10394/Food and Alien Philosophy

Food and Alien Philosophy
Date of Scene:	08 March 2022
Location:	Recreation Lounge: Triskelion
Synopsis:	In which, space-time continuums and space curry are the hot topic between Jane, Jess, and Natasha
Cast of Characters:	Michael Erickson, Natasha Romanoff, Jessica Drew, Jane Foster

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Michael Erickson has posed:
    The clang of metal and the smell of cooking food issues from the break room - down here, the halls collect the aroma of food easily, and the combination of roasted meat and strong spices hang in the air for any who approach the rec room to sample. Garlic, onions, and...other, stranger smells, including the sweet strength of cinnamon and cloves pierce the senses - as does the sound of a twinned voice when one reaches the breakroom doorway, a language that sounds like a combination of Russian and Klingon (lots of doubled vowels) audible beneath a human voice reading what must be a translation. Both are distinctly female - stern but strangely melodious as they emit from a small, boxy device of black metal the size of a deck of cards sitting on the breakroom table.

    << Information, the first principle of warfare, must form the foundation of all your efforts. Know the enemy, but in knowing do not forget to know yourself. The commander who embraces this will win out even with an inferior force. >>

    Michael is there, dressed in his usual gray suit, albeit with the jacket hung off the back of a chair. He's set up some kind of small stove on the breakroom's counter, a bright blue glow emitting from its 'hob' while a large frying pan hovers in the air over the light and fries merrily. Busy man. Hungry man, from the size of the pan.

Natasha Romanoff has posed:
Natasha Romanoff would be currently settled in over on the couch in the room. She has a very large book on her lap in an ancient looking, faded paperback covered in Cyrillic letters that she's reading. The picture on the front of the book has long since faded, the pages look yellowed and like they're falling out, and teh book is in terrible shape and worn down. It's clearly had better days and is in miserable shape. If one were to peer an dknew they language they could probably make out the title.
    She would glance over at Michael and give a low nod of acknowledgement to him, switching her attention over to the book and back and forth. Making sure that she could keep a full view of the comings and goings in the room by paying attention to the reflections.

Jessica Drew has posed:
To super-senses, the olfactory and auditory trails twining their way down the corridor are like meter-high signs pointing to the break room. Familiar hints of cinnamon and cloves could trick someone into thinking that a good curry was being prepared or eaten while someone entertained themselves with audiobooks in Sanskrit? in an unknown Tibetan dialect?

Experience has taught Jessica otherwise. She is on a man's trail and were she inclined would be baying aloud as she approached her prey.

Jess stops in the doorway on seeing Natasha in the room, then walks in to stand next to Michael, asking lightly, "Hello, is there enough for two?"

Michael Erickson has posed:
    "S'kaati brin," Michael says, not looking up from his cooking - stirring the stuff, nostrils flaring. It's very much like curry, this stuff that he's cooking, but then other smells come to Jessica's very sensitive nose. Like sardines. And sugar. What. "Teth ma'taa ros-ti-kaal-srikta."

    The machine makes a little beep and skips to another chapter - or, perhaps, book. < Superior training and superior weaponry have, when taken together, a geometric effect on overall military strength. Well-trained, well-equipped troops -- >

    Michael looks over at the lady who's manifested at his side at the kitchenette. "Should be," he informs Jessica, "If you like the taste. It's not exactly an Earth flavor."

    < -- can stand up to many more times their lesser brethren than linear arithmetic would seem to indicate. >

    Then, to Natasha, he calls: "Do you want to try this when it is done, Agent? It is a taste from another galaxy. More or less."

Natasha Romanoff has posed:
Natasha Romanoff would turn her attention over and move to shrug, "Sure, I don't see why not. So you've gotten to enjoy preparing cuisine here?" Having not met ana lien that enjoys being a chef before that does not involve a flamethrower, Natasha would give him her full attention. I twasn't that often she had a new life experience at her age.
    So the book would be folded and pushed away over and glance. "So long as it's not going to give us any physiological issues." What was edible by one species might not be by another after all. "So I take it that your activities and actions have been productive and efficient lately?"

Jane Foster has posed:
The cacophony draws attention from various parts of the Triskelion. Hello, they're an organization of spooks and anyone up to no good -- or even total good -- typically sends word escalating up the chain. Analysts hear from their friends over in the deep-basin computer pods. Messages ping and trigger the ever-watchful techs responsible for being the modern-day Panopticon, and maybe someone tells their work spouse. Loose lips sink ships but sling chips, and all of that.

"Who makes cinnamon in /meat/?" gets a withering look from the South Asian contingent, a few Filipino agents probably running the unfortunate intern out to the gym to hide rather than be caught. Very much the point to get caught up in, and it's that cacophony that brings Jane out from a not too soundproofed room with her hands on her hips. The SWORD-WAND person is enough of an oddity to draw looks. Doubly when she points to her earbuds. "I'm trying to record a podcast and if the lot of you are going to argue, you can be my starring cast. Raj, you can gauge my Hindi pronunciations anyway. Raj? Hello!" They're already running. Point made.

Thus, a scattering of several people outside through the hall announces the power of a scientist with the device to record others.

Jessica Drew has posed:
Eyeing the intrepid Natasha with a faint smile, Jessica interposes saying, "He can always make extravagant promises about its affects. If he poisoned us, Chief Carter would kill him with her bare hands, I believe. But, he would protest his innocence."

She gathers small plates from the cabinets lining the wall, and silverware from a drawer which she lays out on the table for them all. "On a scale of one to ten, how spicy did you make it Michael? And, it is lovely that you're sharing. I can't imagine how hard it is to get the ingredients."

Hearing Jane's approach, she decides a fourth plate may be wanted.'

Natasha Romanoff has posed:
Natasha Romanoff would go to glance at Michael departing and at Jessica and jane, "I'm sure that everything will be lovely." She would go to fold her hands together. "So are we going to keep things professional tonight?" By which she meant 'not talk about work things'.

Because everything in the end could very much be about work when it came to SHIELD. Between aliens, monsters, mayhem on Earth.. "Or do we wish to trade some professional gossip?"

Jane Foster has posed:
Kill 'em with kindness, that's how the story goes. Peggy might kill Michael for poisoning them or perfuming the air with something fit to make her very full belly turn, but the risk of that is low.

Jane pulls her headphones from her ears, the little devices small but packed with a microphone that picks up details well. She shoves them in her pocket, trusting they can turn off after a few seconds of inactivity and no proximity to her ear canal. Her thumbs hook into the tops of said pockets, her pace blithely settling into a halted stroll. "Evening. I had no idea there was an impromptu cooking class going on," she says. A friendly wave is given, extended for the redhead assassin and the black-haired assassin. Goodness, only one of them isn't trained to that!

"Professional? I fear my side of professional is trying to bridge space with something larger than a breadbox and making jumps for the mid-solar system feasible with terminal decay of atoms in between."

Jessica Drew has posed:
Assassinations are the last thing on Jessica's mind as she spoons a dollop of the curry-like concoction on to a plate. Again, experience has taught her to be cautious around Michael's "home" cooking even though he has a real flair for la cuisine francaise. It's not above her to tease him about being a friend of Julia's.

"Michael is sharing though he has been called away. We are being treated to some Shi'ar cooking. I'm optimistic but wary," she replies, a spoon poised mid-way to her mouth. "I put a plate out for you, if you'd like to try."

Natasha Romanoff has posed:
Natasha Romanoff would glance at Jane, "The issue's not the teleportation, it's always going to be the accuracy. You say you worry about scrambling molecules, I say I don't want to end up a few trillionths of a degree off course and end up in the vacuum rather than within the planetary field. Or popped out to the middle of the sun." She would go to put her book down. "I suppose that's even harder. Making sure you're within a few centimeters of the target, account for gravity, planetary drift, observation.. The mathematical models have to all be so exact and that means the observations have to as well.. I'm most impressed with the degree of accuracy that it can be done with."

She would glance at Jessica, "So are we hopeuflly to survive his meal or will we be ordering out for pizza instead?"

Jane Foster has posed:
Curry, ye never stood a chance. Jane herself sniffs the air as though to place the melange of spices, but her perfectly human nose only takes her so far. Anything in the galactic food pantry far and away exceeds her ability to readily recognize, such as it is. "It looks interesting enough. What happens to be in this?" she asks, curious and not altogether nonplussed by the idea of eating Michael's home food. Asgardian mead will destroy any of the three women after the first glass, what might Shi'ar cuisine offer?

"It looks certainly palatable. Not at all bland, and the colour's quite nice," she adds. "I would be obliged, if you are sure it would be no trouble. Can I help with anything?" Offers made to wash plates or chase off alien cats come with relevant ease, especially as she glides to a sink to wash her hands thoroughly. Bubbly soap and hot water aplenty apply, which comes as a precaution when messing about with materials as she does. "Gravity and planetary drift actually happen to be quite easy considering we've had those markers in orbits for a good fifty years. I can use substantial data on that front to provide for trajectories, perturbations, and the influence of moons in particular. The main problem you get jumping past Mars comes, of course, from the Jovian gravitational well. Plug that in, the equations more or less take care of themselves. The issue comes with trying to fold and bridge two points in space because all conventional science utterly breaks down. Provided you can make the bridge, accuracy on insertion and exit are outright child's play next to ensuring what goes in actually comes out."

Natasha Romanoff has posed:
Natasha Romanoff would nod at Jane, "That makes sense. I'd have thought that the issue primarily was accuracy. But at teh point one has the ability to use that kind of power, accuracy and calculation are minor issues. Just in the past making those calculations and assumptions would have been nigh impossible. For a long time it wasn't even known how many moons Jupiter had purely to the difficulties with observing it." She would muse over and consider.

"And many things don't fit within hte parameters of conventional science. I suppose you know that more than most of us. There are rules you can figure out but the actual mechanics and processes are well,w ell beyond most of us."

Jessica Drew has posed:
The curry is colorful, there are distinguishable vegetables in it - earthborn roots like carrots and potatoes married in a sauce brought to them by the very principles of space they discuss, being folded until vast distances occupy a single point. "No worries about the dishes. I don't mind doing them."

She passes each of them a plate. "How much of our present science is ours and how much of it has been begged, borrowed or stolen from other spacefarers, Jane? Is that too professional a question or just out of bounds?"

Jane Foster has posed:
"Quantum physics has an unnerving way of teaching us the more we know, the less we really do." Jane doesn't linger much on the scientific particulars, not wishing to bore her audience to tears rather than worrying about the mystique being pierced. Such concerns prove utterly lost on her more than likely. "Are you sure, Jess? I'd hate to stand here by the wayside empty-handed while you go about doling out food and keeping us entertained, particularly as I am perfectly capable of doing at least something." She breaks into a smile.

What compels a girl to say that? The faults of society, an endless desire to carve out worth when time and time again, hers falls short by the ruthless yardstick of spycraft? May well be.

Nonetheless, she takes a plate and pushes around a little with a fork after murmuring, "Thank you. And this? Entirely without augmentation from spacefaring races. I didn't fall back on Asgardian technology by the time I adopted it, our precedents come out of the Fifties and Sixties. Einstein to start." She shakes her head. "Interactions with other races is simply too limited in the past few years to have really percolated through. Richards is a whole other ballgame, and I defer to him on the origins of his theorems, but my own? Not much. Thus, trying to work this out independently so we're not beholden to an alien energy source or knowledge base beyond general understanding. I'm just me. If someone can replicate this, it'll be with the same technology and it should be just as useable no matter what culture or region you come from."

Natasha Romanoff has posed:
Natasha Romanoff would glance over at Jessica, "And how muxch of things are just things we've encountered and are just able to make our way through? Sometimes one doesn't have ot understand the mechanics of something so long as they can maek it work. Theories often take longer to catch up with data when it comes to explaining it. Sometimes all one needs is the ability to consistently perform something even if they're not sure entirely how it works."

On the talk of 'Richards' Natasha would raise her lips upwards in a smile. "You say that like the man isn't among possibly the smartest individuals on the entire planet if not possibly in the planet's history."

Jessica Drew has posed:
"You're fiiiine," Jess assures with a grin to match the length of her British syllables. She takes a tentative forkful off her plate. The roulette of genetics that her creators played had rolled out a super smeller and taster capable of eating most food, unlike so many people endowed with similar abilities. She can eat salad without finding it too bitter or stand to be in the same building where someone has fried fish.

"I realize how insulting that question might have seemed. I'm sorry for it, too. But, on the other hand, it is also reassuring to know that we are not beholden to people who might think we owe them something for using their technology or scientific discoveries."

The smile that had flickered out as she tried to decide whether she liked the spicy concoction on her plate returns, "I would much rather be beholding to a genius such as yourself than some passing alien. Will we be galaxy jumping within my lifetime?"

Jane Foster has posed:
Happy to nibble on the meal, Jane does not rush into that experience of Shi'ar cooking with earthly ingredients supplying the familiar and the strange alike. Her eyes close a little as all attention goes to the gustatory impressions rather than visual, a deliberate effort to concentrate. "I spoke of the man exactly as if he's one of those individuals, since his grasp far outreaches most of ours," she dryly answers Natasha. "Trust me to know when the benchmark's been exceeded."

Certainly she does not treat Reed Richards with contempt. Professional courtesy, certainly. Her half-closed eyes open again, and she eats a little more. Seems it meets with approval from the astrophysicist as she glances to Natasha and Jess, managing a warm laugh. "Your intentions were good. Not like I plan to plug into a hidden database and peruse the secrets of a thousand races around the galaxy. Isn't that rather the premise of a sci-fi movie?"

Leaning back against a counter is altogether an act of relaxation, as much as can be. "Galactic spans? I have no idea. Within the solar system is my best guess in the future, and when, who can say?"

How about tomorrow at 2? It doesn't count, does it?

Natasha Romanoff has posed:
Natasha Romanoff would nod over at Jane and smile, "Good then." She would listen to the two converse back and forth, going to grab herself out some sort of energy bar as well to take a bite from. If either of the girls lookeda t it it would be something that was clearly one of the bars from the standard field ration packs. She would smirk.

"So we're not going to ever have someone arriving from space going 'klaatu' to us?"