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"Pop Rock, get out of there!" Monroe called out as she noticed the familiar pink speckled tail swishing above one of her baskets. "If you're not going to help me get these chores done, you can at least stay out of my way." She shot the cat a dirty look as its head poked up from the fish basket. She did a fake-out jump towards the cat, which was enough to frighten it away.

Monroe shook her head, that pesky cat was always getting into her fish baskets. She could easily count the number of baskets that he had broken because of messing around, and she could not easily count the number of fish he had ran off with.

Now that he was gone, she could focus on getting this gruesome task done. Monroe hated fish, the smell was absolutely horrifying, but someone had to sort through the morning's catch and unfortunately that someone was her. The sooner the task was done, the sooner she could jump into the water and attempt to get the stench off. Maybe someday her dad would let her trade for one of the pretty smelling perfumes she heard they had in the city. Monroe doubted she would ever get to go there though.

Monroe picked up another fish, pushing on its cheeks so that its mouth opened and shut. "No, no, don't eat me." She cried out as she made the fish swim away from her and straight into a basket. The large, pretty fish went into the trade cart. The less pretty majority went to the hut to be prepared for the evening meal.

When she was done sorting, she carried the basket to the trade cart and loaded it in. It was then she saw her cat again, "Hey Pop Rock... want to join me for a swim..." She teased, a playful look on her face.

The cat froze, and it's tail started swaying side to side as it seemed to lock onto something. Monroe looked at the cat, a curious expression on her face. She had to wonder what was going on in that head sometimes. In the blink of an eye, the cat took off. "Where are you going?" She giggled as she chased after it. "Do I smell that bad?" Not that the cat thought she smelled bad, he was always nuzzling up to her when she was soaked in fish smell.

The cat was quick, and when Monroe caught up to him he was at the feet of some pae attempting to climb up the poor boy's leg. "Oh! Pop Rock! Stop that!" She called out as she ran over to them and tried to shoo the cat away. "I'm so sorry, I think he wants to play with your bird."

Monroe looked the young male over, it was a small village so she easily recognized everyone, and she didn't recognize this boy. The only other pae that she didn't recognize were the traders that passed through. She didn't usually pay attention to the traders that came because they were all old, but this one was her age! "Hi! You're not from around here." Monroe said, stating the obvious in a strange sort of introduction. At least there was a friendly tone to her voice.

"Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry." Monroe repeated as she offered her hand to the stranger to help him up. Her eyes darted around, looking for her cat to tell him off again, but he seemed to have run off for the moment. That cat knew he was in trouble. "Sorry, birdy," she called out as she spotted the little bird.

"Oh, a trader!" Monroe got a nervous look on her face, hopefully her cat hadn't ruined a potential trade for her village. "Are you looking for anything in particular or... Well I don't really do the trading..." Monroe admitted since she wasn't normally interested in trading at all, although it might be a step up from the stinky fish gig, but she was interested in meeting someone her own age. She should probably just direct him to her dad or someone that knew what they were doing before she made a mess of things.

Monroe stared at the boy curiously as he kissed the back of her hand. She had a look of some disgust on her face, but only because she was imagining kissing hr stinky fish hands and it wasn't pleasant. The girl took her hand back, feeling completely mortified. If the cat hadn't gotten in the way, she's be in the water right now rubbing her skin off to get the smell to go away.

Monroe nodded her heads slowly, still feeling the heat of embarrassment, she wasn't sure what of that stuff that they had for trading. "Considering we're a fishing village... I mean mostly, we probably have some of the things you're looking for... this cat gets into ALOT of trouble."

His pack looked awfully burdensome, he was probably going to want to get to trading just so that he didn't have to carry it around anymore. Monroe sighed from thinking about it. No, there was hardly ever a chance for real fun. "I'm Monroe." She responded, "Do you need me to show you where to go?"

"Oh? That must be tough." Monroe responded, thinking of this saber guy being alone with his mom. It had pretty much always been village life for Monroe, except for when she was really little, but she hardly remembered then. She had all of her needs provided for and didn't really have to think much about how it all worked, she just had to do her part. Her one, stinky part.

"Hopefully somebody can help you out." This was probably why she wasn't a trader, Monroe would gladly hand this young male a basket of goods free of charge if it would help him out because she felt bad for him and his mom being on their own.

"Well it's not super obvious. I mean, I didn't recognize you, but that just means you don't live here. I don't usually pay attention to the pae that are just passing through." Monroe motioned with her hand for him to follow her as she headed in a different direction. They didn't have to go very far since she had been near the trade carts when her silly cat had ran off. "These are getting ready to go out, but you can look them over, if you see anything that interests you. There's probably more stuff that isn't going too, but I need to find..." Monroe paused looking around for a nearby grown up.

The carts were mostly loaded up with baskets full of fish, but there were several baskets that had other things in them, some fishing nets and crude hunting-type weapons, and then there was a stack of just empty baskets because they were really good at making baskets in Monroe's village and had plenty to trade away. There was even some pretty glass bracelets and necklaces.

"Aulii!" Monroe called out. "I have a trader looking for you." She turned to the boy and winked, it was strange to think of someone her age as being a trader. Monroe didn't have to stick around now that she had shown the boy where to go, but she was still curious about him, so she stayed anyways.

"Oh..." Monroe's eyes shifted, not wanting to talk about her job which was as un-glamorous as jobs got. "No, I'm not a tour guide, somebody else is on the welcoming committee." It really would be a good job for her probably, except the position needed someone with a bit more brute strength than she had since they functioned as a sentry as well.

"I uhm... Mostly sort through the mornings fish haul." Her voice turned low and mumbley. Monroe glanced around again, not wanting to look at Saber out of her embarrassment, but also she didn't see Aulii. "I don't see anyone right now... But they should be back soon-ish because the fish has to get out right fast." Maybe she should start paying more attention to the going-ons of the village, she was clearly clueless beyond her own little world. "We could wait if you want... Or if you don't want."

"No!" Monroe said far too eagerly when Saber mentioned her having more fish to start. Monroe realized she had burst out more than she had intended too and toned it down, "I mean, thankfully it's a job that doesn't take up most of the day. But everyone has to do their part." That's how things worked. "I was actually just about to clean up before I ran into you." Monroe still looked rather embarrassed about the whole ordeal, but she hadn't ran away yet.

Her eyes shifted again, not sure if they, specifically she, should wait around or not. "Y'know, since Aulii isn't here yet, perhaps I can try my hand at this whole trading thing." It couldn't be that hard, after all. Maybe if they got his 'work' out of the way, he would want to hang out afterwards for some fun, and she could jump in the water. They could do that now, but they risked the carts leaving and the things he needed along with them.

Monroe looked down at the ground, he actually had a really good point. Sure, she knew that everything on the cart was for trading. However, if anything was already committed to being traded to someone else, she would have no way of knowing that and could potentially put the whole village in a bind! "No, you're right..." That was a tough one to swallow, but she clearly hadn't been thinking straight, distracted by this boy.

"Maybe I should go clean up while you wait for Aulii, I'm sure he'll be around soon enough." There would really be no reason for her to come back to him after she left, he would take care of the trading and be done. She really wanted to spend some more time with him though, it wasn't often someone her age was around. "If you wait here, I'll come back and maybe I can show you around!"