The Next Best Thing (Open)

[Dr. Finch Gamble]

In the occasional days that Dr. Gamble wasn't working (or fooling around) in his laboratory or plotting against his former mentor, he liked to engage in gentlemanly activities. Today was one of those days. The activity of choice? Watching plays. And though he liked to pretend that he had access to what he deemed 'professional thespians' the reality was that if he left Pilot Ridge for Broadway, even for a few hours, there was no doubt that he would return to a ruined mess courtesy of the old geezer that was Atticus Proctor.

And so Finch, as he made called himself today, sat in the Globe Theater, snazzily dressed like a Victorian-age aristocrat. He found his seat and settled in to watch the first half of Shakespeare's Midsummer Night's Dream. When the intermission came, he adjusted his ever-present goggles and got up to stretch his legs a little. "I would have liked to meet Puck, clever fellow. Or should I say clever Goodfellow." He snickered to himself, his mind still wrapped up in the play. Which also meant he wasn't watching where he was going and promptly crashed into someone.

[Deleted]

Oriel worked at the Globe Theater. As an usher. Only during the shows, though. Eugene what’s-his-face had him doing odd jobs during the day when Oriel wasn’t in class. It wasn’t a glamorous job, but it did come with a snazzy red vested uniform. If they added some sequins, it could’ve been a razzmatazz outfit. Oriel didn’t mind it. He just hoped to god or whoever was up there that nobody he knew saw him like this. You know, being responsible.

One of the benefits to this job is that he got to see a lot of fucking weirdos that he could bring home to his darling Phoenix to make fun of. Today’s really took the cake, though, the guy who was lost in time and thought he was still in the Victorian era or something. Because Oriel had no doubt the guy was that old too. Or maybe he had a time machine. Probably the latter.

Whatever, he did his job and intermission hit, so he stood by the door, watching the crowd shuffle out of the theater so they could attempt to get drunk and feed on hour-dourververs or whatever they were called in the span of fifteen minutes. He was looking away, into the lobby, when someone walked right into him from behind. Oriel turned to look behind him. Whoa…it was that weirdo, what’s-his-name?(Oriel didn’t know his name in the first place). Oriel stare was obvious, and he did little to hide how he inspected every little piece of the dude’s outfit. “You alright, gramps?” he asked as he did so.