The park, Saturday afternoon

[seeshowyoudie.livejournal.com]

Miriam had been doing so well. She'd managed two weeks in Fandom without touching someone until the guy behind the counter at JGOB had touched her arm to get her attention and ugh she did not need to see that before eating. So now with no appetite for breakfast she was sitting on a bench and tearing her muffin into pieces and flicking them at the ducks and generally feeling pissed off at the world until she could get the vision out of her head.

[Open!]

Comments

[genesishero]

Walking. And reading. At the same time. Such was the sort of skill that Evan Sabahnur had picked up through years of training by his Uncle Cluster.

... And if Uncle Cluster knew that he was spending most of his time just reading books, he'd tell the boy to get out of the dorms, meet some girls with 'loose morals,' and do... whatever it was that teens with loose morals did. Evan hadn't asked, but he figured that he probably ought to at least get out of his room again.

Hence the walking. And the reading. At the same time. See how that could loosely translate to being social, provided he happened to find somebody while he wandered through the park, his nose stuck into a book? In fact, if he even glanced up now and again, he might even spot somebody!

"Hi! Miriam, right?"

Imagine that!

[seeshowyoudie.livejournal.com]

"Hey, squirt," Miriam said, glancing up at the familiar voice. She even managed to drop the scowl - mostly.

"How's it...." She caught herself before greeting him with "hanging," like she had Stannis the night before, because woman of loose morals she may have been, but she didn't actively try to contribute to the delinquency of minors. "...going?" she said instead.

[genesishero]

"Pretty good," Evan replied, smiling as he walked over to the bench. He didn't quite take a seat just yet, content to stand there, but the bench was totally there if he wanted to! "Quiet, mostly. This place is really, really quiet. But that might be because half the people here seem to be puppies right now."

And puppy Thor was possibly the cutest thing he'd seen in his whole entire life.

"How are you?"

[seeshowyoudie.livejournal.com]

"Yeah, one of my teachers was trying to get out of class Thursday by claiming to be a puppy," Miriam snorted. No, still not buying it. Or the god thing. Just about everyone here, her roommate included, seemed to be a little crazy. It almost made her fit right in.

"I'm okay. Haven't hit the road yet, so I guess that's a good sign."

[genesishero]

"People here are nice," Evan decided, smiling and rocking on his heels at the thought. "Nicer than they were at my last school, anyhow. So... I don't think I'd want to leave just yet, myself."

Fandom, you were stuck with the little guy.

"Are your classes good, at least?"

[seeshowyoudie.livejournal.com]

"Gotta say they weren't what I was expecting," Miriam said. She scooted over a little and patted the bench beside her.

"Norse mythology, the seven deadly sins which is like a checklist, and sex ed." She gave Evan a wicked grin at that one.

[genesishero]

And Evan... blushed. Maybe. A little bit.

... A lot. It was easy enough to tell when he was blushing, considering how pale he was.

"I'm not in any of those." Shocking, wasn't it? "But are they okay, even if they're not what you had in mind at first?"

[seeshowyoudie.livejournal.com]

"Compared to readin', writin', and 'rithmetic they're awesome," Miriam had to admit. "Everyone being stark raving bonkers, that I was not expecting though."

[genesishero]

"Not everyone is crazy," Evan decided, regaining his composure and taking the offered seat on the bench. "Some people are just plain weird."

There was a difference!

"I mean, look at us, right?"

[whateverknight.livejournal.com]

Squall almost jogged right past the kid who was reading, until he got a closer look. Jono had shrunk!

"Hey," he said, by way of a greeting. "Another point to the theory that the island just likes messing with you."

[genesishero]

Oh, there was a whole world of confusion in Evan's face as he looked up at the older kid who had stopped to talk to him.

"Sorry, with me?" He even lowered his book and pointed at himself, and then looked around to see if there was anyone else this boy could be talking to.

It was possible that the island was messing with you, Squall.

[whateverknight.livejournal.com]

Well, that was ENTIRELY the wrong accent. Squall peered thoughtfully at the kid and shrugged. "Sorry -- you look like someone else. It happens here sometimes." He wasn't very good at explanations, unfortunately.

[genesishero]

Oh, Squall. That was completely the right thing to say if you wanted the little Jono-looking kid to give you big, worried eyes.

"It happens back where I'm from, too." A pause. "Is the someone else that I look like a good someone, at least?"

Because in his experience, who people accused him of resembling was not exactly someone he wanted to be mistaken for. At all.

[whateverknight.livejournal.com]

Squall facepalmed at himself while his player chuckled evilly. He'd completely forgotten that Jono's new look had been traumatizing. This kid was probably from the same universe, with the same got-DNA-from-a-bad-guy problem. "A very good someone," Squall reassured the kid. "A friend of mine. Jono. When I saw you, I thought the island had made him younger. You've got the same new mouth."

[genesishero]

Squall was hardly the first person that had spoken about Jono to Evan. He was, however, the first person to make a reference to Jono's new mouth. And that bit there kind of made him pause and look a little more baffled. Up until that point, he'd been thinking that maybe Jono was just a popular nickname for people named John, or something. Raven had mentioned the Jono that looked like Evan, living on the island. And Karla had asked about the Jono with the X-Men. Evan hadn't made the connection between the two.

"He... didn't always look like this?"

[whateverknight.livejournal.com]

Squall shrugged. "Not until recently. He used to be missing his mouth, and on fire. Something happened, and he got DNA from somebody evil, and lost his powers, and nearly died... probably not in that order. It was very traumatic. I think a cult was involved -- there usually seems to be."

[genesishero]

"Usually," Evan echoed, though his voice seemed sort of distant while he digested that.

Missing his mouth, on fire? There weren't really many people like that out there. Particularly not ones that went by that name.

"Professor Starsmore? Is he, um, I mean is his last name Starsmore?"

[whateverknight.livejournal.com]

Squall hadn't killed any monsters in ages -- he hadn't even gotten out much, lately. He had a lot of pent-up energy to burn, and he was trying to relax by jogging around the park.

Whatever.

He surprised himself by stopping to watch the goth girl being emo at the ducks. "Traditionally, people use the roof of the dorms for that," he told her helpfully.

[seeshowyoudie.livejournal.com]

"Little hard to hit the ducks from there," Miriam said, checking Squall out. Huh. Not bad. Probably crazy then.

[whateverknight.livejournal.com]

"It's a little easy to hit them from here," Squall countered. He shrugged. "Don't worry, the island will give us something more challenging to hit sooner or later." Really, he was trying to reassure himself more than her.

[seeshowyoudie.livejournal.com]

Miriam arched an eyebrow. "What's that supposed to mean?" she asked.

She really had no idea.

[whateverknight.livejournal.com]

"An invasion," Squall told her. "It's been a while since our last one. Are you a fighter?"

[seeshowyoudie.livejournal.com]

"I can hold my own if that's what you're asking," Miriam said. She could take a punch and give as good as she got. Once she'd left home she'd had to learn how to do that fast.

[whateverknight.livejournal.com]

"So, no, then," Squall translated. "Never mind, then. Go back to hitting the ducks with bread."

[seeshowyoudie.livejournal.com]

Miriam rolled her eyes. "Why are all the cute ones insane?" she complained. Invasions. Right.