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 Posted: Sun Feb 10, 2008 6:35 pm
[Growth Quest Part 2] Ranza was finally roused from her nap about an hour later and toddled into the living room. Nahuel was still there staring at the puzzle box intently, but when he saw her come in he waved her over. "I got a new toy for us, Ranza!" he said excitedly. Ranza inspected the box and gave it a shake. "What's it?" she asked. "It's a puzzle!" answered Nahuel, taking it back and biting into the shrink-wrap with one sharp canine tooth. It came off in strips. "Whatsa puzzle?" Ranza continued, watching eagerly as he opened the box. "It's a picture in a buncha pieces," replied Nahuel, dumping the box out onto the carpet. "We gotta find the corners first. They're the ones with two flat sides." Sharp-eyed Ranza pulled a piece out of the pile. "Like this?" she asked, holding it up. "Just like that!" answered Nahuel, taking it and laying it flat on the carpet away from the others. "There are three more just like it." He began rummaging through the pile and pulled out another two corner pieces. Ranza found the forth. "Now what?" she asked as Nahuel laid them out with the correct orientation. "We need the edges," he said, fishing a piece out of the pile. "They've got one flat side. See?" "Uh-huh!" replied Ranza, plunging her hands into the pile and pulling out an edge piece. She hadn't been wrong yet! "You're good at this," said Nahuel, taking the piece. "I'm lucky," hummed Ranza, a self-satisfied grin crossing her blue-tinged face. "You bet," nodded Nahuel. He began to piece together the border of the puzzle as Ranza continued to use her miraculous luck to pull more pieces from the pile. After a bit of mashing and fighting and moving things around, the border came together and the puzzle was framed. "What now?" asked Ranza enthusiastically as she looked back and forth between the border and the pile of remaining pieces. "Now we fill it in!" said Nahuel, and they both went back to work.
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Posted: Mon Feb 11, 2008 7:48 pm
[Growth Quest Part 3] The puzzle had filled in quite nicely and they were very close to being done. There were just a few patches that needed to be filled in and a dwindling pile of pieces left. At this point, it became a race. Both Nahuel and Ranza were eager to take the glory of placing the last piece, so they were both fitting pieces as fast as they could to try to steal the privilege. They both went for the last piece at the same time. Nahuel and Ranza both froze, eyes locked on each other. Each child was determined to place the final piece. After what felt like an eternity, Nahuel withdrew his hand. "You can do it," he conceded. After all, he was the big brother. he had to be nice. Ranza had never finished a puzzle before. The parrot girl grinned, picked up the piece, and triumphantly placed it. They sat back and admired their handiwork - the temple was complete. It towered around the surrounding jungle; a palace fit for a god. "Awesome, right?" asked Nahuel. "Yeah." A while later, Eshaa came back and showed them how to slide the puzzle onto a piece of wood and hodge-podge it down to so stayed put as a permanent art project. Nahuel was excited to hang it on the wall of his room - it would look so cool there! That night, Nahuel feel asleep dreaming of jungles and temples and mayan warriors and princesses and jaguar gods.
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Posted: Mon Feb 11, 2008 7:55 pm
While Nahuel is off in distant dreams, his muscles and bones and skin stretch into a form more suited for mischief - and he grows into a kid! 
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Posted: Sat Feb 23, 2008 5:38 am
[Journal entry for 2-14-2008 - Eshaa Cooper] Well, what a busy week! I just managed to get Ranza settled into Wystan's old room when Shouko (I remember her - the pink haired one. From the Project. At halloween.) sent a puzzle for Nahuel. It was awfully nice of her and he really enjoyed doing it with Ranza (how did Shouko know about Ranza? Creepy.) And he grew right after that! I'd heard about how gaia-born children grow a lot faster than human children (the world goes through three day-night cycles every 24 hours, for one thing) but I hadn't been expecting it to be so... fast! He went from being five years old to nine years old over night! Luckily, the schools around here understand these things happen and I've managed to get him enrolled locally with other children roughly his age. He really likes school so far, though he's only gone three times. The drawback of all this is he's far more capable of getting into trouble now - the swings at the playground are a particular vice. He thinks he's Indiana Jones - where does he get this stuff? It's all that hat's fault. I'm blaming Dr. Jones. My baby is growing up so fast! -Eshaa
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Posted: Sat Feb 23, 2008 5:40 am
[Cabbage? (cross-posted with Orli's journal)] Damn it, thought Eshaa as she fumbled for her keys. Esperanza had just started screaming again, and despite her older brother's attempts to calm her, the only reasonable way out of the situation was to get the door unlocked and head inside before the neighbors complained about the noise. It didn't help that she had a notebook full of pictures of pottery shards, a report to for the museum that contracted her, and a cabbage precariously balanced in one arm. "Mom?" asked Nahuel over the parrot child's screeches, "What's the cabbage for?" "I don't know," replied Eshaa, finally locating the keys and unlocking the door. A cranky toddler and an overly-inquisitive child weren't really what she had wanted to come home to. She shepherded her brood inside and pulled the door shut behind her. "Doctor Jones gave it to me and told me it was a new project for me." She scowled. "I don't know why, unless he's referring to my mother's family's propensity for botany." "What's a propensity?" asked Nahuel, putting his sister down. Ranza set to work kicking the carpet. "Why don't you look it up?" Eshaa suggested as she headed into her bedroom. The notebook and report met the desk with a thud. She stared at the cabbage for a bit, debating what to do with it (Accidentally forget to water it? Nah, Doctor Jones would be pissed,) and finally decided to perch in on the windowsill. The weather had been unseasonably warm and clear, so the glass was open, and she supposed that would be good for it. After all, plants liked fresh air, didn't they? "Moooooooooom, what's for dinner?" called Nahuel. Ranza had ceased her temper tantrum, but Eshaa could still hear her sniffling. She gave the cabbage a prod and left the room. The hungry masses demanded feeding, after all. At least the cabbage wasn't making any demands and didn't come with any instructions. After spontaneously combusting parrots and exploding leaves, she was quite through with the unusual flora and fauna of Gaia. Happily, the cabbage had given her no strange empathetic vibes, nor had it done anything particularly out of the ordinary yet. It was just a cabbage. A large, innocent, leafy green cabbage. "Can we have hot dogs for dinner?" asked Nahuel. "Mango!" shrieked Ranza, naming a fruit she had tried molesting at the grocery store the previous afternoon. "Yuck," said Nahuel, making a face. Eshaa put some water on to boil, to a package of frozen franks out of the freezer, and dug a mango and a banana out of the vegetable crisper to cut up for Ranza. "Can I have two hot dogs?" asked Nahuel. Eshaa gave him a warning glance. "You're forgetting something." "Oh yeah," he nodded. "May I please have two hot dogs?" Eshaa noted he was scowling, but agreed anyway. "Sure, but only since you asked so nicely." "Awesome!" enthused the boy as he perched on the counter and dodged a glare from his mother. "We played soccer at school today!" "How was that?" asked Eshaa as she sliced a banana into cubes. "It was fun! My team won!" "Did you help?" "Sorta." Eshaa smiled slyly and looked at him as she put a handful of banana chunks into a plastic bowl and started on peeling the mango. "What's 'sorta' mean?" "I didn't score a goal, but neither did anyone on the other team!" "Well, that's good," said Eshaa. The water had begun to boil, so she unwrapped three hot dogs and dropped them in. "I wan' mango!" shrieked Ranza. Eshaa hurriedly sliced the slippery fruit and dropped it into the bowl. She put it on the table and lifted Ranza into her booster seat. "This goes in your mouth, not in your hair," she warned her. The toddler, as usual, nodded solemnly but did not comply. Sighing, Eshaa turned her attention back to the boiling hot dogs. "Don't burn 'em," said Nahuel. "Who here has been cooking for sixteen years?" asked Eshaa. "You or me?" "You," said Nahuel pointedly. "That's what I thought," she replied. "So could you just sit down and wait for dinner?" Nahuel sat. After about fifteen seconds, he asked, "Is it done yet?" "No." Another fifteen seconds passed. "How about now?" "Nahuel, the hot dogs will be ready when they're ready and no amount of asking will make them cook any faster." "Oh." He didn't interrupt her again. Eshaa stirred the boiling water for another few minutes, got plates out, and put buns on them. Finally, after what could have been considered forever based on the amount of groaning Nahuel did, she drained the pot and put the hot dogs onto the buns. "Do you want ketchup?" she asked. "No." "Mustard?" "No." "Tomato?" "No." Eshaa stared at the naked hot dogs. "Can I put anything on your hot dogs that you will eat that will make it look less like a plain, boiled slab of meat?" And a phallic one at that, she thought, remembering what Wystan's favorite thing to say about them was. They're called wieners for a reason. "No," said Nahuel. "Can we eat now?" Eshaa put a plate in front of him and then sat down with her own. "Dig in."
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Posted: Sat Feb 23, 2008 5:41 am
[Clear with scattered star showers (cross-posted with Orli's journal)] "...And in what astronomers are calling perhaps a once-in-a-decade event, there will be meteor showers steadily through the next week as Gaia passes through the orbit of a minor asteroid group." Nahuel looked up at the television and pushed his homework aside. "Does that mean there are gonna be rocks fallin' from the sky?" he asked. Eshaa laughed. "A meteor shower is a fancy word for a bunch of shooting stars," she explained. Nahuel's face lit up. "Why don't you take Ranza up on the roof and see if you can spot some?" "Cool!" he exclaimed, getting up from the table and going over to his sister, who was building something with blocks on the floor. "Hey, Ranza, wanna go look for stars?" "Yeah!" agreed the parrot girl, reaching out. Nahuel picked her up, tucked a key into his pocket, and left the apartment. They took the elevator up to the roof and the jaguar boy stepped out onto the terrace. A streak of light sped past over his head. "Ranza, look!" he said, "stars!" "Oooh," cooed the little girl, pointing at another streak of light. Brother and sister watched the sky in awed silence for a long time as points of light streaked away into oblivion. "Lookit!" She exclaimed, moving her chubby finger towards a particularly bright and steady streak. "That's a cool one!" said Nahuel. "Good eye, Ranza!" "Fallin!" said Ranza. "Yeah, it's a shooting star," he replied. "No," replied the parrot, getting frustrated. "Is fallin!" Nahuel looked again. The star wasn't simply growing in brightness and then fading away into the atmosphere. It was really falling, speeding towards them. It wasn't big, and it wasn't coming directly at them, so Nahuel wasn't scared, but he was amazed. Was this magic? He and Ranza watched as the star came closer and then vanished through a window a few floors below them. Nahuel gaped at it for a moment before connecting the dots in his head. "That's mom's window! Come on, Ranza!" (Though, since the girl was still in his arms, she didn't have much choice in the matter.) He ran back to the elevator, frantically hit the button for their floor a few too many times, and hopped up and down impatiently as it descended. Finally, after an eternity, it dinged and the doors slid open. Eshaa was still on the couch watching the news, and Nahuel and Ranza proceeded to look around the door to her room. There wasn't anything there, though... The cabbage was glowing. "Was it doing that before?" Nahuel asked Ranza. "Dunno," she shrugged, and fought her way out of his arms in order to crawl back to her blocks. Nahuel stared at the cabbage a bit longer in frustration. Why was it glowing, and where had the star gone?
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Posted: Sat Feb 23, 2008 5:44 am
Maze! - Nahuel and Orli get lost. Nahuel and Orli meet Brownie and August. Nahuel and Orli get un-lost.
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Posted: Fri Mar 07, 2008 2:21 pm
History in a Box - Nahuel meets Owen, Mort, and Alexis at the museum. They argue about what dinosaurs ate.
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Posted: Sat Mar 08, 2008 7:00 am
[A Hole in the Wall] Ever since he had gotten his bicycle, Nahuel had taken to exploring the narrow cobbled streets and wide smooth boulevards of Durem on his own at every opportunity. He tore through the streets at top speed, a hero off on a new adventure, or peddled about nonchalantly, a secret agent surveying new turf. He talked to shopkeeps and bums and other kids who played ball in the alleys. Winter was winging away, and he couldn't help but wonder what came next. He had been born in late summer, the dying days of the month of September, and seen autumn and winter. Summer would return, supposedly, but there was probably something in between. Autumn in reverse. The trees were turning green. Mom called it "spring". Today, Nahuel was riding the road that trailed along the outer wall of the city. The walls were tall and sturdy - no one would ever invade Durem. (Not that there was really much war on Gaia, or bad guys, but hey - it could happen.) Trees stretched over it in patches, casting spindly shadows on the street. The light changed abruptly as Nahuel turned a corner. The quality of the shade changed, going from spindly to leafy and green. Nahuel looked up. The bows of an enormous apple tree stretched over the wall. Hmm. Weird. He peddled a bit further and stopped. There was a hole in the wall. Nahuel got off his bike and leaned it up against the wall before looking through the gap. On the other side of the wall was summer. Or, at least, it looked like summer. It was an orchard in full bloom. The trees were covered in dark leaves and huge fruit. He was intrigued. This was like in stories - an enchanted garden, like a giant's stronghold or a witch's potion stores. It seemed dangerous. Deciding he wouldn't be long, Nahuel stepped through the hole. The air on the other side was warm. It was indeed as if he had found a gateway into summer. But this wasn't some witch's yard - it was unkempt. Witches always tended their gardens, but the grass here came up to Nahuel's knees, and it looked like the trees had simply been allowed to run wild. Nahuel went back and dragged his bike inside the wall, and then set off to explore. ------------------ He remained in the garden for the rest of the day, until the sun started to sink on the horizon. Nahuel found his way back to the hole in the wall quite easily, pulled a few enterprising vines off his bike wheels, and exited back through the crack. The streetlights were starting to come on as he mounted his bike and rode home. He'd be sure to come back and investigate again soon. He was sure he'd found magic.
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Posted: Wed Mar 12, 2008 2:27 pm
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Posted: Thu Mar 20, 2008 5:45 pm
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Posted: Thu Apr 03, 2008 7:53 pm
[Through the Hole Again] "Ranza, I'll show you something cool, but only if you promise not to tell anyone else about it," said Nahuel, crouching at eye level with his little sister. He'd already gone through the trouble of riding to the hole with her on his handlebars, so if she said she couldn't keep a secret he'd be mad. But he figured she would, because Ranza was his sidekick and sidekicks did whatever heroes told them to do. "You promise to keep it a secret?" "I promise," said Ranza solemnly, nodding. She hopped from foot to foot, eager to get at whatever Nahuel was hiding. Where was it? Was it treasure? It sounded like treasure to her! "What is it?" she demanded, trying to see around him. "It's a magic portal," explained Nahuel, stepping aside. Ranza blinked. "It's a hole in the wall," she said, thoroughly let down. "And it's a magical portal," said Nahuel. "Come on." He hopped through and vanished. Ranza frowned. She felt distinctly like she was being duped. On one hand, her brother was cool. On the other hand, her brother was a boy and boys were untrustworthy. After weighing her options and deciding it was better to go through the wall and be stupid with someone she knew than stay outside and be stupid with a bunch of strangers, she hopped through. "Isn't this cool?" Nahuel asked. He was standing above her, perched in an apple tree. "How do I get up there?" Ranza called to him. "You have to climb," he replied, pulling a piece of fruit off a branch and biting into it. Ranza approached the base of the tree and tried to climb. "I'm too little," she pouted. Nahuel hopped down and landed next to her. He was a cat, so he could do things like that. He finished his apple and tossed the core somewhere in the grass. "I'll help you," he said. He picked Ranza up at the waist. "Grab the trunk." "Okay," said Ranza, and did so. "Ok, now start pulling yourself up." Ranza did that, too, and Nahuel boosted her up above his head. "Do you see the branch there?" "Yeah." "Grab it." She did. "I'm going to let go now," he said, and did. Ranza hung in midair. Her arms hurt. "I want to get down!" she whined. "Let go, I've got you," said Nahuel. She let go. He caught her. "Was that so bad?" "No." He showed her the rest of the orchard - the trees that always had fruit, the stream that was always warm enough for swimming, the cave in the roots of the biggest tree where they could hide things, including themselves. "I promise you, it's magic," said Nahuel, as they crouched in the cave. It had begun to rain. There was thunder in the distance. "Magic," repeated Ranza, nodding. She couldn't agree more.
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Posted: Sat Apr 12, 2008 4:00 am
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Posted: Wed May 07, 2008 7:56 pm
[It Feels Like Summer's On Its Way...] Summer was rapidly approaching. Eshaa could feel it in the air and the sunny days. The kids had never seen weather like this - Nahuel was a September baby who emerged from his leaf just as the leaves began to turn colors, and Eshaa and Orli were both winter children. School would be out in a few weeks, and it was already winding down. Nahuel had less and less homework each day despite the accelerated schedule he was on, which left him with more and more time in the long afternoons to go explore with Ranza until dinnertime. Today they had returned from their adventures with an old peanut-butter jar full of pond water and tadpoles. Eshaa knew that if she didn't put a foot down, she would wind up with a kitchen full of frogs. "Can we keep 'em, Mom?" asked Nahuel as he set the jar on the table. Ranza clambered onto a stool to get a better look at their catch. Eshaa gave him a 'what do you think' look. "Please?" asked Nahuel, who had lost the cute baby look months ago (if he'd ever had it at all). "Please?" repeated Ranza, who could still convincingly make her eyes look like a puppy's. Eshaa considered it. The kids looked hopefully. "No," she said, finally. "As educational as watching the metamorphosis of a jar of tadpoles might be, you can't keep them. Take them back to the pond. Now." Ranza and Nahuel pouted for a moment, but then dutifully picked up the jar and trudged back out the door. Eshaa amused herself reading Martian fairy-tales to Orli until they returned about fifteen minutes later with the empty jar. "Thank you," she said, and sent them to go wash up for dinner while she popped a frozen pizza in the oven. She sent the kids back to the bathroom at least three times before all the dirt was gone from under their nails. Yep, definitely almost Summer... "So," she said casually as she laid out plates and napkins, "Dr. Jones was looking for a bright young assistant for this summer." Nahuel's ears perked up as he slid into his chair. "Yeah?" he asked. "He needs someone good at climbing, who likes archaeology and wants to learn more about it." "Yeah?" asked Nahuel eagerly, waiting for her to say more. "I might have mentioned your name to him," said Eshaa, taking the pizza out of the oven and beginning to slice it. "And????" demanded Nahuel, flopping dramatically across the table. "He said you'll do," shrugged Eshaa before grinning wickedly and plopping a slice of cheese pizza onto his place. "Yes!" shouted Nahuel. "I'm gonna be Dr. Jones's assistant! Yes! Awesome! Wicked sweet!" He took a bit out of the pizza and then gulped down a glass of water. "Yeowch! That's hot!"
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Posted: Sun May 25, 2008 5:52 am
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