16280/Museum Fun

Museum Fun
Date of Scene:	08 November 2023
Location:	American Museum of Natural History
Synopsis:	Lara and Peter meet in the American Museum of Nat History, Nat history, a whole building dedicated to people named Nat and their past.
Cast of Characters:	Lara Croft, Peter Parker

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Lara Croft has posed:
Lara had recently returned from the Yucatan region of eastern Mexico. It... it had been a big ordeal. She'd learned a lot about herself during it all, and some of it wasn't exactly something she'd openly share with others. She'd narrowly survived the expedition an enumerable number of times, but... she had survived.

Here now, Lara stands as a silent representitive of the new display of the 'Dagger of Chak Chel' exhibit. It had just opened this past weekend, and was drawing crowds, even if they were thinning out some now.

Dressed in a light leather jacket, khaki colored denim jeans, leather boots, with a sand-hued scarf wrapped around her neck for the autumn weather outside, Lara observes the dagger as a Museum tour guide is giving a class of local students a rundown on the enigmatic weapon's origins and lore, as it sits behind a glass wall, with a number of soft yellow lights shining down upon its surface.

Peter Parker has posed:
Given the Museum's proximity to the local colleges, it's not uncommon to see students milling about. Some of the younger ones from grade schools are on carefully chaperoned tours, while college students are working with a purpose in mind and jotting down their findings and observations on their phones or notebooks.

Peter Parker is among this second group, scribing on a tablet with stylus in hand. The section on 'Relics from Mexico' isn't exactly large, and sometime while Lara's studying the dagger, he wanders up and starts reading from the placard next to it. Peter's lips move soundlessly while he reads, brows furrowing frequently in concentration.

"Dresden... Codex? What's a Codex?" he mutters, not realizing he's speaking aloud. Peter starts looking around for whatever THAT is. "Uh..." he makes a little gesture in Lara's peripheral vision. "Hey, I'm-- I don't know if you work here, but, uh could you tell me--" he fumbles his tablet, recovers, and shows her 'Dresden Codex' in neat printed font. "Is that somewhere else in the building?"

Lara Croft has posed:
Lara's eyes watched the student group walk away moments before Peter arrived at the exhibit. She was holding a cup of coffee between her hands, her scarf dangling down over her chest over the edges of her leather jacket. She is raising the cup up to her lips when Peter draws her attention.

He garners her stare, and after processing his question for a pair of seconds she steps forward to tilt her head to stare at what he's indicating. "The Dresden Codex?" She asks as she looks up at him with her brown eyes, curiously. She spoke with a thick London accent, easily pegging her as being an 'out of towner' around here, so to speak anyway!

With a soft smile she nods her head. "Sure, come with me. It's visiting from Germany." She tells him. "Is that what has brought you here today?" She asks him as she turns to her right, expecting him to follow along with her, finally taking that sip from her coffee cup then.

Peter Parker has posed:
"Yes. Well, no. Kinda," Peter amends. He looks barely old enough to be out of high school, and follows along with Lara a half-step behind and to her left. In jeans, Keds and an 'ESU' hoodie that looks a little well-worn, he definitely isn't here in a 'professional' capacity.

"I'm taking Ancient American History 301. Professor Bartlesby?" he supplies, hopefully. "He handed out research projects last week and I'm trying to get a jump start on mine. But I got the Mayans," he says, with a resigned note. "And I don't know anything about 'em. I heard there was some cool artifact on display and thought, maybe the Museum would be a good place to start. Get some pictures, maybe jazz the paper up a bit with visuals?" he inquires with a hopeful note in his voice.

Lara Croft has posed:
As they walk down the museum corridor, they pass by a railing overlooking another floor below, which Lara briefly touches with her right hand beside her. She smiles at what Peter says of his college course, gently nodding her head a pair of vague times to it. "I remember those days quite well myself." She says fondly toward him on her other side. "I graduated just a few years ago, from UCL. A long way from here..." She tells him, adding a lightly affectionate laugh to emphasize it. They take a left turn down another corridor and Lara points ahead, at the end of it.

"It's just there." She says, leading him toward it. You won't find an older tome originating from the Americas... so they say." She tells him with a sideways glance and a playful grin for him.

As they approach it, Lara is indulging in another sip of her hot beverage when she speaks again. "Focus on the Venus Table section. Your Professor will like that most. It delves in to the astrological positioning of the planet Venus, which the Mayans based many of their rituals upon. It really is remarkable how much they knew, so long ago..."

Peter Parker has posed:
"...Venus... Tablet," Peter echoes, and scribbles furiously on his tablet. "Yeah, it's pretty wild what the ancient civilizations could do," he agrees, looking back from the tablets to Lara. He pulls out a camera from his pocket; it's a fairly modern Stark-Tech phone with an upgraded camera attached to it. The skinny young man starts taking photos of the tablets. He alternates between trying to document them thoroughly and trying to compose the shot properly.

"Oh hey, so, you're not that much older than me." The thought suddenly occurs to Peter and he looks at Lara. "You're from London, right? How did you end up knowing so much about the Mesoamerican cultures?" he inquires with a curious lilt to his voice. "Is that just like, something you pick up working here, or...?"

Lara Croft has posed:
Lara's eyes looked over the book, and all that was on display around it detailing the contents of all of it without people having to actually touch the ancient item itself. She looked back to Peter when he questioned her, and a small smile touched at the edges of her lips. She glanced back the way they'd come. "I uh... I donated that dagger that we just left." She tells him, as her eyes return to his own. She shifts her coffee to her left hand, and extends her right over to him. "I'm Lara. Croft. I majored in Asian Archaeology in school, but you could say I've been minoring in every major culture since I was barely taller than the Codex itself." She says in a friendly tone of her pleasing voice.

"I would say that Norse history is my second most passionate, but Mexico and South America hold a special place in every archaeologists's heart. Having just spent the better part of a month in the Yucatan... I'm both happy to be back here, but... I still have a lot of the thoughts fresh in my mind, you could say."

Clearly she's a crazy person! Run for it, Peter!

Peter Parker has posed:
Peter's entire thought process works across his face pretty transparently. Relief: oh, she does work here. Disbelief: She donated that relic?! Amazement: Wow, SHE donated that relic. Impressed: He recognizes the Croft name.

Disbelief again-- did she say LARA CROFT?

"Oh man, you're the TOMB RAIDER!" Peter says with a barely-strangled yelp. He looks around, pinking a little at his faux pas, and clears his throat to modulate his voice to a deeper register. "I mean, uh, I'm a big fan. I've heard of you. Well, everyone's heard of you, but I've been following you for years. On social media!" he hastens to clarify. "I just-- you know when you bump into someone you're not... expecting to, and you... don't..."

Hem-HEM. Peter clears his throat again. "This is... seriously the coolest," he says. "I would love to-- I mean, if it's not an imposition, but I would love to pick your brain about it," he requests with an eager, nerdly excitement. "How did you even /find/ that dagger? Hasn't it been lost forever?"

Lara Croft has posed:
Lara shows a varying degree of expressions at his reaction to her name and identity. 'Tomb Raider' was a arguably ugly title to be given, considering others who could fit under that umbrella around the world too, generally aren't good people. But it had been given to her in media coverage following the events of Yamatai back when she was still 21 and fresh out of college. Dark days, but through the dark days she was made a stronger woman, and that aspect is what she holds on to today to help her through the bad parts.

She does laugh softly when he asks how she found the dagger, and with a gesture of her head somewhere between a nod and a shake side to side, she speaks back. "I wish I could say I did it entirely on my own wits and educational prowess, but... a large portion of it was garnered from my own father's research. Prior to his passing, he was a leading researcher in all things related to mystical items of great power. The dagger was connected to that, obviously, though it was just one piece of the puzzlebox that he was trying to open. I just picked up his research, and... filled in the blanks, so to speak. I had good help too, of course, as everyone should."

She smiles warmly over at him again as she glances back to the Codex display.

"Are you getting in to the field of research yourself?" She asks the younger man.

Peter Parker has posed:
Peter listens, spellbound. He even forgets to take notes for a few moments, until he realizes yes, he's still holding his tablet. He scribbles furiously to catch up, nodding along to show Lara he is quite capable of multitasking.

At least until she hits him with the question, and there's a delay between him hearing it, staring blankly, and then realizing she's querying him.

"Me? Oh no w-- I mean, I don't have the time," he says, a little wistfully. "I'm in the mechanical engineering program at ESU. Kinda... kinda hoping I can land a good tech job somewhere. Oscorp, maybe," he hazards. "I'm doing a dual study, my BS in general sciences and a MS in engineering. It's--" he winces, realizing it soudns like he's bragging. "I'm in an unusual situation. But that takes up, like, /all/ my time," he says.

Though he is committing a fairly significant lie of omission...

Lara Croft has posed:
The response that he gives her has her showing a little smile at it. Lara nods her head softly to what he says before she reaches in to her jacket to display a SHIELD identification badge. "I understand unusual well. If you're doing all that you say you're doing, I would bet SHIELD would be quite interested in your abilities." She says casually as she drops the badge back in to a inner pocket of her leather jacket. "Still though, I admire your dedication to your work to come all the way to the Museum to see the display first hand, rather than just... watching Youtube videos, or reading about it on Wikipedia." She adds with a sparkling grin showing for the young man.

Another sip of her drink is taken before Lara steps over to a specific section of the Codex that is on display beneath a small soft yellow light. "Here is the section on the Venus Tables." She indicates with a tap of her fingertip against the display. "Read here." She tells him, pointing out a paragraph that explains specifically how the Mayans used their cosmology to influence many of their rituals.

"If you'd like, I could send you some of my father's writings on the Codex. He doesn't cover it a lot, but he does bring it up some. I personally ran in to a number of astrological references that were pulled from the Codex when I was locating that dagger, no less."

Peter Parker has posed:
Peter manages to control his instinctual reaction to Lara flashing a badge. He knows about SHIELD-- everyone in the world does-- but there's a certain, well-earned wary distrust he has for anyone with a badge. Badges mean secrets. Secrets get people killed.

The thought vanishes before it can manifest and he just makes a show of looking star-struck at the display. And the compliments have him grinning a little shyly, taking a half step back and away with a wry laugh. When she brings him in again he leans forward, examining the text and taking more pictures with his phone. From the shots Lara can see over his shoulder, he's definitely a professional photographer.

The offer brings him up short, blinking at Lara and straightening up. "That would be-- I mean if it's not-- yeah, I could totally use that!" he says in a rush. "Oh man, I'm so glad I ran into you. I thought I'd be /screwed/ on this assignment," he admits. "It's hard pivoting from STEM to humanities."

Lara Croft has posed:
Lara's brown eyes watch with keen interest as he lines up the shot, admiring his evident skill behind the lens. She can sense the depth of his experience and appreciates his dedication to the art of photography. His comment about switching from the sciences to the humanities elicits a soft chuckle and a knowing nod from her. "It's quite a leap, isn't it?" She agrees. "But I'm hopeful that a glimpse into Lord Richard Croft's previously unseen journal entries might sway your professor's perspective. And if it doesn't, well, you can always let me know, and I'll have a friendly word with him," she adds, her voice carrying a playful undertone.

With a graceful motion, Lara retrieves her own phone, a Stark model encased in black leather for protection. She initiates a contact swap, revealing her social media handle to him. "You can find me here," she says, offering a warm smile. "I don't delve too deeply into the chaos of social media, but now that I'm involved, I'm looking forward to hearing about how your assignment progresses."

Recognizing the need to depart, she extends her right hand toward him once more. "I should probably be on my way, but it was a pleasure to meet you," she says. "I'll send you that information as soon as I return to my place."