The Pickle Hut, Los Angeles, Thursday Afternoon

[spin_kick_snap]

The Pickle Hut was quietly popular; it had a normal crowd and a decent-sized rush around lunch and dinner, but there were definitely parts of the day that diners could head in and have the restaurant to themselves. Nick, having grown up not far away, could practically set his watch by those times. They were his preferred times to eat there, since he was getting to be a well-known agent for a very known firm. And in LA, where an agent went, the paparazzi had learned that stars often followed after. So days when Nick wanted to lunch in relative peace, he headed down to The Pickle Hut during one of those empty time slots and enjoyed the peace and quiet.

Those dead times also came in handy when you were a superhero meeting up with other superheroes to discuss a zombie invasion over delicious burgers and brined foods. It was pretty inevitable that they'd all find themselves here; Nick had introduced Kathy to it a year ago and sometimes their schedules overlapped enough that they'd end up catching a meal together. So when Max had started complaining about needing to eat, they'd both suggested The Pickle Hut in unison. It was close, cheap, and filling; Mona was content to leave them alone to talk with only the occasional interruption for refills; and they had the chance to eat truly addictive pickles and talk about hordes of the undead without being overheard.

The Mighty Dragon (who just as often went by George) and Stealth (who remained Stealth and had yet to be seen unmasked), had elected to stay and talk strategy. Zzzap had flown back to Boston or wherever, and the rest of the heroes were still at their day jobs. That left Kathy, Max, Nick, and Josh to head to the diner and continue to go over the information they'd gathered during the last few days--while enjoying amazing burgers, giant milkshakes, and random pickled sides--including authentic kimchi which delighted Kathy to no end.

[For the two aggravated ones, please! Link to Dante at the club]

Comments

Re: The Portalocity Station

[rebelseekspizza]

"I wasn't losing," Dante said immediately, pointing a warning finger at him. "I was definitely on top there."

He was not.

Re: The Portalocity Station

[not_every_mage]

Anders patted Dante on the shoulder in condescending comfort.

"Whatever you need to believe."

Re: The Portalocity Station

[rebelseekspizza]

"And I definitely had a head-up on you on I Spy," said Dante, giving him a (gentle, for his standards) shove back in retaliation for that pat. "And-- you know what, I never wanna play a stupid travel game again in my life."

Re: The Portalocity Station

[not_every_mage]

"I still say you cheated at I Spy," Anders said. (Not that he knew how cheating at I Spy was even possible.) "But me either. I swear, that was the longest day of my entire life."

Re: The Portalocity Station

[rebelseekspizza]

"Why does Portalocity even have layovers?" Dante asked. "I mean, portals - you'd think that's like, snap and you're there, right?"

God, he needed food, too. In fact, he was heading for a vending machine real fucking quick.

Re: The Portalocity Station

[not_every_mage]

"I have no idea," Anders admitted, following Dante to the vending machine. The food in the world they'd wasted the last day in hadn't exactly been appetizing. "Don't ask me how it works. I'm still not convinced light bulbs aren't magic."

Re: The Portalocity Station

[rebelseekspizza]

"It's just electricity, how--"

Dante paused in front of the vending machine and wriggled his fingers. "...Right, you do that magic," he said. He cast a look at Anders over his shoulder. "You guys never like, capture that spark magic in a bulb or something?"

Re: The Portalocity Station

[not_every_mage]

Anders shook his head. "A mage would need to stay near the bulb and keep lighting it back up," he said. "There are better ways to spend our time."

Re: The Portalocity Station

[rebelseekspizza]

"Ever tried filling up a battery?" Dante asked, rooting around his pocket for some change. "You want something?"

Re: The Portalocity Station

[not_every_mage]

"Here or at home?" Anders asked. "Here, yes. Nice trick in a pinch. We don't have batteries at home."

A beat as he leaned forward to see the vending machine's offerings. "Maybe. Do they have sour cream and onion chips?"

Re: The Portalocity Station

[rebelseekspizza]

"I know some people make batteries out of potatoes," Dante said, shrugging lightly.

Look, he wasn't a scientist or anything. Anders, with all of his magical education, seemed like he knew way more about stuff in general than he did.

He poked the plastic of the machine. "Yeah, looks like it," he said, shoving some coins into the machine and punching in the code.

Re: The Portalocity Station

[not_every_mage]

"That," Anders said, "sounds like a waste of a good potato."

Anders knew a lot about schools of magic. Not so much about technology.

"And thanks," he added, with a tired smile. "I'll pay you back."

Re: The Portalocity Station

[rebelseekspizza]

"No problem," Dante said, flashing him a quick, tired smile of his own. The bag of chips dropped down the machine, and he picked it up and practically shoved it at Anders.

"Now we gotta figure out where she went. Koreatown, probably."

Re: The Portalocity Station

[not_every_mage]

Anders took the chips, opened them, and popped a few into his mouth before offering the bag to Dante.

"It's a place to start," Anders agreed. "Maybe start with the restaurants."

Re: The Portalocity Station

[rebelseekspizza]

"She does get hungry fast," Dante said, snagging a couple of chips out of the bag. "Thanks."

He banged out the code for a Snickers bar and put some more money in the machine. "She said she really dug this one place that does like, kimchi and pickles on burgers or something? Weird shit."

Re: The Portalocity Station

[not_every_mage]

"She said Pickle Hut on the phone with me yesterday," Anders remembered. "Do you think that's the same place?"

Re: The Portalocity Station

[rebelseekspizza]

"Sounds like it," Dante said.

The Snickers dropped down and hit the container below with a twunk. He bent over to snag it. "So I guess we'll hit that first, see if they know anything," he said, pointing at Anders with the candy as he talked.

Re: The Portalocity Station

[not_every_mage]

"And if they aren't there, we can get some real food," Anders said agreeably. "Perfect plan. Do you know where it is?"

Re: The Portalocity Station

[rebelseekspizza]

"No, but I can find out," Dante said, shoving the chips in his mouth so he could go rooting around his pocket for his phone. He was done eating by the time he got it out, too. "Shouldn't be hard."

He tapped a couple of buttons and called up Google.

"Seriously, though, you've never gone hunting after the potato trick?" he said conversationally, partly to fill up space while he ran searches and partly because he was actually curious. "I'd be messing around with weird magic shit all the time if I'd been in your place."

As opposed to channeling demonic or angelic energy into random things without realizing that was what he was doing, obviously.

Re: The Portalocity Station

[not_every_mage]

Anders shook his head. "I think it's cultural?" he mused. "We'll use our fire to get a campfire started, things like that, but we don't believe in doing magic just to do magic. I should ask Merrill about it sometime and see if elves are the same."

The last bit was mostly to himself.

Re: The Portalocity Station

[rebelseekspizza]

Dante shrugged. "It's just really cool," he said. "Your magic, I mean."

He squinted at his phone. "Think I got it."

Re: The Portalocity Station

[not_every_mage]

"Thanks," Anders said, and realized that he'd lost the rush of shame he used to feel in discussing his magic. It had been too long since anyone treated it as anything but a gift. "And let's go."

Re: The Portalocity Station

[rebelseekspizza]

Dante threw him a jaunty salute. "Go, we will," he said.

At least with an actual goal in front of them that they could actually pursue, he was getting some of his energy back.