Nova Prime / Rich Rider (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
iamresponding) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
legionworld2016-01-02 08:59 pm
iamresponding) wrote in legionworld2016-01-02 08:59 pm
Entry tags:
Imagine There's No Heaven
Who| Rich Rider and YOU
What| Laying face down in the grass in Central Park like a goon
Where| Central Park in the Habitat area of the ship
When| Same day he woke up, natch
Warnings/Notes| Nothing really.
Rich hated being told to slow down. There was a part of him that was screaming at him to be on the move. After all, there had to be 8X8 planetary distress calls to answer; this universe was supposedly as much of a mess as his was.
But the medicos here refused to budge on the "you need rest and time to adjust, especially since you need to adjust to the prosthetic arm" thing so here he was resting and trying to adjust. Kind of. If tooling around the whole ship without stopping was the same as resting and adjusting. Because he couldn't seem to stand still.
Admittedly, even just walking was hard. The Nova Force was still there -- he could feel it -- but it was definitely diminished somehow and that meant his invulnerability and superstrength were gone. Without that pinpoint precision and body awareness it gave him at full capacity, his extremities were a little numb and he was clumsy as anything, just like he was the last time he'd lost the Nova Force.
So after a whole day of pacing around the ship from place to place -- and constantly tripping over his own feet as he did it -- he walked through Central Park (Central Park! Made just for him, reconstructed out of old historical records!) and tripped one last time over his own feet, practically falling on his face in the middle of Strawberry Fields, not far from the "Imagine" John Lennon memorial.
Then he just...stopped. Finally. Because he was alive and he felt grass on his face. How long had it been since he actually felt grass? So he kicked off his boots and socks, too, digging his toes into it.
He'd almost forgotten what grass felt like, but it was itchy and smelled green and earthy and non-sterile in the way everything in space didn't. And as itchy as it was, it was...nice.
Apparently, the Human Rocket could slow down for at least a little while. How 'bout that?
Since he was focusing a bit more on the grass and the light artificial breeze, and his own breathing (he was alive, he was breathing) he wasn't focusing on how it looked to be a grown man face down in the middle of a field.
Truth be told, it looked pretty ridiculous.
What| Laying face down in the grass in Central Park like a goon
Where| Central Park in the Habitat area of the ship
When| Same day he woke up, natch
Warnings/Notes| Nothing really.
Rich hated being told to slow down. There was a part of him that was screaming at him to be on the move. After all, there had to be 8X8 planetary distress calls to answer; this universe was supposedly as much of a mess as his was.
But the medicos here refused to budge on the "you need rest and time to adjust, especially since you need to adjust to the prosthetic arm" thing so here he was resting and trying to adjust. Kind of. If tooling around the whole ship without stopping was the same as resting and adjusting. Because he couldn't seem to stand still.
Admittedly, even just walking was hard. The Nova Force was still there -- he could feel it -- but it was definitely diminished somehow and that meant his invulnerability and superstrength were gone. Without that pinpoint precision and body awareness it gave him at full capacity, his extremities were a little numb and he was clumsy as anything, just like he was the last time he'd lost the Nova Force.
So after a whole day of pacing around the ship from place to place -- and constantly tripping over his own feet as he did it -- he walked through Central Park (Central Park! Made just for him, reconstructed out of old historical records!) and tripped one last time over his own feet, practically falling on his face in the middle of Strawberry Fields, not far from the "Imagine" John Lennon memorial.
Then he just...stopped. Finally. Because he was alive and he felt grass on his face. How long had it been since he actually felt grass? So he kicked off his boots and socks, too, digging his toes into it.
He'd almost forgotten what grass felt like, but it was itchy and smelled green and earthy and non-sterile in the way everything in space didn't. And as itchy as it was, it was...nice.
Apparently, the Human Rocket could slow down for at least a little while. How 'bout that?
Since he was focusing a bit more on the grass and the light artificial breeze, and his own breathing (he was alive, he was breathing) he wasn't focusing on how it looked to be a grown man face down in the middle of a field.
Truth be told, it looked pretty ridiculous.
no subject
If nothing else, the man-made object (Or in this case Athramite-made, built to replace the original leather one) should show that he was fairly well acclimated to people.
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Clearly, this was an intelligent dragon. Maybe an intelligent teenage dragon, judging from the eye-rolling. He finally lowered his hand and craned his neck as he sat there, eyeing the saddle and tail rig.
"Very impressive," he said. "Y'know, on account of the fact that must've been hard to make when you don't have opposable thumbs."
Rich knew the dragon probably didn't make that. He knew they were showing it off to show they were used to humans and probably had a rider. But he was just messing with the dragon at this point.
Which was perhaps not a wise move, 'cause it was a dragon, but he doubted they would've been free to run around the joint if they were going to fry everyone that annoyed them. Still, maybe he should be more careful, especially with his invulnerability gone...
"I'm just messing with you." A pause. "Which I probably shouldn't be doing. My world has a saying, 'Never laugh at live dragons.'"
Well. It wasn't so much a saying as a nerd reference he still remembered from reading The Hobbit in his very introverted and misspent youth, but he figured it still counted. He always played it fast and loose with telling people in space about Earth sayings. For instance, most of the Kree he knew now thought "Fear is the mind-killer. Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration," was an ancient Earth proverb, thanks to him.
"So, uh. Sorry. You're trying to say you're used to being around people, right? You have a rider? A partner?"
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And so Toothless roared, to get Hiccup's attention. That fact that it could make anybody unprepared jump was just a fringe benefit.
A tall, gangly man arrived in short order. "So this is where you wandered off to."
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There were certain distinct noises like the "WHUMP" of a shield generator failing, that when he heard something like it, his first instinct was to dive to the ground in a defensive position and get ready to blast anything nearby, because his brain was expecting a perimeter breach.
Rich never really put much thought to how messed up it was that his brain was still wired like that.
A kid came walking his way in response to the roar (he didn't look that much younger but anyone younger than him was a kid) and he realized he must be the dragon's rider.
"And you must be the guy lucky enough to be livin' out a Pern novel."
Fantasy wasn't really his forte -- he'd always been far more into sci fi growing up -- but any sci fi nerd usually wound up with some kind of working knowledge of fantasy, too. That was the nature of being a geek. And maybe it'd been years since Rich had been one but it wasn't so long that the concept of riding dragons had lost its cool factor.
He stood up now, barefoot in the grass, and started to take a closer look at Toothless.
"He understands everything we're saying, don't he. He actually rolled his eyes at me." A pause. "Or she. Kinda hard to tell."
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"Oh, he does. Sometimes he'll pretend he doesn't just to get a rise out of people, but he definitely does," he said, scratching at the dragon in question's neck. Toothless almost purred at the attention.
"I"m Hiccup by the way. And this is Toothless."
no subject
"Hiccup? Like...the bodily function, that kind of hiccup." He paused. "Then again, I probably shouldn't be surprised. People go by some pretty funny names back where I come from."
Like, who the hell called themselves Batroc the Leaper? Come on.
"Like I go by Nova. Name's Rich Rider. You can call me either."
He held out his hand to shake Hiccup's.
no subject
"It's Viking tradition. Unless you're as terrifying from birth as my girlfriend Astrid is, you get saddled with some sort of gross, disturbing, or otherwise terrible name in order to ward off gnomes and trolls. This, despite the fact that the only person who claims to have seen a gnome or a troll also claims to have met Thor, and Thor's good friend the magical, bipedal, hammerhead whale-riding hammerhead yak."
Parts of that story might have been true, but Hiccup flatly refused to believe the rest of it.
"As you can imagine, he's not always considered to be the most credible witness around."
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Wait. Rich suddenly broke off and his eyes popped open wide. Oh. Oh no, he mentioned Thor. How did he handle this?
"You, uh...you sure this person didn't actually meet Thor for real?"
Because...Thor was actually a pretty friendly guy, in that slightly bombastic warrior kind of way. (Hercules was that way, too). And it was entirely possible he existed in another world, and -- well.
This was awkward. Should he keep his mouth shut about knowing Thor in his world? If he said something, would it cause this kid to have some kind of crisis of faith? Or would he just be psyched?
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Hiccup shrugged. "Something like that, anyways. I've known Gobber for my entire life. He's practically my uncle, and, except Toothless and Astrid, there's nobody else I'd rather have watching my back in a fight. But when he gets in a storytelling mood he just can't help himself."
no subject
He could always explain it as an alternate Thor, right? And well, it's not like his Thor wasn't a god. He was just a god that ran around with mortals and fought villains with the rest of them. It wasn't like he'd be telling him his god wasn't a god or something.
"Thor's not really a 'having people over for lunch every Thursday' kinda guy anyway," Rich said in a somewhat sly voice. "Even with people he's friendly with. It's more likely you'd meet up to throw down with some bad guys every Thursday with him. That kind of thing."
He really hoped he wasn't crushing his kid's religion right now. Seriously.
"Even that's pretty intense, though, I gotta admit. He tends to really get into everything he does. By the end of the day the first time I met him, when we teamed up to fight the Corruptor -- a guy that could turn people evil with a touch -- Thor offered me his hand in eternal friendship. He's pretty quick to warm up to people."
no subject
Hiccup believed in the gods, sure. More-or-less anyways. He just thought them interacting with the mortal world on a regular basis was a little farfetched.
"Y'know, normally I'd have just written you off as completely insane. I'm kind of still on the fence about that as it is. But as crazy as you sound right now, this whole thing, the future stuff and the powers, is even crazier."
"So I'm," Toothless nudged him, "we're, willing to give you the benefit of the doubt. On a trial basis."
no subject
How the hell did he describe Thor?
"In my universe, there's a lot of heroes and villains. Good guys and bad guys. And I guess Thor'd been a little bored since the Viking age or something, so he came to Earth and threw in with the good guys." He scratched his chin. "He's not the only god that runs around with people, either. Hercules -- he's a Greek god -- he throws down with the bad guys all the time, too. Hell, my friends even met Zeus once. King of the Greek pantheon -- kinda like their version of Odin."
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"How- How does that even work?!" he asked incredulously.
"Is that Jesus guy some of the mainlanders worship real too? Does he go around hitting people with a giant cross?"
You have only yourself to blame for this question, Rich.
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Because now he was imagining Jesus and Thor in a knock down, drag-out fight, cross versus hammer.
"To be fair, kicking over tables and chasing people with a whip wasn't really out of the question for Jesus, but no, Jesus never showed up and fought people."
At least as far as he knew.
"Mostly it's been gods of dead religions showing up and some of them helping humanity fight against the villains that try to hurt people." Oh. Oh, maybe he shouldn't, uh, word it that way. "Uh, that is, religions that don't really have many believers anymore. A lot of the peoples that used to believe in them sort of...just changed over time. Like, I think, over time, a lot of Norse converted to Christianity. They didn't, y'know, actually die or anything."
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"Great for warriors. Bakers? Not so much."
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It was just not the easiest to stick to that when you needed to occasionally pull your enemy's stomach out their mouth. No way could he pray for his enemies with the kind of enemies he faced.
Also he just had trouble believing in an well-ordered universe anymore
"Anyway, no Jesus back home. Just Thor and Hercules. And they're good guys. Thor was one of the first heroes I met when I started out."
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Hiccup's vaguely pleased expression faded to a look of growing horror.
"This would be the part where you tell me that you don't have to imagine it, isn't it?" He asked, voice squeaking slightly.
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One that was sometimes a threat to the whole world.
"I think the best thing he's ever done for the world was accidentally bring together a group of heroes so they decided to become a team. The Avengers. That's what started it all. They're the ones that always stand up against the bad guys no one can take on alone. The 'foes no single hero can withstand.'"
Back when being an Avenger meant something anyway. That had changed a little in recent years, after all that infighting, enough that Rich hadn't really been the most sure about accepting membership to Cap's secret Avengers himself. It was an honor but at the same time...well. He'd still been a little unsure.
But he still had said yes because they were trying, weren't they? Trying to make it the way it'd used to be.
"They lost their way for a little while, though, but it was getting better. Last time I was home on Earth."
no subject
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"I solemnly swear I won't enable them to be up to no good," he said, knowing the Harry Potter reference would go right over Hiccup's head and using it anyway. Because he was a dork. "Scout's honor."
He lowered his hand.
"'Sides he's not even worth hero worshiping on the evil front. The guy's lost against the good guys almost every time. There's way worse villains out there."
The way he said it, his expression subtly shifting to be colder, blanker, made it clear that Rich knew that from personal experience.
"Worse as in effective."