badassprodigy | A warehouse called George

And, sometime later that afternoon, the air in the warehouse crackled just a little to precede the appearance of a glowing green portal, from which Summer promptly dropped out of.

Like you do.

"Barry, I--" she started, turning to knock on what she thought would be door to the warehouse, only to discover that she hadn't wound up exactly where she had been planning to wind up. "Dammit!" She gave the device in her hand a frustrated smack. "You were supposed to send me outside the warehouse! Outside!"

She was starting to feel a little more sympathetic toward all the times Rick portal-crashed into her living room, though. Apparently, it was just a thing it did, but that didn't make it any less weird, rude, or awkward, geez!

There was a very unmanly yelp followed by “JESUS FUCKING CHRIST!” As first of all an unplanned incursion into his warehouse followed by a sigh of relief seeing who it was.

“Jesus, Summer. A little warning next time? If my security system was online that could have been a fucking disaster”

That mood soon shifted as Summer began to smack a device in her hand. “Is that what I think it is?”

"I didn't mean to!" Summer argued back. "I totally set the coordinates for outside the warehouse! Outside!" As if repeating it again could help the portal gun to not be a close-enough coordinates type of jerk. "But this thing," she gave it an irritated shake, "has got a real problem with respecting people's privacy."

Was it...bad that she was now sort of wondering what might have happened if the security system was online? That was...bad, right, to be wondering about that, in not so much a thought-exercise way, but in a sort-of-want-to-find-out-first-hand way? Yeah, that was probably bad...

But the fact of the matter was that she even had the thing she was complaining about to complain about, and her irritation dropped away with an excited grin. "And yes," she answered, foisting the gun forward for Barry to take, "it is. I got an alert on my phone letting me know that Grampa Rick had left the house but not via the gun, so as soon as my class was over, I headed back to snag it while he was gone. I don't know how long we can have it out before he comes home and notices, but I figured you wouldn't need too long to, like, look it over and do diagnostics or whatever you need to do to be able to replicate it."

Followed by a scoff, and a roll of her eyes.

"And maybe make it a little less likely to just drop people into other people's living rooms and warehouses."

This had clearly not been a one-time issue.

Edited 2020-09-18 10:50 (UTC)

Barry was now all business. Taking the portal gun in hand he took it over to his workstation and started a physical evaluation of the unit until he finally found what he was looking for. A data port.

“You’d thing that would be built in,” Barry commented as he pulled up an isolated workstation devoid of any network connection and started plugging in the portal gun. “One bad hump and you could be in the middle of a shitstorm.”

Data immediately sprung up on the workstation. “Your grandpa is fucking paranoid. He’s got some complicated security features here but it won’t take too long to get around them. How much time do you think we have before he knows it’s gone?”

Summer followed Barry over to the workstation and, finding a spot where she could sort of lean in comfortably while hopefully being out of the way, watched him work curiously, with a faint snort at the paranoid comment.

"It's really hard to tell," she admitted. "Maybe an hour? But less would probably better, just in case. I wanted to get back way sooner than this, but my dad was home," cue the eyeroll and a displeased scrunch of her face, "and wanted to catch up."

Which was about a million times more awkward than it would have been before last week, too! Thanks, algorithm!

"And it's not like I could just be all, like, 'hey, Dad, that's super cool about your bees and all, and I'm really happy for you, but I'm kind of on a covert mission to steal Grampa's stuff right now, so if maybe we could...not?'"

Edited 2020-09-18 12:15 (UTC)

"Heh. Reminds of all the times when I was a kid and fucked up my experiments," Barry replied as he started typing, "My Dad would get super pissed and start screaming at me for fucking up the furnace because there was always an explosion. That's where I'd usually have to start tap dancing and come up with an excuse. Gas leaks were always my favorite."

As he type he initiate and counter to the ray gun's security protocol providing security responses that made it seem like this was a trusted computer and-

"And I'm in," Barry said with a grin that only came with feeling superior to another 'genius'. "Give me ten minutes and I should be able to get the schematics and firmware copied over."

...

"Your father keeps bees?"

And Barry's grin just inspired a pleased, adoring, somewhat possessive and totally healthy and normal grin that went along with seeing that her genius was totally the superior, better, cuter, smarter one...

Even if she was right back to an eye roll with that last part.

"Ohmygod," she said, "yeah, it's a new thing, and yet another one of his desperate reaches for some kind of relevancy and importance in this word, and he will not shut up about it, so I mean, hey, if you need an in with the guy, just ask about his stupid bees and let him talk and you'll probably be on his good side forever."

Not that Summer cared about Jerry's approval, but it would probably make things a little easier...

"Oh, and speaking of covert missions," she added, because she hadn't just popped in for the portal gun, even if that was definitely the main plot here, "I'm going to be gone for a few days. I'm helping Rey with a weapons run back in her universe, so if I don't, like, answer my texts or whatever, don't worry, it's definitely not you."

"Weapons run? Oh, that's cool," Barry said somewhat distracted by the diagrams coming up on the screen. Who is this guy? It looks like it was put together with spare parts from a garage while drunk.

He then pulled himself away from the monitor because, hello, girlfriend talking here.

"Sooo... look. I'm going to put this on the table. Between you and Rey being fucking badasses? Not worried about whatever shit you might get into. I have no doubts that you could totally handle whatever those galactic shitbags can throw at you. But just in case-"

He leaned over to a cabinet and placed his thumb on a biometric reader which caused the drawer to pop open. Inside was something that looked like a hypodermic gun and also a wristband that looked like a fitbit band.

"-I've got these interdimensional transponders. So if you got into something and needed help I can call in a calvary. If you needed it. No pressure or anything. You can totally say no but it'd give me one less thing to worry about."

Awww, he'd be worried?

That was, anyway, what Summer was mostly going to take out of that, especially since she had mostly assumed Barry hadn't heard any of that once she realized that, right, science mode, probably not the best time for a conversation and had pretty much prepared herself to start idly scoping out his set-up while he worked.

A little part of? Kind of disappointed not to just get to idly scope out his set-up, but it was a small part, especially since she figured she'd have more than enough time for that later, and she grinned as she picked up the transponder for a closer look.

"I mean," she said, "Rey and I pretty much are the fucking calvary, but I guess it never hurts to have a little extra back-up. Just in case."

And she'd totally take it because that was really sweet and adorable and flattering, but she didn't care how much shit hit the fan, how much trouble they were in, or how fucking in the weeds they might get, she could never actually use this thing, because, ohmygod, how fucking embarrassing would that be? She would literally literally rather die.

And she really hoped it wouldn't have some sort of psycho protocol about keeping her safe...been there, done that, not a fan!

Don't worry, Summer. These transponders do not have an AI or the ability to negotiate treaties with psychic spiders.

"Just in case," Barry repeated, in agreement. "I appreciate that. Now there are two versions. One is subdermal which would prevent anyone finding it and taking it away from you, but is invasive. The other one just goes around your wrist but can easily be taken away. Your choice."

"Wrist!" Summer said, almost immediately after Barry stopped finished. It was almost before he even stopped; she managed to hold back, but just barely.

Look, she still hadn't really shaken the feeling that she ready had more than enough undetectable shit like that lurking under her skin right now.

But to make up for anything odd about the alacrity in which she made her decision, she picked up the band with an admiring expression. "It's totally cute, right? It'll actually go really well with my outfit for the weekend, too, really make it pop."

And that actually was sincere, she was super dedicated to looking cute as hell for this gun running thing.

"Well, I'm a function over function guy but I'm glad it works for you," Barry said, not at all surprised by the choice or the reaction from Summer. Based on what he'd gathered from Summer about her grandfather he sounded like a dickhead. A genius but a complete dickhead. "I'll try and keep your style in mind while I'm working on your project here. If that matters to you."

"I mean," said Summer, grinning in a way that completely seemed to contradict the the words, "of course it's not, like, important or anything, buuuut... that is always kinda nice. Whatever works, though, obvs."

Barry laughed. "You're adorable," he said standing up and leaning in to give her a quick kiss on the cheek. "I'll see what I can do for you. I'll send you some color samples."

Which will no doubt be in the middle of a dogfight with imperial fighters.

And then the console Barry had set up let off a pleasing ping-sounding noise. "There we go," Barry said leaning over the keyboard and then typing in some commands. "I'm going to delete any logs of my access and-"

He disconnected the cable and held out the portal gun to Summer "-by Monday or Tuesday I'll have something you can rub in your grandfather's face."

Oh, man, Summer really hoped she'd be stuck in, like, the doggiest of fights. She did have those sweet new cannons that were just going to waste, after all!

At the moment, though, Summer was just content to be beaming over that kiss on the cheek and being called adorable, and then finding a thrilled little squealing sound when Barry handed the gun back over.

"Thank you so much, Barry," she gushed. "This is going to make things so much easier, and I know Seivarden's going to really appreciate it when I managed to finally get through this block of hers..."

And then...yeah, no, sorry, Barry. Just a kiss on the cheek was so not going to cut it, and now that he was finished, Summer was not going to hold back in reaching for him to pull him in so she could thank him better with a proper kiss.

Barry was not prepared for that but he certainly wasn’t going to resist. And for a moment all the elements of his mind were able to quiet down and enjoy the moment.

And he certainly couldn’t stop smiling when it was done. “You better get moving before your grandfather figures out what was going on.”

Funny. Wasn’t letting go just yet.

"Yeah," Summer grinned, "probably."

Also not in any apparent rush to get moving.

"But before I do," she said, fingers brushing coyly at his chest, eyes bright and steady with intent...

"...I've got to ask about that carrot."

“Trying to solve world hunger,” he said looking very amused.

"Of course you are," Summer said admiringly, grinning before leaning in for another quick kiss.

"Okay. I should go." She pulled away enough to change the coordinates on the gun for the house. "Good luck with that. And thanks, again, Barry. You're amazing."

Ah, crap. And she was right back to that stupid, adoring grin.

“Have fun pissing off a galactic empire!”

"Always do!" Summer sang brightly, looking around for a good spot to shoot the portal, then pulled the trigger. One more super quick kiss, another "Thanks again!" And then she hopped right through.

And hopefully not straight into the goddamn living room.

Barry smiled as Summer hopped through the portal. In another time or another place it would have been him going off on wild adventures. But now he was content to be where he was doing what he did best. He stood there for a moment or two basking in the moment before turning back to the project at hand.

And while the never ending streams of thought started up again the smile on his face stuck around for a long time.

Edited 2020-09-19 02:30 (UTC)

A warehouse called George - Friday

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