Different Research Topics - [1518]
Candice was lying down on her full-sized bed, eyes staring up at the ceiling. She had a teal ink pen tucked behind her right ear. Papers were scattered around to her right while her dog Cotton was to the left. The dog's head was resting towards the foot of the bed, her tail in Candice's face. Normally, Candice wouldn't mind at all, but the day was on the warmer side and the dog was already hogging a majority of the fan and bed. "Cotton... Do you need to do that?" She watched as the dog's ears perked towards her and tail wagged, but Cotton did absolutely nothing to change.
Cotton was happy and content to be close to her human. She was still panting a bit and warm from her fur, but not as bad as a human with a dog curled up next to them. The fan was blowing air into Cotton's face, so she was at least cooler than her human.
"Okay fine..." Candice sat up and looked at her papers while Cotton stood up on the edge of the bed and looked back at Candice. Beads of sweat were gathering a bit on her forehead - something needed to be done. Cotton's tail was still high in the air, waiting for Candice to lie down again, but that wasn't about to happen. The reason why she had lied down in the first place was because she was getting tired of the warmth, not so she could warm up even more! The papers were originally scattered to help her study, but the day was getting a bit too hot to allow her to continue. Doing something else was better than trying to study and not absorb anything at all. "I'm not lying back down. It's too hot for that!" Cotton whined just a bit and jumped off the bed, heading out the bedroom door and towards the kitchen, most likely to get herself a drink of water. "That's a good idea. I'll be out right behind you."
She turned her feet to touch the floor and stood up. Maybe a glass of iced water would cool her down and maybe that would allow her to start studying again? Part of her wanted to, the other didn't. Sadly, the warmth was just making her lazy. Candice gathered all her papers in the order of how she was studying them and put them back into the three ring binder on her desk. Then she took the pen off from behind her ear and put it neatly on the binder. "Maybe later tonight when it's cooler... If anything..."
Candice looked around and made sure nothing was out of place before noticing her henshin pen and Senshi phone. They were sitting neatly in a cup she had decorated specifically to hold them. It was in the colors of her fuku: mint, teal and purple, decorated with stars and a white mask shape. She couldn't help but let out a sigh; it wasn't like that part of her life was gone, she just wasn't very active as a Senshi. On and off she would power up for an hour or two, but she stayed away from chaos energy signatures and mainly jumped from building to building making sure no civilians were in need of assistance. Most of those 'patrols' would probably look half assed from a third party looking in. Candice was pretty sure she thought they were.
Her normal, day to day life, was headed in a strong direction. Her med school grades were high among her peers and she wasn't just memorizing but legitimately learning and absorbing how to be a good doctor. Soon, she would be doing her residency and after that, a full fledged doctor. Candice didn't know how much time she'd have to be a Senshi then, when she barely had it now. There was the temptation of putting that life behind her, but there was something else. A sort of need was always tugging at her.
She couldn't put a finger on it, but the feeling was there for a while now. The feeling had first started her last visit to her home star. There was a desire to have a stronger link to that world. She wanted to find it, but didn't know where to start. "No... Not want... NEED to find..." Her life wasn't an easy one either way, but she was determined to figure out what she needed to do a Senshi. There wasn't a bone in her body that wanted to fight or injure another human being since she started med school. There was something else she was meant to do in that world and with every fiber of her being, she would find it.
Candice looked at her laptop that was sitting under her desk. She hadn't used it much recently unless she needed it for research. "Hm... I guess now is better than never." She bent over, picked it up as well as the cup holding her henshin pen and Senshi phone, and headed out towards the kitchen. Today, she'd do research, but not on medicine, but her star. Candice put her laptop on the kitchen nook with the cup not too far from it and went to power up the laptop. As it loaded, she went and grabbed a cup of water with ice from her fridge. There was a long pause as the laptop started up and Candice took a large glup of water. It felt good on her throat despite not cooling her down all that much.
Cotton let out a small bark, wanting some ice in her water bowl as well. Candice emptied her glass of water and poured in the ice to Cotton's bowl. The dog lapped up the iced water while wagging her tail. She couldn't help but smile at the simplicity of Cotton's happiness. If only her own life was that easy. Candice went back to get herself more water and ice before sitting down on a stool in front of her computer.
When the laptop was full started, Candice opened up a browser on it and typed in the search engine her Senshi name: Tiānguān. The first thing that popped up that she could actually read was a wikipedia page. Admittedly, she was curious about a video that seemed to have her name in it, but she could save that for later. "Ah yes... Zeta Tauri..." She knew that was the 'western' name for her star, and she never quite figured out why her ancestors went with the Mandarin pinyin name of Tiānguān. It did sound better than Zeta Tauri, but that wasn't a legitimate reason to choose that name, was it?
She kept reading down the page, noticing that the name did mean Celestial Gate (she swore she knew that, but wasn't sure when she looked it up). The stars was visible, as one, to the naked eye, but was indistinguishable as two, even with a telescope. Her eyes kept going, only to realize that the passage was quite small and, although she knew the orginis of the name, specifications of the stars itself, there didn't seem to be much else. Well, Candice didn't really know what she was expecting.
"Celestial Gate... Why Celestial Gate?" Candice closed her eyes and tried to go back to the time she was at her star and she had brought Remarque along. The area she landed in was similar to the one she had been in before, but what was different? Something was of importance there... "Oh yes! There was a gate!" Candice remembered seeing it, but it wasn't much of a gate. Some strange force was there to keep things from walking through it into the water, but from what her eyes had see, it didn't lead anywhere. "Maybe it was time to go back soon..."
Cotton's head on her lap broke Candice's concentration. "Hey, maybe you want to go with me?" The dogs ears perked and shook with happiness as her tail wagged. "Haha. Maybe we should go on a walk first, since you seem so excited over this!" Cotton barked in agreement. So that was settled. Candice needed to make a trip up to her star again, whether it was alone, with Cotton, or with someone else. There was things she needed to sort out.
Candice closed her laptop and nudged Cotton off her lap. She knew her pup needed a good exercise, but wasn't sure where to go so the sun wasn't beating down on them so hard. Usually, she'd wait for the sun to set, but Candice felt like she needed a distraction, to feel like she was actually accomplishing something today. On that note, Cotton seemed like she needed to get some energy out before she started studying again. "Hmm..." She recalled the weather up on her star. It was warm, but she didn't remember being it as hot as today. Candice walked over and grabbed Cotton's leash, which was greeted by happy whining by the dog. "Maybe it's time to make the trip up sooner than later!"
