Stark Industries, Monday

[endsthegame]

There was no point in spending his time crying about what had happened during the zombie invasion. Ender showed up on time at work, with his laptop full of more Formic data - it was a trickle what he got, but he took it all gladly anyway - and set back to work on the satellite.

When he didn't have his eyes set on all the images on his screen, that was, and that wasn't as often as you'd think. He still did a credible job of making it look like work.

[ open! ]

Comments

[weetuskenraider]

There were a number of reasons that Tahiri was never going to be the go-to Jedi for negotiations or anything involving touchy political issues and instead get sent on the kind of missions that inevitably ended up with her unconscious and possibly losing her lightsaber again.

One of which was her tendency to not care about appropriate conversation settings. Or timing.

"You and I need to have a talk," she said without preamble, in a clipped tone.

. . . another one was not being so great on the conversational lead-ins.

[[May be SPish for a bit, gnargh workload.]]

[endsthegame]

It was probably lucky for her that Ender's social skills were on a completely different level. He was adaptable, and he could make an educated guess as to why she was here. It was hence with all the calm in the world that he lifted himself up and away from his laptop, and said, "Hi, Tahiri," in a tone that was probably the reverse of hers.

There was a reason Ender frustrated Petra Arkanian a lot.

[weetuskenraider]

"Great, you too." Tahiri hadn't spent this much time wanting to bang her head into a wall since being stuck with the Wraiths, and that was different because they talked too much. "So is that Ender-speak for sure, okay or not if you paid me?"

She'd pretty much worn her monthly supply of patience out already, over the past few days.

[endsthegame]

"It's Ender-speak for 'hi, Tahiri'," Ender said, patiently. She was a Jedi, so he took care to exercise his natural talent towards folding feelings far back down where even people who could dig that deep couldn't go. This was about Ben - you didn't need a genius to figure that out. She was also agitated, and not giving her any direct answers would probably make that worse.

He just didn't think spilling Ben's secrets was going to be the best thing for either of them. "I don't say no to talking." She could take the conversation to begin with, and he'd figure out what she knew, and what to say from there, if anything.

[weetuskenraider]

Oh, part of Tahiri agreed with that. It was just getting overridden by the part that was fed up with people shutting down on her and even more by the part that was frustrated, hurt, and more than a little freaked out by not having anything conclusive to go by. She'd have been even more impatient, truthfully, if she hadn't had years of practice dealing with a non-talker in Anakin, but even that was different because she'd always been able to read him.

She gritted her teeth and tried to calm down enough to at least formulate an opening salvo, and sent out a mild Force suggestion in the hope that any eavesdropping squirrels in the vicinity would fall for the notion that anywhere else would be more interesting than here.

"You know what I'm here about, don't you?" she asked to start with. "It has something to do with me, the other me. I can tell that much, and I know it's bad. But other than that I don't know anything."

[endsthegame]

"I could tell you to entertain the possibility there's a good reason you don't know," he said. He could dodge and weave all day if he wanted to, but that wouldn't get him any closer to helping.

[NFB, OMG]

[weetuskenraider]

"A good reason according to who?" Tahiri maintained. "Because from where I'm standing, knowing part of something and having suspicions about the rest is worse than knowing everything, or nothing at all. And he's not exactly being subtle about, oh, I don't know, running away."

Re: [NFB, OMG]

[endsthegame]

"A good reason according to Ben," he said, smoothly. He felt strange, being the one lecturing about keeping secrets, but lying was second nature to everyone. "Ben has the subtlety of a brick. He'll associate you with her for a long while. No amount of knowledge is going to wipe that out no matter how much you'd like it to." He tapped his finger against his desk. "But not being her might be a better start."

Re: [NFB, OMG]

[weetuskenraider]

"He's told me before I'm nothing like her, so why . . ." Tahiri kind of hated that her face went pale, though she had to allow herself a brief, strangled laugh at Ender's assessment of Ben's subtlety. What in the kriffing hells had the other her done to him to make him such a mess? "A better start. Fine. But I need a place to start from. Lines I need to know not to cross. Something."

Re: [NFB, OMG]

[endsthegame]

Ender's mouth quirked a little. "Are you going to try to hit me if I suggest patience?"

Re: [NFB, OMG]

[weetuskenraider]

"No," Tahiri said, getting that 'headwalling would be nice right now' look on her face again, "even if it is kind of tempting."

Re: [NFB, OMG]

[endsthegame]

"Good," he said, "I'm not really capable of fending off a big bad Jedi at present." Although he'd probably be able to figure out a way if it ever came up, but Ender would rather not think about that right now. "You don't make someone comfortable with you by snapping your fingers or using the right trick."

Re: [NFB, OMG]

[weetuskenraider]

Make someone comfortable with you, he said, like she had to start from scratch. Like putting together puzzle pieces, the sort of thing that had always been Anakin's forte while Tahiri watched and tried not to drive him crazy with too many questions.

Tahiri sighed and looked away. "It's all the little things that make him uncomfortable that trip me up, because I can't tell what's going to do it next. I can't even make a joke without wondering if it'll make him twitch."

[momslilassassin]

Ben, who thought he was Shirley Temple, skipped into the shop, twirled around, and frowned. "This isn't the candy shop."

[endsthegame]

"No," Ender said, and looked up, a little bit nonplussed. "Did you hit your head, Skywalker?"

[momslilassassin]

Ben giggled. "Of course not, silly! I have very good balance. I'm a dancer!"

He twirled on one foot to demonstrate.

[endsthegame]

Gremlin bite. There were very few things that could make Ender Wiggin laugh as much as he was currently doing. Probably good Ben wasn't sane enough to hear it.

[momslilassassin]

"Do you like to dance too?" Ben asked, bouncing on his toes. "Or sing?"

[endsthegame]

Ender managed to reel it in after a few moments. "I like to leave that to everybody else," he said.

[momslilassassin]

"But everyone can dance," Ben said, doing a little bit of tapdancing, just to show off.

Except Ben, when he wasn't gremlin-bit, couldn't tap dance. So the dancing was just kind of sad.

[endsthegame]

"Your dancing is lovely," Ender assured him, "I'd just make you look clumsy."

[momslilassassin]

"No you wouldn't," Ben said, bouncing up and down. "After three or four steps, you'd have it down!"

That's how it worked in the movies, after all!

He continued dancing in a little circle and began to sing. "On the go-OOD ship Lollipop..."

[endsthegame]

Ender should probably stop him and take him somewhere else, but Ben could actually probably use this right now. And it was a little funny, to watch him flailing around like that, and dancing.

"I'll let you take the floor," he said, pulling up his laptop again.

[momslilassassin]

Ben grinned, fluffed out the skirt he wasn't wearing, and made sure the ringlets he didn't have were perfect.

He gave Ender a little curtsy and started the song from the beginning.

I've thrown away my toys
Even my drum and train.
I wanna make some noise
With real live aeroplanes.

Some day I'm going to fly.
I'll be a pilot too.
And when I do, how would you
Like to be my crew...

There were some complicated dance steps to go along with this trainwreck performance.

[endsthegame]

Ender mostly kept an eye on him to make sure he didn't break anything, but he couldn't really keep from looking amused. "Don't sidestep so much," he called.