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 Posted: Thu Jul 06, 2006 2:54 pm
Natalie stood outside the lab's front door (or what she assumed was, at any rate), shifting her weight from foot to foot. She had two tickets clenched in one hand, ready to be handed over to Thorn and Hadrian.
That was, if the two ever showed up.
Thorn had called her earlier, told her that he'd arranged everything, and to be at the lab by four. Well, it was four twenty now, and there was no sign of anybody else.
Natalie really, really hated when things like this happened. It just ruined her whole day. Fed up, she plucked up enough courage to call out, "Is anybody there?" to what she thought was an empty area.
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Posted: Thu Jul 06, 2006 3:07 pm
Hadrian had put this off as long as possible - hoping that Thorn would get bored and leave, and it would just be the guardian's left. He didn't want to face him.
Or Marc, for that matter - he'd stopped there once for a change of clothes and a shower, and then holed himself up in the labs. What would he say if he encountered Marc?
He had no idea.
So, finally - after realizing just how truly late he was, he headed upstairs. And there was only one person - ah, that was a relief.
"I apologize for being late."
He wasn't quite as friendly as he'd been becomming, since getting involved with Marc; he was more reminiscent of his old, reticent self when he brooded, after all.
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Posted: Thu Jul 06, 2006 3:12 pm
Stephan was a bit late on the uptake, having spent the better part of the day hauling boxes, and had lost track of time. Fortunately, he'd realized before it was too, late, but he hadn't exactly had time to stop and grab a shower. Hurdling over a bush, college track had been useful for at least one thing, he waved an arm, "Don't leave without me!"
He didn't exactly look ready for a scientific tour, or whatever this was supposed to be, with his hair slicked down with sweat and his shirt still tied around his waist. Noticing two people, her slowed his stride down a bit, "Uh.. I'm guessing one of you is Hadrian. Got a note saying I needed to be here like... Half an hour ago." Settling beside them, he smiled, "Sorry if I held you up.
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Posted: Thu Jul 06, 2006 3:17 pm
"Actually, I was the only one here for a while," Natalie said, recognizing the sight of frantic-fratboy-moving-in. She'd seen it all to often with her friends. "And this would be Hadrian," she said, pointing to the mage.
"Or at least, I'm assuming so, unless Thorn got some massive plastic surgery..."
Oh! The tickets!
She turned to Hadrian. "Oh, uh - Thorn said he'd be here, but I guess it's looking like he's not... so..." She held out the tickets. "Can you give these to him? I'm not sure I'll see him before... well. It's for opening night at a local theatre production I'm in, and he wanted tickets. And I think he's going to invite you, too, but I'm not quite sure...
"But yeah. My schedule's pretty hectic, so... could... I mean, if it's not too much trouble... could you see that these get to him?"
Natalie laughed, sheepishly.
"... And that was a really bad introduction," she added. "My name's Natalie."
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Posted: Thu Jul 06, 2006 3:22 pm
At hearing Thorn mentioned, it was on the tip of Hadrian's tongue to refuse the tickets right there, but -
Well, that would look a little suspicious. So, with reluctance that he carefully kept from his face, he took the tickets.
"I'm Hadrian, as you guessed...and you would be Stephen?"
A rhetorical question, really; he was positive that's who it was.
"Do either of you have any preference on which Soul you would like to see first?"
Blunt and to the point. No niceties today - he didn't have the nerve to deal with people that long. So, doing his best to not be too impolite, he was coming off more as...well, apathetic.
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Posted: Thu Jul 06, 2006 3:38 pm
Souls? Oh, right the kids, or something. Ah well. He hadn't exactly read over what he was supposed to be doing while he lived here, but he figured he'd pick it up today, or later, whenever. Nodding hastily, he remembered his current state and untied his shirt to put it back on. "Whoops, forgot," he mumbled, more talking to himself than apologizing, "I've got a different question. Why's it have to be so damn hot out here?" Well, at least it was conversation. He wasn't really one for blunt and to the point, until it came to women, though he had something fairly blunt to say to the girl who'd just started babbling. Natalie, that was a nice name, and she had a nice- Time to concentrate. He didn't bother buttoning his shirt up, he was just going to take it off again when this was done with after all, instead just standing there waiting for some direction.
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Posted: Thu Jul 06, 2006 3:43 pm
Natalie shot him a slight glare - she was actually planning on being respectful, now that the inital babble rush was over.
"Has to do with fronts, or something, and the fact that it's the middle of summer," she muttered, then smiled at Hadrian. "Whichever is closer, I guess - I'm taking that they're not all in the same room, then?"
See, she could be well-behaved and pleasant!
Part of it was that she was calming down from the slight anxiety over seeing Thorn again. After how their last meeting had ended...
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Posted: Thu Jul 06, 2006 4:22 pm
Slipping the tickets into a pocket, he gave a curt nod to the two - whatever may be going on here, his mind was somewhere else completely.
"In that case, I believe Natalie's is the closest."
Though the other was very close to it. Each 'batch' was always kept in the same area, after all.
Hadrian didn't wait too long before leading them downstairs, heading towards the labs. And as they walked, he went ahead with the customary comments.
"Do either of you have any questions, before seeing them?"
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Posted: Thu Jul 06, 2006 4:40 pm
Stephan did his best to keep up, though he got a bit distracted looking at things on the walls as they went. This whole prospect had him a bit curious, but he didn't think they'd have time for all of his questions. Not that he would be able to swallow his pride and actually ask them.
He did have one question though, "Do you know what they are yet?" Well, he meant whether they'd be boys or girls, or human, compared to the ones he'd already met, but it sounded a bit odd.
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Posted: Thu Jul 06, 2006 5:05 pm
"And.... do they grow like normal kids? Or... faster?" Because she really couldn't see herself raising a kid for the next 18 years, just because she'd gotten a letter in the mail. That would suck.
Natalie tagged along behind, thinking about things. The future and the like - could she actually raise a kid completely on her own?
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Posted: Thu Jul 06, 2006 8:43 pm
"No. We'll only know once they're born...and we do a DNA test at birth, to discover what sort of blend they are."
Though, even that had limits. If there was an object, the DNA test would merely reveal the material - not the actual object. So if a Soul wound up blending with a wooden table, all they would know was that it was blended with something wooden.
"And they seem to grow a bit faster - it seems to slow down as they get older, but we don't know for sure what the typical growth time frame is, as the oldest Soul is still a child."
Gpassing his eyes over the two people, he gave a slight nod, before opening the door an entering the room.
A circular room, with a ring of monitors surrounding a ball of energy in the very center of the room. A few barely visible indentations in the ground surrounded the Soul in a circular pattern, though their reason wasn't obvious.
Natalie's Soul.
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Posted: Thu Jul 06, 2006 8:58 pm
Stephan kept near the door when they came to the room, this whole thing still had him a bit spooked. He'd never been particularly religious, but the fact that souls were treated so scientifically, even if it was with magic as well, seemed to get under his skin. "So like... There's not any way to tell by what they look like, even a guess?" He prodded, a bit anxious to know exactly what he was in for. Facts, he liked facts. They were nice and solid and no matter what happened they always stayed the same.
If it was a little girl he'd have to grow up some, though he knew he'd be a bit too much of an overprotective father if he ever had a daughter, no matter how much "growing up" he'd done. But a boy, he could deal with a boy, no sweat. Boys like rough and tumble, and getting in trouble. And that's exactly what he knew how to deal with. They weren't very emotional and when they were, they showed exactly what they were feeling. Girls were... A lot different.
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Posted: Thu Jul 06, 2006 9:02 pm
"Well, Remi said hers is already a toddler, and I don't think she's been here that long. I mean... it won't take them eighteen years to be an adult, right?" she asked before Hadrian opened the door.
She was going to add something else, but then she caught sight of the little floating black... bubble? She approached it, but stopped a good way away. It looked so... happy. Cheerful.
"That's... mine?" Natalie whispered, almost in awe. She may not've pushed it out of her, but it was still her child, in a way Mictlan had never been. It looked so... fragile. Almost like it had been bandaged up.
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Posted: Thu Jul 06, 2006 9:09 pm
"Well, they seem to have similar coloring. For example, one of the toddlers - she was purple as energy, and when she born, it turned out that she had purple hair. Or one of the others that was orange, and then wound up with that color."
Hadrian felt himself loosen up a bit at the awe on Natalie's face - it was...reassuring, in a way. And he couldn't keep the slight smile from his face, though it left not too soon after appearing.
"Yes...this one is yours. Each one has it's own unique appearance - they're all very different from each other, even at this point."
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Posted: Thu Jul 06, 2006 9:17 pm
Kind of like a scrambled up picture. Or a puzzle piece.
It was interesting the way his mind worked sometimes, but at this particular moment it was driving him right down the path of boredom. Stephan leaned back against the walll, arms crossed firmly over his chest. Well, this couldn't take too long, could it? After all, how long could someone stand and stare at a black ball? Was it even moving? Deciding that was something he actually wanted to know, he piped up again, "So they're like... Dormant? Right now at least?"
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