking them out. They're good at staying hidden until they want to be found, and the last time they wanted me to find them, I yelled in the face of their mad god and stormed out barefoot. So... you can imagine we don't have the greatest relationship.//

[sharp_as_knives]

"So long as they're content to leave you alone," Hannibal said. He smiled and rubbed Jono's back for a moment before turning to head to the next room. "What about your great granddad; is he still alive?"

[furnaceface]

Jono shook his head as they started on into a room with a few more fossils of the 'long-dead animals' persuasion.

//Nah, he died before I was even a teenager,// he replied. //Never did get to see me manifest those powers he was certain I'd end up with. Even when he did get to see me again, it was another one of those 'the dead are visiting' weekends, and it was a little too late for him to see me like this, taking after him so thoroughly.//

A beat.

//He was a firebreather,// he explained.

[sharp_as_knives]

Hannibal gave him a curious look. "What did he think of you then?"

[furnaceface]

//Mostly... he was just surprised that I was a grey face. Starsmores are never grey faces. It just... doesn't happen.//

The lesser houses rarely had enough of Apocalypse's blood in them for that particular mutation to manifest.

//He was still my Granddad, though. Wouldn't hear any of it when Karla's parents started questioning my worth at the head of Glacia's army, going into the war. Wasn't exactly thrilled that that was what I was going to do with my life, but that's more... concern for my well-being.//

[sharp_as_knives]

"It's good to know that you had at least one family member to look out for you," Hannibal said. He glanced at the nearest dinosaur before looking up at the vertical timeline of Earth's history. "It gives quite a sense of perspective, doesn't it?"

[furnaceface]

//It does,// Jono agreed, looking up at the timeline as well. //I heard somewhere that, if the entire history of the universe was condensed down to a calendar year, humans as a species would exist only within the very last few seconds of it all.//

Cosmos. He'd learned that by watching Cosmos.

//It's all so bloody fleeting before the next thing comes along. Most of humanity thinks of all dinosaurs as just... dinosaurs. But most of them existed tens of millions of years apart, as well. Tyrannosaurus would have had problems eating a stegosaurus beyond just the fact that it was well-armoured.//

Jono, your nerdy side was showing.

[sharp_as_knives]

Fortunately, Hannibal adored Jono's nerdy side.

"And when you consider the number of different worlds out there, now that we know we're not alone, and the size of the universe..." He shrugged. Some people might feel it made them small and insignificant; Hannibal wasn't some people. The sense of perspective was exhilarating.

[furnaceface]

//'We are made of star-stuff,'// Jono quoted, reaching for Hannibal's hand. If it made him feel small and insignificant, he'd long accepted it as a matter of course; these days, it simply helped him to feel less alone. //Hell, it's practically a miracle anybody exists at all.//

[sharp_as_knives]

"It is." Hannibal smiled and squeezed Jono's hand. "Life is a fragile and beautiful thing."

[furnaceface]

Jono nodded faintly, content to stand there and just sort of... bask in all of it. The Smithsonian was a beautiful museum; it was a wonder he'd never managed to find the time to visit it before.

//Here would be a wonderful place to bring the students for that class you suggested,// he offered, after a moment. //There's no shortage of inspiration in a place like this.//

[sharp_as_knives]

"It would be," Hannibal agreed. He shrugged and gestured around them. "We could have an entire class simply for visiting a different Smithsonian museum each week, if we wanted to. Although," he acknowledged wryly, "some of our students might be singularly unimpressed with the Air and Space museum, except as history."

[furnaceface]

//Some,// Jono allowed, //though with the assortment of students we get, there'll be a few who've never seen anything like it, either. Really, we could say that about practically any--//

Whud.

//--thing?//

What in the name of...

[sharp_as_knives]

Hannibal frowned and glanced around; there were a few other people - mostly families - in the exhibit, but nothing seemed particularly amiss.

"True," he answered Jono. "I imagine Cosette and Rapunzel would adore it." And possibly Elsa, but she would be much more sedate about it.

[furnaceface]

//Almost certainly,// Jono agreed, though his brow was furrowed now, and he was sort of... checking over his shoulder, trying to puzzle out what the hell was going on. //We can't win every week with everyone, but every museum should at least be a new experience for some--//

WHUMP!

//Okay, I'm not just losing my mind, here, am I? You hear this, too?//

[sharp_as_knives]

"While I make no judgement on the former, yes," Hannibal answered. Another glance around and... He frowned. "Is the stegosaurus moving?"

Dear lord, he'd tried so hard for a sedate world, too.

[furnaceface]

//It...// Jono squinted. //... Apparently is. It isn't animatronic, so far as I'm aware. Wasn't moving when we walked by it...//

WHUNK.

//Bloody hell.//

Yes, Jono was grudgingly letting go of Hannibal's hand in order to head over and investigate. He... sort of wished he hadn't, once he got over there. A little boy in a bright orange shirt had weaseled his way over the barrier, and was trying to goad the stegosaurus skeleton into... coming to life and taking a swing at him or something. Made doubly absurd by the fact that there was a fully fleshed-out sculpture right across the hall from it, but there was a small crowd of people looking at that one, so presumably the child hadn't been able to get through.

"Come on! You aren't even moving! Come on and eat me!"

Jono winced as the dinosaur took another punch to the ribs.

//Bloody hell, 'es an herbivore. He wouldn't try to eat you even if he wasn't 150-million years dead!//

Where the hell were this kid's parents??