Welcome to Gaia! ::

School was over for the day, but Gabriel Blake remained at Meadowview. He was hanging around waiting for the latest meeting of the Astronomy Club to start up, and of course he could think of nothing better to do than flip through the latest newsletter from MUFON. He'd be distributing them to his fellow members at the meeting that night, but of course he had time, so he was getting a head start on reading.

The rest were spilling out of his backpack, set next to him. Perhaps bringing UFO literature to school was not the best idea, but then, Gabriel was not one for good ideas as a rule. Besides, perhaps someone would catch sight and he'd earn a new member for MUFON. He could always hope.

Gabriel glanced up from his newsletter and spotted the other student coming over. He set it aside and gave a smile and a wave. No reason not to be friendly, right?

"Hello!" He said cheerily. "Are you here for the Astronomy Club? Or are you looking for something else?" He offered a hand. "If you're lost, I could try and help you find where you're going...oh, but you go to school here, don't you, I think I've seen you before? so I guess you'd know how to get around." He was babbling, not that he really registered nor cared that he was. That was sort of what he did. "I'm Gabriel." This was friendlier than he sometimes was, but hey, he spent a lot of time at school and didn't have all that many good friends, he might as well at least attempt to make more. (Even if there was that slim chance he was introducing himself to an alien.)

Gabriel nodded, a cheery expression plastered on the auburn-haired male's face. "Ah, art club, that must be fun." It was too bad it met on the same day as the astronomy club, otherwise he might be tempted to join. Then again, his doodles of little green men in spaceships probably wouldn't be much appreciated. They never were. Sigh.

"Alexandre, very nice to meet you." He bobbed his head excitedly. "Astronomy in college? Maybe, if I go." His parents would certainly prefer he went to university, but he wasn't entirely certain it was the right path for him.

"Weelll, there's not really a college for what I want to do." Gabriel replied. He wasn't sure exactly how much information he wanted to divulge.

It was a little sad, but he did in fact follow Alexandre as he headed to the vending machine, the borderline condescension flying right over his head. "Oh, I'm just a member of the astronomy club, but I do run Destiny City's MUFON branch. Uh, the Mutual UFO Network." His face lit up with pride. "I founded the branch here, and I lead it. There aren't many of us, you'd think there would be more in a city like this."

Gabe paused. People tended to react poorly to his choice of career, but, well, he'd been asked directly, what the hell. "I'd like to be a UFO hunter. Go cross-country chasing sightings, that sort of thing." He said. "they don't really teach you how to do that, you know?"

He shook his head. "Contact isn't really in our reach. We're just citizens,w e don't have the kind of technology that people like SETI - er, the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence- do. Mostly, we just discuss sightings and gather evidence. It's crazy,t he sort of stuff we've got right here in Destiny City..." Then, Alexandre's words caught up with him. "Wait, what do you mean, it's not hard to make contact?" He eyeballed the other student vaguely suspiciously.

"Uh, water, thanks," he was surprised the offer had been extended, and of course he took it. Woo, free drinks!

Gabriel nodded. "Exactly! So why would I waste time and money on college when I can't really learn what I need anyway," he said. "I mean, interview skills, sure, but you learn that on the fly."

"Interesting? There's an understatement. This place is like, the strange encounters capitol of the world. It's amazing what people come to meetings with!" Even as occasionally oblivious he could be, he spotted that smile.

He accepted the water graciously. "Thanks," He cracked it open, tilting his head and watching Alexandre carefully. "Yes, we do." He paused, considered. "Have you...had an encounter?" He asked. Alexandre seemed to be hinting at something, and Gabe darned well wanted to know what it was.

"Well,t he thing is, what people see in Destiny City...it's not what you expect. People talk about little green men and flying saucers and that sort of thing...but that's not what you get here. Weird monsters, mostly, and teenagers in crazy outfits. Girls in short skirts and the like." To him, the unusual nature do the Destiny City sightings made them seem all the more real. Anyone could whip up a little green man, but who was going to admit to seeing some chick do weird magic unless it was true?

"People are confused." He said. "But, I mean,t here are some body snatching theories going around. Like, they're coming and they're borrowing human shapes to go incognito and all."

And then Alex admitted to an encounter and Gabe let out a tiny, excited squeak. He began to bounce on his toes. "Really? I've heard about the terrorist attacks, and we'd started to connect the dots...you know, since they always seem to involve all kinds of weird activity and whatnot. You've been in close? What happened? What did you see?"

"Reborn souls of aliens? That's...pretty out there. But hey, who am I to judge." Really, to Gabe, that made a sort of sense. It explained why every report indicated that they looked human-they were born into human bodies! How nefarious. "Where,d you hear this? Er, if you can tell me." That was common, of course, an inability to reveal ones' sources was not discrediting in this field.

"...Magic?" Gabe was even more intrigued now. How rare it was to hear someone use the word "magic" to describe things in this day and age. "Like, point at you and say some nonsense words and suddenly explosions, or what?" He was going to pry as much information out of Alexandre as possible. This was definitely going to top the agenda at the MUFON meeting tonight.