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 Posted: Thu Jan 01, 2015 6:29 pm
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Posted: Mon Jan 12, 2015 6:41 pm
SOLO: Thrown into the Deep End [Backdated to the 8th.] Kayla heard a ding go off inside her head, a very curious sensation for someone who had never heard things inside her head before. She checked her cell phone, but nothing had come in. Maybe she was just hearing things, or it was the TV? No, the noises from the TV were definitely outside her head. Well, there was one possibility. It might have been something tied to her powers as Sadachbia, and there was only one way to check that. Citing an important call from a friend as an excuse, she slipped out and found a good corner to henshin in. When she transformed, nothing seemed to change. She didn’t feel any people nearby like she did that chibi senshi from before. Then she remembered: that’s right, Ash had given her a special phone for senshi communications. With a gesture that felt instinctual (she had no idea how she knew how to do this or how it worked, and it amazed her that such a thing was even possible), she pulled the phone out of subspace and turned it on. Sure enough, there was a message waiting for her there. As Sadachbia read the message sent by none other than Ash herself, she felt her eyes go wider and wider. She remembered how she had completely dismissed the attack on the hotel as something that had nothing to do with her, and now that she was reading the truth behind it all, it now had everything to do with her. Her allies that she had not yet met had been captured, and it had all started on that dangerous New Year’s Eve. It seemed that she was going to get the opportunity to test herself a mere four days after awakening, which was fine by her. She could punch, she could kick, she could throw bricks. She would not let inexperience keep her out of a crucial life-saving mission. It would be a learning experience, at least. She did not know what this Blackwatch was or who this Athene was, but she would most likely encounter both eventually, especially if she went on this mission. West of the city, the message said. She thought she had a good sense of direction; surely she could find the west. Sadachbia turned around to face the direction she thought was west and sped off, practicing jumping as she did. Being on top of buildings was a bizarre experience, and being able to jump down from them with no penalty was even stranger, but it certainly beat navigating the entire town on foot. Talk about a shortcut. One thing was certain: Sadachbia would not forget this night. She would help however she could, she would save her allies, and she would learn more about the world she had been thrust into. She might have objected at first, but now that she had received the power to protect people, she was going to use it. The Negaverse would never know what hit them. Probably.
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Posted: Sat Mar 14, 2015 12:49 pm
SOLO: You Should Have Done This a While Ago [Backdated to Feb 13th, because oops.] Kayla had spent a lot of time since the New Year’s debacle sleeping. Of course, she attended to her usual responsibilities at school and home, but she kept feeling extraordinarily tired when not otherwise occupied. Perhaps part of it was an avoidance tactic; the less often she was conscious, the less often she had to think about her senshi self and what she had witnessed. The work-eat-sleep routine got her through the days for a while, until one day she heard a familiar “ding” in her head as she woke up from a nap. She had received a senshi phone message. While it was tempting to roll over and go back to sleep, an anxious feeling filled her. She couldn’t dodge this addition to her life forever. It was time to get up and face the facts, even if only for a little bit. It took her a little time, but she found an alley that seemed like it might have been a good place to transform in. Cautiously, she took out her henshin pen, and after a cursory glance, muttered “Sadachbia Power, Make-Up.” In a flash of gold and blue and bandages, Kayla became Sailor Sadachbia once more. She reached into the phantom subspace pocket and pulled out her senshi phone (a foreign gesture, the knowledge of which still baffled her). Sure enough, there was a text message waiting for her from Megrez, the stronger senshi that she had met at the funhouse. The text read, “How are you? Have you read the Primer yet?” Sadachbia figured that radio silence wouldn’t be terribly fair to Megrez, so she sent back, “Tired. I can do that right now.” That was right, she could read the primer right now and catch up on all the knowledge she should have known before diving into the rescue mission. It seemed that her next nap would have to wait. She tapped the primer icon on her phone and started reading. As she read through the introduction from Kallichore, Sadachbia found herself nodding along. Though she had no idea what Eternal Sailor Kallichore looked like, much less what she sounded like, she found herself imagining an older senshi, graceful and motherly, with a soothing voice. It left her wondering if she would ever get to meet this mystery senshi and confirm her imaginary perception. There was another section from Kallichore, followed by a written by an Eternal Sailor Thraen. Somehow, the explanations of senshi and starseeds fit into her mind like they were supposed to be there all along, though she cringed and clutched her chest when Thraen described how agents of Chaos could tear a person’s soul out of their body. She didn’t need to be told to accept the new responsibilities of senshihood (despite her shirking them for nearly a month) and protect the innocent; any entity that could seriously and truly de-soul a person was obviously bad news and needed to be stopped. Sadachbia was used to defending the innocent, anyway; she had defended a fair share of targets from a fairly large stack of bullies. She didn’t think the war was much different, aside from the bullies having magical powers and meaning infinitely more business than any normal bully. The section on Guardian Cats was glossed over a bit; Ash had given her a fairly good picture of what they were. Nonetheless, she was pleased to see that the Mauvian that awoke her had a part in the making of the primer. The section on power levels, specifically the part that mentioned auras, made Sadachbia nod once again. It explained the odd feeling she got when she noticed the chibi senshi from earlier, and that uneasy feeling from when she saw the senshi in black (a quick glance downward in the primer led her to conclude that they were Dark Mirror Senshi, since Corrupt Senshi certainly wouldn’t be helping to destroy one of their own youma). It would be something she kept in mind and paid close attention to from now on. Sadachbia took in the section on the Negaverse well enough until she hit the section from Eternal Sailor Athene on a Negaverse attack on civilians. It wasn’t like she needed another reason to want to fight the Negaverse, but the story left her incensed. The enemy wasn’t playing around; they were out to hurt people. Defeating them became merely an extension of her duties to protect that she had maintained long before she became powered. No particularly strong reactions came to her during the sections on youma, corrupt senshi, and the Dark Mirror Court; she had seen the youma at the funhouse. She knew that youma could once have been human. Once she hit the section of space travel, however, she did a double-take. It was an aspect of senshihood that she had not been aware of and would never have guessed existed. Rebirth, visions of the past, the mere ability to travel to another world; all of these concepts made Sadachbia’s head spin. There was an excitement lingering, too. She wanted to go see what her world held in store for her, but now wasn’t the best time to do it. She was going to need careful planning and a full day to explore, something a bit hard to come by at times. The rest of the primer was something of a blur. Something something royals, something something purification, something something the moon. She couldn’t stop thinking about her planet all the while. It was a major bummer that she couldn’t just go up there now, but half the day was nearly over, and she wanted as much time as possible. Bringing up the text app on her phone, she sent another text to Megrez. “When I go to my planet, can you come with me?” Not much later, Megrez responded. “Sure, why not? Let me know and I’ll see if I can come.” Shortly after that, another text came in. “Hope you feel less tired soon. You went through a lot.” It was funny that Megrez said that; Sadachbia was feeling more invigorated already. When she had time, she would definitely go to her world, and Megrez would guide her, and it would be great. Wouldn’t it?
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Posted: Wed Aug 26, 2015 4:35 pm
SOLO: Pit-a-Pratfall Backdated to yesterday but using cooldown starting today.Sadachbia was getting tired of waiting. Megrez kept being busy patrolling or preparing for college (college! COLLEGE! Unbelievable that she was going into college), leaving Sadachbia on her own for the most part. At this point, it seemed like if she kept waiting, she would never get to go to her homeworld. Tonight she caved in and decided that she was going by herself. After finding a nice nook (a nook that could just as easily host Negaversers, she noted), she pressed the planet transfer icon on her phone and focused as she had been told to do. For a moment, she thought she heard a faint drumbeat from somewhere, but she was lurched across the universe before she could focus upon it too strongly. When the world came back into focus, the first thing she was aware of was the heat. A powerful dry heat swept over her, one that felt very different from a Destiny City summer. A desert expanse spread out before her, with a damaged road in front of her. She should not have been terribly surprised to see that the road led to a small pyramid, but she was. In any case, she felt a powerful certainty that this was her world. What else could it be? She was the Egyptian-looking senshi with the mummy bandages and the ankh for a brooch. Seeing nowhere else of note to go, Sadachbia entered the pyramid. She only made it a few steps in before she heard a woman’s deep voice from behind her. “In the front will be the prayer area. In the back will be the important artifacts.” When she turned around, there was a tall woman with nearly black skin and hair and golden eyes addressing a man with a scroll. Most importantly, the woman wore Sadachbia’s fuku, the same down to the positioning of the bandages. The conclusion was obvious: she was watching her past self do official business in her first-ever past life vision. When she got excited and attempted to approach her past self for a better view, the senshi and the man she was with vanished. That’s all? Bummer. Sadachbia turned back around to face the inside of the building. The room opened up into a sizable chamber with little nooks in the walls; most of the nooks had statues in varying states of disrepair (including one that, disturbingly enough, was missing its head completely). Were those the gods and goddesses we worshipped back then?Towards the back of the room was an opening where a door had been ripped completely off its hinges. Sadachbia guessed that it must have lead to where the important artifacts her past self had mentioned were. She walked across the room and through the door into what appeared to be a nondescript hallway. A few more steps, and one creak was the only warning she got before she crashed through the floor with a yelp. The pit wasn’t especially deep, though a short person without senshi jumping power might have a little trouble getting out without some help. Grumbling, Sadachbia jumped out of the pit and dusted herself off. Looking at the pit from above, something seemed excessively consistent about the shape of the pit (and something was also suspicious about the fact that there was a hole in the ground on the first floor). These must have been pit traps to keep people from taking the artifacts. She stepped forward cautiously, then to the right side. Her plan to avoid traps that were presumably in the center of the hallway backfired miserably when she crashed through the floor yet again, faceplanting on the bottom of the pit. When she picked her head up and rubbed the dirt off her face, she saw her past self hunched over in front of some mechanical gizmo. Now that she was closer, Sadachbia could see that her past self kept her long hair in numerous braids. “If anyone falls through here, the alarms will go off,” she said. “Security is very important, particularly for our artifacts.” With that, her past self disappeared once more, leaving Sadachbia alone in the bottom of the pit. She jumped out of it and stared down the hallway. Maybe the pits alternate center-side-center? To test her theory, she walked down the center for a few steps, then went to the left side of the hallway. To her surprise and relief, she didn’t fall through another pit. As she minded her steps, she wondered about the alarm system that her past self seemed to be installing. There must have been some measure of advanced technology and engineering on planet Sadachbia in order for such things to be in place. The alarm system had clearly deteriorated to uselessness over the thousand-year gap. Eventually, she reached a door at the end of the hallway, laying on its side in front of the door frame it used to be attached to. On the other side of the door lay a single dart, presumably another trap to deter people who somehow made it past the pits. With neither barrier nor trap to block her, Sadachbia sauntered right into the room. There were altars and pedestals in the room, but nothing was placed on them. Everything bore some form of damage. The artifacts must have been stolen ages ago, she noted to herself with much chagrin. There was no other way to go, so Sadachbia went back through the hallway (only falling into one more pit along the way) and back into the prayer room. She waited for some sign of what kinds of worship once went on there, but nothing came. Disappointed, she walked over to examine the different statues. There appeared to be a few more women than men; all bore serene expressions, with their palms facing up, as though meditating or perhaps waiting for an offering. The headless goddess statue still disturbed her. The break was oddly clean, as though the head had been sliced off. Who would cut off a goddess’s head and run off with it?
Sighing and wiping some sweat off her brow (she had forgotten the heat in all her exploration; why didn’t it occur to her to bring water?), Sadachbia stepped through the exit and took another look at the building’s surroundings. There were some other buildings visible a little ways off; it would take some time to get there, if not too much. Under other circumstances, she would have gone to explore, but something like that needed a whole day to investigate. It would have to wait till another time. When Sadachbia got back to Earth, the first thing she did was text Megrez with her senshi phone. Went to my planet, found a temple. Lots of traps! Wish you could have been there!!No response came for the five minutes that she was willing to stand around for. Luca must have been busy, or perhaps asleep. With a heavy exhale, Sadachbia powered back down into Kayla and headed for home, the sights of the Sadachbian temple tickling her mind. [Sadachbia went to her planet on August 26th. She can return on September 16th.]
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Posted: Mon Nov 30, 2015 3:52 pm
SOLO: Happy Birthday, Kayla! On November 28, 2015, Kayla Lee turned 17. Kayla’s birthdays tended to be small and practical but nonetheless warm affairs on the tail end of Thanksgiving break. It was nice to be home and away from the stodgy St. Mags ladies, birthday or not, and her mother always did her best to make her feel special even on their limited income. This morning, Mara Lee was making her daughter’s favorite French toast. Kayla came down the stairs and sniffed the air. “Something smells good.” “Hawaiian bread French toast, just for you,” Mara said. “Take a seat. By the way, I found a box with your name on it on the doorstep today. I thought it was a little sketchy, but the message looks normal enough and it’s not ticking or anything, so maybe someone left you a gift.” “I sure hope it’s not ticking,” Kayla said, approaching the box on the table. It was an ordinary cardboard box with a folded piece of paper taped to it; the person who sent it either couldn’t be bothered to wrap it or wanted it to be inconspicuous. She took the paper off first and read the note. “Happy birthday, Kayla! <3” Below the line was an egg with wings, and Kayla immediately knew whom the gift was from. It brought a smile to her face, knowing that Luca remembered her birthday. She opened the box, and a round yellow thing with eyes like hieroglyphics stared up at her. The tag read, “West Nile.” “Look, mom, I got West Nile!” “You what?” After making sure the French toast was good to go, Mara walked over to see the plushie. “Oh, I see! So this is West Nile. He’s a cute little guy. Do you know who sent him?” “There’s no name on the card, but I’m pretty sure it’s Luca. You know, that older girl I met a little while back? She loves stuffed animals.” Kayla set West Nile down on the table and gave it a pat. “I see. Do you know why she picked West Nile though?” “Just an inside joke between us,” Kayla said, hoping that would be enough to defuse her mother and she wouldn’t have to explain being a senshi this early in the morning. Fortunately, Mara was satisfied with that answer. “Okay. Inside jokes are all fun and good, but don’t keep too many secrets!” “I won’t, Mom.” That stung Kayla a bit; she was keeping bunches of huge secrets related to senshi life from her mother, and that probably wouldn’t change any time soon. “Is there anything you’d like to do on your special day?” Mara said as she went back to the French toast. “Mm, well, I kind of want to do some window shopping today,” Kayla said. “Just window shopping? I think you can get yourself something nice for your birthday. You’ve been saving up, and I think I can give you a bit too.” “You’d do that? Thank you, Mom!” Kayla lit up at the offer of money from her mother. “Uh, can we really afford that?” “Yes, we can. I made sure of it. I’ll give it to you after breakfast. Speaking of which, it’s ready!” Mara got out two plates and heaped some French toast onto them. As she came by, she put Kayla’s plate in front of West Nile. “I thought your new friend would like some too.” “Hey, that’s mine,” Kayla said with a joking whine. She slid her plate closer to her and added, “Bon appetit!” “Yes, bon appetit!” Mara sat down across the table from Kayla, and the two dug into their French toast. “Happy birthday, honey.” “Thank you, Mom.”
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Posted: Thu Dec 17, 2015 9:07 pm
SOLO: Back on Board With the creeping closeness of Winter Break, Kayla found herself wondering what kind of trouble would arise over Christmas. She remembered hearing about the New Year’s party gone wrong, which lead to her first ever experience as a senshi: the rescue mission. It hadn’t quite been successful (Megrez had gotten knocked out, and she and Glitnir needed to drag her out before the enemy Negaverse agents went for her starseed), but it was certainly a way to get thrown directly into the deep end of the senshi life. Though it wasn’t always salient, she could recall that senshi-turned-youma with a startling clarity if she tried. Such events had only reinforced her determination to prevent more from falling into the clutches of the Negaverse. Speaking of Megrez, it had been months since she had patrolled with her. When Kayla texted Luca about patrolling, Luca would always mention having to study or having something to do that night, and recently she didn’t respond at all to mentions of powered life. Sure, Kayla could handle herself as Sadachbia, but it was nice to have another senshi around in case something went wrong, particularly a transcendent Eternal. The apparent complete moratorium on powered talk with Luca bothered Kayla greatly; Luca had been a deeply devoted senshi. Why was she suddenly pulling back? During a break in patrolling, Sadachbia pulled her senshi phone out of subspace, accessing Megrez in her contacts. She tapped out a text: Quiet night, wish you were here. Predictably, no response arrived, not after five or even ten minutes of waiting. Perhaps it was the boredom, but Sadachbia felt compelled to text again: It’d be nice if you at least let me know you got my texts.Still no response. The more Sadachbia thought about it, the more it grated on her. College pressure or no, she saw no reason for Megrez to withdraw so completely, especially with the anniversary of the New Year’s fiasco drawing so close. Did she even go to her planet still? This was a terrible dereliction of duty. It was one thing to be busy and another thing to pretend the powered life didn’t exist. With a huff, Sadachbia tapped out another text. Did something happen? Why won’t you patrol? When she failed to get a response yet again, she exploded into a string of smileys, all sent as separate texts so that Megrez had a steady stream of alerts in her head: smile neutral neutral |||||| :/ : ;3; > neutral -_- In the middle of typing out a smiley that required some special characters, the senshi phone rang, which startled her; she had mostly texted, never really received a call. Megrez’s name and photo came up on the screen, and she quickly answered. “Hello?” The voice on the other end sounded quite groggy. “What the hell is going on?” Megrez mumbled. “Why haven’t you been patrolling?” Sadachbia asked. “Does it matter? I’ve been busy. Was it really necessary to send me 500 texts worth of bullshit at this time?” “I guess so. It got you to respond. And yes, it does matter! This isn’t like you, Megrez.” “Nothing happened. I’m just taking a break. Is that a bad thing?” Megrez exhaled heavily. “It’s been a very long break,” Sadachbia said. “Remember what happened last year? What if something like that happens again?” There was a pause on the other end. “If there is, let me know and I’ll come as fast as I can.” “That’s all?” Sadachbia said, not entirely satisfied with the answer. “You know, you’re obviously out and powered up right now. How about you meet up with me and we do a little patrolling?” Megrez paused again. “I have a test tomorrow, or I would. I guess it’d be a good way to ease back into things. How about Friday?” “Deal. I’ll tell you where we meet, and if you don’t show up, I’ll spam you till the cows come home.” “Fair enough.” Megrez sighed. “Can I go back to bed now?” “Yeah, fine. Bye. See you Friday.” When Megrez hung up, Sadachbia was unsure how to feel. Given the recent dereliction, she wasn’t entirely sure she trusted Megrez to meet her on Friday, but she hadn’t exactly said no to patrolling. Hopefully she could help Megrez get back on board with senshi work.
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Posted: Sun Feb 28, 2016 12:00 pm
SOLO: Never Shopping With You Again[PRAISE BE TO THE EGG BED.] [Nebulously backdated.] Kayla had amassed a decent stack of coupons, which meant that she could finally feel comfortable going shopping. Right now she was in need of some supplies: shampoo, conditioner, soap, a new pillow to replace the one that had been ravaged over the nights… there were other things on the list too, but that was just the beginning. Going shopping alone, while nice, could be a bit lonely sometimes, and so Kayla invited Luca to come with her. The store they went to was something like a compressed Bed Bath and Beyond. The two milled about the store for a time, eventually stopping in front of some free perfume samples. Kayla didn’t really see herself as a perfume type, but free samples were free. While Kayla was examining the free samples, Luca saw it. A bed, shaped like a basket, filled with egg pillows. With an audible “eeeeeeeee,” she darted over to the bed and threw herself into it, luxuriating in the egg-pillow-ness. It took Kayla a good few minutes to realize that Luca was no longer with her. “Luca?” She looked around and felt something in her stomach drop when her shopping buddy was nowhere to be found. However, she heard familiar giggling, and that allowed her to track down her wayward friend. Once she saw Luca firmly immersed in the egg pillows, all she could say was an unimpressed “Oh.” “Look, Kayla, I’m a BIRD!” Luca said, whistling and trying to make bird noises as she spread herself out over the eggs. “Oh my god.” Kayla dragged one hand down her face. “You are going to get us in so much trouble. Get out of the bed.” “Noooooo,” Luca said dramatically. “This bed speaks to me on a deep level. And you know it.” “I- yeah, okay, I know it, but… come on, get out before someone comes by and chases you out…” Kayla was already looking back and forth for any security people who might be watching. “Noooooo,” Luca said yet again. “If you make me get out of the egg bed I will send you a crate filled with nothing but West Nile plushies.” “I already have one,” Kayla said, shaking her head. “Come on, Luca, people are staring.” “Too bad! Let it be known that I am… the Egg Lady! I am the Egg.” Luca picked up an egg pillow and tossed it at Kayla, who caught it… …And then promptly tossed it back. “If you don’t get out, I’m calling security on you myself.” “Traitor! You’ve betrayed Hoshido! Eggshido!” Laughing all the while, Luca stuck her head between some eggs, ostrich-head-in-the-sand style. “What are you even talking about?” Well, Kayla had a vague idea of what Luca was talking about, but she hadn’t even been able to get the new Fire Emblem games yet, so it was too bad. “I’m getting you kicked out, and you will wait patiently for me outside the store because you can’t drive.” Just as Kayla turned to leave, Luca reached forward and grabbed Kayla around the waist, yanking her into the egg bed with her. “Now PAY… for your BETRAYAL!” Once Kayla was splayed out on top of her, she lapsed into more manic giggling. “LUCA.” Kayla squirmed around in Luca’s grip, hoping that they wouldn’t end up wrestling in a bed full of eggs (which is undoubtedly someone’s fetish somewhere). “Let. Go.” “I’m naming this one Forrest!” Luca said, lightly bonking Kayla on the head with a green egg pillow. The pillow grab gave Kayla the time she needed to crawl out after the bonk, at which point she said, “You are coming with me. Now.” She grabbed Luca’s legs and tried to drag her out of the bed that way. “Nooooo, my babies!” Luca wailed as she let Kayla drag her out (because she really didn’t want to accidentally kick Kayla in the face right now). Right at that moment, a store employee came up to them. “Ladies, I understand that you two are enjoying the bed, but I’m afraid you’re getting a few complaints.” Kayla sighed and rubbed her face. “I’m sorry. Really. My friend gets, uh, excited.” “It’s like it was made for me, but I bet I don’t even want to know what it costs…” Luca looked back at the egg bed sadly, then came up with an idea. “Do you happen to have any of the pillows by themselves?” “Actually, we do! They’re over there, a bit closer to the bedding section.” Luca grinned, her gaze fixed on the bedding section. “Well, I know where I’m going! I’ll meet you by the checkout, okay, Kayla?” Kayla nodded, hoping that the egg pillow solution would give Luca her fix and keep her from embarrassing her again. “Yeah, fine.” Later, in the car, Kayla grumbled, “I am never going shopping with you again. Do you get excited when you see eggs in the grocery store, too?” “Sometimes a little,” Luca said. “But seriously… it was a nest full of eggs… how could I resist?” “Where is your self-control? There’s wanting something, and then there’s plowing into a bed in the middle of a store.” Kayla sighed and squeezed the steering wheel a bit tighter. “Come on, Kayla, I need to cheer myself up somehow. It’s nice to be a frivolous civilian every once in a while. Really. Trust me.” Luca knew the lesson quite well. That lapse in patrolling had actually been one of the least stressful periods of her life over the last few years. Kayla paused. “You might be right. There’s a lot of serious stuff going on these days, so I guess blowing off some steam is in order.” “Yeah, see? You agree. So we should take some time out and enjoy ourselves before the Next Big Thing happens.” “I guess so. Got any ideas?” The two spent the rest of the car ride home discussing hangout spots and making plans for their next outing, which would hopefully involve a little less public disturbance. [Wordcount: Just over 1000. x2 solos.]
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Posted: Tue May 31, 2016 7:59 pm
SOLO: Window Shopping Sometimes, summer days were idle. Kayla had not found a summer job yet, and so she had a fair bit of time on her hands. Sometimes, she would just wander the city, not even powered up. Recently, however, she found herself wandering into the shopping districts, staring at things in the shop windows and sighing longingly. She saw this one blue and white striped dress that would have looked totally great on her! It reminded her of a bikini she had. (Luca had been asking her to go out with her for “beach season.” If it weren’t for the fact that Kayla was job hunting and thus unsure what her eventual work schedule would be like, she would have taken her egg-fancying friend up on the offer.) Unfortunately, she took one look at the price tag and immediately felt green. That was ridiculous! Shaking her head to clear the ugly price tag shock, Kayla moved on to another shop window. This window had a lovely loose-fit yellow dress that looked quite comfortable. It couldn’t possibly be that expensive, could it? Well, it would be out of her (currently broke) price range no matter what, but maybe she could come back and grab it after she got a job. Indeed, this dress wasn’t as badly priced as the first one, but everything looked expensive when you were broke. Sighing, Kayla moved on to yet another shop. This one was a jewelry store. Of course, getting any jewelry was out of the question, but Kayla still liked to stand and admire the shinies. The light passing through some of the jewels on the rings looked so fantastic. Her staring at the shiny things was interrupted by an old man’s voice. “Looking for something for someone special, young lady?” Kayla pursed her lips, unsure of how serious the old man was being. “Not really.” The words I don’t have a someone special were caught on her tongue before they could escape. Admitting that might make her look really unfortunate. Unfortunately, the old man was more insightful than she expected. “You should at least have someone special. It adds spice to life.” “Do you have someone special?” Kayla hoped the question wouldn’t touch a sore spot. It didn’t, luckily. The man smiled brightly as he said, “Indeed, I do! She’s off looking at a stall someone set up down the block. She loves handmade bracelets and necklaces. Why, she’s still wearing one I made for her when we got married. Care to guess how long ago that was?” Kayla looked the old man over, trying to guess his age and approximate from there. She guessed that he was around seventy, though whether he got married young or not was a matter of speculation. “Fifty years ago?” “Close!” The old man said. “Fourty-eight years. We got married when we both were twenty. Even if we’ve had some ups and downs, I wouldn’t trade growing old with her for anything else.” That notion brought a smile to Kayla’s face. “That sounds wonderful. Really!” The old man put a hand on Kayla’s shoulder. “It is. I hope you find someone you can grow old with too, someday.” He looked to the side, up the block. “Why don’t you go meet my wife? She shouldn’t be far from here. And I’m sure what she’s looking at might be more in your price range than these shiny rocks.” “Thank you, sir,” Kayla said, a bit touched by the man’s words. “Just down the block, right?” When the man nodded, she said, “Thank you. Enjoy your day.” Then she walked further ahead, wondering what the old man’s wife was like. Sure enough, there was an old woman standing at a stall full of handmade jewelry, and Kayla’s eye was definitely caught. She went beside the old woman and ogled a beaded bracelet on a rack. It was simple, but there was a pleasant variety in the color of beads, which Kayla thought suited her just fine. The old woman spoke. “You like that one too, huh?” “Mm-hm. It’s got nice colors.” Kayla went to touch it, but she had the idea of surrendering the bracelet to the old woman if she wanted it. “Ah, well, I was more in the market for a necklace. No bracelet can compare to this one, anyway.” The old woman raised her right hand, revealed a very tarnished-looking metal bracelet. “My husband made it for me so long ago.” Kayla couldn’t help but smile. “I think I met your husband near the jewelry store.” “So that’s where he wandered off to!” the old woman said. “Sometimes he’s a bit of a doddering fool, but he’s my doddering fool. Mine.” “You two must really love each other,” Kayla said. The old woman nodded. “In a world where no one is growing old together, we’re proud of our bond. We’ve stood the test of time! We might be fossils, but we’ll be together till they dig us up a thousand years from now.” Though Kayla didn’t want to, she was starting to feel a bit lonely from the way this woman crowed about her bond with her husband. “Maybe you two should meet up soon,” she said. “I bet he’ll be looking for you.” “Pish posh. We always find each other,” the old woman said, waving dismissively. “It’s kind of you to worry about us, though.” “Mm. Well…” Kayla realized at that moment that she hadn’t brought her wallet with her, primarily to avoid any impulse buys. “Do you two come here often? If I see you again, I’ll be sure to say hello.” “Yes, we do! We like seeing all this newfangled stuff and comparing it to what we used to have,” the woman said. “I’m Carol, my husband is Jack, and you are?” “Kayla. It’s been really nice meeting you. You two enjoy the rest of your day, okay?” Slowly, Kayla began to make her retreat. “You too!” Carol said as Kayla slid off. How very romantic, and yet so real. There really was a couple who loved each other enough to grow old together. Kayla felt a pang of sadness as she remembered scraps of her father, who despised her mother for some reason she was never really able to grasp, and that her mother refused to talk about. Could I do that, too? Could I make a bond so strong that they’ll find us together a thousand years from now? What about the next Sailor Sadachbia? As she walked home in a cloud of thoughts, Kayla’s mixed feelings of sadness and soft delight swirled around in her head. When she got home, her mother asked her if she’d enjoyed her outing, and she said that she would talk about it later. Now was not the time to pick at scarred wounds. [1138 words. 2x solo bonus.]
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