poeticterms | (no subject)

"Well, a tour's up to Tony. Or you. I wouldn't want to impose."

"Hell yes we will give you a tour."

Auggie is not the only showoff in the room.

"Sound good, Jarvis?"

"Absolutely. Where would you like to start? There are two floors above you and two below, but the second basement level is off-limits unless you happen to be a nuclear physicist. Are you a nuclear physicist, by any chance?"

"Nope. Just a run of the mill hacker."

"Auggie, you are so not run-of-the-mill," Tony says, laughing. "But yeah, I'm not taking you down to the arc reactor. No fusing atoms on the first date."

Aren't you glad you had that fistbump, Auggie?

He sighs. "There go my high hopes. What else is there to show me?"

"Tony's workshop is in the basement proper. I've no doubt a few of those projects could fascinate you for hours. The sound system in the room across the hall might be of interest as well—every living room has its very own home entertainment set, but that is where Tony likes to watch his bootlegged IMAX movies and he installed an appropriate number of speakers."

"Honestly, I'm more interested in your speaker setup." He grins in what he thinks is Tony's direction. "Though the workshop sounds good too."

"And you can always talk shop with Jarvis about hacking," Tony says cheerfully. "Just try not to get us in trouble. Auggie's a good guy now," he explains as an aside to Jarvis. "Anyway, killer sound system, right this way." He steps in front of Auggie for the lead.

Auggie takes the proffered shoulder and (gives it a slight grateful squeeze for maintaining the cover) sweeps the cane in front of him one more time.

"Of course I won't get you in trouble. I'm very discreet."

There is no way right now to tell Auggie that Sherry's going to tell Jarvis without ending up telling Jarvis himself, so Tony just shrugs a little and leads the way to the room's other door.

"Thanks, Auggie. You're the best. Okay, it steps up again going into the hall—right here," he says as he clears the tiny hurdle himself.

It's a small enough change that the laser cane doesn't give him a clear read, so he's grateful for the verbal instructions.

The sounds change as they step into the hallway: it's hardwood floor instead of carpet, and from somewhere upstairs Auggie can hear a violin. A violin?

--Ah. "Sherlock beat us here, I take it."

"I wouldn't be surprised. What, is he playing?" Tony listens. "Oh, yeah, now I hear it. And here's the other living room. No change in elevation this time."

But it does go back to carpet again.

"He takes the Sherlock Holmes thing seriously, doesn't he."

Wonder if that extends as far as cocaine and morphine addiction. He didn't hear sniffing when Sherlock was talking earlier, but that's not a particularly good indication one way or another.

"Very. And he's good at it. He skipped some stuff, though—he didn't use to smoke for a long time, and he still doesn't do it much."

The sound of the violin recedes as they enter this room. (Almost every wall in the house has some soundproofing.)

"Better than going through a pack a day, I guess."

Auggie was an occasional smoker when he was younger. Not any more -- not only does he have enough problems without adding cancer and emphysema to the mix, he doesn't want to fuck up his sense of smell.

"And he doesn't have fucked-up ideas about women and he doesn't do drugs. So, you know, basically he just kept the good parts. You wanna take a seat on the couch? Uh—right in front of you. Well, not quite. One o'clock."

Auggie grins, filing the information about Sherlock away.

"Hey, I didn't even have to tell you the clock-face directions. Thanks."

He finds the couch easily and sits. "So, the fabled sound system."

"You use those? Man, suddenly both our lives are so much easier."

He plops onto the couch at Auggie's side—in touching range, but not touching.

"Okay, fabled sound system is go. Jarvis, show off for us, pretty please?"

"Have you ever been to a shuttle launch?" Jarvis inquires. He could use the speakers to place his voice as though he were standing in the room, but he doesn't, preferring to use all of them equally and maintain the perception that he is everywhere.

Every room in this place must be wired with mics and speakers. He'll have to watch what he says.

You know, unlike any other place he spends a lot of time.

He laces his fingers behind his head and snorts. "God, I wish."

"Well then, allow me."

Jarvis goes quiet; a slow rumble starts up all around them.

Auggie closes his eyes -- old reflex. He can feel the vibrations from what must be some incredibly expensive subwoofers.

He takes them through it and it's like they're standing on the launch pad. When the shuttle lifts off, so does the sound—they're not standing on the launch pad at all; they're floating in the air a mile away, hearing it climb the sky in front of them and then fade slowly into the distance.