Outside MHA #4; Late Thursday Night [11/18].

[somethingwithturquoise]

Well. So. That was...a whole thing.

Honestly, Summer was kind of disappointed. That didn't take nearly as long or as much effort as she thought it was going to, and while there was a certain cleverness to what ultimately brought down the New and So-Called "IMPROVED" Galactic Federation, it was all kind of an anticlimax, and then....that was it. Sure, once again, the planets under Federation control were being thrown into utter chaos, but that she was a little more willing to leave to her mom and her crew because she was honestly just a little bit over it and kind of just wanted to get back home again. She missed people. She missed Fandom. And, obviously, she was totally on call if anything started up again, which she was sure it was going to, but for now?

Home sweet home, baybeeeee!

She parked her spaceship in the junkyard, feeling glad her spot was still there but a little disappointed not to see any ships she didn't recognize, grabbed her bags, and headed back to MHA under the cover of darkness, Pancakes prancing along next to her. And it felt good to get back, with a little wistful grin at Caritas as she passed it by before slipping into MHA and heading on upstairs, down the hallway, to her apartment, slipping her key out of her pocket and ready to just get back in and revel in being home.

...only to have the key not fit into the lock.

"What the hell?" she murmured, frowning down at it as she tried again, and jiggled the handled. Pulled. To no avail.

"What the fuck?" she gave it another tug, another attempt to unlock it. "Did someone change the locks?"

Someone defintiely changed the locks.

"Great," she murmured. "Just fucking great. I swear to god, Jon, you asshole, if you rented my apartment out...I paid you six months rent in advance! In cold hard cash! So help me..."

She was already on her knees in front of the door, shaking her head as she dropped her bag and started digging around for some hairpins. "If I have to break into my own damn apartment, because someone fucking sublet it out, despite the rent being paid in full for six fucking months, I am going to choke a bitch. I will." Pancakes let out a protesting meow. "I'll fucking do it, just you wait.

"Wait," she then realized, blinking, pausing in her attempts to pick the lock and pulling out her phone. "Have I been gone for more than six months--no. Nope. Definitely not, okay, good, because I was going to be fucking pissed if I was gone for...I mean, I still am pissed," she resolutely returned to her work, "but not about that. At least I didn't just lose half a year, even if I guess I lost my apartment!"

Pancakes let out another meow, this one more impatient and upset, and Summer cooed at her with a small apologetic smile.

"Ohhhh, I know, baby," she said. "I wanna get home, too, but Mama's just got to break into her own damn apartment, apparently just reaaal fast and we'll be golden, okay?"

And as she got back to work, she shook her head. "I swear to god," she said again, "he better not have fucking rented out my apartment to someone else, or else this is about to get real fucking awkward!"

She was just glad that, with all her experience breaking into Rick's lab (and, hey, she even broke into Rosa's place that one time, too, and that was Rosa!), a lock like this should be easy-peasy.

And if not? Well, fuck, then, she could just portal in, dammit.

[[ OH HEY GUESS WHO DECIDED SHE WANTED TO COME BACK BECAUSE SOMEONE HAS BEEN TOO BUSY TO WRITE HER SOME CRAZY SPACE ADVENTURES and is insisting that, okay, other characters got to have their time to shine a little, we're OVER it. I was going to do this over the weekend, but, well, this happened and I couldn't refuse? Like, how could I not do this??? Anyway, oh, hey, yeah, the post is totally open ]]

Comments

[mother_love]

Billy had spent most of the day messing around at the shop... his shop (man that was still going to take some getting used to) and he had planned to spend most of the evening relaxing.

He had been getting ready to head out to the beach for an evening walk a couple smokes. But something made him pause outside. A voice. A rather annoyed voice, and one he didn't recognize. But granted, he had met only a handful of the other tenants so that didn't mean anything.

Opening the door, Billy stepped out into the hallway, only to be immediately met by the unusual sight of someone apparently trying to pick the lock of the apartment next-door.

"Can I help you?" he asked, giving the scene before him a well-deserved stare.

[somethingwithturquoise]

Oh, what? Like you'd never had to break into your own apartment before, Billy? Pfft.

Summer, at this point, was pretty honed in on the task, her concentration leaving her tongue poking out of her mouth a little as she just gave it oooone more jiggle, and... "Ha!" she declared triumphantly as she heard everything unlatch and tried the knob again, this time to have it turn and gave the door a little bit of a nudge forward.

Pancakes took the opportunity to rush immediately inside, meowing with irritation that it had taken as long as it did and ready to make sure all her favorite toys were still waiting for her.

Welp. Summer hoped, if her apartment had been rented out, they sure didn't mind random cats busting in in the middle of thing night!

Or random redheads, for that matter.

But with the success in front of her, she could only look over at the guy in the apartment next door with a triumphant grin. "Nah," she said, "thanks. I think I got it."

Also?

"You're new."

She didn't even think about that! There had to be at least a few new people since she left, right? She audibly gasped her excitement at her own narrative there. She loved newbies!

[mother_love]

Billy leaned against the wall out in the hallway and folded his arms across his chest, a slightly amused smirk spreading across his face. He had dealt with a fair number of true crooks and criminals over the years and he himself was mighty handy at opportunistic entry (breaking and entering Billy, it's called breaking and entering) so he could appreciate the skills.

"Breaking into apartments is a crime you know" he said simply giving a nod towards Summer and the door. She didnt look like the criminal type but still... best to make sure what was going on and all. Not that Billy really cared about someone else's apartment. But he did want to make sure his place was secure... not that there was a lot to steal really.

[somethingwithturquoise]

"Breaking into other people's apartment," Summer corrected, tucking the hairpins she'd used on the lock back into her ponytail before standing up, brushing her hands off a little as she considered Newbie over here and wondered if she should mention that she'd broken into his apartment before, too, back when Rosa lived there, how would that be for a first impression?, "maybe, but this one," she cocked her head toward the door, "is mine."

A beat, as she sucked in the sort of breath that made it seem like she was ready to go straight back downstairs and break into another apartment and commit a crime far worse than just a little harmless B&E.

"At least," she amended, "it should be, considering I fucking paid for it, and I didn't expect the locks to have changed while I was gone."

Because someone's email got hilariously sent through the spam filter.

And checking her mail was definitely a save-it-for-tomorrow thing.

[mother_love]

"Right" Billy said simply, still considering her for a moment.

"Well, Jon said he sent notices and the new keys are in the mail boxes downstairs. I guess..." Well yeah this was gonna be an obvious statement but he was already into it... "I guess you have been out of town for a bit?"

Seemed logical. Wasn't like there was a lot of insanity and oddness to explain absences. This place wasn't as strange and weird as some people were making out. Right?

[defenderofdesmoines]

Annie had been working in New York until late (it was probably shocking to no one that Vought was already pushing holiday stuff onto her and part of what had kept her late was a meeting with the stage manager at Radio City -- apparently Starlight went great with the Rockettes and Annie was just gonna have to spend the next couple weeks not having any kind a crisis of comparison, there) and thus was just letting herself into the building when she came upon Summer.

"Oh my God, Summer!" First, exclamations, joy, et cetera. "Oh -- oh, shit, they changed the locks. Do you need help?"

Help either in the form of Annie either hunting down the key or blasting the door open. Dealer's choice, really. She was just glad her bestie-slash-across-the-hall neighbor was here and holding her cat and looking very back.

[somethingwithturquoise]

Truth be told, Summer had yet to actually meet a lock that she couldn't handle (well, probably because she still hadn't tried breaking into Barry's lab yet, although she'd thought about doing it, just for shits and giggles), so she was not even worried about it, especially since she was not expecting to run into anyone tonight, much less superhero bestie, soooo....

"Why the fuck did they change the locks?" she asked, because greetings were for losers. "Is this some kind of weird new Fandom thing I totally missed out on?"

Ohgod, how many weird Fandom things had she missed out on? She was going to have so much to catch up on.

[defenderofdesmoines]

"No idea, we opted out," Annie replied, shrugging. "Because we just replaced it after I broke the door in August, anyway."

Hopefully there wasn't, like, an important impetus for this lock change that they'd just ignored. (Though, as always, Annie was pretty confident that anyone who broke into #2 over there deserved the blinding-slash-stabbing-slash-Lord-help-them-if-Five-was-over they got, anyway.)

"Are you, like, back?" she had to add. "Or is this, like, just a visit under cover of night?" Because Annie could be sneaky about this if needed, for sure.

[somethingwithturquoise]

There was a little sympathetic sort of what-can-you-do expression about breaking the door, like that was just a totally normal part of life (and really, where was the lie in that?), and nodded, before all pretense of caring about locks and doors were swept completely away by a big, unabashed grin, so big she had to bite her lower lip a little with a little eager bounce as she reported, "Back back! That's right, the New, Supposedly Improved Galactic Federation is nothing but space dust! Like, pro tip? If you're gonna reboot an evil galactic federation, don't get in bed with corporate sponsors. Like, I know it sounds appealing, like, match made in heaven, right, you scratch my evil back, I'll scratch yours, but, see, here's the thing: when all your weapons are branded to prove that nothing, not even space lasers, can destroy your jeans, some bitch is definitely gonna show up and open a portal to a dimension made entirely of Wranglers jeans and fuck your shit up."

Because, yup. That's how it went down. She just opened a portal to a denim dimension and that destroyed them utterly.

She...still wasn't sure if this was actually really awesome or the lamest thing ever, to be honest.

It definitely seemed to track with canon, though.

[defenderofdesmoines]

"...you defeated them with denim?" Annie wasn't sure why this was surprising to her, knowing all that she did about Summer's particularly weird world and the multiverse in general, but -- really?

From where she was sitting (over here as a reluctant semi-minion of corporate overlords and all), it sounded kind of awesome? In, sure, a slightly lame way, but -- way to hoist them with their own petard! (Whatever a petard was!)

"Is your mom good, still?"

[thatwaslucky]

There were certain things you got a sort of mental heads up when you had the Force, like when you could tell your friend was back on island.

So incoming text: Are you back?

[somethingwithturquoise]

Could the Force also pick up expressions like the teasingly coy, perfectly innocent one that Summer felt she had infused into her oh-so-ambigious-but-also-totally-obvious response back?

Maaaaaaayyyybeeeeeee.

[thatwaslucky]

For just a visit?

She was betting not, with the number of vowels in that response.

[somethingwithturquoise]

And there were more vowels incoming!

Noooooooope!

[thatwaslucky]

Yaaaaaay!

Are you home? Up for a visit?

[intheeyeofthebeholding]

Jon hadn't really been sleeping, which he considered a bonus when he knew that Summer was back and missing her new key.

He hastily retrieved it and hurried up to her apartment, only to find she'd broken in. He stared at it for a moment, unsure how to feel about that. The new locks were supposed to be safer, after all. But on the other hand, it was Summer, and at least she hadn't had to wait for him.

He held out the new key to her. "Erm. H-hello, Summer. Welcome back."

[somethingwithturquoise]

Safer. Oh, sweet summer...whatever the hell you actually were, Jon.

Summer blinked at Jon (she might wonder why everyone else seemed up so late at night, really, except for him, she was pretty sure he didn't actually even know what sleep was), looked a tthe key he was holding out toward her, looked toward the door she'd broken into, and then looked back.

"What," she pronounced. distinctly, "the. Hell, Jon."

[intheeyeofthebeholding]

"I, um. I caught one of the other residents changing a lock, and she...she implied they could be better, so I thought I would, uh...fix that. I did let everybody know. Or, um. I thought I did. And the key was, um. In the mail. But here. Sorry."

[somethingwithturquoise]

Summer took the key, letting it sit pointedly in her open palm for a moment as she looked at it a little longer, looked at Jon yet again, and then back at the lock.

"To be fair," she declared when she looked back, "I used to deal with locks that would kill me if I fucked them up, so don't feel too bad about it. And she's right, though. About the locks. I broke into that one," she pointed toward #3, "back in the day when Rosa used to live there. I....actually think that's why she moved out, but, I mean, have you seen her new place? It's sweet as hell, so, um," she scoffed, "you're welcome, Rosa?"

Pfft. So ungrateful.

[intheeyeofthebeholding]

Jon looked pained. "It sounds as if everybody makes a habit of breaking into other people's apartments."

[notagoose]

Had Goose taken to walking up and down the apartment building to try and fall asleep? Yes he had so he blinked as he saw Summer trying to get into her apartment.

“Summer?” he blinked, wondering if it was him being tired and imagining things, “oh Jon had the locks changed,” he decided to add, “I didn’t find out til after he changed them because I didn’t realise I had a mailbox,” because of course he didn’t.

[somethingwithturquoise]

"Why would you not...?" Summer started, blinking up (and up) at Goose for a moment, before shaking her head and remembering that, yeah, space stuff tended to be a little better about things like not filling your life with useless paper mail and whatever.

They just did it all digitially instead!

She sighed a little and took a break from the breaking in, but only because trying to talk to Goose while kneeling down in front of her lock was going to be pretty rough on her neck. Talking to Goose even when standing was a little rough in that regards, but at least he wasn't, you know, Sidon. Like, Summer wasn't even sure that guy could even fit in this hallway anymore.

"Hey, Goose. Are you....do you live on this floor?"

[notagoose]

“No I live upstairs, apartment 10,” he explained, “I haven’t slept since Monday, I was hoping it would gave been all out of my system by now,” he sighed, he was so very tired and he missed being able to sleep.

[somethingwithturquoise]

Congratulations, Goose. You had the girl who literally just came back from blowing up a space empire with denim squinting at you like you might be a little crazy.

"Why haven't you slept since Monday?" she asked. "Wait a second. How bad is that? What day is it?"

She checked her phone.

"Okay, wow," she declared and looked at him pointedly, "you need sleep."

[notagoose]

“Tell me about it,” Goose sighed, “unfortunately I have to wait for all the sugar and caffeine to leave my system,”

He paused, “I turned into a kid on the weekend, he really got into the sugar and caffeine, too much of it, it’s never been this long though,” he said in case Summer thought he’d randomly gone on a sugar bender one day.