...
By the time Jane entered Walmart the shock had worn off and had been replaced by a low simmering anger. Jane didn't even know she could get this pissed off, but apparently she could. On the way to town she had tried to talk to Darcy several times, but every time Jane had opened her mouth Darcy had exclaimed to 'totally LOVE this song!' and turned up the radio. Darcy had also been compulsively checking the rear-view mirror to the extent that Jane worried that Darcy wouldn't see what was in front of her. Jane though it was a bit over the top.
But then her cellphone had beeped to tell her about an email. An email that had politely informed her that the Commission of Appleby Grants & Scholarships could no longer continue its sponsorship of Dr Jane Foster, Phd., Phd. and the work thereof. So sorry. Which heralded the official end of her career. Her work was obscure and unpopular and a professor of hers had once stated that 'there is fine line between genius and insanity, and you Jane, probably fall on the wrong side of that line'. Even without SHIELD she had struggled to get anyone interested in her work. With SHIELD in the picture, she'd never see another dime.
She could try and start a different research project, applying to different grants and do a career switch. Not that Jane had any idea what kind of different project that would be. Or she could teach.
Jane snorted; she'd sooner take a job at McDonalds. She just couldn't imagine doing any of that. Einstein-Rosen bridges and stable wormholes had been her life for nearly 7 years now. And now it was over. Good God, it just didn't seem real.
…..
Once inside Wallmart Darcy ducked between the first rows of shelves (office supplies, haha irony, thank you) and mouths a 'WHAT THE FUCK?!' with an almost comically shocked expression. Jane gives a helpless shrug but does not get the chance to speak.
"I mean, I was totally prepared to believe he was just some nutter, but all this craps sorta makes it seem like there's more to him you know." Darcy made a good point. SHIELD may be a shadowy government organisation, but they were not being very covert at the moment.
"I doubt the government ruins people's life work every time they encounter a crazy person." Jane agrees. Or maybe they do. Jane isn't very good a keeping in touch with people, but she's fairly certain a one-time co-worker of hers has disappeared just when he was on the brink of 'something ground-breaking'.
"Yeah." Darcy scoffs. "No one would have a job left. Then again," Darcy says pensively. "That would explain the economy."
"Not the point." Jane reminds her. "The point is that my life is ruined just because I hit someone with my car."
"Which is not entirely uncommon." Darcy mutters.
"Darcy! Focus!" Jane snaps. "They are trying to erase any credibility I may have had in the scientific community, just because I witnessed an Einstein-Rosen bridge. An actual stable wormhole capable of facilitating interplanetary travel, how amazing is that? I mean, that happened, they can't-"
"Wait! Wait wait wait." Darcy interrupts her. "You actually believe him?" Darcy sounds astounded. Darcy is not quite as impressed by the scientific implecations, she never had been. Darcy was the practical one, really.
"Well-" Jane starts, but Darcy won't hear of it.
"You really, really really, think Tall, Blond and Ripped is an alien. An alien that fell from a wormhole?" Darcy clarifies. It sounds ridiculous like that, and not just Darcy's description of Thor.
"You were the one that came up with the whole 'primitive people may think aliens are Gods' explanation." Jane says defensively. It makes sense, Jane thinks, it does.
"Yeah, hypothetically!" Darcy throws back. There is long tense pause in which Jane and Darcy look at each other, searching the other for hints. This is only interrupted when a harried looking woman barrels past them towards the printer paper. The moment is gone and Jane steers their cart to Housewares in a huff. She hadn't expected Darcy of all people to make her feel as if she's nothing but a silly girl.
….
Jane selects a blow-up mattress and some bedding for Thor in stony silence while Darcy trails awkwardly behind her. Jane has no reasonable explanation as to why she believes Thor's story. The aliens, the fact he's a prince of all things, it is crazy. Einstein-Rosen bridges, not as abstract occurrences happing thousands of light-years away, but as real, functional modes of transportation, its insanity. She should disbelieve him. She should laugh and call the loony-bin, but she hadn't and…
"Darcy, I know him." Jane tries to explain. Not that she can really. There is just something about the man, that makes her believe him. He makes her feel warm and safe and.. peaceful, Jane thinks. Lunatics wouldn't do that would they?
"No Jane, you really don't." Darcy sounds serious, which is a rare thing, and a little sad. Jane takes a breath to respond but Darcy holds up her hand. "You hit him with your car twice. You had half a conversation with him and then decided to take him out to steal back a magic hammer and then broke him out of government custody when he failed. You had one more conversation with him and now you claim to know him. You don't, Jane, you can't." Darcy says and she is right. Darcy's right. She's never met the man before today. All objective signs point to him being a fruitcake. She has barely spoken to him. Jane tries again.
"Darcy. I know him." Jane tries to put what she knows, perhaps not logically, but certainly truthfully, into that one word. She knows Thor. Knows him like a carrier pigeon just knows where he came from, even if you release him thousands of miles from that point. Knows things about him she never learned. She feels for him, even if she can't put it into words. She looks at Darcy pleading her to understand. Darcy sighs and switches out the air-mattress for another (That one sucks, she says) and selects a pillow with her back turned to Jane.
"Yeah, okay." Darcy relents. "I think maybe I do too." Darcy then admits, though she doesn't sound happy about it. The implication is clear. Darcy feels connected to Thor somehow as well.
"What?" Jane asks completely taken aback. She would never have expected anyone to accept that reasoning, let alone share in it. "They why did you..?"
"Because sanity, Jane." Darcy explains as if she's a two year old. "Sanity. I'm trying to hold on to it." Darcy shrugs helplessly.
"Yeah." Jane agrees. "Sanity." And then laughs.
…..
After the breakfast foods and sodas Jane wanders around the men's section trying to guess at Thor's size. He is certainly a large man, she'll probably bring things with hems and sleeves a couple inches short.
"All of this brings us back to the original question." Darcy suddenly continues a conversation that ended a while ago. "What are we gonna do?" Darcy asks.
"We don't have to do anything." Jane says, even though it pains her. She doesn't know the girl all that well, objectively, but they've struck up a deep, if a bit unusual, friendship. "I will sign off on your credits and you can go back to college. Graduate, have a life." Jane offers. She has, for herself, already decided on Thor and all that he will bring with him. Darcy crosses her arms over her chest and raises and eyebrow.
"One, do you think SHIELD will just let me? I tasered him!" Darcy reminds Jane. As if Jane could forget. "Also, a life? Really?" Darcy says 'life' with such an intonation that it includes all things such as marriage and mortgages. Jane gives her a half-smile, understanding Darcy's contempt on a visceral level. She's also insanely grateful, Lord knows Jane needs Darcy. Jane sighs.
"Ok, well," Jane murmurs, trying to hide her relief. "then I don't know." Jane admits. "I could apply for the University of Cologne's study into the gravitational pull of Zubenelgenubi in the Libra constellation." Jane thinks out loud. It's not really her thing, but it's not McDonalds or a classroom either.
"Yeah, uhuh, that was my second idea too." Darcy waves away. "But my first idea was this one." Darcy holds out another envelope. Jane takes it and notices it's made of a heavy cream paper, almost parchment. It's addressed to her, forwarded from Culver. Jane reads it.
"Dear Dr Foster… blah bah, interested, work in Einsten-Rosen, yada yada, private investment uhuh uhuh, hire with the initial salary of, holy shit." Jane meets Darcy's eyes.
"This is a joke." Jane states.
"Nope." Darcy counters.
"Then this is SHIELD trying to do more spying." Jane concludes. The pay is unusually high, they are offering to pay Darcy as well and unlike official government grants and universities, they get no benefit from hiring her, no mention of rights to patents etc.
"Nope, they're legit." Darcy states. "They, that is, this absurdly rich family business does this more often. They have this dude studying alchemy, and some other dude studying telomere regeneration and nano-technology and this chick that looks into regenerative plants. All the crazy stuff, really." Darcy explains. "Though, as you can see in the letter, they reserve the right to retract all funding if they think you're going actually loopy."
Jane looks at Darcy with new eyes.
"How do you even know that?" Jane asks. "This letter only just arrived." Jane scans the letter. "Two days ago." Huh, that means it would have been written before Thor had even arrived. Not SHIELD then. But with what has been happening, when would Darcy have had the time to enquire?
"I checked." Darcy holds up a particularly ugly bikini top and studies it intently.
"Checked how?" Jane queries.
"On the computer." Darcy says, an odd turn of phrase really.
"On the computer?" Jane asks, but then lets that sink in for a few heartbeats. "You hacked them." Jane realises. "OMG, you hacked them?!"
"Hacking is illegal." Darcy states holding up another bathing suit that is perfectly sized for Jane if she were twelve.
"Shit." Jane breathes. "You're a hacker. You hack… things." Jane tries to wrap her head around that. "You're in political science though." Jane thinks out loud.
"Yeah." Darcy says. "Computer science would be way too obvious." Darcy abandons her bathing suit distraction. "Also, what would I learn? Anyway, I just took a whole bunch of classes and PoliSci just came up." Darcy explains.
Jane needs to think about that for a moment. Darcy is a hacker and is hardly as flighty as she often seems. After all, ever since Darcy has been her intern bills have gotten paid on time, food has always been available, there was always gas in the tank an such things Jane always forgets. Also, her handling of SHIELD was unexpected. But why Darcy would want to work for Jane is beyond her. It's not even paid.
"Wait, did you hack me?" Jane asks, after all, how did those bills get paid? Darcy doesn't speak for a minute.
"Jane, why would I hack someone just so that I would be the only applicant for an unpaid internship with some crazy doctor in the Middle of Nowhere, NM? All on some vague gut feeling that that was where I needed to be?" That was actually not what Jane had been thinking of, but it did make her think. How had Darcy been the only applicant? "Well," Darcy concludes. "That would just be crazy." Jane stares and gets the sudden urge to hug Darcy.
"Yeah." Jane agrees. "Crazy."
"Ooh! Look at the cute Pyjamas!" Darcy changes the subjects suddenly and bounces away, leaving Jane with her thoughts. Jane follows Darcy as she finishes up the shopping for a few minutes before speaking.
"So this offer, it's true?" Jane asks.
"Yeah." Darcy confirms. "Fucking creepily well-timed and plain weird, but true." Jane stares at the letter and reads it again.
"Huh." Jane mutters then to herself. "Canada."
...
I find that Jane is a character that has so much potential, but is hard to make interesting. Darcy rocks. Always.