xp_logs | Fred and Bertha, Joyous Noize Night 1 (BACKDATED to AUG 25)

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Fred meets a kindred spirit during his security shift at the concert...

Unlike her recruited 'extra-security-team', Bertha's security badge was visible on the lanyard around her neck, and glowing slightly in the black-lights of the club. The reflective paper was a genius idea, made the badges stand out even more, especially against her dark blue
t-shirt. She accepted a plastic cup of soda from one of the bartenders and worked her way back outside - inside duty was not her favorite thing - hot and crowded was a great way to meet guys, not a great way to keep an eye on shit.

She headed out the staff door and leaned against the wall - even summer air was cooler than the stuff inside and grinned broadly at the guy on the other side of the door with his hand cupped around a cigarette. "You're one of Dori's X-peeps, right? She didn't tell me
about you at all. I swear, that girl is so bad at giving me the deets on her male friends, I don't even know."

The words directed towards him broke Fred out of his reverie; for the past two hours, some of the more excitable fans had been pestering him constantly to 'do cool mutant stuff'. His cigarette was a reward for dazzling the folks by lifting a small car clean over his head. He was still trying to 'deflate' when girl calling him caught his attention. He grinned at the woman, who obviously knew Dori well enough to know him, "Iffen it ain't written inna comic, Dori ain't got any time for it." Fred offered his free hand, "Fred. Uh, Dukes. Pleasure tah make yah acquaintance, ma'am."

"Ashley Crawford, but I go by Bertha." Bertha shook his hand. "Nice to meet you, Fred -uh- Dukes. And from what I hear, Dori's got time enough for her guy, and for school and her comics and that's about it sometimes. Smart enough girl but her head is up in the clouds half the time. Heart as big as my boots though." She kicked out one foot, clad in impressive size fifteen engineer boots. "If you tell her I said that, I will pound you. It'll ruin my reputation."

Fred laughed a little behind his cigarette, and after a moment of hesitation showed off his larger, unclad foot, "Yah secret is safe with me, Ashley Crawford but-I-go-by-Bertha. An Ah wouldn't worry about poundin me. That's mah whole thing: Ah'm Unpoundable."

Bertha actually clasped one hand to her chest and laughed, in a good-natured way. "I like you. No wonder Dori's keeping you a secret, she doesn't want me to drag you off to keep you for myself. Unpoundable, huh? In the strong way, or the tough way, or both?" She
flexed a fist, and with a intense look of concentration, it grew just a bit. "I've got some of both of that, myself."

Fred coughed a little when Bertha mentioned 'keeping him'. Women made him nervous, and he got rocket propelled granade-ed at least twice a week during training. When Bertha's fist expanded in size, he smiled almost literally from ear to ear. Fred clenched his cigarette between his teeth and took his jacket back off; after a few moments, Fred was half again as large and wide as the woman in front of him, "Uh, Ah guess Ah'm onna those 'both'-types too..."

"Don't you know, I love it when I meet a guy who can keep up with me." Bertha said. "And then some. I don't get much taller than I am now, and if I push my size, I'll bust my jeans, and it's not like the places I do shoots for are rolling in enough green to hand me
clothes." And really, plus-size modeling didn't pay much anyway. Enough to cover a few textbooks, but that was about it. "So what does a guy like you do when he's not flying out to the middle of the country to play undercover concert security?"

Fred shrugged as his body unevenly deflated, waiting until he was closer to 'normal' size to respond, "Uh, normal stuff, Ah guess. Fix cars. Save lives. Fight for tha downtrod mutants of the world. Listen tah tha radio...Ah went tah India once...uh, videogames? Eatin contests with mah friend Kyle...?" Fred rubbed his chin, completely perplexed for a moment. "Yah know, come tah think of it, Ah don't do a lot...huh, Ah'll be damned...hmmm..." he said, as he continued to try and think of his actual day-to-day activities...

"India. Huh. I don't think I've ever been much past the mid-west. My folks took me to Disneyland once, but you barf after riding the teacup ride once, it loses it's charm, you know?" Bertha said. "I bet you win a lot of eating contests though." She grinned, lopsided and easy and shoulder-bumped Fred. "There's a pizza place here that makes sixty inch pies."

Fred just gaped, open mouthed, "Ah...that's the most beautiful thing Ah've ever heard. What's the topping situation? How far are they? What are their hours? Are they hiring?"

A impish giggle was -not- the kind of laugh you'd expect a woman like Bertha to have, but she did in fact, giggle. "Up to three toppings, but you have to pay extra for pineapple, and you know, normal pizza place hours, open an hour before lunch, and until about an hour after
the bars close. No idea on the hiring though, but don't you have a job saving lives and fighting for the downtrod mutants of the world?"

Fred seemed to genuinely sigh, "Dammit, Ah do save lives for ah livin. Dammin hell...but huge-ass pizza with red peppers, garlic an' onions is a pretty good consolation prize..." He gave Bertha a warm punch to the arm, "Thanks for tha tip. Soon as Ah getta chance, that pizza is mine ."

"Hey, you guys flew all the way out here just to help us out, I'll spring for that pizza." She had enough to cover two of those, Bertha figured, and root beer, and Fred seemed like the kind of guy to like root beer. "They won't let me do the 'eat it in an hour' challenge
anymore, and probably'll exclude you just on the basis of you're with me, but it really ain't no thing anyway."

Fred looks indignant, but still grinned, "Sounds like discrimination tah me." He looked around the alley as he lit a new cigarette of his spent one, "Kinda makes me wish these bands would get done with their moshin an playin an such. Ah want mah huge pizza like now..."

"More like capitalism. They gotta make a profit and all." Bertha said. She checked the time on her phone and then made a thoughtful noise. "Two more to go, and then we're all done for the night. Hopefully it'll stay, well, I guess quiet's the wrong word, huh?"

"It's been 'peaceful'. How's that?" Fred snorted a little before sharing the joke with Bertha, "Though from tha little Ah saw of tha guy, Ah dunno iffen 'quiet' and 'peaceful' can exist in tha same zip code as tha Guido fella..." he said, jerking his thumb back towards one of the venues...

"Well, peaceful aside from kicking out a couple of drunk weenies and that guy who decided to get bare-ass nekkid after the second band." Bertha said. "Guido's a card. You know, you meet a guy who has a music career, you think you're gonna be star struck and then he's all midwestern charm and aw shucks about things. And from what I hear, he knew some of you X-peeps back in the day or something."