The Last Voyages: Inbox

[makingitworse]

Hi, this is Bob. Leave a message if you want to.

Comments

[musicdied]

"I would adopt you, but I do not want to inflict my parents on you," she deadpans. And then, so he can't misconstrue her meaning. "Yes. I still want to be your friend."

A brief pause, and then, "Did you know, our names were a cryptography joke?"

[makingitworse]

"They-- what?" He blinks at her. "What's that mean?" Clearly, he did not. Now she gets to explain, and they can move past the feelings talk.

[musicdied]

"Alice and Bob are characters used in problems and thought exercises for cryptography papers and training." She shrugs a little. "More for electronic security than manual ciphering, but it is a common convention in security and academic circles."

[makingitworse]

"Oh, huh." He's not sure if that's a coincidence or if the Admiral has a real weird sense of humor, or something. "Is Charlie also a character they use?" A, B, and C, it would make sense. But maybe they only need two for their thought exercises.

[musicdied]

Yelena nods slightly. "Sometimes. Or sometimes it's Carol, alternating genders with each letter of the alphabet."

She gives him a quick little grin. "If they need a malicious but non-specific character, it is usually Chuck or Chad."

[makingitworse]

"Chad," Bob says with a chuckle. "Maybe that's where the joke about Chads being terrible guys came from. It started with code-people and just kind of spread from there." Okay, he's unaware of the internet meme involved too, but hey, maybe that's where the name in the internet meme came from too?

[musicdied]

There's a moment's pause as she considers this, before finally admitting, "You know, I do not actually know where that came from. But we can just pretend it was an industry joke that broke containment, even if it actually started somewhere else."

[makingitworse]

"It's a fun story, even if it isn't true," Bob agrees. He gives her a little nudge. "Come on. Let's go... watch a dumb movie or something. Something easy that doesn't make us think about spy stuff."

[musicdied]

"Or school," she says, with an exaggerated grimace. "You pick the movie, and I will round up some snacks."