Players:
Summary: Payback's a very lucrative thing. Theo shows gratitude to Caleb for saving him.
Date: September 8, 2010. 3:00pm
Log Title: Payback's a…
Rating: PG
NYC - East 42nd Street
Traveling from East to West in the center of Manhattan is 42nd street. The long street is home to Grand Central Station, United Nations, Bryant Park, New York Public Library and Times Square. This street has many stores and restaurants tailored to the more upscale and tourists of the city. There are also many theatres along this street for Broadway Musicals and motion pictures.
You know when you're in such a good mood that nothing can annoy you, Caleb is in one of those moods, he's had a pretty awesome day, and is just heading back to school to grab a change of clothing, he's dressed in black jeans, black air walk trainers, a pink and purple stripped t-shirt, his white hair is gelled in casual spikes and his violet eyes are glowing faintly as is the yellow stone on the silver wristband on his right wrist, he has his earphones in and is listening to "Take it off" by Ke$ha, he's looking for a quiet neighbourhood where he can fly off.
The day has been so-so for Theo. He hasn't been beat up by anyone yet, but he had to leave work early because of those silly child labor laws and permissible hours for minors to work. He would've preferred to stay, but Bob told him he 'needed to go be a teenager'. And so he is. A possibly familiar looking smart car Ferrari is pulled up to a bank branch, and Theo is just getting out of the car. His wounds from the last encounter have healed, thanks to the wondrous technology of Xavier's Institute.
Caleb is about to turn up a nearby alleyway which leads to a much quieter street when he spots the Ferrari, is that…?, crap it is, the kid from the other week, with that t-shirt, sighing he just keeps walking up the street, not sure why…
Theo steps up to the ATM, and looks over his shoulder, as if he didn't want anyone to watch him. He doesn't spot Caleb, however. He pulls a card from his wallet, and puts it into the machine. After a few pushes of buttons, the machine beeps, and starts dispensing money. And it keeps dispensing money. A neat stack is formed, and he pulls it out and then watches as more cash continues to be given. After a few moments, it stops. The boy pulls the second stack out, and the card comes back out.
As Caleb walks past the spots the huge amount of money coming out of the ATM, he's never seen that much money at once, hold on isn't there a limit on how much cash you can take out of the ATM, hmmm and the first time they met the traffic lights went screwy, turning invisible he reaches out and to take the card out of the machine.
Theo was about to reach up to take the card when it suddenly slides from the machine on its own. "Hey!" he exclaims. He doesn't stop to think that it might be the same invisible guy that helped him not too long ago (after all, how many of them can there be?) Instead, he swings a wild right arm in the general direction to prevent the culprit from taking the card. It isn't a very accurate swing, his forearm rather than his fist is lined up to hit the young mage. The card does, however, have Theodore Fegenbush written on it, and seems to be real.
Caleb lets out a mock "Ow" when Theo's arm hits him, "Calm down I'm just looking, wait your name is Theodore Fegenbush III?, man, your parents were mean", he hold the card out, "Ok, now how did you get that much money, these things have a limit, I'm sure of it".
"Caleb?" Theo asks. His initial aggression is lessened a little. He snatches the card quickly back, and puts it in his wallet. "Yes, that's my name. You don't think I'm good enough to have my dad's and my Grampy's name?" he challenges. He happens to be very proud of his name." He doesn't answer the question about the limit, trying to shift the conversation to his name instead. He folds one stack and places it in his pocket, and the other goes into the opposite pocket.
Caleb turns visible again grinning, "It just sounds a little old fashioned is all", sadly for Theo, he's not easily distracted, "Again i ask, how did you do that, there's a limit on how much cash these things spit out, and from the look of it, you have a couple of thousand there."
"You can set the limit higher if you have enough in your bank account," Theo answers without a thought. Whether that is true, who knows? "I work for Tony Stark, he pays really well." After all, he has a ferrari, so it must. He places the card back in the machine, and punches in a pin. His name comes up, and he hits the balance button. It seems to take a little longer than normal, and Theo seems rather focused on the screen, but then shows his balance. $4396.34. "See?"
After seeing Theo's little demo, Caleb is still suspicous, he's been at Barnes long enough to have a sense when somethings not quite right, still he can't prove it, "Tony is pretty darn loaded, anyways, i gotta fly, say hi for me".
"Hey, wait," Theo says, reaching out to grab Caleb by the arm. "I never said thanks," he admits. "Let's hit the mall or something. I got money, we'll get you something. It's the least I can do for somebody who saved my life. Twice." And for somebody who might be suspicious to how he's getting all this money.
Caleb grins, "It's no big deal, I've got these powers, might as well be doing something useful with them", still he could use a trip to the mall, alot of his clothing has got damaged in the process of playing hero, "The mall sounds good, but you don't have to get me anything, i'm not charging you for saving your life".
"You're not charging me, man," Theo answers, "But I wanna do this anyway. After giving Caleb a slap on the shoulder, he walks back to his car, and hops over the door and into the driver's seat, since the top is down. The car is started, though it is much quieter than most cars, and he holds his hands out. "How about it?"
"Meh, what the hell", Caleb walks over to the car and jumps over the other side into the passenger seat, "Lets go then Theo the third", he grins to show he's only teasing, he himself was almost called Seamus, so can't really talk.
Theo backs out of the space, and then pulls to the edge of the parking lot. Someone slows down and lets him out, though if Caleb pays close attention, the driver seems to be staring at her dashboard as if her car just betrayed her. "So do you just wander around all the time and look for people to save or something?" he asks. He doesn't really know much about Caleb, other than their few brief encounters.
Caleb is actually keeping an eye on everything in the car, he's had bad experiences while in a car driven by a teenager, but he does spot the look on the woman's face, "huh", he shrugs at Theo's question, "Actually trouble seems to find me, like with you, i was just heading back to school when i heard noise from that warehouse, i seem to be attracted to trouble".
"Yeah, I think it's just a bad year for me," Theo answers. "I've had more problems this year than the rest of my life put together. I'm glad you're attracted to trouble, or I probably wouldn't be here." Theo is a rather aggressive driver, quickly taking narrow openings when they are available. Of course, the car he's driving is small enough to fit in them. Still, this little thing probably wouldn't handle a wreck very well.
Caleb laughs, "Then yay for my great great great great great great great great great great grandfather then, who can say he didn't think ahead", Theo's driving doesn't bother him too much, worse comes to the worse, he'll get 'em out, "So you work for Tony?, no school?"
"School started today," he says. "First day is kinda lame, though, it just is introductions to teachers and all that garbage, nothing useful is really done." Hence, he's skipping. "I figured I'd take one last day at the office, but Bob kicked me out. He's the head of R&D." Soon they arrive at the nearest mall. "Here we go," he says, pulling into the closest available spot. "So, any favorite stores?" he asks.
Caleb finished his lessons for today before heading out, when they get out of the car he shakes his head, "I don't really know the stores here, i usually go to the one in Westchester, the Salem center, so i'll just follow your lead".
Theo shrugs, "I don't know this one either," he says. "I just thought I'd check it out." As they enter, he checks the posted map. "We got video games, clothes, William Sonoma cookware, crazy overpriced sunglasses place…"
Caleb looks at the map and hmms, "Well, summer's over so no need for sunglasses, school cooks for me, don't actually own a games console, so clothes?", the crowd in the mall worries him a little though, he's been mentioned in the news a couple of times, last time it said he may be dangerous.
The technopath lets Caleb pick the store, and he follows in. "You know, I've never really thought about what I wear too much. All growing up, all we had was whatever was on the Wal-mart clearance rack. It's kinda surreal to have money."
"Yeah, well, we got to pick it out, as long as it was less than ten bucks, when you have a household income of 40k to split between eight kids, it doesn't go very far." Theo says. He pulls a fedora off of a rack. "Hmm, wonder if I could pull these off…"
Caleb raises an eyebrow at the fedora, "No one can look good in one of those, trust me", the walks over to the hats and tosses Theo a peak beanie, "Try this might suit you better".
"What about you?" Theo asks, swapping hats. "I dunno, I feel like a skater punk." He puts both hats back, and looks across the store. "See, this is the other side, I don't know what is stylish and what isn't. I feel like going back to the Wal-mart racks," he says with a laugh.
"Nothing wrong with skaters, and if you feel more comfortable with Wal-mart, stick with it", Caleb grabs a beanie himself, "Why don't you ask one of the assistants for advice, they can help you more than i can".
Theo shrugs. "Well, maybe." And of course he makes certain to ask the most attractive girl working at the store, who suggests a few things. He takes all of them. She just became salesperson of the day.
After Caleb has grabbed a couple of things, he watches with raised eyebrows as Theo buys everything he's told to, must to the delight of the assistant, when he's done he wanders over, "She's hot and eveything, but did you have to buy it all?"
"A girl that hot must know what's in style," Theo answers with a shrug. He pays for the things that Caleb has picked out with a smile. "Nice thing about being in high school, all the money you get goes to whatever you feel like. I don't have bills yet. Might as well enjoy it while it lasts."
