Room 308, Friday Morning

[bitten_notshy]

Jack had arranged his schedule to leave Fridays free to make it easier to come and go from Baltimore. The problem with that was that it left weekends when he was in town as rather stunningly long and dry.

He sat on his bed and worked on a letter to Sebastien, a CD of Debussy compositions spinning in the stereo he'd recently acquired. The door was cracked so he could watch people come and go.

[OOC: Emma thread gets NWS.]

Comments

[icecoldfrost]

He might be able to hear some faint howling from the hall, and a moment later Emma appeared in his door, looking slightly annoyed as she juggled a sniffling droid baby.

"Have I mentioned how much I hate my ethics class lately? Because I do."

[bitten_notshy]

Well. This was entertainment. Jack set his letter aside and stepped over to the door, eying the baby as if he thought it might explode.

"Don't tell me you had a torrid affair with the fellow who teaches it."

[icecoldfrost]

That earned him a glare.

"Hardly." She replied crisply. "If you ask him, this is the result of my lustful and irresponsible affair with Kyle."

[bitten_notshy]

"My little brother Kyle?" Oh, this was hysterical. "Emma. You ought not corrupt him. Well, let me see my nephew."

[icecoldfrost]

"Maybe you should have been a better big brother, and taught him not to be so easily corruptible," Emma complained, coming over and offering him the child. "As a punishment for your negligence, you can babysit while I take a nap this afternoon."

[bitten_notshy]

Jack took the doll, distinctly dubiously. He really wasn't sure he should be trusted with even a fake child.

"What does it do?" he asked. "Other than sniffle."

[icecoldfrost]

"Cry. Get fed from a fake bottle. Make a wide variety of sounds ranging from baby-giggles to wailing inconsolably so that you have to guess what it wants," she replied. "Kyle actually seemed to be pretty good with it in class yesterday."

[bitten_notshy]

"Hmmm," Jack said, and held his finger so the robot would take it in his hand. The effect was at once creepy and cute. "He'd be the type. Did you give it a name?"

[icecoldfrost]

Emma handwavily told him the name since the players are still in SP over that.

"It was cute," she laughed. "He picked it up and immediately started rocking it. I think he'll be the good influence in our little temporary family."

"Although two weeks is too many, in my opinion."

[bitten_notshy]

"You're a mother for two weeks?" Jack looked slightly ill. "That is a long time. How are you splitting custody?"

[icecoldfrost]

Emma shrugged. "Trading back and forth, mostly," she admitted. "We are in different rooms, with different schedules, and to make it worse, McCoy's got one of these damn - er - darn things too." She was trying to watch her language around the impressionable baby, darn it.

Two robot babies, one room. Skywalker was a jerk.

[bitten_notshy]

"Two babies in the room?" Jack repeated. "Maybe you and McCoy can trade parenting tips."

He glanced over at the other bed and added, "... Andy isn't in your class, is he?" That was the most important thing, here.

[icecoldfrost]

"Afraid of turning into a nursery, Jack? Rose has twins, and is a single parent." Why yes, Emma was taking solace from the misery of her friends. "But no, Andy isn't in our class."

[bitten_notshy]

"Twins," Jack said, shaking his head. "That would drive you to drink, wouldn't it?"

He looked down at the doll again. "I think it's asleep. You might have some peace for a moment."

[icecoldfrost]

Emma was going to quickly snag one of the pillows off Jack's bed and set it on the floor, plucking the baby away from him to settle it on the makeshift napping spot.

"Thank goodness," she sighed, flopping back on to his bed in relief. "Sorry, but I don't want to risk walking it back to my room and having it wake up. You're stuck with us both for the duration."

[bitten_notshy]

"How horrible," Jack said, and reached over to rest his hand flat against her stomach. "You interrupt my letter-writing with my fake brother's bastard child, and then you say you can't leave?"

He wasn't going to let her leave.

[icecoldfrost]

"He might make an honest woman out of me eventually, but I wouldn't count on it," Emma admitted cheerfully, sliding her fingers along his wrist. "I do enjoy being disruptive."

Hey, the baby was asleep. She could flirt without corrupting it beyond all hopes of passing the class.

[bitten_notshy]

"He's too young, anyhow," Jack cheerfully slandered. "You wouldn't want to be supported on what he earns in the library and the general store."

Jack didn't have a job, but he had money. That was better.

"I've had my day disrupted in worse ways," he added, with genuine warmth. "Though i do wonder how you plan to entertain me while the child sleeps...?"

[icecoldfrost]

And Kyle, bless his wee little heart, didn't have half the charm that Jack did.

"I've always preferred older men; it's a wonder I bothered to corrupt him at all," she teased, watching him from under her lashes. "I suppose we could run our lines for the play, or I'd be happy to help you with your letter. I've been told I have lovely penmanship."

[bitten_notshy]

"You are a woman of broad tastes." Jack slid the letter toward Emma, showing his own exceptionally neat hand. There was nothing remarkable in it, just an accounting of Jack's most recent classes and his request a telegraph be built.

"It's for Sebastien," he said. "Is there anything about the week you think a vampire would want to know?"

[icecoldfrost]

"Have you told him about the marauding vegetables yet?" she asked, shifting closer to him so they could look at it together. "Considering he's the only vampire I've met, I haven't a clue what others of his kind enjoy reading about."

"You could tell him that your fake-brother has left me destitute with robot-child after a scandal-filled class, but I think I'm more amused by that than he would be."

[bitten_notshy]

Jack moved to put an arm over her shoulder so they were leaning together. "He's always amused by gossip," he said fondly. "Crime, human nature -- the vegetables came up last weekend and I'm not sure he believed me,"

He chuckled dryly at that. "It always interests me that a vampire is selective about what to believe in."

[icecoldfrost]

"I could draw pictures," she offered, projecting images of herself drawing a stick-figure caricature of Jack fending off a rampaging...something. Spherical, so most likely a tomato or cabbage. "I'm a very reliable source for gossip, you know."

Especially when she was the one to cause it.

[bitten_notshy]

Jack laughed at the caricature. "My head is not that big, Emma."

[icecoldfrost]

"So you say," she teased, looking up at him speculatively. "From here it looks rather large."