Gathering: New Year's Eve Gala

[concierge]

The annual Nexus New Year's Eve gala began at 8 in the evening. Too grand to be contained by the lobby or dining hall, the gardens at the front of the hotel were employed, with long strings of white lights forming a twinkling canopy from the front doors all the way to the hedge maze. The weather was temperate and calm, and the night perfectly clear.

Drinks were served at various bars set up throughout the gardens and lobby, with champagne cocktails being the specialty of the night. Wheeling through the crowd was a bartender with golden cart providing warm drinks on the go: Tom and Jerrys, rum punch, negus, and Irish coffee.

Crisply-dressed wait staff wove through the collected guests with an abundance of hors d'oeuvres for all different tastes. The Bistro remained open with a limited selection of items for those who were wanting something more substantial.

Above the front doors was hung a large, gold-rimmed clock counting down the last hours, minutes, and seconds of the current year.

Comments

Re: Martha Jones - OTA

[legendthatwas]

"You're too damn kind," Martha replies with a brief teasing flash of her own. "It's good to see you," she adds, and she's had enough liquor that the idea of giving him a rub of the head seems like a good plan, but not enough to actually go through with it.

Not, for that matter, that Olaf seems to be the kind of guy who minds.

Re: Martha Jones - OTA

[trulyoracular]

"I meant it actually and honestly," Olaf promises, not sure if the stars having spoken to him is oracle-stuff or if it's just the drugs talking. He grins and leans down to kiss her cheek. "And when did you get here?" he wonders. "You're supposed to send me a note so I can be there to greet you."

Re: Martha Jones - OTA

[legendthatwas]

Martha presses a light kiss to his cheek in reply. "Sorry, mate," she drawls. "There's not exactly a transuniversal post office, or at least not one that I'm aware of, much less email. I just sort of..." She gestures with a slight flourish, and maybe it's a bit of a Doctory gesture. "Turned the corner and here I was."

Re: Martha Jones - OTA

[trulyoracular]

Olaf is still grinning, not minding how she'd come around so long as it means she's here. He steps back just enough to properly look at her get-up, then back at the hotel, and things start to make sense. "Am I underdressed for some particular party? Or is this just general festivities?"

Re: Martha Jones - OTA

[legendthatwas]

"It looks like New Year's Eve," says Martha, sipping her drink--by now she's used to people appraising her though she only tolerates it from a few--and gesturing around them. "Which is good, because I came from there myself, a few years back, so it didn't require much of a change."

That said, if anyone can pull off casual at a festive shindig, it's Olaf.

Re: Martha Jones - OTA

[trulyoracular]

So that's why the universe is telling him all about new beginnings. And here he'd just thought that he was being told that so he could start a new hobby or something. "Well, regardless of what we're celebrating, we need drinks," he announces cheerfully, offering his elbow. "Shall we?"

Re: Martha Jones - OTA

[legendthatwas]

Hanging out with Olaf is, if Martha's being honest, a lot like hanging out with the Doctor when he was in a fun frame of mind; the times when they weren't running for their lives, hunkering down and praying for daylight, or riding an emotional rollercoaster.

Which is why she grins broadly and takes his elbow. "Indeed, sir, indeed," she says. "What's your poison this evening?"

Re: Martha Jones - OTA

[trulyoracular]

"I've already taken a surprisingly copious amount of drugs," he says, sounding very serious when he's talking about illegal substances. "So maybe we should stick to vodka. I mean, I could totally go for water from the asgardian planes, but I don't think they stock that behind the bar," he jokes, even if he has been craving it lately. Or Baldr is, between trips.

Re: Martha Jones - OTA

[legendthatwas]

The amount probably wouldn't shock Martha, as she's known Olaf long enough, though she admits she might end up being surprised. And, him being the god-avatar-being he is, she at least doesn't have to warn him not to mix much for fear of a fatal OD. "I can go for vodka," she says. "Stirred, not shaken, of course, with lemon peel."

Olives do not belong in a martini, in her mind. Bloody mary, sure, and other savoury drinks she's totally not able to think of at the moment. But not a martini.

Re: Martha Jones - OTA

[trulyoracular]

Olaf waits at the bar, feeling immensely pleased to be served faster than usual seeing as he's accompanied by a beautiful woman. "So, what have you been up to lately, when you're not here making sure I get drinks even faster than before," he jokes, handing her the glass as he downs his, tapping the bar for a refill already.

Re: Martha Jones - OTA

[legendthatwas]

Martha cocks an eyebrow at just how fast Olaf downs his drink, but hell, she's not going to be the one pouring him into his bed at the end of the night. His job. She sips her martini.

"Work, for the most part. I've been asked to do some consulting for an...interesting government agency." Interesting was certainly one way to put it, but when Jack Harkness was one of your references, things wouldn't ever be normal.

Re: Martha Jones - OTA

[trulyoracular]

Olaf cocks his head to the side and narrows his eyes, not even sure he could name one non-interesting government agency, which is partially because he just never cared to find out and more that he finds it a touch boring. "What sort of consulting? And how can governments be interesting?"

Re: Martha Jones - OTA

[legendthatwas]

"Medical consulting," Martha says, slightly sheepish. "It's one of the few things I'm good enough at to be worth the consult--and the agency occasionally needs a doctor who both doesn't blink or pass out at weird shite and who asks the right questions instead of the wrong ones. I'm picking up some alien and transdimensional anatomy knowledge, so that's something."

She adds, after a moment of thought, "Governments can be interesting when they're the parts you don't hear about on the news."

Re: Martha Jones - OTA

[trulyoracular]

"Usually, my family is half the things you don't hear on the news," Olaf says, thinking of the god shit they've managed to keep out of the public eye, and usually just because Anders has no qualms about using his Bragi voice on them. "But I wouldn't mind hearing a story or two."

Re: Martha Jones - OTA

[legendthatwas]

"Well, my friends are the other half," Martha replies, and grins over the rim of her glass as she takes another sip. She doesn't fool herself that she'll keep up with him, but she could do better. "Mostly dealing with aliens and rifts in the space-time continuum, and having run around space and time myself, I make for a good help--I gather it's a job that doesn't let you have much of a home life, though, so I'm glad to just assist."

Re: Martha Jones - OTA

[trulyoracular]

"I'm just glad I don't have to worry about aliens," Olaf says, though he has spent a lot of time (usually high on acid) wondering if they're in Auckland and he just hasn't really noticed. "You want the whole family and friends and home package, then?" he wonders, getting another drink for her just to be polite.

Re: Martha Jones - OTA

[legendthatwas]

Martha hesitates, picking up the new drink rather than replying right away. "I want some of it," she says, looking down into the clear liquid, shimmering with the lights of the room. "I guess I want a job where I can take annual leave, go travel, and not feel like it's quite going to cause the end of the world."

Re: Martha Jones - OTA

[trulyoracular]

"Well, speaking as someone who's done both, I can definitely recommend it." The trouble with Olaf is that he's done both at once, which leads to a heavy amount of resentment from the family (probably well-deserved, but he doesn't like to fixate on that). "You just need to get a job that doesn't care if you leave."

Re: Martha Jones - OTA

[legendthatwas]

"Hey, I want them to at least miss me," Martha points out. She's worked the occasional temporary job where she wasn't missed, and it doesn't really make for good morale. "One where I can leave and come back, more like. So that's why I'm still just a plain old doctor, not a fancy xenobiologist or summat."

Re: Martha Jones - OTA

[trulyoracular]

Olaf groans as he thinks of the number of phone calls he'd had to ignore before he'd managed to lose his phone in the ocean. "I don't even know what those words mean. I mean, I get doctor. I've got a friend who's a doctor," he says, even if he's not sure Michele is really a friend so much as an ally he occasionally stands near. "She fucks off sometimes, though I'm pretty sure I know how she gets away with it."

Re: Martha Jones - OTA

[legendthatwas]

Martha considers whether or not it's worth explaining to Olaf what a xenobiologist does, decides it's probably all for the best to avoid it, and swirls the lemon peel in her drink instead. "How does she get away with it?" she asks, rather curious. She also wonders if this friend knows Olaf is a god.

Re: Martha Jones - OTA

[trulyoracular]

Olaf smirks a little, shrugging his shoulders. "Generally, when you've got powers above and beyond most mortals, you can get away with it. Plus, she does go in most the time. She just tends to take more vacation than she needs to, but she's got her own powers of persuasion." And, he thinks, there'd been a weird agreement between her and Anders for a time in which she probably could've arranged anything.

Re: Martha Jones - OTA

[legendthatwas]

"Ah, right, so she's a..." Another vague gesture from Martha, perhaps slightly clumsier. "Divine being as well?" she finishes, also somewhat clumsily. "Well, I'm definitely not that good. Good, but not that good."

Re: Martha Jones - OTA

[trulyoracular]

"Divine, but of the goddess persuasion," he says, and if he were someone else, that might sound a little more derisive, but Olaf has always gotten along with them -- especially Stacey and Ingrid, and so Michele is a part of that. "She's not what you'd expect, thinking of a goddess, though," she warns.

Re: Martha Jones - OTA

[legendthatwas]

If Martha's being honest, she really doesn't have any particular expectations for a goddess, per se--but now Olaf has piqued her interest, and she finds her eyebrows going up. "How do you mean?" she asks.