Welcome to Gaia! ::

Bornes looked up to the sky, which was oddly devoid of stars. He couldn't seem to spot the moon either. He let out a curious "Hrmm..." in thought.

What could they do to pass the time? He gave a slight frown, looking back to Isiah, his green eyes running from his face slowly down his upperbody, studying all the tattooing. Isiah looked as if he'd just walked out of some Jungle book or ancient african tribe. He wondered if he should ask about it. Especially interesting were the swirls around Isiah's pecs. Most of the other tattoos seemed rectangular in nature, with straight lines. The swirls were different- more important, perhaps? His eyes gave a faint green glow as he stared, as if light were refracting on them, but there was no external light to speak of.

The glow dissipated almost as soon as Bornes lifted his head, curious, to study Isiah's face. "How old are you?"

Isiah was pretty young to have that many tattoos. Bornes looked at them again, absentmindedly offering his answer of "A year younger."

He put his elbow on his knee, his face left to lay in his palm. "What's the significance of the swirls?" Those tattoos must've been more important than the others. The tattoos were all over the man's body- no one who just wanted to 'look cool' would get them arranged like this.

Bornes exhaled loudly, thinking it over.
Ocean waves? Whaler? No... Surfer? No, he said the sun baked his skin too much.

"You're lying," he finally replied. He looked back up to Isiah's face, studying his facial expression. Bornes was unimpressed.

"You must have gotten inked very young to regret it so much now?"

Bornes went quiet again for a few seconds, trying to figure out what sort of history it could be. Almost a minute passed before he came up with something.
"So then the swirls represent a change?"

Bornes closed his eyes, clasping his hands between his legs once more as he exhaled softly.

A religious cult? he thought to himself. Why would he have brought up Jesus if it was not religious? He could've mentioned Hitler or Martin Luther King or some other pivotal historical figure, but no.. He mentioned Jesus, who could be argued didn't exist at all. He gave a hmph, looking back to Isiah, studying him once again, his eyes glowing their dull green again as he thought.

"You don't have to pretend to be so strong," he said. "We have plenty of time to waste. If you walk too much, you will not be able to walk tomorrow."
He waved his hand haphazardly, his eyes closing and the glow in them subsiding. "Besides, it is the first day. We have been cramped up in that vault with no proper exercise for a long time. We should go slow."

Bornes stood up and stretched again, his hands above him. When he finished he gave a sigh of relief and sat down on the ground near Isiah's feet. "You should sit on the bag," he offered. "You won't fall asleep as easily."

He bent his knees, and brought his hands to his face, musing with his hair so it was parted in the middle, rather than the side. Now both his eyes were visible, though they were not glowing. Bornes preferred to have his hair parted in the middle, but he was self-conscious about his scars. There was a long one diagonal between his eyes, along his nose. His grey hair usually covered it, at the expense of one eye. Now that it was nightfall however, he doubted someone like Isiah would be able to pick it out.

When he was finished musing with his hair, he let his arms fall to his knees, elbows propped on them. "If you're uncomfortable with something," he mused, noting Isiah's change in breath, "You could say so, and I won't bother you about it."

He decided to be chivalrous and offer himself up as the new spectacle anyway. He had stared at Isiah long enough, had he not? Twenty questions was becoming a bit boring. Perhaps if he got the chance to be the one answering things, it would be more entertaining for him. Bornes' tail thwapped the ground once in slight boredom.

"Is there anything you'd like to know about me, then?"

Bornes looked to Isiah. "Isn't it obvious? I am a super soldier sent to destroy America!" He let out a laugh, his tail wagging slightly at the joke.

When he finished, he calmed himself down, clasping his hands between his legs. "To be honest I really don't know. I was born with it. The woman Father had sex with was cursed or something-- supposedly. Though once he saw me as a baby, why would he keep me? I don't know." His tail scraped across the ground, raking tiny pebbles in its wake.

Truth be told, Bornes used to be much more bestial than he as. He went through extensive plastic surgery. The surgeons must've been extremely good, as he had hardly any scars. The one on his face was something different entirely. He also used to be more human than this. His eyes, particularly. But he had run from his country, his father. Because of that he hadn't been taking whatever it was they were giving him and he had regressed over the years. But it wasn't as if the treatments hurt Bornes at all-- he didn't even consider them that traumatic. He couldn't remember most of his childhood. Just vague memories, here and there.

Mostly he remembered colors. He missed appreciating rainbows. He wondered how eerily beautiful the sky looked during the day now, after whatever was in the atmosphere contaminated it. He remembered someone telling him the sun had turned green once as it set due to smog. Bornes wished he could have seen that. His sunglasses were so thick, everything during the day was either too bright and white, or some very muted shades of dark grey.

The hybrid sighed and ran a hand through his hair. He wasn't expecting unsettling reminders of his own past from this conversation. He wondered if these were near the feelings Isiah had felt when he had pressured the man about his tattoos.

He decided to try and lighten the mood. "You'd be surprised," he chimed in. "Many girls think it's cute. A lot of people wish to play with it. Sometimes it's fun." His tail curled up near his leg. "Othertimes, annoying and awkward. Children, especially. In that regard."

Was he making fun of his sexual...? Whatever. It didn't matter. Bornes shook his head.

"Children are fascinated by me," he tried to brag. He wasn't feeling it. "I assume they would be frightened by you."