The road goes ever on and on.

Porter nodded in agreement, taking a deep breath before speaking again. “Oh, my name is Porter. A-and no, you’re fine, you’re not disturbing me.” He put his hands in the pockets of his sweatshirt, pulling his legs closer to his chest. He let out a short sigh. “It’s uh… nice to meet you.”

“Likewise.” Zeke is thankful, though Porter likely can’t tell. Telling anyone his name always has some risk attached to it, but it doesn’t seem like he’s heard of him. Good. Maybe the wanted posters have stopped circulating since he managed to evade capture last year. Perhaps he’s been pronounced legally dead or the like? That’d be useful.

Clive’s mouth twists to the side and looks over Zeke again in consideration. What’s this guy been up to, then. “Ye, you do look different but, honestly, the workers here get 2 hours of guaranteed free time everyday besides showers and sleep. And they’d mostly have their head in the desserts, they ain’t gonna notice much about a guy who looks close enough but just has weird eyes and is a bit pink.” Zeke gives the other Elsen a bit too much credit, the ones who weren’t sweetened up enough to notice where probably too busy wanting to get sweetened up. “Like, it ain’t like you’re planning on robbing the sugar vaults or anything. It’s the cafeteria,” he snorted slightly before turning around and began walking off. “Look,I’m heading there anyway so if you’re jittery about it you can just come with me.” The offer was casual, the guy seemed weird before and he’s still weird but he doesn’t seem like a dangerous sorta weird. At first impression, second impression??, anyway… “Besides. I’m a good guy like that, wouldn’t you say so, Mister Passing-Through?”

“True, I suppose.” Zeke knows what sugar-high elsen are like - hell, he’s had enough of the stuff to feel it himself, a few times - and he has to agree with Clive. They can barely remember their own names.

He almost flinches at the joke about the sugar vaults. Well... Hopefully he won’t have to do that again anytime soon. He catches up to Clive as he walks away.

“No, no, while I do enjoy being with my friends, it sometimes gets…. tiring, y'know? So I take a walk, find a place to settle, and play guitar all I want before I feel comfortable going back.” Porter shrugged. “I don’t know. Sometimes it’s too much. Knowing that people even….. care.” He mumbled the last part, looking down at his burnt hands. “O-oh uh, sorry. I-I didn’t mean for th-that to get all… uh… p-personal.” He shifted himself a little bit, nervous.

Clive shrugs casually, part of him feeling unused to talking this amicably to another elsen. “It’s a living,” he could tell Zeke was a skeptic and honestly couldn’t blame the guy, “don’t worry it won’t cost you money.” Okay, so the second hand feelings coming from Zeke were giving him the most amusement he’s felt in weeks, sue him. He doesn’t want the guy too stressed out though, so he continues after a beat. “Like, you get a meal yeah. You have some, much as you want but you leave some. You give what’s left to me and I read it from there. Simple enough.” Yeah, Clive probably wouldn’t believe that either but hey. “If you feel like giving it a go sometime, or you have some free time to spare after all, passing through. You could usually find me at the cafeteria. Gonna guess you know where that is?” Zeke doesn’t look like he’s from Clive’s Vesper but he definitely looks like he could be from another places Vesper.

Zeke listens curiously, though he squints at the last remark. He’s already come to expect jabs and double entendres from Clive. “V-very funny. Yes, I do know where it is.” He lets it slide; in his experience Vesper elsens tend to be more laissez-faire about weight. It’d be a little difficult not to be, in a lot of cases. It was certainly that way back in his home file.

“Is that so? I-i’m not from around here too… but it’s a long story…ha ha…” Fleur laughs nervously, looking somewhere with a blank expression. “Ah, y-yes, of cousre you can take it! I read it anyway…”

“I get bored sometimes, yeah.” Porter shrugged. “But I usually just stay around my friends. Another reason that I moved. Pretty much everyone I knew at the time lived in Zone 2, so.” He was surprised that this person didn’t ask about his scars yet. Almost everyone did the first time they met him. It was odd, but he didn’t mention it.

Porter shrugged, looking over to the side for a bit and then back at the other elsen. He wasn’t exactly comfortable talking about Zone 3, but he tried to not show it. “Well, Zone 3 is a lot more… organized. It’s not as calm and quiet as Zone 2 is. I honestly prefer Zone 2 over Zone 3…”

Clive grinned at the others reaction and half-assedly brought a hand to his mouth to cover the suppressed laughing.

That was beautiful.

“Okay, passing through, could already tell you’re a file hopper. Not gonna lie its pretty obvious.” He said, gesturing casually at his own eyes to in point. “You’re certainly prettier than the lot you tend to get around here, anyway.” Okay, yeah he’s being a asshole. “Though, I wouldn’t worry about any of your Virtues,” Clive smirked, “that ain’t what I was offering. I’m a fortune teller, one with a fairly good satisfaction rate around here.”

Zeke experiences a poorly-maintained kiddie-coaster of emotion: rather short and not terribly dramatic, yet still somewhat jarring.

First comes nervousness. He’s perfectly aware that he doesn’t quite blend in in this file, but it still sets him on edge to hear it stated so plainly. He’s been finding it progressively harder to hide in general; he used to be pleased to be getting taller, but since many files have elsens on the shorter side, it’s getting difficult for him to disappear into a crowd even when things like his eyes don’t give him away.

Then he is, admittedly, a little flustered. “Pretty” is something he hasn’t been called for a long time, and it’s pleasant to hear. Even if he’s not interested. (Not right now, anyway.)